“Besides, what would the admiral say?”
“Is he your father or your brother?” Dan inquired.
“My husband!”
Then it was that Midshipman Dalzell’s face had gone so suddenly gray. He fairly gasped and felt as though he were choking.
“Mr. Dalzell,” spoke Mrs. Henshaw, earnestly, “let us both forget that you ever spoke such unfortunate words. Let us forget it all, and let it pass as though nothing had happened at all. I will confess that, two or three times, I thought you addressed me as ‘miss.’ I believed it to be only a slip of the tongue. I didn’t dream that you didn’t know. Even if I were a single woman I wouldn’t think of encouraging you for a moment, for I am much—much—too old for you. And now, let us immediately forget it all, Mr. Dalzell. Shall we continue our stroll?”
Somehow the dazed midshipman managed to reply gracefully, and to follow his fair companion from Wiegard’s.
“Poor Dan!” sighed Dave. “I’ll wager that’s the worst crusher that Dalzell ever had. But how do you read so much at a glance, Belle?”
“By keeping my eyes moderately well opened,” that young woman answered simply.
“I wonder where poor Dan’s adventures in search of a wife are going to end up?” mused Darrin.
“He’d better accept the course that you outlined for him a little while ago,” half smiled Belle. “Dan’s very best course will be to devote his thoughts wholly to his profession for a few years, and wait until the right woman comes along and chooses him for herself. You may tell Dan, from me, some time, if it won’t hurt his feelings, that I think his only safe course is to shut his eyes and let the woman do the choosing.”
“I must be a most remarkably fine fellow myself,” remarked Midshipman Darrin modestly.
“Why do you think that?”
“Why, a girl with eyes as sharp as yours, Belle, would never have accepted me if there had been a visible flaw on me anywhere.”
“There are no very pronounced flaws except those that I can remedy when I take charge of you, Dave,” replied Belle with what might have been disconcerting candor.
“Then I’m lucky in at least one thing,” laughed Darrin good-humoredly. “When my turn comes I shall be made over by a most capable young woman. Then I shall be all but flawless.”
“Or else I shall take a bride’s privilege,” smiled Belle demurely, “and go back to mother.”
“You’ll have plenty of time for that,” teased Dave. “A Naval officer’s time is spent largely at sea, and he can’t take his wife with him.”
“Don’t remind me of that too often,” begged Belle, a plaintive note in her voice. “Your being at sea so much is the only flaw that I see in the future. And, as neither of us will be rich, I can’t follow you around the world much of the time.”
When Midshipman Dave Darrin reentered his quarters late that afternoon be found Dan Dalzell sitting back in a chair, his hands thrust deep into his pockets. His whole attitude was one of most unmilitary dejection.
“Dave, I’ve run the ship aground again,” Dan confessed ruefully.
“I know you have, Danny,” Darrin replied sympathetically.
Dan Dalzell bounded to his feet.
“What?” he gasped. “Is the story going the rounds?”
“It can’t be.”
“Then did you hear what we were saying this afternoon in Wiegard’s?”
“No; we were too far away for that. But I judged that you had succeeded in making Mrs. Henshaw feel very uncomfortable for a few moments.”
“Then you knew she was a married woman, Dave?”
“No; but Belle did.”
“How, I—wonder?”
“She saw the wedding ring on Mrs. Henshaw’s left hand.”
Dan Dalzell looked the picture of amazement. Then he whistled in consternation.
“By the great Dewey!” he groaned hoarsely. “I never thought of that!”
“No; but you should have done so.”
“Dave, I’m the biggest chump in the world. Will you do me a supreme favor—kick me?”
“That would be too rough, Dan. But, if you can stand it, Belle offered me some good advice for you in your affairs with women.”
“Thank her for me, when you get a chance, but I don’t need it,” replied Dan bitterly. “I’m through with trying to find a sweetheart, or any candidate to become Mrs. Dalzell.”
“But you’d better listen to the advice,” Dave insisted, and repeated what Belle had said.
“By Jove, Dave, but you’re lucky to be engaged to a sensible girl like Belle! I wish there was another like her in the world.”
“Why?”
“If there were another like Belle I’d be sorely tempted to try my \ luck for the fourth time.”
“Dan Dalzell!” cried Dave sternly. “You’re not safe without a guardian! You’ll do it again, between now and graduation.”
“You can watch me, if you want, then; but I’ll fool you,” smiled Dan. “But say, Dave!”
“Well?”
“You don’t suppose Belle will say anything about this back in Gridley, do you? By Jove, if she does I’d feel—–
“You’ll feel something else,” warned Dave snappily, “if you don’t at once assure me that you know Belle too well to think that she’d make light of your misfortunes.”
“But sometimes girls tell one another some things—–“
“Belle Meade doesn’t,” interrupted Dave so briskly that Dalzell, after a glance, agreed:
“You’re right there, David, little giant. I’ve known Belle ever since we were kids at the Central Grammar School. If Belle ever got into any trouble through too free use of her tongue, then I never heard anything about it.”
“Dan, do you want a fine suggestion about the employment of the rest of your liberty time while we’re at Annapolis?”
