I Plan a Voyage

The river shipping appealed to me, to my imagination, clean washed
by my illness and ready as a child's for new impressions: liners
gliding down to the bay and the open sea; shrewish, scolding tugs;
dirty but picturesque tramps. My enthusiasm amused the nurses,
whose ideas of adventure consisted of little jaunts of exploration
into the abdominal cavity, and whose aseptic minds revolted at the
sight of dirty sails.

One day I pointed out to one of them an old schooner, red and
brown, with patched canvas spread, moving swiftly down the river
before a stiff breeze.

"Look at her!" I exclaimed. "There goes adventure, mystery,
romance! I should like to be sailing on her."

"You would have to boil the drinking-water," she replied dryly. "And
the ship is probably swarming with rats."

"Rats," I affirmed, "add to the local color. Ships are their native
habitat. Only sinking ships don't have them."

But her answer was to retort that rats carried bubonic plague, and
to exit, carrying the sugar-bowl. I was ravenous, as are all
convalescent typhoids, and one of the ways in which I eked out my
still slender diet was by robbing the sugar-bowl at meals.

That day, I think it was, the deck furniture was put out on the
Ella--numbers of white wicker chairs and tables, with bright
cushions to match the awnings. I had a pair of ancient opera-glasses,
as obsolete as my amputating knives, and, like them, a part of my
heritage. By that time I felt a proprietary interest in the Ella,
and through my glasses, carefully focused with a pair of scissors,
watched the arrangement of the deck furnishings. A girl was
directing the men. I judged, from the poise with which she carried
herself, that she was attractive--and knew it. How beautiful she
was, and how well she knew it, I was to find out before long.
McWhirter to the contrary, she had nothing to do with my decision
to sign as a sailor on the Ella.