Page:Cruise of the Dry Dock.djvu/124

 because you didn't know a common French phrase——”

“French! I'm no Frenchman! Why don't you talk English!”

The two tired, worried, overheated men were rapidly brewing a quarrel, when Madden interrupted.

“Look how close we are to that schooner! If somebody would raise another shark alarm, we'd land plump on her decks.”

“Yes, but this Zulu here has run us straight into a loop of seaweed it'll take two hours' swimming to get out of—cul de sac, school of sharks! Why the two phrases scarcely resemble each other!”

Madden turned longing eyes toward the motionless schooner that was not more than three-quarters of a mile distant. “Say, it's too bad to turn around and swim away from that vessel!” he lamented wearily, “and this sun is fierce!”

“I say let's try going through!” encouraged Greer.

“It'll be—difficult,” warned Caradoc.

“Won't swimming clear around the earth be difficult?” demanded Greer hotly.