Page:Waylaid by Wireless - Balmer - 1909.djvu/130

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WAYLAID BY WIRELESS

"I meant I couldn't buy a berth in even a freight steamer for New York, Boston, or Philadelphia, or even for Canada, out of Plymouth for the next two weeks."

"Not within the fortnight?" the Englishman repeated, with disappointment. "Why, you know, after getting final word from my barristers and having the property right again, I more than half fancied I might go to America myself. Really, that was quite half my notion, too, in coming down here. And there is nothing for America within the fortnight?"

"You can sail for Rio de Janeiro at twelve o'clock to-night in the Bahia, the Brazilian mail steamer, which is loading down there now, if you want to, Mr. Dunneston," the American replied. "She has a cabin or two left. I spent yesterday afternoon with the shipping agents of all the lines trying to get a booking, and then looked over the shipping itself, and I found this chance for Rio Janeiro. But for any place in either America north of that, absolutely nothing."

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