“I hit it for you to keep you quiet,” burst out Nat; “and if you don’t shut up now, I’ll bust it again.”
Going on deck, the three lads found that it had grown lighter. But the water still boiled about them furiously. Clouds of sulphurous steam arose from it, making them cough and choke.
In the brighter light they had quite an extensive view of their surroundings. But, of the islands, not a trace appeared. They had vanished as if they had been the fabric of a dream.
“By George! I have it!” cried Joe suddenly. “Those islands were of volcanic origin. Didn’t you notice how bare and bleak they were? I’ll bet that in this disturbance, whatever it is, they have subsided as suddenly as they arose.”
“Such cases are not uncommon,” rejoined Nat. “Only last year, Captain Rose, of the missionary schooner Galilee, of San Francisco, reported seeing an island of some extent arise and then vanish again before his very eyes.”
“W-w-w-well,” sputtered Ding-dong, with a grin and a return to his old manner, “w-w-w-we can r-r-r-report the same thing; but as t-t-this isn’t a go-go-gospel schooner maybe nobody w-w-w-will believe us.”
“My suggestion is, that we get the engines going and get out of this without delay,” said Nat.
“Here, too,” agreed Joe Hartley. “There’s nothing to hang about here for.”
An examination of the engines showed that, in falling, Ding-dong had shut off the gasolene supply valve, and had thus stopped the motors. This was soon remedied and the motors set going again. As the Nomad cut her way through the boiling sea where lately the twin islands had stood, they all felt like raising a fervent prayer of thanks to Providence for their wonderful deliverance.
“I’ve often heard of such things on the Pacific, but I never expected to live through one,” was Nat’s comment.