"Thank you, gentlemen," exclaimed the skipper, with ill-disguised appreciation of the result of his question. "Your answer is exactly what I expected. Mr. Bourne will take charge of the gig, and Mr. Crosthwaite will take the whaler. They will each have a midshipman with them." The Captain had not made his choice without due consideration. Bourne, he knew, was a capable officer in a boat, while Dick Crosthwaite had had a great amount of experience in that sort of work, both at Dartmouth and during his commission on the _Seasprite_. In fact the Sub had been specially reported to the Admiralty for the smart way in which on several occasions he had taken away a boat to board merchant ships during the light cruiser's patrol work in the North Sea. In these days of steam propulsion, small-boat work in the British Navy rarely gets the attention it deserves, and comparatively few officers can handle a sailing boat with any great degree of smartness. Dick's qualification, therefore, was the exception rather than the rule. Saluting, the Sub hastened to make his preparations. His first act was to choose a midshipman. He would have selected Sefton but for the fact that that young gentleman had received a slight wound in the hand from a flying fragment of shell. Maynebrace he dismissed from his mind; the youngster was too impetuous, and apt to lose his head in a tight corner. Eventually the Sub decided to ask Farnworth to accompany him, and the lad literally jumped at the chance. Dick had no difficulty in getting together a crew, for the men belonging to Farnworth's boat simply clamoured to be taken. This was a decided advantage, since all the party were used to the whaler. While Farnworth was busily engaged in seeing that the boat was ready, comparing the articles placed in her with the list in his "Watch Bill", the Sub made his way to the chart-room and obtained a copy of the largest-scale chart of Yenikeui and neighbouring coast. Rolling up the plan he placed it in a cylindrical watertight case and hurried to the quarter-deck, where the whaler's crew had already fallen in, and all hands for lowering were waiting at the falls. The whaler seemed a frail craft to take away on a dark and boisterous night. Being only of moderate beam in proportion to her length of twenty-seven feet, she was fairly swift under oars or sail in calm or moderate weather, but was a "wet boat" whenever she had to encounter any crested waves. Nevertheless her pointed stern enabled her to manoeuvre in broken water, such as had to be expected in Yenikeui Bay, where it would be almost a matter of impossibility to approach the stranded trawler in a steam cutter or pinnace. "All correct, sir," reported Midshipman Farnworth. The Sub thoroughly examined the boat, not that he doubted his subordinate. It was a case of "two heads being better than one", for in the excitement it was quite possible for necessary articles to be overlooked.