“Don’t rightly know where you are, hey, boys? Well, you’re aboard the James Kennedy and right now we’re out in the middle of Lake Superior.” He cocked a twinkling eye at them and flashed another one of his smiles, and the youths were heartened to find someone, at least, who seemed to want to be friendly with them.
“Go ahead and wash up,” Cookie said. “Be in the galley in fifteen minutes and I’ll have your breakfasts ready. In fact, you might just have the time to go topside and see the sun come up.”
Then he was gone.
Sandy and Jerry obediently headed for the washroom. There, they sloshed cold water on their faces and brushed their teeth. That made them feel better. By the time they had grasped the handrail of the ladder leading abovedeck, they had recovered their normal high spirits.
“Shucks,” Jerry said. “I don’t see what we got so riled up about last night. We’ll be in Buffalo in plenty of time to warn Mr. Kennedy.”
“You’re right, Jerry,” Sandy said. “That’s what I was thinking, too. Funny how you forget that a boat can make good time because it’s moving in a straight line. Driving in an automobile, Mr. Kennedy will have to go through six or seven states.”
“Sure. And don’t forget that a boat keeps moving all the time, like a railroad train. In a car, you have to stop to get some sleep or eat.”
It was still dark as they came out on deck. Far out in front of them, they could see the bulk of the forward superstructure—the navigation bridge and the deck gang’s quarters—rearing out of the black. Beneath their feet they felt the steady throbbing of the James Kennedy’s engines. All around them, for miles and miles, stretched the flat, black surface of Lake Superior. Ahead of them, for they were sailing due east, there was a light rosy glow that heralded the rising of the sun. Even then, as they looked, a line of horizon was beginning to take shape.
“Isn’t it something?” Sandy whispered. “Here we are, thousands of miles inland. Yet, it’s just like sailing on an ocean.” Sandy Steele stretched his neck and stood on his tiptoes and turned slowly around. “You can’t see anything but water,” he said.
“Boy, what a country!” Jerry James breathed.