[Sidenote: Destroyers keep in touch by lights and sirens.]
The destroyers had to turn on their lights and use their sirens to keep
in touch with each other; the air attack was suspended, and
_Vindictive_, with some distance yet to go, found herself in gross
darkness.
[Sidenote: The fog and smoke are dense.]
[Sidenote: A motor-boat leads the way for _Vindictive_.]
There were motor-boats to either side of her, escorting her to the
entrance, and these were supplied with what are called Dover
flares--enormous lights capable of illuminating square miles of sea at
once. A "Very" pistol was fired as a signal to light these; but the fog
and the smoke together were too dense for even the flares. _Vindictive_
then put her helm over and started to cruise to find the entrance. Twice
in her wanderings she must have passed across it, and at her third turn,
upon reaching the position at which she had first lost her way, there
came a rift in the mist, and she saw the entrance clear, the piers to
either side and the opening dead ahead. The inevitable motor-boat dashed
up, raced on into the opening under a heavy and momentarily growing
fire, and planted a flare on the water between the piers. _Vindictive_
steamed over it and on. She was in.
[Sidenote: A hail of lead falls upon the _Vindictive_.]
The guns found her at once. She was hit every few seconds after she
entered, her scarred hull broken afresh in a score of places and her
decks and upper works swept.
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