Whistler heard an oar snap. The man behind him fell upon his back in the bottom of the yawl. His broken oar entangled with Whistler's, and the latter lost stroke.

There was a yell from the ensign. Whistler heard Al Torrance shriek. The next moment the yawl rolled completely over, and he was struggling in the sea and in the pitchy darkness underneath the overturned boat!



CHAPTER XIX

COINCIDENCE

Whistler kept cool in his mind. As far as his body went, that was icy.

He knew that, after all, he was personally in less danger than those who had been thrown far from the boat. He could hear nothing of what went on outside; the rolling and plunging of the overturned yawl continued.

Where had Torry gone? And the ensign, and the other members of the yawl's crew? Once Whistler had spent a long time in the sea, drifting about on a hatchcover; having been saved from that perilous adventure, he was not likely easily to give up hope now.

There was air enough under the overturned yawl, and he knew her water-tight compartments would keep her afloat indefinitely. But there might be work for him to do outside.

He might help the other members of the shipwrecked crew. Therefore he filled his lungs with air and dived under the side of the yawl.

Just as he came out into the open sea he collided with another person coming down. They seized each others' hands and rose to the surface.

It was Torry! When they popped up and expelled the air from their lungs and blinked the water from their eyes, each boy instantly recognized the other.

"Crickey!" coughed Torrance. "I thought we'd lost you."

"Are you all right?" demanded Morgan.

"Just as all right as a fellow can be when he—he can't walk ashore," chattered Torry.

"Here's the yawl!" cried Whistler. "Where's Mr. MacMasters? And Rosy and Slim? And the others?"

But when his eyes were well cleared of the water he beheld the entire crew of the yawl, including Ensign MacMasters, perched along the yawl's keel like a string of very much bedrabbled crows on a rail fence.

Strangely enough the gale seemed to have lulled for the time. Having done its worst to them, it gave the unfortunate castaways a breathing spell.

With the aid of their mates, Whistler Morgan and Torry were able to reach the keel of the overturned boat. There they perched, too, and, chattering in the cold wind, tried to look about them.

Where was the raft? This question, first and foremost in Whistler's mind, troubled him intensely. It was impossible to see far across the tossing sea; but he was sure that the life raft was nowhere within the range of their vision.

"Poor Frenchy and Ikey!" groaned Whistler.

"That raft can't sink," urged Torry in his ear.

"But they could easily be torn off it by the waves."

"Don't look at it in that way. They may be better off than we are," returned his chum.

"What's that yonder?" shouted Slim suddenly.

"Land!" Mr. MacMasters cried.

"And a lot of good that'll do us," growled Slim. "We'll be dumped ashore, maybe, like a ton of trap-rock."

The sodden boat was drifting steadily toward the island. The surf thundered against its ramparts most threateningly. But the outlook did not seem so serious as that upon the other island they had passed.

Ensign MacMasters, after some fishing, secured the loose end of the broken hawser. With the help of those nearest to him he hauled this out of the water. Then, by his advice, they all lashed themselves to the long rope with their belts or neckerchiefs.

"No matter what happens, we want to hang together," he declared. "No one man can fight this sea alone."

His cheerfulness and optimism raised their spirits. At least they hung on to their insecure refuge with much ardor, and not uncheerfully waited to be cast upon the strand.

A great swell suddenly caught the yawl and drove it shoreward. Mr. MacMasters uttered a warning shout and waved his hand in a gesture of command. They all cast loose from the keel, and the boat was carried high upon the breast of the breaker.

Still fastened together by the rope, the castaways were tumbled over and over in the surf. The yawl was east upon the strand with dreadful force and if they had continued to cling to it their chances of being seriously injured would have been great indeed.

Lightly the men and boys lashed to the rope were tossed by the surf—rolling over and over, but still clinging to each other and to the hawser. Mr. MacMasters at one end and Whistler Morgan at the other managed to obtain a footing on the sand despite the undertow.

They threw themselves upon the beach and clung "tooth and toenail" when the breaker receded. Slim was completely exhausted; but before another comber rolled in those who were strong managed to drag the weaker ones out of the reach of the undertow.

There was only a fitful light on sea and shore. The castaways lay in a panting group, looking at each other dripping with brine, and very miserable.

"Begorra!" exclaimed Irish Jemmy at last, "I broke me poipe. Lend me a cigareet, will you, Rosy?"

Rosy gravely reached into his blouse and brought forth a little package filled with tobacco pulp.

"You're welcome, Jemmy," he said gravely. "Help yourself."

"Begorra!" growled the Irishman, "ye might have kept thim dry."

"That's a good word!" exclaimed Mr. MacMasters, briskly, struggling to rise. "We all need to get dry. I have matches in a bottle in my pocket, and the bottle didn't get broken. Come on and find some dry wood. We'll have a fire. We may have to camp out here till morning."

"Oh, Mr. MacMasters!" urged Whistler, who was loosening himself likewise from the rope. "Let us look for the fellows who were on the raft first."

"Shout for them," advised the ensign. "But don't worry if they do not answer at once. This is a big piece of land, this island."

Whistler and Torry shouted loudly; but after fifteen minutes they were hoarse, and the wind seemed to blow their voices back into their teeth.

"Save your breath to cool your porridge," advised Jemmy. "You're wastin' it. If ye shout from now till doomsday ye won't bring them back if they're drowned. And if they are all right we'll find them safe and sound."

That was sensible; but it did not make Phil and Al any the less anxious regarding Frenchy and Ikey. The younger lads had always been in their care, and the situation looked serious.

Whistler and Torry knew they were expected to help gather wood, and so they gave up shouting and followed Rosy and the others toward the forest. The whole island, as far as they had seen, was forest-covered.

There had been a heavy fall of rain that day, and to find dry fuel was not an easy task. While they were thus engaged the two boys came upon an opening in the trees. In the dusk it seemed that the opening was the beginning of a well-tramped path, leading inland.

Whistler called to Mr. MacMasters to show him this sign of human occupancy of their refuge. Before the ensign arrived at the spot Torry made a second discovery.

"Look who's here!" called the boy in a low voice. "Here's a Man Friday, sure enough!"

There was a light approaching through the forest path. It was a torch, and before long the wavering brand revealed a strange figure—no Man Friday but, as Whistler whispered, a Woman Friday!

She was a peculiar looking being, indeed, dressed in a single loose flowing garment, which covered her from neck to ankles. She was barefooted and bareheaded, her iron-gray hair tossed about her weather-beaten face in wild elflocks.

Her eyes were as brilliant as coals. Either she was not right in her mind or she assumed that manner. At first she merely glowered at the two boys and the Navy officer, and said nothing in reply to the latter's queries.

Her hands and fingers were gnarled from hard work. She looked as tough as bale wire, to quote Torry.

When she finally spoke her voice was as deep and coarse as a man's. She said:

"You-uns was blowed up in yon channel. And you lost your boat, ain't you?"

"Crickey!" gasped Torry to Whistler. "She's a German—a German with a southern accent! What do you know about that?"

Meanwhile Mr. MacMasters was interrogating her to some purpose.

