So Elbert Carstairs's dream had come true, and his daughter was going home to him at his desire. She stood on his yacht, as truly a prisoner as though she wore a ball and chain; and the beat of the engines, already gathering speed, was driving her straight toward that dock in Harlem whither he, within a very short time, would be driving down to meet her.
"Going? Of course we are," said Varney.
He leaned against the rail and, looking at Mary, almost laughed at the thought of how easy and simple it was.
"The point of being on a yacht, Miss Carstairs, is to see her go. Otherwise, one might as well sit in the den at home and look at pictures of them in the encyclopedia."
"But I—didn't expect to go," she said, gazing at him doubtfully—"only to look around a little. I'm really afraid I haven't time for a sail."
"Well, you know," he said cheerfully, "as far as looking around is concerned, going doesn't necessarily take any longer than staying. In one case, you stay and look around: in the other you go and look around. That is really all the difference, isn't it?"
"Well, then, it must be a little go and a short look around. Where does one begin, in looking around a yacht?"
It would have been plain to a far duller plotter that they should be fully clear of Hunston before he explained the situation to her more definitely.
"Suppose," said Varney, "we begin with a few general remarks of a descriptive nature. This vessel, Miss Carstairs, is what is known as a schooner-rigged steam-yacht. She stands a good bit under a hundred tons. She is ninety feet long, eighteen feet in the beam and she draws ten feet—"
"I don't understand a word of that except ninety feet long, but it all has a perfectly splendid sound! But where can Mr. Hare be? Please send for him like a good host, and begin back at the beginning again. He just told me that yachts interested him intensely."