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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea-Hounds, by Lewis R. Freeman
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Sea-Hounds
+
+Author: Lewis R. Freeman
+
+Release Date: August 15, 2010 [EBook #33438]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEA-HOUNDS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Greg Bergquist, David J. Cole and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                              SEA-HOUNDS
+
+
+
+              [Illustration: BRITISH BATTLE-SHIPS ON PATROL]
+
+
+
+
+                              SEA-HOUNDS
+
+
+
+                                  BY
+
+                           LEWIS R. FREEMAN
+
+                            Lieut. R.N.V.R.
+
+
+
+
+                        WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM
+                       PHOTOGRAPHS BY THE AUTHOR
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                               NEW YORK
+
+                        DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
+
+                                 1919
+
+                     PUBLISHED IN THE U.S.A 1919
+                   By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, INC.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                                =To=
+
+               Commodore Sir DOUGLAS BROWNRIGG, Bart.
+                C.B., R.N., Chief Censor, Admiralty
+
+
+
+
+
+                               CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER                                                   PAGE
+
+    I THE MEN WHO CHANGED SHIPS                              1
+
+   II "FIREBRAND"                                           35
+
+  III "BACK FROM THE JAWS"                                  59
+
+   IV HUNTING                                               82
+
+    V THE CONVOY GAME                                      112
+
+   VI YANK BOAT _VERSUS_ U-BOAT                            135
+
+  VII ADRIATIC PATROL                                      157
+
+ VIII PATROL                                               173
+
+   IX "Q"                                                  199
+
+    X THE _WHACK_ AND THE _SMACK_                          232
+
+   XI BOMBED!                                              250
+
+  XII AGAINST ODDS                                         268
+
+ XIII ROUNDING UP FRITZ                                    287
+
+
+
+
+                            ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+ British Battleships on Patrol                          _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                                  PAGE
+
+ German Shells Striking the Water at the Battle of Jutland          12
+
+ A Broadside at Night at the Battle of Jutland                      12
+
+ "Kamerading" with Uplifted Paws                                    90
+
+ Helping the Cook to Peel Potatoes                                  90
+
+ Where the Great Liner Plowed Along                                128
+
+ We Had Collided with the "Brick Wall"                             128
+
+ Now She Was Back at Base                                          128
+
+ A Limit to the Number of "Cans" a Destroyer Can Carry             152
+
+ A Depth Charge                                                    188
+
+ Disabled Destroyer in Tow                                         188
+
+ The Lookout on a Destroyer, and Part of His View                  242
+
+ She Came Bowling Along Under Sail                                 284
+
+
+
+
+SEA HOUNDS
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE MEN WHO CHANGED SHIPS
+
+
+Between the lighter-load of burning beeves that came bumping down along
+their line at noon, a salvo of bombs slapped across them at one o'clock
+from a raiding Bulgar air squadron, a violent Levantine squall which all
+but broke them loose from their moorings at sundown, and a signal to
+raise steam for full speed with all dispatch at midnight, it had been a
+rather exciting twelve hours for the destroyers of the First Division of
+the ----th Flotilla, and now, when at dawn the expected order to proceed
+to sea was received, it began to look as though there might be still
+further excitement in pickle down beyond the horizontal blur where the
+receding wall of the paling purple night-mist was uncovering the Gulf's
+hard, flat floor of polished indigo.
+
+"It's probably the same old thing," said the captain of the _Spark_,
+repressing a yawn after he had given the quartermaster his course to
+enter the labyrinthine passage where puffing trawlers were towing back
+the gates of the buoyed barrages, "a U-boat or two making a bluff at
+attacking a convoy. They've been sinking a good deal more than we can
+afford to lose; last week they got an oiler and another ship with the
+whole summer's supply of mosquito-netting aboard--but that was off the
+south peninsula of Greece or up Malta way. Here they haven't more than
+'demonstrated' about the mouth of the Gulf for two or three months. They
+know jolly well that if they once come inside, no matter if they do sink
+a ship or two, that it's a hundred to one--between sea-planes, 'blimps,'
+P.B.s, and destroyers--against their ever getting out again. There's
+just a chance that they may try it this time, though, for they must know
+how terribly short the whole Salonika force is of petrol, and what a
+real mess things will be left in if they can pot even one of the two or
+three oilers in this convoy. You'll see a merry chase with a kill at the
+end of it if they do, I can promise you, for the convoy is beyond the
+neck of the bag even now, and if a single Fritz has come in after them,
+the string will be pulled and the rest of the game will be played out
+here in the 'bull-ring.'"
+
+The captain had just started telling me how the game was played, when
+the W.T.[A] room called him on the voice-pipe to say that one of the
+ships of the convoy had just been torpedoed and was about to sink, and
+shortly afterwards a radio was received from the C.-in-C. ordering the
+flotilla to proceed to hunt the submarine responsible for the trouble.
+Then the officer commanding the division leader flashed his orders by
+"visual" to the several units of the flotilla, and presently these were
+spreading fan-wise to sweep southward toward where, sixty to a hundred
+miles away, numerous drifters would be dropping mile after mile of light
+nets across the straits leading out to the open Mediterranean.
+Northeastward, where the rising sun was beginning to prick into vivid
+whiteness the tents of the great hospital areas, several sea-planes were
+circling upwards; and southeastward, above the dry brown hills of the
+Cassandra peninsula, the silver bag of an air-ship floated across the
+sky like a soaring tumble bug. The hounds of the sea and air had begun
+to stalk their quarry.
+
+[Footnote A: Wireless Telegraph]
+
+"It's a biggish sort of a place to hunt over," said the captain, as the
+_Spark_ stood away on a course that formed the outside left rib of the
+flotilla's "fan," and took her in to skirt the rocky coast of Cassandra;
+"and there's so many in the hunt that the chances are all in favour of
+some other fellow getting the brush instead of you. And unless we have
+the luck to do some of the flushing ourselves, I won't promise you that
+the whole show won't prove no end of a bore; and even if we do scare him
+up--well, there are a good many more exciting things than dropping
+'ash-cans' on a frightened Fritzie. It won't be a circumstance, for
+instance, to that rough house we ran into at the 'White Tower' last
+night when that boxful of French 'blue-devils' wouldn't stop singing
+'Madelon' when the couchee-couchee dancer's turn began, and her friend,
+the Russian colonel in the next box, started to dissolve the Entente
+by----"
+
+The captain broke off suddenly and set the alarm bell going as a
+lynx-eyed lookout cut in with "Connin' tower o' submreen three points on
+port bow," and, with much banging of boots on steel decks and ladders,
+the ship had gone to "Action Stations" before a leisurely mounting
+recognition rocket revealed the fact that the "enemy" was a friend,
+doubtless a "co-huntress."
+
+Although we were still far from where there was yet any chance of
+encountering the U-boat which had attacked the convoy, there were two or
+three alarms in the course of the next hour. The first was when we
+altered our course to avoid a torpedo reported as running to strike our
+port bow, to discover an instant later that the doughty _Spark_ was
+turning away from a gambolling porpoise. The second was when some kind
+of a long-necked sea-bird rose from a dive about two hundred yards on
+the starboard beam and created an effect so like a finger-periscope with
+its following "feather" that it drew a shell from the foremost gun which
+all but blew it out of the water. It was my remarking the smartness with
+which this gun was served that led the captain, when a floating mine was
+reported a few minutes later, to order that sinister menace to be
+destroyed by shell-fire rather than, as usual, by shots from a rifle.
+All the guns which would bear were given an even start in the race to
+hit the wickedly horned hemisphere as we brought it abeam at a range of
+six or eight hundred yards; but the lean, keen crew of the pet on the
+forecastle--splashing the target with their first shot and detonating it
+with their second--won in a walk and left the others nothing but a
+hundred-feet-high geyser of smoke-streaked spray tumbling above a heart
+of flame to pump their tardier shells into.
+
+The captain gazed down with a smile of affectionate pride to where the
+winners, having trained their gun back amidships, were wiping its smoky
+nose, sponging out its mouth, polishing its sleek barrel, and patting
+its shiny breech, for all the world as though they were grooms and
+stable-boys and jockeys performing similar services for the Derby winner
+just led back to his stall.
+
+"There's not another such four-inch gun's crew as that one in any ship
+in the Mediterranean," he said, "which makes it all the greater pity
+that they have never once had a chance to fire a shot at anything of the
+enemy's any larger than that Bulgar bombing plane they cocked up and
+took a pot at after he had gone over yesterday. I mean that they never
+had a chance as a crew. Individually, I believe there are two or three
+of them that have been through some of the hottest shows in the war.
+That slender chap there in the blue overall was in the _Killarney_ when
+she was shot to pieces and sunk by German cruisers at Jutland, and I
+believe his Number Two--that one in a singlet, with his sleeves rolled
+up and just a bit of a limp--was in the _Seagull_ when she was rammed,
+right in the middle of an action with the Huns, by both the _Bow_ and
+the _Wreath_. A number of ratings from the _Seagull_ clambered over the
+forecastle of the _Bow_ while the two were locked together, evidently
+because they thought their own ship was going down, while two or three
+men from the _Bow_ were thrown by the force of the collision on to the
+_Seagull_. When the two broke loose and drifted apart men from each of
+them were left on the other, and by a rather interesting coincidence, we
+have right here in the _Spark_ at this moment representatives of both
+batches. They, with two or three other Jutland 'veterans' who chance
+also to be in the _Spark_, call themselves the 'Black Marias.' Just why,
+I'm not quite sure, but I believe it has something to do with their all
+being finally picked up by one destroyer and carried back to harbour
+like a lot of drunks after a night's spree. And, to hear them talk of it
+when they get together, that is the spirit in which they affect to
+regard a phase of the Jutland battle which wiped out some scores of
+their mates and two or three of the destroyers of their flotilla.
+Talking with one of them alone, he will occasionally condescend to speak
+of the serious side of the show, but their joint reminiscences, in the
+constant by-play of banter, are more suggestive of tumultuous 'nights of
+gladness' on the beach at Port Said or Rio than the most murderous spasm
+of night fighting in the whose course of naval history. You've got a
+long and probably tiresome day ahead of you. Perhaps it might ease the
+monotony a bit if you had a yarn with two or three of them. They'll be
+bored stiff standing by in this blazing sun with small prospects of
+anything turning up, and probably easier to draw out than at most times.
+Gains, there by the foremost gun, would be a good one for a starter.
+There is no doubt of his having seen some minutes of the real thing in
+the _Killarney_. Only don't try a frontal attack on him. Just saunter
+along and start talking about anything else on earth than Jutland and
+the _Killarney_, and then lead him round by degrees."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We were just passing the riven wreck of a large freighter as I sidled
+inconsequently along to the forecastle, and the strange way in which the
+stern appeared to be stirring to the barely perceptible swell gave ample
+excuse for turning to the crew of the foremost gun for a possible
+explanation. It was Leading Seaman Gains, as incisive of speech as he
+was quick of movement, who replied, and I recognized him at once as a
+youth of force and personality, one of the type to whom the broadened
+opportunities for quick promotion offered the Lower Deck through the
+war has given a new outlook on life.
+
+"She was a tramp with a cargo of American mules for the Serbs, sir," he
+said, "and she was submarined two or three miles off shore. The mouldie
+cracked her up amidships, but her back didn't break till she grounded on
+that sand spit there. At first her stern sank till her poop was awash at
+high tide--there's only a few feet rise and fall here, as you probably
+know, sir--but when the bodies of the mules that had been drowned 'tween
+decks began to swell they blocked up all the holes and finally generated
+so much gas that the increased buoyancy lifted the keel of the stern
+half clear of the bottom and left it free to move with the seas. I have
+heard they intend to blow out her bottom and sink her proper for fear
+that end of her might float off in a storm and turn derelict."
+
+That story was, as I learned later, substantially true, but it had just
+enough of the fantastic in it to tempt the twinkling eyed "Number Two"
+to a bit of embroidery on his own account. He was the one with the
+muscular forearms and the slight limp. The suggestion of "New World"
+accent in his speech was traceable, he subsequently told me, to the many
+years he had spent on the Esquimault station in British Columbia.
+
+"They do say, sir," he said solemnly, rubbing hard at an imaginary patch
+of inferior refulgency on the shining breech of his gun, "that she's
+that light and jumpy with mule-gas, after the sun's been beating on her
+poop all day, that she lifts right up in the air and tugs at her
+moorings like a kite balloon. And there's one buzz winging round that
+they're going to run a pipe-line to her end and use the gas for
+inflating----"
+
+Gains, evidently feeling that there were limits to which the credulity
+of a landsman should be imposed upon, cut in coldly and crushingly with:
+"She's not the only old wreck 'round here that they could draw on for
+'mule-gas' if there's ever need of it, my boy; and as for her rising
+under her own power--well, if she ever goes as far as you did under
+yours the night you jumped from the _Seagull_ to the _Bow_ I'll----"
+
+The gusty guffaw that drowned the rest of Gains' broadside left us
+all on good terms, and, by a happy chance, with the "Jutland ice"
+already broken. Number Two, joining heartily in the laugh, said that,
+"nifty" as was his jump from the _Seagull_ to the _Bow_, it wasn't a
+"starter" to the "double back-action-summerset" with which Jock
+Campbell was chucked from the _Bow_ to the _Seagull_. "We played a
+sort of 'Pussy-Wants-a-Corner' exchange, Jock and me," he said, "for
+Jock was Number Four or 'Trainer' of the crew of one of the fo'c'sle
+guns of the _Bow_, and I was the same in the _Seagull_. We didn't
+quite land in each other's place when the wallop came, but it wasn't
+far from it; and we each finished the scrap in the other guy's ship.
+You might pike aft and try to get a yarn out of Jock when 'Pack up!'
+sounds. He's a close-mouthed tyke, though, and if you can get him to
+tell how he played the human proj, you'll be doing more'n anyone else
+has been able to pull off down to now. He's half clam and half sphinx,
+I think Jock is, and that makes a 'dour lad' when crossed with a
+'Glasgie' strain. Which makes it all the sadder to have him qualify
+for membership in the 'Black Marias,' and me, because I finished in
+the _Bow_, froze out."
+
+I told him that I would gladly have a try at Jock later, provided only
+that he would first tell me what happened in his own case, adding that
+it wasn't every British sailor who could claim the distinction of
+fighting the Hun from two different ships within the hour.
+
+"It would have been a darned sight better for me if I'd confined my
+fighting to _one_ ship," he replied with a wry smile, "and it was mighty
+little fighting I got out of it anyhow. But sure, I'll tell you what I
+saw of the fracas, and then you can take a chance at Jock. It was along
+toward midnight, and the _Seagull_ was steaming in 'line ahead' with her
+half of the flotilla. The _Killarney_ and _Firebrand_ was leading us,
+with the _Wreath_ and one or two others astern. I was at 'action
+station' with the crew of the foremost gun, and keeping my eye peeled
+all round, for some of the ships astern had just been popping away at
+some Hun destroyers they had reported. All of a sudden I saw the
+officers on the bridge peering out to starboard, and there, coming up
+astern of us and steering a converging course, I saw the first, and
+right after, the second and third, of a line of some big lumping
+ships--some kind of cruisers. All of the flotilla must have thought they
+was our own ships, for no one challenged or fired all the time they came
+drawing up past us, making four or five knots more than the seventeen we
+were doing.
+
+"When the leader was about abreast the _Killarney_ and inside of half a
+mile range, she flashed on some red and green lights, switched on her
+searchlights and opened fire. Ship for ship, the Huns were just about
+even with our line now, and the _Firebrand_ and _Seagull_ must have
+launched mouldies at the second and third cruisers at near the same
+moment. Hitting at that range ships running on parallel courses was a
+cinch, and both slugs slipped home. It was some sight, those two spouts
+of fire and smoke shooting up together, and by the light of 'em I could
+see that the _Firebrand's_ bag was a four-funneller, and ours a three.
+The first one keeled right over and began to sink at once, but the one
+our mouldie hit went staggering on, though down by the stern and with a
+heavy list to port.
+
+"We would sure have put the kibosh on this one with the next torpedo if
+we hadn't had to turn sharp to port to avoid the _Killarney_ just then,
+and so missed our last chance to do something in 'the Great War.' I lost
+sight of the _Firebrand_ and took it for granted she had been blown up.
+It was not till a week afterwards that we learned she had turned the
+other way, engaged one Hun cruiser with gunfire, rammed another, just
+missed being rammed by a third, and finally crawled into port under her
+own steam.
+
+"The _Seagull_ came under the searchlights of the leading Hun cruiser
+for a few seconds as she came up abreast of the burning _Killarney_, and
+then the smoke and steam cut off the beam and I was blind as a bat for a
+minute. The _Killarney_ had been left astern when I looked for her
+again, and seemed all in, with fires all over her and only one gun
+yapping away on her quarter-deck. I didn't know it at the time, but it
+was my old college friend, Gains, here, who was passing the projes, for
+that pert little piece. You'd never think it to look at him, would you?"
+Gains, feigning to discover something which needed adjustment in the
+training mechanism, ducked his head behind the breech of his gun at this
+juncture, and did not bob up again until a resumption of the yarn
+deflected the centre of interest back to Number Two.
+
+[Illustration: GERMAN SHELLS STRIKING THE WATER AT THE BATTLE OF
+JUTLAND]
+
+[Illustration: A BROADSIDE AT NIGHT AT THE BATTLE OF JUTLAND]
+
+"Turning to port took us over into the line of the other Division, and
+the first thing I knew the _Seagull_ had poked in and taken station
+astern of the _Bow_, which was leading it. Just then some Hun
+ship, I think it was the same one that strafed the _Killarney_, opened
+on the _Bow_ from starboard, the bursting shell splashing all over her
+from the funnels right for'ard. _Bow_ turned sharp to port to try to
+shake off the searchlights, and _Seagull_ altered at same time to keep
+from turning in her wake and running into the shells she was
+side-stepping. All of a sudden I saw another destroyer steering right
+across our bows, and to keep from ramming her the captain altered back
+to starboard. That cleared her stern by an eyelash, but the next second
+I saw that it was now only a question of whether _Seagull_ would ram
+_Bow_, or _Bow_ would ram _Seagull_. How a dished and done-for
+quartermaster, falling across his wheel as he died, decided it in favour
+of _Bow_ I did not learn till later.
+
+"The Hun shells were tearing up the water astern of the _Bow_ for half a
+minute as she began to close us; then they stopped, and the smash came
+at the end of five or ten seconds of dead quiet. It was pitchy dark,
+with the flicker of fires on the deck of the _Bow_ making trembly red
+splotches in the smoke and steam. A sight I saw by the light of one of
+those fires just before the wallop is my main memory of all the hell I
+saw in the next quarter hour. It has lasted just as if it was burned
+into my brain with a hot iron, and it figures in one way or other in
+every nightmare I've had since."
+
+The humorous twinkle in the corner of the man's eye, which had persisted
+during all of his recital up to this point, suddenly died out, and he
+was staring into nothingness straight ahead of him, where the picture
+his memory conjured up seemed to hang in projection.
+
+"It was just before we struck," he went on, speaking slowly, and in an
+awed voice strangely in contrast to the rather bantering tone he had
+affected before; "and the bows of the _Bow_ were only ten or fifteen
+yards off, driving down on us in the middle of the double wave of
+greeny-grey foam they were throwing on both sides. By the light of a
+fire burning in the wreck of her bridge I saw a lot of bodies lying
+round on her fo'c'sl', and right then one of them picked itself up and
+stood on its feet. It was a whole man from the chest up, and from a bit
+below the waist down, but--for all that I could see--nothing between. Of
+course, there must have been an unbroken backbone to make a frame that
+would stand up at all, but all the shot-away part was in shadow, so I
+saw nothing from the chest to the hips. It was just as if the head and
+shoulders were floating in the air. I remember 'specially that it held
+its cap crushed tight in one of its hands. The face had a kind of a calm
+look on it at first. Then it turned down and seemed to look at what was
+gone, and I could see the mouth open as if to holler. Then the crash
+came, and I didn't see it again till they were stitching it up in canvas
+with a fire-bar before dropping it overside the next day. I learned then
+that an 8-inch shell had done the trick--rather a big order for one man
+to try to stop."
+
+He took a deep breath, blinked once or twice as though to shut out the
+gruesome vision, and when he resumed the corners of a sheepish grin were
+cutting into and erasing the lines of horror that had come to his face
+in describing it.
+
+"There's no use of my claiming that I was thrown over to the _Bow_ by
+the shock," he continued, the twinkle flickering up in his eye again,
+"like Jock was pitched over to the _Seagull_. That _did_ happen to three
+or four ratings from the _Seagull_, though, one signalman and a chap
+standing look-out being chucked all the way from the fore bridge. But in
+the case of most of the twenty-three of us who found ourselves adorning
+the _Bow's_ fo'c'sl' when the ships broke away, it was the result of a
+'flap' started by some ijits yelling that we were cut in two and going
+down. What was more natural, then, with the _Bow_ looming up there big
+and solid--she was a good sight larger than the _Gull_--that the 'rats'
+should leave the sinking ship for one that looked like she might go on
+floating for a while. I'm not trying to make an excuse for what
+happened, but only explaining it. The Lord knows we paid a big enough
+price for it, anyhow.
+
+"The _Bow_ hit us like a thousand o' bricks just before the bridge, and
+cut more than half-way through to the port side. The shock seemed to
+knock the deck right out from under my feet, and I was slammed hard
+against the starboard wire rail, which must have kept me from being
+ditched then and there. A lot of the wreckage from the _Bow's_ shot-up
+bridge showered down on the _Seagull's_ fo'c'sl', but my friend, Jock
+Campbell, floated down on the side toward the bridge, so I had no chance
+to welcome him. From where I was when I pulled up to my feet, it looked
+as if the _Bow_ only lacked a few feet from cutting all the way through
+us, and as soon as I saw her screws beating up the sea as she tried to
+go astern, I had the feeling that the whole fo'c'sl' of the _Gull_ must
+break off and sink as soon as the 'plug' was pulled out. I was still
+sitting tight, though, when that howl started that we were already
+breaking off and going down, and--well, I joined the rush, and it was
+just as easy as stepping from a launch to the side of a quay. I'm not
+trying to make out a case for anybody, but the little bunch of us who
+climbed to the _Bow_ from that half-cut-off fo'c'sl' sure had more
+excuse than them that swarmed over from aft and leaving the main solid
+lump of the ship. But we none of us had no business clambering off till
+we were ordered. In doing that we were only asking for trouble, and we
+sure got it.
+
+"The fo'c'sl' of the _Bow_ was all buckled up in waves from the
+collision, and there was a slipperiness underfoot that I twigged didn't
+come from sea water just as soon as I stumbled over the bodies lying
+round the wreck of the port foremost gun where I climbed over. We
+couldn't get aft very well on account of the smashed bridge, and so the
+bunch of us just huddled up there like a lot of sheep, waiting for some
+one to tell us what to do. The captain had already left the bridge and
+was conning her from aft--or possibly the engine-room--at this time.
+From the way she was shaking and swinging, I knew they were trying to
+worry her nose out, putting the engines astern, now one and now the
+other. The clanking and the grinding was something fierce, but pretty
+soon she began to back clear.
+
+"It was just a minute or two before the _Bow_ tore free from her that
+the poor old _Gull_ got the wallop that was finally responsible for
+doing her in. This was from a destroyer that came charging up out of the
+night and wasn't able to turn in time to clear the _Gull's_ stern, with
+the result that she went right through it. Her sharp stem slashed
+through the quarterdeck like it was cutting bully beef, slicing five or
+ten feet of it clean off, so that it fell clear and sank. The jar of it
+ran through the whole length of the _Seagull_, and I felt the quick kick
+of it even in the _Bow_. In fact, I think the shock of this second
+collision was the thing that finally broke them clear of the first, for
+it was just after that I saw the wreck of the _Seagull's_ bridge begin
+to slide away along the _Bow's_ starboard bow, as what was left of it
+wriggled clear.
+
+"It wasn't much of a look I had at this last destroyer, but I had a
+hunch even then that she was the _Wreath_, who had been our next astern.
+It wasn't till a long time afterward that I learned for certain that
+this was a fact. The _Wreath_ had followed us out of line when we turned
+to clear the stopped and burning _Killarney_, and then, when we messed
+up with the _Bow_, not having time to go round, she had to take a short
+cut through the tail feathers of the poor old _Seagull_. Then she tore
+right on hell-for-leather hunting for Huns, for it's each ship for
+herself and the devil take the hind-most in the destroyer game more than
+in any other.
+
+"I saw the water boiling into the hole in the side of the _Seagull_ as
+the _Bow_ backed away, and expected every minute to see the for'rard end
+of her break off and sink. But beyond settling down a lot by the head,
+she still held together and still floated. Bulkheads fore and aft were
+holding, it looked like, and there was still enough 'ship' left to carry
+on with. I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw the blurred wreck of
+her begin to gather stern way. But it was a fact. Though her rudder, of
+course, was smashed or carried away, and though she couldn't go ahead
+without breaking in two, she was still able to move through the water,
+and perhaps even to steer a rough sort of course with her screws. As it
+turned out, it wouldn't have made no difference whether we was in her or
+no; but just the same it was blooming awful, standing there and knowing
+that you'd left her while she still had a kick in her. The ragged line
+where some of the wrecked stern of her showed against the phosphorescent
+glow of the churn of her screws--that was my good-bye peep at all that
+was left of the good old _Seagull_. Gains here, or Jock Campbell, can
+tell you what her finish was. I don't like to talk about it.
