The Submarine Boys and the Spies | Page 3

the first volume, "The Submarine Boys on Duty," was related how all
these people came together; how the boys, by sheer force of character
"broke into" the submarine boating world. In that volume the building
of the first of the company's boats, the "Pollard" was described, and all
the exciting adventures that were connected with the event were fully
narrated.
Our former readers will also remember all the wonderful adventures
and the rollicking fun set forth in the second volume, under the title of
"The Submarine Boys' Trial Trip." In this book, bristling with
adventures, and made lighter, in spots, by accounts of humorous doings,
was told how the boys gained fame as submarine experts. It was their
fine, loyal work that interested the United States government in buying
that first boat, the "Pollard."
The third volume in the series, entitled "The Submarine Boys and the
Middies" told how our young friends secured the prize detail at
Annapolis; where, for a brief time, the three submarine boys served as
instructors in submarine work to the young midshipmen at the Naval
Academy. Nor was this accomplished without serious, and even
sensational, opposition from the representative of a rival submarine
company. Hence the boys went through some rousing adventures.
Incidentally, they fell against practical instruction in hazing at the
Naval Academy.
Adventures enough had befallen the submarine boys to last any man for
a lifetime. Yet, as fate decreed it, Captain Jack Benson and his staunch
young comrades were now destined to adventures greater and further
reaching than any of which they could have dreamed. In advance, this
winter trip to Spruce Beach promised to be little more than a pleasant
relaxation for the youngsters. What it really turned out to be will soon
be made clear in the pages of this volume.
"It seems a very risky plan that you're trying, Jack," remarked Jacob
Farnum, at last.

"Don't you want me to do it, sir?" asked the young skipper, looking up
instantly from his chart.
"Why, er--"
But here David Pollard, the inventor of these boats broke in, eagerly:
"Of course we ought to do it, Farnum. Jack is wholly right. If we enter
the harbor at Spruce Beach in this fashion, and carry through our entire
plan successfully, what on earth can there be left for opponents of our
class of boats to say?"
"Not if we succeed, of course," smiled Farnum. "It's only the pesky
little 'if' that's bothering me at all. I don't want any of you to think me a
coward--"
"We know, very well, you're not, sir," Captain Jack interposed, very
quietly.
"But if we make any slip in our calculations," continued Jacob Farnum,
"the first bad thing about it is that we'll smash a fine boat which,
otherwise, the United States Government is likely to want at a price
around two hundred thousand dollars. That, however, is not the greatest
risk that I have in mind. On board this craft are five people without
whom it would be rather hopeless for anyone to go on building the
Pollard type of boat. Therefore, besides risking a valuable craft and our
own rather inconsequential lives, we go further and put the United
States Navy in danger of having only a couple of our boats. Now, the
fact is, we want the Navy to have three or four dozen of our submarine
craft, for we ourselves believe implicitly in the great worth of the
Pollard boats."
"That's just the point, sir," cried Captain Jack Benson.
"Eh? What is?" inquired Mr. Farnum, looking at his young skipper in
some bewilderment.
"Why, sir," laughed Jack, "the point is that we believe our boats to be

infinitely ahead of anything owned in any other navy on earth. We
believe it possible to do things, with boats like this one, that can be
accomplished with no other submarine craft in the world. Now, it's a
fact that, in all the navies, lest an accident happen to a submarine, that
craft is obliged to travel about, always, in the company of a steam craft
of war, which is known as the parent ship. Yet we've come, straight
from the shipyard at Dunhaven, many hundreds of miles, without any
such escort. We've been running along under our own power, night and
day, without accident, stop or bother. Thus we've shown that the
Pollard boat can do things that no other submarine craft are ever trusted
to try alone. And now, all that remains to show is that, at the end of a
long voyage, we can approach a coast, unseen, even though thousands
of people are probably looking for us, and that we can get into a harbor
without being detected; that, in fact, we could do anything we might
have a mind to do to