"This 'ere isn't any mill-pond, eh? Well, my boy, all I'm afraid of is that it'll be a dead calm before we can get there and back again. What I hate is a calm. I got stuck in one once for more'n a month. It's next thing to being wrecked."
"She's a hard boat to row," said Pete; and he spoke of the Elephant.
Sam did not say anything, but it seemed to him that the face of the Atlantic might wear its pleasantest expression when it had no wrinkles at all. He would even have been willing to row a little. The Elephant thus far had wind enough in her sail for a boat of her size, and the stranded ship could be seen pretty well without any glass. So the Captain put the "binocular" back into its case and returned it to the valise. Before he did so, however, he had looked across the sea long and carefully, and he remarked:
"She's a-standing straight up, and the tugs are trying to pull her off. Guess she isn't going to break up."
Sam felt better the moment he could again take an interest in the wrecking business. After all, the ocean was reasonably good-tempered that morning, and the terrible lines of surf were now far behind him. He understood, too, that shallow water extended to a long distance out, and that the Elephant was in very good hands.
"He knows all about the weather," Pete told him; and the 'longshore boy appeared to feel altogether at home.
According to him, they were now in the very best cruising-ground for blue-fish, and even mackerel, but the Captain did not encourage trying their luck. Nearer, nearer sped the Elephant, and at last Sam ventured to remark:
"I guess it's just as you said. Is she on a rock?"
"Nary rock," growled the Captain. "But I'm worse puzzled than ever 'bout the valise. This isn't the Narragansett. This is the Goshawk, and she's from Liverpool. If we haven't come away out here for nothing! Anyhow, I'll hail her."
It occurred to Sam that it was not needful to go close to the ship to make them hear the trumpetlike voice with which the Captain demanded, "What ship is that?"