"Try the screw!" panted Oscar. "If it is all right, fix a torpedo under the warship and run away."
The screw was tried immediately and found to work as well as ever.
Then the torpedo was brought forth from the ammunition room and adjusted, and the Holland XI. ran off a distance of a quarter of a mile and then came to the surface.
The Tokio was preparing to close in on the American transport; with the evident intention of killing or capturing all on board, when the torpedo went off with a rumble and a roar that could be heard for many miles around.
The execution done by the torpedo was frightful, for the instrument of death had been attached to the weakest part of the Japanese ship's keel.
The charge went straight up through the four decks of the Tokio, setting fire to every magazine.
It was a fireworks spectacle which could not be equaled and was followed by a scene of horror.
Everything went to pieces at once, and it is safe to say that scarcely an officer or a man on board escaped with his life.
Those on the American transport could scarcely believe their eyes, and when the Holland appeared and a man went to the deck, to wave an American flag and then the private flag of the submarine craft, there was a wild hurrahing.
"The Holland XI.!"