“Yes.”
“You remember Barnes’s General History, that we used to have in Grammar school?”
“Yes.”
“Devote your liberty time to reading the book through again.”
CHAPTER XXI
IN THE THICK OF DISASTER
Examination week—torture of the “wooden” and seventh heaven of the “savvy!”
For the wooden man, he who knows little, this week of final examinations is a period of unalloyed torture. He must go before an array of professors who are there to expose his ignorance.
No “wooden” man can expect to get by. The gates of hope are closed before his face. He marches to the ordeal, full of a dull misery. Whether he is fourth classman or first, he knows that hope has fled; that he will go below the saving 2.5 mark and be dropped from the rolls.
But your “savvy” midshipman—he who knows much, and who is sure and confident with his knowledge, finds this week of final examinations a period of bliss and pride. He is going to “pass”; he knows that, and nothing else matters.
Eight o’clock every morning, during this week, finds the midshipman in one recitation room or another, undergoing his final. As it is not the purpose of the examiners to wear any man out, the afternoon is given over to pleasures. There are no afternoon examinations, and no work of any sort that can be avoided. Indeed, the “savvy” man has a week of most delightful afternoons, with teas, lawn parties, strolls both within and without the walls of the Academy grounds, and many boating parties. It is in examination week that the young ladies flock to Annapolis in greater numbers than ever.
Sometimes the “wooden” midshipman, knowing there is no further hope for him, rushes madly into the pleasures of this week, determined to carry back into civil life with him the memories of as many Annapolis pleasures as possible.
A strong smattering there is of midshipmen who, by no means “savvy,” are yet not so “wooden” but that they hope, by hard study at the last to pull through on a saving margin in marks.
These desperate ones do not take part in the afternoon pleasures, for these midshipmen, with furrowed brows, straining eyes, feverish skin and dogged determination, spend their afternoons and evenings in one final assault on their text-books in the hope of pulling through.
Dave Darrin was not one of the honor men of his class, but he was “savvy” just the same. Dan Dalzell was a few notches lower in the class standing, but Dan was as sure of graduation as was his chum.
“One thing goes for me, this week,” announced Dan, just before the chums hustled out to dinner formation on Monday.
“What’s that?” Dave wanted to know. “No girls; no tender promenades!” grumbled Midshipman Dalzell.
“Poor old chap,” muttered Dave sympathetically.
“Oh, that’s all right for you,” grunted Dan. “You have one of the ‘only’ girls, and so you’re safe.”
“There are more ‘only’ girls than you’ve any idea of, Dan Dalzell,” Dave retorted with spirit. “The average American girl is a mighty fine, sweet, wholesome proposition.”
“I’ll grant that,” nodded Dan, with a knowing air. “But I’ve made an important discovery concerning the really fine girls.”
“Produce the discovery,” begged Darrin. “The really fine girl,” announced Dan, in a hollow voice, “prefers some other fellow to me.”
“Well, I guess that’ll be a fine idea for you to nurse—until after graduation,” reflected Darrin aloud. “I’m not going to seek to undeceive you, Danny boy.”
So Dave went off to meet Belle and her mother, while Dan Dalzell hunted up another first classman who also believed that the girls didn’t particularly esteem him. That other fellow was Midshipman Jetson.
“Mrs. Davis is giving a lawn party this afternoon,” announced Dave, after he had lifted his cap in greeting of Mrs. Meade and her daughter. “I have an invitation from Mrs. Davis to escort you both over to her house. Of course, if you find the tea and chatter a bit dull over there, we can go somewhere else presently.”
“I never find anything dull that is a part of the life here,” returned Belle, little enthusiast for the Navy. “It will suit you, mother?”
“Anything at all will suit me,” declared Mrs. Meade amiably. “David, just find me some place where I can drop into an armchair and have some other middle-aged woman like myself to talk with. Then you young people need pay no further heed to me. Examination week doesn’t last forever.”
“It doesn’t,” laughed Darrin, “and many of our fellows are very thankful for that.”
“How are you going to come through?” Belle asked, with a quick little thrill of anxiety.
“Nothing to worry about on that score,” Dave assured her. “I’m sufficiently ‘savvy’ to pull sat. all right.”
“Isn’t that fine? And Dan?”
“Oh, he’ll finish sat., too, if he doesn’t sight another craft flying pink hair ribbons.”
“Any danger of that?” asked Belle anxiously, for Dan was a townsman of hers.
“Not judging by the company that Dan is keeping to-day,” smiled Darrin.
“Who is his companion to-day, then?”
“Jetson, a woman hater.”
“Really a woman hater?” asked Belle.
“Oh, no; Jet wouldn’t poison all girls, or do anything like that. He isn’t violent against girls. In fact, he’s merely shy when they’re around. But in the service any fellow who isn’t always dancing attendance on the fair is doomed to be dubbed a woman hater. In other words, a woman hater is just a fellow who doesn’t pester girls all the time.”
“Are you a woman hater?” Belle asked.
“Except when you are at Annapolis,” was Dave’s ready explanation.
That afternoon’s lawn party proved a much more enjoyable affair than the young people had expected. Belle met there, for the first time, five or six girls with whom she was to be thrown often later on.
