"Seen this, you fellows?" asked the junior watch-keeper, holding out a slip of paper. "Something doing this trip, I fancy."
It was a decoded wireless message, brief and to the point.
"Mail-boat _Sunderbund_ reported torpedoed, latitude 34° 15' 20" N., long. 22° 4' 16" E. Passengers and crew taken to boats, supposed making for Alexandria. _Portchester Castle_ to proceed and investigate to eastward of position; _Restormel_ to westward. Immediate."
THE latitude and longitude given showed that the attack upon the mail-boat had occurred close to the Tripolitan coast off the province of Barca, a desolate country on the western frontier of Egypt. At the time of receiving the message the _Portchester Castle_ was twenty miles S.E. of Cape Sidero, in the island of Crete, and roughly 250 miles from the scene of the disaster.
Immediately upon receipt of the wireless the armed merchant-cruiser set off at full speed to carry out instructions. A message from the _Restormel_ announced the fact that that vessel was eighty miles to the westward.
"Glass tumbling down as if someone had knocked a hole in the bulb," remarked Osborne. "We're in for a spell of very dirty weather before very long. The _Sunderbund's_ boats won't stand much chance in the heavy seas one meets with in the Eastern Mediterranean, and heaven help them if they are cast ashore. They've an even chance of death by starvation--that is, if they survive the landing through the breakers--or captivity in the hands of the Senussi."
"I thought that those fellows had been knocked out long ago," remarked Haynes.
"Yes, as far as the Sollum district is concerned," replied the Lieutenant. "But, unfortunately, numbers of these undesirables have made their way westward into the fringe of the Tripolitan desert. They have, apparently, lost their Turkish officers, and are acting as banditti. From all accounts they are well armed with modern rifles, although their field-guns and machine-guns were captured several months ago."
The barometer had given a certain warning of bad weather, and before many hours had elapsed it was blowing hard from the east'ard. The sun set in a ragged bank of indigo-coloured clouds. The wind whistled shrilly through the armed merchant-cruiser's rigging, and the spindrift began to fly in heavy masses over the weather bow.
