Mr Hawkins Humorous Adventures | Page 7

me so nervous that I snapped that key off short in the lock!"
"What!" I shrieked.
"Yes, sir. The motor's locked up in there with fuel enough to keep her
going for three months. I can't stop her or move the rudder without
getting into the case, and nothing but dynamite would dent that case!"
"Then, Hawkins," I said, a terrible calm coming over me, "we shall
have to go straight ahead now until we hit something or are blown up.
Am I right?"
"Quite right," muttered Hawkins, defiantly. "And it's all your fault!"
I transfixed the inventor with a vindictive stare, until he abandoned the
attempt at bravado and looked away.
"We--we may blow back, you know," he said, vaguely, addressing the
breeze.

"The chances of that being particularly favorable by reason of your
having set your miserable rudder to correspond with the present wind?"
I asked. "Can't we tear up the woodwork and contrive some sort of
rudder?"
"We could," admitted Hawkins, "if it wasn't all riveted down with my
own patented rivets, which can't be removed, once they're set."
Hawkins' rivets are really what they claim to be. Only one
consideration has delayed their universal adoption. They cost a trifle
less than one dollar apiece to manufacture and set.
But they stay where they are put, and I knew that if the launch's
woodwork was held together by them, it wasn't likely to come apart
much before Judgment Day.
"Real nice mess, isn't it, Hawkins?" I said.
"It--it might be worse."
"Far worse," I agreed. "We might be wallowing helplessly around in
those heaving billows, or a gale might be tiring itself all out in the
effort to swamp us. But, as it is, we are merely careering gaily over the
sunlit waves at an unearthly speed. In a day or two, Hawkins, we shall
sight the French coast, barring accidents, go ashore, and----"
"By Jove, Griggs!" exclaimed the inventor, lighting up on the instant.
"Do you know, I hadn't thought of that? Just let me see. Yes, my boy, at
this rate we shall be in the Bay of Biscay Monday night or Tuesday
morning, at the latest. Think of it, Griggs! Think of the fame! Think
of----"
I couldn't bear to think of it any longer. I knew that if I thought about it
for another ten seconds, I should hurl Hawkins into the sea and go to
my own watery grave with murder on my hands.
The bow of the launch being the furthest possible point from its owner,
I gathered up my overcoat, cigars, and a sandwich, and crouched there,

keeping out of the terrific wind as much as possible, watching for a
possible vessel and munching the food with a growing wonder as to
whether I should ever return to the happy home wherein it was
prepared.
There I sat until sunset, and it was the latest sunset I have ever observed.
With dusk descending over the lonely ocean, I returned in silence to
Hawkins.
He was in bounding spirits. He chattered incessantly about the trip,
planned a lecture tour--"Across the Atlantic in Forty Hours"--formed a
stock company to manufacture his motor, offered me the London
agency at an incredible salary, and built a stately mansion just off
Central Park with his own portion of the proceeds.
Having babbled himself dry, Hawkins informed me that salt air
invariably made him sleepy, and crawled into the cabin for slumber.
And he slept. It passed my understanding, but the man had such utter
confidence in himself and his unintentional trip that he snored
peacefully throughout the night.
I didn't. I felt that my last hours in the land of the living should be
passed in consciousness, and I spent that terrible time of darkness in
more or less prayerful meditation.
After ages, the dawn arrived. I lit another cigar, and wriggled wearily to
the bow of the boat and scanned the waters.
There was a vessel! Far, far away, to be sure, but steaming so that we
must cross her path in another fifteen minutes.
I tore off my overcoat, scrambled to the little deck, wound one arm
about a post, and waved the coat frantically.
Nearer and nearer we came to the steamer. More and more I feared that
the signal might be unnoticed, or noticed too late. But it wasn't.

I have known some happy sights in my time, but I never saw anything
that filled me with one-half the joy I felt on realizing that the
steamer-people were lowering one of their boats.
They were doing it, there was no doubt about the matter. In five
minutes we should be near enough to their cutter to swim for it.
I dived to the stern to awaken Hawkins.
He was already awake. He stood there,