"I might have known!" Dave snapped at him. "We no sooner get in a tight spot and you want to quit me cold!"
"But, Dave," Freddy protested, "I didn't mean it that way. I simply meant that I...."
"Then get a grin on your mug, and stop picking on yourself!" Dave cut in. "How many times have I got to explain that Freddy Farmer is the best pal I ever hooked up with, and that I don't allow anybody to ride him. Not even you, Mister! Get it? Come on, that grin, or I'll toss you overboard, myself."
Freddy blinked a couple of times, swallowed, and then forced a faint smile to his lips.
"Always right there to put sense into a chap's head," he said softly. "That's Dave Dawson. But I still say I was a blasted fool. How long, though, do you think before we'll be in the water with only our Mae Wests keeping us afloat?"
Dave shrugged and made a little gesture with both hands.
"Search me," he grunted. "Your guess is as good as mine. What's worrying me is that darn U-boat. If we'd only been able to clip it. We didn't, and now the darn thing's down under some place getting ready to let loose a brace of torpedoes at the first navy ship that comes tearing up this way."
"I wonder about that," Freddy said. "Maybe it just happened to come to the surface by accident. Ten to one it's making tracks for distant places right now."
"No," Dave said firmly. "I'm sure it's hanging around. This thing was all planned, Freddy. That bum in that Fairey Swordfish proved that to me."
"How so?" Freddy questioned with a frown.