When it was over, Dave, having town liberty as well, proudly escorted his sweetheart and her mother back to the hotel.
There were more days like it. Dave, by Thursday, realizing that he was coming through his morning trials with flying colors, had arranged permission to take out a party in one of the steamers.
As the steamer could be used only for a party Darrin invited Farley and Wolgast to bring their sweethearts along. Mrs. Meade at first demurred about going.
“You and Belle have had very little time together,” declared that good lady, “and I’m not so old but that I remember my youth. With so large a party there’s no need of a chaperon.”
“But we’d immensely like to have you come,” urged Dave; “that is, unless you’d be uncomfortable on the water.”
“Oh, I’m never uncomfortable on the water,” Belle’s mother replied.
“Then you’ll come, won’t you?” pleaded Dave. Belle’s mother made one of the jolly party.
“You’d better come, too, Danny boy,” urged Dave at the last moment. “There’ll be no unattached girl with the party, so you’ll be vastly safer with us than you would away from my watchful eye.”
“Huh! A fine lot your watchful eye has been on me this week,” retorted Midshipman Dalzell. “Jetson has been my grandmother this week.”
It was a jolly party that steamed down Chesapeake Bay in the launch that afternoon. There was an enlisted man of the engineer department at the engine, while a seaman acted as helmsman.
“Straight down the bay, helmsman,” Dave directed, as the launch headed out.
“Aye, aye, sir,” replied the man, touching his cap.
After that the young people—Mrs. Meade was included under that heading—gave themselves over to enjoyment. Belle, with a quiet twinkle in her eyes that was born of the love of teasing, tried very hard to draw Mr. Jetson out, thereby causing that young man to flush many times.
Dan, from the outset, played devoted squire to Mrs. Meade. That was safe ground for him.
“What’s that party in the sailboat yonder?” inquired Mrs. Meade, when the steamer had been nearly an hour out. “Are the young men midshipman or officers?”
Dave raised to his eyes the glasses with which the steamer was equipped.
“They’re midshipmen,” he announced. “Gray and Lambert, of our class, and Haynes and Whipple of the second class.”
“They’ve young ladies with them.”
“Certainly.”
“Isn’t it rather risky for midshipmen to have control of the boat, then, with no older man along?” asked Mrs. Meade.
“It ought not to be,” Dave replied. “Midshipmen of the upper classes are expected to be familiar with the handling of sailboats.”
“Those fellows are getting careless, at any rate,” muttered Dan Dalzell. “Look at the way that sail is behaving. Those fellows are paying too much attention to the girls and too little heed to the handling of the craft!”
Even as Dalzell spoke the helm was jammed over and the boat started to come about.
“Confound Lambert! He ought to ease off his sheet a good bit,” snapped Midshipman Dalzell.
“Helmsman, point our boat so as to pass under the other craft’s stern,” spoke Darrin so quietly that only Dan and Belle overheard him.
“Aye, aye, sir,” murmured the helmsman, in a very low voice. Dave signaled the engineman silently to increase the speed.
“There the boat goes, the sail caught by a cross current of air!” called Midshipman Dalzell almost furiously.
The girls aboard the sailboat now cried out in alarm as they felt the extreme list of the boat under them. All too late Midshipman Gray Sprang for the sheet to ease it off.
Too late! In another moment the sailboat had capsized, the mast nearly snapping in the blow over.
“Make haste—do!” cried Mrs. Meade, rising in the steamer.
But the steamer was already under increased headway, and the helmsman had to make but a slight turn to bear down directly to the scene of the disaster.
Three midshipmen could be seen floundering in the water, each steadily supporting the head of a girl. But the fourth, midshipman was floundering about wildly. Then he disappeared beneath the water.
“That young man has given up and gone down!” cried Mrs. Meade, whom Dave had just persuaded to resume her seat.
“No,” Dave assured her. “Gray isn’t drowning. But his girl companion is missing, and he has dived to find her.”
“Then the girl is lost!” quivered Mrs. Meade.
“No; I think not. Gray is a fine swimmer, and will find Miss Butler before she has been under too long a time.”
Then Dave rose, for he was commander here. “Danny boy, throw off your shoes and blouse and cap. The rest stand by the boat to give such aid as you can. Ladies, you’ll excuse us.”
Thereupon Dave Darrin doffed his own cap, blouse and shoes. He and Dalzell were the two best swimmers in the party, and it looked as though there would be work ahead for them to do.
In another moment the steamer was on the scene, and speed was shut off. Lambert, Haynes and Whipple, with their girl companions, were speedily reached and hauled aboard.
Then Gray came up, but alone.
“Hasn’t Pauline come up?” he gasped in terror.
“No,” Darrin replied shortly, but in a voice laden with sympathy.
“Then I’ve got to down again,” replied Gray despairingly. “I’d better stay down, too.”
He sank instantly, a row of bubbles coming up at the spot where he had vanished.
“The poor, unfortunate fellow! He won’t really attempt to drown himself, will he, if he doesn’t find his young woman friend?” inquired Mrs. Meade.
