Then the mysterious searchlight vanished, leaving Smith and his comrade blinking in the darkness.
"Hanged if I know and hanged if I care," replied Smith. "Where's that lamp? There's the _Boxer_ signalling."
Throughout the whole of the hazardous period the flashing lamp in the cockpit was still intact. Bracing himself against the swaying mizen-mast the skipper of the _Diomeda_ replied by a few short flashes.
Slowly and deliberately the message was flashed from the destroyer, for the naval men knew that the average yachtsman is more or less of a duffer at Morse signalling.
"Ride to sea-anchor if you have one. Keep your lights burning; traffic about. Will stand by you."
"I understand," was Smith's reply, after the message had been roughly jotted down and transcribed by the aid of a codebook.
Within ten minutes the yacht was riding to her sea-anchor. The motion, as compared with the straining and plunging while under tow, was fairly easy, and after lashing an awning over the broken skylight the crew of the _Diomeda_ were able to "stand easy".
"I'm sorry I snapped you up," remarked the skipper slowly.
"But I did. Don't you remember my saying something about being hanged if I cared, when you asked me what vessel that was that was flashing her searchlight?"
"After all, it was a silly question," rejoined Stirling. "How could you be expected to know any more than I should?"
"I believe I do know, though," asserted Smith. "Look away on our port hand. Do you see those patches of misty light on the sky?"
"They're searchlights playing on the clouds. Evidently the Heligoland torpedo flotilla are engaged in night manoeuvres; to me it seems like a trial of aircraft versus submarines and destroyers."
"And the vessel that turned her searchlight on the _Boxer_? She wasn't sky hunting?"
"No; not just then. You see, she spotted the navigation lights of the _Boxer_ and the _Diomeda_, and was naturally curious. But there she goes!" As Smith spoke a narrow ray of light flashed vertically upwards at apparently less than two miles away to the southward. Then, describing an ever-widening spiral, the beam searched the clouds for a considerable time, till, having satisfied herself that the object which she was in search of was not within range of the searchlight, the foreign warship screened the light and made off.