By degrees this feeling of depression passed away. They were healthy
boys, and as such could not long remain in the grip of the “blues.” It
was all their own doings, too, and they were headed for an experience
that certainly no other young fellows had ever been given before.
Soon they were taking an interest in all that went on around them.
Oyster boats with the men at work dredging or tonging; duck hunters in
blinds, or lying, it might be, in sink-boxes on the shallows with their
decoys all around them--things like these were constantly cropping
up to be observed through the marine glasses which they had been
thoughtful enough to provide themselves with before starting on the
voyage.
The afternoon sun was sinking toward the western horizon, and it was
figured that by morning they would have arrived close to the ocean at
Hampton Roads.
“How fast are we going, do you think, boys?” Ballyhoo was asking, while
they continued to sit there and enjoy the bracing air of that late Fall
afternoon.
“That’s hard to decide,” Oscar told him. “I understand that this boat
can make about seventeen miles on the surface of the water, providing
the sea is fairly calm. We may be doing nearly that right now.”
“And when she sinks down under the sea, what is she capable of doing
then?” continued Ballyhoo, always eager for facts.
“Oh! I think it was about eight or nine knots an hour, which would be
pretty good, all things considered,” Oscar replied.
“Our quarters are pretty cramped and we’ll be crowded a whole lot,”
Jack said in a reflective way, “but we expected that before we came.
Your uncle told us, Ballyhoo, we’d likely have to put up with many
discomforts, and lack of space would be one of them.”
“What’s the odds so long as we’re happy,” Ballyhoo Jones laughingly
declared. “We can be as snug as three bugs in a rug. There are some
things a heap worse than being crowded. Sitting up in a bally old tree
the livelong night, with a pair of hungry lions prowling around under
you is one of them.”
“Yes, you know all about that sort of thing, Ballyhoo,” chuckled Oscar;
“also how being almost devoured by cannibal ants feels. But we’re not
going to run across anything like that on _this_ trip, I reckon.”
“Oh! give things a chance, boys,” said Ballyhoo, confidently, “and
there’ll be adventures a-plenty cropping up to make our hearts jump
like mad. This time it may be storms, pirates, a damaged engine while
we’re lying at the bottom of the sea so we can’t rise for air, and all
that sort of thing.”
“What are you staring so hard at through the glasses, Jack?” asked
Oscar, giving little heed to the pleasant prospect thus outlined so
cheerfully by Ballyhoo, for he knew very well the other was only joking
when he rattled these possible perils off so glibly.
“Why, I was watching that black steam yacht over there a mile or so
away from us,” Jack remarked, lowering the marine glasses as he spoke.
“I could see a fellow in some sort of uniform holding glasses on us
right along. I guess he must be wondering whether we mightn’t prove to
be a German submarine that had strayed across the broad Atlantic, like
they threaten to do some of these fine days, to sink British munition
steamships close to our shores, rather than wait for them to get over
into the waters they’ve marked as the war zone.”
“I tell you what I think,” he observed a minute afterwards, “that same
black steam yacht may be our rival, the _Dauntless_, and the man who is
watching us all the while would then be that rollicking old world-wide
adventurer, Captain Badger, who has sailed the Seven Seas from boyhood,
been everything from blockade-runner to naval officer, and perhaps a
little of a pirate on the sly besides.”
“Whew! do you really think so, Oscar?” cried Ballyhoo; “please let me
have a peek at him then. I’ve heard so much about the old reprobate I’d
love to say I’d actually set eyes on his phiz, even at a mile away.”
“We may see a little more of him than we want, before we’re done with
this job,” Oscar told him, with the air of a prophet, but Ballyhoo only
laughed, for he was not the one to cross any bridge before he came to
it.
Just then Captain Barnaby Shooks, the man who had been placed in full
charge of the treasure-hunting expedition by the incorporated company,
came up the ladder from the conning-tower of the submarine boat. He was
a grizzled old sea dog, who had seen much of life on many waters, and
was well qualified to manage just such a strange mission as the one
that had been placed in his hands.