+
+"Some of us tried to get aft as soon as we were clear of the _Seagull_,
+but couldn't make the grade over the wreck of the bridge. As all the
+officers and men who had been there had either been killed or wounded,
+or had gone to the after steering position they were now conning her
+from, we were as much cut off from them as though we were on another
+craft altogether. All the crews of her fo'c'sl' guns--or such of them as
+were still alive--were in the same fix. So we just bunched up there in
+the dark and waited. Some of the wounded were in beastly shape, but
+there wasn't much to be done for them, even in the way of first aid.
+Some shipmates of other times drifted together in the darkness, and I
+remember 'specially--it was while I was trying to tie up some guy's
+scalp with the sleeve of my shirt--hearing one of them telling another
+of a wool mat he had just made, all with ravellings from 'Harry
+Freeman.'[B] Funny how it's the little things like that a man
+remembers. The gunner whose head I bound up was telling me just how the
+_Bow_ happened to be strafed, but it went in one ear and out of the
+other.
+
+[Footnote B: The bluejackets' name for knitted woollen gifts from
+friends on the beach.]
+
+"But the queerest thing was me hearing some guy lying all messed up on
+the deck muttering something about _skookum kluches_, and some more
+Chinook _wa-wa_ that I knew he couldn't have picked up anywhere else but
+from serving in a 'T.B.D.' working up and down the old Inland Passage
+from Vancouver Island. I felt my way to where he was huddled up in the
+wreck of a smashed gun, told him that I was another _tilicum_ from the
+'Squimalt Base, and asked him what ship he had been there in. I knew
+there was a good chance that we'd been mates in the old _Virago_, and
+there even seemed a familiar sound to his voice. But I wasn't fated ever
+to find out. He just kept on muttering, slipping up on some words as if
+something was wrong with his mouth, and I didn't dare light a match, of
+course. When I tried to ease him up a bit by lifting so he'd lie
+straight--well, all of him didn't seem to come along when I started
+dragging by his shoulders. I never did find what was wrong with him, for
+right then new troubles of my own set in.
+
+"I was still down on my knees trying to locate what was missing with
+this poor guy, when--out of the corner of my eye, for it was near behind
+me--I spotted the flash of a ship challenging. _Bow_ challenged
+back--from somewhere aft--and then what I piped at once for a Hun
+destroyer switched on searchlights and opened fire. She was about two
+cables off on our port quarter, heading right for us and blazing away
+with one or two guns, probably all that would bear on that course. A
+second destroyer, right astern her, didn't seem to be firing. I heard
+the bang and saw the flash of two or three shells bursting somewhere
+amidships, and then the _Bow's_ port after gun began to reply. The crews
+of all the others were knocked out, and so were the searchlights.
+
+"Between the twenty-three from the _Seagull_ and what were left of the
+_Bow's_ fo'c'sl' guns' crews, there must have been thirty-five to forty
+men bunched together there for'rard of the wreck of the bridge. When the
+firing started, the whole kaboodle of us did what you're always under
+orders to do when you have nothing to stand up for--laid down. Or,
+rather, we just tumbled into a heap like a pile of dead rabbits.
+
+"I went sprawling over the poor devil I was trying to help, and there
+were two or three on top of me. Into that squirming hump of human flesh
+one of the Hun's projes landed kerplump. It didn't hit me at all, that
+one, but I can feel yet the kind of heave the whole bunch gave as it
+ploughed through. Then it was like warm water was being thrown on the
+pile in buckets, but it wasn't till I had scrambled out and found it
+sticky that I twigged it was blood.
+
+"Bad as it was, it might have been a lot worse. There hadn't been enough
+resistance to explode the proj, and so it killed only four or five and
+wounded, maybe, twice that, where it would have scoured every man jack
+of us into the sea and Kingdom Come if it had gone off. The next one
+found something in the wreck of the bridge hard enough to crack it off
+though, and it was a ragged scrap of its casing that drove in to the
+point of my hip and put a kink in my rolling gait that I've never quite
+shaken out yet. It wasn't much of a hurt to what it gave some, though,
+'specially a lad that caught the main kick of it and got ditched to
+starboard, some of him going under the wire rail, and some over.
+
+"The Huns couldn't have known how down and out the _Bow_ really was, for
+there was nothing in the world but that one port gun to prevent their
+closing and polishing her off. The chances are they recognised her
+class, knew she was more than a match for the pair of them if she was
+right, and were glad to get off with no more'n an exchange of shots in
+passing. That was the end of the fighting for the _Bow_, and about time,
+too. Her bows were stove in, all the fore part of her was full of water,
+her bridge was smashed and useless, her W.T. and searchlights were
+finished, all but one gun was out of action, and--when they came to
+count noses next day--forty-two of her crew were dead. Far from looking
+for more trouble, it was now only a question of making harbour, and
+even that--as it turned out--was touch-and-go for two days.
+
+"It was about one in the morning when that brush with the destroyers
+came off, and after that there was nothing to do but hang on till
+daylight and they could clear a way to reach us from abaft the wreckage
+of the bridge. It was pretty awful, ticking off the minutes there in the
+darkness. A good many of the worst knocked about were talking a bit
+wild, but I never heard the guy with the Chinook _wa-wa_ again. He must
+have died and been pitched over while I was being bandaged up. I _did_
+hear the 'wool-mat-maker' yapping again, though, saying how 'target
+cloth' was better to work on than canvas, and describing how to pull the
+stuff through in a loose loop, and then cut them so that they bunched up
+in 'soft, puffy balls.' Seems like I was cussing him when I dropped off
+to sleep.
+
+"I must have bled a good deal, for I slept like a log for four or five
+hours, and woke up only when some one turned me over and began to finger
+my hip. It was broad daylight, but hazy, and the sun just showing
+through. Some of the wounded had already been carried aft, and they were
+mostly dead ones that were lying around. These were being sewed up in
+canvas to get ready to bury. I thought there was something familiar in
+the face of one guy I saw them laying out and sort of collecting
+together, but it wasn't till later that it suddenly came to me that he
+was the one I had seen by firelight when he stood up and looked at
+himself where he'd been shot in two.
+
+"The two guys who bundled me up in a 'Neil Robertson' stretcher and
+packed me aft, picking their way over and through the wreckage, were
+both all bound up with rags, and so was about every one else I saw. They
+took me below into the wardroom, and then, because that was full up, on
+to some officer's cabin, where they found a place for me on the deck.
+After a while, a little dark guy--he was also a good deal bandaged, and
+so splashed with blood that I didn't notice at the time he was a sick
+bay steward--came in, washed my wound out with some dope that smarted
+like the devil, and tied it up. He worked like a streak of greased
+lightning, and then went on to some one else. That chap was Pridmore,
+and, let me tell you, he was the real 'top-liner' of all the heroes of
+the _Bow_. The surgeon had been killed at the first salvo the night
+before, leaving no one but him to carry on through all the hell that
+followed. And some way--God knows how--he did it; yes, even though he
+was wounded three or four times himself, and though he had to go without
+sleep for more'n two days to find time to dress and tend the thirty or
+forty crocks he had on his hands. He was sure the star turn, that
+Pridmore, and I was glad to read the other day that they had given him
+the D.S.M. Not that he'd have all he deserved if they hung medals all
+over him; but--well, a guy likes to have something to show that what
+he's done hasn't been lost in the shuffle entirely."
+
+I made an entry of "Pridmore, sick bay steward, _Bow_," in my notebook
+for future reference, and as I was returning it to my pocket a sudden
+list to starboard, accompanied by a throbbing grind of the helm,
+heralded a sharp alteration of course. Round she went through ten or
+twelve points, finally to steady and stand away on a course that seemed
+to lead toward the dip in the skyline between the jagged range of
+mountains back of Monastir and the point where a lowering bank of
+cirro-cumuli hid the ancient abode of the gods on the snow-capped summit
+of Olympus. On Number Two assuring me that his yarn was spun, that there
+was nothing more to it save an attempt he had made, in spite of his
+wound, to get into a fight that started when some of the wounded were
+hissed by a gang of dockyard "mateys"--I clambered back to the bridge to
+learn the significance of the new move. I still wanted to hear Gains'
+story of the _Killarney_, but I had already sized him up sufficiently to
+know that he was not the type of man who would unbosom himself before
+his mates. With him, I knew, I should have to watch my chances, and
+endeavour to have a yarn alone. Number Two's parting injunction was to
+"try and have a go at Jock Campbell, 'the human proj.' Jock's the guy at
+the after gun that looks like he was rigged out for deep-sea diving," he
+said. "Most likely he'll only growl at you at first, but if he won't
+warm up any other way, try him with a yarn about a skirt. He's 'verra
+fond o' a braw lass,' is Jock Campbell."
+
+Our alteration of course, the captain told me, was the consequence of an
+order received by wireless directing him to cross over and hunt down a
+strip along the western shore of the gulf which was not being covered by
+the present formation of the division. "I've had a signal stating that
+they're on the track of one U-boat, and there may be something to make
+them think another has slipped further along and is lying in ambush for
+the convoy about off Volo. They're evidently keeping the rest of the
+division heading in to meet the convoy itself."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The _Spark_ stood on to the north-west until the Vardar marshes showed
+as an olive-green rim around the bend of the gulf, before turning
+southward again to skirt the steep shingle-strewn beach along the
+alluvial "fans" spreading down to the sea from the base of Olympus. The
+wild-looking Thessalian shepherds were just driving their motley flocks
+down to the open foreshore to freshen up in the rising midday sea
+breeze, and it was when I assured Jock Campbell (where I found him
+leaning on the breech of the after gun and staring landwards with his
+bushy brows puckered in the incredulous scowl of a man who can't credit
+the evidence of his own eyes) that it was an actual fact that the fuzzy
+black sheep were wading in and drinking--if sparingly--of the salt
+water, that a basis of conversation was finally established. Up to that
+moment he had given no sign that any of my carelessly thrown out
+tentatives had penetrated to his ears through the "telepad" rig-out
+which established his connection with the gunnery control. But when,
+bringing my lips close to his nearest "ear-muff," I shouted that I had
+come up along that coast from Lharissa but a few weeks previously by
+motor and pack-train, and that, in lieu of any fresh water for many
+miles in either direction, I had actually seen the sheep and goats
+drinking in flocks from the sea, the look of hostile suspicion in his
+eyes was replaced by one of friendly interest.
+
+"Weel, weel, y'u dinna say so?" he ejaculated, easing away the edge of
+the helmet over one ear; "the puir wee beasties!" Then he volunteered
+that he had once kept from freezing to death in a snowstorm on Ben Nevis
+by curling up among his sheep, and I told how I had once sheared sheep
+(not mentioning it was for only half a day, and that my "clip" was
+composed of about equal parts mutton and wool) on a back blocks station
+in Queensland. Then he described how he had seen a big merino ram butt a
+Ford car off the road up Thurso way, and I--with more finesse than
+veracity--capped that with a yarn of how I had seen a flock of
+Macedonian sheep blown up by a Bulgarian air-bomb, and how one of them
+had landed unhurt upon a passing motor lorry load of forage--and gone
+right on grazing! I reckoned that might be calculated to remind Jock of
+something of the same character which had befallen him on a certain
+memorable occasion, and I was not disappointed.
+
+"'Twas verra like wha' cam ma way on the nicht the _Bow_ rammed the
+_Seagull_ at the fecht aff Jutland," he commented instantly, with no
+trace of suspicion in his voice. "Wad ye care to hear aboot it? Ye wud?
+Weel, then----." As brief, as direct and to the point was the plain
+unvarnished tale Jock Campbell told me the while a noon-day storm awoke
+reverberant echoes of the Jovian thunders in the snow-caverns of Olympus
+and the _Spark_ hunted down through the jade green waters of the
+Thessalian coast for a U-boat that was supposed to be lurking in their
+lucent depths "somewhere off Volo."
+
+"Ah was at ma action station at the port foremost gun," he began, wiping
+his perspiring brow with a wad of greasy waste, which left an undulant
+trail of oil from the recoil cylinder in its wake, "when we gaed bang
+into a line o' big Hun cru'sers, and we lat blaze at them and them at
+us. The range was short, and wi' their serchlichts lichten us up oor
+position wasna that Ah wad ca' verra pleasant. Up gaed a Hun cru'ser in
+a spoort o' flame and reek, hit, Ah thocht, by a mouldie launched by
+oor next astern. Ah was fair jumpin' wi' joy at the sicht, when a hale
+salvo o' screechin' projes cam bang inta the fo'c'sl. Ah minded the
+licht o' them mair than the soun', which was na great.
+
+"The Huns had switched aff their serchlichts when they opened fire, so
+that noo the projes was bursting in inky mirk. I doubtna oor midships
+and after guns was firing, but na the foremost, for Ah dinna mind being
+blinded by their licht afore the Hun projes gan bursting. My ain gun
+wudna bear on the Huns, so Ah was just standing by for the time, ready
+to train if we turned.
+
+"Twa salvos cam--maybe frae twa different cru'sers--ane after the ither,
+wi' aboot half a meenit atween. Ye ken that the licht o' a shell-burst
+is ower afore ye can even think, and a' the furst ane showed me was just
+the gun crews, standin', and bracin' themsel's like when a big sea braks
+inboard. It was ower like a flash o' lichtnin, and the licht had gone
+oot afore Ah saw anybody blown up or knocked oot. But Ah felt a michty
+blast o' air and an awfu' shaikin o' the deck, and then the bang o'
+lumps o' projes dingin' 'gainst the bridge and smackin' through bodies.
+
+"The flash o' the burst o' the second salvo tellt me what havoc the
+first had wrocht, but by noo ma een was licht-blind and Ah cudna see
+weel. The sta'bo'd gun was twisht oot o' shape, and a' the crew but ane
+were strechit on the deck. To a' appearance that lad had been laid oot
+wi' the ithers, but noo he was puin himsel' to his feet and crawlin' up
+the wreck o' the gun when a proj frae the second salvo burst richt alow
+him. By the flash Ah saw him flyin' inta the air, and--by the licht o'
+anither flash a bittie efter--then his corp, wi' twa or three ithers,
+gang ower the side. A lump o' that last proj carried awa' the Number Wan
+o' ma ain gun, and, onlike some o' the ithers, not a bit o' him was left
+ahint. Ah mesel' was knockit flat, but wasna much the worse for a' that.
+
+"That was the hinmost Ah saw o' the Huns for that nicht, and the last I
+mind o' the _Bow_ was the dead and deein' wha covert the fo'c'sl', wi'
+the licht o' the fires burnin' aft flickerin' ower them. Then cam' a cry
+frae the bridge that a 'stroyer was closin' us to port, and then Ah mind
+hearin' the captain shoutin' an order ower and ower, like he wasna bein'
+answered frae the ither end o' the voice-pipe. 'Hard-a-port!' he roared,
+but weel micht he shout for ay, for the qua'termaster, wi' a' on the
+signal bridge, was dead by noo, and the helm was left jammed
+hard-a-sta'bo'd.
+
+"Then Ah felt her shudder as the engines went full speed astern, and Ah
+got to ma feet in time to see she was headin' straicht for the fo'c'sl'
+o' a T.B.D. that was steerin' cross her bows. And richt after that she
+must ha' struck wi' a michty crash. The next thing Ah mindit--weel, Ah
+didna mind much save that I was lyin' on ma back in a sort o' narrow
+way atween twa high wa's, wi' a turrible pain in ma back and mony
+sea-boots trampin' ower ma face. The bashin' o' the boots didna hurt me,
+for Ah was kind o' dazed; but Ah seem to mind turnin' ma face to the
+wa', just like ye do whan the flees are botherin' ye in the mornin'.
+
+"What brocht me roun', I'm thinkin', was the shock that Ah got whan that
+wa' 'gan to shak' up and doon, and then slid richt awa', leavin' me
+hingin' ower the brink o' a black hole, wi' water souchin' aboot the
+bottom o't. 'Twas like wakin' oot o' a bad dream and findin' that the
+warst o' it was true.
+
+"Ah was too groggy to ken richt awa' that the _Bow_ had rammed anither
+ship and that Ah had been pitched oot o' her into the wan she'd hit.
+Quite natteral, Ah thocht masel' still in the _Bow_, seem' that Ah cud
+be nae mair use on the fo'c'sl', which was a' smashed and rippit up and
+drappin' to bits, Ah thocht that Ah ought to run aft to see if Ah could
+gie a haun.
+
+"But when Ah tried to get up, Ah fund the bane o' ma spine was so sair
+that Ah cudna stand straicht, and a' Ah cud do was to craw' and stagger
+alang. Every mon Ah knockit agin, and every bit of wreck Ah felt ower,
+sent me sprawlin'. Whan I fund that there was no so mony funnels as Ah
+minded afore, and whan Ah cudna find the W.T. hoose, Ah thocht that
+they had been shot awa'. Findin' a crew at stations by a midships gun,
+Ah speired if they was short o' hauns. They said they werna, so Ah gaed
+alang aft, lookin' for a chance to be useful.
+
+"Ah was thinkin' to masel', 'she's awfu' little shot up' (for ye ken Ah
+had expectit her to be a' to bits frae the way Ah'd heard the projes
+burstin' ahint the bridge), whan a syren gae a michty shriek a' most at
+ma lug, and Ah turned to see anither T.B.D., spootin' fire frae her
+funnels and throwin' a double bow wave higher'n her fo'c'sl', headin'
+richt inta us. Ah cud see that her helm was hard-a-port by the way her
+wake was boilin', but it was nae guid. She turned enough to keep frae
+rammin' us midships, but she cudna miss oor stern.
+
+"Ah had just been tellt by ane o' the after gun's crew to get oot o' the
+wa' (they not bein' short o' hauns), whan this new craft hove inta
+sicht. At first it lookit like she wad cut thro' for'ard o' me, leavin'
+me ahint to drown in the wreck o' the stern. Then Ah thocht she was
+comin' richt at me, and Ah started crawlin' back to whaur Ah had come
+frae. But she keepit turnin' and turnin', so that she hit at last richt
+abaft the after gun. Ah fell a' in a heap at the shock, and, tho' Ah was
+a guid ten feet frae whaur her stem cut in, the bulge o' her crunched
+into the quarterdeck till she passed sae close that suthin' stickin' oot
+frae her side--it micht hae been the lip o' a mouldie-tube, Ah'm
+thinkin'--gae ma puir back a sair dig, and there Ah was amang the mess
+left o' the gun and its crew. Ah was near to bein' dragged owerboard
+after that T.B.D., and when she was gone Ah fund masel'--for the second
+time in ane night--hangin' ower the raggit edge o' a black hole
+listenin' to the swish o' ragin' waters.
+
+"And then, gin that and ma half-broken back werna enough for ony mon, Ah
+hear some ane shoutit that they thocht that last rammin' had done in the
+auld _Seagull_, and that the time wad soon come to 'bandon ship.
+
+"'_Seagull!_' says Ah; 'dinna ye ken this ship is the _Bow_?' Ah kind o'
+went groggy after that, and Ah have a sort o' dim remembrance that some
+ane flashit an 'lectric torch in ma face and said that Ah must have been
+pitchit ower whan the _Bow_ rammed the _Seagull_, and that Ah prob'ly
+hadna shaken doon to ma new surroundin's. Ah tried hard to speir what
+kind o' a shakin' doon they meant gin this hadna been ane. But Ah didna
+seem to have the power to mak' ma words come straicht, and they said,
+'He's gane a bit off his chuck,' and ca'd some ane to carry me below.
+
+"The pains runnin' up and doon ma spine when Ah was lowered doon the
+ladder were ower much for me, and Ah passed off for a bit. Whan Ah cam
+roun' Ah was bein' shoved along the ward-room table--whaur Ah had been
+lyin'--to mak' room for a lad wi' bandages roun' his head and a'
+drippin' wi' salt water. His ship had gone doon twa hours syne, and
+maist o' the time he had been in the water or roostin' on a Carley
+Float. That lad's name was Gains, noo the gun-layer o' the fo'most gun
+o' the _Spark_--him Ah saw ye talkin' wi' just noo. He was strong and
+cheery himsel', but fower o' his mates were chilled to the bane, and Ah
+wacht 'em shiver to death richt afore ma een.
+
+"It was aboot daylicht when we pickit up a' that was left o' the crew o'
+the _Killarney_, and aboot an hour efter we fell in wi' the _Sportsman_,
+wha passed us a hawser and tried to tow, stern-first, what was left o'
+the _Seagull_. Ah didna see what was wrang, but they tellt me that the
+wreck o' the stern and the helm bein' jammed hard a-sta'bo'd made sae
+much drag that the cable partit. Then there was naithing else to
+do--sin' the _Seagull_ cudna steam--but to sink her wi' gun-fire. The
+captain askit permission for this by W.T., and when it came they ditched
+the books and signals, transferred abody to the _Sportsman_, and then
+gae her a roun' or twa at the water-line wi' the _Sportsman's_ guns.
+Doon she gaed, and that," he concluded with a grin, "is the true yarn o'
+the sinkin' o' the _Seagull_. If only o' ma mates try to mak' ye b'lieve
+that she foundert 'count o' bein' hit and holed by a 'human proj' kent
+as Jock Campbell, I'm hopin' ye'll no listen to 'em."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+"FIREBRAND"
+
+
+It was a little incident which occurred one night when the Grand Fleet
+was returning to Base from one of its periodical sweeps through the
+North Sea that set Able-seaman Melton talking of the things he had seen
+and felt and heard the time he was standing anti-submarine watch in the
+_Firebrand_, when her flotilla of destroyers mixed itself up with a
+squadron of German cruisers in the course of the "dog-fight" which
+concluded the battle of Jutland.
+
+I had found him, muffled to the eyes and dancing a jangling jig on a
+sleet-slippery steel plate to keep warm, when I picked my precarious way
+along the coco-matted deck and climbed up to the after searchlight
+platform of the Flotilla Leader I chanced to be in at the time. A fairly
+decent day was turning into a dirty night, and the steadily thickening
+mistiness which accompanied a sodden rain in process of transformation
+into soft snow had reduced the visibility to a point where the
+Commander-in-Chief deemed it safer for the Fleet to put back to open sea
+and take no further chances among the treacherous currents and rocky
+islands that beset the approaches to the Northern Base.
+
+The Flagship, which had received the order by wireless, flashed
+"Destroyers prepare to take station for screening when Fleet alters to
+easterly course at nine o'clock," and shortly before that hour the
+Flotilla Leader made the signal to execute. Almost immediately I felt
+the hull of the _Flyer_ take on an accelerated throb as her speed was
+increased, and a moment later the wake began to boil higher as the helm
+was put hard-a-starboard to bring her round. We were steaming a cable's
+length on the starboard bow of the _Olympus_, the leading ship of the
+squadron at the time, and the carrying out of the manoeuvre involved
+the _Flyer's_ leading her division across the head of the battleship
+line and down the other side on an opposite course, so that the
+destroyers would be in a position to resume night-screening formation
+when the fleet had finished turning.
+
+Just how the captain of the _Flyer_ happened to cut his course so fine I
+never learned, but the patchiness of the drifting mist must have had a
+good deal to do with making him misjudge his distance. At any rate, just
+as we had turned through nine or ten points, I suddenly saw the
+ominously bulking bows of the _Olympus_ come juggernauting out of the
+night, with the amorphous loom of the bridge and foretop towering
+monstrously above. The _Flyer_ seemed fairly to jump out of the water
+at the kick her propellers gave her as the turbines responded to the
+bridge's call for "More steam," and a spinning puff of smoke darkened
+the glow above the funnels for a moment as fresh oil was sprayed upon
+the fires beneath the boilers.
+
+It was a good deal like a cat scurrying in front of a speeding
+motor-car, and the consequences would have been more or less similar had
+not one of the _Olympus's_ swarming lookouts, peering into the darkness
+from his screened nest, gathered hint of the disaster that menaced in
+time to warn the forebridge. The great super-dreadnought responded to
+her helm very smartly considering her tonnage, and she turned just far
+enough to starboard to avoid grinding us under. I could almost look up
+through the port hawse-pipe as the flare of her bow loomed above my
+head, and the man standing by the depth-charges on the all-but-grazed
+stern of the _Flyer_ might well have been pardoned even if the story his
+mates afterwards told of his action on this occasion were true--that he
+had tried to fend off one of the largest battleships afloat with a
+boat-hook.
+
+A silhouette against the barely perceptible glow at the back of the
+forebridge of a "brass-hatted" officer shaking his fist as though in the
+act of ramping and roaring like a true British sailor moved by righteous
+anger; a forty or fifty degree heel to starboard as the curling bow-wave
+of the _Olympus_ thwacked resoundingly along her port side, and the
+_Flyer_ drove on into the sleet-shot darkness to blow off accumulated
+steam in rolling clouds, allow her fluttering pulse to become normal,
+and resume the even tenor of her way.
+
+Melton, A.B., whistling over and over the opening bars of the chorus of
+"Do You Want Us to Lose the War?" started his metallically clanking jig
+again, but presently, like a man with something on his mind, sidled over
+and shoved his Balaklava-bordered face against the outside of the
+closely-reefed hood of my "lammy" coat, and muttered thickly something
+about being afraid he had got himself into trouble. When I had pulled
+loose a snap and improved communications by unmuffling a lee ear, I
+learned that it had just occurred to the good chap that he failed to
+report to the bridge the battleship he had sighted "fifty yards to the
+port beam," and he was wondering whether there would be a "strafe"
+coming from the skipper about it.
+
+"Fact is, sir," he said, speaking brokenly as the galloping gusts every
+now and then forced a word back into his mouth, "that that rip-rarin'
+stem, with the white foam flyin' off both sides of it, bearing down
+right for where I was standin'--all that was so like what I saw the
+night of Jutland in the _Firebrand_ that--that the turn it give me took
+my mind right back and--and I wasn't thinkin' o' anything else till the
+_'Lympus_ was gone by."
