"Sir?"
"Ask the Dimpled Lassie to report the state of the dynometer."
Promptly came the reply that already the strain on the grapnel hawser was 2-½ tons.
"And the breaking strain is four, sir," Sefton reminded his chief.
"We'll get it all right," reiterated Crosthwaite. "Never fear."
His optimism was justified when forty-five minutes later the grapnel sullenly bobbed above the surface, holding in its tightly-closed jaws the bight of a large submarine electric cable.
"Let's hope we've hooked the right one," muttered the engineer-lieutenant.
"You atom of despondency!" exclaimed Stirling.
"I state a possibility, not a probability, Pills," rejoined Boxspanner. "It's a three-to-one chance, you know."
Already a number of artificers, who had been temporarily detailed for duty on board each of the trawlers, were hard at work in connection with the retrieved cable. What they were doing in connection must remain a matter of conjecture, but the fact was patent that the success or otherwise of unremitting toil depended upon the next few minutes.