The Battleship Boys' First Step Upward Part 16

"Attention! First division, right face! Forward march!"

The command was repeated for the other divisions. Snare drums rolled, the band changed to a livelier tune, to which each division marched off in steady lines, one division following the other. Soon all had disappeared, save a group of officers who remained chatting on the quarter-deck. These, too, soon turned and went below for the evening mess.

The day's work was done for all except those who were to go on watch duty for a two-hour trick.

Mess finished, Sam went out to the forward deck to growl at the jackies who had been responsible for the pig's foot on his own right foot. The pig's foot hurt him, and the lad limped painfully.

While Sam was forward Dan got out his ditty box, to which, by this time, he had become as much attached as were the other sailors to theirs. From the box he drew a recent letter from his mother, which the Battleship Boy, sitting on the steel deck under a wall lamp in a corridor, read over several times. It seemed a long time to Dan since he had left her at Piedmont, and had gone on to New York to enlist in the service of his country.

"I think I must know this letter by heart," mused Dan, folding the letter and tenderly laying it away in the precious ditty box. Then, fixing up his fountain pen, he began writing industriously, using his elevated knees for a desk, on which he had laid his writing pad.

"I have written in more comfortable places than this, but I never had more to say than I have this time," he said.

Mails were not very regular on shipboard, and sometimes it was a matter of weeks before a single mail was put over the side.

Dan was still writing, an hour later, when Sam came along looking for him.

"Oh, here you are, eh?"

"Yes."

"Writing a book?"

"No, I'm writing to mother. Is there any word you would like to send to the folks at Piedmont?"

"You might say h.e.l.lo to Mrs. Davis for me. If they'd let a fellow change his mind in this business, you'd see me back there to-morrow.

What are you writing to her?"

Dan smiled quizzically.

"If it were anyone else who asked me that question I might tell him it was none of his business."

"But you don't dare tell me that, hey?"

"Maybe, Sam," answered Dan with a good-natured laugh.

"All right; what you are telling her?"

"Want to know very much?"

"I shouldn't have asked you if I didn't."

"Very well; I'll tell you, You know I have something more than two hundred dollars laid up with the paymaster----"

"Yes; aren't you afraid the Jack-o'-the-Dust will run away with it?"

"Hardly. Even if he does, the Government would make the amount good."

"What you going to do with the money?"

"I was about to tell you. That is what I am writing to mother about.

I am sending the money to her."

"All of it?" interrupted Sam.

"Yes, of course. Why not?"

"You're a good sport, you are."

"I am telling her to go buy a lot out on the Perkins road. That amount will just about purchase one. Then, as fast as I earn more money, I tell her, I will send it to her, and by next summer she will have enough to go on and build a house. Mother will have a home of her own then, and I'll feel much better when she has."

"How much does a house cost in that neck-o'-the-woods?"

"Well, I should say that eight hundred dollars will put up a very fair place. At least, it will satisfy us. Why do you ask?"

"I was thinking. Say, did you hear about my pig's foot?"

"Your pig's foot?"

"Yes."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I've got one on my right foot."

"I haven't the least idea what you are talking about."

"You would have, if you'd got a pig's foot. It's a lot different from a rabbit's foot, and don't you make any mistake about that."

"Somebody gave you a pig's foot, for luck, eh? I never heard they were lucky."

"Oh, yes; they gave it to me, all right. Here, look at this."

Sam pulled off a shoe and stocking, exhibiting his freshly tattooed foot.

"Well, what do you think of that?" marveled Dan.

"Not much," growled Sam.

"Who did it?"

"Old Pin Head--No, I mean old Needle Johnson."

"Why did you let him do that, Sam?"

"Let him? I didn't. The whole forecastle sat on me, and tied my foot up to a stanchion, while the head butcher performed the operation. I can hardly walk. But I forgot to tell you. Those black-faced fellows from the other side of the world sailed into me as if they wanted to eat me up. I don't like that pair a little bit, Dan."

"Imagination, Sam. Just because they are a little darker than we are, you do not like them. That is foolish."