Running smoothly and swiftly the submarine passed from the Sea of Marmora back into the Dardanelles, and set out on the last lap of her journey. It was now after 7 o’clock in the morning, and a grey mist, heralding the approach of a storm, was in the air above.
Gradually the swell of the waves increased as the wind grew in violence, and the waters of the strait grew angry. But below, where the D-16 moved swiftly along, all was smooth and tranquil, although the barometer showed a heavy disturbance above.
The new military governor of Constantinople, desiring the freedom of the vessel rather than to be confined, had given his parole, and, seeming to take his plight with fortitude, was watching the workings of the vessel with the greatest interest. Some of the intricate details Lord Hastings took the trouble to explain to him.
Then, just as the D-16 seemed about to accomplish the last lap of her return journey safely, the trouble occurred.
Lord Hastings had given it as his opinion that they must at that moment be in the very heart of the Turkish fortifications in the strait, and had turned away, when the prisoner, with a sudden leap, sprang to the signal that controlled the air tanks. Before any one could stop him he had given the signal that sent the D-16 soaring to the top of the water, where she floated upon the surface not a hundred yards from the guns of the nearest Turkish fort.
The wind had kicked the strait into an angry swirling mass of water, with the waves running high. But the D-16 had hardly been tossed upon the crest of the first wave when a Turkish sentry espied her.
He gave a hoarse cry, and in another moment a big gun spoke.
“Boom!”
The D-16 staggered. One more huge wave she climbed, and when she settled into the trough of the sea with it, she went deeper.
She seemed to turn on her beam ends as she dived, but suddenly she righted herself. Officers and crew picked themselves up from the positions into which they had been flung, and rushed for their posts.