In fact we are nearing the
southern limit. Have you taken a look forward?"
"No, I haven't," said Hogan, taking vague alarm at Madden's tone.
"What's wrong?"
"I don't see many more big seaweed fields ahead. If she gets us in open
water----"
"Why bad luck to it! Bad luck to it, Oi say!" cried Hogan as the wind
whistled about him; "running us out o' the bushes loike a swamp rabbit."
Just then the submarine veered off her straight course somewhat to
extend her open water run for two or three miles up the edge of the
field. A length view showed her to be a delicate looking craft. Her
sharp prow cut the water with hardly a ripple, in sharp contrast to the
_Vulcan_, which shouldered up a waterfall as she lunged forward.
Suddenly, and rather unexpectedly, the submarine porpoised. There was a
swash of foam, and she was gone.
The men on the poop stepped around to the side of the tug and stared
anxiously southward. Bits of flotsam mottled the blue expanse, but it
really appeared as if the saving drift weed were thinning to nothing.
Hogan glanced back over the way he had come.
"Sure it'll be a fair field and no favor, sweet Peggy O'Neal!" he hummed
nonchalantly under his breath.
At that moment a violent shaking went over the _Vulcan_, and the
short boat swung her prow about with tug-like promptness.
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