On tiptoe Jack crossed the cabin and peered over Frank’s shoulder. His chum had one arm through the porthole, clutching the extended umbrella. One wire led to the wire stem. Another wire dangled downward to the sea, although Jack could not, of course, observe more than the fact of its direction. Here were aerial and ground. Jack tapped his chum on the shoulder, but Frank, with serious face, frowned at him, and Jack interpreted the look to be a request for silence. Perhaps Frank was hearing something of moment. He stood to one side, waiting for Frank to speak.
Evidently his chum was straining hard to hear. He even closed his eyes, the better to concentrate. What could it be? Jack had news of his own to impart, important news, but in Frank’s attitude he sensed something that bespoke importance too. Suddenly Frank opened his eyes.
“That’s all,” he said. “The conversation grew fainter and fainter. Now I can’t hear at all any more.”
“Just two ships talking, Jack. That’s all.”
Frank smiled teasingly, as he folded the umbrella and pulled it back through the porthole, then laid off the headphones and began hauling in the ground wire.
“Just two ships, that’s all. You don’t mind my taking liberties with your toy, do you, Jack?”
“Of course not. But, look here, you heard something that excited you, Frank. Quit joshing. What was it?”
Frank turned a serious face, his eyes gleaming.
“Jack, the funniest thing. I heard two ships talking, or rather, only one ship talking to another. The replies of the second I couldn’t hear at all.”
“That ring-radio has a radius of about ten miles,” said Jack. “Perhaps not quite that much. That accounts for it. You heard the ship that was within our radius, but not the other because it was too far away to be heard. But what was said? Business, I suppose?”
“Business, my eye,” said Frank. “The one nearby was the U. S. Sub Chaser X-51. And as far as I could gather, it was talking to a coast liner bound north for San Francisco aboard which was Inspector Burton. He was asking the sub chaser to run alongside the liner and take him off. Remember, I could only hear what the sub chaser replied. I gathered from something said that the liner could not be so very far away. The sub chaser started for it, however, and as it drew away from us the radio got fainter and fainter until I lost it altogether.”