"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 n.o.body 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 a.s.signed 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 pa.s.s without some additional excitement. The cutter pa.s.sed 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 sh.e.l.l 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 sh.e.l.ls 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 sh.e.l.l from the destroyer dropped fairly upon the deck of the U-boat, just abaft the conning tower.