"Have you seen others of our party?" he asked. "There were fourteen men and boys on a raft."

"Ain't seen no stranger befo' to-day, but you-uns," she declared. Her eyes seemed as lidless as a snake's. They did not blink at all.

"Then how did you know that our steamer was blown up?" the ensign queried.

"Old Mag knows a heap other folks don't know," croaked the woman.

The rest of the party came up and heard this statement. Jemmy gave her one look and crossed his fingers.

"She's a witch, and the banshees do her bidding," he whispered hoarsely.

"Well," said Mr. MacMasters, much puzzled, "is there any place where we can get dry—and get some food?"

"I'll take you all to my cabin," she said. "That's what I come for."

She turned around abruptly and strode back along the path. There seemed nothing for the castaways to do but to follow her. But they certainly did discuss the queer woman in whispers while they kept on her trail.

"She's a witch sure enough," repeated Jemmy. "Sure you kin see that easy from the cut of her jib. The ensign had better have no doin's with her. Maybe she'll charm the whole of us with her evil eye."

The island was half a mile or more across. It was almost dark by the time the party of castaways with their strange leader came out upon the other shore.

Here the sound between the islands and the mainland was mist-enshrouded, and it was evident that a nasty night had shut down. Whistler and Torry were terribly anxious about their friends who had been on the life raft.

However, they could not start off alone to hunt for Michael Donahue and Ikey Rosenmeyer. They were just as much under Mr. MacMasters' orders ashore as they were at sea.

They had confidence in the ensign's judgment, too. They believed he would make a search for the rest of their party just as soon as it was practicable.

The cabin to which the woman led them was a large log hut of only one room, but with a number of bunks, built in two tiers, along the walls. At one end was an open hearth and chimney and arrangements for cooking. A long table and some rough-hewn benches were in the middle of the open space.

It was more like a barracks than a home; and from the ancient and fishy smell about the place, the party from the battleship was sure that it had not long since housed fishermen and their nets.

Mr. MacMasters and most of the others turned in at once for a nap; but Whistler Morgan was much too anxious to sleep. The old woman who called herself "Mag" went to work at once to prepare a meal, and the boy offered to help her.

He peeled the vegetables and cut corn from the cob for a sort of Brunswick stew which she prepared. Mag put into it a rabbit, a pair of squirrels and a guinea fowl, the neck of which she wrung and then skinned and cleaned in a most skilful manner.

While she was thus engaged she talked to Whistler. The boy noted, as his chum had, that she arranged her spoken sentences much as Germans do who are not well drilled in English. Yet she had the southern drawl and accent.

"I know whar yo' boys come from," she advanced almost at once. "Yo' are from the Kennebunk battleship—and she's a fur ways from here."

"You have seen the rest of our crowd, then!" cried Whistler earnestly, "haven't you, Missus?"

"No, no!" the old hag said, wagging her head. "Old Mag sees strange sights and knows more'n most folks. Oh, yes! Your little steamboat was blowed up by a big bomb in yon channel."

"It was blown up by a Hun mine," declared Whistler bitterly.

The old woman's eyes flashed at him threateningly. "What yo' mean by 'Hun'? Them that put that bomb there is just as good as yo' folks. I ain't got no use fo' Yankees yet."

"You don't call yourself a Southerner, do you?" asked the boy curiously.

"What am I then?"

"You're German. At least, your folks were," Whistler declared with conviction.

The woman scowled at him and said nothing more. When Whistler had finished helping her he moved his chair back from the fireplace, for the heat from the live coals was intense. He saw a scrap of torn paper upon the earth floor, near his foot.

His suspicions had been aroused now and he covered the paper with his foot until he could get a chance to pick it up without the old woman observing him. Having secured it he moved still farther back to the table. There was a smoky hanging-lamp over the board which gave him light enough to see by. Secretly he examined the torn paper.

It seemed to be part of a letter, and was closely written on both sides of the scrap. On one side was the beginning of the missive, and after a minute Whistler realized that it was written in German script.

At the head of the letter was a line that not alone amazed, but startled the boy. Coincidence often has a long arm, and in this case the adage proved true. The letter was addressed to

"Herr Franz Linder."



CHAPTER XX

THE WITCH'S WARNING

Whistler had been assured when he attended the session in the sheriff's office at home, before joining the crew of the Kennebunk, that the enemy alien named Franz Linder, who was supposed to have blown up the Elmvale dam, was an influential member of that band of spies that were doing so much harm in the United States.

It was surprising to find this scrap of a letter addressed to the spy in this island cabin off the coast of North Carolina. Yet it smacked of no improbability.

Whistler had heard the spy tell the skipper of the oil carrier, the Sarah Coville, that his work was done in that vicinity. Linder, or Blake as he was known at Elmvale, had naturally got well away from the neighborhood of the dam after it was blown up.

That he was on this island at the present time was not so likely; but that he had been here, and in this cabin, was very possible. Perhaps had the castaways from the wrecked yawl arrived a few hours before at the cabin of Mag they might have seen the German spy.

The old woman who tried to make Whistler believe she possessed second sight, or some gift quite as uncanny, was in league with or had some knowledge of Franz Linder. The boy was confident on this point.

She was of German descent at least, and she showed bitterness toward "the Yankees." However, she proved herself to be a hospitable hostess. It was her southern, not her Teutonic, training probably that led to this.

Whistler could not read German, and he did not know that any member of his party could do so. Nevertheless, he crumpled the bit of paper in his hand and thrust it into his pocket, biding his time until he could show it to Mr. MacMasters.

It was ten o'clock before the stew was ready to be dished up. The aroma of it awakened the hungry men.

"This must be heaven, for it smells like mother's cooking!" declared Slim. "Oh, yum, yum! Oh, boy!"

"The old lady ain't no angel," put in Jemmy; "but she sure can cook."

"And angels can't, I guess," added Torrance, grinning.

"Say, boy!" grinned Rosy, "didn't you ever eat angel cake?"

Whistler found his chance to speak to Mr. MacMasters when the others crowded around the table. Mag put the steaming kettle of stew in the middle of the bare board and ladled it out into brown earthen bowls.

"See what I found on the floor here, Mr. MacMasters," Whistler said quietly, and thrusting the paper into the ensign's hand. "Don't let the old woman see it, sir."

Mr. MacMasters was cautious. He held the paper under the edge of the table and saw almost instantly what the communication was and to whom it was addressed.

"That's the name of that spy you boys say blew up the Elmvale dam, and was out on that oil tender we chased in the submarine patrol boat, isn't it?" whispered the ensign. "I declare! Did you find it here?"

"Yes, sir. You see, the edge of the paper is browned. The whole letter was probably thrown into the fire on the hearth and this piece failed to be destroyed."

"You've hit it right, I fancy," agreed the officer. "Something queer about this old woman and about this place."

"She knows we are from the Kennebunk, too. How should she know so much if she wasn't in with the spies?"

"And she knew too much about the steamer being mined in the channel over there," muttered Mr. MacMasters.

"It looks as if we were watched by the spies and that she is in cahoots with them," Whistler suggested.