+
+I assured him that, since the _Olympus_ had doubtless been sighted from
+the bridge several winks before she had been visible from his
+less-favourable vantage, they would probably have been too busy to
+respond to his call at the voice-pipe even had he tried to report what
+he saw.
+
+"If I were you," I said, "I would forget all about that, and try to
+explain how a cruiser that the _Firebrand_ was about to ram bow-to-bow"
+(I had, of course, already heard something of that dare-devilish
+exploit) "could have looked to you like the _Olympus_ ramping down on a
+right-angling course and threatening to slice off the _Flyer's_ stern
+with all her depth-charges. I quite understood that one ramming is a
+good deal like another, as far as a big ship hitting a destroyer fair
+and square is concerned, but----"
+
+"'Twasn't that _first_ cru'ser 'tall, sir," Melton interrupted, nuzzling
+into my "lammy" hood again to make himself heard. "Twas 'nother 'un,
+sir--a wallopin' big un. The seas was stiff wi' cru'sers fer a minit,
+sir, an' no sooner was we clear o' the first un than the second come
+tearin' down on us, tryin' to cut us in two amidships. An' that last un
+was a battl' cru'ser nigh as big as the _'Lympus_, all shot up in the
+funnels and runnin' wild an' bloody-minded like a mad bull. We were
+pretty nigh to bein' stopped dead, an' if she hadn't been slower'n cold
+grease wi' her helm she'd ha' eat us right up."
+
+There had been nothing of malice aforethought in my action in cornering
+Melton on the searchlight platform that night, for, as it chanced, I
+had failed to learn up to that moment that he had been in the famous
+_Firebrand_ at Jutland. Nor, with the wind and sea getting up as fast as
+the glass and the thermometer were going down, was the time or the place
+quite what a man would have chosen for anything in the way of cosy
+fireside reminiscence. But, both these facts notwithstanding, I felt
+that, since I was leaving the _Flyer_ to go to another base directly she
+arrived in harbour on the morrow, it would be criminal to neglect the
+opportunity of hearing what was perhaps the most sportingly spectacular
+of all the Jutland destroyer actions related by one who was actually in
+it. I did not dare to distract Melton's attention from his lookout by
+drawing him into talking while he was still on watch, but, when he was
+relieved at ten o'clock, I waylaid him at the foot of the ladder with a
+pot of steaming hot ship's cocoa (foraged from the galley by a
+sympathetic ward-room steward) and both pockets of my "lammy" coat
+filled with the remnants of a box of assorted Yankee "candy" looted from
+the American submarine in which I had been on patrol the week before.
+
+Melton rose to the lure instantly--or perhaps I should say "fell to the
+bribe"--for the British bluejacket, if only he were given a chance to
+develop, is quite as sweet of tooth as his brother Yank. Because I could
+hardly take him to the captain's cabin, which I was occupying for the
+moment, for a yarn, and because he, likewise, could not take me down to
+the mess deck to disturb the off-watch sleepers with our chatter, there
+was nothing to do but carry on as best we could in the friendly lee of
+one of the funnels.
+
+It was a night of infernal inkiness by now, and only clinging patches of
+soft snow and their blanker blankness revealed the dimly guessable lines
+of whaler and cowls and torpedo tubes and the loom of the loftier
+bridge. The battleship line was masked completely by the double curtain
+of the darkness and the snow, and only a tremulous greyness, barely
+discernible in the intervals of the flurries of flakes where the
+starboard bow-wave curled back from the _Olympus_, gave an intermittent
+bearing to help in keeping station. Underfoot was the blackness of the
+pit, not the faintest gleam reflecting from the waves washing over the
+weather side to swirl half-knee high about our sea boots. Even overhead
+all that was visible were fluttering patches of snow flakes dancing
+through the haloes of pale rose radiance that crowned the tops of the
+funnels. The wail of the wind in the wireless aerials, the crash of the
+surging beam seas, the throb of the propellers, and the pussy-cat purr
+of the spinning turbines--these were the fit accompaniment to which
+Melton A.B. recited to me the epic of the _Firebrand_ at Jutland.
+
+The cocoa I quaffed mug for mug with Melton, down to the last of the
+sweet, sustaining "settlings" in the bottom of the pot; but the candy I
+kept in reserve to draw on from time to time as it was needed to
+lubricate his tongue and stoke the smouldering fires of his memory. I
+started him off with a red-and-white "barber's pole" stick, which took
+not a little fumbling with mittened hands to extract from its greased
+tissue paper wrapper, and the seductive fragrance of crunched peppermint
+mingled with the acrid fumes of burning petroleum as he leaned close and
+began to tell how the ----th Flotilla, to which the _Firebrand_
+belonged, screening the ----th B.S. of the Battle Fleet, came upon the
+scene toward the end of the long summer afternoon. He had witnessed
+Beatty's consummate manoeuvre of "crossing the T" of the enemy line
+with the four that remained of his battered First Battle Cruiser
+Squadron, and he had seen the main Battle Fleet baulked of its action
+the lowering mists and the closing in of darkness; but it was not until
+full night had clapped down its lid that the fun for the _Firebrand_
+really began.
+
+"It was just 'twixt daylight an' dark," he said, reaching me a steadying
+hand in the darkness as the _Flyer_ teetered giddily down the back of a
+receding sea, "that the flotilla dropped back to take stashun 'stern the
+battl'ships we was screenin'. The _Killarney_ was leadin' an' after her
+came the _Firebran'_, _Seagull_, _Wreath_, an' _Consort_, makin' up the
+First Divishun. _Wreath_ an' _Consort_ sighted some Hun U-boats and
+'stroyers while this move was on, an' plunk'd off a few shots at 'em.
+Don't think wi' any fatal consequence. Then there come the rattle of
+light gun fire from the south'ard, like from cru'sers or battleships
+repellin' T.B.D.'s. Then it was all serene for mor'n an 'our, an' then
+all hell opens up."
+
+I suspected, from the sounds he made, that Melton had bitten into a
+block of milk chocolate without removing its wrapping of foil and paper,
+but presently his enunciation grew less explosive and more intelligible.
+
+"It was Hun cru'sers drivin' down on us from the starboard quarter that
+started the monkey-show," he said, "an' that bein' the nor'west it was
+hardly where we'd reason to expect 'em from. It looks like we had 'em
+clean cut off, wi' the 'hole Battl' Fleet steamin' 'tween 'em an' their
+way back home, an' that they was tryin' to sneak through in the
+darkness. The _Wreath_, at the end o' the line nearest 'em, spotted 'em
+first, and she, 'cause she didn't want to give herself 'way wi'
+flashin', reported what she'd seen by low-power W.T. to the rest o' the
+flotilla. Course I--standin' watch aft--didn't know nothin' 'bout that
+signal, so that the first I hears o' the Huns was when they all opened
+up on the poor ol' _Killarney_, 'cause she was the leader. I s'pose, and
+she started firin' back at their flashes.
+
+"The leadin' Hun flashed his searchlight on the _Killarney_ as he opened
+up, but shut off sharp when _Killarney_ came back at him. I could see
+some o' the projes flittin' right down the light beam until it blinked
+off, an' it was a flock of two or three of these that I kept my eye on
+all the way till they bashed into the _Killarney's_ bridge and busted.
+She was zigzaggin' a coupl' o' points on _Firebrand's_ starboard bow
+just then, so my standin' aft didn't prevent my gettin' a good look at
+what was happenin'. I could see the bodies o' four or five men flyin' up
+wi' the wreckage o' the explosion, an' then, all in a minnit, she was
+rollin' in flames from the funnels right for'ard. By the light o' it I
+could see the crews o' the 'midships and after guns workin' 'em like
+devils, an' twice anyhow, an' I think three times, I saw a bright, shiny
+slug slip over the side, an' knew they were loosin' mouldies to try to
+get their own back from the Hun.
+
+"The sea was boilin' up red as blood where the light from the burnin'
+_Killarney_ fell on the spouts the Huns' projes was throwin' up all
+round her. She was the fairest mark ever a gun trained on, and p'raps
+that was what tempted the Hun to keep pumpin' projes at her instead o'
+givin' more attenshun to the rest of the divishun trailin' astern. That
+was what gave _Firebran'_ her first chance o' alterin' the Hun navy list
+that night.
+
+"The second cru'ser in the Hun line was bearin' right abeam to starboard
+by now, an' I could see by her gun-flashes she was of good size, wi'
+four long funnels fillin' up all the deck 'tween her two masts. She was
+firing fast in salvoes wi' all the guns that would bear on the burnin'
+_Killarney_. I could just make out by the light from the _Killarney_,
+which was growin' stronger every minnit, that the crew of our after
+torpedo tube was gettin' busy, an' while I was watchin' 'em, over flops
+the mouldie and starts to run. I knew it was aimed for one or t'other o'
+the two leadin' Huns, but wasn't dead sure which till I saw the after
+funnels an' mainmast o' the second toppl' over an' a big flash o' fire
+take their place. Then it looked like there was exploshuns right off
+fore an' aft, and then fires broke out all over her from stem to stern.
+Next thing I knows, she takes a big list to starboard, an' over she
+goes, wi' more exploshuns throwin' up spouts o' steam, as she rolls
+under. The second mouldie--it got away right after the first--was never
+needed to finish the job. The _Firebran'_ had evened up the score for
+the _Killarney_, wi' a good margin over.
+
+"The captain turned away to reload mouldies after that, an' just as we
+swung out o' line I saw a salvo straddle the _Killarney_, and two or
+three shells hit square 'tween her funnels an' after sup'rstruct'r'.
+They must have gone off in her engine room, for there was more steam
+than fire risin' from her as we turned an' left her astern, an' she
+looked stopped dead. A Hun cru'ser was closin' the blazin' wreck o' her,
+firm' hard; but, by Gawd, what d'you think I saw. The only patch on the
+ol' _Killarney_ that was free o' the ragin' fires was her stern, an'
+from there the steady flashes of her after gun showed it was bein'
+worked as fast an' reg'lar as ever I seen it done at any night-firin'
+practice. I looked to see her blow up every minnit, but she was still
+spittin' wi' that littl' after gun when the sudden flashin' up of the
+fightin' lights for'ard turned my attenshun nearer home.
+
+"I could just make out a line of what looked like 'stroyers headin'
+cross our bows, an' thought we'd stumbled into 'nother nest o' Huns till
+they answered back wi' the signal o' the day, an' I knew it was one of
+our own flotillas we'd been catchin' up to. That flashin' up o' lights
+come near to doin' for us tho', for it showed us up to a big Hun
+steamin' three or four miles off on the port beam, an' he claps a
+searchlight on us an' chases it up wi' a sheaf o' shells. The only proj
+that hit us bounced off wi'out doin' much hurt to the ship, but some
+flyin' hunks o' it smashed the mouldie davit and knocked out most o' the
+crews o' the after tubes, includin' the T.G.M.[C] That put a stop to
+reloadin' operashuns wi' a mouldie in only one o' the tubes. By good
+luck we managed to zigzag out o' the searchlight beam right after that,
+an' was free to turn back an' try to start a divershun for the poor ol'
+_Killarney_.
+
+[Footnote C: Torpedo Gunner's Mate.]
+
+"Her fires looked to be dyin' down when we first picked her up, but
+right after that some more projes bust on her an' she started blazin'
+harder than ever. I watched for the spittin' o' that littl' after gun,
+but when it come it looked to spurt right out o' the heart o' a blazin'
+furnace, showin' the fire was now burnin' from stem to stern. One more
+salvo plastered over her, an' that one got no reply. The good ol'
+'_Killy_' had shot her bolt, an' her finish looked a matter o' minnits.
+
+"It was plain enough if anyone was still livin' they was goin' to need
+pickin' up in a hurry, an' the captain put the _Firebran'_ at full speed
+to close her an' stan' by to give a han'. Just then I saw a Hun
+searchlight turned on and start feelin' its way up to where the
+_Killarney_ was burning, wi' a cru'ser followin' up the small end o' the
+beam, seemin' to be nosin' in to end the mis'ry. She did not bear right
+for a mouldie, but we opened up wi' the foremost gun, an' I saw the
+shells bustin' on her bridge and fo'c'sl' like rotten apples chucked
+'against a wall. The light blinked off as the first proj hit home, but
+there was no way to tell if it was shot away or no. It was the second
+time that night that we'd done our bit to ease off the hell turned loose
+on the _Killarney_. Likewise it was the last. From then on we had our
+own partic'lar hell to wriggle out of, wi' no time left to play 'Venging
+Nemisus' to our stricken sisters. Just a big bonfire sittin' on the sea
+an' lickin' a hole in the night wi' its flames--that was the last I saw
+of the ol' _Killarney_."
+
+Melton paused for a moment as if engrossed in the memories conjured up
+by his narrative, and I took advantage of the interval to hand him one
+of those most loved lollipops of Yankee youngster-hood, a plump, hard
+ball of toothsome saccharinity called--obviously from its resistant
+resiliency--an "All-Day Sucker." When he spoke again I knew in an
+instant that a sure instinct had led him to make the proper disposition
+of the succulent dainty--that it was stowed snugly away in a bulging
+cheek like a squirrel's nut, to melt away in its own good time.
+
+"'Tween the glare of the burnin' _Killarney_," Melton went on after
+thrashing his hands across his shoulders for a minute to warm them up,
+"the gleam o' the Hun cru'ser's searchlight an' the flash o' our own
+gun-fire, we must all have been more or less blinded in the _Firebrand_,
+for we had run close to what may have been a part of the main en'my
+battl' line wi'out nothin' bein' reported. Our firin' had give us away,
+o' course, an' the nearest ships must have had their guns trained on us,
+waitin' to be sure what we was. One o' 'em must have made up his mind we
+was en'my even before we spotted 'em at all, for the first thing I saw
+was the white o' the bow wave an' wake as she turned toward us, prob'ly
+to ram. She'd have caught us just about midships if the bridge hadn't
+sighted her an' done the only thing open to do--turned to meet her head
+on.
+
+"I don't remember that either she or us switched on recognition lights,
+but the Hun opened with ev'rything that would bear just before we
+slammed together. It must have been by the gun-flashes that I saw she
+had three funnels, wi' what looked like some kind o' marks painted on
+'em in red. I saw our second funnel give a jump and crumple up as a proj
+hit it, an' then a spurt o' flame--from a big gun fired almost
+point-blank--looked to shoot right on to the bridge. I thought that it
+must have killed ev'ry man there an' carried away all the steering gear.
+But no.
+
+"The old _Firebrand_ wi' helm hard-a-port, went swingin' right on thro'
+the point or two more that saved her life. I could feel by the way she
+jumped an' gathered herself that last second that the ol' girl was still
+under control. Then we struck wi' a horrible grind an' crash, an' I went
+sprawlin' flat.
+
+"If the Hun had hit us half a wink sooner, or if we had turned half a
+point less, we'd have been swallowed alive and split up in small hunks.
+As it was, we didn't have a lot the worst o' it, an' p'raps we more than
+broke even. It was like a mastiff an' terrier runnin' into each other in
+the dark, an' the terrier only gettin' run over an' the mastiff gettin'
+a piece bit clean out o' his neck. It was our port bows that come
+together, an' for only a sort o' glancin' blow. But it was the stem o'
+the _Firebran'_ that was turned in sharpest, an' it was her that was
+hittin' up--by a good ten knots--the most speed. She was left in a
+terribl' mess, but most o' the damage was from her rammin' the Hun, not
+from the Hun rammin' her. While as for what she did to the Hun, the best
+proof o' it was the more'n twenty feet of her side-platin'--an upper
+strake, wi' scuttl' holes in it an' pieces o' gutterway deck hangin' to
+it--that we found in the wreck of our fo'c'sl'. If the hole that hunk of
+steel left behind it didn't put that Hun out o' bus'ness as a fightin'
+unit till she got back to port an' had a refit, I'll eat it."
+
+I wasn't quite clear in my mind whether Melton meant to imply that he
+would eat the hole in the Hun cruiser or the hunk of steel that came out
+of it, but there _was_ no room for doubt that the violent crunch with
+which he emphasised the assertion had put a period to the life of his
+"All-Day Sucker," which was never intended to be treated like chewing
+toffy. Dipping into the grab-bag of my "lammy" coat pocket for something
+with which to replace it, therefore, I brought up a stick of chewing
+gum, and he resumed his story in an atmosphere sweet with the ineffable
+odour of spearmint and escaping steam.
+
+"How much the Hun was shook up by that smash," Melton continued, "you
+can reckon from this: We was almost dead stopped for some minnits, an'
+all out o' control from the time of rammin' till they started connin'
+her from the engine-room. There was one fire flickerin' in the wreckage
+o' the forebridge, an' another somewhere 'midships, while there was also
+a big glare throwin' up where the foremost funnel was shot away. We was
+as soft an' easy a target as even a Hun could ask for; an' yet that one
+was in too much of a funk wi' his own hurts to let off a singl' other
+gun at us in all the time that he must have been flounderin' on at not
+much more'n point-blank range. Mebbe he was knocked up even more'n we
+thought. Nothin' else would account for him not havin' 'nother go at us.
+
+"Just one wild bally mess--that was what the _Firebran'_ looked like
+when I got to my feet again an' cast an eye for'ard. There was too much
+smoke an' steam to see clear, an' it was mostly flickers o' red light
+where the fires were startin', an' big, black shadows full o' wreckage.
+As it looked to _me_ from aft--tho', o' course, the full effects wasn't
+vis'bl' till daylight, the bridge an' searchlight platform an' mast was
+shoved right back an' piled up on the foremost funnel. The whaler an'
+dingy was carried away, an' my first thought, for I was sure she was
+sinkin', was that we had no boats to put off in. I could see two or
+three wounded crawlin' out o' the raffle, but I knew that the most to be
+dished would be in the wreck o' the bridge. The queerest thing o' all
+was the flashes o' green an' blue light flutterin' thro' the tangled
+steel o' the wreckage. At first I thought I was sort o' seein' things;
+but fin'lly I figgered it out as the juice from the busted 'lectric
+wires short-circuitin'. It meant, I tol' myself, that the men under them
+tons o' steel was bein' 'lectrocuted on top o' bein' crushed.
+
+"It looked like any one o' three or four things would be enough to
+finish the ol' _Firebran'_. I remember thinkin' that if she didn't blow
+up, she was sure to burn up; an' that if, by chance, she missed doin'
+one o' them, she was goin' to founder anyhow. She was already well down
+by the head, an'--leastways, it looked so to me at the time--still
+settlin' fast. An' I was just reflectin' that, even if she was lucky
+enough not to burn up, or blow up, or founder, she was still too easy
+pickin' for the Huns to miss doin' her in one way or 'nother, when,
+thunderin' out o' the darkness an' headin' up to crumpl' underfoot what
+was left o' the stopped an' helpless _Firebran'_, come a hulkin' big
+battl' cru'ser, the one I was just tellin' you the _'Lympus_ set me
+thinkin' on a while back.
+
+"Starin' at our own fires must have blinded me a good bit, or I'd have
+seen him sooner'n I did. He looked like he been gettin' no end o' a
+hammerin', for his second funnel was gone, an' out of the hole it left a
+big spurt o' flame an' smoke was rushin' that would have showed him up
+for miles. There was a red hot fire ragin' under his fo'c'sl', too, an'
+I saw the flames lashin' round thro' some jagged shell holes in his port
+bow. Lucky for us, he was runnin' for his life, an' had no time to more
+than try to run us down in passin'.
+
+"It must have been just from habit I yelled down my voice-pipe, for I
+knew they was no longer controllin' her from the bridge; but the roarin'
+o' a fire an' the clank of bangin' metal was the only sounds that come
+back. When I looked up again the Hun was right on top of us, an' I must
+have just stood there--froze--like to-night wi' the _'Lympus_. By the
+grace o' Gawd, he hadn't been abl' to alter course enough to do the
+trick. His stem shot by wi' twenty feet or more clearance, an' it was
+only the fat bulge of him that kissed us off in passin'. It was by the
+glare o' his fires, not ours, which throwed no light abaft the
+superstructure I was on, that I saw some of the hands was already
+workin' to rig a jury steerin' gear aft. Then he was gone, an' much too
+full o' his own troubles to turn back, or even send the one heavy proj
+that would have cooked us for good an' all. A few minutes more, an' the
+wreck o' the _Firebran'_ begun gatherin' way again, an' when I saw her
+come round to her nor'westerly course an' push ahead wi'out settlin' any
+deeper, I knew that the bulkheads were holdin' an' that--always
+providin' we run into no more Huns--there was a fightin' chance o'
+pullin' thro'.
+
+"There was about a hundred jobs that needed doin' all at once, an'
+'tween the loss o' dead an' wounded--only about half the reg'lar ship's
+company was fit for work. The bulkheads had to be shored, for, wi' the
+fo'c'sl' crumpled up like a concertina an' the deck an' side platin'
+ripped off from the stem right back to the capstan engine, she was open
+to the whole North Sea from the galley right for'ard. This made the
+first an' second bulkheads o' no use, an' made the third bulkhead all
+that stood 'tween us an' goin' to the bottom. Then there was the
+fires--'bove deck an' 'tween decks--that had to be put out 'fore they
+got to the magazines, an' the engines to be kept goin', an' the ship to
+be navigated, an' the wounded to be looked to. An' on top o' all this,
+the ship had to be got into some kind o' fightin' trim in case any more
+Huns come pokin' her way. I won't be havin' to tell you it was one bally
+awful job, carryin' on like that in the dark, an' wi' half the ship's
+company knocked out.
+
+"When I saw it was the first lieutenant that seemed to be directin'
+things, I took it the captain was done for, an' that was what everyone
+thought till, all o' a sudden, he come wrigglin' out o' the wreck o' the
+bridge--all messed up an' covered wi' blood, but not much hurt
+otherways--an' began carryin' on just as if it was 'Gen'ral Quarters.'
+Some cove wi' the stump o' his hand tied up wi' First Aid dressin' was
+sent up to relieve me on the lookout, an' I was put to fightin' fires
+an' clearin' up the wreck 'bove decks. As there ain't much to burn on a
+'stroyer if the cordite ain't started, we were not long gettin' the
+fires in hand, even wi' havin'--cause the hoses an' the fire-mains was
+knocked out--to dip up water in buckets throwed over the side. Wi' the
+wreckage, the most we could do was to dig out the dead an' wounded an'
+rig up for connin' ship from aft.
+
+"It was a nasty job when we started in on the wreck o' the forebridge,
+for the witch-lights o' the short-circuit were still dancin' a cancan in
+the smashed an' twisted steel plates an' girders, an' it kept a cove
+lookin' lively to keep from switchin' some of the blue-green lightnin'
+into his own frame by way o' his ax or saw. No one that had been on any
+part o' the bridge was wi'out some kind o' hurt, but the three dead was
+a deal less than was to be expected. There was also three very bad
+knocked up, an' on one o' them the surgeon--a young probasuner
+R.N.V.R.--performed an operashun in the dark. It was a cove he was
+'fraid to move wi'out tinkerin' up a bit, an' he pulled him thro' all
+right in the end. One o' the crew of the foremost gun never turned up,
+an' we figured he must have been lost overboard when she rammed.
+
+"Pois'nous as it was workin' on deck, that wasn't a circumstance to what
+it must have been carryin' on below. I didn't see nothin' o' that end o'
+the show, thank Gawd, but every man as came out o' it alive said it was
+just one livin' bloomin' hell, no less. There was a good number o' coves
+who did things off han' that saved the ship from blowin' up, or burnin'
+up, or sinkin', an' three o' the best o' 'em was a engine-room
+artif'cer, a stoker P.O., and a stoker that was in the fore stokehold
+when the bridge was pushed back an' carried away that funnel. They
+ducked into their resp'rators, stuck to their posts a' kept the fans
+goin' till the fumes was all cleared away. Nothin' else would have saved
+the foremost boiler--an' wi' it the ship herself--blowin' up right then
+an' there. Same way, gettin' on the jump in backin' up Number 3
+bulkhead--the one that was holding back the whole North Sea--was all
+that kept it from bulgin' in an' floodin' right back into the
+stokeholds. It was the chief art'ficer engineer that took on that job,
+an' it was him, too, that stopped up the gaps left by the knocking down
+o' the first and second funnels.
+
+"Even after it at last seemed like we was goin' to keep her from sinkin'
+or blowin' up, things still looked so bad to the captain that he ditched
+the box o' secret books for fear o' their fallin' into the hands o' the
+Hun. As we'd have been more hindrance than help to the Fleet, he did not
+try to rejoin the flotilla, but turned west an' headed for the coast o'
+England on the chance of makin' the nearest base while she still hung
+together. All night she went slap-bangin' along, wi' the engines shakin'
+out a few more rev'lushuns just as fast as it seemed the bulkhead was
+shored strong enough to stand the push o' the sea.
+
+"Mornin' found her still goin', but what a sight she was! My first good
+look at what was left o' her give me the same kind o' a shock I got the
+first time I had a peep at my mug in a glass after havin' small-pox in
+Singapore. She wasn't a ship at all, any more'n my face was a face. She
+was just a mess, that's all, an' clinkin' an' clankin' an' wheezin' and
+sneezin' an' yawin' all over the sea. An' the sea was empty all the way
+roun', wi' no ship in sight to pass us a tow-line or pick us up if she
+chucked in her hand an' went down.
+
+"We had our hands so full keepin' her afloat an' under weigh, that it
+wasn't till four in the afternoon--more'n sixteen hours after we rammed
+the Hun cru'ser--that we found time to bury our dead. It was like
+gettin' a turribl' load off your chest when we dropped 'em over in their
+hammocks wi' a fire-bar stitched in alongside 'em to take 'em down.
