A sudden burst of flame and smoke enveloped the wheel-house, and the skipper went hurtling through the doorway and pitched with a thud on the deck. The mate ran aft and knelt beside him. “Father,” he cried hoarsely. The inert blue-clad figure raised himself on his hands, and his head swayed between his massive shoulders. “Father,” said the mate again, and shook him, as if trying to awaken someone from sleep. “Be ye hurted terrible bad?” The grim old seadog raised his head, and his son saw that he was blind. “Pitch the codes overboard,” he said. “I’m blind an’ stone deaf, an’ my guts are all abroad under me, but ye’ll fight the little gun while there’s a shell left aboard....” The mate stood up and looked aft along the splintered, bloody deck, beyond the smoke and steam trailing to leeward. “The gun’s wrecked,” he said slowly, as if speaking to himself. “The little smacks are clear o’ danger.... The destroyers are comin’ up.... Ye have fought a good fight, father.” The submarine had ceased fire, and as he spoke, she submerged and vanished sullenly, like a wild beast baulked of its prey. * * * * * An old woman sat knitting beside the fire in the heart of a Midland town next day. The door opened and a girl came in quickly, with a shawl over her head and a basket on her arm. “There’s a surprise for supper,” she said. The old woman looked inside the basket. “Herrin’!” she said. “What did they cost?” “Tuppence apiece,” replied the girl lightly, as she hung up her shawl. “They was cheap,” said the old woman as she fell to larding the frying-pan. But all things considered, perhaps they were not so very cheap after all. [Illustration] CHAPTER III THE NAVY-THAT-FLIES[A] The Royal Naval Air Service found itself “over the other side” about the time that the shells of the British monitors began feeling for the hidden batteries of the Boche behind the Belgian coast. “I can’t see where they’re pitching,” said the Navy-that-Floats, referring to the shells of the monitors bursting twelve miles away. “What about spotting for us, old son?” “That will I do,” replied the Navy-that-Flies. “And more also. But I shall have to wear khaki, because it’s done, out here; by everybody apparently. Even the newspaper reporters wear khaki. Also I must have the right machines and lots of ’em.” “Wear anything you like,” replied the Navy-that-Floats, “as long as you can help us to hit these shore batteries. Only--because you wear khaki and see life, don’t forget you’re still the same old Navy as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be.”