"I 'ears a steamer, so help me Dick!" bellowed Billings joyfully. "I 'ears 'er plain. Don't none of you blokes 'ear 'er too?"
There was such a buzz among the crowd that it would have been hard to hear a fog-horn, and it was not until Spink had hit three, kicked half a dozen, and used at least ten pounds' worth of bad language, according to 19 Geo. II. cap. 21, that anything like silence was restored. Then it was obvious that Billings had made no mistake. The sea was fairly calm, the breeze from the west was light, and any sound carried long and far.
"She's coming from the westward," said Spink, as he consulted a toy compass on his watch-chain.
"No," said Day, "she's bound west, or I'm a Dutchman."
"Then you come from Amsterdam for a certainty," said the 'old man' crossly. "Now, men, shout all together when I say three. One, two, three."
And just as the men yelled there was a hoot-too-oot from the steamship, which for a moment made them believe she had heard them. But Spink knew better, and when there was another hoot he grabbed Day by the arm.