He too carried a glass which he quickly focussed on the black steam
yacht that was evidently capable of making much faster time than the
low _Argonaut_, often almost awash.
“We’ve about made up our minds, Captain,” remarked Ballyhoo, who had
struck up quite an intimate acquaintance with the commander, after his
frank, confiding fashion, “that yonder vessel might be the _Dauntless_,
our rival in the salvage trade. Were we right about that, sir?”
“It’s the _Dauntless_, sure enough,” the captain told them, “and
they’re holding in as if they’d like to shadow us all the way down to
where we’re going.”
“Oh! could they do that?” demanded Ballyhoo, in dismay.
“Well, if you’ve ever tried to clap your finger on a flea,” laughed the
old mariner, “you’d know what it means to keep tabs on a boat that can
duck under the surface of the sea, and stay there for ten hours, moving
all the while.”
Captain Barnaby Shooks somehow did not seem to talk as most sea
captains do in stories. He never once said “shiver my timbers” or used
any similar phrase that was calculated to stamp him as a nautical man.
Perhaps this arose from the fact that many years had elapsed since
last he trod the deck of a genuine sailing vessel. With the gradual
disappearance of the full-rigged ships, the brigs, and the barques, all
that peculiar language is going out of date. Mechanics have taken the
places of the old-time sailors accustomed to clambering up the shrouds,
and standing on the yards of a ship reeling in an eighty mile gale.
When later on, after the sun had set, the boys prepared to go down
below for supper, that black steam yacht was still on their lee
quarter, and apparently bound to keep within sighting distance.
“Goodness gracious!” Ballyhoo was remarking the last thing before he
crept down the steep little ladder leading into the conning tower, from
which place they could reach the lower parts of the queer vessel, “I
only hope they don’t mean to ram us in the night-time, and so get rid
of a dangerous rival.”
“Not much danger of that,” Oscar assured him. “Captain Shooks will
keep a faithful watch every minute of the time. And besides, I’ve got
a sneaking suspicion that those fellows don’t know all we do about the
location of sunken treasure, also that their plan is to spy on us, and
then steal our thunder.”
They did not go on deck again after partaking of the evening meal in
the little saloon devoted to cabin purposes, in which, as Ballyhoo
said, was not room to “whirl a cat around by the tail.” The night air
was cold, and the blackness would prevent them from seeing anything
worth while.
None of them secured much sleep during that first night. Everything
was against it, for their quarters were terribly cramped, and the air
anything but fresh, even though the boat continued to remain upon the
surface of the water all through the night.
“Whee! just imagine what it’s going to be when we’re down under the
surface of the sea,” said Ballyhoo, at one time, as they prepared to
lie down in their bunks, placed above each other in a tier.
“Oh! you can get used to most anything in time,” Jack assured him, “if
only you make up your mind that way. Always think of something that’s a
whole lot worse, and it’s wonderful how satisfied you soon feel.”
The boat rolled somewhat later on in the night, and Oscar, being awake,
made up his mind that no doubt they were coming closer to the wide
mouth of the great bay, so that they now encountered the long inward
sweep of the ocean’s heaving billows.
Sure enough, when, after awakening to find that it was morning, for
light came in through the heavy glass observation bull’s-eyes arranged
in numerous places, the boys upon reaching the deck again discovered
that they could look far out to sea, as the submarine had already
passed Fortress Monroe and was now awaiting the coming of a cutter
from a black destroyer carrying the U. S. flag, that had shot out to
overtake them.
An officer came aboard, and was shown down into the captain’s
diminutive cabin, where no doubt he looked over the ship’s papers,
asked many questions concerning the proposed voyage, which must have
interested him considerably, and finally said “good-bye and good luck”
to the smiling skipper.
Then the engines once more began to throb, and the boat to quiver with
the energy they displayed. The boys, looking back toward the beautiful
shores they were leaving, again had their thoughts turn toward the
folks at home. But the summons to breakfast dissipated all such sad
reflections; and when an hour later they again came on deck the shore
was dim and hazy in the distance.
