“Liquor, eh?” exclaimed the naval officer, the odor reaching his nostrils.

“No such thing,” retorted Farnum, turning upon the officer. “At least,
Jack Benson has been drinking no such stuff.”

“It was only a guess,” murmured Mr. Mayhew, apologetically. “You know your
young man better than I do, Mr. Farnum.”

“There is liquor on his clothing,” continued the shipbuilder. “It looks as
though someone had assaulted the lad, laid him out, and then sprinkled
him. It’s a wasted trick, though. I know him too well to be fooled by any
such clumsy bit of nonsense.”

“A stupid trick, indeed,” agreed Lieutenant Commander Mayhew, but the
naval officer did not quite share the shipbuilder’s confidence in the
submarine boy’s innocence. Mr. Mayhew had known of too many cases of naval
apprentices ruined through weak indulgence in liquor. Indeed, he had even
known of rare instances in which cadets had been dismissed from the Naval
Academy for the same offense. The lieutenant commander’s present doubt of
Jack Benson was likely to work to that young man’s disadvantage later on.

Others of the party left the auto. Hal and Mr. Farnum got into the
tonneau, supporting Jack there between them. Thus they carried him to Mr.
Farnum’s office at the yard, Grant Andrews then going in the car after a
doctor, while the others stretched Jack on the office sofa. The naval
officers returned to the “Hudson,” at anchor in the little harbor below.

“The young man acts as though he had been struck on the head,” was the
physician’s verdict. “No bones of the skull are broken. The odor of liquor
is on his coat, but I can’t seem to detect any on the breath.”