ng'; so it was only a few seconds until I was out of my bunk and
up to my station on the bridge. It was not many minutes later before I
found myself in command of the ship.

"It was now clear that the force sighted consisted of two enemy light
cruisers and four destroyers, the latter disposed two on each quarter of
the rear cruiser. They were closing on us at high speed at a constant
bearing of a point or two abaft the beam. It was up to the _Flip_, as
senior ship, to decide whether to fight or to run away on the off-chance
of living to fight another day, something which was hardly likely to
happen in the event we closed in a real death grapple. The disparity
between our strength and that of the enemy would have entirely justified
us in doing our utmost to avoid a decisive fight, had it been that the
cards on the table were the only ones in the game. But this was hardly
the case. Out of sight, but still not so many miles distant, was another
subdivision of our destroyers, while overwhelming forces would
ultimately be hurrying up to our aid in case the enemy could be delayed
long enough. To close in immediate action was plainly the thing, and the
_Flip_ was turning in to challenge even as she made us a signal
indicating that this was her decision. A moment more, and we were
turning into line astern of her.

"Out of the moon-track now, the outlines of the enemy ships were
indistinct and shadowy, and it was from the dull blur of opacity above
the slightly phosphorescent glow of the 'bone' in the teeth of the
leading cruiser that the opening shot was fired. It lighted her up
brilliantly for the fraction of a second, and the ghostly geyser from
the bursting shell showed up distinctly a few hundred yards ahead of the
_Flip_. Both the sharpened image of the cruiser in the light of the
gun-fire and the time of flight of the shell helped us with the range,
and the fall of shot from the _Flip's_ opener looked like a very near
thing. We followed it with one from our fo'c'sl' gun, which was a bit
short, and the next, if not a hit, was only slightly over. At this
juncture, all six of the enemy ships came into action with every gun
they could bring to bear, and the _Flip_ and the _Flop_ did the same.
For the next few minutes things happened so fast that I can't be sure of
getting them in anywhere near their actual sequence.

"We began hitting repeatedly, and with good effect, after the first few
shots, and the _Flip_ also appeared