"Humph! Maybe. You can't read this letter, I suppose, Morgan?"

"No, sir. None of us boys read German. Not even Ikey, although he understands the language quick enough when it is spoken. And poor Ikey isn't here!"

"Don't worry about that," advised Mr. MacMasters. Then: "I do not think any of the men can translate German. Of course there is probably nothing on this paper of present moment to us.

"What we should do first is to find the rest of our crowd and get off this island. The Kennebunk will be coming back up the coast and we'll miss her altogether."

"I hope the other boys are safe," sighed Whistler anxiously.

"I hope they have as good a refuge and are treated as kindly as we are. But we can't make a search of the island in the dark. Besides, they may not have landed on this island at all. There are other beaches quite as hospitable as this one proved, I have no doubt."

Whistler and Torry helped the old woman clear up and wash the bowls and spoons after supper. She sat in the chimney corner and puffed away slowly at a short-stemmed and very black pipe.

The seamen were rather afraid of Mag, Jemmy especially. He carefully crossed his fingers whenever she chanced to glance in his direction.

Mr. MacMasters went outside to assure himself that nothing could be done toward searching for the rest of the crew of the auxiliary steamer before daybreak. It was as dark as Erebus without, and the gale still blew strongly off shore.

The ensign politely asked the strange old woman what arrangements they should make for the night.

"We don't wish to turn you out of your bed, you know, Ma'am," he said.

She waved him away, the pipe in her hand. "Tumble into yo' bunks," she ordered. "Old Mag doesn't sleep—hasn't slept for more years than you-uns are bo'n already. That is why she knows more than others—yes! The spirits of the night come and whisper to her while she stays awake."

"Arrah! D'ye hear that now?" whispered Irish Jemmy hoarsely. "'Tis as much as our lives are worth to stay here."

Superstitious as he was, Jemmy was afraid to leave the cabin alone. Most of the castaways were glad to retire to the berths again and, blessed with full stomachs, it was not a great while before they fell asleep.

The two Seacove boys finished helping the old woman.

"You are a pair of good boys," she said after looking at them for some time and muttering to herself the while. "Why don't you run away? I'll get you off the island yet, befo' that officer man wakes up."

"Why, Mother! we don't want to run away," Torry told her, laughing. "We belong to one of the Navy's crack superdreadnaughts."

"Aye, I know. The Kennebunk," said Mag, nodding gloomily.

"Sure," Torry rejoined. "We want to see some fighting."

"'Tis not fighting you-uns'll see," croaked the woman. "Old Mag tells you, and she knows. Yo' fine, big ship will go down in the midst of the seas and her crew with her. Better yo' luck if it happens befo' yo' git back to her already."

"You don't mean that?" Whistler cried.

"I'm a-tellin' yo' so," said the queer old woman. "Old Mag knows mo' than other folks. Oh, yes! She'll sink. Better yo' boys stay ashore."

"What do you know about 'the witch's warning'?" whispered Torry to Whistler. "She thinks she's got second sight. Knows more than anybody else. She's like one of the Seven Sutherland Sisters—she prophesies."

"Shucks!" chuckled Whistler in the same cautious tone, "they weren't prophetesses; they sold hair restorer."

But to himself Whistler muttered:

"Maybe she does know more than we do. But how does she know it? There's something awfully queer about this whole business."



CHAPTER XXI

THE EXPLANATION

Although Whistler was quite sure "Old Mag," as she called herself, possessed no powers of divination, he knew she did have certain knowledge that he considered she had no moral right to have.

Here she was, an ignorant old creature living on a well nigh uninhabited island off an isolated coast, with some mysterious means of information upon subjects that she should know nothing about.

She claimed not to have seen the other party of castaways; yet she knew at once that Mr. MacMasters and his companions were from a craft that had been blown up miles away from her cabin, and completely out of sight and hearing of this island.

Whistler did not believe any fishing boat, or other craft, had brought this information to Mag. There had been no vessel in sight when the Kennebunk's tender was blown up by the floating mine.

The scrap of a letter addressed to "Herr Franz Linder" he had found in the cabin connected the old crone, in Whistler's mind, with the German spy system. She was of Teutonic extraction herself.

Clearly the old woman was trying to befool her visitors. She probably possessed some local celebrity as a witch or wise woman.

Whistler, however, was not ready to believe her any wiser than her neighbors.

He thought out the matter back to the time the auxiliary steamer was blown up in the channel between the islands. The wireless operator sent out S O S messages till the very last. Small as the radius of the instrument was, a station along the adjacent coast would surely pick up the cry for help.

It was an important thought, but he had no time that evening to mention it to Mr. MacMasters. He and Torry shared one of the wide and fishy smelling bunks together, and they did not wake up until it was broad daylight.

There was a heavy smell of rank, boiling coffee in the air. Bacon was sizzling over the fire and a huge corn pone was baking on a plank before the coals. Mag did not propose to starve her guests, that was sure.

The sun had burst through the clouds and the gale had ceased. The surf still thundered upon the outer shores of the island; but the sound, upon which the cabin fronted, was smooth and sparkling. It was a pretty view from the cabin door.

And almost at once, when Whistler and his chum ran out of the cabin to look about, they saw a number of familiar figures approaching along the rock-strewn shore. These newcomers were as shabby and bedraggled as themselves, and it was easy to identify them.

"Here they come!" yelled Torry, and rushed toward the approaching party.

Whistler was not behind him; but when they reached the refugees they discovered that Mr. MacMasters was already with them. The ensign had been up since before dawn and had searched out Mr. Mudge and his companions at the other end of the island.

"Oi, oi!" wailed Ikey Rosenmeyer, meeting the older boys. "Such a time! I swallowed enough salt water to make me a pickled herring yet!" Ikey could not get away from memories of the delicatessen shop.

"By St. Patrick's piper that played the last snake out of Ireland!" was Frenchy Donahue's complaint, "it was holdin' a wake over you two fellers, we was, all the night long."

"Where did you put in the night, anyway?" asked Whistler.

"Say! we didn't have no more home than a rabbit," cried Ikey.

"After we got ashore," began Frenchy, when Torry interrupted to ask:

"How did you do that? Give us the particulars."

"Why, when you fellers went off and left us without sayin' 'by your leave,' even——"

"What's that?" growled Whistler. "You know that hawser snapped."

"Just the same you parted company from us mighty brusk," grinned Frenchy. "We drifted in with the tide. Mr. Mudge took a line ashore—Oh, boy! he's some swimmer. So we followed him along the line, hand over hand——"

"And head under water," grunted Ikey. "Oi, oi!"

"Aw, Ike would kick if you was hangin' him," scoffed Frenchy, "unless you tied his feet. We all got out of the water safe, and that's enough. The wind and the rain beat us so that we went up into the woods for shelter. And then we found a clearing and in it a cabin."

"Ah-ha!" ejaculated Whistler. "Another cabin like this one?"

"Not on your life!" said Frenchy.

"No," added Ikey. "Nothing like it."

"It was a little cabin without any windows, and the door was padlocked. We couldn't get into it; but we camped there in the clearing all night. I'm as soggy right now as a sponge."

