leaden waters beyond her to form a scintillant
background against which she stood out as what she was--the
sweetest-lined little steam yacht that ever split a wave. The
fishing-boat effect had been obtained by a simple arrangement of colours
which effectually clipped the clippiness from her clipper bows and
equally effectually discounted the graceful overhang of her counter.

In plain words, they had blocked in the lines of a bluff, squatty tug on
her hull with some kind of paint that was very easy to see, and covered
the rest of her with a paint that was very hard to see. A few changes
in rig, and the alteration was complete.

"Quite the cleverest and simplest bit of camouflage I ever saw," said
the captain, lowering his binoculars. "It's only the fact that we're
looking down on her from a considerable height against that bright sheet
of water that gives a chance to follow her real lines at all. From the
deck--and even more so from the bridge of a submarine, or through its
periscope--it would be a lot easier to tell what she _isn't_ than what
she _is_. As a matter of fact, I can't say that I know what she is even
now. It is evident that she _was_ a yacht, and no end of a beauty at
that. But now, in that guise--probably some sort of patrol or
anti-U-boat worker, for a guess, perhaps a 'Q.'"

The officer of the watch turned aside for a moment from the gyro across
which he had been sighting. "I think she must be the '----,' sir," he
said. "Some American millionaire had her in the Mediterranean, and,
wanting to do his bit, brought her up to Portsmouth and turned her over
to the Admiralty to do what they wanted with her so long as it would
help to lick the Hun. She's been mixed up in several kinds of stunts,
and is supposed to have a U-boat or two to her credit. Her present
skipper's a Yank who came to her from a M.L. They say he's no end of a
character, but right as rain on his job and with a natural nose for
trouble. One of his hobbies is making his ship look what she isn't,
and, in order to see her as she would appear to a U-boat, he goes out
and studies her through the periscope of one of our own submarines. When
one of these isn't handy, he sometimes goes out in a whaler and studies
her through a stubby periscope poked over its gunwale. He got blown
right out to sea one night when he was making some experiment from a
whaler in 'moonlight visibility,' and didn't get back till the next
morning. It had no effect on his