A minute or two later they were tumbling aboard the _Follow Me_, Tom to dart below to the engine, Harry to make fast their end of the line and Joe to look after the tender.

Then Harry waved a hand and shouted, and the _Adventurer_, which had been going slowly astern, taking up the slack of the cable, settled to her task.

The big rope tightened, throwing a spray of water into the sunlight along its length, strained and creaked and the _Follow Me's_ propeller, reversed, did its part.

There was an anxious two minutes.

Very grudgingly the black cruiser's stern came around.