Forward, beyond the end of the passage, the full conical interior was built as an instrument room, with the torpedo tube running under it to nearly amidship, where the torpedoes were stored. The Franklin projectors were here in the bull’s-eye windows, by which, gazing along the light, through the jacket of humming water, we could see into the ocean ahead. I noticed here a score of familiar instruments, and others strange to me. But Dr. Plantet did not stop now to explain them. We went back to the stern. A similar room, rather larger, held charts and instruments of navigation. A table at which Arturo would work over the log and the diagrams. And here I saw the apparatus for air purification--cylinders of oxylithic powder, moisture coils, tubes for absorbing carbonic acid and all the waste products of our breathing. We climbed back to the floor of the shop. By to-morrow our little vessel would be fully equipped, provisioned, and ready. The Australian Flyer, westward bound from London to Melbourne, leaving London at 5 P.M. to-morrow evening, would stop and pick us up. The magnetic cranes lowered the Dolphin into the dark rectangle of canal at our feet. She lay awash, quiescent, waiting. Polly, trembling with the thrill of it, christened her with proper ceremony, and the little group of engineers and workmen cheered. We flew back home to “Sea End.” The servants had been given a holiday, and the house was silent as we entered. I recall a sudden pounding of my heart--the flash of a thought that Arturo might really be ill! “Arturo! Arturo!” Polly’s voice held a quiver of anxiety. The lad should have been at the gateway to greet us, of course. “Arturo!” Her voice echoed as she ran upstairs. “Arturo--father, Jeff, come here!” We rushed up. Arturo’s room was disordered. Some of his clothes and his luggage cases were gone. His small personal sending radio was gone from its accustomed table. In its place was a sheet of paper: a penciled radio code which evidently he had invented. And a note--a few brief words in his familiar scrawled handwriting. We bent over it; pathetic, scrawled little note: FATHER DEAR: Please try to believe in me. Keep the code and at midnights listen. If I need or want any one, it shall be only you. I am all confused. I want to do what is best, and I don’t know. Please try to believe in me. ARTURO. CHAPTER V. NEREID OF THE SEA.