The same tactics were to be followed as had been used on the day when the battleship went aground; that is, firing when the ship was traveling at full speed, about seventeen knots an hour.
The red-headed boy was retained on shipboard to attend to the wig-wagging, Dan going out in the motor boat with an engineer and coxswain.
"Red flag up!" shouted Dan. "Keep clear of the course."
The ship's siren blew, and soon they saw the path made by the marine monster heading off in their direction. Dan, in the motor boat, was near the extreme end of the range.
"Better sheer off, coxswain, because you can't tell where the old torpedo is going when it gets near the end of its run. There she goes."
The torpedo took a long dive at an angle of about forty-five degrees from her course.
"Look where she's going!"
Off in the direction that the projectile was headed was a fleet of fishermen in small boats, tending to their nets, which were scattered over an area of a quarter of a mile, standing almost end to end.
"Head toward them, head toward them! We must warn them!"
The coxswain was a seaman, not a coxswain by appointment, and he did not appear to be as familiar with the work as he might have been. The regular coxswain of the motor boat was in the sick bay, though Dan did not know this.