"I shall be glad when the hour is up," admitted Captain Jack, candidly. Yet no one proposed cutting the time short by returning to the surface sooner.
Hal Hastings climbed up into the conning tower to take the trick at the wheel for the last twenty minutes. Indeed, occupation of any sort helped to kill some of the time.
"I believe," laughed Jacob Farnum glancing about him, "we all feel just about as though we had lost confidence in the 'Pollard's' ability to rise when the time comes."
From the engine room came a burst of seaman's song. Bill Henderson was loudly crooning some ditty. Although the listeners could not mike out the words, the song had a gruesome sound that made one's flesh want to creep.
"Shall I tell him to stow that noise?" asked Captain Jack.
"No," replied Mr. Farnum, though he made a grimace. "If it cheers the fellow any let him have his melody."
Presently Henderson was singing another song. Those in the cabin paid little heed until the sailor's voice roared out the couplet:
_Down below went the good brig Mary!
She was heard from again—nary!_
"Say, that's fine!" muttered Eph Somers, in an undertone loaded with sarcasm.