"How long have you lost it?"
"Only just noticed it, sir."
Smith stood for a moment, his hand on the check valve, his eyes far away. The weight of responsibility comes early on these young men, especially if they have a tendency to skylarking and letting things drift occasionally; as a rule they look old beyond their years.
Only for a moment Smith hesitated.
"Damp your fires! Get some of those wet ashes and cover them over! Let the stream drop and shut this one in as soon as it's back twenty pounds!" He stood in front of the boiler and watched the stoker throw ashes on the fires; he looked a different man; he was very steady and calm. This young man with the vulgar name of Smith had some excellent British blood in his veins, as who shall say in England here, that any navvy in the street has not?
Carstairs stood behind him, his heart beating considerably faster; only the day before he had been reading a detailed account of a disastrous boiler explosion. He felt a tingling, pricking sensation in his blood; afterwards he learnt to look for this tingling of the blood, it was one of his chief sources of enjoyment.
The big stoker watched Smith very intently with a sort of child-like dependent observation. He obeyed his instructions quietly but quickly, very quickly. He was very silent, and very meek, but there was a tinge almost of fever in his movements.
The new man watched them for a moment, then with every assumption of languor he strolled off—and he did not come back till the boiler was shut in and the pressure very low.
When, after about half an hour, everything seemed safe again, Smith gave a sigh of relief as he and Carstairs returned to the engine room. "I don't mind sparks, but I'm darned if I like steam," he said. He looked at Carstairs with approval. "You didn't seem to be very much impressed."
Carstairs smiled, his slow, steady smile. "As a matter of fact, I felt like a chap who's found a bomb and doesn't quite know whether it's exploded or about to explode, or whether it really is a bomb."