By this time the "Grigsby" was a bare half-mile away, and going fast.
"We're bringing to bear on you to blow you out of the water," Darrin signalled this time. "Will you stop?"
If he had made any plan to die fighting the fleeing skipper must have lost his nerve at that point, for he suddenly swung his bow around, reduced speed and moved ahead at mere steerage-way.
"Call Ensign Peters to clear away a launch with an armed crew," Darrin directed. "I will accompany him, for I must see what reason that craft had for firing on a British dirigible."
On either bow of the strange steamship was painted the national flag of the same neutral nation to which the "Olga" had appeared to belong. She flew no bunting.
"Stand by to receive boarding party," a signalman on the "Grigsby's" bridge wigwagged as the launch started toward the water.
The two craft lay now not more than five hundred yards apart. Across the water sped the fast power launch and came up alongside of the unknown steamship, which displayed no name.
Not a human being was now visible on her deck. An undersized watch officer had appeared on the bridge, but he now vanished.
"Who commands that destroyer?" demanded a voice in English, though it had the broken accent of a German-born speaker.
"I do," Darrin replied.