r quickly answered. The steamer remained by the two boats from
the sunken schooner until the fast-flying naval vessel appeared in the
west.

After that the boys on the steamer kept their eyes open for sight of the
camouflaged U-boat. As the boat picked up speed again and kept to her
course. Whistler Morgan and his mates discussed the matter with much
excitement.

"Do you s'pose Mr. MacMasters will let us shell the Hun?" demanded
Frenchy eagerly.

"She'll more likely shell us," declared Torry, inclined to be
pessimistic.

"I bet we can run away from her," cried Ikey Rosenmeyer.

"Say! this tender is no sub chaser. In a race with the S. P. 888, for
instance, she wouldn't have a chance."

"Aw, well," Frenchy broke in, "that U-boat will not have a speed of over
fourteen knots on the surface. We can do better than that."

"But if she sneaks up on us as that other one did on the _Kennebunk_,"
Whistler observed, "we might easily be potted."

"Right-o!" declared Torry. "Whichever way you put it, I don't want to
see that U-boat till we're aboard the _Kennebunk_ again--if ever."

After leaving the crew of the _Hattie May_ to be picked up by the
destroyer, the tender continued to run parallel with the coast. Land was
seldom wholly out of sight, for Mr. MacMasters had orders as to his
course, expecting to meet the superdreadnaught on that vessel's return
from the south.

The fog in which they had run out from the Capes was the forerunner of a
storm which increased as the day advanced. The gale was behind them,
however, so there was no fear of the tender being cast ashore.

The sea around Cape Hatteras is notoriously rough in a gale, and the
outlook was not promising when they sighted Hatteras Light that evening.
Seaworthy as the steamer was, she pitched terrifically in the seas that
threatened now to overwhelm her.

There was a pale and watery moon that evening, with wind-driven clouds
scurrying across its face and quenching its light every few minutes. The
steamer pitched so that her propeller was frequently entirely out of the
sea.

Phil Morgan, in his watch on deck, thought the situation was as nasty as
any he had experienced since joining the Navy. With every hatch and door
battened to keep the seas from flooding her, they ran on, making
scarcely five knots an hour. Now and then they were completely
overwhelmed with the seas; and always the craft plunged and kicked as
though she actually had to fight for suprem