But before the Sub could make his way along the partly submerged timber Haynes exclaimed:
"Stand by; here they come!"
Webb listened intently. He could distinguish the thud of many feet, and the high-pitched sort of cheer that Turkish infantry frequently give vent to when advancing at the double.
"Back with you!" he ordered, addressing the two seamen on the balk. "Stand to your arms, men!"
The Sub had made up his mind. It must be a fight to the death. There could be no surrender. Yet it was a forlorn hope. At the utmost, only a dozen rifles would be able to reply to the renewed attack.
Another and totally different sound wafted across the sea, at first so faintly that Webb was afraid to trust the evidence of his own senses. The sound increased in volume. Now it was unmistakable—the chug-chug of the steam cutter's engines.
Snatching up a Very's pistol and inserting a cartridge, Webb fired into the air. The green light from the signal-cartridge threw a sickly glare upon the scene, hitherto shrouded in intense darkness; for, although the greater portion of the creek was one blaze of search-lights, the darkness under the cliffs was almost impenetrable.
Well it was that Webb had fired the signal, for the steamboat was heading for the centre of the creek. Instantly the boat altered helm and tore down upon the two trapped craft. She was charging at full speed against the formidable boom. "Steamboat ahoy!" shouted Webb at the full force of his lungs. "Slow down; there's an obstruction ahead of you."
The warning was unheeded. Either Osborne had failed to hear his chum's voice, or else he had made up his mind to charge the boom, in the hope that the steamboat's sharp bow would shear through the danger.
The outermost wire of the boom parted like packthread under the terrific impact of ten tons of deadweight, travelling at fifteen knots. By good luck the boat had struck the boom immediately between two of the balks of timber, otherwise her planks would have been ripped like paper by the formidable steel spikes.