"There was a flagstaff sticking out of the roof of the cabin," Ikey observed. "And somebody must have thought a deal of whatever's in the shack, by the size of the padlock on the door."

There was a call to breakfast from the cabin just then. Whistler slipped aside and caught Mr. MacMasters' attention.

"Something mysterious, Morgan?" asked the ensign, observing Whistler's expression of countenance.

The young fellow briefly related what the old woman had said to him and Torry the night before, and then told the officer of the suspicions that her words had aroused in his mind.

In addition, he told Mr. MacMasters what Frenchy and Ikey had said about the locked cabin in the woods. Whistler put great stress upon this matter.

"Why, I did not see the cabin myself, although Mudge mentioned it," said the ensign. "I met them marching out of the woods up along the shore yonder."

"Can't we find that cabin and have a look at it?" urged Whistler earnestly.

"But we can't get into it."

"No, sir. But we can see it. I have an idea."

"I presume you have, Morgan," returned the ensign, smiling grimly. "And I have a glimmer of an idea myself."

When the men trooped in to breakfast the officer and Whistler Morgan stole away. The old woman was too busy just then to notice their absence.

In half an hour they found the place where the warrant officer and his companions had broken through the jungle. They retraced their course and soon came to the clearing in the wood.

It was a secret place, indeed. The cabin was ten feet square, built of heavy logs, and as Whistler had been told, had no window openings. The door of heavy planks was fastened by a huge hasp held in place by the padlock mentioned so particularly by Ikey Rosenmeyer.

"I guess we can't get into it without tools," said the ensign.

"I don't suppose so, sir. But see that pole on top of the cabin? That had the upperworks of a wireless attached to it, I'm sure. The bolts are still up there. It is no flagpole."

"Right again, Morgan," agreed Mr. MacMasters.

"And that piece of a letter to Linder," the boy eagerly reminded him. "Don't you think with me, sir, that the old woman is linked up with the German spy system?"

"It seems reasonable. At least, I shall make a report as soon as we get away from the island. And the old woman should be watched, too."

"Indeed she should!" cried Whistler. "What do you suppose she meant, Mr. MacMasters, about our Kennebunk being sunk?"

"The speech was fathered by the wish, perhaps."

"But she seemed so certain—so assured," murmured Whistler.

He was not satisfied by this explanation of Mr. MacMasters, and was silent all the way back to Mag's cabin. They came in sight of the place just as the men poured out of the cabin in great excitement.

"What do you suppose is the matter with them now?" demanded the ensign.

But he spied the cause of the excitement as soon as Whistler did. Crossing the sound was a swift revenue cutter, and one of the seamen, under direction from Mr. Mudge, leaped upon a bowlder and began to signal, semaphore fashion.

The signals were returned and the cutter swung in shoreward and soon dropped a boat for the castaways. The shipwrecked seamen from the Kennebunk swarmed down to the strand.

Mr. MacMasters whispered to Whistler that they would have their breakfast aboard the Coast Guard boat. Then he went to the scowling old woman who, after all, had been a most hospitable hostess. Some of the sailors had given her money in small sums; but the ensign forced her to accept an amount that he thought generous payment for what she had done for them, and Mag seemed to agree.

"Yo' Yankees air free-handed already," she drawled. "But that won't save you, Mr. Officer, from the trouble that's heaped up for you-uns."

"What is the nature of this trouble?" asked the ensign curiously.

"Death an' destruction," said the old woman. "Death and destruction. Yo' fine big ship, the Kennebunk ship, will be blowed sky-high. It's a comin'! Mark Old Mag's prophecy, Mr. Officer."

"We shall all have to go on and do our duty just the same, Mag," said Mr. MacMasters, seriously. "And if a sailor does his duty, he's done his all. The rest is in God's hands."

"Don't blaspheme, Mr. Yankee!" warned the old woman. "The Lawd ain't studyin' 'bout he'pin' you-uns none. He's on the other side already."

The boat from the cutter had to return a second time before all the castaways were transferred to the revenue vessel. Whistler went in the last boat with Ensign MacMasters.

When they were on the cutter's deck the young fellow heard Mr. MacMasters ask at once about the character of the old woman, and of any other people who might belong on the island.

"They're under suspicion," the commander of the cutter said briefly. "The Department has its eye on them. On that old woman, too."

Mr. MacMasters asked if anything was known about the small cabin back in the forest. The revenue officer listened eagerly.

"Ah-ha! That is something of moment, Ensign. I shall surely be glad to hear all about that. But we must be brisk. Do you know that your Captain Trevor is combing the sea and the coast with wireless messages for you?"

"He must have heard that we lost our steamer."

"That was relayed last night to the Kennebunk, I believe. The Huns are sowing many mines in these waters. There is a flock of U-boat chasers and destroyers out after the German submarines.

"But there is something else of moment in the wind," added the revenue officer. "The Kennebunk," he added, mysteriously, "will not be long in these waters."

"No?"

"It is expected that there will be a great naval movement on the other side. The report of the Kennebunk's manoeuvres, and her gun record, is said to be so good that she may be sent across."

Whistler, standing by, could scarcely suppress a cry of delight.

"What do you think of that, Morgan?" the ensign cried. Then to the revenue officer: "After this cruise, I suppose you mean, sir?"

"She may be sent on the jump—and within a few hours. I have orders to take you to sea at once and find the Kennebunk. Our operator is sending out feeler messages for the battleship right now."

"Then you will do nothing toward looking into this nest of trouble-makers on the island—if there is such—immediately?"

"Not until we return."

"And then," said Mr. MacMasters seriously, "if you do stir up these snakes, look for a fellow named Franz Linder. He is wanted in Elmvale, up there in New England, for blowing up a dam, destroying munition factories and drowning twelve innocent people. We'll be glad, Morgan here, and I, to hear about the capture of that scoundrel."



CHAPTER XXII

THE RACE

The revenue cutter was a speedy craft, and by midforenoon she was far outside the string of islands near which the crew of the Kennebunk's steamer under Ensign MacMasters had experienced so many adventures.

The wireless operator picked up the superdreadnaught at last. She was two hundred miles away, and when she gave her course to the cutter the boys noticed that it occasioned a deal of excitement upon the quarterdeck.

Unless the message is spread on the notice-board by the door of the wireless room, the members of the crew of any vessel are not likely to know what is going on in the air. The operator, like the usual telegraph operator, is bound to secrecy.

"There's something up besides the blue peter, just as sure as you're a foot high, Whistler," Al Torrance declared eagerly. "I'd give a punched nickel to know just what it is."

Having nothing to occupy their time on the cutter, the four Navy boys naturally gave their attention to rumor and gossip. They believed the Kennebunk was no longer headed up the coast; but where she was going was a question.

"Crickey!" groaned Al, "if she gets into any muss without our being aboard, I'll be a sore one."

"They wouldn't be so mean," wailed Ikey, "as to have a fight without us being in it. Oi, oi! Oi, oi!"

"Nothing but subs to fight over here, kid, if any," the older boy said. "Stop your keening."

"Say, how do we know where the big fight will be pulled off?" demanded Frenchy excitedly.

