Page:Ballinger Price--Fortune of the Indies.djvu/138

 But he was no less surprised when the engine stopped again, with an air of finality this time. He tumbled down the engine-room companionway. It was the youngest engineer who again gave him the information he wanted.

"I. P. valve-stem's busted," he remarked. "Just plain busted, for no reason at all. This is our busy night. The Chief's mad as thunder."

"What's he going to do?" Mark inquired, aghast.

"Take out the I. P. valve and run on the H. P. and L. P. engines, I reckon," said the youngest engineer. "That's a rotten combination. We'll be doing the toddle, my boy. We can't get doctored up till Honolulu, either. Gosh, what a funeral procession we'll be! Wonder what the skipper's doing all this time?"

The skipper was busy. Talking now to the engine-room through the tube, now to the deck-officer beside him, he stood on the bridge watching his ship take sea after sea. It had been necessary to stop the engines so suddenly that she was not hove to, and she kept falling off broadside and rolling in the trough of vast