Page:Ballinger Price--Fortune of the Indies.djvu/119

 swung rhythmically from a hook. The port-hole showed a slip of sky that waited already for the dawn.

With surprisingly quick adjustment, life on the Delphian soon became the actuality and Resthaven seemed like a gray dream ten thousand miles astern. As the ship would not make any port until she reached the Canal, there was no mail to be received nor letters dispatched, and the boys lived in an isolated world of new interests, with hardly a thought for the old. At first they kept somewhat to themselves, meeting off watch and discussing their own affairs and their respective duties. But the younger members of the ship's personnel would not allow this seclusion very long. Deck and engine-room met amicably around the battered victrola in the junior officers' uarters, and Mark and Alan learned to play their part in he small social world of the ship, as well as in its business.

The youngest engineer was possessed of a banjo, and made the bridge-deck resound with strains of New York jazz. Somehow, it was discovered that Mark could sing, in a voice