HOMEWARD BOUND.
The boys thought they had never seen so many vari-colored uniforms as
were on parade in Brussels. They passed a fresh one every minute.
“I guess every soldier designs his own,” said Raynor.
“Well, some of them certainly look it,” agreed Jack as a dapper little
man with a bottle green uniform with yellow stripes and facings and a
cap without a peak swung by.
They went to the Church of St. Gudule, an old Gothic structure on the
top of a hill, which Jack wished to see. Raynor came along for company.
“I’ve seen enough ruins,” he declared.
“Well, this will be the last one,” promised Jack.
In the church they found many people at prayer, especially in front of
an altar on which were hung models of arms, legs and every portion of
the human anatomy, as a reminder to the saint of what part of the body
needs help.
“There’s Adam and Eve,” exclaimed Raynor in low tones, motioning to the
figures of the father and mother of the race carved under a fine pulpit.
Some American tourists were admiring these figures at the same time as
the boys.
“Oh, look!” cried one of the lady tourists. “Wasn’t that sculptor a mean
thing?”
“Why?” asked her companion innocently.
“Just look! He’s put all the lions and tigers around Adam and given poor
Eve nothing but peacocks, monkeys and parrots. It’s a shame!”
The boys had dinner at a side-walk café. They found it very amusing to
watch the various types of Belgians who went strolling by, enjoying the
evening air. More uniforms than ever seemed to be out. To their surprise
the bill for their meal was moderate, although the café declared that it
“Catered to the King.”
“Well, if this is all he pays for his meals I wonder what he does with
the rest of his money,” was Raynor’s comment.
After dinner the boys went out to the “Kirmess,” which lasts six weeks
each summer.
“Like a cheap Coney Island,” was their verdict as, not much impressed,
they sought a theater. Here they found that they might as well have
saved their money—almost their last—for nearly every act they saw was
American.
Early the next day they had to return to Antwerp, tired out but happy
from sight-seeing and conscious of exceedingly light pockets.
“Anyhow, we’ve had our money’s worth,” declared Jack.
“Yes; both in adventure and sight-seeing,” added Raynor, as they
returned to the ship.
They found a warm invitation from the La Farge family awaiting them; but
had to decline it, with sincere regrets, for there were minor repairs to
be made on the wireless and, besides, Raynor was on duty in the fire
room.
The next day the _Ajax_ was ready for sea. She was to sail “in ballast,”
that is, without cargo. Jack thought her uglier than ever as she lay at
the dock with steam up, as a white plume from her scape pipe testified,
and with big patches of rust on her black sides; for the work of
repairing these ugly patches would not be done till a few days before
she arrived in New York.
Now that she was so high out of the water, the “tanker” looked like a
big black cigar with a miniature turret on either end.
“She’ll roll like a bottle going over,” the crew prophesied; a prophesy,
by the way, which was to be fulfilled.
But Jack forgot all this when at last the orders to sail came from the
agent’s office and, with a roaring of the whistle, the “tanker” started
on the voyage home.
Raynor came up to Jack as he stood gazing down at the puffing tugs which
were helping the marine monster clear.
“Glad to be going home, Jack?” he asked.
“What a question! Glad? I should say so! Of course I love my work and
all that, but after all there’s no place like home, you know.”
“That’s so,” assented Raynor, “although I haven’t much of a home. Both
my parents died when I was a kid, and except for a sister who lives way
up New York state, I haven’t a relative in the world that I know of.”
“I am almost as badly off,” confessed Jack, and he went on to tell
Raynor about his home life.
“What a jolly way to live,” cried the young engineer, “on a
flower-garden schooner! That’s the greatest ever!”
“I didn’t think so all the time, I can assure you,” said Jack with a
laugh, “but I guess the wireless I rigged up there made me think of this
way of life.”
The ship was in the stream by this time and it was Raynor’s turn on
watch. As he dived below, he took occasion to turn and grin at Jack.
“We ought to make a good run home,” said he.
“How is that?” asked Jack innocently.
“Oh, maybe a certain young lady has hold of the tow rope,” and, before
Jack could reply, he had dived below.
The _Ajax_ made the run through the Channel and out on to the broad
Atlantic without incident. Coming through the Channel, they encountered
fog and some bad weather, but on the whole the skipper was pleased with
the conditions and the ship’s behavior.
They had been two days on the ocean and a fairly high sea was running
one night, when Jack, who was seated in the wireless room, where he had
been exchanging information and wireless small-talk with half a dozen
other operators, noticed a sudden bustle on the deck outside.
A grimy fireman had run forward from the fire-room companionway and then
the captain had hastened aft. He went to the door and looked out. He was
just in time to see several men carrying up a limp form from the
engine-room and taking it into the captain’s cabin.
“An accident!” exclaimed the boy. “Somebody hurt! I wonder who it can
be?”
He hailed a passing fireman who was coming off watch and going forward.
“What has happened below?” he asked.
“An accident. Someone hurt.”
“Do you know who it is?”
The fireman shook his head.
“I was just coming off watch and didn’t stop to inquire.”
He made off and then Jack saw the captain hasten past and come hurrying
back with his surgical case. Jack would have asked him, if he had dared.
As it was, he buttonholed another grimy stoker on his way to the
forecastle and put his question again.
“Sure I know,” was the reply, “one of the engineers hurt.”
“Badly?”
“I dunno.”
“Who was it?”
“The third. Name’s Raynor, I guess.” And the man hurried on, leaving
Jack standing there aghast.
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