“Get your hat and go up on deck.  Do you hear me?” insisted Captain Jack.

“I hear you, but I please myself about when I do it,” retorted the Japanese, drawing himself up to his full though not very imposing height.

“Then you’ll go without waiting for your hat,” retorted Benson, his patience rapidly oozing now.  He started toward the Japanese, just as Eph, hearing the sound of talking, looked in and down the staircase.

“Gunpowder and smoke!” ejaculated the carroty-topped boy.  “It’s little chocolate drop!”

“Are you going up on deck quietly and in an orderly way?” demanded Benson, a resolute glitter in his clear, blue eyes.

“I please myself,” retorted Kamanako, defiantly.

At that Jack Benson promptly forgot the warning he had given Eph, and sprang at the inquisitive steward.

“You’ll go—­” began Benson.

He was in error, though.  It was he himself who “went.”  As he reached out with his right hand to seize Kamanako something happened.  Exactly what it was the young submarine captain never quite knew.  But he found himself sprawling under the seat at the opposite side of the cabin.

“Hi, yi!  Wow!” exploded Eph, darting down the stairs.  “Save some of that for me!”

It was ready and waiting.

The carroty-topped boy crouched low, resting his hands on his knees, after the manner of a football player awaiting an assault.

Kamanako slid in close.  Ere Eph could seize him the Japanese let himself fall lightly on one side.  One of his feet hooked itself behind Eph’s advanced left ankle, the other foot pressing against the knee of the same leg.  Eph’s ankle was yanked forward, his knee pressed back, and Somers went toppling as a tree in the forest does.

Kamanako was so quickly on his feet again to suggest that he had fallen and risen in the same movement.  There was a quiet, yet dangerous, smile on the face of the Japanese.

The door of the engine room opened swiftly though noiselessly.  Williamson, the machinist, took in the whole scene instantly.  Hardly a full step forward he took when his fist landed between the shoulders of Kamanako, sending that young Japanese through the air, to land sprawling.

As Kamanako leaped to his feet he found himself blinking at the muzzle of a revolver that the machinist held in his right hand.

CHAPTER VI

THE LITTLE RUSSIAN HAS HER WAY

“Don’t get troublesome,” advised the machinist, softly.  “I’ve never shot a Jap, but I’ve always wanted to.”

There was a flicker of a grin in Williamson’s face that found a reflection in Kamanako’s own features.

By this time Jack Benson was on his feet, a bit ruffled though with all his wits about him.  At the same time Hal Hastings peered down from the top of the staircase.

“You’ve had all the fun so far, Kamanako,” Jack admitted.  “But now you’ve got to get off this boat mighty quick.  Do you choose to go without any more fuss?”