Just before midnight the thud of a ship's engines became audible. Gradually the sound drew nearer and nearer. A large vessel, showing no lights, was cautiously making her way through the drift ice.
The ship was not H.M.S. "Heracles." The cutter's crew knew that by the noise of the engines, for it lacked the rhythm of the cruiser's smoothly running machinery.
She was certainly coming in the direction of the boat, but the question was, would she stop. Since she had gone a long way to the northward of the usual trade routes, it was evident that the vessel had good reasons for wishing to avoid examination by the British patrol craft, and would not be likely to stop at the signal of distress.
Accordingly the sub. determined to bluff her. By means of a Morse flashing-lamp, with which the cutter was equipped, a peremptory order to heave-to was sent. For a few moments the men waited in acute suspense. Upon the success of the demand depended their lives, since they had little chance of outliving the rigours of a long winter's night in the ice-infested sea. A steady white light shone through the darkness, followed by the signal "I am heaving-to."
"Give way, lads," exclaimed Tressidar encouragingly. "Another five minutes will do the trick."
Gathering their remaining energies, for the men were almost done up, the rowers urged the boat in the direction of the now motionless steamer, and ranged alongside her towering hull, the rail of which seemed lost in the darkness overhead.
A coil of rope, hurtling from the deck, dropped into the cutter. The bowman, his fingers numbed with the cold, fumbled as he took a turn round the for'ard thwart.
"Lower a ladder," shouted the sub.
"Aye, aye!" replied a voice with a pronounced foreign accent. There was neither cordiality nor resentment in the words; merely an acceptance with a good grace of a situation that could not be avoided.
The cutter was grinding alongside the rust-streaked wall-sides of the steamer. Her exhausted crew had not the strength to fend her off. It was, indeed, doubtful whether some of the men would be able to gain the vessel's deck without assistance.