"Absolutely," said Erskine, taking the receiver down from the hooks. "If we didn't do it with them, they'd do it with us. That's war."
Lennard made no reply. He was looking hard at the now rapidly approaching shape of the big French cruiser, and when men are thinking hard, they don't usually say much.
The Ithuriel completed her quarter-circle and dead head on to the Dupleix, Erskine said, "Centre gun ready, forward—fire. Port and starboard concentrate—fire."
There was no report—only a low, hissing sound—and then Lennard saw three flashes of bluish-green blaze out over the French cruiser.
"Hit her! I think those shells of yours got home," said Erskine between his clenched teeth. And then he added through the telephone, "Well aimed, Castellan! They all got there. Load up again—three more shots and I'm going to ram—quick now, and full speed ahead when you've fired."
"All ready!" came back over the telephone, "I've told Mackenzie that you'll want it."
"Good man," replied Erskine. "When I touch the button, you do the rest. Now—are you ready?"
"Yes."
"Let her have it—then full speed. Ah," Erskine continued, turning to Lennard, "he's shooting back."
The cruiser burst into a thunderstorm of smoke and flame and shell, but there was nothing to shoot at. Only three feet of freeboard would have been visible even in broad daylight. The signal mast had been telescoped. There was nothing but the deck, the guns and the conning-tower to be seen. The shells screamed through the air a good ten feet over her and incidentally wrecked the Marine Hotel on Selsey Bill.