+Nothin' is so depressin' to a sailor as bein' shipmates wi' a mate that
+ain't a mate no longer. Even the ol' _Firebran'_ 'peared to ride easier
+an' more b'oyant after the buryin' was over, as if she knowed the worst
+o' her sorrer was left behind.
+
+"Luck took a turn against us again just after dark, for the wind shifted
+six or seven points an' started blowin' strong from dead ahead. We had
+to alter course some to ease off the bang o' the seas a bit, an' fin'ly
+the speed had to be slowed even slower'n before to keep the bulkhead
+from being driv' in. But she weathered it, by Gawd she did, an' next
+mornin' the goin' was easier. We made the Tyne at noon. It was just a
+heap o' ol' scrap-iron so far as the eye could see, that they let into
+the Middle Dock the next day, but it was scrap-iron that had come all
+the way from Jutland under its own steam, an' wi' no help from no one
+save what was left o' the lads as once manned a 'stroyer called the
+_Firebran'_.
+
+"It hadn't taken long to reduce her from a 'stroyer to scrap-iron, an'
+it didn't seem like it took much longer--time goes fast on home
+leave--to turn that scrap-iron back into a 'stroyer again. The ol'
+_Firebran's_ got many a good kick in her yet, so they say, an' I'd ask
+for nothin' better'n to be finishin' the war in her."
+
+I thanked Melton for his yarn, bade him good night, and was about to
+start picking my way to my cabin to turn in, when I sensed rather than
+saw that there was something further he wanted to say, perhaps some
+final tribute to his officers and mates of the _Firebrand_, I thought.
+There was a shuffling of sea-booted feet on the steel deck, a nervous
+pulling off and on of woollen mittens, and it was out.
+
+"I just wanted to say, sir," he said, "that I likes the Yankee Jackies
+very much; 'specially their candy an' chewin' gum. I was just wonderin'
+if that last stick you give me was all----"
+
+I emptied both pockets before I renewed my thanks to Melton and bade him
+a final good night. There are strange ingredients entering into the
+composition of the cement that is binding Britain and America together,
+and if there is any objection to chewing gum it certainly cannot be on
+the ground that it lacks adhesiveness.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+"BACK FROM THE JAWS"
+
+
+I had gone to the _Nairobi_, not because the rather routine stunt her
+flotilla was on promised any excitement, but rather because of the
+notable part she had played in the Jutland action and the fact that I
+had been assured that there was still in her an officer who was said to
+have figured prominently in the splendid account she had given of
+herself on that occasion. As luck would have it, however, this officer
+had been appointed to another destroyer only a day or two previously, so
+that no veteran of the great action remained in the ward room. A canvass
+of the ship's company revealed that one of the stoker petty officers was
+a Jutland survivor, but before I could run him to cover some kind of a
+light cruiser affair had occurred down Heligoland Bight way which called
+for destroyer work in that direction, and the next two days, with the
+flotilla creasing up the brine at high speed and everyone at Action
+Stations most of the time, were not favourable for the "intimate
+reminiscence" I was bent on drawing out.
+
+It was not until the flotilla, salt-frosted and low in fuel, was
+lounging along in the leisurely dalliance of half-speed on the way back
+to base that I cornered Stoker Petty Officer Prince in the angle between
+the foremost torpedo tubes and the starboard rail, and engaged him in
+serious discussion of the shamefulness of supplying worn-out films to
+the Depot Ship kinema. The second dog watch was only half gone, but in
+the hour that elapsed before it was over there was no mention of
+Jutland, or anything else connected with the war for that matter, though
+the talk ran the full gamut from cabbages to kings. I mean this quite
+literally, for he began by telling me of what his mother had raised in
+her allotment at Ipswich, and was describing how, when he was on a
+cruise in the _Clio_ ten years before the war, he had once shaken hands
+with the King of Fiji, as eight bells went to call him on watch. It was
+a happy inspiration which prompted me to volunteer to go down and stand
+a part of his watch with him in the stokehold, for once on his own
+"dung-hill," his restraint fell away from him and he spoke easily and
+naturally of the things which had befallen him there and on the deck
+above.
+
+There is little in the small, neat compartment from which the oil fires
+of a modern destroyer are fed and controlled to suggest the picture
+which the name "stokehold" conjures up in the popular mind. There is no
+coal, no grime, no sweating shovellers, no clanging doors. Under
+ordinary conditions two leisurely moving men do all there is need of
+doing, and with time to spare, and there are occasions at sea, in the
+winter months, when the stokehold is a more comfortable refuge than the
+chill fireless ward room. It was my remarking upon the grateful warmth
+of the stokehold after the cold wet wind that was sweeping the deck,
+which finally turned the current of Prince's reminiscence in the
+direction I had been vainly endeavouring to deflect it for the last
+hour.
+
+"It's all comfy enough, sir, when she's loafing along at fifteen or
+twenty knots," he said, slipping aside a "flap" and peering in at his
+fires with the critical eye of a housewife surveying her oven of bread,
+"but just tumble in some time when, while she already plugging away at
+full speed, the engine-room rings up more steam. That's the time she's
+just one little bit of hell down here, sir, with the white sizzle of the
+fires turning the furnaces to a red that shows even with the lights on,
+and the plates underfoot getting so hot that you have to keep dancing to
+prevent the soles of your boots from catching fire. Why, long toward
+morning of the night after Jutland----"
+
+It didn't take much manoeuvring from that vantage to back him up to
+the beginning for a fresh start of the story of what is unquestionably
+one of the most remarkable, as it was one of the most successful, phases
+of the Jutland destroyer action. The fact that, during the daylight
+action between the battle cruisers, he had ample opportunity for
+observation (through his being on deck standing by in the event of
+emergency and without active duties to perform) makes him undoubtedly
+one of the most valuable witnesses of the opening phase of this the
+greatest of all naval battles. The story which I am setting down
+connectedly, he told me in the comfortable intervals of his leisurely
+fire-trimming, and, once he was warmed up to it, with little prompting
+or questioning from myself. Much of it was punctuated with frequent
+stabs and slashes with one of the short-handled pokers which perform for
+the stoker of an oil-burner a service similar to that rendered his
+brother of the coal-burner by his mighty "slice" of iron.
+
+"Big as the difference is between being on deck and in the stokehold at
+ordinary times," said Prince, turning round with glare-blinded eyes
+closed to narrow slits after cracking off the accumulating carbon from
+an oil-sprayer with his poker, "it is ten times more so when a fight is
+on, and I'll always be jolly thankful that it was my luck not to be
+caged up down here during the daylight part of the Jutland show. I had
+my turn of it at night, and it was bad enough then, even though I knew
+it was blacker'n the pit above; but, in daylight, with everything in
+full view outside, I'm not sure I wouldn't have gone off my chuck if I'd
+had to go 'squirrel-caging' on here with one eye on the fires and the
+other on the Kilroy. But I didn't. It was my luck to be off watch when
+the ball opened, so that my 'action station' was just loafing round the
+deck and keeping a stock of leak-stopping gear--mushroom-spreaders and
+wooden plugs--ready to use as soon as we got holed. Not having anything
+to do with navigating the ship, or signalling, or serving the guns or
+torpedo tubes--though I did get a bit of a chance with a mouldie as it
+turned out--I not only had time to see, but also to let the sights 'sink
+in' like. For that reason, when it was all over, I was probably able to
+give a more connected yarn of what happened than anyone else in the
+ship, not excepting the captain. They'll take a lot of forgetting, some
+of the things I saw that day."
+
+Prince went over and settled down at ease on the steel steps of the
+ladder. "The worst grudge I had against Jutland--save for the way it
+whiffed out the lives of some of my friends in some of the other
+destroyers--" he continued with a grin, "was for making me miss my tea
+that afternoon. We left base the night before, and about daybreak joined
+up with the 'battlers,' which was our way of speaking of the First
+Battle Cruiser Squadron, to which the flotilla was attached. It was a
+fairly decent day, and we were able to make good weather of it with the
+light wind and easy swell. I had stood the forenoon watch, had a bit of
+a doss in my hammock in the early part of the afternoon one, and had
+just gone down to tea before going on for the 'First Dog.' There had
+been some buzz in the morning about the Huns being out; but that was so
+old a story that no one paid much attention to it. I was just getting
+my nose over the edge of a mug of tea when I heard the bos'un growling
+'Hands exercise action stations,' and tumbled out on deck to go through
+the motions of getting ready for a fight that would never come off, or
+leastways that was how we felt about it. The 'battlers' were speeding up
+a bit, but there was not even a smudge of smoke on the horizon to hint
+of Huns. After rigging the fire-hoses and getting out my 'plugs,' I
+stood by for 'what next,' but nothing happened. At the end of half an
+hour the order 'Hands fall out' was passed, and, leaving everything
+rigged, down we went to tea again. The mugs we had left were stone cold
+by this time, and we were just raising a howl for a fresh lot when,
+'Bing!' off goes the alarm bells, and up we rushes again, this time to
+find signs of what we had been looking and hoping for. A good many hours
+went by before we went below again, and all through the fight--when
+things would ease off a bit now and then--I would hear the 'matlos'
+grousing about missing their afternoon tea.
+
+"The old _Nairobi_ was nosing along under the port bow of the _Lion_ as
+I came up, and so close that we saw her guns--trained out abeam with a
+high elevation, right above us. We seemed to be speeding up to take
+station farther ahead. There was nothing at all in sight (from the deck,
+at least; though probably there was a better look-see from the bridge)
+in the direction the _Lion's_ guns were trained, and it was almost as if
+a bomb had been dropped from the sky when a shell came plumping down
+about half-way between our starboard quarter and her port bow. The fact
+is, having heard no sound of gunfire, I was so surprised that I
+foolishly asked someone if the _Lion_ hadn't blown out one of her
+tompions testing a circuit. The spout of foam should have told me
+better, but it goes to show what crazy things run through a man's mind
+when he can only see effect without the cause. A few moments later I saw
+unmistakable gun-flashes blinking along the skyline to south'ard and
+knew that at last we were under the fire of the Huns. The next two or
+three shots fell singly, and were plainly merely attempts to get the
+range. Following the first 'short,' there were one or two 'over,' and
+then a fair hit. This one, falling almost straight, struck the fo'c'sl'
+of the _Lion_, penetrated the deck and came out on the starboard side. I
+don't think it exploded, and we were just far enough ahead to see past
+her bows to where it struck the water with a kind of spattery splash,
+not at all like the clean spout thrown by a shell which goes straight
+into the sea.
+
+"Then there was a big spurt of flame from the _Lion_, and the screech of
+shells reached my ears, even before the heavy crash of her four-gun
+salvo. Watch as I would, I could not make out the distant fall of shot,
+but the fluttering flashes of the Hun guns to the south'ard told where
+the target was. Firing opened up all along the line of our battle
+cruisers after that, and the racket from that and the fast falling enemy
+shells increased till it was a steady unbroken roar. The Hun shells were
+falling so straight that many of the 'overs' missed by only a few yards.
+The hits, of which there were quite a number on the leading ships,
+looked rather awful at the moment of exploding. There would be a wild
+gush of flame that seemed to be eating up everything it touched, and
+then, all of a sudden, it was gone, and only a few little fires would be
+left flickering on the deck. The shells which struck against the sides
+seemed to nip on into the sea almost before they began to explode.
+Neither these, nor even those which struck the decks and turrets, seemed
+to be doing much damage at this stage, and our own firing never
+slackened in the least. I think none of the destroyers were hit up to
+now, though there were a number of very near things from some of the
+'overs.' Our turn was coming.
+
+"This sort of a give-and-take fight had been going on for some time,
+when there was a sudden increase of the enemy's fire. From the way the
+fresh fall of shot came ranging up, it was very plain that new ships
+were coming into action, while the fact that the splashes were higher
+and heavier than those from the first salvoes seemed to make it likely
+that some of the Hun battleships had now arrived at the party. As it
+turned out, this was just what had happened, and, although we could not
+see them from the low decks of the destroyers, the first B.C.S. was soon
+under the fire of the whole Hun High Seas Fleet. It was to draw these on
+into action with our approaching Battle Fleet that Beatty now turned
+away to the north'ard.
+
+"Right here was where the big moment of this part of the fight came. The
+Huns must have scented the chance of catching our battle cruisers on the
+'windy corner' as they turned, for suddenly their fire slackened on the
+ships down the line and concentrated on the point where that line began
+to bend. It must have been something like the barrage they make at the
+Front, for at times the water thrown up by the bursting shell made a
+solid wall which completely cut off my view of the ships beyond it. The
+way it seemed to boil up and quiet down looked like there was some sort
+of general control over the bunched fire, though that sort of thing
+would be pretty hard to handle.
+
+"The _Lion_ caught only a corner of the 'boil,' and left it on her
+starboard quarter, but the shell or two that struck her started a fierce
+fire burning 'midships, and I did not see the guns of that turret again
+in action. The 'P.R.'--the _Princess Royal_--turned in a quiet interval
+of the barrage, and seemed not to be hit, but the _Queen Mary_ steamed
+right into it, and just seemed to dissolve in a big puff of smoke and
+steam. I have no special memory of the noise or shock of the explosion,
+but the pillar of smoke shot up as sudden and solid as a
+'Jack-in-the-box.' It was black underneath, but always with a crown of
+flame at the top, as though the gases were spouting up inside and taking
+fire as they met the air. Some of my mates said they saw big pieces of
+flying wreckage, such as plates from turrets and decks, but I only
+remember smoke and flame. I never saw a bit of the 'Q.M.' again. When
+the smoke cloud lifted she was gone completely, with nothing but a gap
+in the line to mark the place where she had been. The thing looked so
+impossible that the 'T.I.' (that was what we called the torpedo gunner's
+mate, because he was also torpedo instructor), who was standing beside
+me, kept saying over an over again, 'She's not gone up! She's not gone
+up!'
+
+"Perhaps it was no more than a coincidence, but it has always struck me
+as being just a bit uncanny the way that barrage on the 'windy corner'
+seemed to 'work by threes.' The 'Q.M.' was third in line, and up she
+went after the _Lion_ and 'P.R.' had passed unhurt. Then the _Tiger_ and
+_New Zealand_ weathered the turn safely, but the poor old
+_Indefat_.--Number three again--got hers. She went up under a rain of
+shells plumping down on her deck, just as the 'Q.M.' did, and I remember
+specially watching the top of a turret go spinning up into the air, till
+it almost disappeared, and then came slowly down again, till it was lost
+in the rising smoke of the explosion.
+
+"The fire of the Huns began to be divided more equally among the four
+surviving battle cruisers now, and the _Nairobi_ was led a lively dance
+dodging about among the 'overs.' It was the big fire raging amidships
+that turned my eyes to the _Lion_ again. One of the guns of the
+'midships turret had a sickly droop to it, but the other three turrets
+were blazing away as merry as ever. We were close enough to see men on
+the bridge with the naked eye, and it suddenly occurred to me that one
+of the quietly moving figures there must be Admiral Beatty, who I knew
+hated to be cooped up in a conning tower in action. I could not be sure
+which he was, but everyone in sight looked no more concerned than if
+they had been steaming out for target practice. I didn't have time to
+think of it then, but every time since that I've felt surer and surer
+that no man since the world began ever showed more real guts than Beatty
+in that part of the Jutland show."
+
+Prince stood up, and put a forty-five degree kink in his poker by
+slamming it over the steel rail of the ladder to emphasise his words,
+and then stopped talking for a minute or two while he worried it
+straight with a hammer.
+
+"It was just about this time," he resumed, squinting approvingly down
+the straightened bar, "that the _Nectar_ hoisted the signal, 'Second
+Division prepare for torpedo attack,' and a few minutes later I saw the
+whole flotilla start streaming out, some ahead of the battle cruiser
+line, and some through it, toward the Huns. I also have some memory of
+seeing the ----th flotilla, smoking like young factory chimneys, coming
+out astern of the line, but I had no chance to see what became of them.
+
+"The range between us and the Huns had been decreasing for some time,
+and the battle cruisers at the head of the line loomed up pretty big and
+awful as we started to close them. I've never made quite sure yet
+whether we were sent out to repel an attack of the Hun destroyers, or
+whether they were sent out to repel our attack. Anyhow, there they were,
+filtering out through their battle cruisers just as we had filtered
+through ours. We met and turned them back something more than half-way
+between the lines, but before we got to that point we had to pass, first
+through the fire of the Hun heavies, and then through a still hotter
+zone where their secondaries were slapping down a barrage that took some
+fancy side-stepping to avoid coming to grief in. The _Onward_ was the
+first of our division to fall by the wayside. She stopped a 'leven-inch
+shell with her engine-room, and got stopped in turn herself. Luckily it
+didn't explode, or she would have been blown out of the water then and
+there. I saw her fall out of line and disappear in a cloud of steam, and
+that was the last peep we had of her for many weeks. When she finally
+rejoined the flotilla, we learned that she and another cripple--the
+_Fencer_, I think it was--had limped back home together. I don't
+remember just where the _Wanderer_ got hers, but I think it must have
+been from the Hun's secondaries. Anyhow, the first thing I remember was
+that she was gone, and that the _Nectar_ was leading the _Nairobi_--all
+that was left of the division--on a course to cross the bows of the
+enemy battle cruisers. The Hun destroyers, which had no chance with us
+in a gun fight, had now turned tail and were heading back for the
+shelter of their battle line. Several of them appeared on fire, but I
+didn't see any sinking.
+
+"I am not quite sure what orders were made to the flotilla at this time,
+but I rather think that after the Hun attack had been stopped the signal
+was hoisted to return to the battle cruisers. I think that is what the
+other divisions did do, but for our division--or what remained of
+it--things were looking too promising just then to turn our backs on. I
+was standing by the foremost tubes at the time, and all of a sudden the
+Hun line began to turn away, and I saw that the leading ship was being
+heavily hit and that she was afire in two or three places. As she turned
+she presented us a fine broadside target at about three thousand yards,
+and the order came from the bridge to 'Stand by foremost tubes and fire
+when sights come on.'
+
+"The turning of the Hun battle cruiser line exposed us to the fire of a
+number of his light cruisers which had been seeking shelter behind it,
+and some smashing salvoes from these began to plump down all around us
+just as we got ready to launch the torpedoes. Though there was not one
+direct hit, we were 'straddled' a dozen times, and the foam spouts
+tossed up by the shells exploding on striking the water made a wall of
+smoke and spray that almost shut off a view of our target. Shell
+fragments were slamming up against the funnels and tinkling on the
+decks, and I believe two or three men were hit by them, though not much
+hurt. It was this sudden savage shelling that spoiled the only chance we
+had at the Hun big 'uns. Just as the sights were coming on to the
+leading ship a salvo came down kerplump right abreast of the foremost
+tubes, throwing a solid spout of green water all over them. I saw both
+mouldies start to slide out, but only one struck the water and began to
+run. A moment later I saw that the other, for some reason we never found
+out, but probably because it had been knocked sideways by the rush of
+water or perhaps a fragment of shell, was hanging by its tail to the lip
+of the tube, with its war-head full of gun-cotton trailing in the sea.
+It cleared itself when the next sea slapped it against the side, and
+started diving and jumping about like a wounded porpoise, most likely
+because its propellers had been knocked out. Luckily, our speed carried
+us on before it had a chance to 'boomerang' back and blow up the old
+_Nairobi_. We could not watch the first torpedo run on account of the
+spouts from the falling shells, but though it started right to cross the
+enemy's line, there was nothing to make us believe it scored a hit.
+
+"Before there was time to grieve over losing our chance at the battle
+cruisers the 'T.I.' called me to give him a hand with the 'midships'
+tubes, as one of his men had been knocked out. 'There's a light cruiser
+just going to bear for a shot,' he yelled from his seat between the
+tubes as I ran round to the breech; 'jump up and tell me what speed
+she's making. I can't see her fair from here.' The trouble was that the
+awful speed the _Nairobi_ was going at settled her down so low that,
+anywhere abaft the bridge, a man couldn't see over the bow wave from the
+deck. But, standing on top of the tubes, I was high enough to get a good
+look at the Hun, when he wasn't shut off by the spouts from the fall of
+shot. He was a small three-funnelled light cruiser, and every gun he had
+looked to be training on us. Another cruiser astern of him was also
+firing on the _Nairobi_, while two or three others were concentrating on
+the _Nectar_. She was getting it even hotter than we were, and all I
+could see of her--when one of her zigzags brought her to one side or the
+other so the bridge didn't cut her off from my view--was some masts and
+funnels sliding along in the middle of a dancing patch of foam
+fountains. Both _Nectar_ and _Nairobi_ were replying for all they were
+worth with their foremost guns; the after ones were too low down to fire
+at such close range with much effect. I saw one of our shells bursting
+on the Huns, and why their shooting at us was so bad I have never quite
+understood. The fact we were settled so deep aft from our speed was
+plainly making a lot of shells ricochet over what would otherwise have
+been hits, but, at the same time, the bows being so much higher out of
+the water offered all the more target for'ard. It was more 'Joss' than
+anything else, I suppose. Besides, the _Nectar_ was just on the edge of
+getting hers anyhow.
+
+"I saw all these things out of the corner of my eye like, for my mind
+was centred on getting what the 'T.I.' wanted to know about his cruiser.
+I knew just what this was to a 't,' for I'd taken many a turn of drill
+at the tubes. 'Parallel courses, thousand yards range, speed about
+twenty-five,' I shouted, jumping down again; 'and you'll have to slip
+her right smart or you'll miss your chance.' Right then the seas
+flattened down for a few seconds, and the 'T.I.', giving me an order of
+how to train her, set his sights and pulled the cocking lever. A moment
+later he fired, and the mouldie slipped out smooth and easy and started
+running straight and true for a point the Hun was going to arrive at
+about a minute later."
+
+Prince had been poking away at a sprayer as he talked, with the
+fluttering light-mote from the fire in the heart of the furnace playing
+on one of his squinting eyes in a way that, with the other quenched in
+shadow, gave his face a look of Cyclopean fierceness. "I jumped up on
+the tubes again to follow our little tin fish on its swim," he resumed.
+"There seemed to be a bit of a flap on the cruiser, for its next salvo
+fell a long way short of us. One of the shells--a five-or
+six-incher--did not explode, but bounced off the water and came
+'skip-jacking' along straight for us. It kicked into the water twice
+before it reached us, the second time right at the base of the wave that
+was rolling up and hiding our sunken stern, and that seemed to give it
+just enough of an up-flip to make it clear the _Nairobi's_ shivering
+hull. It came so slow that I caught the glint of the copper band round
+its base, and so low that the after superstructure blotted it off from
+my sight as it passed over the stern. One of the after gun's crew told
+me he could have reached up and patted it as it tumbled along over his
+head. He said it was going so slow that he hardly felt any wind at all
+from it. Perhaps that was because he had his own wind up, though, for it
+was making a great buzz, and must have been carrying a big 'tail' of air
+in its wake.
+
+"I lost track of our mouldie when I ducked--no, I don't mind admitting
+that's just what I did, though it missed me by a mile--and before I
+could get my eye on its wake again it had gone home. I think they must
+have spotted it coming on the cruiser, for I saw her begin to alter
+course away just about the time I figured it was due to arrive. If they
+were altering to avoid the mouldie, they turned the wrong way, for it
+only brought right abreast the funnels what'd 'a' been a hit somewhere
+about the bridge. I've got a picture in my mind of what happened that
+I'm dead certain is as true as a photograph, and the spout of water
+that went up must have been almost exactly amidships. If the hit had
+been anywhere for'rard it would never have broken her back the way it
+did, and she might have got away. The funny part of it was that it was
+not the 'midships section of her, where the mouldie hit, that seemed to
+be lifted by the explosion. That part of her seemed just to go to pieces
+and begin to sink all at once, while the bow and stern halves started to
+come up and close together like a jack-knife. She must have gone down
+inside of a minute or two, but things were happening so fast I don't
+think I was looking when she disappeared."
+
+Prince, engrossed in his story, forgot that the end of his poker had a
+sheet of flame playing upon it, and the heat which crept back from the
+rosy-red tip gave his palm a sharp singe as he clutched the handle
+preparatory to executing one of his sweeping gestures. From then on to
+the end of his narrative he paused frequently to lick with his tongue
+the blistered cuticle, the stoker's sovereign remedy for a slight burn.
+"I was just starting to give the 'T.I.' an account of what I had had a
+lot better chance to see than he had," he went on thickly, still
+touching the blisters gingerly with an extended tongue-tip, "when I
+heard him growl, 'Stand by! here's another one. What speed d'you think
+she's making?' I was still standing up on top of the tubes, and--to get
+a better view--right in front of the 'T.I.', with my waist on just
+about the level of his face. As I turned my head to look at the second
+Hun he straddled us fair with a full salvo. Most of it went over, but
+one proj struck right alongside and just about flooded us out. But there
+was something heavier than water that it sent aboard. I felt a sharp
+sting across my stomach, as if someone had given me a cut with a whip.
+As I put my hand down to it the whole front of my overall dropped away
+where a fragment of shell casing had shot across it. A few threads--I
+found out later--had been started on my singlet, but my hide was not
+even scratched. I heard the 'T.I.' give a yell, and when I looked round
+saw his face covered with blood, and a flap of skin from his forehead
+hanging down over one eye like a skye terrier's ear. The piece of proj
+had caught him a nasty side-swipe, though without hurting anything but
+his looks in the least. And it wasn't that he was yelling about, either,
+but at me for not giving him the course and speed of the second cruiser.
+He had the flap of skin tied up out of his eye--using a strip of my
+overall because neither of us could find a handkerchief--by the time I
+was back at the handle. I saw the blood dribbling over his sights, but
+he seemed to be seeing through them all right, for he was telling me how
+to train when I felt the helm begin to grind as it was thrown hard over
+to make a sudden alteration of course. She heeled fifteen or twenty
+degrees as she turned six points to starboard, and the boil of her wake
+flooded across her stern three or four feet deep. The sudden heel threw
+me off my feet, and I pulled up just in time to see us rushing by, and
+just missing by a few yards, a stopped destroyer that was nothing but
+spurts of fire flashing under a rolling cloud of steam and smoke.
