Head-on, the opposing fleets collided with a crash which twisted their keels and racked their timbers. Lights merged together and became stationary as hull locked with hull in a grinding embrace. The alien crews swarmed to the decks and leaped across the rail upon the American sailors who surged forward to meet them. Fists flashed in the darkness. Men met hand to hand. The night was filled with wild cries, the trampling of heavy feet, the thud of contact of wood meeting wood and flesh meeting flesh. From the center of the struggling mass of men and boats came a sudden flare of light which dispelled the dark shadows cast athwart the vessels and brought into bold relief the struggling figures of the men who battled on the decks.
"Fire!"
The cry was taken up by every throat and echoed down the line. It came to Kenneth Gregory on the
extreme end of the left wing where he had been directing the defense of his weakened quarter, by a counter-flanking movement. A boat afire! And right in the center of his fleet! When the tank exploded hundreds of gallons of burning distillate would flood the waters. But he dared not think that far. Whirling the Richard about, and circling behind his line of boats he dashed away to face the new peril.
The crew of the Florence abandoned the attack at the first cry and surged to the hold to fight the conflagration. A gasoline stove, carelessly left burning by one of that vessel's drunken crew, had been overturned by the shock of collision, and had fired the bilge. Fanned by the rising winds, the flames were licking at the oil-soaked timbers and spreading rapidly toward the tanks in the bow.
The alien crew of the Florence fled in a panic of fear. Leaping to the rail they flung themselves to the deck of a neighboring craft which was already backing away from the ill-fated vessel. From all sides, friend and foe alike drew away from the blazing fishing craft. For the time being the sound of conflict gave place to the rasp of reverse levers, hoarse cries of warning and the labored chug of heavy-duty motors going full astern. In the ever-widening cleared space about the ill-fated derelict the lurid waters were churned into a roseate foam by the frenzied lashing of the heavy propellers of the fishing craft as their masters sought to clear the dangerous area.
As the Richard sped on in the direction of the ever-
brightening glare, Gregory's mind kept pace with the rapid pulsing of the high-speed motor. He must tow the blazing vessel clear of the fleet before the tanks exploded.
Dodging among the retreating fishermen he grazed the Curlew's hull and plunged into the open space. Warning cries sounded above the roar of the flames but he did not hear them. His plan, formed on the instant, must be put into execution at once. If it failed, the speed of the Richard would carry Dickie to a place of safety. It was a fighting chance. That was all.
Swinging the Richard about, he drove straight for the Florence.