In spite of the rapidly rising wind, which had now got to thirty knots, the quickly decreasing daylight, and the barometer that was falling with ominous persistence, Gordon and Faux, and Hodgson and Wilson, volunteered to go out and look for Perham. They pushed off in two boats from the slipway. The harbour was a froth of whitecaps, and the boats took off in a smother of spray.
Half an hour later a great-hearted pigeon came battling in against the quartering breeze carrying a message from Perham. Smoothing out the crumpled paper on the desk in the flying office we read the signal.
"Port engine crank-shaft fractured. Good landing. Approximate position ten miles south of North Hinder."
I rang up the naval authorities at Harwich, informed them of the state of affairs, and asked for assistance. I was told that the Harwich flotilla had run into a mine-field off the Dutch coast. The flagship of Rear-Admiral Tyrwhitt had struck a mine with her stern and the explosion had detonated a depth charge carried on her counter. She was returning to port at about two knots, with the sea that was running outside, and all available destroyers were required to guard the disabled light cruiser. However, help would be sent.
At dusk the two flying-boats returned. The pilots had made the North Hinder, had gone ten miles south and had searched a large area, but had failed to locate Perham.
And then a signal came in that the two destroyers sent to the position had been unable to find the flying-boat.
With the shutting down of night the wind increased in violence. In the open, when you stood up to it, it was like a solid wall.
The disabled cruiser outside was in a precarious condition, and many of her attendant destroyers had to leave her and return to Harwich, making heavy weather of it.
The wind got up to forty knots, fifty knots, and finally to sixty knots in gusts. The wooden mess groaned and protested beneath the heavy hand of the storm.
To a chorus of chattering windows, fierce spurts of smoke from the stove due to violent back drafts down the chimney, a chart was spread out on the Staff-room table and the probable course of the drifting flying-boat was laid out. All this, with the reservation in our own minds, if the boat would live through the gale. But it was at least something to do, and three boats stood ready to push off next morning, if required.