Almost immediately he closed his eyes, drifting off into stupor.

"Why, your friend _is_ drowsy, isn't he?" laughed the bearded one, turning to the submarine skipper.

Jack Benson's own eyelids were suspiciously close together.

"Why-what-ails you?"

Curtis spoke in a low, droning, far-away voice that caused Jack Benson's upper eyelids to sink. Curtis stood watching him, in malicious glee, for some moments. Then, at last, he took hold of the young skipper.

"Come, old fellow," coaxed the bearded one, "you'll do best to join your friend in a good nap. Get up in the berth."

"Lemme alone," protested the boy, thickly, feeling that he was being lifted. Jack struggled, partly rousing himself.

"Come, get up into the berth. You'll be more comfortable there."

"Lemme alone. What are you trying to do?" demanded Jack, swinging an arm.

Curtis dodged the light blow, then gripped Jack Benson resolutely.

"Now, see here, young man," hissed the bearded one, "I'm not going to have any more nonsense out of you. Up into the berth you go! Do you want me to hit you?"

Another man thrust his head down the cabin hatchway, showing an evil, grinning face.

"Got 'em right?" demanded the one from the hatchway.

"Yes," snapped the bearded one, then turned to give his attention to Jack Benson, who was putting up an ineffectual fight while Hal slumbered on.

"Now, see here, Benson, quit all your fooling!"

"You lemme up," insisted the submarine boy, in a low, dull voice, though he swung both his arms in an effort to a.s.sert himself. "'M not goin' t'

stay here. Lemme up, I say! 'M goin' back to-own boat."

"The submarine?" jeered the bearded man.

"Yep."

"Guess again, son," laughed Curtis, jeeringly. "You're not going back aboard the submarine to-night."

"Am so," declared Benson, obstinately, though his tone was growing more drowsy every instant, and his busy hands moved almost as weakly as an infant's.

"Listen, if you've got enough of your senses left," growled the bearded men. "You're not going back to the 'Farnum'-neither to-night, nor at any other time during the next few months. You're bound on a long cruise, but not on a submarine boat. I am the captain here, and I'll name the cruise!"

CHAPTER XVIII: HELD UP BY MARINES

It was barely a minute afterward that Jack Benson lapsed into a very distinct snore.

"No more trouble from this pair," laughed the bearded one to his companion at the hatchway. "Now, I'll douse the cabin light, and then we'll cast off. This thing has moved along very slickly."

Eph, after having made up his mind to turn in early, had found his sleepy fit pa.s.sing. He read for a while in the cabin, then pulled on a reefer and went up on deck. Williamson was already in a berth, sound asleep.

"It would be a fine night if there was a moon," Eph remarked to the marine sentry on deck.

"Yes, sir."

The marine-"soldier, and sailor, too"-not being there for conversational purposes, continued his slow pacing, his rifle resting over his right shoulder.

As Eph strolled about in the limited s.p.a.ce of the platform deck he heard a distant creaking. It was a sound that he well knew-the hoisting of sail.

"I wonder if the local fishermen start out at this time of the night?" Eph Somers remarked, musingly, to the sentry.

"It may be so, sir; I don't know," replied the marine.

Presently Eph made out the lines and the spread of canvas of a handsome knockabout sloop standing on out of the harbor.

The course being narrow, the sloop was obliged to sail rather close to the fleet.

"That's no fisherman!" muttered Somers, watching, his hands thrust deep in his pockets.

Presently the sloop's hull was lost to Eph's sight beyond the gunboat.

Then the boy heard a voice from the "Hudson's" deck roar out:

"Look alive, you lubber! Do you want to foul our anchor chain?"

"No, sir," came from the sloop's deck. "We'll clear you all right."

"See that you do, then!"

Then the sloop's hull came into view again, as the craft headed out toward the open water beyond.

"That's the kind of a craft Jack would give a heap to be on," thought Eph.

"Queer that he should spend all his time on gasoline peanut-roasters when he's so fond of whistling for a breeze behind canvas."

As the sloop neared the mouth of the little bay, and her lines became rather indistinct in the darkness, Eph Somers turned to resume his pacing of the deck.

"Hullo," muttered the submarine boy, two or three minutes later. "Here's the sh.o.r.e boat coming on its regular trip. I wonder if Jack and Hal are in it? It's about time for them to be coming on board."

But the sh.o.r.e boat, instead of coming out to the submarine, lay in at the side gangway of the gunboat opposite, and Eph discovered that his two comrades were not in the boat.

"I say," hailed Eph, "have you seen Mr. Benson and Mr. Hastings on sh.o.r.e!"

"No, sir," replied the petty officer in charge.

Then one of the sailors in the boat spoke in an undertone.