"The trouble will come when
she drops down to the vessels."
In spite of the heavy smashing of head-on seas the SPRITE held her
course straight out.
"Where's she going, anyway?" marvelled little Mr. Smith, the
stationer. "She's away beyond the wrecks already."
"Probably Marsh has found the seas heavier than he thought and is
afraid to turn her broadside," guessed his companion.
"Afraid, hell!" snorted a riverman who overheard.
Nevertheless the SPRITE was now so distant that the loom of the
great seas on the horizon swallowed her from view, save when she
rose on the crest of some mighty billow.
"Well, what is he doing 'way out there then?" challenged Mr. Smith's
friend with some asperity.
"Do'no," replied the riverman, "but whatever it is, it's all right
as long as Buck Marsh is at the wheel."
"There, she's turned now," Mr. Smith interposed.
Beneath the trail of black smoke she had shifted direction. And
then with startling swiftness the SPRITE darted out of the horizon
into full view. For the first time the spectators realised the size
and weight of the seas. Not even the sullen pounding to pieces of
the vessels on the bar had so impressed them as the sight of the tug
coasting with railroad speed down the rush of a comber like a
child's toy-boat in the surf.
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