"Yes," answered Milsom; "and what I have learned is not very comforting. That torpedo boat, it appears, is practically a new craft, and she has a sea speed of twenty-five knots, which is one knot better than our best; so how we are going to dodge her is more than I at present know. The three gunboats we need not trouble about, for the two-masted craft are only capable of sixteen knots, while the three-masted boat--the _Destructor_--can do about seventeen, at a pinch, though she is said to have been at one time capable of twenty-two and a half. Neither need we trouble about the cruisers, for the faster of them--the _Lepanto_--is only capable of twenty and a half knots when she is clean, and I am told that at present she is dreadfully foul." "Still, it appears to me that the torpedo boat is, apart from the rest, more than we shall be able to manage," remarked Don Hermoso. "If she persists in dogging our heels we shall not have a ghost of a chance of landing our cargo anywhere." "No," said Jack. "But she will not dog our heels, Don Hermoso; don't you trouble. This is where my submarine comes in, and is going to score, if I am not mistaken. Macintyre and I will be able to doctor that torpedo boat so that she will not trouble us. We will just go down in the submarine and remove the nut that secures her propeller to its shaft, and when she begins to move, her propeller will drop off; and before it can be replaced we will have our cargo ashore, and be in a position to laugh at her." "But how will you manage that, Jack, in the presence of all these ships?" demanded Milsom. "You could not possibly do what you suggest without being seen. Besides, there is the custom-house officer to be reckoned with; and I really do not believe that the man is to be trusted with your secret." "We shall have to do the job at night-time--the night before we leave here for Cuba," said Jack. "And, as to the custom-house officer, we must trust that he will sleep too soundly to hear anything." "Leave him to me," said Don Hermoso. "I am a bit of a chemist, in my way, and I will concoct a liquid a few drops of which in his grog the last thing at night will cause him to sleep soundly all night, and awake none the worse in the morning."