"What big fight?" queried Whistler, unpuckering his lips.

"The one they've been talking about for months. You know, everybody's said the Huns would come out some time. They're bound to give us a chance at their Navy."

"Aw, they won't! Will they, Whistler?" asked Ikey.

"I don't really believe so myself," Torry said, shaking his head. "No such luck."

"I believe the Kennebunk has got new orders," Whistler rejoined thoughtfully. "Whether or not they are for her to sail for the other side, I don't know. I heard a hint about it when we came aboard the cutter."

"Crickey! Let 'em hit it up, then," urged Torry. "If this little old tub doesn't go fast enough I'll jump overboard and swim!"

"Oi, oi! Not me!" objected Ikey Rosenmeyer. "I've soaked in enough salt water. I don't feel as though I should really need a bath again before I get to be twenty-one yet."

"Tough on your messmates, Ikey," observed Whistler. "Do think better of such a rash decision."

The four boys from Seacove were not alone in being anxious regarding the Kennebunk and their chance of overtaking her. Every man of the crew of the wrecked auxiliary steamer desired to get aboard the superdreadnaught if there was to be any fresh excitement.

Whistler's chums urged him to waylay Ensign MacMasters for information.

"G'wan, Whistler!" begged Frenchy. "You and him's just like brothers. Ask him if the old Kennebunk is running away from us, or if it's all bunk?" and he grinned at his pun.

"Of course she's not running away," Whistler returned.

"Just the same this cutter is sprinting like all get out," put in Torry. "Be a good fellow, Whistler. Ask Mr. MacMasters what it means."

His chum did not feel that he could do this. There is, after all, a gulf between the quarterdeck and the forecastle. But Whistler put himself in the ensign's way and, saluting smartly, asked a question:

"Beg pardon, sir! Did you find anybody aboard who could translate that torn letter I picked up in the old witch's cabin?"

"That letter addressed to Franz Linder? No, Morgan; there is nobody aboard the cutter who is familiar with German. But the moment we reach the Kennebunk I will put it into Captain Trevor's hands—never fear."

"Shall we really catch the battleship, sir?" asked Whistler eagerly.

"We've got to, Morgan;" declared Mr. MacMasters. "As you boys say, 'there is something doing' and we must be in it."

"But the battleship has changed her course, has she not, sir?"

"She has received new orders; but we will meet her on this course, I have no doubt. Cheer up, my boy," and the ensign laughed. "You may yet help work the big guns in a real battle."

So it was actually a race. The cutter must reach a certain point in the open ocean to meet the superdreadnaught; if they missed her, in all probability the party from the Kennebunk would have to be returned to port and be assigned to some other duty for the time being.

"Oi, oi!" groaned Ikey when he heard Whistler's report. "I never did have any luck. If they had delicatessen shops on board ships, I'd be made to police the pickle barrels yet."

The day did not pass without some additional excitement. The cutter passed and signaled several Government vessels; but toward evening the lookout picked up the smoke of a small destroyer ahead which, within the next half hour, acted very strangely, indeed.

She seemed to be steaming in circles, and as the cutter raced nearer those circles narrowed. Then her guns began to pop.

The cutter's crew and their guests became much excited. Surely the gun crews of the destroyer were not at target practice. Yet they seemed to have found a target in the middle of that circle the destroyer was furrowing through the sea.

At last they saw an answering shot fired from the midst of the circle. The destroyer was traveling at top speed and her own guns continued to keep up a wicked cannonading of the central object.

"A Hun submarine!" shouted somebody. "They're circling it, and they are going to get it, too!"

"If it is a submarine why doesn't she sink?" demanded Torry the sceptical.

"I see why," Whistler said. "If the U-boat goes down the destroyer will dart in and drag depth bombs. Then—good-night!"

"Wow, wow!" cried Frenchy. "She's so fast she can cut circles around the U-boat, eh?"

"Sure as you live!" said Torry. "My! that's a pretty fight. If that destroyer was the old Colodia, and we were only aboard of her! What fun!"

The destroyer was narrowing her circles; the U-boat was in a pocket, and unless the Hun put a lucky shell into the destroyer's engines, she seemed doomed to capture or destruction.

The cutter raced nearer. Her course would take her directly into the circle of battle unless her helm was changed.



CHAPTER XXIII

UNDER SPECIAL ORDERS

It was like bombarding a whale with bomb lances. One after another the shells from the destroyer's guns shrieked over the sea to fall around the more sluggishly manoeuvring U-boat.

The captain of the submarine handled his craft with skill; but his gunners were poor marksmen. They kept both the U-boat's deckguns smoking; but the shots went wild.

Torpedoes could not be used against the destroyer, for the latter was steaming too swiftly. Around and around she went, and each time she finished a lap the circle had narrowed.

The spectators on the revenue cutter were highly interested. They climbed upon the upperworks and cheered and yelled in their excitement. At last a shell from the destroyer dropped fairly upon the deck of the U-boat, just abaft the conning tower.

The submarine rocked, dipped, and seemed about to sink. The helm of the destroyer was changed instantly and she shot straight for her quarry.

"She'll sink her! She's going down!" yelled Al Torrance, clinging to a stay beside Whistler, as the cutter bobbed through the rather choppy seas.

But the Germans had no desire for a glorious death. Up went the white flag, and the men on her deck put up their hands, signifying that they had surrendered. Probably they were already crying "Kamerad!"

The destroyer did not even drop a boat to send aboard a crew. She steamed right up beside the submarine, put out a ladder for her captain, and then sent a hawser aboard for the German crew to fasten. She would tow her prize to port without risking any of her own crew aboard the wabbly undersea boat.

When the cutter drew near, her ship's company cheered and jeered the bluejackets on the destroyer with good-natured enthusiasm. The destroyer was then steaming away with the U-boat in tow.

"Something's fouled your patent log!" yelled one seaman aboard the cutter.

"Hey, there, garby!" shouted another. "What's that the cat brought in?"

The crew of the destroyer, evidently mightily swelled with pride, refused to reply to these scoffing remarks.

As long as the twilight held the cutter steamed into the east and south. By dark the destroyer and her tow were out of sight. The cutter began to burn occasional lights. Then the wireless chattered again.

"Hurrah, boys!" whispered Whistler to his three mates. "I believe the Kennebunk is near."

Nor was he mistaken in this supposition. The night was dark, the stars were overcast, merely a fitful light played upon the surface of the sea.

The horizon ahead was quite indistinguishable from the water itself. But at last a faint glowing point appeared upon it. Ensign MacMasters and the commander of the cutter showed excitement as they watched this spot through their night glasses.

"Is it a star?" asked Frenchy.

"A star your grandmother!" snorted Torry. "That's a ship."

"A big steamship under forced draft," added Whistler. "And I believe it is the Kennebunk."

It was the glow above her smokestacks that they saw. Within half an hour the fact that a huge steam craft was storming across the cutter's course could not be doubted.

Mr. MacMasters gave some sharp orders to his men. The latter had nothing with them but the water-shrunk garments they stood in; so it took but a moment for Mr. Mudge to line them up properly along the rail.

