"Humph!" muttered Jack, dryly, "if that scow were an enemy's battleship, twelve-inch barkers and all, we'd be twenty feet under the surface, and we'd be out of sight and out of mind."
"Quite right," nodded Lieutenant Danvers. "In a contest of that sort I'd feel fifty times safer here than on the battleship we were after. Now, Benson, you've seen the first part of it. We have the other dummy to fire. The real gunner, on a submarine, is the fellow at the wheel. Do you want to take the wheel, manoeuvre the boat and give the order for the next dummy shot?"
"Do I?" uttered Jack Benson. "Just!"
Orders were then given to place the other dummy torpedo in the tube, and this done, Jack took his place at the wheel, while Eph Somers and the lieutenant stood outside. At the naval officer's direction Jack Benson came up on the other side of the scow, about three hundred yards away, with the nose of the "Hastings" so pointed that the torpedo dummy could be delivered straight amidships.
At just the right moment Captain Jack passed the order to fire. Then he watched the scow with a strange fascination. Danvers stood, watch in hand.
"Now!" he shouted.
Barely two seconds later the second dummy torpedo rose, a few yards back from the side of the scow.
"That torpedo struck, full and fair," nodded Lieutenant Danvers, turning toward the conning tower. "Mr. Benson, if you always hit as full and well, you'll be an expert torpedoist."
"Why, it's nothing but holding the nose of your own boat full on the other craft, amidships, and the torpedo itself does the rest," uttered the young submarine skipper.
"That's it," nodded Lieutenant Danvers. "But, when you're below the surface, the problem becomes a harder one."