All night the Lena forged ahead at full speed through the fog, which hung thick and dismal overhead and all about; and all this time the boys did not leave the bridge.
The men were allowed to rest at their posts, but were kept on the alert, for, as Jack said, "we must be prepared for anything."
Jack looked at his watch. It was 8 o'clock in the morning; and, even as he glanced at his timepiece, the fog lifted as suddenly as it had enveloped them.
"This is better—" Frank began, and broke off with a cry of amazement.
Not a hundred yards to the leeward his eyes fell upon the dark hull of the German cruiser which had pursued them the night before. Evidently the commander of the vessel had anticipated the course of the Lena and had taken the same route. There is no telling in what imminent danger the two had been of a collision during the night, as both had sped along silently, each fearing to betray his presence to the other.
Jack espied the enemy at the same instant that Frank cried out; and he acted upon the instant.
Hoarse commands were shouted across the decks of the Lena, and a moment later her small guns burst into sound. In spite of the fact that the enemy must have been on the lookout for the Lena, it was apparent that the Lena had been the first to realize the presence of the other.
"Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!" spoke the Lena's guns, and the sound went hurtling out across the sea.
"Crash! Crash!"
At this close range a miss was almost out of the question, and the Lena's shells crashed into the sides of the German cruiser. The German vessel staggered and reeled, but in a moment her big guns answered the smaller caliber ones of the Lena.