“Broken?” asked Joe.
“Yes, snapped clean through.”
“And it was a new one not long ago!” exclaimed Nat.
“Yes, and the best made. It beats me how it came to fly off the handle that way.”
“Good thing it didn’t wreck the whole engine,” was Joe’s comment.
“Yes; lucky I was below, or it would have,” rejoined Ding-dong, stammerless in his excitement.
“Let me look at that eccentric strap a minute, Ding-dong,” said Nat quietly, but with a strange ring in his voice.
Ding-dong, looking rather surprised, handed it over to the young captain of the Nomad. Nat didn’t often have anything much to say about the machinery. He left that part of the running of the boat to Ding-dong and Joe, although he was quite conversant with it.
They watched him while he examined it carefully at the broken ends.
“It’s a wonder this lasted as long as it did,” he said.