Page:Cruise of the Dry Dock.djvu/200

 “There wasn't none on the Minnie B, sir.”

“What's the Minnie B got to do with the Vulcan? We're going to run the tug and dock out of this sea, crew or no crew—ease away on that rope, Mulcher. Let go! Now climb down, Galton, loose the tackle and swing her in alongside the ladder.”

When the cockneys obeyed, Madden ordered the whole crew into the small boat. They climbed down the ladder one by one with a reluctance Madden did not quite understand at the time.

Fifteen minutes later, the little boat, loaded down to her gunwales, set out for the tug. Four oarsmen rowed, one man to the oar. The slow clacking of shafts in tholes echoed sharply from the huge walls of the dock as the dinghy drew away through the burning sunshine.

At some half-mile distance, the harsh outlines of the walls and pontoons changed subtly into a great wine-red castle, that lay on a colorful tapestry of seaweed, with a background of blue ocean and bronze sky.

As he drew away, Madden had a premonition that the dock was vanishing out of his life and