+
+"She seemed to be afire all over, and about ready to blow up; yet, from
+the quick flashes of some of the spurts of fire, I knew they came from a
+hard-pumped gun that some stout-hearted lads were working to the last.
+There was nothing in the look of that spouting volcano of smoke and
+steam that would help a man to tell whether it was a battleship or a
+trawler, but I knew that it could be only the _Nectar_, our Division
+leader. We never saw her nor anyone in her again. She must have gone
+down within a few minutes, and anyone that survived fell into the hands
+of the enemy. She led us a fine dance while it lasted, and the only pity
+was that she couldn't trip it to the end.
+
+"That left the old _Nairobi_ as the last of the Division, and I haven't
+any recollection of any of the rest of the flotilla being in sight by
+then. Not that I had any time to look for them, though. Our sudden
+change of course to keep from ramming the _Nectar_ spoiled our chance at
+the second Hun cruiser, but we were left no time to mourn that any more
+than the finish of the _Nectar_. Hardly had we left the wreck of her
+astern than a full salvo of large shells--I think they must have come
+from one of the battle cruisers, for they were much heavier than
+anything the light cruisers were firing--struck only thirty or forty
+yards short of us. The shells were bunched together like a salvo of
+air-bombs kicked loose all at once. The wall of water they threw up shut
+everything on that side off from sight for a few seconds, and when the
+spouts settled down there was a Hun destroyer inside of a mile away. I
+jumped up to give her course and speed to the 'T.I.', but before I had
+time more than to see that she had two funnels and many tubes the
+bursting projes from our foremost and midships guns began knocking her
+to pieces so fast that I soon saw there was no use of wasting a mouldie
+on the job.
+
+"I saw the captain waving encouragement from the bridge to the crew of
+the midships guns, and, when the noise died down for a moment, I heard
+him shout, 'You've got her! Give it to her!' Just then another salvo was
+plastered a-straddle of us, and I saw a fragment of shell knock the
+sight-setter of the midships gun out of his seat. He looked a little
+dazed as he climbed back, but his eye must have been as good as ever,
+for I saw his next shot make a hit square on a whaler they were lowering
+from the sinking Hun and blow it to bits. A minute or two more, and the
+destroyer itself blew up and disappeared under a column of steam and
+smoke.
+
+"That," continued Prince, beginning to prod anew his neglected sprayers,
+"just about concluded our day's work. As there was no longer any
+prospect of getting in mouldie-range of any of the big Huns, and as none
+of the little Huns were in sight to fight with gun-fire, it must have
+occurred to the captain that it was time he was rejoining the flotilla.
+There was only some dark blurs on the north'ard skyline to steer for at
+first, and the Huns did all they knew to keep us from getting there,
+too. For a while we were doing nothing but playing 'hide-and-seek' among
+the salvoes they tried to stop us with, and I have heard since that the
+way the captain used his helm to avoid being hit at this stage of the
+show was rated as about the cleverest work of the kind in the whole
+battle.
+
+"It was the Fifth B.S.--the _Queen Elizabeth_ class--that we caught up
+to first, and a grand sight it was, the four of them standing up and
+giving battle to about the whole of the High Sea Fleet. They were taking
+a heavy pounding without turning a hair, so far as a man could see, and
+even when the _Warspite_ had her steering gear knocked out and went
+steaming in circles it didn't seem to upset the other three very much.
+We sighted our own Battle Fleet about six, and rejoined the flotilla in
+good time to be back with the battle cruisers when Beatty took them
+round the head of the Hun line and only failed to cut off their retreat
+through night coming on.
+
+"Compared with what the next six or eight hours held for some of our
+destroyers--or even with what we had just been through ourselves--the
+night for us was fairly quiet. We were in action once or twice, and I
+saw several ships--mostly enemy, but one or two of our own--go up in
+flame and smoke before I went on watch down here at midnight. But
+through it all the devil's own luck which had been with us from the
+first held good. Although we were through the very hottest of the day
+action, and not the least of the night, the old _Nairobi_ did not
+receive one direct hit from an enemy shell. She accounted for at least
+two Hun ships, saw the other three destroyers of her division sunk or
+put out of action, and returned to base with almost empty oil tanks and
+perhaps the largest mileage to her credit of any craft in the Jutland
+battle--all without a serious casualty or more than a few scratches to
+her paint. On top of it all, on the way back to harbour, by the queerest
+fluke you ever heard of, she rammed and exploded the air-chamber of a
+mouldie that had been fired by a Hun U-boat at the destroyer next in
+line ahead of her. As the Yanks say, 'Can you beat it?'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+HUNTING
+
+
+"If it's destroyer work you want, there are five of them getting under
+weigh at four o'clock," said the "Senior Officer Present," looking at
+his watch. "You'll have just about time to pick up your luggage and
+connect if you want to go. I can't tell you what they're going to
+do--they won't know that themselves till they get to sea, and their
+orders may be changed from hour to hour, and things may happen to send
+them to the Channel, France, or to several other places, on and off the
+chart, before they put in here again. But there'll be work to do--plenty
+of it. That's the best part of this corner of the North Atlantic in
+which our Allies have done the American destroyers the honour of setting
+them on the U-boats. Whatever else you may suffer from, it won't be from
+ennui." It was luck indeed, on two hours' notice, to have the chance of
+getting out in just the way I had planned, where I had been quite
+prepared to stand-by for twice as many days, and I fell in with the
+arrangement at once.
+
+Captain X---- ran his eye down a board where the names of a number of
+destroyers were displayed against certain data indicating their
+whereabouts and disposition. "_Zop_, _Zap_, _Zip_, _Zim_, _Zam_," he read
+musingly. "_Zip_--yes, I don't think I can do better than send you on
+the _Zip_. Her skipper is as keen as he is able, and the _Zip_ herself
+has the reputation of having something of a nose for U-boats on her own
+account. I'll advise him you're coming. Pick up your sea togs and put
+off to her as soon as you can. Good luck." The American naval officer,
+like the British, never says "Good-bye" if it can possibly be avoided.
+
+They were already preparing to unmoor as I clambered over the side of
+the _Zip_, and by the time I had shifted to sea-boots and oilskins in
+the captain's cabin--which, unoccupied by himself during that strenuous
+interval, was to be mine at sea--she was swinging in the stream and
+nosing out into the creaming wakes of the two of her dazzle-painted
+sisters who were preceding her down the bay.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There are several things that strike one as different on going to an
+American warship after a spell in a British ship of the same class, but
+the one which surges to meet you and goes to your head like wine is the
+all-pervading spirit of vibrant, sparkling, unquenchable youthfulness.
+Everything you see and hear seems to radiate it--every throb of the
+engines, every beat of the screws--and at first you may almost get the
+impression that it comes from the ship herself. But when you start to
+trace it down, you find it bubbles from a single fount, the men, or
+rather the boys--the lounging, laughing, devil-may-care boys. Theirs the
+alchemy to transform every one and everything that comes near them into
+the golden seeming of themselves.
+
+This youthfulness of the American destroyers is in the crew rather than
+the officers, for the latter--especially the captain and executive--will
+average, if anything, a shade older than their "opposite numbers" in a
+British destroyer. There is a certain minimum of highly specialised work
+in navigating and fighting a destroyer which must be in the hands of
+officers and men who can have only attained the requisite training in
+long years of technical study and practical experience. Given these, and
+the remainder of the ship's company--provided only that they have
+digestive organs that will continue to function when tilted through a
+dozen different slants and angles in as many seconds--can be trained to
+perfection in an astonishingly short time. Here it is that America has
+scored, for there is no doubt that the youngsters that have rushed to
+enrol themselves for her destroyer service are better educated and
+quicker in mind and body than those available for any other navy in the
+war. It is the incomparable adaptability these advantages have conspired
+to give him that has made the Yankee destroyer rating a combination of
+keenness and efficiency that leaves little, if anything, to be desired
+on either score.
+
+Here is the way a British naval officer who is familiar with the work of
+the American destroyer flotilla expressed himself in this connection:
+"The ship's company of any one of these American destroyers," he said,
+"will average a good five years younger than that of a British
+destroyer. Off hand, one would say that this would tell against them,
+but, as a matter of fact, quite the contrary is the case.
+
+"Given that the command and the technical operations are in the hands of
+highly trained and fairly serious-minded officers, you can't have too
+much slapbang, hell-for-leather, devil-take-the-consequences spirit in
+the ship's company. And where will you find that save in the
+youngsters--tireless, fearless, careless boys. They've found that out in
+the air services, and we're finding it out in the destroyers. And right
+there--in these quick-headed, quick-footed super-boys of theirs--is
+where the Yankee destroyers have the best of us. It is they--working
+under consummately clever officers--that enabled the American destroyer
+flotilla to reach in a stride a working efficiency which we had been
+straining up to for three years."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The green hills astern had turned grey and dissolved in mist and
+darkness before the captain was able to announce what work was afoot for
+us. The _Zim_ and _Zam_, it appeared, were to be detached on some
+mission of their own, while the _Zop_, _Zap_, and _Zip_, after
+"hunting" submarines for some time, were to proceed to a certain port,
+pick up the _Lymptania_, and escort her through the danger zone on her
+westward voyage. The captain was grinning as he finished reading the
+order. "I can't give you any definite assurance," he said, "that the
+hunt part of the stunt is going to scare up any U-boats, although the
+prospects this week are more promising than for some time; but"--he
+turned his level gaze to the westward, where the in-rolling Atlantic
+swells were blotting with undulant humps the fading primrose of the
+narrow strip of after-glow--"if this wind and sea keep the same force
+and direction for three or four days more, I'll promise you all the
+excitement your heart can desire when we take on our escort duties. The
+last time we took out the old _Lymptania_--well, I've got marks on me
+yet from the corners I got banged up against, and as for the poor little
+_Zip_--but she's had a refit since and most of the scars have been
+removed. As you will have ample chance to see for yourself, there isn't
+a lot of _dolce far niente_ in any of this life we lead in connection
+with our little game here, but if there is one phase of our activities
+that is farther removed from 'peace, perfect peace' than any other, it
+is trying to screen an ex-Atlantic greyhound that is boring at umpty-ump
+knots into a head wind and sea. Strafing U-boats is a Sunday-school
+picnic in comparison at any time; but it will be worse this week because
+they have just put down a couple of big liners, and the skipper of the
+_Lymptania_, knowing they will be laying for him, will force her like he
+was trying to get his company the trans-Atlantic mail subsidy. For us to
+cut zigzags around that kind of a thing--but you'll be able to judge for
+yourself. I only hope we can catch you a U-boat or two by way of
+preliminary, so as to lead up to the climax by slow degrees."
+
+Things were fairly comfy that night--that is, as comfort goes in a
+destroyer. There was a good stiff wind and a good deal more than a lop
+of sea running; but as both were coming on the quarter and we were
+plodding along at no great speed, the _Zip_ made very passable weather
+of it. The bridge, save for occasional showers of light spray where a
+sea slapped over the side, was quite dry, and even on the long run of
+low deck amidships there were several havens of refuge where the men off
+watch could foregather to smoke and yarn without fear of more than an
+occasional spurt of brine. A dry deck does not chance every day that a
+destroyer is on business bent at sea, and when it does, like sunshine in
+Scotland, is a thing to luxuriate in.
+
+As the twilight deepened and melted into the light of a moon that was
+but a day or two from the full--"bad luck for the _Lymptania_ convoy,
+that moon," the captain had said as he noted how it was waxing on his
+chart--I came down from the bridge and worked along from group to group
+of the sailor men where, lounging and laughing, they sheltered in the
+lee of funnel and boat and superstructure. The first one I pushed into
+was centred round a discussion, or rather an argument, between two boys,
+the one from Kansas and the other from Oklahoma, as to which had raised
+the best and biggest corn in the course of some sort of growing
+competitions they had once taken part in. Several others standing about
+also appeared to have come from one or other of those fine
+naval-recruiting States of the Middle West, and seemed to know not a
+little about intensive maize culture themselves. I was just ingratiating
+myself with this party by nodding assent and voicing an emphatic "Sure!"
+to one's query of "Some corn that, mister, hey?" when I discovered a
+cosmopolitan group (two Filipino stewards, the coloured cook, and three
+or four bluejackets in sleeveless grey sweaters) collaborating in the
+arduous task of teaching a very sad-faced white mongrel to sit up on his
+haunches and beg. Or rather it was an elaboration of that classic trick.
+On drawing nearer I perceived that the lugubrious-visaged canine already
+had mastered begging for food, and that now they were endeavouring to
+teach him to beg for mercy. At the order "Kamerad!" instead of sitting
+with down-drooping paws, he was being instructed to raise the latter
+above his head and give tongue to a wail of entreaty. He was a brighter
+pup than his looks would have indicated, and had already become letter
+perfect in the wail. "Kamerading" properly with uplifted paws, however,
+was rather too much for his balance, at least while teetering on the
+edge of a condensed milk case which was itself sliding about the deck of
+a careening destroyer. The dog had been christened "Ole Oleson," one of
+the sailors told me, both because he was "some kind of a Swede" and
+because, like his famous namesake, he had tried to come aboard in "two
+jumps" the day they found him perched on a bit of wreckage of the
+Norwegian barque to which he had belonged, and which had been sunk by a
+U-boat an hour previously. The men seemed to be very fond of him, and I
+overheard the one who picked him up off the box to make a place for me
+to sit on, whisper into his cocked ear that they were going to try to
+catch a Hun in the next day or two for him to sharpen his teeth on.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+These boys told me a number of stories in connection with the survivors
+they had rescued, or failed to rescue, from ships sunk by U-boats. Most
+of them were the usual accounts of firing on open boats in an attempt to
+sink without a trace, but there was one piquant recital which revealed
+the always diverting Hun sense of humour at a new slant. This was
+displayed, as it chanced, on the occasion of the sinking of "Ole's"
+ship, the Norwegian barque. After this unlucky craft had been put down
+by shell-fire and bombs, the U-boat ran alongside the whaler containing
+the captain and mate, and they were ordered aboard to be interrogated.
+Under the pretence of preventing any attempt to escape on the part of
+the remainder of those in this boat, the Germans made them clamber up
+and stand on the narrow steel run-way which serves as the upper deck of
+a submarine. No sooner were they here, however, than the Hun humorist on
+the bridge began slowly submerging. When the water was lapping round the
+necks of the unfortunate Norwegians, and just threatening to engulf
+them, the nose of the U-boat was slanted up again, this finely finessed
+operation being repeated during all of the time that the captain and
+mate were being pumped below by the commander of the submarine. No great
+harm--save that one of the sailors, losing his nerve when the U-boat
+started down the first time, dived over, struck his head on one of the
+bow-rudders and was drowned--was done by this little pleasantry, but it
+is so illuminative of what the Hun is in his lightsome moods that I have
+thought it worth setting down.
+
+[Illustration: "KAMERADING" WITH UPLIFTED PAWS]
+
+[Illustration: HELPING THE COOK TO PEEL POTATOES]
+
+The American is more violent in his feelings than the Briton, and much
+more inclined to say what he thinks; and I found these boys--to use the
+expressive phrase of one of them--"mad clean through" at the Hun pirate
+and all he stands for. America--with more time to do that sort of
+thing--has undoubtedly gone farther than any other country in the war in
+trying to give her soldiers and sailors a proper idea of the beast
+they have been sent out to slay. These lessons seem to have sunk home
+with all of them, and when it has been supplemented--as in the case of
+the sailors in the destroyers--by the first-hand teachings of the Huns
+themselves, it generally leaves a man in something like the proper state
+of mind for the task in hand. Not that I really think any of the
+Americans, when they have the chance, as happens every now and then,
+will carry out all the little plans they claim to be maturing,
+but--well, if I was an exponent of the U-boat branch of German kultur,
+and my _unterseeboot_ was depth-charged by a British and an American
+destroyer, and I came sputtering up to the surface midway between them,
+I don't think I would strike out for the lifebuoy trailing over the
+quarter of the one flying the Stars and Stripes. I may be wrong, but
+somehow I have the feeling that the Briton--be he soldier, sailor, or
+civilian--hasn't quite the same capacity as the Yank for keeping up the
+temperature of his passion, for feeling "mad clean through."
+
+Joining another group bunched in the lee of a tier of meat-safes, I
+chanced upon a debate which threw an illuminative beam on the feelings
+of what might once have been classified as hyphenated Americans. At
+first the whole six or eight of them, in all harmony and unanimity, had
+been engaged in cursing Sinn Feiners, with whom it appeared they had
+been having considerable contact--physical and otherwise--in the course
+of the last few months. Then one of the more rabid of them on this
+particular subject--he and one of his mates had been waylaid and beaten
+by a dozen hulking young Irishmen who resented the attentions the
+Yankees were receiving from the local girls--threw a bone of dissension
+into the ring by declaring that a Sinn Feiner was as bad as a Hun and
+ought to be treated the same way.
+
+The most of them could hardly bring themselves to agree to this, but in
+the rather mixed argument which followed it transpired that the lad who
+had led the attack on Sinn Fein was named Morarity and had been born in
+Cork, and that the one who maintained that nothing on two legs, not even
+a Sinn Feiner, was as "ornery as a Hun," was named Steinholz, and had
+been born in St. Louis of German parents.
+
+The wherefore of this they explained to me severally presently, when it
+turned out that their views--as regards their duties as Americans--were
+precisely similar. Like all good Yankees, they said, they had it in for
+both the Hun and the Sinn Feiner; but, because each of them had a _name_
+to live down, he felt it incumbent on himself to out-strafe his mates in
+the direction from which that name came. It was a bit naive, that
+confession, but at the same time highly instructive; and I wouldn't care
+to be the Hun or Sinn Feiner that either of those ex-hyphenates had a
+fair chance at.
+
+A very domestic little party I found cuddled up aft among the
+depth-charges. One lad--he had been a freshman at Cornell, I learned
+later, and would not wait to train for a commission, so keen had he been
+to get into the war--was just back from a week's leave in London, and
+was telling about it with much circumstance. There were many things that
+had interested and amused him, but the great experience had been three
+days spent as a guest in an English home at Wimbledon. The head of the
+family, it appeared, was some kind of a City man, and, encountering the
+doubtless aimlessly wandering Yank at Waterloo, had forthwith carried
+him home. Everything had bristled with interest for the young visitor,
+from the marmalade at breakfast and the port at dinner to croquet on the
+lawn and a punt on the Thames at Richmond. But the best of it all had
+been that he had brought a standing invitation from the same family to
+any of his mates who might be coming up to London while the war was on.
+During the refit, which was supposed to be imminent, two of these, who
+had plumped for the great London adventure, had screwed up their courage
+to following up the invitation to the hospitable home in question. Out
+of his broader experience, their worldly mate was tipping them off
+against possible breakers. This is the only one I remember: "You'll
+find," he said, gesturing with an admonitory finger that could just be
+dimly guessed against the phosphorescence of the tossing wake, "that
+they don't seem to have any great grudge 'gainst us for licking them and
+going on our own in '76; but go easy on rubbing it in just the same,
+'cause you're a guest in the house. Best forget the Revolution while
+you're over here. That scrap was more'n a hundred years ago, and we've
+got another on now. Half the people you meet here never heard of it,
+anyhow, and when you mention it to them they think you refer to another
+Revolution in France which came off about the same time."
+
+It was at about this juncture that a change of course brought seas which
+had been quartering a couple of points forward of the beam, and in a
+jiffy the swift spurts of brine had searched out the last dry corner of
+the deck and sent scurrying to shelter every man who had not a watch to
+stand. Three times I was completely drenched in groping forward from the
+after-superstructure to the ward-room, under the bridge, so that I was a
+good deal inclined to take it as a joke--and a rather ill-timed one at
+that--when an ensign about to turn in on one of the transoms muttered
+something about being thankful that we were going to have _one_ quiet
+night when a man could snatch a wink of sleep. I asked him if he
+referred to the night we expected to be in port waiting for the
+_Lymptania_, but the fact that he had already dozed off proved that he
+really had not been trying to be funny at my expense. Indeed, it was a
+fairly quiet night, as nights go in destroyers; but, even so, I needed
+a good high sideboard to keep from rolling out of the captain's bunk,
+and then two sofa pillows and my overcoat to keep from pulping my
+shoulder against the sideboard.
+
+We were still sliding easily along at the same comfortable umpteen knots
+in the morning, but with the breaking of the new day a subtle change had
+come over the spirit of the ship. It was just such a change as one might
+observe in a hunter as he passes from a plain, where there is little
+cover, to a wood where every tree and bush may hide potential quarry.
+And that, indeed, was precisely the way it was with us. The night before
+we were "on our way"; this morning we were ploughing waters where
+U-boats were _known_ to be operating. It was only a couple of days
+previously that the good old _Carpathia_ had been put down, and not many
+hours had passed since then but what brought word, by one or another of
+the almost countless ways that have been devised to trace them, of an
+enemy submarine working in those waters. We were ready enough the night
+before, ready for anything that might have turned up; but this morning
+we were more than that.
+
+There was a new tenseness now, and a feeling in the air like that which
+follows the click-click after a trigger is set to "hair." It was as
+though everyone, everything, even the good little _Zip_ herself, was
+crouched for a spring.
+
+There was an amusing little incident I chanced to see which illustrates
+the keenness of the spirit animating the men even in the moments of
+waiting. A favourable course had left the deck unswept by water for an
+hour, and a half-dozen boys, off watch, but too restless to turn in,
+were trying to kill time by helping the cook peel potatoes. It was one
+of these whom I saw stand up, take several swift strides forward across
+the reeling deck, draw a rag from the pocket of his "jeans," and then,
+with great care and deliberation, begin to polish a patch of steel plate
+that was exposed in the angle of two strips of coco-matting. "Wha' cher
+holystoning deck yetawhile fer, Pete?" one of his mates shouted.
+"Can'cher wait till we gets back to port? We may have to foul your
+pretty work with greasy Huns any minnit." Unperturbed, Pete went right
+on rubbing, testing the footing every now and then with the sole of his
+boot. Only when the job, whatever it was, was done to suit his
+fastidious taste did he return to his seat on the reversed water-bucket
+and start peeling potatoes again. Not till a full dozen or more neatly
+skinned Murphies had passed under his knife did he vouchsafe to reply to
+the half-curious, half-pitying looks and remarks his mates had continued
+to direct at him. Then his explanation was as crushing as complete.
+
+"It don't look much as if you guys wants to get a Hun," he observed
+finally, running a critical eye over them. "Oh, you do, do you? My
+mistake. Well, then, don't try to be funny with another guy that's
+doing his best to effect that same good end. Now looka here. From where
+I sits to my gun-station is just six steps. Six for me, I mean; it'd be
+more for most of you 'shorties.' Now I just figures that step number
+four lands my foot square in the dribble of oil on that patch where
+there ain't no matting; so what was more natural than for me to go and
+swab it up. Last time the gong binged I hit half a preserved peach, and
+sprained a wrist and ankle so bad that I woulda been dead slow on the
+gun if we'd had to fire it. Keeping my eye peeled for another piece of
+peach, I pipes that gob of oil, and so goes and gets rid of it. It's
+painful having to explain a simple thing like that to you bone-heads,
+but, now that you got it, p'raps you'll ease off on your beefing, and
+peel spuds. _That_ don't take no brains."
+
+Two or three times in the course of the morning the look-out's shout of
+"Sail!" bearing this way or that, brought those in sound of it to their
+feet in the expectation that it would be followed by the welcome
+clanging of the alarm bell; and once or twice the wireless picked up the
+S.O.S.--they do not send it out that way now, but these letters are
+still the common term in use to describe the call of a ship in
+distress--of a steamer that had been torpedoed. But the sails turned out
+to be friends in every case, while both of the ships reported sinking
+were too far away for us to be of any use to them. Early in the
+afternoon a suspiciously cruising craft, which proved presently to be a
+friend, got a high-explosive shell under her nose as a consequence of
+her deliberation in revealing that fact. The smartness with which the
+men tumbled to quarters, and the almost uncanny speed with which the
+forecastle gun was served, boded well for developments in case the real
+thing turned up.
+
+"Do you always fire a blank across their bows when you don't quite like
+the look of 'em?" I asked the captain innocently, as he gazed dejectedly
+through his glass at certain unmistakable evidences proving that he had
+been cheated of his quarry. "Blank!" indignation and half the look that
+sits on the face of a terrier who discovers that he has cornered his own
+family's "Tabby" instead of the neighbour's "Tom"; "blank!--did you ever
+see a blank 'X-point-X' that threw up a spout as high as a masthead, and
+all black with smoke? That was the worst punisher we have in our
+lockers; and, what's more, it was meant to be a hit. And the next one
+would have been," he added. "You can't afford to waste any time where
+five or ten seconds may make all the difference between bagging and
+losing a Hun."
+
+"But how about bagging something that isn't a Hun?" I protested. "I told
+you, I think, that I had arranged to go out next week on patrol in one
+of the American submarines; but after what I've just seen----"
+
+"The burden of proof is up to the craft under suspicion," cut in the
+captain, "and they ought to have no trouble in supplying it if they have
+their wits about them." Then, with a grin, "But if you're really going
+out on submarine patrol next week, why--I'll promise to look twice
+before turning loose one of those--those 'blanks.'" How he kept his word
+is another story.
