"
"To Grandma Bell? And to Aunt Jo?" asked Vi.
"Oh!" cried Laddie, "let's send one to Cowboy Jack. I know he'd be glad
to hear from us."
So Russ turned the interest of his brothers and sisters away from the
castaway play. All but Rose. She wondered just what it was that was
troubling Russ and what the lifeboat had to do with it.
But there were so many new things to be interested in aboard the
steamship that even Rose forgot to be puzzled after a while. Their
friend, the quartermaster, took them all over the ship. They saw the
engines working, and peered down into the stoke hole which was very hot
and where the firemen worked in their undershirts and trousers and a
great clanging of shovels and furnace doors was going on.
"I guess the steampipes always hum on this boat," remarked Laddie. "It
is not like it was at Aunt Jo's before that Sam boy came to make the
furnace go."
Whether the steampipes hummed or not, the children found that it was
quite balmy on the boat. Although a strong breeze almost always blew, it
was a warm one. They had long since entered into the Gulf Stream and the
warm current seemed to warm the air more and more as the _Kammerboy_
sailed southward.
It was only two hours after passing the schooner that was in distress
when they "spoke," as the quartermaster called it, the revenue cutter
which had been sent to help the disabled vessel, steaming swiftly toward
the point of the compass where the schooner was wallowing.
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