"Shall you permit them to board?"
"Decidedly not. I have cabled to Washington for instructions. Until they arrive I shall keep everybody off the boat."
"That listens good to me," Ned said.
Boats which seemed to have no business there prowled around the warship all night, and once a sneak was caught hanging to the forward chains. However, no one succeeded in getting aboard.
In the morning the Captain came to Ned's cabin with a number of cablegrams, all from Washington.
"I have orders for you," he said.
Ned yawned and shook his head.
"Not for a submarine trip," he said.
"I am going north," the Captain said, "north through the China Sea, into the Yellow Sea, and so on to the Gulf of Pechili. Do you know where that is?"
"It is the highway to Peking," laughed Ned. "I hope you are not going there."