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.