CHAPTER XXV—SAVED BY RADIO
Jessie Norwood was not tireless. It seemed to her as though her right arm would drop off, she pressed the key of the wireless instrument so frequently. They had written out a brief call of distress, and finally she got it by heart so that Amy did not have to read her the dots and dashes.
But it was a slow process and they had no way of learning if the message was caught and understood by any operator, either ashore or on board a vessel. Hour after hour went slowly by. The Marigold was sinking. The pumps could not keep up with the incoming water; the fuel was almost exhausted and the engines scarcely turned over; the buffeting seas threatened the craft every minute.
Dr. Stanley remained outwardly cheerful. Darry and the others took heart from the clergyman’s words.
“Tell you what,” said Burd. “If we are wrecked on a desert island I shall be glad to have the doctor along. He’d have cheered up old Robinson Crusoe.”
As the evening waned and the sea continued to pound the hull of the laboring yacht the older people aboard, at least, grew more anxious. The young folks in the radio room chattered briskly, although Jessie called them to account once in a while because they made so much noise she could not be sure that she was sending correctly.
Darry tried to relieve her at the key, but he confessed that he “made a mess of it.” The radio girls had spent more time and effort in learning to handle the wireless than the collegians—both Darry and Burd acknowledged it.
“These are some girls!” Darry said, admiringly.
“You spoil ’em,” complained Burd Ailing. “Want to be careful what you say to them.”
“Oh, if anybody can stand a little praise it is Jess and I,” declared Amy, sighing with weariness.