“But that isn’t saying it wasn’t the original cause of the accident,” declared Ned. “I’d like to get hold of that pepper-pot and tell him what I think of him.”
“They’ll do more than tell him, provided they can prove that he had anything to do with it,” commented Jerry.
“And it certainly looks as if he had—the way they’re keeping him a prisoner in that cabin,” asserted Ned.
“We aren’t sure he is there,” answered the tall lad.
“I’m pretty sure,” Ned asserted. “Well, there’s no hope for it. All we can do now is to drift around, wait for a wireless message, or——”
“Sail home!” interrupted Bob. “Look, here come some sailors now, getting ready to put up some sort of sail.”
This, indeed, seemed to be the case. A number of men came on deck, and then an effort began to have sails take the place of steam power. There were two masts on the craft, used, ordinarily, to support the wireless apparatus. It was determined, now, to fasten sails on these sticks of steel.
True not much speed could be hoped for, as the Sherman was a big craft and powerful engines were required to move her. But it was hoped that such sails as could be rigged would at least give her steerage way, and this would be needed, in case of a storm, to keep her head on to the waves. Though there was bitter disappointment over the failure of the repairs to the engines, there was hope in the sails.
So interested were the three chums in this that, for the time, they forgot about the mysterious cabin and its occupant, guarded by two marines.
Rumor had it that the engine room was a wreck, but whether this was because of the explosion of the steam pipe, which had caused injuries to a number of men, or to the explosion of a bomb, no one seemed to know for certain. All that was sure was that the engines were out of commission.