“Clancy? That club-footed, knock-kneed galoot! Much I care about Clancy. Where’s that package o’ oatmeal I had once? Gruel on a submarine! They’ll be askin’ for asparagus and artichokes next!”
A new party of men entered, three capable looking youngsters not much older than Nelson, and only removing their sea-boots, climbed into bunks. They viewed Nelson with a sort of tired interest, but asked no questions. In something less than three minutes as many new and assorted snores were added to the symphony. Occasionally a sailor passed through toward the bow, or hurried aft again. The sound of voices traveling from the compartments further back reached Nelson as from an underground passage. There was only a slight motion perceptible, a queer lunging and rolling combined that was quite new to anything he had before experienced. Save for the sound of voices and the musical efforts of the sleeping men and Cookie’s muttered apostrophes to the simmering gruel, the boat was oddly still. Once when someone far forward in the engine compartment dropped a wrench the clatter was startling. The atmosphere was close, but Nelson found no inconvenience in breathing. Something, and he thought it might be the air, made him strangely sluggish and sleepy, and he was on the point of dozing off again when he heard from beside his bunk a startled exclamation:
“For the love of Mike! See who’s here!”
Opening his eyes he looked up into the astounded face of Martin Townsend.
CHAPTER XII
IN THE SUBMARINE “Q-4”
Nelson couldn’t remember having ever been so glad to see anyone as he was to see the lad who, his surprise turning to pleasure, thrust a brown and not over-clean hand toward the bunk. He had been many times pretty lonesome since leaving the Wanderer, and the fact came to him as he seized the proffered hand and gripped it hard. Martin Townsend’s laughter rang out gayly as he seated himself precariously on the edge of the bunk, and Nelson found himself joining in for no very apparent reason. Somehow, finding Townsend again was like finding an old friend, even though they had been together but a little over an hour in all their lives!
What happened after that is easily imagined. Martin took possession of Nelson and, standing by while he dressed himself in his togs which were as dry as they were likely to get in an atmosphere that would have discouraged a hygrometer, and a pair of borrowed boots, and superintending the process of devouring a tin cup of strange oatmeal gruel, he afterwards bore him off in the direction of the after battery compartment which, save for the absence of cooking arrangements was similar to the corresponding compartment forward. In the central station Nelson saw Captain Hale and the junior officer, Lieutenant Morris, both clear-eyed, lean-faced men well under thirty years. It was the captain who noted them as they passed and spoke to Martin.
“Is this the man we picked up, Townsend?”
“Yes, sir.”