By this time Mr. Baldwin was going down a short flight of steps to a landing stage. There lay moored a trim-looking sixteen-foot power tender.
"Fall aboard," briefly directed Mr. Baldwin, and the motor boat boys, rather enjoying this systematized bustle, obeyed.
Bickson, without waiting for orders, cast off, started the motor and sent the boat gliding out into the stream.
"Quite a motor yacht that carries a quartermaster," observed Captain Halstead, with a smile.
"I carry three," rejoined Mr. Baldwin, thrusting a cigar into his mouth and lighting it with a "blazer" match.
In and out among the shipping the tender glided. Then, at last, Captain Tom caught sight of a graceful craft some hundred and twenty feet long. She looked like a miniature liner.
"I wonder if I'll ever command a handsome craft like that?" thought the young motor boat skipper, with a brief pang of envy. "Jove! what a boat!"
The next thing the motor boat boys knew they were running up alongside this hundred-and-twenty-footer. A young man of twenty-five or twenty-six, whose uniform proclaimed him to be a watch officer, stood at the top of a side gangway.
"This can't be the boat—such a beauty!" gasped Tom Halstead, inwardly. Joe Dawson's eyes were full of wonder. Ab Perkins's lower jaw was hanging down in proof of his bewilderment. Dick Davis's face was flushing. Jed was staring. Only Jeff Randolph appeared indifferent.
"How do you do, Mr. Costigan?" hailed Mr. Baldwin, leading the way up the side gangway. "Mr. Costigan, pay your respects to the new captain of the 'Panther.' Captain Halstead, Mr. Costigan, your third officer."