"And what were you doing all this time?" inquired one of the officers of the embarrassed witness.
"Picking stickers out of myself, sir."
"What! Be careful, young man; this is no time for levity."
"Well, sir, I guess if you had fallen into a tack-tus bush you'd have been picking those vegetable tenpenny nails out of your system for a while, too," replied Herc in an aggrieved tone, while suspicious twitches appeared about the corners of the mouths of several of the assembly. Rear-Admiral Gibbons got up and gazed out of the window for a moment to conceal his smiles at the naïve rejoinder of the red-headed youth.
Suddenly he turned, with a sharp exclamation.
"Gentlemen," he exclaimed, "here comes the automobile, or one just like it, that those two precious rascals, the Pulsifers, used. I've seen it before. As it was the only one in Guantanamo, I remarked it especially."
The officers crowded to the window, and Herc would have joined them, but a marine barred his way.
"Get back, young feller," he warned, suggestively pointing his bayonet.
"Huh! I guess you never had a friend in trouble," grunted Herc, going back to his witness chair in high dudgeon.
But the auto, instead of coming up to the hotel, turned off two blocks below.