“No,” Dave answered without turning. “And we wouldn’t allow him to do so, either.”
Dave waited but a brief interval, this time. Then, as Midshipman Gray did not reappear, he called:
“Danby!”
“Yes, sir,” replied the enlisted man by the engine.
“Hustle forward and rig a rope loop to the anchor cable. How long is the anchor?”
“About three feet, sir.”
“Then rig the loop two feet above the mudhook.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hustle!”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is Gray trying to stay under? Trying to drown himself as a sign of his repentance?” whispered Wolgast in Dave’s ear. But Darrin shook his head. An instant later Gray shot up to the surface—alone!
“Come aboard,” ordered Dave Darrin, but he did not rely entirely on coaxing. Snatching up a boat-hook he fastened it in Gray’s collar and drew that midshipman alongside, where many ready hands stretched out and hauled him aboard.
Two of the rescued young women were now sobbing almost hysterically.
“If you won’t let me stay in the water, won’t some of the rest of you do something?” demanded Midshipman Gray hoarsely.
“We’re going to,” nodded Dave. “Danby!”
“Yes, sir.”
“Let go the anchor.”
“Very good, sir.”
“Follow me, Dan,” directed Dave. The anchor went overboard while the two midshipmen were hustling forward.
“I’m going down first, Danny,” explained Dave. “Follow whenever you may think you need to, but don’t be in too big a hurry. Use good judgment.”
“Trust me,” nodded Dan hoarsely.
With that Dave seized the visible part of the anchor cable and went down, forcing himself toward the bottom by holding to the cable. It was a difficult undertaking, as, after he had gone part of the way, the buoyancy of the water fought against his efforts to go lower. But Midshipman Darrin still gripped hard at the cable, fighting foot by foot. His eyes open, at last he sighted the loop near the anchor. With a powerful effort he reached that loop, thrusting his left arm through it. The strain almost threatened to break that arm, but Dave held grimly, desperately on.
Now he looked about him. Fortunately there was no growth of seaweed at this point, and he could see clearly for a distance of quite a few yards around him.
“Queer what can have become of the body!” thought Darrin. “But then, the boat has drifted along slightly, and Miss Butler may have sunk straight down. She may be lying or floating here just out of my range of vision. I wish I could let go and strike out, but I’d only shoot up to the surface after a little.”
Many a shadow in the deep water caused Darrin to start and peer the harder, only to find that he had been deceived.
At that depth the weight of the water pressed dangerously upon his head and in his ears. Dave felt his senses leaving him.
“I’d sooner die than give up easily!” groaned the young midshipman, and he seemed about to have his wish.
CHAPTER XXII
THE SEARCH AT THE BOTTOM OF THE BAY
By the strongest effort of the will that he could make, Darrin steadied himself and forced his eyes once more open.
Drifting toward him, two feet above his head, was what looked like another shadow. It came closer.
At the first thought Darrin was inclined not to believe his senses.
“I’ll have to go up, after all, and let Dan have his chance. I’m seeing things,” Dave decided.
For, though the object floating toward him had some of the semblance of a skirt-clad figure, yet it looked all out of proportion—perhaps twice the size of Pauline Butler.
That was a trick of the scanty light coming through the water at an angle—this coupled with Darrin’s own fatigue of the eyes.
Closer it came, and looked a bit smaller.
“It is a girl—a woman—some human being!” throbbed Dave internally.
Now, though his head seeming bursting, Dave hung on more tightly than ever. The drift of the water was bringing the body slowly nearer to him. He must hold on until he could let himself strike upward, seizing that body in his progress.
At last the moment arrived. Dave felt a hard tug at the cable, but he did not at that instant realize that Dan Dalzell had just started down from the steamer.
Dave judged that the right instant had come. He let go of the loop, and was shot upward. But, as he moved, his spread arms caught hold of the floating figure.
Up to within a few feet of the surface Darrin and his burden moved easily. Then he found it necessary to kick out hard with his feet. Thus he carried the burden clear, to the open air above, though at a distance of some forty feet from the steamer.
“There they are!” Farley’s voice was heard calling, and there was a splash.
“Bully for you, old fellow! Hold her up, and I’m with you!” hailed Midshipman Farley.
In another moment Dave Darrin had been eased of his human burden, and Farley was swimming to the steamer with the senseless form of Pauline Butler.
Darrin tried to swim, and was astounded at finding himself so weak in the water. He floated, propelling himself feebly with his hands, completely exhausted.
Just at that moment nearly every eye was fixed on Farley and his motionless burden, and many pairs of hands stretched out to receive them.
Yet the gaze of one alert pair of eyes was fixed on Darrin, out there beyond.
“Now, you’d better look after Dave,” broke in the quiet, clear voice of Belle Meade. “I think he needs help.”
Wolgast went over the side in an instant, grappling with Midshipman Darrin and towing him to the side of the boat.
“All in!” cried Midshipman Gray jubilantly.
“Except Dan. Where’s he?” muttered Dave weakly, as he sat on one of the side seats.
“I’ll signal him,” muttered Wolgast, and hastened forward to the anchor cable. This he seized and shook clumsily several times. The vibrated motion must have been imparted downward, for soon Dan Dalzell’s head came above water.
