"I guess not," she answered softly. "But come and call." With a smile she was gone, and from the boat there came the Baron's voice mocking through the still air, "Good night, Lieutenant Travers. Thank you so much." And, drowned by the band that started at that moment, the wonderful and fearful curse that left the torpedo-lieutenant's lips drifted into the night unheard. * * * * * Let us go on a couple of years. The moment thought of by the gunnery-lieutenant, the day acclaimed by the Prussian officer had come. England was at war. Der Tag was a reality. No longer did silks and shaded lights form part of the equipment of the Navy, but grim and sombre, ruthlessly stripped of everything not absolutely necessary, the great grey monsters watched tirelessly through the flying scud of the North Sea for "the fleet that stayed at home." Only their submarines were out, and these, day by day, diminished in numbers, until the men who sent them out looked at one another fearfully--so many went out, so few came back. Tearing through the water one day, away a bit to the south-west of Bantry Bay, with the haze of Ireland lying like a smudge on the horizon, was a lean, villainous-looking torpedo-boat-destroyer. She was plunging her nose into the slight swell, now and again drenching the oilskinned figure standing motionless on the bridge. Behind her a great cloud of black smoke drifted across the grey water, and the whole vessel was quivering with the force of her engines. She was doing her maximum and a bit more, but still the steady, watchful eyes of the officer on the bridge seemed impatient, and every now and again he cursed softly and with wonderful fluency under his breath. It was our friend Jerry, who at the end of his time on the flagship had been given one of the newest T.B.D.'s, and now with every ounce he could get out of her he was racing towards the spot from which had come the last S.O.S. message, nearly an hour ago. There was something grimly foreboding about those agonised calls sent out to the world for perhaps twenty minutes, and then--silence, nothing more. German submarines, he reflected, as for the tenth time he peered at his wrist-watch, German submarines engaged once again in the only form of war they could compete in or dared undertake. And not for the first time his thoughts went back to the vainglorious boastings of his friend the Baron. "Damn him," he muttered. "I haven't forgotten the sweep." There were many things he hadn't forgotten; how, when he'd gone to call on the lady as requested, she had been "out," and it was that sort of "out" that means "in." How a letter had been answered courteously but distinctly coldly, and, impotent with rage, he had been forced to the conclusion that she was offended with him. And with the Prussian able to say what he liked, it was not difficult to find the reason.