But nobody fled, and Dorothy tried to turn on the electric light which had been one of the fine features of this palatial house-boat. No radiance followed, and, watching from the doorway, Cap’n Jack triumphantly exclaimed:
“Didn’t I know it? What’s them new-fangled notions wuth in a case o’ need? Taller’s the stuff, or good, reli’ble whale-ile. Well, ship’s comp’ny, how’d ye like it? Warn’t that the purtiest leetle blow ’t ever you see? Didn’t I warn ye ’twas comin’? Yet ye went an’ allowed I warn’t no real captain and couldn’t run a boat like this easy as George Washin’ton! Now you’re wiser. That there leetle gale has larnt ye all somethin’. And ’nough said. Give old Jack a couple o’ sail or so an’ a man to climb the riggin’ an’ he’ll beat all the steam engines ever was hatched. Oh! I’m just feelin’ prime. That bit o’ wind has blowed all the land-fog out o’ my head an’ left it clear as glass.
“‘A life on the ocean wave,
A home on the rolling de-e-ep.’”
The old man’s rich voice trailed off toward the tender—or where the tender should have been—while a clear and boyish one took up the ditty from the roof above, with:
“‘Where the scattered waters rave
And the wi-i-inds their vigils ke-e-ep!’”
“Melvin! Jim! Gerald! Are you all up there? Come down, come down!”
“Yes, Captain Dolly! Coming! Here!” shouted Melvin, rattling down the crooked stair, while Jim’s voice responded: “Present!” and Gerald finished with a merry: “Accounted for!”
Then Aurora ran to meet her brother and to kiss him with an unexpected affection. To his credit it was that he gently returned her caress, but laughed at her statement that she had feared he was drowned.
“Not a bit of it! But this doesn’t look much like mourning, if you did!” he jested, pointing at the white silk frock she had again put on.