"Wonder if we'll enlist a second time, too, Whistler."

"Bet you!" was the succinct reply.

The car started under Torry's careful guidance, and they quickly whisked
around the corner into the main street of Seacove, the small port in
which the chums had been born and had lived all their lives until they
had enlisted as seamen apprentices in the Navy not many months before.

They passed the little cottage in which Mrs. Hertig, Seven Knott's
mother, lived. Beyond that was the Donahue home, where Frenchy's widowed
mother lived with his younger brothers and sisters.

Then came the Rosenmeyer delicatessen shop, and there the car was pulled
down by Torry, for there was a little group outside the shop, the center
of which were three figures in blue.

"Look at those happy Jacks, will you?" ejaculated Torry in feigned
disgust. "Got an audience, haven't they? And even Seven Knott must be
talking some, too. What do you know about that?"

For the attitude of Seacove had changed mightily since these boys had
joined the Navy early in 1917. War had been declared between the United
States and Germany and her allies, the drafted men were being called to
the training camps, and some had already gone "over there" and were
fighting in the trenches of northern France.

Philip Morgan, Alfred Torrance, Michael Donahue, Ikey Rosenmeyer, and
their mates on the destroyer _Colodia_ had already aided in convoying a