"Keep away, Frank," said Jack. "I've got this fellow, and I hope he doesn't give up too easily. We've heavy accounts to settle with him."
The big German showed no symptoms of giving up. He lashed out with both arms and Jack was kept busy warding off the blows. But the German commander was a novice at this sort of fighting, while Jack, only a year or so before, had won the heavyweight boxing championship of the British navy. So there was no doubt in Frank's mind as to the outcome. He and his men formed a circle around the struggling figures, at the same time guarding the conning tower to prevent the enemy from closing it.
"Shoot the first head you see down there," Frank enjoined the men he left on guard, and he knew they would be only too glad to obey this order.
Jack, with a smile still on his face, permitted the German commander to waste his energy in ineffective blows. Then Jack stepped forward and delivered a heavy blow to the man's mouth. The German staggered back. Jack doubled him up with a left-handed punch to the pit of the stomach, then straightened him with a second hard right to the point of the chin.
The German commander reeled backward. Jack followed up his advantage, and for the space of a minute played a tattoo on the man's face with both fists. Then he stepped back, and as the German came toward him, the lad muttered:
"I guess this has gone far enough. Now for the finish."
He started a blow almost from the deck, and putting his full force behind it, struck.
"Crack!"
The blow could be heard even aboard the Ventura, which had approached close by this time.
The German commander seemed to stagger back all of ten paces, the British sailors scurrying back to keep out of his way. Then the man fell, his head striking the deck with a sickening thud.