The sight before us was indeed a beautiful pyrotechnic display. The bombs lighted up the shores and the low-lying hills, making everything stand forth and cast long spectral shadows. Cottages hidden among trees or in coves along the wide sweep of the shore line stood out as if in an unearthly flare.
What people on the shore thought we had no time even to wonder. They crowded out on the porches, in consternation. The music at the Casino stopped. No one had ever seen anything like it before. It was fire on water!
As yet none of us had even an inkling of what it was that Kennedy expected to discover. But every craft in the harbor now stood out distinct—in the glare of a miniature sun. We could see that, naturally, excitement on the boats was greater than it was on shore, for they were closer to the flares and therefore it seemed more amazing.
Craig was scanning the water carefully, seeking any sign of something suspicious.
“There it is!” he exclaimed, bending forward and pointing.
We strained our eyes. A mile or two out I could distinguish a power-boat of good size, moving swiftly away, as though trying to round the shelter of a point of land, out of the light. With a glass some one made out a stubby wireless mast on her.
Kennedy’s surmise when we had first studied the wireless interference had proved correct.
Sure enough, in the blackness of the night, there was a fast express cruiser, of the new scout type, not large, almost possible for one man to control, the latest thing in small power-boats and a perfect demon for speed!
Was that the source of the strange wireless impulses? Whose was it, and why was it there?