"Why should a telegram be sent to the owner of a sixteen-knot boat, informing him of a change of sailing a twenty-knot boat, when the sixteen-knotter is supposed to be going up the Baltic, and the twenty-knotter is going across the Atlantic? It seems ridiculous, doesn't it? It would, even if they were both going across the Atlantic, as they might be. Now, those are hard facts; and there's a dead contradiction between them, just as you might say there is between positive and negative in electricity. Now, where's the spark that's going to connect them?" There was silence at the table for a few moments, while the president blew two or three long whiffs of blue smoke from his lips; and then Hardress, remembering his thoughts on the bridge, and what he had seen from it, blurted out, almost involuntarily: "Something wrong with the engines, I suppose?" "You've got it in once, viscount," said the president, flicking the ash off his cigar. "Is there any other way that a sixteen-knotter could overtake a twenty-knotter? I don't want to say anything against anyone, but, you know, accidents to engines are easily managed, and we just can't afford to have any right here." "I've seen to that already," said Hardress. "I don't think there's any fear of a mishap, accidental or otherwise." "But," said the president, lighting another cigar, "if it should happen that the sixteen-knotter did overhaul the twenty-knotter, wouldn't it be just as well to get that gun mounted? They may have guns on that Russian boat, and they probably have; but I don't think they'll have anything that's a circumstance to our twelve-pounder Vandelite gun." "Well, in case of accidents," said Lord Orrel, "I think, Shafto, that it wouldn't be a bad idea to get the gun mounted at once. If, in spite of any precautions, there is going to be an accident in the engine-room, it might as well be mounted as soon as possible." "I quite agree with you, sir," said Hardress. "We will have it out of the hold, and mount it first thing to-morrow morning." CHAPTER XX On the morning of the second day out, when Adelaide came on deck, she was astonished, and not a little disquieted, to see nearly the whole of the yacht's crew, under the command of Mr M'Niven, the chief engineer, engaged in mounting a long, light, slender gun, with a very massive breech, on the flush deck just forward of the foremast. Happening to look up at the bridge, she also saw that a light Maxim had been mounted at either end of it.