ully, why the others didn't come. They were to cast off at eleven
and it was now well after ten.

"Probably," he muttered, edging back so that he could have the support
of the big, round smoke-stack, "Neil's buying another necktie! It would
serve them right if I started the thing up and went off without them."
As, however, Perry knew absolutely nothing about a gasoline engine,
there was little likelihood of his carrying that threat into action. In
any case, there would have been no excuse, for less than a minute later
he descried the tardy ones skirting the shed and coming along the wharf.
They looked, Perry thought with satisfaction, very hot and disgruntled
as, each carrying his belongings in a parcel so that there would be no
bags to stow away, they approached the boat. Although Perry was no
mechanician, he quite understood the operation of an electric horn, and
now, swinging nimbly down to the bridge deck, he set the palm of his
hand against a big black button. The result was all that he desired. An
amazing, ear-splitting shriek broke the ordinary clamour of the scene.
Perry smiled ecstatically and peered out and up from under the awning.
But the half-dozen countenances that looked down at him expressed only
disgust, and Joe's voice came to him even above the blast of the horn.

"Don't be a silly fool, Perry!" shouted Joe peevishly. "Let that alone
and catch these bundles!"

Perry obeyed and one by one the fellows scrambled from wharf to boat.
And, having reached the bridge deck, they subsided exhaustedly onto the
two cushioned seats or the gunwale. Perry viewed their inflamed,
perspiring faces in smiling surprise. "What did you do?" he asked. "Run
all the way?"

"Joe got us on the wrong car," panted Neil, "and we went halfway to
Coney Island, I guess."

"It wasn't my fault any more than it was yours," growled Joe. "You had
eyes, hadn't you?"

"We had eyes," replied Ossie from behind his handkerchief, as he wiped
his streaming face, "but we aren't supposed to know where these silly
cars go to."

"I didn't have any trouble," murmured Perry.

"Well, we did," said Han resentfully. "We waited ten minutes on a
broiling-hot corner and then, when we did get another car, it got
blocked behind ten thousand drays and we had to foot it about eleven
miles! Got any ice-water aboard?"

"We've got ice and we've got water," replied Perry. "If you mix 'em in
the proper proportions--"

"Oh, dry up and blow away," muttere