"Oh, and then? Yep," said Larry, opening his lips, shutting his eyes, and then grinning inanely at the two of them.
"Yep," he repeated, and looked hard at Jim.
"Yep," said Bill, looking in the same direction.
"And then—oh!—and then," said Jim, scratching his head, "well, let's get there," he added in the most practical voice. "The train will take us there without any bother, and once on the spot we'll be nearer the coast—on the water, as you might say—and could really get a move on about sailing."
See them then on the cars en route from Salt Lake City, via the Canyon, to New York, where, in the course of four days, they put in an appearance.
"First thing is to fix up quarters," said Larry as he jingled a few cents in his pockets. "Time was when I come to Noo York and gone to the best hotel. That was in good times, Jim, when I was out for a holiday and didn't mind spending. But this is business; we're on a different jaunt altogether now. Say now, we'll make right down for the docks."
Taking their "grips" (hand-bags) with them—for, like many an American, the three travelled very light, and (porters not being in evidence at the stations as they are in England) were therefore not in any difficulty—they found their way to the cars (tram-cars) which plough in all directions through the old and new portions of this premier city of America, where once the Dutch held play, and where in their turn the British dispossessed them. Presently they were down in the docking area, with warehouses about them, the masts of huge ships projecting into the air—amongst them not a few which were German. Larry jerked a somewhat dirty thumb in that direction.
"There's the Vaterland and what-not yonder," he grinned. "Ships nigh thirty or more thousand tons, what the Kaiser built to beat creation on the water. Guess they'll be American soon, if they ain't already."
"Not yet," replied the critical Jim, "though in effect they do belong to the country. I was reading in the news last night that Uncle Sam has put a guard upon each of the ships belonging to Germany, and that the crews which have lived on them all these months since the war began in Europe have been sent ashore. Pity is that in the meanwhile they've damaged the engines, though our workmen will soon make that good. And—who knows?—in a few months' time they'll be taking American soldiers to France to teach the Kaiser his lesson."