"About 5 a.m." answered the captain. He stood leaning against a door, and the fine head, the pallor, the touch of fatigue, all made a very striking and appealing picture. "Say about eight minutes after five. I'd just come up to take a look-see, and saw him just about two miles away, on the surface, and moving right along. So I went under to get into a good position, came up again, and let him have one. Well, he saw it just as it was almost on him, swung her round, and dived like a ton of lead."
The audience listened in silent sympathy. One could see the disappointment on the captain's face.
"Where was he?"
"About so-and-so."
"That's the jinx that got after the convoy sure as you live."
Two blind ships that tried to find each other under water.
The speaker had had his own adventures with the Germans. A month or so before, he had shoved up his periscope and spotted a Fritz on the surface in full noonday. The watchful Fritz, however, had been lucky enough to see the enemy almost at once, and had dived. The American followed suit. The eyeless submarine manœuvred about, some eighty feet under, the German evidently "making his getaway," the American hoping to be lucky enough to pick up Fritz's trail, and get a shot at him when he rose again to the top. And while the two blind ships manœuvred there in the dark of the abyss, the keel of the fleeing German had actually, by a curious chance, scraped along the top of the American vessel and carried away the wireless aerials!
All were silent for a few seconds, thinking over the affair. It was not difficult to read the thought in every mind, the thought of getting at the Germans. The characteristic aggressiveness of the American mind, heritage of a people compelled to subdue a vast, wild continent, is a wonderful military attribute. The idea of our navy is, "Get after 'em, keep after 'em, stay after 'em, don't give 'em an instant of security or rest." And none have this fighting spirit deeper in their hearts than our gallant boys of the submarine patrol.
"That's all," said Captain Ned. "I'm going to have a wash-up." He lifted a grease-stained hand to his cheek, rubbed his unshaven beard, and grinned. "Any letters?"
"Whole bag of stuff. Smithie put it on your desk."