eizing the piece of rubber tubing that projected from his
pocket he thrust it into his mouth and proceeded to blow with distended
cheeks and his serious brown eyes fixed solemnly on Cecily's face.

He was still blowing when they capsized. How the accident happened
Cecily never knew: principally because she was concentrating her mind
on the bottom of the boat and wondering how soon the pangs of
_mal-de-mer_ might be expected to encompass her. But the fact remains
that one moment the boat was rising and falling dizzily on the waves
and the next, with a confused shouting of orders and a crash, they were
all struggling in the water.

Cecily's life-saving jacket brought her to the surface like a cork, and
a couple of strokes took her to the side of the capsized boat and
situation No. 2 already described. Here she was presently joined by
the American, puffing and blowing like a grampus, who was placed in
possession of statement (c) referred to above. He appeared either not
to hear, however, or to incline to the view that it was a mere theory
based upon a fallacy....

The remaining late occupants of the boat attached themselves along the
sides and awaited succour with what patience they could. Then a
muffled sound like an internal explosion came from within the stricken
hull as a bulkhead went. The great ship lurched sickeningly above them
as a wall totters to its fall. Cecily looked up and saw for a moment
the figure of the Captain standing on the end of the bridge; true to
his grand traditions he was staying by his ship to the last. She
listed over further and began to settle rapidly. Then, and only then,
the Captain climbed slowly over the rail and dived.

The stern of the ship rose slowly into the air, then swiftly slid
forward with a sound like a great sob and vanished beneath the surface.
One of the life-boats approached the capsized jolly-boat, and the
figures that clung to her were hauled, dripping, one by one into the
stern.

Then they picked up the Captain, clinging to a grating, an angry man.
He scowled round at the long green slopes of the sea and shook his fist.

"The curs!" he said. "The dirty scum.... Women on board.... No
warning...." Anger and salt water choked him.

"They wouldn't even give me a gun because I was a passenger ship.
Unarmed, carrying women, torpedoed without warning.... I'll spit in
the face of every German I meet from here to Kingdom Come!"

A little elderly lady with a