Mr. Neilsen was greatly excited when the steward knocked at his door and handed him the second wireless message. He opened it with trembling fingers and read:
Still more successful. Uncle Hyacinth's tonsils removed. Appetite now colossal. Bless him. Taking large quantities frozen meat.
He could hardly wait to translate it. He sat down on his suitcase again, and spelled it out with the help of his Number Six, word by word, refusing to believe his eyes, refusing even to read it as a consecutive sentence till the bottom of the two parallel columns had been reached, thus:
| Still | Impossible |
| More | Total |
| Successful | Destruction |
| Uncle Hyacinth's | Hispaniola |
| Tonsils | Von Tirpitz |
| Removed | Advises |
| Appetite | Essential |
| Now | Squadron |
| Colossal | Twenty |
| Bless him | Submarines |
| Taking | Waiting |
| Large | Appropriate |
| Quantities | Death |
| Frozen | Good |
| Meat | German |
| Best | Enviable |
| Greetings | Position |
No grain of poison was too small. He had even written letters to the newspapers in Scotland, which had stimulated the belief of certain zealous Scots that whenever the name of England was used it was intended as a deliberate onslaught upon the Union. There was hardly any destructive force or thought or feeling, good, bad or merely trivial, which he had not turned to the advantage of Germany and the disadvantage of other nations. Then when the war broke out he had redoubled his activities. He was amazed when he thought of the successful lies he had fostered all over the world. He had plotted with Hindus on the coast of California, and provided them with the literature of freedom in the interests of autocracy. He worked for dissension abroad and union in Germany. He was hand-in-glove with the I. W. W. He was idealist, socialist, pacifist, anarchist, futurist, suffragist, nationalist, internationalist and always publicist, all at once, and for one cause only—the cause of Germany.
And this was the gratitude of the—of the—swine! Well, he would teach them a lesson. God in heaven! There was only one thing he could do to save his skin. He would send them an ultimatum! It was their last chance. He shivered to think that it might be his own!
But it was not so easy as he thought it would be to burn all his boats. It cost him two days and two nights of tortuous thinking before he could bring himself to the point. At eleven o'clock on the third night the purser brought the captain a new message, which Mr. Neilsen had just handed in to be despatched by wireless. It ran as follows:
Continue treatment. Vastly amusing. Uncle Hyacinth's magnificent constitution stand anything. Apply mustard. Try red pepper.
The group that met to consider this new development included three passengers, whom the captain had invited to share what he called the fun. They were a Miss Depew, an American girl who was going to Europe to do Red Cross work; and a Mr. and Mrs. Pennyfeather, English residents of Buenos Aires, with whom she was traveling. The message, as they interpreted it, ran as follows:
Unless instructions to sink Hispaniola countermanded, shall inform captain. No alternative. Most important papers my possession.