The “Logan” had been out four days. Though headed westward at this moment, she had not been moving steadily westward, for she was now not more than three hundred and thirty miles west of the coast of Ireland.
On this fourth day, as on its predecessors, the destroyer steamed along at cruising speed. Though the crew knew nothing of Germany’s proposed big submarine drive directed at the troopships conveying the One Hundred and Seventeenth Division, yet every marine and sailor felt that something unusual was in the wind. The lookouts had been instructed to aid their vision by the free use of their marine glasses and precautions out of the ordinary had been taken in other directions.
“The Germans are using a new submarine periscope, slimmer than any that they have heretofore employed. They hoist it for only a few seconds at a time and do not send it as far out of the water as they did with the old style periscope. The man who sights a periscope in time will save our ship.”
That was the word constantly passed about by the “Logan’s” officers. Every sailor hoped that he might be the lucky one to discover a periscope in time to lead to the bombing of one of the pests.
Dave had reached the bridge at seven bells. Dalzell was now below, sleeping as soundly as though he were back in the old home town of Gridley. Lieutenant Curtin was on the bridge watch.
“It’s odd, Mr. Curtin, that we haven’t sighted a submarine in four days; that we haven’t had the slightest visible reason to suspect the presence of one,” Dave remarked to his subordinate officer.
“Very likely, sir, we’re too far out,” Curtin replied.
“Yet we have every reason to believe that they’ve extended the danger zone further westward,” Darrin continued.
“That’s the belief of the fleet commander,” Curtin answered, “but there’s always a chance of his having guessed wrong. Why isn’t it just as probable,” he added, in a much lower tone, “that the Huns have decided to have a try at the troopship fleet fairly close to land?”
“It wouldn’t be likely,” Dave went on, in an equally low tone. “For one thing, Mr. Curtin, the enemy would want their first try farther out. Then, if they missed, they’d have another chance, perhaps, closer to land.”