, the boys drew lots to determine which
one should do duty until morning in the wireless room, and it fell to
Joe.

But the first faint gray streaks were hardly painting the eastern sky
when Jerry and Slim, unable to sleep longer, came out upon deck to take
for themselves a general survey of the danger zone.

"What's that?" cried Slim suddenly, staring off over the stern of the
_Everett_.

"Smoke!" echoed Jerry, excitedly.

"Yes, smoke from the stack of the destroyer," said Joe, who had come up
behind them without being heard. "We just got her signal a moment ago."

"How far do you suppose she is away?" asked Slim.

They were speculating upon the distance between the two vessels, when
Slim, speechless for the moment, pointed to what seemed to be little
more than a dark speck on the water about a mile astern and to the west
of them--for at that time their zig-zag course pointed them almost due
north.

"Submarine approaching astern!" sang out the man in the crow's nest.

It was as though the startling message had been megaphoned to every man
aboard the _Everett_. At the same time the cruiser of the fleet began
maneuvering herself between where the periscope showed the submarine to
be and the transport itself.

Almost simultaneously the U-boat came to the surface and one of the big
guns on the cruiser belched forth a shell that apparently fell a short
distance the other side of the submarine. The U-boat itself let loose a
shot, and with such accuracy that only the sudden maneuver of the
transport at that instant saved it from being hit.

By this time the decks of the _Everett_ were crowded with the khaki-clad
soldiers of Uncle Sam whom the Germans were trying to prevent from
getting into the trenches by sending them to the bottom of the Atlantic.

The cruiser had headed straight for the U-boat, while the destroyer was
coming up behind it with even greater speed.

For some reason that never will be known the commander of the submarine
had ignored the destroyer entirely, although it was difficult to imagine
that he had not seen it. The general supposition later aboard the
_Everett_ was that something had happened to his batteries and he was
unable to submerge.

"Hurrah!" shouted hundreds of men on the _Everett_ in unison as the
torpedo-boat destroyer opened fire.

And the aim of her gunners was deadly! for just as the U-boat began to
submerge, one of the big projectiles from the destroyer hit her squarely
a