“Perhaps he is not to be blamed too much, on account of his extreme youth,” responded Mr. Mayhew.

“Forget his youth altogether,” urged Mr. Farnum.  “Let us treat him as a man.  I’ve always found him one, in judgment, knowledge and loyalty.  Do you mind telling me, sir, in what way he erred in bringing you in here?”

“An error in giving his advice,” replied Mr. Mayhew.  “Or else it was ignorance of how to handle a craft as large as this gunboat.  For my anchorage he told me—­”

Here the lieutenant commander repeated the first part of Jack’s directions correctly, but wound up with: 

“He advised me to throw my wheel over four points to port.”

“Pardon me, sir,” Jack broke in, unable to keep still longer.  “What I said, or intended to say, was to bring your vessel so that the forward end of the submarine shed over there would be four points off the port bow.”

“What did you hear Mr. Benson say, Mr. Trahern?” demanded the gunboat’s commander, turning to the ensign who had stood with him on the bridge.

“Why, sir, I understood the lad to say what he states that he said.”

“You are sure of that, Mr. Trahern?”

“Unless my ears tricked me badly,” replied the ensign, “Mr. Benson said just what he now states.  I wondered, sir, at your calling for slow speed astern.”

Lieutenant Commander Mayhew gazed for some moments fixedly at the face of Ensign Trahern.  Then, of a sudden, the gunboat’s commander, who was both an officer and a gentleman, broke forth, contritely: 

“As I think it over, I believe, myself, that Benson advised as he now states he did.  It was my own error—­I am sure of it now.”

Wheeling about, Mayhew held out his right hand.

“Mr. Benson,” he said, in a deep voice full of regret, “I was the one in error.  I am glad to admit it, even if tardily.  Will you pardon my too hasty censure?”

“Gladly, sir,” Benson replied, gripping the proffered hand.  Jacob Farnum stood back, wagging his head in a satisfied way.  It had been difficult for him to believe that his young captain had been at fault in so simple a matter, or in a harbor with which he was so intimately acquainted.

As for the young man himself, the thing that touched him most deeply was the quick, complete and manly acknowledgment of this lieutenant commander.

“Mr. Farnum,” inquired the gunboat’s commander, “have you any towboats about here that can be used in helping me to get the ‘Hudson’ off this sand ledge?”

“The only one in near waters, sir,” replied the yard’s owner, “is a craft, not so very much larger than a launch, that ties up some three miles down the coast.  She’s the boat I use when I need any towing here.  Of course, I have the two torpedo boats, though their engines were not constructed for towing work.”

“May I offer a suggestion?” asked Jack, when the talk lagged.