“Everyone all right?” called Dan, as soon as he had gulped in a mouthful of air.
“O.K.” nodded Wolgast. “Come alongside and let me haul you in.”
“You let me alone,” muttered Dalzell, coming alongside and grasping the rail. “Do you think a short cold bath makes me too weak to attend to myself?”
With that Dan drew himself aboard. Back in the cockpit Mrs. Meade and some of the girls were in frenzied way doing their best to revive Pauline Butler, who, at the present moment, showed no signs of life.
“Let me take charge of this reviving job. I’ve taken several tin medals in first aid to the injured,” proclaimed Farley modestly.
In truth the midshipman had a decided knack for this sort of work. He assailed it with vigor, making a heap of life preservers, and over these placing Miss Butler, head downward. Then Farley took vigorous charge of the work of “rolling” out the water that Miss Butler must have taken into her system.
“Get anchor up and start the steamer back to Annapolis at the best speed possible,” ordered Dave, long before he could talk in a natural voice.
Wolgast and Dan aided Danny in hoisting the anchor. Steam was crowded on and the little craft cut a swift, straight path for Annapolis.
“Pauline is opening her eyes!” cried Farley, after twenty minutes more of vigorous work in trying to restore the girl.
The girl’s eyes merely fluttered, though, as a slight sigh escaped her. The eyelids fell again, and there was but a trace of motion at the pulse.
“We mustn’t lose the poor child, now that we’ve succeeded in proving a little life there,” cried Mrs. Meade anxiously.
“Now, that’s what I call a reflection on the skill of Dr. Farley,” protested that midshipman in mock indignation. It was necessary, at any amount of trouble, to keep these women folks on fair spirits until Annapolis was reached. Then, perhaps, many of them would faint.
All of the dry jackets of midshipmen aboard had been thrown protectingly around the girls who had been in the water.
“Torpedo boat ahead, sir,” reported the helmsman.
“Give her the distress signal to lie to,” directed Dave.
The engine’s whistle sent out the shrieking appeal over the waters. The destroyer was seen to heave about and come slowly to meet the steamer.
Long before the two craft had come together Dave Darrin was standing, holding to one of the awning stanchions, for he was not yet any too strong.
“Destroyer, ahoy!” he shouted as loudly as he could between his hands. “Have you a surgeon aboard?”
“Yes,” came back the answer.
“Let us board you, sir!”
“What’s—–“
But Dave had turned to the helmsman with:
“Steam up alongside. Lose no time.”
In a very short space of time the destroyer was reached and the steamer ran alongside. The unconscious form of Miss Butler was passed up over the side, followed by the other members of the sailboat party. Mrs. Meade followed, in case she could be of any assistance.
“You may chaperon your party of young ladies in the steamer, Belle,” smiled Mrs. Meade from the deck of the destroyer. “I give you express authority over them.”
Farley’s and Wolgast’s sweethearts laughed merrily at this. All hands had again reached the point where laughter came again to their lips without strong effort. Pauline Butler was safe under the surgeon’s hands, if anywhere.
Then the destroyers pulled out again, hitting a fast clip for Annapolis.
“That’s the original express boat; this is only a cattle-carrier,” muttered Dave, gazing after the fast destroyer.
“Calling us cattle, are you?” demanded Belle. “As official chaperon I must protest on behalf of the young ladies aboard.”
“A cattle boat often carries human passengers,” Dave returned. “I call this a cattle boat only because of our speed.”
“We don’t need speed now,” Belle answered. “Those who do are on board the destroyer.”
By the time that the steamer reached her berth at the Academy wall, and the young people had hastened ashore, they learned that Pauline Butler had been removed to a hospital in Annapolis; that she was very much alive, though still weak, and that in a day or two she would again be all right.
With a boatswain’s mate in charge, another steamer was despatched down the bay to recover and tow home the capsized sailboat.
Examination week went through to its finish. By Saturday night the first classmen knew who had passed. But two of the members of the class had “bilged.” Dave, Dan and all their close friends in the class had passed and had no ordeal left at Annapolis save to go through the display work of Graduation Week.
“You still have your two years at sea, though, before you’re sure of your commission,” sighed Belle, as they rested between dances that Saturday night.
“Any fellow who can live through four years at Annapolis can get through the two years at sea and get his commission at last,” laughed Dave Darrin happily. “Have no fears, Belle, about my being an ensign, if I have the good fortune to live two years more.”
CHAPTER XXIII
GRADUATION DAY—AT LAST
Graduation Week!
Now came the time when the Naval Academy was given over to the annual display of what could be accomplished in the training of midshipmen.
There were drills and parades galore, with sham battles in which the sharp crack of rifle fire was punctured by the louder, steadier booms of field artillery. There were gun-pointing contests aboard the monitors and other practice craft.
There were exhibitions of expert boat-handling, and less picturesque performances at the machine shops and in the engine and dynamo rooms. There were other drills and exhibitions—enough of them to weary the reader, as they doubtless did weary the venerable members of a Board of Visitors appointed by the President.
