Thanks to the purser’s kind and skilful ministrations, Roy’s eye was not long in returning to an almost normal appearance. But Roy had little time to worry over his looks. As the time for sailing approached, he was busy day and night. There were a multitude of unusual details connected with the maiden voyage of the Lycoming that entailed endless messages. The ship’s owners were continually sending important communications. Commanders of other Confederated liners sent congratulations to the Lycoming’s commander. Shipping agents and commercial houses fairly bombarded Captain Lansford with wireless communications. Finally passengers began to arrive and messages were sent to and by them.

Even Roy, ignorant as he still was of matters nautical and commercial, could see that things were not going right. The ship still had to be coaled, and the coal barges were badly delayed in arriving. Certain big freight shipments, which it was imperative for the Lycoming to carry, were held back by the congested condition of the railways. The first of these shipments began to arrive about the time the last should have been safely stowed in the hold. Captain Lansford was plainly disturbed. He grew sharper and sharper tempered. He drove the stevedores at an incredible pace. He made the coal-passers work at a speed past belief. But the thing that seemed to annoy him most was the continual stream of wireless messages. Every succeeding communication seemed to put a sharper edge to his temper. From the first officer down to the humblest coal-passer, every member of the crew was on the alert. At the least word from Captain Lansford they jumped to execute his command. Despite the innumerable delays and obstacles, it looked as though the ship would sail on time.

When Roy had said to himself that his job was to help keep the ship safe and on the dot, he meant it. By the terms of his employment he was required to be at his post at certain hours and to listen in at certain intervals. But Roy saw that already opportunity had come to him to be of real help to his captain. An hour’s delay in some of the messages that were arriving, he quickly saw, would make a great deal of difference to Captain Lansford and the sailing of the ship. So Roy threw aside all idea of working during prescribed hours only and stuck to his post. Indeed, he hardly left the wireless house, even for meals. Sam, the steward, was as anxious to win Roy’s good-will as Roy was to gain the captain’s, and he saw to it that Roy did not lack good things to eat or drink. It was hard to be confined so closely. And when there was so much near at hand that he wanted to see, it took real courage to force himself to stay in the wireless house. But Roy put aside his desire for sightseeing, sent and received his messages promptly, and made sure that communications for Captain Lansford were always put into the commander’s hands immediately. Especially was Roy particular to spell his words correctly, write them plainly, and get all his figures correct.

The purser had arranged to have a cabin-boy deliver the captain’s messages, and Roy was glad enough that he did not have to face Captain Lansford. As for the latter, he gave no sign that he either understood or appreciated the service Roy was rendering him. On the contrary, he lost no opportunity to condemn the innovation that had been forced on him. The cabin-boy, who disliked the task assigned to him, repeated to Roy all the harsh things that Captain Lansford said to him. But Roy only screwed his lips together a little tighter and stuck to his job. It was the only way he knew of to make good.

As the hour for sailing approached, the activities on the pier were past describing. Roy had thought the stevedores worked fast when he saw them. If he could have watched them now he would hardly have believed his eyes. Hour after hour, in unending streams they rushed down the gangplanks with their enormous loads. Drays came and went. Drivers swore frantically at their horses and at one another. Motors honked and roared. Boxes and bales crashed to the floor of the pier shed with resounding thumps. The little hand-trucks rattled incessantly over the uneven planking. Donkey-engines and steam-winches clanked and shrieked, and the derricks groaned and creaked as load after load was hoisted aboard. Every hand that could be employed in loading was working at top speed. The scene would have delighted Roy. But, like the coal-passers, the stevedores, the truckmen, the crew, and everybody else about the ship, he, too, was working at top speed. It seemed as though each one of the scores of men who were toiling about the ship was determined that the ship should sail on time, cost what it might. A very frenzy seemed to have taken possession of all these toilers. Something had gotten into them, some spirit that made it seem more important to get the Lycoming off on time than to do anything else in the world. Like everybody else aboard, Roy was too busy to think about the thing or even to comprehend that a miracle was taking place under his very nose.

Yet a miracle it was. For a few minutes before the hour for sailing arrived, the final bale of freight was stowed in the hold, some of the hatches were battened down, and the gangplanks drawn ashore. The Lycoming would sail on time.

