Then, too, they had each outfitted more or less elaborately, according to their pocket-books.  Steve and Joe had pointed out that, with seven aboard, locker room would be at a premium, and had urged the others to take as little in the way of personal luggage as they could get along with.  But when the out-of-town boys got into the stores the advice was soon forgotten.  Neil had outfitted as if he was about to set forth on a voyage around the world, and Han was not far behind him.  Perry would have liked, too, to become the proud possessor of some of the things the former fellows brought aboard, but Perry’s finances were low after he had paid for that talking machine, and so, with the exception of a new grey sweater, he had made no additions to his wardrobe.  This morning he had volunteered to go to the basin early and superintend the loading of ice and water, and now, those things aboard, he was wondering, a trifle resentfully, why the others didn’t come.  They were to cast off at eleven and it was now well after ten.

“Probably,” he muttered, edging back so that he could have the support of the big, round smoke-stack, “Neil’s buying another necktie!  It would serve them right if I started the thing up and went off without them.”  As, however, Perry knew absolutely nothing about a gasoline engine, there was little likelihood of his carrying that threat into action.  In any case, there would have been no excuse, for less than a minute later he descried the tardy ones skirting the shed and coming along the wharf.  They looked, Perry thought with satisfaction, very hot and disgruntled as, each carrying his belongings in a parcel so that there would be no bags to stow away, they approached the boat.  Although Perry was no mechanician, he quite understood the operation of an electric horn, and now, swinging nimbly down to the bridge deck, he set the palm of his hand against a big black button.  The result was all that he desired.  An amazing, ear-splitting shriek broke the ordinary clamour of the scene.  Perry smiled ecstatically and peered out and up from under the awning.  But the half-dozen countenances that looked down at him expressed only disgust, and Joe’s voice came to him even above the blast of the horn.

“Don’t be a silly fool, Perry!” shouted Joe peevishly.  “Let that alone and catch these bundles!”

Perry obeyed and one by one the fellows scrambled from wharf to boat.  And, having reached the bridge deck, they subsided exhaustedly onto the two cushioned seats or the gunwale.  Perry viewed their inflamed, perspiring faces in smiling surprise.  “What did you do?” he asked.  “Run all the way?”

“Joe got us on the wrong car,” panted Neil, “and we went halfway to Coney Island, I guess.”

“It wasn’t my fault any more than it was yours,” growled Joe.  “You had eyes, hadn’t you?”

“We had eyes,” replied Ossie from behind his handkerchief, as he wiped his streaming face, “but we aren’t supposed to know where these silly cars go to.”