CHAPTER

  1. [Captain Restronguet leaves Cards]
  2. [Sub-Lieutenant Hythe Discovers the Submarine]
  3. [The Man Who Walked out of the Sea]
  4. [The Signal from the Depths]
  5. [Captured]
  6. [Face to Face]
  7. [In the Conning-Tower]
  8. [Explanations]
  9. [The First Day in the "Aphrodite"]
  10. [The Second Officer Returns]
  11. [Concerning Captain Restronguet's Rival]
  12. [The "Vorwartz" is Sighted]
  13. [The Missing Submarine]
  14. ["La Flamme"]
  15. [A Visit to Gibraltar]
  16. [Over a Volcano]
  17. [The Rescued Italians]
  18. [The Rivals pass through the Suez Canal]
  19. [Struck by Lightning]
  20. [Rammed Amidships]
  21. [Captain Restronguet learns the News]
  22. [Beset by Somalis]
  23. [Over the Bar]
  24. [The Aero-Hydroplane]
  25. [The Approach of the "Vorwartz"]
  26. [The Sinking of the "Topaze"]
  27. [A Pilot under Compulsion]
  28. [In the Ballast Tank]
  29. [The "Pride of Rhodesia"]
  30. [Captured.]
  31. [The Unsuccessful Competitors]
  32. [The Fate of von Harburg]
  33. [Hythe's Masterstroke]

THE RIVAL SUBMARINES.

CHAPTER I.

CAPTAIN RESTRONGUET LEAVES CARDS.

The garrison port of Portsmouth was mobilized. Not for the "real thing," be it understood, but for the quarterly practice laid down in the joint Naval and Military Regulations of 1917.

Everything, thanks to a rigid administration, had hitherto proceeded with the regularity of clockwork; the Army officials were patting themselves on the back, the Naval authorities were shaking hands with themselves, and, in order to cement the bond of unity, each of the two Services congratulated the other.

To the best of their belief they had reason to assert that Portsmouth was once more impregnable. A series of surprise torpedo-boat attacks upon the fortress had signally failed. The final test during the mobilization was to be in the form of a combined attack upon the defences by the battleships then lying at Spithead and the airships and aeroplanes stationed at Dover, Chatham, and Sheerness.

At eight o'clock on the morning of the day for the grand attack the fleet at Spithead prepared to get under way. Forty sinister-looking destroyers slipped out of harbour in double column line ahead, and as soon as they had passed the Nab Lightship a general signal was communicated by wireless for the battleships to weigh and proceed.

The Commander-in-Chief and the Admiral-Superintendent of Portsmouth Dockyard had breakfasted ashore on that particular morning, and both officers, with the Military Lieutenant-Governor of the Garrison, were to proceed to Spithead on a cruiser to witness the departure of the fleet. It was a fine day, but the beauties of the morning were lost upon them; to have to breakfast at an unearthly hour had considerably ruffled their tempers.