"Well hit, poppa!" cried Miss Chrysie, from the bridge. "I guess that's got him on a tender spot. The count won't have much screws to work with after that. Oh, they're going to shoot again. Suppose you gave them one forward this time."
While she was speaking, the quick-firer had already been reloaded, the president moved the long barrel a couple of degrees, and touched the button again. The sharp hiss of the released air was followed by an intensely brilliant flash of light on the forecastle of the Vlodoya, and when the smoke had cleared away the Maxim-Nordenfeldt had vanished.
"I guess there's not much wrong with that automatic sighting arrangement of mine," said the president; "hits every time."
"Couldn't be better, poppa! I reckon they're pretty tired by this. Suppose Mr Vernon gives her full speed again, and we go along and have a talk with Ma'm'selle Sophie and the count. Shouldn't wonder if they knew by now that we've raised their bluff, and are ready to see them for all they've got."
The president re-charged his gun, and then, leaning his back up against the bridge, said:
"Well, yes, Chrysie, I think we can see them now, if Mr Vernon will give us full speed ahead for a few minutes."
The chief officer nodded, and pulled the handle of the telegraph over. The answering tinkle came back from the engine-room, in which the chief had retired after he had given his message, and the Nadine again sprang forward towards the crippled vessel that was now her prey. She described another magnificent curve, and as she rushed up alongside the Russian yacht at a distance of about two hundred yards, Miss Chrysie sat herself down on a camp-stool behind the Maxim, and sent half-a-dozen shots rattling through the rigging of the Vlodoya. Then, as the Nadine swung in closer, she depressed the barrel of the gun on to the bridge, on which she could now recognise the count and his daughter, and sang out, in a clear soprano:
"Hands up, please, or I'll shoot. My dear Countess Sophie, I never expected this of you."
Countess Sophie looked at her father, and bit a Russian curse in two between her tightly-clenched teeth, and said to her father who was standing beside her on the bridge:
"She has failed—she and the engineer too—and these accursed Americans have done it, I suppose. They have broken our propellers and disabled our gun. What are we to do? It is exasperating, just when we thought that everything was going so well. What has happened to Adelaide?—has she turned traitor too? Surely that would be impossible."