On Wednesday night came the class german. Now our young first classmen were in for another thrill—the pleasure of wearing officers’ uniforms for the first time.
On graduation the midshipman is an officer of the Navy, though a very humble one. The graduated midshipman’s uniform is a more imposing affair than the uniform of a midshipman who is still merely a member of the brigade at the Naval Academy.
On this Wednesday evening the new uniforms were of white, the summer and tropical uniform of the Navy. These were donned by first classmen only in honor of the class german, which the members of the three lower classes do not attend.
All the young Women attending were also attired wholly in white, save for simple jewelry or coquettish ribbons.
Dave Darrin, of course, escorted Belle Meade with all the pride in the world. Most of the other midshipmen “dragged” young women on this great evening.
Dan Dalzell did not. He attended merely for the purpose of looking on, save when he danced with Belle Meade.
On the following evening, after another tiresome day spent in boring the Board of Visitors, came the evening promenade, a solemnly joyous and very dressy affair.
Then came that memorable graduation morning, when so many dozens of young midshipmen, since famous in the Navy, received their diplomas.
Early the young men turned out.
“It seems queer to be turning out without arms, doesn’t it?” grumbled Dan Dalzell.
But it is the rule for the graduating class to turn out without arms on this one very grand morning. The band formed on the right of line. Next to them marched to place the graduating class, minus arms. Then the balance of the brigade under arms.
When the word was given a drum or two sounded the step, and off the brigade marched, slowly and solemnly. A cornet signal, followed by a drum roll, and then the Naval Academy Band crashed into the joyous march, consecrated to this occasion, “Ain’t I glad I’m out of the wilderness!”
“Amen! Indeed I’m glad,” Dave Darrin murmured devoutly under his breath. “There has been many a time in the last four years when I didn’t expect to graduate. But now it’s over. Nothing can stop Dan or myself!”
Crowds surrounded the entrance to the handsome, classic chapel, though the more favored crowds had already passed inside and filled the seats that are set apart for spectators.
Inside filed the midshipmen, going to their seats in front. The chaplain, in the hush that followed the seating, rose, came forward and in a voice husky with emotion urged:
“Friends, let us pray for the honor, success, glory and steadfast manhood through life of the young men who are about to go forth with their diplomas.”
Every head was bowed while the chaplain’s petition ascended.
When the prayer was over the superintendent, in full dress uniform, stepped to the front of the rostrum and made a brief address. Sailors are seldom long-winded talkers. The superintendent’s address, on this very formal occasion, lasted barely four minutes. But what he said was full of earnest manhood and honest patriotism.
Then the superintendent dropped to his chair. There were not so very many dry eyes when the choir beautifully intoned:
“God be with you till we meet again!”
But now another figure appeared on the rostrum. Though few of the young men had ever seen this new-comer, they knew him by instinct. At a signal from an officer standing at the side of the chapel, the members of the brigade broke forth into thunderous hurrahs. For this man, now about to address them, was their direct chief.
“Gentlemen and friends,” announced the superintendent, “I take the greatest pleasure that may come to any of us in introducing our chief—the Secretary of the Navy.”
And now other officers appeared on the rostrum, bearing diplomas and arranging them in order.
The name of the man to graduate first in his class was called. He went forward and received his diploma from the Secretary, who said:
“Mr. Ennerly, it is, indeed, a high honor to take first place in such a class as yours!”
Ennerly, flushed and proud, returned to his seat amid applause from his comrades.
And so there was a pleasant word for each midshipman as he went forward.
When the Secretary picked up the seventeenth diploma he called:
“David Darrin!”
Who was the most popular man in the brigade of midshipmen? The midshipmen themselves now endeavored to answer the question by the tremendous explosions of applause with which they embarrassed Dave as he went forward.
“Mr. Darrin,” smiled the Secretary, “there are no words of mine that can surpass the testimonial which you have just received from your comrades. But I will add that we expect tremendous things from you, sir, within the next few years. You have many fine deeds and achievements to your credit here, sir. Within the week you led in a truly gallant rescue human life down the bay. Mr. Darrin, in handing you your well-earned diploma, I take upon myself the liberty of congratulating your parents on their son!”
As Dave returned to his seat with his precious sheepskin the elder Darrin, who was in the audience, took advantage of the renewed noises of applause to clear his throat huskily several times. Dave’s mother honestly used her handkerchief to dry the tears of pride that were in her eyes.
Another especial burst of applause started when Daniel Dalzell, twenty-first in his class, was called upon to go forward.
“I didn’t believe Danny Grin would ever get through,” one first classman confided behind his hand to another. “I expected that the upper classmen would kill Danny Grin before he ever got over being a fourth classman.”
But here was Dan coming back amid more applause, his graduation number high enough to make it practically certain that he would be a rear admiral one of these days when he had passed the middle stage of life in the service.
One by one the other diplomas were given out, each accompanied by some kindly message from the Secretary of the Navy, which, if remembered and observed, would be of great value to the graduate at some time in the future.
The graduating exercises did not last long. To devote too much time to them would be to increase the tension.
