“Look here, youngster, I’ll not stand for any impidence,” Barnes declared, puffing out his cheeks and doing wonderful things with his bushy eyebrows. “You’ll have a frying-pan about your ears in a brace of shakes. Don’t stand there like a dummy! Why don’t you get to work? Do you expect me to wash all them dishes?” Dave whipped off his coat and started on the task with a celerity which brought a grunt of satisfaction from the cook――a sound which Barnes hastily strove to hide with a cough. It occurred to the new hand that he might be able to extract some information from the cook. “Can you tell me what other duties I’ll have on board this boat, Mr. Barnes, besides washing dishes?” The cook glared at him. “Not a thing, my son,” he said. “It’s one of the rules on this ship that the boy isn’t allowed to do anything but wash dishes. When he’s got through he has to part his hair in the middle and dine with the skipper――if there isn’t some more dishes to wash, which there allus is. What are you pesterin’ me with fool questions for, anyhow? Do you take me for the navigatin’ officer or only the owner? Reach me that frying-pan down and I’ll belay your ears with it.” Dave promptly obeyed, and got a thump on the shoulders with it for “more impidence.” After that, he was kept busy with various duties in the galley until, for the first time in his life, he felt the peculiar vibration of a ship’s engines. The propeller had begun its endless song of “_chug-chug-a-chug_.” Another Hallard had started on his first voyage. “Can I go on deck a few minutes, Mr. Barnes, please?” he asked. The idea of cutting up cabbages while the lights of his home town dropped astern did not appeal to him. “Why, yes, son,” the cook replied, working his eyebrows so ridiculously that the boy had to laugh in spite of the curious feeling it gave him to know that Aunt Martha was probably in tears at the moment and that his dad was possibly watching that very ship from the window upstairs. “Go right along. Don’t forget to ask Mr. Quick for a deck-chair and plenty of cushions. You’ll need the cushions if Mr. Quick catches you admirin’ the scenery.” Dave slipped up the companion-way. Already they were steaming along at seven or eight miles an hour, a thick trail of smoke hanging astern. All was hustle and hurry on deck. The boy dodged out of the way of the sailors, and, standing on a coil of rope, watched familiar scenes disappear. It seemed difficult to realize that he was not dreaming. The lump was there in his throat bigger than ever when he went back to the galley, and something in his expression caught the watchful eye of the cook. “Never mind, laddie,” said Barnes. “This is your first trip, isn’t it? Left the old folks behind, eh? We’ve all been through it. It’s a dog’s life at sea, but you’ll be back eatin’ corn-beef an’ cabbage at home afore you know it.” CHAPTER IV THE DERELICT