Again the boys sought their old stand up on the small deck where the ventilation shafts protruded, and the periscope reared its lofty head.
Everywhere they looked the same tumbling waters met their gaze. Not a vessel was in sight, even through the glasses.
“We’ve given the Dauntless the slip, all right!” Ballyhoo hastened to boast after he had made sure of this fact.
“But the chances are we’ll see considerably more of that same boat before we’re through with this voyage,” said Jack; and subsequent happenings proved him a true prophet, as will be made manifest later on in this story.
CHAPTER III
A PERIL OF TROPICAL WATERS
Days and nights followed. All the time the boat continued to head into the south, and leagues upon leagues were placed behind them. Sometimes they were able to pick up glimpses of land far away to the west; and one night the boys were told that the flashlight they watched, so like a distant star, was Jupiter Light situated at the lower extremity of the Indian River in Florida. Off somewhere in the opposite quarter lay the Bahamas, and Old Nassau, of which they had read so often.
They were now getting down to a warm climate, and on this account spent as much time on deck as possible. Here the ocean breeze fanned their already ruddy cheeks, and they could watch the white-winged gulls and other sea birds flying in eccentric fashion here, there, and everywhere, now dipping to snap up a fragment of food cast overboard, and anon wheeling high overhead, or following the course of the speeding submarine as though keeping time with its progress.
Occasionally they met some vessel bound north. Now it might be a lumber schooner, and then again a coastal steamer. When one of the latter passed not far away the side seemed to be black with people, all staring at the strange, squatty craft, for doubtless the officers passed the word around that it was one of those species of undersea boats that had been creating such terrible havoc across the Atlantic.
So the time slipped along, and one sunny day they drew near an island in the Caribbean Sea where the palms hung low over the water, and made a picture that set Jack busy with his camera, for it was really his first chance to do anything along that favorite line.
“Seems that we’re meaning to lay by here a short spell,” Ballyhoo announced, as the ardent photographer was busying himself with his camera.