"I'll signal them," thought Herc; but even as the thought entered his mind he recollected that as he had gone overboard the flags had gone with him.
He was marooned on a floating target, with every prospect of having a twelve-inch shell come shrieking toward him at any moment.
Suddenly Herc saw a string of flags hoisted on the flagship. Instinctively he knew what they meant.
Ned, his cousin and chum, had signaled that all was ready, and the Connecticut was about to open fire!
Situated far to the rear of the target as they were, Herc knew that those in the boats had not sighted him, and unless he was missed from the Number One whaleboat, his doom was sealed. He could have screamed aloud with real terror at the peril of his situation.
At almost the same instant his burning eyes saw a burst of flame suddenly flash from the side of the battleship. Herc's brain reeled. Already he could hear the scream of the shell, and in fancy saw his dismembered body flung in torn fragments before it.
"Phsiwis-is-s-s-s-s-s-s-s-s!"
The projectile shrieked nearer and nearer and passed like a thunderbolt through the target, ripping it from top to bottom with a vicious hiss. It plunged into the sea far beyond, ricocheting from wave to wave for two miles or more.