"Somebody working the wireless," decided Ned, for the arrival of a message is not attended by any sound audible outside the ear receivers. "Who can it be? Trevor, the regular wireless man, is off duty. He was one of the emergency gang I sent below with all the other hands I could spare."
There followed a moment of indecision, and then a flame of anger swept Ned's face.
Whoever was sending out those thundering detonations of electricity that were splitting space like a scimitar was no novice. Moreover, he was trying to raise the Manhattan, the flagship of the Red Squadron, and using the secret code to do it.
"I'll find out what this means in two shakes," exclaimed Ned to himself. "I miss my guess if it isn't somebody trying, absolutely without orders, to flash news of this accident to the flagship and put me in bad."
He hastened from the bridge to the upper deck and through an alleyway to where a short flight of steel steps led to the wireless room, perched like a miniature pilot house astern of the funnel.
As he gained the door of the place and looked in, he stopped as abruptly as if he had been struck a blow in the face.
For an instant he stood there rigid, taking in the picture that had suddenly presented itself to his indignant gaze.
Bending over the key and sending out impatient waves of sound into the atmosphere was Kenworth. His pale face was alight with poisonous glee, as again and again he sent out the secret call for the flagship of the Reds.
Ned was into the room in a bound. In another instant he had Kenworth by the collar. The astonished and startled midshipman was as helpless as a puppy in Ned's powerful grasp.