"There she is!" I said, and put my finger upon the rapidly growing smear.
Within twenty minutes, a large battleship raised her hull, making directly towards us. We altered our course a little, and as we swerved I could see she had four funnels which grew larger every moment. Of her accompanying flotilla and of the transports we could see nothing at all.
Then we rose to the surface.
Our short-handedness became apparent at once. Adams had to be called from the engines to stand at the wheel. Scarlett and my brother went on deck as I was useless at the manipulation of flags. It was a critical moment.
"I am determined to take no chances," Bernard said; "that is why I am risking signalling. We could probably get her without showing at all, but as she expects us and will lay to for us, we can make it absolutely certain."
He had the signal book, over which he had pencilled translations of the German, in his hand.
"That flag, Scarlett—'wireless out of order,' it means."
That flag ran up a steel halliard bent to the top of the conning-tower.
"Ah, they see us!"
Scarcely three-quarters of a mile away, the great battleship was moving at a snail's pace. Her decks were crowded with men—in the clear sunlight I could see every detail. A piece of bunting ran up her mast in a ball and opened to the breeze.