“Well, the Old Man couldn’t very well leave them to drown, could he?” responded Morgan gravely. “Spanish girls, too. One is a beauty; but the other is too fat,” said Frenchy who claimed to be a connoisseur regarding girls and their looks. “Hold him, fellows! Hold him!” advised Ikey, sepulchrally. “He’ll be off again, look out!” “Aw, you----” “Don’t forget how he fell for that Flora girl when we were back there in England.” “Shucks!” said Belding laughing. “Flora was the goddess of flowers.” “Ah,” said Ikey, shaking his head, “you don’t know Mike Donahue. He’ll call this Spanish girl a goddess, yet. You just see.” The _Colodia_, however, was driven at top speed for the nearest port, there to be relieved of the shipwrecked company from the Argentine steamship. So the susceptible Frenchy was soon out of all possible danger. There was a keen desire, on the part of both the destroyer’s crew and officers, to overtake the craft that had brought the _Que Vida_ to her tragic end. It was well established now that the big submarine and the _Sea Pigeon_ were two different vessels, though they might be working in conjunction. But either or both of the German craft would be welcome prey to the United States destroyer. The latter continued her tedious work of “combing the sea” for these despicable enemies. CHAPTER XVI--STATIONS Since sailing out of Brest and before receiving her special orders by wireless telegraph, the _Colodia_ had made no base port where the crew could receive either mail or cablegrams. Two weeks and more had passed. Philip Morgan and George Belding had no idea where the _Redbird_ was, or whether or not their relatives were safe. “The fate of a ship at sea is an uncertain thing at best,” Phil Morgan said seriously to his friend, “in spite of the old salt’s oft-repeated prayer: ‘Heaven help the folks ashore on this stormy night, Bill!’” “Don’t joke about such serious matters,” Belding replied. “Wonder how far the folks have got toward Bahia?” “Well, you know where we stuck the pins in the chart to-day, boy?” “To be sure. But we don’t really know a thing about it.” “Courage!” urged Whistler. “We are just as likely to be right in doping out the _Redbird’s_ course as not.” “It’s the confounded uncertainty of it that gets me,” said Belding bitterly, and then changed the subject. Interest in the _Colodia’s_ search for German raiders and submarines did not flag even in the minds of these two members of her crew. For several days, however, the destroyer plowed through the sea, hither and yon, without picking out of the air a word regarding either the _Sea Pigeon_ or the huge submarine which some of the boys believed they had surely seen in the mirage reflected against the morning sky. The detail work of a naval vessel at sea even in wartime, unless something “breaks,” is really very monotonous. Drills, studies, watch duties, clothes washing, deck scrubbing, brass polishing. All these things go on with maddening regularity.