A young fellow, barely five feet six, with the figure of a jockey, hopped into the car, and, seizing the regulator, rattled off:
“Cast away there! Smartly now, my man, smartly! Take in your spinnaker! Ship the maintop-gallant sheets! Douse the poop-deck! Stand by the battens!”
In response to this rapid salvo, the elevator began to budge, creaking and protesting, rising at about the rate of six inches a second.
“Do you think we can make it?” said Kidder, with assumed alarm. “How’s the old scow to-night, mate?”
“Why, most surprisin’ well—yassah, most surprisin’.”
“It’s a stormy night, and there’s a bad reef above the fourth. Well, mate, we’re in the hands of Providence. It’s will be done!”
All at once, seeming to perceive King O’Leary for the first time, he inquired anxiously:
“Excuse me, sir, does my presence at the helm cause you any anxiety?”
“Not here,” said King O’Leary, who, in his amusement, had been tricked out of his glumness.
“What floor can I serve you, sir?”