"I dare you to do it!" replied the brave skipper. Then, turning to the operator, he said, "Send the S.O.S. with the latitude and longitude to the patrols. Smartly there, Robson."
"Yes, sir."
"This is that raider we heard of at Delhi, but he can't touch us."
The raider, however, had caught the sentence, or part of it, and he understood the order. The next instant a burst of fire from a machine gun, trained with wonderful accuracy, blew the main part of the wireless apparatus to pieces, and rendered it perfectly useless for either receiving or transmitting. How the captain and the operator escaped injury or death will for ever remain a mystery.
Seizing a megaphone, the former dashed out of the cabin, down the keel corridor and the narrow slip-way, to the central touring gondola on the starboard side, and, shaking his fist at the raider, who sailed calmly alongside about a hundred feet away, shouted through the instrument: "You brigand! You shall hang for this!"
A mocking laugh, drowned by the roar of the engines, which still continued full speed ahead, was the only reply. Evidently this mad airman was enjoying the fun immensely. At any rate he appeared very careless of the other's threats.
"I mean it, you felon!" roared the skipper.
"Are you going to heave to?" came the the reply through the raider's megaphone.
"No, certainly not!"
"Then you must take the consequence!" came the mocking taunt, and the next instant, "Rep-r-r-r-r-r-r-r!" came another burst from that deadly machine-gun, which seemed so effective every time it spoke.