“Don’t have to,” Scott said. “But most of ’em try it, sir—some time later. They all want to see Minnie and Winnie.”
“Minnie and Winnie?” March asked. “Who are they and where are they?”
“They’re mermaids,” Scott said without a smile. “Beautiful mermaids. And they’re painted on the walls of the tank down at the hundred-foot level. Only one way to see ’em—and that’s to make the escape. An’ you get a diploma when you’ve done it.”
“I’ll see you there, Scott,” March said. “We’ll both have a look at Winnie and Minnie one of these days.”
CHAPTER FIVE
FIRST DIVE
The next day classes started for March and Stan and the other new officers going through the school. Expecting the most difficult and intensive of studies, March was a little disappointed in the first day’s work.
“Just ground work, I suppose,” he said to Stan at mess that evening. “They couldn’t start throwing the whole book at us on the first day.”
“I think they did pretty well,” Stan said. “I got a big dose of the history and development of the submarine and the construction of modern pigboats. Back in college we’d have taken a week to cover what we got in this one day. But, of course, you’ve read a lot of general stuff about subs. I was so busy studying engineering in college I didn’t look at anything else.”