The luncheon gong sounded immediately after his efficacious diversion,
and the military people who were to eat in the first section--the
_Buford's_ dining-room was small--went down to lunch. The junior
lieutenants, and the civil engineers and schoolteachers, who made up
her civilian list, took their last look at San Francisco. We swung
past Alcatraz Island and heard the army bugles blowing there. The
irregular outline of the city with its sky-scrapers printed itself
against a background of dazzling blue, with here and there a tufty
cloud. The day was symbolic of the spirit which sent young America
across the Pacific--hope, brilliant hope, with just a cloud of doubt.
We passed the Golden Gate just as our own luncheon gong sounded, and
the _Buford_ was rolling to the heave of the outside sea as we sat
down to our meal. At our own particular table we were eight--eight
nice old (and young) maid schoolteachers. Some of us were plump and
some were wofully thin. One was built on heroic lines of bone, and
those sinners from Radcliffe were pretty.
Toward the end of luncheon the _Buford_ began to roll and pitch
and otherwise behave herself "most unbecoming," and my room-mate,
declining to finish her luncheon, fled to the deck, where the air
was fresher. Feeling no qualms myself, and secretly triumphing in her
disillusion, I followed with her golf cape and rug, of which she had
been too engrossed to think.
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