CHAPTER X.

UNDER OLD GLORY.

Sandy Hook lay behind a dim blue line on the horizon, and the long Atlantic heave was beginning to swing the _St. Mark_ in a manner disconcerting to some of the passengers, before they came in sight of the cruiser that had led the _Kronprinzessin_ such a harried chase.

"Looks familiar, doesn't she?" commented Jack, as they slowed down and the _Berwick_ steamed up alongside, about five hundred yards off.

"If it hadn't been for that lucky fog, she'd have looked more familiar yet," declared Bill. "Look, they're lowering a boat."

From the cruiser's side a small boat, crowded with uniformed sailors, and in the stern sheets of which sat a smart junior officer, dropped and, propelled by long, even strokes of the oars which rose and fell in perfect unison, was presently coming toward the liner. The _St. Mark's_ accommodation ladder was lowered, and in a few minutes the young British officer was aboard.

Every passenger was lined up in the saloon and compelled to answer questions as to their nationality, etc. All passed satisfactorily. Then came the turn of the second cabin and the steerage. From the second cabin, two admitted German reservists were taken as prisoners of war and in the steerage six more were found. They took their apprehensions stoically, although they knew that they would probably be confined at Halifax or Bermuda till the close of hostilities.

Jack and Bill Raynor watched these scenes with interest.

"I suppose it will be months, maybe years, before some of those poor fellows see their homes again," said Bill.

"Yes, but it's what you might call the fortune of war," responded Jack briefly.

So expeditiously was the work of culling out the reservists done that an hour after the _Berwick's_ officers had boarded the liner, the last of the prisoners was off and the ship's papers had been inspected and O.K.'d. With mutual salutes, the two craft parted, the _Berwick_ to lie "off and on," looking for commerce carriers of a hostile nation, the _St. Mark_ to resume her voyage to a Europe which was even then crowded with desperate, stranded American tourists unable to obtain money or passage home.

At dinner time Muller, the _St. Mark's_ regular operator, relieved Jack, and he was free for the evening. He elected to spend his leisure time reading up in a text-book, lately issued, an account of the workings of a new coherer that had recently been brought out.

But the fatigues of the day had made him drowsy and he soon dropped off to sleep in the chair he had placed on the upper deck in the shelter of a big ventilator. Despite the time of year there was a cool, almost a chilly breeze stirring, and most of the small number of first-class passengers were either in the smoking room or the saloon.

How long he slept Jack did not know, but he was awakened by the sound of voices proceeding from the other side of the ventilator, which masked him from the speakers' view. One of the voices, which Jack recognized as belonging to Martin Johnson, grated harshly on his ears.

"If it hadn't been for that cub of a wireless boy," Johnson was saying, "that message would have been in the hands of Von Gottberg by this time."

"And so you haven't been able to send word about the British cruiser?" inquired the other speaker.

"No, and from the same cause. I shall have to see what I can do with the night operator. He may not be so absurdly scrupulous, unless that young whelp who was on day duty has been talking to him."

"Did you say, Herr Professor, that you had met him before?" asked the last speaker's companion.

"Yes, confound him, on the _Kronprinzessin Emilie_. I was--er--I was trying to organize an orderly retreat to the boats after the alarm had been spread that British cruisers were after us, when this young scoundrel attacked me brutally."

"Didn't you report him to the captain?"

"Well, you see there were--er--reasons which made it unwise to do so."

"You bet there were, Herr Professor Radwig,--for I know who you are now, Mr. Johnson," muttered Jack to himself. "No wonder I thought I knew you in spite of your disguise."

"What are your present plans?" asked Mr. Johnson's, or rather, Herr Professor Radwig's companion.

"I shall have to see. You understand wireless, Schultz?"

"Intimately. Why, you have some idea--?"

"Never mind now. It is getting chilly. Let us go to our cabins. I will talk to you more about this to-morrow."

The voices died away as the two left the upper deck. Jack, wide awake now, sprang to his feet. Clearly there was some mischief concerning the wireless in the air. But of the nature of the impending scheme he could not hazard a guess.

"Anyhow, I'll just put Muller wise to what's going on," thought Jack. "He's a decent, square fellow, who wouldn't stand for any monkey business. How to deal with Herr Radwig is another matter. I guess I'll sleep on it. If only those chaps on the _Berwick_ knew who they had overlooked on their hunt for Germans, wouldn't they be mad as hornets!"