Page:Barbour--For the freedom from the seas.djvu/162

 "Yes, indeed," responded the other eagerly. "Lieutenant Somebody—the one with the gruff voice—told a man named Clancy to take me in charge, and Clancy told me to report to him in the engine room. Maybe I'd better, eh?"

"Clancy?" laughed the other. "He's a fine lad to have charge of anyone! Come on in here and we'll see him."

The engine room was the next compartment aft, and they found Clancy alone there engaged in polishing the bright work of the port engine, although so far as Nelson could; see every inch of brass or copper or steel was already immaculate.

Clancy's willingness to be relieved of his responsibility was so patent as to be almost impolite, and the two boys went on to the after compartment. Here were the main motors and the auxiliary machinery of all kinds. Two men were in charge there, a petty officer and an oiler. The low hum of the motors and the faint, slow churn of the twin propellers alone broke the silence. Martin explained the mechanism that was driving the steel cylinder through the depths, once or twice calling on the electrician for aid. On the surface, Nelson learned, it was the big Diesel oil-burning engines that supplied the power, but, 137