“You see, I’ve never sent a message by wireless before,” said the parson mildly, “and I wasn’t quite sure what to do. Can you get an answer quickly?”
“Depends on whom you are sending it to and where he is.”
“He’s on a yacht somewhere in this neighborhood,” answered the clergyman. “He is a missionary, like myself, whose health has broken down, and a kind philanthropist is taking him for a cruise to help him recover. I felt it would be so nice if I could speak to him, so to say—and hear from him, perhaps, how he is getting on.”
“Quite,” agreed the skipper gravely. “Well, Mr. Longfellow, there is nothing to prevent your speaking to him as much as you like. You just hand in your message to the operator whenever you want to, and he’ll send down the answer to you as soon as he receives it.”
“Oh, thank you, Captain Kelly,” said the parson gratefully. “I suppose there’s no way of saying where I am,” he continued hesitatingly. “I mean on shore when one sends a wire the person who gets it can look up where you are on a map, and it makes it so much more interesting for him.”
The skipper knocked the ashes out of his pipe.
“I’m afraid, Mr. Longfellow,” he remarked at length, in a stifled voice, “that you can’t quite do that at sea. Of course, the position of the ship will be given on the message in terms of latitude and longitude. So if your friend goes to the navigating officer of this yacht, he’ll be able to show him with a pin exactly where you were in the Indian Ocean when the message was sent.”
“I see,” said the clergyman. “How interesting! And then, if I tell him that we are moving straight toward Colombo at twelve knots an hour, my dear friend will be able to follow me in spirit all the way on the map.”
The skipper choked slightly.