At noon we rose at last for good, emptied the tanks, and then travelled at top speed over the water.
Favoured by the fine weather we approached our goal with considerable rapidity; and on August —— at eight o'clock in the evening, we saw a circle of white lights all round the horizon.
Our natural fear was, of course, that we were surrounded; if we turned to starboard we saw those accursed lights, to port—there they were too.
Finally our excellent Zeiss glasses removed our fears that at the last moment with the homeland already in sight we had fallen into a trap. The twilight was still clear enough to allow us to see and recognize from the construction of the uncanny-looking ships that only some harmless Dutch fishing boats lay before us.
CHAPTER XIV
THE ARRIVAL
Favourable winds astern helped us on towards home. On August —— at six o'clock in the morning, our alarm was raised once more. In the far distance something appeared on the water which looked like the sail of a boat, though certainly of a very strange appearance. As it approached nearer the sail turned out to be the conning-tower of a U-Boat, which, with her deck still dripping, was going on her way.
Although we were at first inclined to take careful and instructive observations of the strange object in the distance, in order to judge how we ourselves showed up at a distance of three knots, the best course in our case appeared to be to find out as quickly as possible if she were an English or a German submarine.
We preferred, however, in any case to make ourselves as unnoticeable as possible, and in the last emergency to submerge.
We had already flooded up to tank 3, already the sea broke over the deck and struck against the conning-tower, and even the latter was cutting half-way down through the green waters—when suddenly a well-known flag signal rose yonder, which gave us the certainty that it was a German U-Boat in front of us.
We answered immediately, and gave the command directly after: