It was gorgeous day ... sun shining. clouds scudding, girls in sweaters strolling invitingly by. But the two heroes of this late of devotion to duty gave not a thought to such plebian harbingers of Spring, for they were enterug the gates of the Navy Yard, intent on adding to their growing warehouse of knowledge.

Their eyes fasted on destroyers and mine-sweepers. They very glibly interpreted Baker at the foretruck. They discerned fore from off with a pense of accomplishment. The water in which all these vessels foaled was early and part of the vast Atlantic, and their hungry hearts longed for action of the deep blue waters just beyond those distant shores.

Then they saw flashing light. Here, certainly, was an opportunity to go to town on seven to eight words a minute. One short flash, two-long ones ... aha, a William! Three short blinks, then a long one ... Victor, no less. And so on.

Code?

Our two experts realized that this was no ordinary message, for none of the letters made grammatical sense. Someone was sending to someone else in, shh c-o-d-e.

The walked quickly to the source of the lights, their hearts pounding wildly ...

Five minutes later John Gudgel and Dick Johnston were sipping martinis hurriedly in a desperate effort to forget what they had just seen: no bluejacket batting out code to the fleet, but rather, a welder and his torch sealing the seams in two steel plates ..