nutes later Grant Andrews hailed from the "Pollard," and Eph rowed
over in the shore boat to ferry over the machinists.

Half an hour later Andrews and his men had put in the few needed touches
aboard the newer submarine boat. The sun, meanwhile, had gone down,
showing the hull of a naval vessel some four miles off the harbor.

Darkness came on quickly, with a clouded sky. As young Benson stepped
on deck Grant Andrews followed him.

"All finished here, Grant?" queried the yard's owner.

"Yes, sir. There's mighty little chance to do anything where Hal
Hastings has charge of the machinery."

"That's our gunboat out there, I think," went on Mr. Farnum, pointing to
where a white masthead light and a red port light were visible, about a
mile away.

"Dunhaven must be on the map, all right, if a strange navigating officer
knows how to come so straight to the place," laughed Jack Benson.

"Oh, you trust a United States naval officer to find any place he has
sailing orders for," returned Jacob Farnum. "I wonder if he'll attempt
to come into this harbor!"

"There's safe anchorage, if he wants to do so," replied Captain Jack.

While Somers was busy putting the foreman and the machinists ashore,
Mr. Farnum, Jack and Hal remained on the platform deck, watching the
approach of the naval vessel, which was now plainly making for Dunhaven.

Suddenly, a broad beam of glaring white light shot over the water,
resting across the deck of the "Farnum."

"I guess that fellow knows what he wants to know, now," muttered Benson,
blinking alter the strong glare had passed.

"There, he has picked up the 'Pollard,' too," announced Hastings. "Now,
that commander must feel sure he has sighted the right place."

"There go the signal lights," cried Captain Jack, suddenly. "Hal,
hustle below and turn on the electric current for the signaling
apparatus."

Then Benson watched as, from the yards high up on the gunboat's signaling
mast, colored electric lights glowed forth, twinkling briefly in turn.
This is the modern method of signaling by sea at night.

"He wants to know," said Benson, to Mr. Farnum, as he turned, "whether
there is safe anchorage for a twelve-hundred-ton gunboat of one hundred
and ninety-five feet length."

Reaching the inside of the conning tower at a bound, the young skipper
rapidly manipulated his own electric signaling control. There was a low
mast on the "Farnum's" platform deck, a mast that could be unsteppe