Later in the day the graduated midshipmen again appeared. They were wearing their new coats now, several inches longer in the tail, and denoting them as real officers in the Navy. A non-graduate midshipman must salute one of these graduates whenever they meet.
In their room, to be occupied but one night more, Dave and Dan finished dressing in their new uniforms at the same moment.
“Shake, Danny boy!” cried Dave Darrin, holding out his hand. “How does it seem, at last, to know that you’re really an officer in the Navy?”
“Great!” gulped Dalzell. “And I don’t mind admitting that, during the last four years, I’ve had my doubts many a time that this great day would ever come for we. But get your cap’s and let’s hustle outside.”
“Why this unseemly rush, Danny?”
“I want to round up a lot of under classmen and make them tire their arms out saluting me.”
“Your own arm will ache, too, then, Danny. You are obliged, as of course you know, to return every salute.”
“Hang it, yes! There’s a pebble in every pickle dish, isn’t there?”
“You’re going to the graduation ball tonight, of course?”
“Oh, surely,” nodded Dalzell. “After working as I’ve worked for four years for the privilege, I’d be a fool to miss it. But I’ll sneak away early, after I’ve done a friend’s duty by you and Belle. No girls for me until I’m a captain in the Navy!”
The ball room was a scene of glory that night. Bright eyes shone unwontedly, and many a heart fluttered. For Belle Meade was not the only girl there who was betrothed to a midshipman. Any graduate who chose might marry as soon as he pleased, but nearly all the men of the class preferred to wait until they had put in their two years at sea and had won their commissions as ensigns.
“This must be a night of unalloyed pleasure to you,” murmured Belle, as she and her young officer sweetheart sat out one dance. “You can look back over a grand four years of life here.”
“I don’t know that I’d have the nerve to go through it all again,” Darrin answered her honestly.
“You don’t have to,” Belle laughed happily. “You put in your later boyhood here, and now your whole life of manhood is open before you.”
“I’ll make the best use of that manhood that is possible for me,” Dave replied solemnly.
“You must have formed some wonderful friendships here.”
“I have.”
“And, I suppose,” hesitated Belle, “a few unavoidable enmities.”
“I don’t know about that,” Dave replied promptly and with energy. “I can’t think of a fellow here that I wouldn’t be ready and glad to shake hands with. I hope—I trust—that all of the fellows in the brigade feel the same way about me.”
CHAPTER XXIV
CONCLUSION
There was one more formation yet—one more meal to be eaten under good old Bancroft Hall.
But right after breakfast the graduates, each one now in brand-new cit. attire, began to depart in droves.
Some went to the earliest train; others stopped at the hotels and boarding houses in town to pick up relatives and friends with whom the gladsome home journey was to be made.
“I don’t like you as well in cits.,” declared Belle, surveying Dave critically in the hotel parlor.
“In the years to come,” smiled Dave, “you’ll see quite enough of me in uniform.”
“I don’t know about that,” Belle declared, her honest soul shining in her eyes. “Do you feel that you’ll ever see enough of me?”
“I know that I won’t,” Dave rejoined. “You have one great relief in prospect,” smiled Belle. “Whenever you do grow tired of me you can seek orders to some ship on the other side of the world.”
“The fact that I can’t be at home regularly,” answered Midshipman Darrin, “is going to be the one cloud on our happiness. Never fear my seeking orders that take me from home—unless in war time. Then, of course, every Naval officer must burn the wires with messages begging for a fighting appointment.”
“I’m not afraid of your fighting record, if the need ever comes,” replied Belle proudly. “And, Dave, though my heart breaks, I’ll never show you a tear in my eyes if you’re starting on a fighting cruise.”
Mrs. Meade and Dave’s parents now entered the room, and soon after Danny Grin, who had gone in search of his own father and mother, returned with them.
“What are we going to do now?” asked Mr. Darrin. “I understand that we have hours to wait for the next train.”
“We can’t do much, sir,” replied Dave. “Within another hour this will be the deadest town in the United States.”
“I should think you young men would want to spend most of the intervening time down at the Naval Academy, looking over the familiar spots once more,” suggested Mrs. Dalzell.
“Then I’m afraid, mother, that you don’t realize much of the way that a midshipman feels. The Naval Academy is our alma mater, and a beloved spot. Yet, after what I’ve been through there during the last few years I don’t want to see the Naval Academy again. At least, not until I’ve won a solid step or two in the way of promotion.”
“That’s the feeling of all the graduates, I reckon,” nodded Dave Darrin. “For one, I know I don’t want to go back there to-day.”
“Some day you will go back there, though,” observed Danny Grin.
“Why are you so sure?” Dave asked.
“Well, you were always such a stickler for observing the rules that the Navy Department will have to send you there for some post or other. Probably you’ll go back as a discipline officer.”
“I would have one advantage over you, then, wouldn’t I?” laughed Darrin. “If I had to rebuke a midshipman I could do it with a more serious face than you could.”
“I can’t help my face,” sighed Danny Grin.
“You see, Dave,” Mr. Dalzell observed, with a smile, “Dan inherited his face.”
“From his father’s side of the family,” promptly interposed Mrs. Dalzell.
Here Mr. Farley, also in cits., entered the parlor in his dignified fashion.
