:

-. ... -. ... -. ...

"N S," Joe jotted down on the sheet before him.

"A ship at sea calling Newport News," Lieutenant Mackinson informed the
other two, who waited impatiently for Joe to begin recording the
message.

Newport News acknowledged the call, and then the vessel's wireless
continued:

.--- .- ... .--. . .-.

And Joe, transcribing, wrote: "JASPER." Following this came:

-.. . - .- .. .-..

The other boys looked on in chagrin, while Lieutenant Mackinson's
countenance took on an amused smile, as Joe wrote down the word
"DETAIL," and then nothing else but the initials "N. N.," which ended
the message.

"Don't make sense," announced Slim in a discouraged voice. "You must
have missed part of it."

"No, I didn't," Joe replied, looking anxiously toward the lieutenant.

"I guess he got it all," the young officer assured them, at the same
time unlocking a little closet and taking a leather-bound book from an
upper shelf. "Let's see."

He turned to the J's and ran his finger down the page until he came to
the word "JASPER."

"That means 'We have coaled,'" he said, writing the words out on the
pad.

"Oh, it's in code," said Slim apologetically; "I didn't know that."

"DETAIL," the lieutenant announced, finding that word. "'Understand and
am following sealed orders'. That's the _North Dakota_. She has coaled
at sea and is now starting upon some mission known only to her commander
and the naval authorities."

Almost as he finished speaking the _Everett_ gave a lurch, her whistle
was tooted two or three times, the engines started turning, and the big
boat began to vibrate under the pressure.

There was a shout from the thousand or more who had crowded to the
river's edge, responded to by the fifteen hundred khaki-clad young men
who were lined up at every point of vantage along the vessel's side.

"And we're off, too," shouted Lieutenant Mackinson.

"Hurrah!" cried the three boys from Brighton in the same breath, as they
double-quicked it behind the lieutenant to the upper deck.

The scene was one to inspire the most miserable slacker. Somewhere in
the upper part of the yard a band was playing Sousa's "Stars and Stripes
Forever." From the windows of the ordnance and other buildings at the
lower end of the yard workmen hung forth, waving hats and handkerchiefs,
and joining in the shouted well-wishes of those along the shore. The
crews of every fighting craft in that part of the river sang out