She wore a fetching breakfast cap, which did not prevent a rebellious wisp or two of golden hair from playing about her pink ears. Her cheeks were rosy, her eyes sparkling, and her demure little housewifely air as she poured the coffee was bewitching. The excitement of the start, the novelty of the quest on which they had embarked, and the presence of two young and attentive cavaliers put her on her mettle, and she was full of quaint sayings and witty sallies.
Her father gazed on her fondly, Tyke beamed approvingly, and Parmalee's admiration was undisguised. As for Drew, the havoc she had already made in his heart reached alarming proportions. He found himself picturing a home ashore, where every morning that face would be opposite to him at the breakfast table with that ravishing dimple coming and going as she smiled at him.
"How do you like your coffee?" she asked him, her slender fingers hovering over the cream jug and the sugar tongs.
"Two lumps of cream and plenty of sugar," he responded.
She laughed mischievously.
"We always try to please," she said; "but really our cream doesn't come in lumps."
He reddened.
"I surely did get that twisted," he said a little sheepishly. "Suppose we put it the other way around."
"I guess your mind was far away," she jested. "You must have been thinking of the treasure."
"That's exactly right," he returned, looking into her eyes as he took the cup she handed him. "I was thinking of the treasure."
CHAPTER XIV BEGINNING THE VOYAGE
The meal over, all went on deck. The captain took charge and sent Ditty and Rogers, the second officer, below to get breakfast. The crew had already breakfasted.
Tyke had been carefully helped up by Drew and Captain Hamilton and placed in a chair abaft the mizzenmast, where his keen old eyes could delight themselves with the activities of the crew. Ruth had fussed around him prettily with cushions and a rest for his injured leg, until the veteran vowed that he would surely be spoiled before the voyage was over.
They had passed the Battery by this time, and were moving sluggishly with the tide. Behind them stretched the vast metropolis, with its wonderful sky-line sharply outlined by the bright rays of the morning sun. The Goddess of Liberty held her torch aloft as though to guide them in their venture. At the right the hills of Staten Island smiled in their vernal beauty, while at the left, white stretches of gleaming beach indicated the pleasure resorts where the people of the teeming city came to play.
Ditty had come on deck again. Unpleasant though his countenance was, and as suspicious as Drew was of him, it was plain that the mate of the Bertha Hamilton was a good seaman.
He looked now at Captain Hamilton for permission to make sail. The latter signed to him to go ahead. Useless to pay towage with a favoring wind and flowing tide.
Ditty bawled to the crew:
"Break her out, bullies! H'ist away tops'ls!"
The halyards were promptly manned. One man started the chorus that jerked the main topsail aloft.
In a trice, it would seem, her three topsails were mastheaded and the foretopsail laid to the mast. The fore-braces came in, hand over hand, the hawsers were tossed overboard and the tug fell astern. The Bertha Hamilton leaned gracefully to the freshening gale, and was shooting for the Narrows.
"It is perfectly beautiful, isn't it?" cried Ruth.
"Magnificent," agreed Drew.
"It's the finest harbor in all the world, to my mind," declared Parmalee.
"I wonder when we'll see it again," mused Ruth, with a touch of apprehension in her voice.
"Oh, it won't be long before we're back," prophesied Parmalee.
"And when we do come back, we'll have enough doubloons with us to buy up the whole city," joked Drew.
"Don't be too sure of that," smiled Ruth. "Those who go out to shear sometimes come back shorn."
"We simply can't fail," asserted Drew. "Especially as we're taking a mascot along with us."
"The mascot may prove to be a hoodoo," laughed Ruth. "I've thought more than once that I shouldn't have teased my father to take me along."
"He'd have robbed the whole trip of brightness if he had refused," affirmed Parmalee.
"It's nice of you to say that," returned Ruth. "But if any serious trouble should come up, fighting or anything of that kind, you might find me terribly in the way."
"We'd only have an additional reason to fight the harder," declared Drew. "No harm should come to you while any of us were left alive. But really, there's nothing to worry about. This trip is going to be a summer excursion."
"Nothing more serious to fear than the ghosts of some of the old pirates who may be keeping guard over their doubloons and may resent our intrusion," said Parmalee.
"I'm not afraid of ghosts," cried Ruth. "It's only creatures of flesh and blood that give me any worry."
"If anything should come up," said Drew, "we're in pretty good shape to give the mischief-makers a tussle. Your father has a good collection of weapons down in the cabin."