:

"Skipper of steamship so bothered that he appears to be rigging
anti-aircraft gun. Am about to signal him to stop for search."

Despite the haze over the sea the "blimp's" movements could still be made
out from the deck of the destroyer. Mast lookouts and those on bridge and
deck followed the "blimp's" movements with keen interest.

"He maneuvers as if he were closing in on the steamship," declared Ensign
Andrews.

"If the steamer's skipper uses anti-aircraft guns the dirigible's
commander will be justified in dropping bombs," Dave returned. "It's a
stupid piece of business for any lightly armed steamer to attempt to
resist a 'blimp.' But of course the steamer's skipper does not know that
there is a warship so close."

"The rascal's firing on us," reported the "blimp."

"If you'll keep back we'll close in and talk to the stranger," Darrin
suggested, by wireless.

"We're hit," almost instantly came the report from the airship.

"Badly?" Dave asked by radio.

"Investigating. Report soon."

"That ship must be up to something extremely desperate to dare to fire on
a British 'blimp'!" exclaimed Dave Darrin. "But we're getting close, and
soon ought to know what we have to tackle!"

CHAPTER XVIII

STRIKING A REAL SURPRISE

"ARE we heading straight course?" was Dave's next question through the
air.

"You're going straight," came the cheering information.

"Found out your hurt?"

"Yes; gas-bag intact, and we've withdrawn out of easy range. One motor
damaged more than we can repair in air. Can limp home, however."

"Leave the steamship to me," Darrin wirelessed back.

Inside of another minute and a half, Darrin made out the mast-tops of the
stranger sticking up from the fringe of haze as the cloudy, reddish
curtain shifted.

If Dave had sighted his intended prey, so had the stranger caught sight
of the destroyer. The steamship cut a wide circle and turned tail.

"He's going at nineteen knots, we judge," came the radio report from the
"blimp."

"That won't do him any good!" was the laconic answer that Darrin
returned, this time in plain English instead of code.

The lower masts, the stack and then the hull of the stranger became
visible as Darrin gained on him.

Bang! A shell struck the water ahead of the stranger, the war-ship's
world-wide signal to halt.

Instead, the stranger appeared to be trying to crowd on more speed.

"Give him one in the stern-post," Darrin ordered.

The shell