Speake was in the room, hardly knowing what to do.
"If we try to run," said he, "the Jap steamer will catch us, and if we don't run, the rowboats will be on top of us. If we can't dive, Matt, we're in another kind of a hole."
"Don't lose your nerve, Speake," said Matt. "Go down and see if you can help Dick. Glennie will go up into the tower and steer. I'm for the deck to watch and see how matters progress."
"I'm for der teck, too!" declared Carl, who happened, at that moment, to be in the periscope room.
He had a keen scent for trouble, and always tried hard to be around whenever any was going to happen.
Without paying much attention to Carl, Matt opened the locker and took out the submarine's copy of the Stars and Stripes.
"If the Sons of the Rising Sun try any of their old tactics," said Matt, "I'll make it plain that it's a ship carrying Old Glory."
"What do they care for any flag?" demanded Glennie. "Why, they're flying the Chilian flag now, and every man of them is got up in Chilian naval uniform. It's hard to tell them from the real thing, at a distance, too."
Matt ran up the ladder, gained the deck, and bent the flag to the halyards. Presently he had it flying, and drew back from the staff to look at the approaching boats.
Carl was on the after deck. In order, perhaps, to make himself look more nautical, the Dutch boy had crowded himself into sailor clothes. They were too big for him, up and down, and too small the other way.