The expected danger-spot was reached, every eye on the alert. Over went the helm, they were through it; it was passed and the tension relaxed. Still there was no sign from the depths, and Jenkins slowly lowered his glass again. ‘He’s missed us, I think,’ he said. ‘We must have given him the slip.’ ‘A bit too quick for him,’ remarked Burton complacently. Save for themselves the ocean seemed untenanted, and there lay the harbour a bare two miles ahead. ‘Don’t crow till you’re out of the wood, though,’ went on the skipper. ‘He may have us yet.’ Then suddenly, like a bolt from the blue, his eye caught a glint in the water. ‘Hard-a-starboard!’ he snapped. ‘Over with it!’ Too late! A flash of white and creamy bubbles told where one torpedo had rushed across the bow. The other shot clean under the Torpedo Boat, was lost for an instant, and reappeared on the other side like an arrow from a bow. Two cables away they broke surface, and the red peace-heads bobbed up and down as witnesses of the attack. ‘Got us, by Jove!’ roared Jenkins. ‘A beautiful shot! Steady the helm! Stop her!’ Still there was no sign of ‘123,’ and with her engines going astern the _Zero_ gradually lost her weigh and came to a standstill. The boat was called away and Burton despatched to retrieve the spent torpedoes, and presently a dark wedge-shaped object pushed up above the surface and revealed itself as the submarine’s periscope standard. The bridge, the gun, and finally the superstructure appeared, and she was up from the eighty foot dive which she had undertaken to increase the realism of the attack. An enemy who had seen the torpedoes on their mission would have taken the warning and cast about for his assailant, if he had not been blown to a better world. She lay on the surface about half a mile off, menacing and silent. The figures were seen moving on her bridge, and she slowly dropped alongside, while her telescopic mast went up in sections and the White Ensign was hoisted to the peak. ‘Beautiful shot!’ shouted Jenkins, as she came within hailing distance. ‘A real ripper! One went just ahead and the other right underneath me. That depth you set them at was about right and they ran straight. If I’d been a Hun you’d have blown me to smithereens.’ ‘Did you see me?’ howled Raymond. ‘No fear. Never saw a vestige of periscope. In fact, I thought you’d missed me.’ ‘That’s good. I nearly broke surface once, and I was afraid it would be no use carrying on. Will you bring the “fish” in and I’ll take ’em from you when we get alongside the _Parentis_?’ ‘Yes, all right. I’m picking them up now. See you later.’