“I mean, I knew you hadn't been in any low sailor resorts.”
“Who said we had?” demanded Jack, flaring in spite of his dizziness.
“Some of the Navy folks didn't know but you had,” replied Eph, then bit his tongue for having let that much out of the bag.
Doctor McCrea came aboard early. He looked the boys over.
“Eat a little toast, if you want, and drink some weak tea,” he suggested. “After that, eat nothing more until to-night.”
“But the day's work—?” hinted Jack.
“I don't know,” replied the doctor, shrugging his shoulders. “I'm not a line officer, and therefore know nothing about the fleet's manœuvres.”
That reply, however, was quite enough to send Jack Benson's suspicions aloft.
[pg 199] “Eph,” he cried, wheeling upon his friend the moment Doctor McCrea was gone, “there's something you haven't told us.”
“Such as—what?” asked Somers, doing his best to look mighty innocent.