XIX.
DEATH SHIPS OF THE SEA.
A thick fog rose from the sea, as we stole away in the darkness with the torpedo boat. We had no distinguishing lights and every sound was muffled. Even the funnels were protected against the tell-tale sparks of soft coal. The spume of the sea fell over our forward deck in flecks, and the waves splashed at our bow. The harbor lights of Panama shone in a glow of sickly yellow.
An officer stood by the hooded binnacle, watching our course by the faint glow of a tiny lamp. The bulldog engines, which I was working, were speeding us at 17 knots an hour and we were headed for Mollendo. We had no armament. That was sent to the Peruvian government by other means and our only defense against the Chilean cruiser was a clean pair of heels.
Suddenly, the eye of a search-light opened, and sent a long gleam of yellow into the fog. It swung around and rested for a moment on the column of smoke trailing from our funnels and changed its color from a black to a fiery red. It rested there a moment, then closed and all was darkness. The tumult was deafening. The hissing rush of projectiles, as they struck the water and exploded by impact, or shrieked in ricochet overhead.
The brave officer at the binnacle fell to the deck, his mangled body a quivering mass. One funnel was struck midway and cut in twain as though by a sharpened blade. Fire darted up from the half funnel, and showed the cruiser’s gunners the correctness of their aim. It lit our deck with its glare and showed the bodies of two others on the forward deck bathed in blood. Another officer coolly took his place at the binnacle and directed a change in the course of the boat.
The spurting jets of fire from our broken funnel gleamed in the fog, like a beacon 168 light to those on board the gaunt black monster of the seas, in pursuit of his prey. A hunted thing on the black waves, we crowded on every ounce of steam throughout the watches of the night.