With a frightful shriek of her great whistle, the huge ship gradually moved astern, sliding slowly out of its dock into the broad Hudson, where boats were crossing and recrossing and passing up and down like shuttles in a loom. The air was vibrant with their shrill, incessant tootings. Ponderously the huge craft, pushed by snorting little tugs, turned its nose down-stream, headed for the open sea, and with quickening speed majestically slid through the tossing waters, with Captain Lansford, erect as a pine and as motionless, watching like an eagle on the bridge.

Roy had lost none of his dislike for this harsh-tempered commander. But when he saw him standing thus at his post, like a veritable Gibraltar, Roy gained a new conception of the man’s character. Suddenly there came to him an appreciation of the fact that Captain Lansford alone had made it possible to sail on time. Men, whom money would not budge, had worked like mad at his mere command. Obstacles that were seemingly insurmountable had been overcome. Work that was apparently impossible had been accomplished. Roy did not understand it at all, yet he began to realize that there was something in his commander that rose superior to obstacles and carried his fellows with him. Instinctively Roy felt safer because of that silent, immovable figure on the bridge.

“But it makes it all the tougher for me,” he thought. “He’s got it in for me, and I know he’ll never forgive me for talking to him as I did.”

Now that the pressure was relaxed, Roy was too busy seeing things to worry about the matter, for the Lycoming was fast picking up speed.

“Toot! Toot! Toot!” went the Lycoming’s whistle, as one vessel after another saluted the new craft. “Toot!” it shrieked; “Toot! Toot!” as approaching craft indicated that they would pass to right or left.

Now far out from the shore, the ship had left behind her the roar of the water-front. Gone were the stench and dust of the streets, and the noise of traffic. Hidden from sight were the sordid and ugly features of the city. The great buildings seemed like dream structures. A fairy city, indeed, appeared the great American metropolis as it shone in the summer sun. To Roy it was fairer than any city he had ever seen.

Shortly the ship was passing Bedloe’s Island, with its towering statue of Liberty. Never had Roy been so close to the giant goddess. Always his heart thrilled at the sight of this emblem of Democracy. He was still a boy, but he was beginning to understand what is meant by that word Democracy. It meant opportunity to climb up, to get ahead, even as he was now starting to do; and Roy resolved that he would let nothing, absolutely nothing, stand between him and duty. For, as he looked at that immovable figure on the bridge, Roy realized more keenly than ever that if anything at all could help him to make good with his captain, it would be through doing his duty—just his plain, every-day duty as it came to him.

Soon the statue of Liberty was far to the rear. Past Robbin’s Reef light, past quarantine, through the Narrows, past the forts on either side that dominate the narrow neck of water, and on into the lower bay, sped the Lycoming. Ahead loomed Hoffman’s and Swinburne’s Islands, the latter with its imposing hospital buildings, where quarantined immigrants are treated. On the right, ever receding, were the low-lying shores of New Jersey. Far to the left lay Coney Island, Manhattan Beach, Rockaway, and other famous pleasure resorts on the south shore of Long Island. While straight ahead rolled the illimitable ocean, the goal of Roy’s desire.

Presently Roy heard a step on the iron ladder leading to his perch and a moment later the purser joined him.

“Now,” said that individual, with a sigh, “we can let down a bit. When it comes to being a slave-driver neither Pharaoh nor Simon Legree had anything on Captain Lansford. But he got us off on time, didn’t he?” And the purser chuckled as though all his hard work of the past few days was a good joke.

On the right the Atlantic Highlands were looming up, and the purser, who had a powerful glass in his hand, pointed out to Roy the range-lights that help to guide the mariner in the dark. Soon the Lycoming was off Sandy Hook, that low-lying finger of sand, with its fort and a lighthouse at the very tip.

“Ever read Cooper’s Water Witch?” asked the purser, and Roy nodded, “Yes.”

“Then you’ll remember that famous little craft used to elude her pursuers by sailing into Sandy Hook Bay there—the body of water enclosed by the Hook—and slipping out to sea through a break in the Hook itself.”

“Was that the place?” asked Roy, all interest.

“That’s it, all right, but the break in the Hook has long since filled up and Uncle Sam now has a little railway that runs along that narrow neck of sand out to the proving-grounds. You know some of the big guns for the army are tested here. If you look carefully, you will see that the little neck of sand is protected on the ocean side by pilings and rocks. Otherwise a heavy storm would wash the sand away and Sandy Hook would soon be an island.”