“Darry, and you, too, Danny Grin, some of the fellows are waiting outside to see you. Will you step out a moment?”
“Where are the fellows?” asked Dave unsuspectingly.
“You’ll find them on the steps outside the entrance.”
Dave started for the door.
“You’re wanted, too, Danny Grin, as I told you,” Farley reminded him.
“I’ll be the Navy goat, then. What’s the answer?” inquired Midshipman Dalzell.
“Run along, like a good little boy, and your curiosity will soon be gratified.”
Danny Grin looked as though he expected some joke, but he went none the less.
Dave, first to reach the entrance, stepped through into the open. As he did so he saw at least seventy-five of his recent classmates grouped outside.
The instant they perceived their popular comrade the crowd of graduates bellowed forth:
“N N N N,
A A A A,
V V V V,
Y Y Y Y,
NAVY!
Darrin!
Darrin!
Darrin!”
In another moment Danny Grin showed himself. Back in his face was hurled the volley:
“N N N N,
A A A A,
V V V V,
Y Y Y Y,
NAVY!
Grin!
Grin!
Grin!”
“Eh?” muttered Danny, when the last line reached him. They were unexpected. Then, as be faced the laughing eyes down in the street, Dalzell justified his nickname by one of those broad smiles that had made him famous at the Naval Academy.
Dave Darrin waved his hand in thanks for the “Four-N” yell, the surest sign of popularity, and vanished inside. When he returned to the parlor be found that Farley had conducted his parents and friends to one of the parlor windows, from which, behind drawn blinds, they had watched the scene and heard the uproar without making themselves visible.
At noon the hotel dining room was overrun with midshipmen and their friends, all awaiting the afternoon train.
But at last the time came to leave Annapolis behind in earnest. Extra cars had been put on to handle the throng, for the “train,” for the first few miles of the way, usually consists of but one combination trolley car.
“You’re leaving the good old place behind,” murmured Belle, as the car started.
“Never a graduate yet but was glad to leave Annapolis behind,” replied Dave.
“It seems to me that you ought not to speak of the Naval Academy in that tone.”
“You’d understand, Belle, if you had been through every bit of the four-year grind, always with the uncertainty ahead of you of being able to get through and grad.”
“Perhaps the strict discipline irked you, too,” Miss Meade hinted.
“The strict discipline will be part of the whole professional life ahead of me,” Darrin responded. “As to discipline, it’s even harder on some ships, where the old man is a stickler for having things done just so.”
“The old man?” questioned Belle.
“The ‘old man’ is the captain of a warship.”
“It doesn’t sound respectful.”
“Yet it has always been the name given to the ship’s captain, and I don’t suppose it will be changed in another hundred years. How does it feel, Danny boy, going away for good?”
“Am I really going away for good?” grinned Dalzell. “I thought it was only a dream.”
“Well, here’s Odenton. You’ll be in Baltimore after another little while, and then it will all seem more real.”
“Nothing but Gridley will look real to me on this trip,” muttered Dan. “Really, I’m growing sick for a good look at the old home town.”
“I wish you could put in the whole summer at home, Dan,” sighed his mother. “But, of course, I know that you can’t.”
“No, mother; I’ll have time to walk up and down the home streets two or three times, and then orders will come from the Navy Department to report aboard the ship to which I’m to be assigned. Mother, if you want to keep a boy at home you shouldn’t allow him to go to a place where he’s taught that nothing on earth matters but the Navy!”
Later in the afternoon the train pulled in at Baltimore. It was nearing dusk when the train pulled out of Philadelphia on its way further north.
Yet the passage of time and the speeding of country past the ear windows was barely noticed by the Gridley delegation. There was too much to talk about—too many plans to form for the next two or three weeks of blissful leave before duty must commence again.
Here we will take leave of our young midshipmen for the present, though we shall encounter them again as they toil on upward through their careers.
We have watched Dave and Dan from their early teens. We met them first in the pages of the _”Grammar School Boys’ Series.”_ We know what we know of them back in the days when they attended the Central Grammar School and studied under that veteran of teachers, “Old Dut,” as he was affectionately known.
We saw them with the same chums, of Dick & Co., when that famous sextette of schoolboys entered High School. We are wholly familiar with their spirited course in the High School. We know how all six of the youngsters of Dick & Co. made the name of Gridley famous for clean and manly sports in general.
Our readers will yet hear from Dave and Dan occasionally. They appear in the pages of the _”Young Engineers’ Series,”_ and also in the volumes of the _”Boys of the Army Series.”_
In this latter series our young friends will learn just how the romance of Dave Darrin and Belle Meade developed; and they will also come across the similar affair of Dick Prescott and Laura Bentley.
Dave and Dan had, as they had expected, but a brief stay in the home town.
Bright and early one morning a postman handed to each a long, official envelope from the Navy Department. In each instance the envelope contained their orders to report aboard one of the Navy’s biggest battleships.
Our two midshipmen were fortunate in one respect. Both were ordered to the same craft, their to finish their early Naval educations in two years of practical work as officers at sea ere they could reach the grade of ensign and step into the ward-room.