“The idea! Oh, girls, aren’t the bunks too cute for anything!” and Betty sat down on one.
“And the dining room—may I call it that?” Grace timidly asked of the captain.
“Well, saloon is a better word, but let it go,” he murmured. “Now, what do you say to a little run down the river? It will give you an idea of how to handle her.”
“Oh, how lovely!” cried Betty. “Let’s go, girls.”
“That man is from the firm that built the craft,” went on the former sailor. “He’ll show you all the wrinkles,” and he motioned to a man standing near.
Lines were cast off, the motor started, the clutch thrown in and then, with Captain Betty at the wheel, her uncle standing near to instruct her, the Gem started down the stream, attracting not a little attention.
“This is a sea wheel,” explained the captain. “That is, you turn it the opposite way to what you want the boat to go. I wouldn’t have a land-lubber’s wheel on any boat I built. So don’t forget, Bet, your boat shifts opposite to the way you turn the wheel.”
“I’ll remember, Uncle.”
With dancing eyes and flushed faces, the girls sat in the cockpit back, or “aft,” of the trunk cabin, and watched Betty steer. She did very well, for she had had some practice in a small motor boat the girls occasionally hired.
“Oh, I couldn’t have had anything in the world I wanted more than this!” she cried to her uncle. “It is just great!”