enly
thrust up out of the water close to the port gunwale. Filippo cried out
in alarm, but Percy reassured him.

"Only a seal!"

Abruptly the sea grew rough. All around them tossed and streamed and
writhed long, black aprons of kelp. They were passing over a sunken
ledge. Soon it lay behind them; the kelp vanished and the waves grew
lower.

Three o'clock went by; then four. The afternoon was waning. The thick,
woolly gray that surrounded them assumed a more somber shade. Night was
coming, pitchy and starless, doubly so for the two lost boys, adrift on
the open ocean.

Hark! What was that? They both heard it, far distant, off the port bow!
Percy leaped up in excitement.

"The shot-gun!" he cried. "They're signaling!"

Heading the boat toward the sound, he rowed his hardest, while Filippo
strained forward, listening. Ten minutes dragged by, and once
again--_pouf!_--slightly louder, and slightly to starboard. Percy
corrected his course and again threw his whole heart into his rowing.

So it went for an hour, the signals sounding at ten-minute intervals,
each louder and nearer than the one before. At last Percy thought it
possible that their voices might be heard against the wind. He stopped
rowing.

"Now shout, Filippo!"

Their cries pealed out together. They were heard. An answering hail came
back. Soon the puff-puff-puff of the _Barracouta's_ exhaust was driving
rivets through the fog. A little later they were on board the sloop,
answering the inquiries of Jim and Budge, while the empty pea-pod towed
astern.

"Your seamanship wasn't bad, Perce," was Jim's judgment. "After you
dropped the buoy, and then found you'd been rowing into the teeth of the
wind, it might have been better to have tried only to hold your own
until we came out to look you up. That breeze at first was nearer north
than northeast, and when you ran before it you went south past the
island. After that you were all at sea. But I might have done just the
same thing. I can't tell you, though, how glad we are to see you back,
even if it did cost next to our last shell of birdshot. The Gulf of
Maine's a pretty homesick place to be kicking round in on a foggy
night."

"You aren't any gladder than we are," replied Percy.

He glanced at the pea-pod towing astern.

"But say, Jim! Just cast your eye over that tub. When it comes to
catching lobsters, haven't Filippo and I got the rest of the bunch beat
to a frazzle?"

XIV

SWORDFISHING