+
+It was about an hour or two later that the wireless winged word that
+seemed at last to herald the real thing. It was the S.O.S. of a steamer,
+and conveyed merely the information that she had just been torpedoed,
+with her latitude and longitude. The position given was only thirty or
+forty miles to the northward, and though the name in the message--it was
+_Namoura_ or something similar--could not be found on any of our
+shipping lists, the _Zop_, as senior ship, promptly ordered course
+altered and full speed made in the hope of arriving on the scene in time
+to be of some use. With every minute likely to be of crucial importance,
+it was not an occasion to waste time by waiting or asking for orders. A
+swift exchange of signals between ships, a hurried order or two down a
+voice-pipe, an advancing of the handle of the engine-room telegraph, a
+throwing over of the wheel, and we had spun in the welter of our tossing
+wake and were off on a mission that might prove one of either mercy or
+destruction, or, quite conceivably, both. The formation in which we had
+been cruising when the signal was received gave the _Zip_ something
+like a mile lead at the get-away, and this--though one of the others was
+a newer and slightly faster ship--she held gallantly to the end of the
+race. By a lucky chance, though there was a snoring wind and a lumpy sea
+running, the course brought both abaft the beam and permitted us to run
+nearly "all out" without imposing a serious strain on the ship. The
+difference between running before and bucking into seas of this kind I
+was to learn in a day or two. For the moment, conditions were all that
+could be asked to favour our getting with all dispatch into whatever
+game there was to be played.
+
+Many a so-called express train has travelled slower than any one of
+those three destroyers was ploughing its way through solid green water.
+For a few seconds after "Full speed!" had been rung down to their
+engine-rooms, swift-spinning smoke rings had shot up from their funnels
+and gone reeling off down to leeward; then, with perfect synchronisation
+of draught and oil, the duskiness above the mouths of the stumpy stacks
+had cleared, and only the mirage on the horizon astern betrayed the
+up-spouting jets of hot gases. Only the vibrant throb of the speeding
+engines--so pervading that it seemed to pulse like heart-beats through
+the very steel itself--gave hint of the mightiness of the effort that
+speed was costing. With that throb stilled--and the mounting wake
+quenched--the progress of that thousand tons or so of steam-driven
+steel would have seemed scarcely less effortless than that of an
+aeroplane.
+
+An order from the Commander-in-Chief--which was picked up presently--to
+go to the assistance of the torpedoed ship and to "hunt submarine" had
+been anticipated; but the real name of the steamer--finally transmitted
+correctly--brought to me at least a distinct shock. It was H.M.S.
+_Marmora_, and the _Marmora_, the former P. & O. Australian liner, was
+an old friend. To anyone who loves the sea a ship, no matter of what
+kind, has a personality. But in the case of a ship in which he has
+sailed--lived in, worked and played in, been happy in, perhaps gone
+through certain dangers in--has more than a personality, it has a place
+in his heart. Many and many a morning since the first U-boat campaign
+was started I had read--and never without a lump rising in my throat--of
+the passing of just such a friend, of the going out of the world of
+something--almost of "some one"--which I had always looked forward to
+seeing again. _Afric_, _Arabic_, _Aragon_, I knew their names well
+enough to compile the list alphabetically. It would have run to some
+score in length, and from every name would have led a long train of
+treasured memories. But the blow had never come quite this way before,
+never fallen quite so near at home. An especially dear friend had just
+been stricken less than a degree of latitude away; but the poignancy of
+that realisation was tempered by the thought that I was in a ship
+rushing to her assistance, a ship that could be as swift to succour as
+to avenge.
+
+I must confess to a queerly mixed state of mind that next half-hour.
+Consumed as I was with interest in our terribly purposeful progress
+leading up to the entrance into that grim drama approaching its
+climacteric act just beyond the sky-line, there were also vivid
+flare-backs of memory to the days of my friendship with the _Marmora_,
+arresting flashlights of the swift refreshing morning dive into the
+canvas pool on her forecastle, of lounging chairs ranged in long rows
+'twixt snowy decks and awnings, of a phosphorescent bow-wave curling
+back and blotting the reflections of stars in a tropical sea. There was
+a picture of the clean sweet lines of her as--buff, black, and
+beautiful--she lay at the north end of the horseshoe of the Circular
+Quay at Sydney, with a rakish Messageries liner moored astern of her and
+a bluff Norddeutscher Lloyd packet ahead. It was her maiden voyage, and
+Australia, which had never seen so swift and luxurious a liner before,
+was receiving her like a newly arrived _prima donna_. I took passage in
+her back as far as Colombo. That fortnight's voyage had been diverting
+in a number of ways, I recalled, but most of all, perhaps, as a
+consequence of the throwing together of a large party of Wesleyan
+missionaries from Fiji and the members of a London musical comedy
+company returning from its Australian "triumphs." I was just beginning
+to chuckle inwardly at the recollection of what one of the missionary
+ladies had said to a buxom chorus-girl who tripped out to the fancy
+dress cricket-match in her pink tights and a ballet skirt, when the
+ting-a-ling of a bell brought the captain to the radio-room voice-pipe.
+"Message just received," I heard him repeat. "All right. Send it up." He
+slapped down the voice-pipe cover, and a messenger had handed him the
+signal before he had paced twice across the bridge.
+
+"_Marmora_ just sunk," he read; "survivors picked up by P.B.'s _X_ and
+_Y_."
+
+The sinking made no immediate change in our plans. There was still a
+chance we might be of use with the survivors, and also the matter of the
+U-boat to be looked after. With no abatement of speed, all three
+destroyers drove on. The navigating officer reckoned that in another
+fifteen minutes we should be sighting the rescuing craft, and probably
+wreckage; but when twice that time still left a clear horizon ahead, it
+began to appear as though there had been a mistake of some kind. And so
+there had, but it was a lucky mistake for us. It was some time later
+before they figured just how it had chanced, but what had happened was
+this. The _Marmora's_ last despairing call--doubtless sent out by a
+breaking-down radio--gave her position as some ten or twelve miles out
+from what it really was. The consequence was that, heading somewhat wide
+of the sinking ship, to which, however, on account of the presence of
+the patrol boats, which had evidently been close enough to come to her
+immediate assistance, we could have been of small use, we had steered
+directly for the one point where it was most desirable we should make
+our appearance at that psychological moment: for the point, in short, at
+which the coolly calculative skipper of the U-boat responsible for the
+outrage, after running submerged for an hour or more and doubtless
+figuring he had come sufficiently far from the madding crowd that would
+throng the immediate vicinity of the wreckage to be at peace, had come
+up to smoke his evening pipe and cogitate upon the Freedom of the Seas.
+
+It was just as it began to become apparent that we were badly adrift as
+regards the point where the _Marmora_ had gone down that a whine from
+the lookout's voice-pipe reported to the bridge that it had sighted a
+"sail--port, ten."
+
+"What is it?" asked back the captain.
+
+"Looks like subm'rine," came the reply; and with one quick movement the
+captain had started the alarm-bell sounding "General quarters!" in every
+part of the ship. With every man knowing precisely what he had to do,
+and how to do it, there was incredible speed without confusion. Tumbling
+to their stations like hounds on a hot scent, they yet managed to avoid
+getting in each other's way, even in the narrow passages and on the
+ladders. The loom of the conning-tower was plain to the naked eye, now
+that one knew where to look for it, but only for a few minutes. Even as
+a swiftly passed shell was thrown into the open breech of the forecastle
+gun, came the look-out's whine through the voice-pipe, "She's going
+down, sir; she's gone!" The breech of the gun spun shut, but the eye of
+the sightsetter groped along an empty horizon.
+
+"Never mind," muttered the captain grimly. "Couldn't have croaked him
+with one shot anyhow. Got something better'n shells for him. Now for
+it," and his hand went back to pull the wire of a gong which gave
+certain orders to the men standing-by with the depth-charges. That, a
+word down the engine-room voice-pipe, and a fraction of a point's
+alteration in the course--and there was only one thing left to be done.
+The time for that had not quite arrived.
+
+Because a destroyer's engine-room telegraph-hand points to "Full speed!"
+it does not necessarily mean that there are not ways of forcing more
+revolutions from the engines, of driving her still faster through the
+water should the need arise. Such a need now confronted the _Zip_, and,
+like the thoroughbred she was, her response was instant and generous.
+The pulsing throb of her quickened till it was almost a hum; the
+quivering insistency of it struck straight to the marrow of the bones,
+drummed in the depths of one's innermost being. If there is anything to
+stir the blood of a man like a destroyer beginning to see red and go
+Berserk, I have yet to encounter it.
+
+There must have been something like three miles to go from the point
+where the U-boat had been sighted to the point where the inevitable
+patch of grease would mark the place where it had submerged, and rather
+less than twice that many minutes had elapsed when the cry of "Oil
+slick--starboard bow!" came almost simultaneously from the look-outs in
+the foretop and on the bridge. Over went the helm a spoke or two, and
+the executive officer, in his hand a thin piece of board with a table of
+figures pasted on it, moved up beside the captain. Straight down the
+wobbly track of iridescent film drove the _Zip_, and when a certain
+length of it had been put astern, the captain turned and drew a lever to
+him with a sharp pull.
+
+Three, four seconds passed, and then, simultaneously with a heavy
+knocking thud, a round patch of water a hundred yards or so astern
+quivered and fizzed up sharply like the surface of a glass of
+whisky-and-soda after the siphon has ceased to play on it. Following
+that by a second or two, a smooth rounded geyser of foam boiled up a
+dozen feet or so, and then gradually subsided. That one, plainly, was a
+deep-set charge, whose force was expended far beneath the surface. A
+second one threw a geyser twice as high as the first, and a third, which
+fizzed and spouted almost simultaneously, blotted out a great patch of
+sternward sky with its smoke-shot eruption.
+
+Presently the _Zop_ "struck oil," and then the _Zap_. Soon the muffled
+booms of their rapidly scuttled depth-charges began to drum, while
+astern of them the foam-spouts nicked the sky-line like a stubby picket
+fence.
+
+Perhaps the lad whom I later overheard describing that bombardment by
+saying that "'tween the three of us, we was scattering 'cans' like rice
+at a wedding" was guilty of some exaggeration; but it is a fact that
+they were spilling over very fast and, there is little doubt, with
+telling effect. The savageness of the bolts of wrath released by the
+exploding charges was strikingly disclosed when two of them chanced to
+be dropped at nearly the same time by destroyers a mile or more apart,
+when the under-sea "jolts" would meet half-way and form weird evanescent
+"rips" of dancing froth strongly suggestive of chain-lightning. The way
+in which even the most distant of the detonations made a destroyer "bump
+the bumps," quite as though it was striking a series of solid
+obstructions, gave some hints of the bolts that were descending upon the
+lurking pirate.
+
+At the end of a minute or two a quick order from the captain sent the
+wheel spinning over, and, with raucous grinding of helm, round we swung
+through sixteen points to head back in reverse over the path of
+destruction we had just traversed. Just as the steel runners of a
+racing skater throw ice when he makes a sudden turn, so the screws of a
+speeding destroyer hurl water. The stern sank deep into the
+propeller-scooped void, so that the high-tossed side-slipping wake
+buried it beneath a frothing flood. Through several long seconds I saw
+the water boiling above the waists of the men at the depth-charges,
+without appearing to disturb them in the least; then the wheel was spun
+back 'midships--and a spoke or two beyond to meet and steady her--the
+bow wave resumed its curled symmetry and the wake began trailing off
+astern again.
+
+It was into a peaceful sea, indolently rolling, sunset tinged and
+slightly sleeked with a thin streak of oil, that we had raced five
+minutes before; it was a troubled sea, charge-churned and wave-slashed,
+that we now nosed back into to see what good our coming had wrought. The
+grey-blue-black of the long oil wake had been scattered into broken
+patches by the explosions. Most of these were pale, sickly, and highly
+anaemic in colour, and of scant promise; but for one, where fresh oil
+rising spread rainbow-bright upon the surface, the _Zip_ headed full
+tilt. The explosion here appeared to have been an unusually heavy one,
+for the sea was dotted with the white bellies of stunned fish, most of
+them floating high out of the water, with trickles of blood running from
+their upturned mouths and distended gills. A six or eight-foot shark,
+wriggling drunkenly along the surface with a broken back, was hailed
+with a howl of delight by the men, who claimed to see in the fact that
+the unlucky monster could not submerge his telltale dorsal, a sign that
+their Fritz might be in the same difficulty.
+
+Another "can" or two was let go as we dashed through that iridescent
+"fount of promise"; and when we turned back to it again the wounded
+shark had ceased to wriggle and now floated inertly among his hapless
+brothers. But of Fritz--save for a glad new gush of oil--no sign.
+Prisoners or wreckage are rated as the only indubitable evidence of the
+destruction of a U-boat, and neither of these were we able to woo to the
+surface in that busy hour which elapsed before the descending pall of
+darkness put a period to our well-meant efforts. During that time not
+the most delicate instrument devised by science for that purpose
+revealed any indication of life or movement in the depths below. As the
+water at this point was far too deep to allow a submarine to descend and
+lie on the bottom without being crushed, this fact appeared morally
+conclusive. It was this I had in mind when I tried to draw the captain
+out on the subject. "Of course there's no doubt we bagged him?" I
+hazarded, in a quiet interval when we were watchfully waiting for
+something to turn up, or rather come up. He smiled a rather tired smile.
+"Oh, very likely we have," he replied. "But, unluckily, there's nothing
+we can lay our hands on to carry away and prove it. In case this
+particular Fritz doesn't come to life and sink another ship in the
+course of the next few days, there is just a chance that we may be
+credited with a 'Possible.' They never err on the optimistic side in
+sizing up a little brush of this kind, and perhaps it's just as well.
+Anyhow, a game like this is worth playing on its own account, whether
+you come in with a scalp at your belt every time or not."
+
+It was just as darkness was slowing down our anti-U-boat operations,
+that a signal came through stating that there were believed to be
+several survivors still alive among the wreckage of the _Marmora_, and
+ordering us to proceed to the scene of her sinking with all dispatch.
+The moon was rising as we began to nose among the pathetic litter of
+scraps that was all that remained afloat of what, five or six hours
+previously, had been a swift and beautiful auxiliary cruiser.
+
+There was enough light for us to be reasonably sure, at the end of an
+hour's search, that our mission was in vain; that there remained no
+living man to pick up. There was something strangely familiar, though,
+in the lines of a cutter which, in spite of a smashed gunwale, was still
+afloat, and I was just thinking of how grateful a lee, in the monsoon,
+the windward side of the old _Marmora's_ lifeboats had furnished for a
+deck-chair or two, when the captain, advancing the handle of the
+engine-room telegraph, turned to me with: "We're off to rendezvous with
+the _Lymptania_ now; I think we can promise you some real excitement in
+the course of the next day or two."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE CONVOY GAME
+
+
+The fantastic pile of multi-coloured slabs blotting out a broken patch
+of sky above the seaward end of the estuary, if it had been on land,
+might have been anything from a row of hangars, viewed in slant
+perspective, to the scaffolding of a scenic railway, or a "Goblin's
+Castle" in Luna Park. But there in the middle of the channel, the
+mountainous bulk could only be one thing, the _Lymptania_, the ship
+which our division of American destroyers had been ordered to escort on
+that part of its westbound voyage in which there was reckoned to be
+danger of submarine attack. Distorted by the camouflage, the tumbled
+mass of jumbled colours continued to loom in jagged indefinitiveness as
+we closed it from astern, and it was only when we had come up well
+abreast of it that the parts settled down into "ship-shapeliness," and
+the silhouette of perhaps the most famous of the world's great steamers
+sharpened against the sunlit afternoon clouds.
+
+The change which had been wrought in the appearance of the _Lymptania_
+since last I had seen her was almost beyond belief. Then she had been a
+hospital ship, with everything about her, from snowy whiteness to red
+crosses in paint and coloured lights, calculated to establish her
+character, to give her the protection of conspicuousness. Now she sought
+protection in quite the opposite way. Every trick of scientific
+camouflage had been employed to render her inconspicuous; while, if that
+failed, there were the destroyers. The protection of these big liners is
+a considerable undertaking, but it has its redeeming features. As U-boat
+bait they are unrivalled, and the number of German submarines which have
+been sent to the bottom as a direct consequence of attempting to sink
+one of them will make a long and interesting list when the time comes to
+publish it.
+
+There was something almost awesome in the emptiness of the great ship,
+in the lifelessness of the decks, in the miles of blinded ports. The
+heads of a few sailors "snugging down" on the forecastle, a knot of
+officers at the end of the bridge, and two stewardesses in white
+uniforms leaning over the rail of one of the upper decks--that was all
+there was visible of human life on a ship which a few days before had
+been packed to the funnels with its thousands of American soldiers. A
+lanky destroyer gunner lounging by a ladder, described her exactly when
+he said to one of his mates: "Gee, but ain't she the lonesome one!"
+
+The captain of the _Zip_ turned his glasses back to cover the little
+group of officers on the liner's bridge. "There's the skipper," he said
+presently. "I only hope he's well ahead of the game on the sleeps, for I
+wouldn't mind betting that he won't be leaving that bridge for a cup of
+coffee for some time. It's going to be an anxious interval for him--very
+anxious. It's quite beyond calculation, the value to the Allies at this
+moment of a ship of the size and speed of the _Lymptania_, and her
+skipper must know from what has happened the last week, that the Huns
+are all out to bag her this time, and he can hardly be able to extract
+any too much comfort out of the fact that it's about a hundred to one
+that we'll bag the Fritz that tries it--either before or after the
+event. Yes, it will be an anxious time for him--but," a grimly wry smile
+coming to his face as he turned his eyes to the opening seaward horizon,
+"even so, it'll be nothing to the time we're in for in the _Zip_ and all
+the rest of the escort. _He'll_ be able to sleep if he happens to take a
+notion to; _we_ won't, at least, not during the time we've got _her_ to
+shepherd. Again, he's only got the _chance_ of being hit by a torpedo to
+worry about; we've got the _certainty_ of being hit by head-seas that
+have as much kick in them to a driven destroyer as a tin-fish full of
+gun-cotton. Unless the weather gets either a good deal better or a shade
+worse, we're sure up against the real thing this time.
+
+"The fact is," continued the captain, taking up the slack in the hood of
+his weather-proof jacket as a slight alteration of course brought a new
+slant of wind; "the fact is, I'd much rather see it get worse than
+better. If it would only kick up enough sea so that there was no chance
+of a submarine operating in it, she could drive right along on her own
+without any need of destroyers. But so long as we've this weather
+there's a possibility of a torpedo running in, we've got to hang on to
+the last shiver, and there are two or three things which are going to
+make 'hanging on' this particular trip just a few degrees worse than
+anything we've stacked up against before. This is about the way things
+stand: The _Lymptania's_ best protection is her speed; but while she is
+just about the fastest of the big ships, she is also just about the
+biggest of the fast ships. This means that the size of the target she
+presents goes a long way toward offsetting the advantage of her speed;
+so that the presence of destroyers--in any kind of weather a submarine
+can work in--is very desirable, and may be vital.
+
+"Now the escorting of any steamer that makes over twenty knots an hour
+is a lively piece of business, no matter what the weather, for
+destroyers, to screen most effectively, should zigzag a good deal more
+sharply than their convoy, and that, of course, calls for several knots
+more speed. This can be managed all right in fair weather, or even in
+rough, where there is only a following or a beam sea; but where the seas
+come banging down from more than a point or two for'ard of the beam it
+is quite a different matter. In that event, the speed of the whole
+procession depends entirely on how much the destroyers can stand without
+being reduced to scrap-iron. Naturally, the ship under escort endeavours
+to make her speed conform to the best the destroyers can do under the
+circumstances; but since an extra knot or two an hour might well make
+all the difference in avoiding a submarine attack, the tendency always
+is to keep the escorting craft extended to just about their limit of
+endurance.
+
+"Just how the mean will be struck between what a fast steamer thinks its
+escorting destroyers _ought_ to stand, and what the destroyers really
+_can_ stand, depends upon several things. Perhaps the principal factor
+is the state of mind of the skipper of the steamer, and that, in turn,
+is influenced by the value of his ship--both actual and potential--and
+the danger of submarine attack at that particular time in the waters
+under traverse. When the destroyers set out to escort a very fast and
+valuable ship, steering into heavy head seas in waters where there are
+known to be a number of U-boats operating, they've got the whole
+combination working against them, and the result is--just what you're
+slated to see this trip. Best take a good look at the _Zip_ while you've
+got a chance; she may be quite a bit altered by the time we get back to
+port again. And you might take a squint at the _Flossie_ over there,
+too. She's our latest and swiftest, the Fotilla's pride. But this is
+her first experience of taking out an ex-ocean greyhound, and if, in a
+burst of fresh enthusiasm, she chances to tap any of these several extra
+knots of speed she is supposed to have--well, the _Flossie's_ sky-line
+in that case will be modified more than those of all the rest of her
+older and wiser sisters put together."
+
+Those were prophetic words.
+
+"The one thing that makes it certain that we'll be put to the limit
+to-night," resumed the captain, after he had rung up more speed on our
+coming out into opener water, "is the news in this morning's official
+announcement of the sinking of the _Justicia_. We seem just to have
+struck the peak of the midsummer U-boat campaign. It was scarcely a week
+ago that they got the _Carpathian_. Then, a few days later, came the
+_Marmora_ (you won't forget for a while the strafe we had at the U-boat
+which put her down), and now it's the _Justicia_, the biggest ship
+they've sunk in a year or so. That's the thing that must be worrying the
+skipper of the _Lymptania_, for it shows they're after the great
+troop-carriers. The way they stuck to the _Justicia_ proves they're not
+yet beyond taking some risk if the stake is high enough. Now and then
+some Fritz is found desperate enough to commit hari-kari by coming up
+close (if the chance offers) and making sure of getting his torpedo
+home. He gets what's coming to him, of course, but there is also a fair
+chance of his getting the ship he is after; and a fast liner for a
+U-boat is a poor exchange--from our standpoint. Naturally, these things
+all make the skipper of the _Lymptania_ anxious to minimise his risks by
+hitting up just as hot a pace as he can, and that, with her size and her
+power, will be just about full speed. I can't tell you to a knot how
+fast that is, but I can tell you this: if you were on the bridge of a
+destroyer going at that speed when it hit a good heavy head-sea, the
+only thing that would tell you it wasn't a brick wall she had collided
+with would be the sort of moist feeling about the pile-driver that
+knocked you over the side. So it looks like the rub is going to come in
+getting the _Lymptania_ to content herself with a speed at which--well,
+at which you can detect some slight difference between a head-sea and a
+brick wall from the bridge of the destroyer doing the butting. Whatever
+that proves to be, you'll have such a chance as you may never get again
+to see what stuff your Uncle Sam's destroyers are made of."
+
+We made screening formation as soon as we were well clear of the
+barraged waters of the estuary, though the sea we had to traverse before
+entering the open Atlantic was considered practically empty of menace.
+The _Lymptania_, making astonishingly little smoke for a coal-burner,
+worked up to somewhere near her top speed in a very short time; but,
+with the light-running seas well abaft the beam, the destroyers cut
+their zigzags round and about her with many knots in reserve. The big
+liner, with much experience to her credit, knew precisely what to do and
+how to do it, and the whole machine of the convoy worked as though
+pulled by a single string. Her very movements themselves seemed to give
+the various units of the escort their cues, for, though she steered a
+course so devious and irregular that no submarine could have possibly
+told how to head in order to waylay her, she was never "uncovered."
+Ahead and abreast of her, going their own way individually, but still
+conforming their general movements to hers, the destroyers wove their
+practically impenetrable screen.
+
+Whatever there was ahead, it was ideal destroyer weather for the moment,
+and all hands came swarming out on the dry sun-warmed deck to make the
+most of it while it lasted. An importunate whine from a nest of arms and
+legs sprawling abreast the midships torpedo-tubes attracted my attention
+for a moment as I sauntered aft to see what was afoot, and presently the
+rattle of dice on the deck and an imploring "Come on, you Seven!" told
+me they were "shooting Craps," with, I shortly discovered, bars of milk
+chocolate and sticks of chewing-gum for stakes. Several others were
+playing "High, Low, Jack," and here and there--using elbows and knees to
+keep the bellying pages from blowing away--were little knots clustered
+about the latest Sunday Supplement from New York.
+
+But quite the best thing of all was two brown-armed youngsters going
+through a proper battery warming-up with a real baseball. I had seen
+enthusiasts on two or three of the American units with the Grand Fleet
+playing catch right up to the moment "General Quarters" was sounded for
+target practice; but that was on the broad decks of battleships, with
+some chance of saving a ball that chanced to be muffed. But here the
+pitcher had to wind-up with a sort of a corkscrew stoop to keep from
+hitting his hand against a stay, while the catcher braced himself with
+one foot against a depth-charge and the other against the mounting of
+the after-gun. There were four or five things that the ball had to clear
+by less than a foot in its flight from one to the other, but the only
+ones of these I recall now are a searchlight diaphragm and a gong which
+sounded from the bridge a standby signal to the men at the
+depth-charges. I actually saw that skilfully directed spheroid make two
+complete round-trips, from the pitcher to the catcher and back, before
+it struck the gong a resonant bing! caromed against the side of an
+out-slung boat and disappeared into the froth of the wake.
+
+The pitcher and catcher were in a hot argument as to whether that was
+the twenty-sixth or the twenty-seventh ball they had lost overboard
+since the first of the month, but they fell quiet and turned sympathetic
+ears to my description of a net I had seen rigged on one of the
+American battleships to prevent that very trouble.
+
+"Nifty enough," was the pitcher's comment when I had finished describing
+how the net was drawn taut right under the stern to prevent all leakage.
+"Only thing is, the captain might rule it off on the score that it'd
+catch the 'cans' we was trying to drop on Fritz as well as the 'wild
+pitches.' Might do for harbour use, though. Lost balls is a considerable
+drain even there."