The great battleship began to slow down when the cutter was at least three miles from her. Otherwise she would have passed, and the revenue craft would have been a long time catching up.

The cutter was run in to the side of the towering hull of the superdreadnaught. The port ladder was down. A number of the watch on deck were strung along the rail, and the officers did not forbid their cheering the members of the wrecked tender's crew.

"Welcome home again, Mr. MacMasters!" was the greeting of the officer of the watch as the ensign led his party up the ladder.

"And mighty glad we are to get here," declared Ensign MacMasters.

The boys and men scrambled aboard and bade good-bye cheerfully though gratefully to the cutter's crew. The latter craft turned on her heel and shot away toward the distant coast.

Already the huge battleship was under way again. She was running with few lights. And where she was running was a question that even the members of the crew the boys put the question to could not answer.

It was generally known that Captain Trevor had received orders by wireless that had changed the plan of the cruise entirely. Instead of running back up the Atlantic coast, they had put to sea.

It was the next day before the Kennebunk's company in general knew that she was bound first for the Azores. That meant a European cruise, without a doubt. All the "old timers" were agreed upon that.

It was finally rumored about the ship that the report of the Kennebunk's cruise to the southward, and the score of her gun crews at target practice, together with her good luck in sinking a German submarine with the first shot ever fired from her guns, had so impressed the Department that she was to join the European squadron under Admiral Sims at once.

"There's a chance for you boys to see some real action," declared one of the masters-at-arms. "If the Hun comes out of Kiel, we'll be there to say 'How-do!' to him."

The boys who had been absent from the battleship for so long found, however, that the spiritual atmosphere of the crew was not much changed. There were still a lot of "croakers" as Torry called them.

"They are ghost-ridden, as sure as you're born, Whistler," Torry declared. "Somebody has heard that clock ticking again. It doesn't seem to be at work all the time. Just now and then. 'The death watch' they call it."

"Stop it!" ordered Whistler. "The less said the soonest mended about such things aboard ship. We boys don't believe such foolishness, do we?"

"How about the old witch's prophecy?" asked Torry wickedly. "Suppose we should tell these garbies about them?"

"Don't you dare!" cried Whistler.

That very morning, after sick call, he was ordered to appear before Captain Trevor in the commander's office, and there found assembled Ensign MacMasters and several of the other officers of the ship with the commander.

"Morgan," said Captain Trevor, "let me hear about your finding of this paper Mr. MacMasters has brought to our attention. There seems to be something of moment in it in reference to the Kennebunk."

Ensign MacMasters put a translation of the torn letter into the young fellow's hand. The letter had been so mutilated that it was impossible; to make any exact translation of it. But here were extracts that stood out plainly:

". . . success of your water-wheel bomb. Congratulations.

". . . from Headquarters an order to . . .

". . . If it equals your former . . .

". . . clockwork arrangement that may raise your name as an inventor to the nth power. The Ken—— . . .

". . . shall hear of her destruction at the time appointed.

". . . for the German Fatherland."

"I am told that you, Morgan, have some knowledge of the dastardly work of this spy, Franz Linder. Is it so?" asked Captain Trevor suggestively.

"Oh, sir!" cried the young fellow, in excitement, "I believe I know what is referred to here by Linder's correspondent, as 'the water-wheel bomb.' That is what he blew up the Elmvale dam with!"

"Do you think, from what the woman on the island said, that there is some plot afoot against the Kennebunk?" went on the commander.

"It's referred to right here!" declared the excited Whistler. "This 'clockwork' thing. Oh, Mr. MacMasters!" he added, turning abruptly to the ensign. "You know some of the crew, before we left to carry poor Grant to the hospital, were bothering about a sound they had heard on the lower deck? Remember Seven Knott's ghost?"

"Right!" declared the ensign. "I had forgotten it, Captain Trevor," he added. "Something about a clock ticking."

"I have heard it myself," Whistler said eagerly. "And the boys say they have been hearing it, off and on, while we were gone."

"Do you two mean to intimate that there is a time bomb, or some such infernal machine, aboard this ship?" demanded Captain Trevor, in contemptuous amazement.

"Look at this, sir," urged Whistler so earnestly that he forgot his station. "'. . . clockwork arrangement that may raise your name as an inventor to the nth power.' That certainly means something. And that noise below does sound something like a clock."

"It seems ridiculous," stated the commander of the Kennebunk. "And yet we must not refuse to believe that the secret agents of Germany are at work in the most impossible places. If they could sink this great, new vessel in mid-ocean! Mr. Smith," to his first lieutenant, "have that part of the ship searched. Find out what causes the sound which has been heard before you make your report. We'll investigate this matter to the very bottom."



CHAPTER XXIV

TICK-TOCK! TICK-TOCK!

The superdreadnaught was so huge a ship, and the divisions of the crew were so busily engaged in drills and other work, that few, indeed, knew that the "ghost of the Kennebunk" was being investigated by the officers.

The ship was storming along her course through the sea at a pace which fairly made her structure shake. Had one been able to be out upon the sea on another ship and watch her pass, her speed would have been impressive, indeed.

Routine work went on, and the bulk of the ship's company knew nothing about that little party of searchers at work deep down in the ship. Whistler was one of those assigned to find the cause of the "tick-tock" noise, and it was he who finally suggested the spot where the mechanism which caused the sound might be found.

The party had searched the lumber room and the compartments on both sides, that above, and the one directly beneath the room in question. Nothing was discovered save that the sound seemed clearer in the lumber room than elsewhere.

Overhauling the stuff stowed there did no good. They seemed no nearer to the sound. And as the latter was not continuous it was the more puzzling.

"Don't you think we ought to open that chest, sir?" asked Whistler of the warrant officer who had immediate charge of the work.

"It doesn't seem to come from that box," objected the man.

"It doesn't seem to come from anywhere exactly," Whistler said. "It is sort of ventriloquial. One time it seems to be from one direction, then from another. But that chest hasn't been open——"

"Whose is it?"

"I don't know, sir."

"Who does know?" the warrant officer asked.

But nobody seemed able to answer that query. The searchers gathered about the chest that had been pulled out of the heap of rubbish. It was ironbound and made of heavy planking.

"It gets me!" murmured the officer.

Just then the sound started again: "Tick-tock! Tick-tock! Tick-tock!"

"It don't come from that box!" declared one man.

Whistler stooped and put his hand on the cover. "Wait!" he said suddenly. "Just feel this, sir."

"What do you feel?"

"There is vibration here. And it isn't the vibration of the ship's engines, either."

The warrant officer rested his hand upon the chest. He looked more puzzled than ever.

"Get something and break the lock!" he commanded.

"Wait a minute, sir!" cried Whistler. "If there should be some infernal machine in that box we must take care in opening it. Maybe the carpenter can pick the lock."

"Good idea," agreed the officer.

The carpenter's mate was sent for. He came with a bunch of spare keys and a pick-lock. The latter had to be used skilfully before the lock of the chest was sprung.

Then the warrant officer suddenly experienced an accession of caution. He refused to have the cover of the chest lifted until the chest itself was carried carefully out upon the open deck.

