from the
skipper--and he wasn't what you'd call fastidious in his dress
either----"

The Volunteer made a little grimace at the recollection, because he was
a man of refined tastes and raced his own yacht across the Atlantic in
peace time.

"It was too rough to board, but the submarine closed to within hailing
distance, and a little pipsqueak of a Lieutenant, nervous as a cat,
talked to us through a megaphone. Fortunately I can speak
Norwegian...."

"What about the skipper of the wind-jammer?" interrupted the other.

"He kept his mouth shut. Wasn't much in sympathy with the company that
owned the submarine, having lost a brother the month before in a
steamship shelled and sunk without warning. You can't please
everybody, it seems, when you start out to act mad in a submarine.
Well, this lad examined our papers through a glass and I chucked him a
cigar.... He hadn't had a smoke for a week. Then he sheered off,
because he saw something on the horizon that scared him. He was very
young, and, as I've said, nerves like fiddle strings."

The Reserve man lit a cigarette and inhaled a great draught of smoke.
There was something in his alert, intent expression reminiscent of a
bull terrier when he hears rats scuffling behind a wainscot.

The war has evolved specialists without number in branches of Naval
warfare hitherto unknown and unsuspected. Among these is the Submarine
Hunter. The Reserve man belonged to this type, which is simply a
reversion to the most primitive and savage of the fighting instincts.
At the first mention of the German submarine he leaned forward eagerly.

"Threw him a cigar, did you?" he said grimly. "Sorry I wasn't
there. I'd have thrown him something. That's my line of
business--Fritz-hunting."

The ribbon of the Distinguished Service Cross on the lapel of his
monkey-jacket showed that he apparently pursued this branch of sport
with some effect. "Been at it from the kick-off," he continued.
"Started with herring nets, you know!" He laughed a deep bark of
amusement. "Lord! We had a lot to learn. We began from an East Coast
fishing port, working with crazy drifters manned by East Coast
fishermen. There was a retired Admiral in charge, as tough an old
terror as ever pulled on a sea boot--and half a dozen of us all
together, some Active Service and some Reserve like me. Navy? Bless
you, _we_ were the Navy, that old Admiral and us six." The speaker
raised his voice to make plain