+
+It was just before dinner-time that the lengthening life of the seas
+gave warning that we were coming out into the Atlantic. The force of
+them was still abaft the beam, however, and their principal effect was
+to add a few degrees of roll, with an occasional deluge dashing in
+admonitory flood across the decks. But it was enough to make the Ward
+Room untenable, so that dinner had to be wolfed propped up on the
+transoms, one nicely balanced dish at a time. There would be about an
+hour more of this comparative comfort, the captain said, before we
+reached a position where the full force of the seas would be felt, but
+things would not really "begin to drop" till the _Lymptania_ altered
+course and headed westerly. "If you have any writing, reading, sleeping,
+or anything except just existing to do," he warned, as he kept his soup
+from overflowing by an undulant gesture of the hand which poised it,
+"better do it now. It's your last chance."
+
+The forty winks I managed to snatch as a result of following up the
+sleeping part of that recommendation stood me in good stead in the times
+ahead. It took no little composing to doze off even as it was, and it
+was the sharp bang my head got from the siderail of my bunk that put a
+period to the nap I did get. The rolling had increased enormously, and
+though it was apparent we were not yet bucking into it, the swishing of
+the water on the forecastle overhead indicated that there had been
+enough alteration of course to bring the seas--on one leg of the zigzags
+at least--well forward of the beam. I climbed out, pulled on my
+weather-proof suit and sea-boots, and clambered up to the bridge.
+
+There were still a couple of hours to go before dark, and in the
+diffused light of a bright bank of sunset clouds the gay dazzle colours
+of all the ships showed up brilliantly as they ploughed the
+whitecap-plumed surface of a sea which now stretched unbrokenly to the
+westward horizon. There was a world of power behind the belligerent bulk
+of swells which had been gathering force under the urge of a
+west-nor'-west wind that had chased them all the way from Labrador, and
+the destroyers, teetering quarteringly along their foam-crested tops,
+were rolling drunkenly and yawing viciously ahead of jagged wakes.
+
+Still driving on at express speed, however, they continued to maintain
+perfect formation on the swiftly steaming _Lymptania_. The latter,
+apparently as steady as though "chocked up" in a dry-dock, drove
+serenely on in great swinging zigzags.
+
+The captain came up from the chart-room and took a long look around.
+"It's just about as I expected," he said, shaking his head dubiously.
+"It isn't so rough but what a submarine might stage an attack if her
+skipper had the nerve; and it's a darn sight too rough for destroyers to
+screen the _Lymptania_ with her holding to anything like full speed.
+It's all up now to _what_ speed she will try to hold us to."
+
+"But what's the matter with this?" I protested. "We're still hitting the
+high places for speed, and, while I wouldn't call this exactly
+comfortable, we still seem to be making pretty good weather of it."
+
+The captain smiled indulgently. "You're right," he said, "as far as you
+go. We are indeed hitting the high places, but--the high places haven't
+started hitting us yet. Wait just about five or ten minutes," he added,
+turning his glasses to where the great liner, silhouetted for the moment
+against the sunset clouds, ploughed along on our port beam, "and you'll
+see the difference. Ah!" this as he steadied his glasses on where the
+boiling wake of the _Lymptania_, beginning to bend away in a sharp curve
+indicating a considerable alteration of course. "There she goes now.
+Hold tight!"
+
+With his hand on the engine-room telegraph, the captain gave the men at
+the wheel a course to conform to that of the _Lymptania_. Quick as a
+cat on her helm, the _Zip_ swung swiftly through eight points and
+plunged ahead. This brought on her bows seas that had been rolling up
+abeam, and we were up against the real thing at last.
+
+The first sea, which she caught while she was still turning, the _Zip_
+contented herself with slicing off the truculently-tossing top of before
+crunching it underfoot. It was a smartly-executed performance, and
+seemed to promise encouragingly as to the way she might be expected to
+dispose of the next ones. The second in line, however, which she met
+head-on and essayed the same tactics with, dampened her ardour--and just
+about everything and everybody else below the foretop--by detaching a
+few tons of its bumptious bulk and raking her fore-and-aft with its
+rumbling green-white flood. The bridge was above the main weight of that
+blow, but 'midships and aft I saw men bracing themselves against a
+knee-deep stream. One bareheaded and bare-armed man, who had evidently
+been surprised in making his way from one hatch to another, I saw rolled
+fifteen or twenty feet and slammed up against the torpedo-tube which
+prevented his going overboard. He limped out of sight, rubbing his
+shoulder, and probably never knew how lucky he was in being caught by
+_that_ wave instead of one which came along a minute later.
+
+The slams which she received from the next two or three seas left the
+_Zip_ in a somewhat chastened mood, and rather less sanguine respecting
+her ability to go on pulling off that little stunt of surmounting waves
+by biting them in the neck and then trampling their bodies under foot.
+She was beginning to realise that she had a body of her own, and that
+there was something else around that could bite--yes, and kick, and
+gouge, and punch below the belt, and do all the other low-down tricks of
+the underhand fighter.
+
+Languid and uncertain of movement, like a dazed prize-fighter, she was
+just steadying herself from the jolt a bustling brute of a comber had
+dealt her in passing, when the skyline ahead was blotted out by the
+imminent green-black loom of a running wall of water which, from its
+height and steepness, might well have been kicked up by a Valparaiso
+"Norther" or a South Sea hurricane.
+
+It may have been the chastened state of mind the last sea had left her
+in which was responsible for _Zip's_ deciding to take this one "lying
+down"; or again, it may be that she was acting, in reverse, after the
+example set by the rabbit who, because he couldn't go under the hill,
+went over it. At any rate, after one shuddering look at the mountainous
+menace tottering above her bows, she made up her mind that she was
+better off under the sea than on the surface, and deliberately dived. Of
+course, it was the Parthian kick the last sea had given her stern that
+was really responsible for her bows starting to go down at the very
+instant those of every other ship that one had had experience of would
+have been beginning to point skyward, but to all intents and purposes
+she looked, from the bridge, to be submerging of her own free and
+considered decision. The principal thing which differentiated it from
+the ordinary dive of a submarine was the fact that it was made at a
+sharper angle and at about four times the speed.
+
+There was something almost uncanny in the quietness with which that
+plunge began; though, on the latter score, there was nothing to complain
+of by about half a second later. I have seen at one time or another
+almost every conceivable kind of craft, from a Fijian war canoe to the
+latest battlecruiser, trying to buck head seas, and invariably the wave
+that swept it had the decency to announce its coming by a warning knock
+on the bows. This time there was nothing of the kind. The retreating sea
+had lifted her stern so high that the forecastle was under water even
+before the coming one had begun to topple over on to it. The consequence
+was that there was no preliminary bang to herald the onrush of the
+latter.
+
+The base of the mountainous roller simply flooded up over the diving
+forecastle and crashed with unbroken force against the bridge. We had
+collided with the "brick wall" right enough, and for the next few
+seconds at least the result was primal chaos.
+
+I have a vivid but detached recollection of two or three things in the
+instant that the blow impended. One is of the helmsman, crouching low,
+with legs wide apart, locking his arms through the slender steel spokes
+of the wheel the better to steady her in the coming smash. Another is of
+the captain, with hunched shoulders and set jaw, throwing over the
+telegraph to stop the engines. But the clearest picture of all is of the
+submarine lookout on the port side--a black-eyed, black-haired boy with
+a profile that might have been copied from an old Roman coin--who was
+leaning out and grinning sardonically into the very teeth of the
+descending hydraulic ram. It was his savagely-flung anatomy, I believe,
+though I never made sure, which bumped me in the region of the solar
+plexus a moment later and broke my slipping hold on the buckling
+stanchion to which I was trying to cling.
+
+There was nothing whatever suggestive of water--soft, fluent, trickling
+water--in the first shattering impact of that mighty blow. It was as
+solid as a collision between ship and ship; indeed, the recollection I
+have of a railway wreck I was once in on a line in the Argentine Pampas
+is of a shock less shattering. It is difficult to record events in their
+proper sequence, partly because they were all happening at once, and
+partly because the self-centred frame of mind I was in at the moment was
+not favourable for detached observation. The noise and the jar of the
+crash were stupendous, yet neither of these has left so vivid a mental
+impression as the uncanny writhing of the two-inches-thick steel
+stanchion to which I was endeavouring to hold, and the nerve-racking
+sound of rending metal. I have no recollection of hearing the clink of
+broken glass, nor of being struck by pieces of it; yet all the panes of
+heavy plate which screened the forward end of the bridge--of a
+thickness, one had supposed, to withstand anything likely to assail
+them--were swept away as though they had been no more than the
+rice-paper squares of a Japanese window.
+
+[Illustration: WHERE THE GREAT LINER PLOWED ALONG]
+
+[Illustration: WE HAD COLLIDED WITH THE "BRICK WALL"]
+
+[Illustration: NOW SHE WAS BACK AT BASE]
+
+The rush of water, of course, followed instantly upon the crash, yet, so
+vivid are my impressions of the things intimately connected with the
+blow itself that it seems as though there was an appreciable interval
+between the fall of that and the time when the enveloping cataclysm
+transformed the universe into a green-white stream of brine. From ahead,
+above and from both sides the flood poured, to meet and mingle in a
+whirling maelstrom in the middle of the bridge. There was nothing of
+blown spindrift to it; it was green and solid and flowed with a heave
+and a hurl that made no more of slamming a man to the deck than of
+tossing a life-buoy. I went the whole length of the bridge when I lost
+my grip on the port stanchion, brought up against the after-rail, and
+then went down into a tangle of signal flags. I remember distinctly,
+though, that the walls of water rushing by completely blotted out sea
+and sky to port and starboard, and that there was all the darkness of
+late twilight in the cavern of the engulfed bridge. Then the great sea
+tumbled aft along the main deck, and it grew light again.
+
+The captain and the helmsman had both kept their feet, and the latter,
+dripping from head to heel, was just throwing over the engine-room
+telegraph as I shook off my mantle of coloured bunting and crawled back
+to my moorings at the stanchion. Immediately afterwards I saw him jump
+on to the after-rail and make some sort of negative signal to a couple
+of half-drowned boys who, waist-deep in swirling water, were pawing
+desperately among the depth-charges. Then he came over and joined me for
+a few moments.
+
+"Some sea, that," he said, slipping down his hood and throwing back the
+brine-dripping hair from his forehead. "It's happened before, but never
+like that. Lord only knows what it's done to her. S'pose we'll begin to
+hear of that in a minute." He pointed to a string of porcelain
+insulators dangling at the end of twisted bits of wire in front of one
+of the paneless windows. "That's the remains of our auxiliary radio," he
+said, grinning; "and look at the fo'c'sle. Swept clean, pretty near.
+Thank heaven, the gun's left. But, do you remember that heavy iron bar
+the muzzle rested on? Gone! It was probably that, with some of the
+shells in the rack, that made all that rat-a-tat. But what of it? Look
+how she rides 'em now that she's eased down a bit. Only trouble is,
+she's got to go it again. Look how we've dropped back." And he gave the
+engine-room, by voice-pipe, a new "standard" speed, and threw the
+telegraph over to "Full."
+
+The pulsing throb began anew, and under the urge of speeding propellers
+the _Zip_, steering in narrowed zig-zags quickly regained her station.
+All of the destroyers, and the _Lymptania_ as well, had eased down
+slightly, and the reduced speed meant also a reduction of the danger of
+another of those deep-sea dives, something no craft but a submarine is
+built to stand the strain of. But even as it was we were driving right
+up to the limit of endurance all the time, and the sea that did not come
+rolling up green right over the bows was the exception rather than the
+rule. From the forecastle right away aft there was never more than a few
+seconds at a time when the main deck was free of rollicking cascades of
+boiling brine, and there were moments when only the funnels and the
+after superstructure, rearing up like isolated rocks on a storm-beaten
+coast, were visible above the swirling flood. There were times when the
+men standing-by at the guns and torpedo-tubes seemed almost to be
+engulfed; yet none of them was swept away, and they even--from the way
+they kept joking each other in the lulls--appeared to be getting a good
+deal of sport out of the thing.
+
+The barometer was falling, and both wind and waves gained steadily in
+force as the afternoon lengthened and merged into a twilight that was
+itself already melting before the rising moon. Clouds were few and
+scattering, and it was plain there were to be no hours dark enough to
+offer any protection from submarine attack. Looming as large as ever,
+the big liner offered scarcely a better target on the side she was
+illuminated by the moonlight than on the one from which she was
+silhouetted against it. From either side a fifth of a mile of steel
+would "take a lot of missing," and her captain, sensibly enough, would
+not ease his engines by a revolution more than was necessary to keep
+within his destroyer screen. It was plainly up to the destroyers to
+stick it to the limit, and that is just what they did. As I heard one of
+the men put it, it was the "bruisiest" bit of escort-work they had ever
+been--or probably ever will be--called upon to face, but every one of
+those Yankee destroyers stayed with it to the finish.
+
+Now it would be the _Zop_ that would emerge from under a mountainous sea
+and come drifting back without steerage weigh, rolling drunkenly in the
+trough, and now it would be the _Zap_. And now this or that result of a
+"hydraulic ramming" would disable one of the others temporarily. But,
+game to the last flake of brine-frosted camouflage, back they came to it
+again, and again, and yet again. Sunrise of the next day found them
+plugging on in station, and in station they remained until the
+_Lymptania_, beyond the zone of all possible submarine danger, made a
+general signal of "Thank you," and headed off to the westward on her
+own.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Out of the dim grey dawn of the morning after the night before, battered
+and buckled, but still unbroken, the wearily waggling line of the
+_Lymptania's_ late escort trailed back into harbour. The mussed-up
+silhouette of every one of them bore mute testimony to the way she had
+been put "through the mill," and, in most cases, the things that met the
+eye were not the worst. The _Zop_ needed every yard of the channel as
+she zig-zagged up it under a jury steering-gear, and the _Zap_, like a
+man dazed from a blow, would have sudden "mental hiati" in which she
+would straggle carelessly out of line with an inconsequential
+going-to-pick-flowers-by-the-roadside sort of air. The _Zim's_
+idiosyncrasies had more of an epileptic suddenness about them, and her
+hectic coughing plainly indicated some kind of "lung trouble." Our
+little _Zip_ presented a very brave front to the outer world, but I
+heard hollow clankings punctuating the erstwhile even hum of the
+engines, while the drip, drip, drip and the drop, drop, drop through the
+crinkled sheet-steel sheathing of my cabin told that the deck-plates of
+the forecastle fitted a good deal less snugly than before they had
+played anvil to the lusty head-sea hammer.
+
+But the _Flossie_, the "latest, the swiftest, the flotilla's pride"--the
+wounds of all the rest of us put together were as nothing to those of
+the _Flossie_. In trying to maintain her pride of place at the head of
+the escort, she _had_, for a brief space, unleashed those extra knots of
+speed the captain had spoken of, and all that, and even more than, he
+had prophesied had come to pass. It was just such a swaggerer of a sea
+as that first one that _Zip_ had dived into which did the trick, only,
+as the _Flossie_ was going faster, the impact was somewhat more severe.
+She was a mile or more distant from us when it happened, and, watching
+from the bridge of the _Zip_, we simply saw her dissolve into a
+sky-tossed spout of foam. When she reappeared she was floating, beam-on,
+to the seas, and, for the moment, an apparently helpless hulk.
+
+The captain's instant diagnosis of a couple of muffled detonations which
+followed was entirely correct.
+
+"That sea must have 'jack-knifed' the _Flossie_ so sharply," he said,
+"that the recoil took up the slack in the wires, releasing two 'cans'
+she seems to have had set and ready. It's about the same thing as just
+happened to us, except that the tautened wire only rang the stand-by
+bell, the signal for the men to set the depth-charges. First thing I did
+after we came to the surface was to negative that supposed order. That
+was what I was doing when I waved to those boys who were clawing at the
+'cans,' with their heads under water. Lucky they weren't carried away."
+
+It was a chastened _Flossie_ which had gone floundering back to station
+a few minutes later, but somehow or other she had managed to carry on,
+and now she was back at Base. I won't "give comfort to the enemy" by
+trying to describe her appearance, but some hint of it may be gleaned
+from the laconic comment of one of the _Zip's_ signalmen, as the
+"Flotilla's Pride" was warping in to moor alongside the mother ship.
+
+"Gee whiz!" he ejaculated. "See the old _Vindictive_ limpin' home from
+Zeebruggy! S'pose they'll fill her up with concrete now an' block a
+channel."
+
+The captain grinned as he overheard the remark where he waited by the
+starboard rail for the last of the mooring lines to be made fast. "It's
+not quite so bad as that," he said. "If need be, they'll have her, and
+all the rest of us, right as trivets in three or four days, and quite
+ready to take the sea again when our turn comes. It's all in the convoy
+game, anyhow, and not such bad fun after all, 'specially when it's
+behind you, and you've got a bath, and a change, and a lunch at the
+Club, and an afternoon of tennis in immediate prospect. Come along."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+YANK BOAT _versus_ U-BOAT
+
+
+It was the turn of the tide and the turn of the day on the "quiet waters
+of the River Lee." Pale blue columns of smoke rose above the verdant
+boskiness which masked the squat brown cabins where the peat fires
+smouldered, and along the straggling stone wall which crowned the ridge
+the swaying heads of home-returning cows showed intermittently against
+the glowing western sky. The peacefulness of it was almost palpable. You
+seemed to breathe it, and could all but reach out with the hand and
+touch it.
+
+It permeated even to the long lines of lean destroyers in the stream,
+and it was the subtly suggestive influence of it which had deflected
+homeward the minds of the motley-clad sailors who were lounging at ease
+about the stern of the first of a "cluster" of three of these--like a
+sheaf of bright multi-coloured arrows the trim craft looked, with the
+level rays of the setting sun striking across them where they lay moored
+alongside each other--and set tongues wagging of the little things
+which, magnified by distance, loom large in the imaginations of men in
+exile.
+
+They were deep in the "old home town" stuff when I sauntered
+inconsequently aft on the off-chance of picking up a yarn or two, but as
+there appeared to be no one present from my part of the country, no
+immediate opportunity to break in presented itself. Equally an outsider
+was I when the flow of discussion turned to woollen sweaters and socks
+and mufflers, and the golden trails of romance leading back from the
+names and messages sewed or knitted into them.
+
+No fair unknowns had ever sent _me_ any of these soft comforts, and
+after I had heard a lusty youngster from Virginia tell how a "sweater
+address" he had written what he described as a "lettah that was good and
+plenty w'am, b'lieve me," replied that she was "jest goin' twelve
+years," and that her mother didn't think she ought to be thinking of
+marriage just yet--after that I didn't feel quite so bad over not having
+had a chance to open one of these "woolly" correspondences. There was
+some solace, too, in hearing a pink-cheeked young ex-bank clerk tell how
+the "abdominal bandage" (they name them, as a rule, after the garment
+that starts the correspondence), with whom he had exchanged something
+like a dozen letters of cumulative passion, brought the affair to a
+sudden and violent end by some indirect and inadvertent admission which
+showed that she remembered when Grant was President.
+
+But when the talk drifted, as it always does in the end, to baseball
+and baseballers, I knew that there was going to be an opening for me
+presently, and stood by to take advantage of it. A three-year absentee
+from the bleachers, I was not sufficiently up on last season's pennant
+race "dope" to do more than make frequent sapient observations on this
+or that big-leaguer's stickwork or fielding as he was mentioned; but
+when they began to discuss, or rather to wrangle over, for discuss is
+far too polite a term, the theory of the game and to grow red in the
+face over such esoterics (or "inside stuff," to put it in "Fanese") as
+how and when a "squeeze" ought to be pulled off, I showed them the
+bulbous first joint of the little finger of my right hand--which there
+is no other way of acquiring than by the repeated telescopings of many
+seasons on the diamond--and was welcomed at last on equal terms. A seat
+was offered me on a depth-charge, across the business end of which an
+empty sack had been thrown to prevent a repetition of what came near
+happening the time a stoker, who was proving that Hans Wagner could
+never again be a popular idol now that we were at war with the Huns,
+punctuated his argument by hammering with a monkey-wrench on the firing
+mechanism.
+
+They were not as impressed as they should have been when I told them
+that I learned the game under the tutelage of the mighty Bill Lange
+(this, of course, because the incomparable "Big Bill" was at his zenith
+long before their time); but they were duly respectful when I said I
+had played three years' Varsity baseball, and became quite deferential
+when I assured them I had also survived a season of bush-league in the
+North-West. There was some kind of electrician rating in the crowd who
+had been a bush-league twirler before his "wing went glass," as he put
+it, and he, it soon transpired, had played in one place or another with
+a number of my old team mates of the Montana League. Deep in
+reminiscence of those good old days, I quite forgot my subtle scheme of
+using baseball as a stalking-horse for destroyer yarns, when the arrival
+of some callers from a British sloop lying a mile or two farther down
+the harbour recalled it to me. They had been in the _Moonflower_, the
+man next me said, when she put a U-boat out of business not long before,
+and one of them--he had some sort of decoration for his part in the
+show--spun a cracking good yarn about it if you got him started. This
+latter I managed to do by asking him how it chanced that the
+_Moonflower_ was allowed to sport a star on her funnel. The story he
+told, the while he rolled cigarettes and worked his jaws on Yankee
+chewing-gum, revealed rather too much that may be used in some future
+surprise party to make it possible to publish just yet, but it had the
+desired effect of turning the current of reminiscence U-boatward. That
+was what I wanted, for, now that men from several other destroyers had
+come aboard and sauntered aft to join the party, the opportunity for
+finding out at firsthand just what the American sailors thought of the
+anti-submarine game at the end of a year and a half of it was too good
+to be missed.
+
+There was a considerable variety of opinions expressed in that last hour
+of the second dog-watch on the intricate inside stuff of the anti-U-boat
+game, just as there had been about baseball, but there was one point on
+which they were practically agreed: that Fritz, especially during the
+last six months, was not giving them a proper run for their money. This
+is the way one of them, a bronzed seaman gunner, with the long
+gorilla-like arms of a Sam Langford, and gnarled knots of protuberant
+muscles at the angles of his jaws, epitomized it: "We sees Fritzie, or
+we don't. Mostly we don't, for he ducks under when he pipes our smoke.
+If he's stalkin' a convoy there's jest a chance of him givin' us time
+for a rangin' shot at him on the surface. Then we waltzes over to his
+grease and scatters a bunch of 'cans' round his restin'-place. An' if
+the luck's with us, we gets him; an' if the luck's with him, we don't.
+If we crack open his shell, down he goes; if we jest start him leakin',
+up he comes. Only dif'rence is that, in one case, it's all hands down,
+and in t'other, all hands up--'Kamerad!' In both cases, no fight, no run
+for our money. Now when we first come over, an' 'fore we'd put the fear
+o' God into Fritzie's heart, he wasn't above takin' a chance at a
+come-back now an' again. _Then_ there was occas'nal moments of
+ple'surabl' excitement, like the time when"--and he went on to tell of
+how an enterprising U-boat commander slipped a slug into the _Courser_
+abreast her after superstructure, and "beat it" off before that stricken
+destroyer had a chance to retaliate. Only the fact that, by a miracle,
+the torpedo failed to detonate her depth-charges saved the _Courser_
+from destruction, and even as it was, rare seamanship had been required
+to take her back to port. And he also told of the unlucky _John
+Hawkins_, which a U-boat had actually put down, and the grim situation
+which confronted the sailors when they found themselves sinking in a
+ship which carried a number of depth-charges set on the "ready." But all
+that, he said, with the air of an old man speaking of his departed
+youth, was before they had begun to learn Fritzie's little ways, and
+before Fritz, perhaps as a consequence, had begun to lose his nerve.
+Now, far from being willing to put up a fight with a destroyer, it was
+only "once in a blue moon that he's got the guts to put up a scrap even
+to save his own hide."
+
+A slender fair-haired lad, with a quick observant eye which revealed him
+as a signalman even before one looked at his sleeve, cut in sharply at
+this juncture.
+
+"Then there must have been a blue moon shedding its light over these
+waters last month," he said decisively. "I quite agree with you that
+Fritz hasn't got the nerve--or it may be because he's got too much
+sense--to take a chance at a destroyer any more. But in the matter of
+putting up a fight for his life--yes, even for giving a real run for the
+money--well, all I can say is that if you'd been out on the _Sherill_
+about three weeks ago, you wouldn't be making that complaint about one
+particular Fritz at least. If going eighteen hours, with two or three
+destroyers and a sloop or two doing everything they know how to crack in
+his shell all the time, without chucking his hand in, and very likely
+getting clear in the end--if that isn't putting up a fight for life and
+giving a run for the money, I don't know what is."
+
+I had heard this astonishing "battle of wakes and wits," as someone had
+christened it, referred to on several occasions, but had never had the
+chance to hear any of the details from one who had had anything like the
+opportunities always open to a signalman to follow what is going on.
+"Most of the bunch have heard all they want to hear of it already," the
+lad replied with a laugh when I asked him to tell me the story; "and,
+besides, a more or less long-winded yarn of the kind I suppose you want
+would tire 'em to tears anyway. If you really want to hear something of
+it, come over to the _Sherill_ (that's her stern there, just beyond the
+_Flossie_) any time after eight bells. I go on watch then, but it's a
+'stand easy' in port, and there'll be time for all the yarning you
+want."
+
+I closed with that offer at once, and eight bells had not long gone
+before I had picked my precarious way over to the _Sherill_, and climbed
+the ladders to her snug little bridge. My man was there already, whiling
+away the time by rewriting an old college football song (he had been in
+his freshman year at Michigan when America came into the war) to fit
+destroyer work in the North Atlantic. I found him stuck at the end of
+the second line of the first verse, because the only rhymes he could
+think of for flotilla were Manila and camarilla, neither of which seemed
+sufficiently opposite to be of use, and he was rather glad of an excuse
+for putting the job by to await later inspiration.
