"Telephone to Lieutenant von Waldkirch that he is now in command!"
An electrician roused himself, attempted to obey, and reported:
"The communications are broken, Herr Leutnant."
"One of you go and fetch him—he is in the after fire-control station."
A man wrenched at the lid of the manhole.
"It will not open, Herr Leutnant—it is jammed."
The lieutenant glanced at the observation slit. The aperture was no longer regular. In front of him it gaped, behind him it was closed.
"So!—then we will carry on!" His face had gone deathly pale, but his lips were tight-pressed. "Telephone to such guns as you can—independent firing!" He himself leaned over to the voice-funnel from the engine-room. "Wollenmetz!—Wollenmetz!"
The reply came in a gush of fluent curses, evidently roared with full lung-power at the other end and terminating with: "What is it?"