“It wouldn’t do, shipmate,” he stated. “In the first place, we’d have to capture some member of Scorpia who looked enough like me to make my disguise and substitution possible. Next, I’d have to find a way to open that man’s mind out flat, and memorize everything he knew. It’s all very well to dream about, but you know yourself such breaks only come once in a lifetime.”
“Unless you make ’em, Skipper!” returned the stocky lieutenant, pushing himself up to his feet. “For instance, you could get yourself kicked out of the Navy—dishonorably discharged—stripped of your commission—disgraced publicly before your shipmates. Suppose you did that, and were determined to get revenge on the Navy for breaking you. Just where, then, would you be most likely to turn for help? Answer me, Don!”
For ten seconds the young commander stood gaping in stark amazement at the wildness of Red Pennington’s scheme. Slowly his expression changed to a boyish grin.
“I get you now, Red!” he said admiringly. “For sheer, crazy daring, your idea takes the cake. It’s fantastic, goofy, impossible, and yet—the more I think about it the more it grows on me, sailor! We’ll talk it over with Michael Splendor in any case, and see....”
With a sudden leap, Don Winslow cleared the space to the cabin door and yanked it violently open. A crouched figure outside dodged back, ducking around a corner. The officer sprang after him, only to trip and go sprawling in the “cabin country” just outside.
Ruefully he got to his feet and re-entered the door, closing it after him.
“Looks as if that poison gas left my legs kind of wobbly, too!” he grumbled, seating himself on his berth. “I almost caught Mr. Snooper at that. But, Red! You see what this means? There’s at least one Scorpion spy aboard this vessel! He probably got an earful of our conversation, too, and....”
“BOO-OOM! BR-ROM-BOOM!”
The heavy explosions came from somewhere inshore. Red Pennington leaped from his chair to join Don Winslow at the cabin’s porthole. They were in time to see a huge mushroom of earth and water rise high over the jungle at the edge of the little cove.
Closer to the ship, and traveling nearer at appalling speed, rose a low wall of water—a miniature tidal wave created by the blast. As it struck the Gatoon’s port bow, the decks tilted crazily, like those of a toy boat. After the wave had passed there came a dull roar of water rushing into a vast crater in the cove’s white beach.