"The 'K----'s' low freeboard made the drop a short one, and, luckily, 'Brunnhilde' missed the gun'nel' of the whaler and landed gently in the water, from where she was dragged by the ready hands of her sisters a few moments later. They do say, though, that she turned a complete flip-flop in the air, and that there was a display of--well, if a Goerz prism binocular won't reveal the difference between a pair of blue sailor's breeches and French lingerie at under a mile, all I can say is that we've much overrated German optical glass. As I learned later, however, the Huns, observing only the fall and missing the revealing details, merely concluded that the Englanders were jumping overboard in panic, and dismissed their last lingering doubts and suspicions. "The girls were already instructed that they were to lie low and keep their peroxide curls out of sight as long as they were within a mile or so of the submarine, so as not to tempt the latter to follow them up for a look-see at closer range. The boat had orders to pull astern for a while, and then, if the Hun was observed to come alongside the '----' as hoped, to turn eight or ten points to port and head up in the direction from which he had appeared. The reason for this manoeuvre, which was carried out precisely as planned, you will understand in a moment. "On came Fritz, coolly contemptuous, and on went the show, like the unrolling of a movie scenario. For a while I was fearful that he might order back my boat to use in boarding me with, but as soon as he was close enough to be sure that I had no gun he must have decided so much trouble was superfluous. He had only one gun, it was evident--the gunners kept sweeping it back and forth to cover from about the bridge to the engine-room as they drew nearer--and presently I saw men, armed with short rifles, coming up through both fore and after hatches. Far from exhibiting any signs of belligerency, I still kept three or four of my 'flannelled fools' mildly panicking. Or, rather, I _ordered_ them to panic mildly. As a matter of fact, they did it rather violently--a good deal more like movie rough stuff than the real thing.