"Won't you need more than the three of us to handle that tug?" asked
Harty.

"Three's plenty, Bud. You and me an' old Pete, we can make out. What's
the use of risking any more, though if we did need 'em, we'd get 'em.
We'd only have to beat up the water-front, and volunteers! They'd come
a-running, Bud, from every joint and dance-hall, enough to run a
battleship--in no time, yes, sir. Why, Bud, even that squash-head of a
piano-player would 'a' come if we'd ast him."

"H-m-m--you surely think well of people, Baldy."

"No more strain than to think bad of 'em. But what'd be the use? Us two
an' old Pete, who'll be sleepin' aboard, c'n run her, Bud."

And they had put out in the _Whist_, and now down in the combined engine
and fire-room of her were Harty and old Pete toiling to keep steam up. A
notorious little craft, the _Whist_, one of those legacies which
sometimes fall to the Service; the department always going to fix her
up, and always putting it off until the next appropriation. Her old
boilers leaked, and in a sea-way her old seams gaped, and what between
keeping steam up and her bilge pumped out, Harty and Pete could hardly
find time to brace their feet whenever she attempted, as she did about
every fifteen seconds, to heave them across the floor.

To the wheel of the _Whist_ was Baldwin, and as with every dive of the
plunging _Whist_ the spray scattered high above her bows, so through the
open windows of the pilot-house came barrels of it, and not a spoonful
that didn't go to his drenching.