He broke off suddenly.
Anstey made some remark, but the Wireless Officer took not the slightest notice. Already he had snatched up a pencil and was scribbling upon the ever-ready pad.
It was a TTT or urgent warning signal. Mostyn wrote it down mechanically without knowing its import, but the Third Officer, looking over Peter's shoulder, made a grimace as he deciphered the other's scrawl:
"CQ de GNF—TTT—mine warning—S.S. two-step reports 1630 sighting two mines, lat. 53° 20' 15", long. 1° 5' 30" east stop mines just awash barnacle covered apparently connected by hawser—end of message."
"By Jove!" exclaimed Anstey. "Just our luck. Right in our course, an' it's my blessed watch."
CHAPTER VI
A Night of Peril
Making his way to the chartroom the Third Officer "laid off" the position of the mines. His rough guess proved to be remarkably accurate. According to the position given, the source of danger was only a few miles from the Outer Dowsing Lightship, and the West Barbican had to pass close to the Outer Dowsing on her course to Brocklington.
Anstey's next step was to inform the Captain. The Old Man, a sailor to the backbone, was in the chart-house in a trice, where, after a brief but careful survey of tide-tables and current-drift charts, he was able to determine the approximate position of the floating mines when the ship would be in the immediate vicinity of the light-vessel. Allowing for the set and strength of the tide and the drift caused by the wind, between the time the mines were first sighted and the time when the West Barbican entered the danger-zone, he was able to assert that, if the ship's original course were maintained, she would pass at least ten miles to the east'ard of those most undesirable derelicts.