But you get the idea
just the same. But, boy, oh boy! If we only could get word to Colonel
Welsh and Admiral Jackson. Darn it, Freddy! We've got to, somehow. We've
just got to!"

"No doubt of it," Freddy mumbled gloomily in the darkness. "But how?
That's the stickler, old thing. _How?_"

"I don't know," Dawson murmured. "But maybe we'll get some kind of a
break. If we don't, we'll just have to make one, that's all. This Jap
rat who shot us down, I wonder how he figures to fly us to Suicide's
force?"

"That one is easy," Freddy Farmer sighed. "You'll see. Tied hand and
foot, and jammed down into the rear pit of that seaplane like a couple
of sardines, I fancy. No, I don't think I'm looking forward to that
particular airplane ride."

"Yeah, like a couple of helpless sardines, probably," Dave murmured.
"Yes, I guess I can think of more comfortable flights I've had, too.
Oh, well, a guy can always hope."

And with that listless comment Dave lapsed into brooding silence, and
Freddy Farmer joined him. For quite some time neither of them spoke.
What was there to say, anyway? What was there to say that hadn't already
been spoken? Absolutely nothing. And so it was better just to sit and
keep one's thoughts to oneself. What the future would bring it would
bring, and that was that!

After a long, long spell of mutual silence a sudden change in the
movement of the U-boat told them both that the undersea craft was going
up to the surface. Dawson grunted and sat up a little straighter.

"Up we go," he grunted. "So things will be happening soon."

"Can't say I'd be mad if said things were bombs dropping on this thing
from a chance plane or two of ours!" Freddy Farmer growled. "The way I
feel right now, I don't think I'd mind at all. Oh, blast it! I guess
that gun slap from that Jap rotter did do something to my nerve. I feel
in an awful funk, Dave."

"Swell, perfect, pal!" Dave said with a chuckle. "Keep right on feeling
that way, and everything will be okay."

"Not much it will!" the English youth grated. "And what the deuce do you
mean by that crack, anyway?"

"I mean that I've seen you like this before, and plenty!" Dawson told
him, and squeezed his arm in the darkness. "And those other times you
just hauled back and knocked 'em high, wide and handsome. So it's okay
by me, kid. Very much okay. You'll get us some action, if I don't."

"Thanks, old thing," Freddy said with a faint huskiness in his voice.
"And I am a r