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Sad hearts in homes when the news comes; but it is only one of the scenes in the drama of life. A bad night at sea with a great ocean liner, its iron heart pulsating, plunging through the black waves into dense mountains of fog. Despite the darkness and chill of the winter night, Quincy, Alice, and Florence were on the deck of the Altonia.
"To the boats!" came the cry from above, and it was echoed by hundreds of voices. In those three words were a gleam of hope: they opened a path, but through what and to what would it lead? The other ship, a tramp steamer, which had collided with the Altonia was already sinking, and in a few minutes went down, bow foremost, only a few of the crew having escaped in their own boats.
We expect an addition not edition to our family library soon after our return from England." "That settles it. Literature takes a back seat when Maternity becomes its competitor. It is well. Otherwise, how could we keep up our supply of authors?" The evening before the sailing of the Altonia, a happy party assembled in a private dining room at Quincy's hotel. Toasts were drunk.
Finally, the father began: "On the night of the collision, after seeing you safely started in the life-boat with the last of the passengers, Captain Hawkins thought of a small boat on the upper deck which had been overlooked in the general scramble to get away from the doomed Altonia.
Few, if any, would have recognized in him the young man who more than twenty-three years before had taken passage on the Altonia, looking forward to a pleasant trip and an early return to his native land. Alice explained to her son her apparent lack of affection for him in allowing him to be separated from her so long. "I knew you were with your relatives and good friends, Quincy.
Besides, he wanted, personally, to see how Arthur Scates was getting along at the Sanatorium which was at Lyndon in the Adirondacks, and so he booked passage on the steamer Altonia, to sail from New York in three weeks. "Florence will be ready to start to-morrow," said Alice. This was welcome intelligence to Quincy, who wished several days to spare in New York before sailing.
It stuck, and finally I got down on my hands and knees thinking I could force it out better in that position. The water was steadily pouring in at the ship's side, and it was only a question of a few minutes before the Altonia would founder.
"Let us go in," said Florence, "some one has been singing." In the main saloon, all was merriment. Each passenger had faith in Capt. Robert Haskins, who had crossed the Atlantic hundreds of times. The Altonia belonged to a lucky line, the luck that follows careful foresight as regards every detail, the luck that brings safety and success from constant vigilance.
Alice and many others had hoped that the wrecked vessel was still afloat, but the Altonia had disappeared, was far below in hundreds of fathoms of water.
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