'Are we going to torpedo her?' asked Ken.
'Not likely. We ain't like Germans, as chucks away a thousand pound torpedo on a pore little fishing smack.'
'But we shan't let her go, surely?'
Williams chuckled. 'Bless your innocence, no! A couple o' shells from our little popper up topside will settle her hash all right.'
Another order echoed from aft. Strang's voice had a curious hollow sound, like a shout in a tunnel. Ken felt the vessel rising beneath him.
Men sprang up the steel ladder leading to the conning tower. A moment later the hatch flew open with a hollow clang, and the sea air gushed in, freshening delightfully the thick oily atmosphere below.
At the same moment power was switched off the electric engines, and the petrol motor broke into life with an appalling racket. The long, cigar-like vessel trembled under the increased power.
'Can't we go up on deck?' muttered Roy who had joined Ken.
Ken shook his head. He knew that this was impossible, yet all the same it was intolerably irksome to remain below without being able to see or take a hand in what was going on.
More orders, and presently the submarine came to rest, and lay, with hardly a movement, on the surface.