Bentley's first sight when Wind Rode broke clear was not for the cruisers, but the destroyers.
His task was difficult enough as it was. But the destroyers could make it even tougher if they decided to join in. Spitting the oily taste from his mouth he swung his glasses. No—there they were, still milling about the torpedoed flagship. Wasted.
But maybe the Japanese admiral did not think so. Bentley had to concede his point of view. He was in a crippled ship, there could quite easily be enemy submarines about. And to handle the three midgets he still had two great cruisers.
Bentley's decision to continue fighting was possibly the simplest he had ever made in all his life. It would be true to claim that the decision had been made for him, centuries before. Never in the memory of living man, nor for a long time further back than that, had a British warship surrendered to, or run from, an enemy.
