two narrow bands of white. Capt. Meade with a seaman's appreciative eye admires the shapely lines of the yacht, but as his practiced vision notices the comparative ease with which she is creeping up on the America his jovial face becomes slightly troubled.
"Mr. Jones, have the log taken and work out our speed at once," he orders.
"Twenty-four and a quarter knots," is the report.
For the next ten minutes the captain watches intently the strange yacht. Her course is apparently shaped precisely parallel with that of the America, and she still continues to gain, inch by inch, upon the white cruiser. Now she is amidships, and now the two vessels are on even terms.
A puff of white steam rises abaft the stranger's big smokestacks, and a long shrill whistle salutes the cruiser.
'Tis a challenge for a race and it stirs Capt. Meade's blood to fever heat. He sends for the chief engineer.
"How is the machinery working?" he inquires.
"Finely, sir; not the sign of the slightest trouble anywhere."
"Very well, sir; we will begin now to push her for a record. Put on every ounce of steam she will stand, first with natural and afterward with forced draught."
The chief engineer salutes, and returns to his domain, and a second later the hoarse whistle of the America sounds a defiant acceptance of the challenge of the black yacht.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
GREAT RACE TO THE OCEAN.
"By Jove! I had no idea the captain had so much
sporting blood in his veins," murmurs Jack Ashley to
himself, as he watches alternately the challenging craft
and the America. "It is a race fit for a king's delectation.
I wonder whose yacht that is. I don't remember
