I was never going to believe I was home, till
with my own eyes I saw the anchor splash in a home port. But there it
was now--the anchor actually splashing in Bayport. I had the bridge
making port, and I remember what a look I took around me before I turned
the deck over to the executive. From the bridge, with a long glass, I
could see above the tree tops the roof of the colonel's old quarters. I
pictured him on the veranda below with the baby and Doris waiting for
me. I'd sent a wireless ahead for Doris not to risk herself or that baby
out in the bay with a fleet of battle-ships coming to anchor. And the
baby! I dreamed of him reaching up his little hands and calling, 'Papa,
papa!' when he saw me.

"Well, everything was shipshape. We were safe to moorings and I was
relieved of the deck and about to step off the bridge when the word was
passed that somebody was waiting to see me in the ward-room. And with no
more than that--'Somebody to see you, sir'--I knew who it was. The fort
boat had come alongside and people had come aboard--officers' wives and
families, I knew, but not just who, because the boat had unloaded aft
while I was on the bridge forward. But I knew.

"The messenger smiled when he told me. The men along the deck smiled
when they saw me hurrying aft. The marines on the half-deck smiled as I
flew by them. Everybody aboard knew by this time of my five years from
home and the little baby waiting. Good old Doctor and Pay, going up to
take the air on the quarter-deck, said: 'Hurry, Dick, hurry!' Hurry? I
was taking the ladders in single leaps. At the foot of the last one, in
the passageway leading to the ward-room, I all but bowled over a little
fellow who was looking up the ladder like he was expecting somebody. I
picked him up and stood him on his feet again. 'Hi, little man!' I
remember saying, and thinking what a fine little fellow he was, but no
more than that, I was in such a hurry.

"And into the ward-room, and everybody in the ward-room that wasn't
occupied with some of his own was smiling and pointing a finger to
where, in the door of my stateroom, Doris was waiting for me. And I dove
through the bulkhead door, leaped the length of the ward-room country,
and took her in my arms. For a minute, five minutes, ten minutes--just
how long I don't know--but I held her and patted her and dried her
tears.

"'And where's little Dick?' I asked at last.

"'Why, that was Dick you stood on his feet in the passag