“Well, anyhow, they can never take his kingdom away from him,” softly quoth Johnny Kent.
THE LINER “ALSATIAN”
Fifteen years ago the crack Atlantic liners were no larger than ten thousand tons. Some of them are still in service, safe and comfortable ships, quite fast enough for the traveller who is not bitten with speed madness. When the Alsatian of the International Line was new she attracted as much attention as one of the monsters of to-day with its length of almost a fifth of a mile and horse-power to stagger the imagination.
As she rode at anchor in the Mersey on a certain sailing day in March, spick-and-span with fresh paint, brasswork sparkling in the sunshine, flags snapping in the breeze, the Alsatian was a handsome picture to greet the passengers who arrived in the special train from London and were transferred on board in the paddle-wheel tender. There were fewer than a hundred of them in the first cabin, for the season of the year was between high tides of travel east and west.
It was a tradition of the International Line that its steamers should sail precisely on the stroke of the hour appointed. More than five minutes’ delay was viewed by the port superintendents in Liverpool and New York as a nautical crime. Therefore when noon came and there was none of the activity of departure, the passengers were curious. A loquacious young man, of the noisy breed which makes the English say unkind things about American tourists, ordered another cocktail of the smoking-room steward and pettishly exclaimed:
“This right-on-the-minute business is all a bluff. The gangway hasn’t been hoisted and the tender is still alongside. This ship is nowhere near ready to start. Slow country—slow people, these Britishers. We can show ’em a few things, bet your life.”
A nervous, thin-faced gentleman who had been fidgeting between the deck and the smoking-room door chimed in to say:
“Confound it, I hate to be behind time! I can’t stand it! What’s the matter with this steamer? Why don’t the officers tell us something?”
Several passengers listened deferentially to this jerky protest. The speaker was immensely, notoriously rich, and, although dyspepsia had played hob with his internal workings, and his temper was chronically on edge, he was an enviable personage in the eyes of many American citizens. Whether he toiled or loafed, his millions were working night and day to earn more millions for him. It could make no essential difference under heaven at what hour the Alsatian should carry him out of Liverpool, for he could not be happy anywhere; but the delay made him acutely miserable.
An old man with kindly, scrutinizing eyes laid down his cigar to comment: