“It makes you think a bit!” he exclaimed. “Here we are, thousands of us Americans, on board British ships, being convoyed into a British port by the British Navy. I wish the old Kaiser was here! And I wish some of our folks at home who are asking what the British Navy is doing in this war could be here too! They might learn then what is meant by the freedom of the seas!” “Still,” complained the youthful seeker after sensation, Miss Lane, “I did hope that we might have seen just one little submarine.” It is hard to refuse some people anything—especially American girls of twenty-three. Miss Lane’s wish was promptly gratified. A few hundred yards away, right in the middle of the convoy, there was suddenly protruded from the unruffled surface of the ocean a few feet of something grey, slender, and perpendicular—something which, after a hurried and perfunctory survey of the situation, retired unobtrusively whence it came. But not before it had been seen, and welcomed. For a brief minute shells burst around it, machine guns pattered imprecations over it, bombs descended upon it from the heavens above, and depth-charges detonated in the waters beneath. The convoy altered its formation, as prudence dictated. But nothing further happened. Calm reigned once more upon the face of the waters. “Some little surprise for him, I guess,” said Cruttenden. “Lying on the bottom, and just came up for a look around! He did not expect to poke his periscope into this hornet’s nest, I should say. I wonder if anything hit him. I guess not: he was too slick. But you had your thrill right enough, Miss Lane!” Miss Lane sighed rapturously. “The censor has just _got_ to pass that when I write home,” she announced. * * * * * Late that evening we made our port. On our way in we passed a British cruiser, coaling. The band was playing, as is usual during coaling. Our tall ship slid past in the dusk, undemonstratively, almost surreptitiously. One of the tragedies of modern warfare lies in its anonymity. You may not display your true colours or advertise your presence anywhere—even to your friends. So we crept past. But a sailor can read ships as a landsman reads books. The cruiser’s band stopped suddenly, right in the middle of a tune, and in two minutes the cruiser’s sides, rigging, and tops were crowded with half-naked, coal-grimed humanity yelling themselves hoarse to the roaring multitude on the liner. “Listen!” shouted Boone Cruttenden into his companion’s ear, as a fresh burst of sound added itself to the tumult; “their band has struck up again. Can you hear it?” “No! Yes, I do now. I guess it’s ‘God Save the King,’ or one of those tunes.” But Miss Lane was wrong. Suddenly the cheering died away for a moment, and the band made itself heard, joyfully and triumphantly, for the first time. And the tune it played was “Over There.” “Oh, _gee!_” said Miss Lane, with a sob in her voice. “Oh, gee!” CHAPTER FIVE TERRA INCOGNITA