Evidently they were now well started on their interesting voyage. What
the outcome was going to be could only be guessed at; but hope ran high
in all their hearts.
“There’s our friend, the enemy, just as we expected would be the case!”
cried Ballyhoo Jones as he pointed to a dim spot several miles off,
and which seemed to be some sort of black boat, also bound south.
“I’m looking at something else, though,” remarked Oscar. “That bank of
clouds lying low along the horizon in the south seems to have a storm
hidden in it. And we are heading straight that way in the bargain.”
“Oh! perhaps it’s only a little squall, such as they often meet in
these waters,” Jack was saying. “The West Indian hurricane season is
pretty well over by now, you know, or else the expedition wouldn’t have
started when it did.”
“But even a little storm would send the waves clean over this low
boat,” suggested Ballyhoo. “I’m not a born sailor, and I don’t want to
seem bothered when there’s no danger, but you can see how we wallow at
times right now, when we run smack up against one of those long swells.”
“You mustn’t forget,” Oscar told him, “that we’ve got one way of
snapping our fingers at the wind and the waves when the time comes.”
“Course you mean by submerging, Oscar,” continued the other, grinning
amiably. “I had that in mind all the while, but was only fishing to
find out what you other fellows thought about it. The wind seems to be
increasing a whole lot, and, yes sir, those clouds are rising right
now. Whee! looks like we’ll experience our first dip below the waves
before another hour goes by.”
As the clouds rose higher the sea began to look black. Although they
knew what caused this the boys could not keep from feeling a little
anxious, especially when the waves commenced to splash them with scud,
as they struck the bow of the dipping submarine and broke.
They were really glad, therefore, when the captain ordered them to go
below, as it was necessary to make preparations against foul weather.
For some time afterwards the little boat labored heavily, until
Ballyhoo began to feel the first signs of uneasiness in the pit of his
stomach.
All of them felt relieved when they discovered that they were
commencing to sink. The water tanks were being filled rapidly, and
before long they realized that in truth they had vanished from the
surface of the sea.
How calm it seemed down there, with the engines once more taking up
their regular pulsations. The boys glued their eyes to the thick
plate-glass observation bull’s-eyes, but all they could see when the
searchlight was turned on was rushing green water all around them.
Doubtless the storm raged above as the squall spread over the sea, but
safe in the stanch little submarine, far beneath the troubled surface,
they knew nothing of it. By degrees the three chums became more used
to their strange surroundings. The experience of novelty began to wear
away. When one becomes accustomed to anything it no longer has the
power to excite wonder, and give the same kind of thrill.
Later on they could sleep calmly when lying at the bottom of the sea,
even though the manufactured air did seem queer, and breathing not
as comfortable as under ordinary conditions, with the pure article to
inhale.
Hours passed during which they continued to forge ahead. Oscar figured
that they were making something like eight knots an hour while pushing
through the depths.
Then came the time when they arose to take an observation through the
periscope. The boys, of course, had to be allowed a chance to see, of
which they hastened to avail themselves eagerly.
Never would they forget that first experience at looking through the
periscope of a submarine far out at sea. The still heaving waters,
running far away to the horizon, looked startling to their unaccustomed
eyes. It seemed as though they might be lying on the edge of the world
itself, and looking over a vast undulating plain.
When the captain judged that it would be safe to come up, as the storm
had passed, and the sea was no longer rough, he gave the order.
Again the boys sought their old stand up on the small deck where the
ventilation shafts protruded, and the periscope reared its lofty head.
Everywhere they looked the same tumbling waters met their gaze. Not a
vessel was in sight, even through the glasses.
“We’ve given the _Dauntless_ the slip, all right!” Ballyhoo hastened to
boast after he had made sure of this fact.
“But the chances are we’ll see considerably more of that same boat
before we’re through with this voyage,” said Jack; and subsequent
happenings proved him a true prophet, as will be made manifest later on
in this story.