The Screamer’s captain was at the throttle, watching the steadily rising steam-gauge. “Give ’er a turn and take up the slack!” shouted Captain Joe. “Ay, ay, sir!” answered the skipper quickly, as the cogs of the hoisting-engine began to move, winding all the loose slackened “fall” around the drum, until it straightened out like a telegraph wire. “What’s she carryin’ now, Cap’n Bob?” again shouted Captain Joe. “Seventy-six pounds, sir.” “Give ’er time—don’t push ’er.” A crowd began to gather on the dock: fishermen and workmen on their way to the village, idlers along the shore road, and others. They all understood that the trial of the sloop was to be made this morning, and great interest was felt. The huge stones had rested all winter on this wharf, and had been discussed and rediscussed until each one outweighed the Pyramids. Loading such pieces on board a vessel like the Screamer had never been done in Keyport before. Old Marrows whispered certain misgivings, as he made fast a line far up on the wharf. Some of the listeners moved back across the road, yielding to the vague fear of the inexperienced. Bets were offered that “her mast would be tore clean out of her;” or that “she’d put her starboard rail under water afore she’d start ’em;” and that “she’d sink where she lay.” The needle of the gauge on the sloop’s boiler revolved slowly until it registered ninety pounds. Little puffs of blue vaporless steam hissed from the safety-valve. The boiler was getting ready to do its duty. Captain Joe looked aloft, ordered the boom topped a few inches, so that the lift would be plumb, sprang upon the sloop’s deck, scrutinized the steam-gauge, saw that the rope was evenly wound on the drum, emptied an oil-can into the sunken wooden saddle in which the butt of the boom rested, followed with his eye every foot of the manilla fall from the drum through the double blocks to the chain hanging over the big stone, called to the people on the dock to get out of harm’s way, saw that every man was in his place, and shouted the order, clear and sharp,— “Go ahead!” The cogs of the drum of the hoisting-engine spun around until the great weight began to tell; then the strokes of the steam-pistons slowed down. The outboard mooring-lines were now tight as standing rigging. The butt of the boom in the sunken saddle was creaking as it turned, a pungent odor from the friction-heated oil filling the air. The strain increased, and the sloop careened toward the wharf until her bilge struck the water, drawing taut as bars of steel her outboard shrouds. Ominous clicks came from the new manilla as its twists were straightened out. Captain Bob Brandt still stood by the throttle, one of his crew firing,—sometimes with refuse cotton waste soaked in kerosene. He was watching every part of his sloop then under strain to see how she stood the test. The slow movement of the pistons continued.