“Karl, haf you ship’s time?”
Ali Baba paused to fish out his watch, and the two compared timepieces. Then Golden Beard wound the clock, set the hands of one dial at the time indicated by their watches; set the hands of the other dial at 2:13; and Ali Baba, carrying a reel of copper wire from the bed to the washstand, fastened one end of it to the mechanism of the clock.
Golden Beard turned sharply on Ilse Dumont:
“I said go on deck! Did you not understand?”
The girl replied steadily:
“I understood that we had abandoned this idea for a better one.”
“There iss no better one!”
“There is! Of what advantage would it be to blow up the captain’s cabin and the bridge when it is not certain that the papers will be destroyed?”
“Listen once!” returned Golden Beard, wagging his finger in her face:
“Cabin and bridge are directly above us and there remains not a splinter large like a pin! I know. I know my bombs! I know––”