No sound came from the chest now, if that had been the locality of the tick-tock noise. The vibration could be felt just the same.

The men were ordered to stand back and the warrant officer courageously lifted the lid of the chest. Nothing happened.

There was an empty tray in the top of the odd chest. That, too, was cautiously lifted out.

There came suddenly a faint buzzing from the interior that startled everybody near. Then followed the ticking sound, which lasted at least a full minute.

The warrant officer jerked away a layer of pasteboard that hid what was under the tray. Several grim cylinders lay side by side in the chest's bottom. They were connected by wires with a mechanism that hummed like the purring of a well-piled motor.

"Clockwork!" exclaimed the carpenter's mate, bending over the chest. "That's what she is. Ah! It reverses itself. See that spring—winding tighter and tighter? Why, it's almost perpetual motion! Some inventor that fellow!"

"What fellow?" growled the warrant officer.

"Whoever built this."

"Can you stop it without exploding those cylinders?"

"Great Scott! Do you s'pose that's dynamite under there?"

"Or T N T."

The petty officer thrust an iron bar suddenly into the heart of the complicated machine. Something snapped. The mechanism stopped.

"Great heavens, man!" gasped the warrant officer, "suppose you had set it off?"

"No. Couldn't be done till the spring here was wound up to the top-notch. This machine was arranged to run for weeks. Some ingenious arrangement, take it from me!"

The discovery and destruction of the infernal machine, and a big one at that, relieved the tension of feeling aboard the warship. As Frenchy Donahue remarked:

"It's bad enough to have a banshee tick-tocking around the place; but that tidy little bunch of cylinders would have made a lot more noise if they had been exploded."

But the matter was serious. The captain took the opportunity to lecture the entire ship's company regarding foolish rumors and gossip.

"If there is anything strange comes under your notice, report it properly," he said. "Don't camouflage it with a lot of superstitious nonsense so that the officer you report to must disbelieve the yarn. There never was a strange occurrence yet that could not be explained."

"How does he explain Jonah being swallowed by the whale?" whispered Frenchy.

"He doesn't have to explain it," retorted Torry. "If you don't believe a whale can swallow a man, jump down the throat of the next one you see."

As a whole, the crew of the Kennebunk were not inclined to consider the incident of the infernal machine carelessly. A serious impression was made upon them all.

But the mysterious prospect of what was ahead of them shortly smothered the matter of the peril escaped. There might be greater perils ahead.

The superdreadnaught halted but for an hour at a port of the Azores. This was to send mail ashore. Then she picked up speed again and traveled north.

She passed convoys of merchant vessels guarded by French, British and American destroyers. The Kennebunk exchanged signals with several cruisers of the United States Navy as well.

Drill at the guns went on daily. Once they spied and shelled a German submarine, but she escaped. This incident greatly enraged the crew of the gun that missed her. It was not the gun to the crew of which Whistler and Torry belonged.

"Can't expect to get the Hun every time," was the soothing remark of one of the division captains.

"Why not?" asked somebody else. "That's what we are here for, isn't it? I don't believe Uncle Sam wants excuses."

The standard the men set themselves in our Navy is higher than their officers require.

The boys from Seacove, as well as Hans Hertig and Mr. MacMasters, kept a sharp lookout for their beloved Colodia. But they were fated not to meet the destroyer until the great event which had brought the superdreadnaught into European waters.

The Kennebunk steamed into a certain roadstead one evening where lay more huge battleships, cruisers and smaller armored vessels than Whistler and his mates had ever seen before. They flew the flags of three nations, and they were prepared to move en masse upon the enemy at the briefest notice.



CHAPTER XXV

IN THE THICK OF THE FIGHT

The methods of strategy by which the German Navy, or a large part of it, was tolled out of its impregnable hiding place the Navy boys did not learn till long afterwards. But Phil, at least, half realized that the German High Command believed that the way to shelling the British coast by her great naval guns was at last opened.

The Allied fleet moved on a certain day and at a certain hour, and with the open sea as its destination. It was a calm and utterly peaceful sea through which the Kennebunk sailed with her sister ships.

The high bow of the superdreadnaught crashed through the seething waters. Her lookouts traced the course of each tiny blot upon the distant sea-line.

Suddenly, out of the north, appeared a scout cruiser, her funnels vomiting volumes of dense smoke that flattened down oilily upon the sea in her wake. Her stern guns spat viciously at some craft of low visibility which followed her.

Immediately everybody aboard the Kennebunk forgot the other ships of the squadron. The enemy was in sight, and the work would be cut out for every man aboard the superdreadnaught.

The cruiser came leaping toward the fleet, her signal flags fluttering messages. A gun boomed on the flagship. Bugles shrilled from every deck of the Kennebunk.

Messages were wigwagged from ship to ship. But aboard the Kennebunk there was just one order that interested every one.

"Clear decks for action!"

The divisions responded to the notes of the bugle with a snappiness that delighted the officers on the bridge. As they had gone through the manoeuvres a thousand times in practice, so now they faced the enemy with the same precision.

Ventilators, life-lines, parts of the superstructure and deck woodwork came down and were stowed in their proper place. Boats dropped from their davits, were hurriedly lashed together, their plugs pulled, and left to sink, riding attached to sea anchors formed of their own spars and oars. "Cleared for action!" when reported to the commander meant exactly that! Not a superfluous object in the way of the activities of a fighting crew.

"Battle stations!"

The four friends from Seacove knew exactly where they were to be all through the battle—if they lived. Whistler knew that he was to stand in the corridor of the handling-room for Turret Number Two, until he was called to relieve some wounded or exhausted member of his gun crew. His immediate order was to "stand by."

Every other individual aboard the Kennebunk had his station, from the firemen shoveling tons of coal into the fiery maws of the furnaces to keep the indicator needles of the steam-gages at a certain figure, to the range-finders high up in the fighting-tops, bending over their apparatus.

In the turrets the officers fitted telephone receivers to their heads. The gunners, literally "stripped for action" to their waists, their glistening, supple bodies as alert as panthers, crouched over the enormous guns.

Up from the sea appeared the great fighting machines of the enemy. They could not run away this time. Inveigled into range of the Allied ships, the Hun must fight at last!

A word spoken into a telephone from the conning tower to one of the fighting tops! Then, an instant later, to Turret Number One! A roar that shook the ship and seemed to shake the very heavens, while the flash of the fourteen-inch rifle blinded for a second the spectators!

A cheer rose from all parts of the ship, even before the tops signaled a hit. After that the men fought the ship in silence.

Alone in the corridor, Whistler Morgan felt that it would be easier to be on active duty in this time of stress. Yet he had been taught that his station was quite as important as that of any other man or boy aboard.

Through the half open door of the handling room he heard other men loading powder bags and shells upon the electric ammunition hoist that led to the turret above.

Suddenly the whole ship staggered. A deafening explosion, different from that of the guns, shocked him. An enemy shell had burst aboard the Kennebunk!

"Relief!"

Whistler sprang through the corridor and up to the gun deck. Was the call for him?

