“Hooray! we’ve smashed her steam steering gear!” yelled Ned, half crazy with excitement.
But, crippled as she was, the Calvo could still fight. Suddenly two bright flashes showed at her midship section, and a couple of six-inch projectiles shrieked toward the Barrill. The bridge was carried half away before they could stir. Ned caught Midshipman Stark as the young officer was hurled back against him. Captain Gomez stood grimly at the engine-room telegraph, which, luckily, had not been carried away. Nor, by good fortune, had the range-finder and fire-control instruments.
At the same instant as the Calvo’s shell shrieked its way through one end of the destroyer’s little bridge the other missile from the same vessel carried away the canvas forward funnel. The little destroyer stood revealed in her true colors.
An instant’s glance served to show that the midshipman was not seriously wounded. A deep cut on his head from a steel splinter was his only injury. But it had temporarily disabled him, and two sailors carried him to the small cabin, in which the surgeon had established himself.
Ned now stood alone on the bridge by Captain Gomez. A thrill ran through the boy as he realized this. They were in a real battle, and he was actually second in command!
“Shall we let them have it again, sir?” he asked, as the shouts and cries of the terrified crew died out under Stanley’s persuasion and Herc’s reckless flourishing of his weapon.
“Yes, my boy. This time we’ll sink them, if possible. It will be in revenge for the terrible fright they gave me when I saw our brave young friend wounded.”
As the signal was transmitted, Stanley’s battery mingled its fire with Herc’s. This time the Calvo did not answer. Instead they could see that the greatest confusion prevailed on her decks.
“Give her some more!” shouted the captain.
But even as he spoke there resounded from the crippled ship a terrific explosion. She seemed to lift for half of her length upward out of the water, and then, in a shroud of dense, white vapor, she settled back.