On the quarter-deck, officers and men fell in, bare-headed, whilst the little pale-faced Padre read the burial service for those missing from the blown-up trawler.
Nothing more happened that day, but on the Wednesday the wind rose, and by nightfall was blowing hard--a very black night it was--and at about two o'clock in the morning an explosion occurred under the bows of the _Aennie Rickmers_.
She made signals of distress, and began to sink rapidly by the head. There had been rumours for some days that two Austrian submarines had escaped from the Adriatic; it might be a torpedo from one of them, or perhaps from some Turkish torpedo-boat. Some suggested floating mines; others that an explosion had occurred inside the _Aennie Rickmers_ herself. No one knew exactly what had happened. All that anyone did know, when Captain Macfarlane took the _Achates_ close to her, was that she was sinking; that her "dago" crew of Levantine nondescripts had deserted in all her boats; and that her English officers, the flying officers, their men, and the four wounded from the _Achates_ were left without any means of saving themselves.
A most unpleasant hour-and-a-half followed.
The first the China Doll knew of it was being roughly punched in the ribs and shaken. He woke to hear men passing from hammock to hammock, singing out: "Turn out, sir, turn out; submarines about; all hands on deck, sir!"
He didn't lie long after that. He was down, had pulled on his trousers, found a coat and cap, fumbled in his chest until he found his swimming-collar, and was blowing it up round his neck before he was really awake.
Bubbles, whose hammock was slung next to his, had gone to sleep again. He prodded him feverishly. "Submarines, Bubbles! All hands on deck! Get your swimming-collar!" he squeaked.
"Oh, bother! Curse you!" grunted Bubbles. "You aren't pulling my leg? Oh, hang it!" he grumbled, as he saw all the other snotties tumbling into their clothes, officers coming out of their cabins into the dark, crowded "half-deck", and heard the banging down of armoured hatches. "I do hate this beastly war. Breakfast at seven; then a cold bath at two in the morning. Beastly!"
The China Doll went up on the dark quarter-deck and hunted round for someone to talk to. His teeth were chattering and his knees were trembling--it was so dark and cold.