“I’ll say we were,” declared Frank, slangily.
“Then,” continued the doctor, “when I returned to the engine room, the Chinese all left. Perhaps they suspected some treachery toward them was going on. At any rate, they scampered for the forecastle, and Engineer MacFinney couldn’t stop them with his curses and blows.
“A moment or two later, Matt Murphy came into the engine room. Mr. MacFinney was working at his gauges. Murphy beckoned me, and I followed to the deck. He asked me to help him lower a boat and tie it to the stern. He said the Chinese were plotting an attack even then, and that if I wanted to save my life I must carry out his orders. I obeyed.
“As we worked, I asked whether he was coming, too? ‘No,’ said he, ‘ye’ll be picked up by Uncle Sam’s men. Them byes are calling a speedy patrol boat by radio right now. I want to get ’em off an’ away quick, so we can escape in the trawler. I don’t want to be put in prison the rest o’ my life.’
“‘But this trawler is slow,’ I protested. ‘How can you hope to escape from a fast patrol boat?’
“‘Fog,’ said he. ‘I can smell it comin’. After last night’s storm, it’s bound to come up. If it only comes in time we can hide in it, an’ that’s our chance.’”
So interested had all been in Doctor Marley’s narrative they had paid no attention to their surroundings. Now, at Frank’s cry, they glanced around.
“Here it comes, too,” Frank added, pointing toward the trawler. The vessel was more than two miles away, and making fast going. As Frank pointed, a wall of fog sweeping across the water engulfed it. One moment, the trawler stood out clear and distinct. The next, it had disappeared entirely from sight, and the fog was rolling toward them.
“Good heavens,” cried Doctor Marley, “we’ll be lost in mid-ocean. How can the patrol boat find us?”
“Here she comes now,” Frank shouted, pointing to the southwest, where the sun yet shone.
“Two or three miles away yet,” said Jack, anxiously, estimating the distance to where the speedy little craft was sending up two columns of water before her prow.
“Frank, you hold the rudder so that we make a small circle, and Bob and Jack, do you row easily,” called Mr. Temple. “That will be better than merely drifting. The Sub Chaser evidently sees us. It must, for it is undoubtedly on the lookout. It ought to be up in fifteen minutes. Presently we’ll begin to shout.”