The boat had now begun to move slowly out of its slip, backing into the river. Ropes had been cast off, and an ever widening strip of water appeared between the vessel and the shore. It was now that the man on the dock sighted the girl. She gesticulated at him. He gesticulated at her. She appeared helpless and baffled, but he showed himself a person of resource of the stuff of which great generals are made. Foch is just like that, a bird at changing pre-conceived plans to suit the exigencies of the moment.
The man on the dock took from his pocket a pleasantly rotund wad of currency bills. He produced a handkerchief, swiftly tied up the bills in it, backed to give himself room, and then, with all the strength of his arm, he hurled the bills in the direction of the deck. The action was greeted by cheers from a warm-hearted populace. Your New York crowd loves a liberal provider.
One says that the man hurled the bills in the direction of the deck, and that was exactly what he did. But the years had robbed his pitching-arm of the limber strength which, forty summers back, had made him the terror of opposing boys' baseball teams. He still retained a fair control but he lacked steam. The handkerchief with its precious contents shot in a graceful arc towards the deck, fell short by a good six feet and dropped into the water, where it unfolded like a lily, sending twenty-dollar bills, ten-dollar bills, five-dollar bills, and an assortment of ones floating over the wavelets. The cheers of the citizenry changed to cries of horror. The girl uttered a plaintive shriek. The boat moved on.
It was at this moment that Mr. Oscar Swenson, one of the thriftiest souls who ever came out of Sweden, perceived that the chance of a lifetime had arrived for adding substantially to his little savings. By profession he was one of those men who eke out a precarious livelihood by rowing dreamily about the waterfront in skiffs. He was doing so now: and, as he sat meditatively in his skiff, having done his best to give the liner a good send-off by paddling round her in circles, the pleading face of a twenty-dollar bill peered up at him. Mr. Swenson was not the man to resist the appeal. He uttered a sharp bark of ecstasy, pressed his Derby hat firmly upon his brow and dived in. A moment later he had risen to the surface and was gathering up money with both hands.
He was still busy with this congenial task when a tremendous splash at his side sent him under again; and, rising for a second time, he observed with not a little chagrin that he had been joined by a young man in a blue flannel suit with an invisible stripe.