“It’s a hit!” he yelled in sheer delight.

So it proved.  Officer Cleary, still straining at the reserve periscope, beheld the same picture.  The torpedo had shot across the bow of the destroyer and leaped forward to finally bury its steel nose in the great gray side of the cruiser.

“Almost directly amidships,” called out “Little Mack.”

And then, as the Dewey plunged beneath the waves, Lieutenant McClure explained eagerly how he had beheld the explosion of the torpedo just aft the main forward battery turret directly on the line of the forward smoke funnel.

“Giving them a dose of their own medicine,” ejaculated Cleary as his commander turned laughingly from the periscope.

“This will settle a few scores for the Lusitania, to say nothing of the many more ships with defenseless men and women that have been sunk since the beginning of the war,” added McClure seriously.  Then turning to Jack Hammond he added:  “I guess you are the good-luck chap.  We got both those Boche boats since I called you into the turret as my aide.  Don’t forget, you are to stay right here permanently.”

Jack saluted mechanically, but his heart beat high and he could scarce repress an exclamation of delight.

At a depth of sixty feet the Dewey’s engines were slowed down and she floated gracefully out of range of the German destroyer.  After traveling ahead for half a mile the submersible was stopped again and began slowly to ascend.

As the eye of the periscope projected again out of the sea Lieutenant McClure hastened to get a glimpse of his surroundings.

There, off the port bow, lay the crippled German cruiser—–­the same vessel that had been hit by the Dewey’s torpedo.  She was listing badly from the effect of the American submarine’s unexpected sting and had turned far over on her side.  A British destroyer was standing by rescuing members of the Teuton crew as they flung themselves into the water from their overturning craft.

Far off the Dewey’s starboard bow could be seen a moving column of warships—–­the remnants of the German raiding fleet in the van, followed by the English and American patrol vessels.

“Useless for us to follow them,” declared McClure, as he took in the situation.  “Might as well stand by this stricken Hun cruiser and pick up some of her floating crew.”

“There’s a lot of them in the water,” said Cleary, as he swung the other periscope to scan the open sea well to the sinking cruiser’s stern.

In a few minutes the Dewey ascended and made herself known to the British “limey.”  Over the decks of the latter clambered several score German seamen who had been fished from a watery grave.

A stiff wind had come up out of the southeast and was kicking the sea into rollers with whitecaps.  However, the men of the Dewey, armed with life preservers, steadied themselves on the turtle-back deck of their craft, and started the hunt for swimming Germans.