“None of us who ain’t built that way can be destroyers, but we can look as near it as we can. Let me explain to you, Sir, that the stern of a Thorneycroft boat, which we are _not_, comes out in a pretty bulge, totally different from the Yarrow mark, which again we are not. But, on the other ’and, _Dirk, Stiletto, Goblin, Ghoul, Djinn_, and _A-frite_—Red Fleet dee-stroyers, with ’oom we hope to consort later on terms o’ perfect equality—_are_ Thorneycrofts, an’ carry that Grecian bend which we are now adjustin’ to our _arriere-pensée_—as the French would put it—by means of painted canvas an’ iron rods bent as requisite. Between you an’ me an’ Frankie, we are the _Gnome_, now in the Fleet Reserve at Pompey—Portsmouth, I should say.” “The first sea will carry it all away,” said Moorshed, leaning gloomily outboard, “but it will do for the present.” “We’ve a lot of _prima facie_ evidence about us,” Mr. Pyecroft went on. “A first-class torpedo boat sits lower in the water than a destroyer. Hence we artificially raise our sides with a black canvas wash-streak to represent extra freeboard; _at_ the same time paddin’ out the cover of the forward three-pounder like as if it was a twelve-pounder, an’ variously fakin’ up the bows of ’er. As you might say, we’ve took thought an’ added a cubic to our stature. It’s our len’th that sugars us. A ’undred an’ forty feet, which is our len’th into two ’undred and ten, which is about the _Gnome’s,_ leaves seventy feet over, which we haven’t got.” “Is this all your own notion, Mr. Pyecroft?” I asked. “In spots, you might say—yes; though we all contributed to make up deficiencies. But Mr. Moorshed, not much carin’ for further Navy after what Frankie said, certainly threw himself into the part with avidity.” “What the dickens are we going to do?” “Speaking as a seaman gunner, I should say we’d wait till the sights came on, an’ then fire. Speakin’ as a torpedo-coxswain, L.T.O., T.I., M.D., etc., I presume we fall in—Number One in rear of the tube, etc., secure tube to ball or diaphragm, clear away securin’-bar, release safety-pin from lockin-levers, an’ pray Heaven to look down on us. As second in command o’ 267, I say wait an’ see!” “What’s happened? We’re off,” I said. The timber ship had slid away from us. “We are. Stern first, an’ broadside on! If we don’t hit anything too hard, we’ll do.” “Come on the bridge,” said Mr. Moorshed. I saw no bridge, but fell over some sort of conning-tower forward, near which was a wheel. For the next few minutes I was more occupied with cursing my own folly than with the science of navigation. Therefore I cannot say how we got out of Weymouth Harbour, nor why it was necessary to turn sharp to the left and wallow in what appeared to be surf.