He stopped to look at a perspiring gun crew. They worked the gun with the precision of automatons. Wherever the shell had burst it had not interfered with the firing of the huge guns of Number Two Turret.

Another enemy shell burst inboard of the Kennebunk. There was a hail of bits of steel and flying wreckage. Whistler stood squarely on his feet and began to breathe again.

If he was afraid he did not know it!

One of his mates fell back from position. It was not Torry, as Whistler immediately saw. The man's shoulder dripped blood from a raking wound. Had it been Torry, Phil knew he would still have stepped forward, just as he was doing, and have calmly taken the place of the wounded man.

"Keep it up, boys!" grinned the wounded one. "I'll be back soon's the doc gives this the once over."

The work went on. Shell, powder, breech! Ready all! A moment while the captain's finger trembled on the trigger button. Then the hiss of air as the breech swung open, yawning for another charge.

The thousand-pound shell, hurtling through the smoke-filled air, found the vitals of the Kennebunk's immediate enemy. It scarcely shocked Whistler when he peered out to see that vast mountain of steel burst open amidships. She sank in seconds, and the Kennebunk steamed on to attack a second monster of the deep.

The battle continued. Moments seemed longer than minutes; minutes dragged by like hours. The wonder of it all was that so much damage could be done in so short a time.

Ships that had cost months of labor to build settled and disappeared beneath the surface in a few minutes. And their crews? Best not talk about them.

History will relate in detail and with exactness, the story of this fight. The superdreadnaught, so shortly off the ways, endured her baptism of fire, coming through the battle scarred but victorious. Alone she sank two of the enemy.

Her own casualty list was small. But it was some hours after the battle before Philip Morgan made sure that his three friends were safe. Repairs and other necessary work took up the attention of the crew until long past nightfall, although the battle itself had lasted just under two hours.

Then Phil found Al first, for they had fought in the same turret. They went to look for the younger boys, and came across an agile little chap with his head done up in bandages, working with a deck-washing crew aft of Turret Number Three, which had been wrecked by a Hun shell.

"It's Ikey!" shouted Torry. "What's the matter with your head, Ikey?"

"Don't say a word," said Ikey, shaking his bandaged head. "The doc used all the gauze he had left aboard after binding those up that was really hurt."

"But you've got some kind of a wound, haven't you?" demanded Whistler.

"Oi, oi! I ought to have, eh? But it's only that boil I had coming on the back of my neck. You remember? Somehow the head got knocked off of it and it was bleeding. So the doc grabbed me and bandaged me like this," he added in a much disgusted tone.

It was Michael Donahue who proudly showed himself later with his arm in a sling. He had actually got a piece of shell through the flesh below his elbow. The others were inclined to scorn his wound as they did Ikey's boil.

"That'll do for you fellers," said Frenchy proudly. "By St. Patrick's piper that played the last snake out of Ireland! I've shed me blood for Uncle Sam! That is something you garbies haven't done. And, oh, goodness! Ain't I hungry—just!"

* * * * *

Because of the repairs necessary to the Kennebunk she was ordered home; but to the delight of the four Navy boys they, with Hertig and Mr. MacMasters, were not to go with her.

The Colodia was now one of the destroyer fleet chasing German submarines in the Bay of Biscay. They were ordered to meet the destroyer at a certain English port and would rejoin their old comrades and continue their training under Lieutenant Commander Lang.

Much as they disliked leaving their comrades on the superdreadnaught, active service, and of a new kind, was ahead of them, as will be related in the next volume of this "Navy Boys Series."

"We can't kick," declared Torry. "We got into the Navy to work, not to loaf. We've seen a good deal of service, and of several different kinds. But there is always something new to learn."

"Sure!" agreed Ikey. "I've wrote my papa and mama that although I ain't an admiral yet, I'll be something or other before I get home."

"True for you!" exclaimed Frenchy. "But just what you'll be is hard telling, Ikey. Even that old witch of the island couldn't foretell your finish, I bet."

"That reminds me," said Whistler. "Mr. MacMasters told me he read in an American paper that he just got hold of that they have arrested Franz Linder, the spy. He will be tried for blowing up the Elmvale dam. And I guess we had something to do to getting evidence that will convict him. The ensign says we will have to give our testimony about the infernal machine before Captain Trevor before the superdreadnaught leaves this port for home."

"Say!" said Torry with energy, "hasn't this been a great old cruise?"

And his three mates emphatically agreed.

THE END



The Young Reporter Series

By HOWARD R. GARIS

12mo. cloth, illustrated and with full colored jacket

Fascinating stories of great mysteries and extreme perils—the life of a daring young reporter for a metropolitan daily, written by one who was himself a reporter for sixteen years.

THE YOUNG REPORTER AT THE BIG FLOOD Or the Perils of News Gathering

THE YOUNG REPORTER AND THE LAND SWINDLERS Or The Queer Adventures in a Great City

THE YOUNG REPORTER AND THE MISSING MILLIONAIRE Or A Strange Disappearance

THE YOUNG REPORTER AND THE BANK MYSTERY Or Stirring Doings in Wall Street

THE YOUNG REPORTER AND THE STOLEN BOY Or A Chase on the Great Lakes

THE YOUNG REPORTER AT THE BATTLE FRONT Or a War Correspondent's Double Mission

GEORGE SULLY & COMPANY Publishers New York



Joe Strong Series

12mo. cloth, colored jacket and illustrated

Vance Barnum is a real treasure when it comes to telling about how magicians do their weird tricks, how the circus acrobats pull off their various stunts, how the "fishman" remains under water so long, how the mid-air performers loop the loop and how the slackwire fellow keeps from tumbling. He has been through it all and he writes freely for the boys from his vast experience. They are real stories bound to hold their audiences breathlessly.

JOE STRONG, THE BOY WIZARD Or Mysteries of Magic Exposed

JOE STRONG ON THE TRAPEZE Or The Daring Feats of a Young Circus Performer

JOE STRONG, THE BOY FISH Or Marvellous Doings in a Big Tank

JOE STRONG ON THE HIGH WIRE Or A Motorcycle of the Air

JOE STRONG AND HIS WINGS OF STEEL Or A Young Acrobat in the Clouds

JOE STRONG AND HIS BOX OF MYSTERY Or The Ten Thousand Dollar Prize Trick

JOE STRONG, THE BOY FIRE-EATER Or The Most Dangerous Performance on Record

GEORGE SULLY & COMPANY Publishers New York



* * * * *



Transcriber's Notes:

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

Page 47, "swifty" changed to "swiftly" (the swiftly approaching)

Page 62, "swifty" changed to "swiftly" (he described swiftly)

Page 93, "saluate" changed to "salute" (trying to salute)

Page 131, "U-Boat" changed to "U-boat" to conform to rest of text

Page 144, "agan" changed to "again" (again and again)

Page 151, "overwhelmn" changed to "overwhelm" (threatened to overwhelm)

Page 156, "sharts" changed to "charts" (marked on the charts)

Page 157, "finshing" changed to "fishing" (so the fishing boats)

Page 191, "Frency" changed to "Frenchy" (demanded Frenchy excitedly)

THE END