"Get your orders changed, then," proposed another newspaper man, cheerfully.
"If you'll wait, I'll see if I can," muttered Eph, hopefully.
"Oh, we'll wait."
Williamson's head had appeared in the manhole way.
"Come out on deck, and don't let anyone on board unless we get orders to that effect," murmured Somers, passing the conning tower. Then, through a megaphone, the submarine boy hailed the gunboat, asking if it would be possible for him to talk with Jack Benson. Benson soon afterward came forward on the "Waverly." Eph explained the situation. Jack shouted back to allow the visitors on the platform deck, but not to let any of them into the conning tower, or below.
So Eph turned to the two boatloads of visitors, explaining:
"Perhaps you men can get that all changed if you come out to-morrow, when the captain is here. But the best I can do to-day is to let you up here on the platform deck."
"Oh, well," returned the first newspaper man to get up there beside the boy, "you can tell us, as well as anyone, about your trip down the coast and the way you slipped in here."
"And also," chimed in another, "you're the young man who came straight up through the water when she was beneath the surface?"
Eph admitted that he was.