“Seems you were looking for this,” he chuckled as he watched the plucky old man disrobe himself.
“Johnny,” said MacGregor. “In the Coast Guard service you are always looking for it an’ all too often you’re not disappointed.”
When, a few minutes later, after a brisk rub-down, MacGregor had struggled into dry clothes and had succeeded in lighting his pipe, he said, “Well, me boy, we thought we had ’em an’ now they’ve got us. We’re miles from anywhere in a fog. And that’s bad! Mighty bad.”
“Do you suppose Blackie heard it?”
“What? The explosion? ’Tain’t likely. We’re all of four miles from there. Don’t forget, we followed that net two miles. An’ that explosion was muffled by the water.
“An’ if he heard,” he added after a brief pause, “what could he do? He’s four miles away. No compass. An’ no boat except maybe a fishing skiff. No, Johnny,” his voice sounded out solemn on the silent sea. “For once in our lives we are strictly on our own, you and me.
“Well, me lad,” he murmured a moment later. “They got us that time. Attached some sort of bomb to their net, that’s what they did. Safe enough in a way, too, for how you goin’ to prove it was their net? Yes, they got us. But you wait, me lad, we’ll be gettin’ them yet.”
CHAPTER XVI
LOOMING PERIL
Many times in his young life Johnny had been on his own, but never quite like this.
“Not a bit of good to row,” was MacGregor’s decision. “We’ve not the least notion which way to go. If there was a breeze we might row by that. There’s no breeze.”