It was blowing a whole gale (in nautical language, sixty-five miles or more an hour) and as the submarine chaser was meeting the seas on a slant, it might almost as well have been a hurricane. As Frenchy said:
"The smaller the boat, the bigger the wind seems. And a 'happy thought' like this chaser will kick up like a frisky colt in a dead calm, I do believe. By St. Patrick's piper that played the last snake out of Ireland! I'll be a week gittin' over this pitchin'. What d'you say, Mister Torrance, acushla?"
"Hast thou a feeling that all is not well in the daypartment av the intayrior?" teased the Irish lad, who would joke at all times and upon the most serious subjects.
"Torry does look a bit green about the gills," put in Whistler.
"Serves him right for eatin' crab-meat salad there at Yancey's," declared Ikey Rosenmeyer. "That's nice chow to go to sea on, yet."
"I don't have to ask you what to eat," said Torry gruffly.
"Oi, oi! That's right," agreed Ikey. "Just the same I could tell you lots better than that."
The boys had sampled the cook's coffee, but not much else, since embarking on the S. P. 888. It was true that the pitching of the chaser was not conducive to a ravenous appetite.
"If Uncle kept all his bluejackets on these submarine chasers," said Whistler, "he'd save money on grub. I wonder these fellows," referring to the crew of the S. P. 888, "manage to keep up with their rations."
The little craft swerved at last and took the waves directly astern as she ran shoreward. The mouth of the harbor opened up to her, and in the gray light, as the chaser shot in between the headlands, almost smothered in foam, the men and boys on her deck sighted through the haze the towering hull of the great battleship.
"There she is!" gasped Frenchy. "My! isn't she a monster?"
"She's a regular leviathan," agreed Whistler.
Even Torry forgot his discomfort and showed enthusiasm. "She's the biggest thing I ever saw afloat," he said. "Listen, fellows!"
Two strokes of a silvery bell rang out from some ship asleep in the morning mist. It was five o'clock. From the decks of the battleship sounded the bugles of the boatswain's mates, piping reveille and "all hands."
"Gee!" groaned Frenchy, "reg'lar duty again, fellows."