"I don't see anything, Benson. You've been below so long that up here, in less light, you're a victim of shadows."
But Jack, who had snatched the marine glasses from the rack, and was using them, retorted:
"The shadows I see, Mr. Pollard, are human shadows, clinging to something in the water, and that something must be an overturned craft of some sort."
"Let me have the glasses," requested Mr. Pollard.
After taking a long look the inventor replied, excitedly:
"Benson, you're right. There are some human beings in distress over yonder. Thank heaven, we didn't go by them."
For the first time that night David Pollard turned on the powerful searchlight, projecting abroad, brilliant ray off the starboard bow. The bottom of a hull about forty feet long, presumably that of a sloop, was what David Pollard now saw. Clinging to it were two men. One of them appeared to be middle-aged, the other much younger. The overturned boat was some three hundred yards distant.
"What have you stopped for? What's up?" called up Mr. Farnum.
"Wreck, sir. Two men in distress," Jack answered.
"We'll go close and contrive to take them off," announced the inventor. Turning on slow speed, he swung the "Pollard's" prow about, making for the wreck.