Roy saw that the shore-line for miles was protected by a heavy sheeting of piling and planks.

“It needs to be well protected,” said the purser, when Roy drew his attention to the fact. “You will notice that there is an almost unbroken row of houses for miles along the ocean front. The land is nothing but sand and is very low. If it weren’t for the protection of these pilings, storms would soon eat the sand away and the houses would topple into the sea. In fact, it isn’t very long since a big storm did get a number of them.”

“It doesn’t seem possible that such a thing could happen,” said Roy.

“When you’ve seen one or two rough storms and have watched the waves crashing over the Lycoming’s decks, you’ll have a different idea of the power of the ocean.”

“What?” said Roy. “Do the waves ever sweep over the deck?”

“Well, I guess,” said the purser. “Just now the sea is as calm as a mill-pond, but let the wind blow a little and you’ll see what a fuss it will kick up.”

“But,” protested Roy, “the deck is many feet above the water-line. Surely the waves don’t get so high as that.”

“A good deal higher, youngster. They’ll roll up close to thirty feet in a good storm, and that’s as high as the average house or higher. Wait till you see some of those huge combers come crashing down on the deck and you won’t wonder that they have to fortify the coast along here. There isn’t a thing between here and Europe to stop the waves, once they get to rolling.”

Roy whistled in amazement and took another look at the ocean.

The Lycoming was now fairly at sea. In quick succession she passed a string of towns so grown together that there appeared to be but one long community. These were the numerous summer resorts that occupy the narrow strip of land between the Navesink River and the Atlantic Ocean. With the purser’s strong glass Roy could see from his high perch the crowds of bathers on the long beach and motor-cars speeding along the smooth boulevard that runs for many miles close to the shore-line. As darkness came on, the shore faded from sight. But in its place innumerable twinkling lights sprang into being, stretching in unbroken lines, like great strings of glowing jewels, for miles and miles up and down the coast, with brighter clusters here and there like pendants, to mark the hearts of the numerous towns.

From his high post atop the ship, Roy commanded an unobstructed view for miles in every direction. And in every direction lights twinkled. Ashore, millions of lights shone steadily like huge glowworms. The twin headlights of automobiles, like giant, fiery eyes, turned this way or that and darted through the darkness. Search-lights pointed their long beams toward heaven, where they swung, now here, now there, like enormous pencils of light writing on the firmament. As far as he could see, the coast-line was pricked out in innumerable lights.

Seaward shone the lamps of occasional ships. In places single, low-lying, bright eyes in the dark betokened the presence of small sailing ships with lights in their rigging. Lanterns gleamed aboard belated fishing ships, as they made for the great metropolis with their cargoes of sea food. And beyond them, but drawing steadily nearer, a moving mass of lights indicated the presence and approach of a great ocean liner.

Roy had only to turn his eyes heavenward to see the faithful watch-lights that God so long ago placed in the heavens, and that are still shining undimmed to guide the footsteps of those who struggle upward—even as Roy was doing. Something of this he felt as he stood in silent wonder, charmed by the myriad lights ashore, fascinated by the bobbing gleams at sea, with their hint of mystery and romance. The sea! What things it had witnessed! What tragedies it had seen! What adventures had occurred on its heaving bosom! What acts of heroism had taken place on its broad expanse!

Duty called Roy to the wireless house, for the early part of the night was his busy hour afloat. As he turned his back on the panorama of lights and went to his post, he wondered what the sea would bring to him. Hitherto he had thought little about the dangerous side of life at sea. Now he began to grasp the possibilities of tragedy, to understand that not all of those who go down to the sea in ships return safely. As he looked out over the vast void and up into the unfathomable firmament, he felt again that sense of littleness and insignificance that had overwhelmed him upon his arrival in New York. But somehow there was a difference. The stars did not terrify him as his callous fellow beings had done. A sense of awe rather than fear gripped him. Long he looked at the silent stars, so calm, so imperturbable, and though it seemed ridiculous to compare his commander to one of God’s stars, he could not help thinking of that calm, immovable figure he had last seen on the bridge. Whether the night was fair, as it was now, or the tempest raged and the wave-crests hurled themselves upon the ship, Roy felt sure that his commander would be at his post, unterrified. With a prayer that he, too, might be found at his post, unterrified, doing his duty calmly when the pinch came, Roy took a final look at the stars, slipped into the wireless house, and sat down at his operating table, ready for the night’s work.