+
+I gave him a "lead" for the U-boat yarn he had lured me there to hear,
+and he launched into it at once. This is the story the young signalman
+of U.S.S. _Sherill_ told me, the while the red squares of the cottagers'
+windows blinked blandly along the bank in the lengthening twilight and
+the purple shadows of the western hills piled deeper and duskier upon
+the "quiet waters of the River Lee."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"We were out on convoy," he said, speaking the first words slowly
+between the teeth which held the string of the tobacco sack from which
+the gently manipulated paper in his hand had been filled. "It was some
+kind of a slow convoy--probably a collier or an oiler or two--and there
+were only two of us on the job--the _McSmall_ and the _Sherill_. It was
+just the usual ding-dong sort of a drudge up to about four in the
+afternoon of the first day out, when the _McSmall_ made a signal that
+she had sighted a submarine on the starboard bow of the convoy, distant
+about five miles, and immediately stood off to the west to see if
+anything like a strafe could be started. She was more than hull-down on
+the horizon when I saw, by the way the angle of her funnels was
+changing, that she was manoeuvring to shake loose a few 'cans' into
+the oil-slick she had run into, but I remember distinctly that I felt
+the jolt of the under-water explosions stronger than from many we had
+kicked loose from the _Sherill_, and which had detonated only a hundred
+yards or so off. It's just a little trick the depth-charge has. The
+force of it seems to shoot out in streaks, just like an explosion in the
+air, and you may feel it strong at a distance and much less at fairly
+close range. So far as we ever learned, this opening salvo did not find
+its target.
+
+"Meanwhile the _Sherill_ was escorting to the best of her ability alone.
+Or at least we thought we were alone. About half an hour after the
+_McSmall_ had laid those first 'cans,' however, one of the
+quartermasters reported sighting a periscope on the port quarter of the
+convoy, about five hundred yards distant, and headed away. We signalled
+its presence to the convoy, turned eight points to port, and drove at
+full speed for the point where the wake of the moving finger had pinched
+out.
+
+"We had received a report that morning to the effect that two submarines
+were operating in these waters, and there is just the chance, therefore,
+that this was a joint attack. Everything considered, however, we have
+been inclined to believe that the Fritz we were now starting to make the
+acquaintance of was the same one which the _McSmall_ was still
+assiduously hunting some miles off to the westward. It was a mighty
+smart piece of 'Pussy-wants-a-corner' work, shifting his position like
+that under the circumstances; but it was quite possible if the Fritz
+only had the guts for it, and that I think you'll have to admit this
+particular one had.
+
+"It's seconds that count in a destroyer attack on a U-boat, and the
+captain hadn't lost a tick in jumping into this one. The dissolving 'V'
+which the ducked-in periscope had left behind it was still visible in
+the smooth water when the _Sherill's_ forefoot slashed into it, and it
+was only a few hundred yards beyond that a slow undulant upcoiling of
+currents marked, faintly but unmistakably, the under-water progress of
+the game we were after. There was no oil-slick, understand, because an
+uninjured submarine only leaves that behind--except through
+carelessness--when it dives after a spell on the surface running under
+engines. Then the exhausts cough up a lot of grease and oil, and a layer
+of this, sticking to the stern, leaves a trail that rises for some
+little time after submergence, and which almost any kind of a dub who
+has been told what to look for can follow.
+
+"The spotting of the surface wake of a deep-down submarine, and the
+holding of it after it almost disappears with the slowing down of the
+screws that make it, is quite another thing. _That_ takes a man with
+more than a keen eye--it takes instinct, mixed with a lot of common
+sense. It's a common thing to say of a successful look-out that he has a
+'quick nose for submarines.' The expression is used more or less
+figuratively, of course; and yet the nose--the sense smell--is by no
+means a negligible factor in detecting the presence, and even the
+bearing, of a hunted U-boat. I will tell you shortly how it figured in
+this particular instance.
+
+"That wake was swirling up so strong when we struck it that it was plain
+the submarine was still only on the way down, and it was no surprise
+when, a few seconds later, the distinct form of it was visible, close
+aboard under the starboard side of the bridge.
+
+"I don't mean that it was distinct in the sense that you could see
+details such as the bow or stern rudders, or even the conning-tower, but
+only that a moving cigar-shaped blob of darker green could be plainly
+made out. The for'ard end was rather more sharply defined than the
+after, probably because the swirl from the propellers made uneven
+refraction about the tail. It was doubtless a good deal deeper than it
+looked, and the fact that it could be seen at all must have been almost
+entirely due to the fact that the absence of wind left the surface quite
+unrippled.
+
+"The appearance of the submarine abreast the bridge was our cue to get
+busy, and I won't need to tell you that we went to it good and plenty.
+We were primed for just that kind of an emergency, and we slapped down a
+barrage in a way that looked more like chucking coppers for kids to
+scramble after than the really scientific planting of high explosives
+that it was. For a minute or two the little old _Sherill_, dancing down
+the up-tossed peaks of the explosions, jolted along like the canoe you
+are dragging over a 'corduroyed' portage. Then the going grew smooth
+again, and under a hard-over right rudder we turned back rejoicing to
+gather in the sheaves. Yes, it looked quite as simple as harvesting on
+the old home farm, and it didn't seem that there could be anything left
+to do but to go back and pick up with the rake what the mower had
+brought low. And so it would have been on an ordinary occasion, which,
+unluckily, this was not. From the first to last, indeed, it was quite
+the contrary.
+
+"The whole map of that little opening brush was spread out before us as
+we came back, and almost as clearly, for the moment, as though modelled
+in coloured clay. The _Sherill's_ wake, though it had obliterated that
+of the submarine, coincided with the tell-tale swirl of the latter we
+had followed, while the round patches of spreading foam made the
+dizzily dancing buoys temporarily superfluous as markers of the spots
+where the depth-charges had exploded. Like every other story that is
+writ in water, this one was rapidly dissolving; but, from all that we
+needed to learn from it, the record was as complete as a bronze relief.
+
+"That there was to be another chapter to the story became evident before
+we had doubled back half the length of that part of the wake we had
+sprinkled with 'cans.' At about the point where two-thirds of that sheaf
+of depth-charges had been expended a clearly defined wake of oil and
+bubbles turned sharply off to the left. The presence of that little
+trail cleared up several important points right then and there without
+following it any farther, though I will hardly need to tell you that we
+didn't drop anchor to hold a court of inquiry over it. The vital thing
+it told us was that--strange as it seemed--our under-water bombardment
+had not sent the U-boat to the bottom, nor even injured it sufficiently
+to compel it to come to the surface. But that it was injured, and
+probably fairly badly, was proved by the wake of oil and bubbles. Don't
+ever let any one delude you with that yarn about the way Fritz sends up
+oil and bubbles to baffle pursuit. There may be circumstances under
+which he could work that particular brand of foxiness with profit, but
+if there is one place where you could be sure he would _not_ try
+anything of that kind on, it is when a destroyer has got his nose on his
+trail, with her eye and ears a-cock for just that kind of little
+first-aid to 'can-dropping.' For a submarine voluntarily to release air
+or oil when a destroyer is ramping round overhead would be just about
+like a burglar scattering a trail of confetti to baffle the pursuit of
+the police. Fritz is as full of ways that are dark and of tricks that
+are vain as Ah Sin, but--with the hounds at his heels--nothing so
+foolish as that oil and bubble stunt of popular fiction.
+
+"The first few of the 'cans' had evidently burst near enough to this
+Fritz to buckle his shell and release the oil and air, but his sharp
+right-angled turn to the left had taken him quite clear of the last of
+the charges, which had only been thrown away. Wounded and winged as he
+appeared to be, the next thing in order was to polish him off. Slowing
+down slightly, the captain steadied the _Sherill_ on the wake.
+
+"As we passed the point where this was rising, the rate at which it was
+extended gave the approximate speed of the U-boat, and the fact that
+this was not above three knots seemed only another indication that all
+was not well with him. Holding on past the 'bubble fount,' we passed
+over the point below which the U-boat must have been moving, but now he
+was so much more deeply submerged than before that no hint of his
+outline was visible on either side. We knew he was there, however, and
+when we hit the proper place shook loose another shower of 'cans' over
+him.
+
+"There is nothing deeply mysterious about the calculations in dropping
+depth-charges, for in no sense of the term can it be called an
+instrument of precision. Indeed, it is of the bludgeon rather than the
+rapier type. If you have a wake to guide, you approximate his speed and
+course from that, guess at his depth, set the charge at the
+corresponding depth from which you judge its explosion will do most
+good, and then, allowing for your own speed and course, release it at a
+point which you reckon the target will have reached by the time the
+charge gets down on a level with it. It is something like bomb-dropping
+from an aeroplane, only rather less accurate, because you don't see your
+target as a rule.
+
+"This is more than compensated for, however, by the greater
+vulnerability of its target and the fact that the force of an
+under-water explosion is felt over a wider area than that of an
+air-bomb. That's about all there is to it. Success in 'can-dropping'
+depends about half on the skill and judgment of the man directing it,
+and about half on luck. Or perhaps I should say that fifty-fifty was
+about the way it stood when we started in at the game. Naturally, as we
+have accumulated experience, skill and judgment begin to count for more
+and luck for less, though we are a long way from reaching the point
+where the latter is eliminated entirely.
+
+"Again we circled back to pick up the pieces, and again we found only a
+wake of oil and bubbles angling sharply off from where the 'cans' had
+been dropped. It was encouraging to note that both oil and bubbles were
+rising faster than before, but there was surprise and disappointment in
+the fact that they were now streaming along at a rate which indicated
+Fritz was hitting an under-water speed of six or seven knots.
+
+"By now it was plain what his method was, however. This was to steady on
+his course till his hydrophones, which all U-boats are fitted with, of
+course, told him we were bearing down on him, and then to start making
+'woggly' zigzags. The captain was doing some deep thinking as we headed
+in for the next attack, and I noticed him following his stopwatch with
+more than usual care as he jiggled off the 'cans.'
+
+"One of the detonations had a different kick from the others, and I was
+just speculating if it had been a hit, when up comes Fritz, rolling like
+a harpooned whale.
+
+"We were just turning sharp under left rudder and, not wanting to take
+any chances, the captain gave orders for all guns fearing to open fire.
+No. 1 and No. 2 of the port battery got off about five rounds apiece,
+and when the splashes from the exploding shells had subsided Fritz had
+gone. It looked like a hundred to one that we had finished him--until we
+ran into another of those darn wakes of oil and bubbles reeling off at
+a good five or six knots.
+
+"Again we 'canned' him, and again the thickening trail of grease gave
+promise that, if nothing else, we were at least bleeding him hard,
+perhaps to death. As there was no doubt that he was still a going
+concern, however, the captain decided on a change of tactics, to try
+attrition, so to speak, instead of direct assault.
+
+"There is, of course, a limit to the number of 'cans' a destroyer can
+carry, and those which still remained he wanted to husband against a
+better chance to use them with effect. The several remaining hours of
+daylight would be enough, if the U-boat could be kept running at maximum
+speed, to exhaust its batteries in and force it to come to the surface
+for lack of power to keep going submerged. A submarine, you understand,
+unless it can lie on the bottom, which was impossible here on account of
+the depth, must keep under weigh to maintain its bouyancy, so it follows
+that the exhaustion of its batteries leaves no alternative but coming
+up. That was what we were now driving at with this one.
+
+"About this time, hearing the radio of the _Cushman_ close aboard, the
+captain sent a signal requesting her help in clearing up the job in
+hand. She hove in sight presently, accompanied by the _Fanny_, which was
+out with her on some special stunt of their own. They had an hour to
+spare for us, and in that time we played just about the merriest little
+game of hide-and-seek that any of our destroyers have had with a Fritz
+since the Yanks came over.
+
+"He wasn't left time to sit and think for a single minute. Now a
+destroyer would come charging up his wake from astern and shy a 'can' at
+his tail; now one would ambush him from ahead and try and have one
+waiting where his nose was going to be.
+
+"It was a good deal like when three or four of us kids used to spear
+catfish in a muddy pool. We were always grazing one, but never quite
+getting it. And, believe me, the wake of one of those catfish didn't
+have anything on the wake of that Fritz for sinuosity.
+
+"He was zigzagging constantly, and just after charges had been dropped
+on him he twice broached surface. It was only for a few seconds though,
+and never long enough to offer a target for even a ranging shot. Once we
+tried to ram, but he turned as he submerged, and the forefoot cut into
+nothing more solid than his propeller swirl.
+
+[Illustration: A LIMIT TO THE NUMBER OF "CANS" A DESTROYER CAN CARRY]
+
+"After the _Cushman_ and _Fanny_ left us to resume their own job the
+_Sherill_ took up the chase again on her own account. There were still
+about three hours to go till dark, and two of these we spent in keeping
+our quarry on the jump by every trick we knew. Then we stood away, and
+gave him a chance to come up and start charging on the surface. When it
+finally became evident that he was not going to take advantage of our
+consideration on this score, we closed in again, picked up his wake,
+sent down another 'can' or two to tell him what we thought of him.
+
+"The last of these must have been near to a hit, for it brought up oil
+bubbles three feet in diameter, with smaller bubbles of air inside of
+them. The oil-slick left behind by his wake was so heavy that, even in
+the failing light, it was visible for several miles. He was now making
+about five knots. We followed that broad slick of oil for some time
+after darkness had fallen, and it was not till a little before midnight
+that we lost it.
+
+"There wasn't much hope of regaining touch before daybreak, but on the
+off-chance the captain started circling in a way that would cover a lot
+of sea, and yet not take us too far from the centre of interest.
+
+"It was a little after one in the morning that one of the
+look-outs--perhaps 'sniff-outs' would be a better term under the
+circumstances--reported an oil smell to windward. The captain promptly
+ordered her headed up into the wind, with sniffers stationed to port and
+starboard, fore and aft. Every man on watch was sniffing away on his
+own, of course, and you can bet it would have been a funny sight if
+there had only been enough light for us to see one another in. Nosing--I
+can use the term literally this time--slowly along, turning now to port,
+now to starboard, as the oil smell was strongest from this side or that,
+within ten minutes we picked up a slick which, even in the darkness, it
+was evident was trending to south'ard. For an hour and a half we
+zigzagged up along that wake, keeping touch by smell until just before
+three o'clock, when the new well-risen moon showed it up distinctly to
+the eye. No," answering my frivolous interruption, "I don't recall
+noticing at the time that it was a _blue_ moon.
+
+"Ten minutes later we came up to where the wake turned to
+south-westward, and had a brief glimpse of Fritz trying to evade
+detection by running down the moon-path. He was plainly near the end of
+his juice, and taking every chance that offered to charge on the
+surface. He ducked under before there was time for a shot, but, knowing
+that he could hardly stay there for long, we continued following down
+his wake.
+
+"It was broad daylight when, at half-past four, we sighted him again,
+running awash about five hundred yards ahead and slightly on the
+starboard bow. Ordering the bow gun to open fire, the captain put the
+_Sherill_ at full speed and headed in to ram. The shots fell very close,
+but no hit was observed.
+
+"He turned sharply to port, preparing to dive. We tried to follow with
+full left rudder, but missed by twenty feet. His conning-tower and two
+periscopes showed not over thirty feet from the port side as we swept
+by. It was too close for a torpedo, nor was there a fair chance for a
+depth-charge. The port battery was opening on him as he submerged.
+
+"The strengthening breeze began kicking up the surface about this time,
+making it difficult to follow the wake. It was six o'clock before we
+circled into it again, to find that Fritz was now trying to blind
+pursuit by steering his course so that the wake led away straight toward
+the low morning sun. It was probably by accident rather than design that
+his now reversed course also laid his wake across some of the zigzags of
+his old oil-slick. At any rate, between that and the sun, we got off the
+scent again, and did not get in touch till an hour later, when a thin
+blue-white vapour to the eastward revealed the blow-off of his exhaust
+where he had resumed charging on the surface.
+
+"He was a good five miles away, but we turned loose at him with the bow
+gun and started closing at full speed. At almost the same time, the
+British sloop _Moonflower_--the same one we were talking about this
+evening--stood in from eastward, also firing at the enemy, who was about
+midway between us.
+
+"Fritz disappeared under the foam-spouts thrown up by the fall of shot,
+and, although two more destroyers joined in the hunt, which was
+continued all that day and on to nightfall, no further trace of him was
+discovered. Even if he did not sink at once, the chances are all against
+his being in shape ever to get back to base. But just the same," he
+concluded, with a wistful smile, "it would have been comforting to have
+had something more tangible than the memory of an oil smell and
+thirty-six hours without sleep as souvenirs of that little brush."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It had been dark for an hour where the waters of the River Lee were
+streaming seaward with the ebbing tide, but the tree-tops along the
+crest of the eastward hills were silvering in the first rays of the
+rising moon. The signalman was looking at it when I bade him good night
+and started down the ladder to the main deck.
+
+"I hope it isn't a blue one," he said with a grin; "we're expecting to
+go out again tomorrow."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+ADRIATIC PATROL
+
+
+Boring into a North Sea blizzard in a destroyer off the coast of Norway
+is not exactly the kind of thing that one would think would turn a man's
+thoughts to sunny climes, with scented breezes blowing over flowery
+fields, and cobalt skies arching over sapphire waters, and all that sort
+of thing; but the human mind moves in a mysterious way, and that is just
+what Lieutenant K---- started talking about the night we were
+shepherding the northbound convoy together, after it had been
+temporarily scattered by what had proved to be an abortive German light
+cruiser raid.
+
+Sea-booted, mufflered and goggled, and ponderous where his half-inflated
+"Gieve" bulged beneath his ample duffle-coat, he leaned over the
+starboard rail of the bridge for a space to get the clear view ahead
+that the frost-layer on the wind-screen denied him from anywhere
+inboard. Then, just ducking a sea that rolled in tumultuously fluent
+ebony over the forecastle gun and smothered the bridge in flying spray,
+he nipped across and threw a half-Nelson around a convenient stanchion
+before the pitch, as she dived down the back of the retreating wave,
+threw him against the port rail.
+
+"Got 'em all in line again," he said, pushing his face close to mine.
+"That's something to be thankful for, anyhow. Didn't expect to round up
+half of 'em before we had to stand away to pick up the southbound. Piece
+of uncommon good luck. Now we can stand easy for a spell."
+
+I was about to observe that "stand easy" didn't seem to me quite the
+appropriate term to apply to the act of keeping one's balance on a craft
+which was blending thirty-degree rolls with forty-degree pitches to form
+a corkscrew-like motion of an eccentricity comparable to nothing else in
+the gamut of human experience, when he continued with: "Not much like
+what I was enjoying a month ago, this," indicating the encompassing
+darkness with a rotary roll of his head. "I was in a destroyer at an
+Italian base then--Brindisi--with the smell of dust and donkeys and
+wine-shops in the air, and straight-backed, black-haired, black-eyed
+girls, with rings in their ears and baskets of fruit--soft red and
+yellow and blue fruit--on their heads. Now it's"--and she put her nose
+deep into a wave that dealt her a sledge-hammer blow and sent spray
+flying half-way to the foretop in a solid stream--"this, just this. Grey
+by day, black by night, and slap-bang all the time. No light, no colour,
+no atmosphere, no----"
+
+"I quite understand," I cut in. "No straight-backed girls with rings in
+their ears and fruit-baskets on their heads. Of course, there's more
+light and colour down there than here; but wasn't there also a bit of
+slap-bang to it now and then?"
+
+"Ay, there was a bit," he replied. "There was the time----" He started
+to tell me the already time-worn yarn of the Yarmouth trawler skipper
+and the Grimsby trawler skipper, each of whom, enamoured of the same
+Taranto maid, wooed her while the other was absent on patrol; of how one
+of them, looking through his glass as he stood in toward the entrance on
+one of his return trips, saw his rival walking on the beach with arm
+round the waist of the artful minx in question, and her red-and-yellow
+kerchief-bound head resting on his shoulder; of how the one on the
+trawler, consumed by a jealousy fairly Latin in its intensity, swung
+round his six-pounder, discharged it at the faithless pair, and--so
+crookedly did the rage-blind eyes see through the sights--hit a
+fisherman's hut half a mile away from his target!
+
+I had heard the story in Taranto a year previously, and knew it to be
+somewhat apocryphal at best. "I didn't mean that kind of 'slap-bang,'" I
+said. "I was under the impression that the destroyers had some rather
+lively work down there on one or two occasions."
+
+"There were several brushes which might have been called lively while
+they lasted," he admitted. "I was in one of them myself just before I
+was transferred north."
+
+"You don't mean the recent attack on the drifter patrol--the one where
+two British destroyers stood the brunt of the attack of four Austrian
+destroyers and a light cruiser or two?" I asked. "I have always wanted
+to hear about that. I've heard Italian naval men say some very
+flattering things of the way the British carried on."
+
+"That's the one," he replied. "I was in the _Flop_--the one that got
+rather the worst banging up."
+
+"You've just got time for the yarn before your watch is over," I said,
+settling myself into the nearest thing to a listening attitude that one
+can assume on the bridge of a destroyer bucking a north-east gale. "Fire
+away."
+
+I didn't much expect he would "come through," for I had failed in so
+many attempts to draw a good yarn by a frontal attack of this kind that
+I had little faith in it as compared with more subtle methods. Perhaps
+it was because rough methods were suited to the rough night; or it may
+have been only because K----'s mind (his non-working mind, I mean; not
+that closed compartment of sense and instinct with which he was
+directing his ship) had drifted back to the Adriatic, and he was glad of
+the chance to talk about it; at any rate, in the hour that had still to
+go before eight bells went for midnight, to the accompaniment of the
+banging of the seas on the bows and the obbligato of the spray beating
+on the glass and canvas of the screens, he told me the story I asked
+for.
+
+"I don't need to tell you," he said, after giving the man at the wheel
+the course for the next zigzag, "that the Adriatic is full of various
+and sundry little traps and contrivances calculated to interfere as much
+as possible with the even tenor of the way of the Austrian U-boats
+which, basing at Pola and Trieste, sally forth in an endeavour to
+penetrate the Straits of Otranto and attack the commerce of the
+Mediterranean. You doubtless also know that this work is very largely in
+British hands. This is no reflection whatever on our Italian ally. Italy
+simply did not have the material and the trained men for the task in
+hand, and since Britain had both, it was naturally up to us to step in
+and take it over. This was done over two years ago; but, like the
+anti-submarine work everywhere, it is only now just beginning to round
+into shape to effect its ends. The winter of his discontent for the
+U-boat in these waters is closing in fast.
+
+"You will understand, too, that these various anti-U-boats contrivances
+take a lot of looking after to prevent their interference with, or even
+their complete destruction, by enemy surface craft. All the good
+harbours are on the east coast of the Adriatic, and that sea is so
+narrow that swift Austrian destroyers can raid all the way across it at
+many points, and still have time to get back to their bases the same
+night. With our own bases--the only practicable ones available--at the
+extreme southern end of the Adriatic, our greatest difficulty, perhaps,
+has been in guarding against these swift tip-and-run night-raids by the
+enemy's speedy surface craft. I don't know whether the fact that we seem
+to have about put an end to their operations of this kind is a greater
+tribute to our enterprise or the Austrians' lack of it. The brush in
+question occurred as a consequence of the latest of the Austrian
+attempts to interfere with the measures which, he knows only too well,
+will ultimately reduce his U-boats to comparative impotence.
+
+"I was Number Two in the _Flop_, which, with the _Flip_, was patrolling
+a certain billet well over toward the Austrian coast of the Adriatic. We
+had turned at about eleven o'clock, and were heading back on a westerly
+course, when the captain sighted a number of vessels just abaft the
+starboard beam. Being almost in the track of the low-hanging moon, they
+were sharply silhouetted; but the queer atmospheric conditions played
+such pranks with their outlines that, for a time, he was deceived as to
+their real character. The warm, coastal airs, blowing to sea for a few
+hours after nightfall, have a tendency to produce mirage effects
+scarcely less striking than those one sees on the desert along the Suez
+Canal. It was the distortion of the mirage that was responsible for the
+fact that the captain mistook two Austrian light cruisers for small
+Italian transports (such as we frequently encountered on the run between
+Brindisi and Valona or Santi Quaranti), and that he reported what
+shortly turned out to be enemy destroyers as drifters.
+
+"The captain had just made a shaded lamp signal to the _Flip_, calling
+attention to the ships and their supposed character, when the white,
+black-curling bow-wave of the two leaders caught his eye and made him
+suspect they were warships. The alarm bell clanging for 'Action
+Stations' was the first intimation I had that anything was afoot. In the
+Adriatic, as everywhere else, everyone in a destroyer turns in 'all
+standing'; so it was only a few seconds until I was out of my bunk and
+up to my station on the bridge. It was not many minutes later before I
+found myself in command of the ship.
+
+"It was now clear that the force sighted consisted of two enemy light
+cruisers and four destroyers, the latter disposed two on each quarter of
+the rear cruiser. They were closing on us at high speed at a constant
+bearing of a point or two abaft the beam. It was up to the _Flip_, as
+senior ship, to decide whether to fight or to run away on the off-chance
+of living to fight another day, something which was hardly likely to
+happen in the event we closed in a real death grapple. The disparity
+between our strength and that of the enemy would have entirely justified
+us in doing our utmost to avoid a decisive fight, had it been that the
+cards on the table were the only ones in the game. But this was hardly
+the case. Out of sight, but still not so many miles distant, was another
+subdivision of our destroyers, while overwhelming forces would
+ultimately be hurrying up to our aid in case the enemy could be delayed
+long enough. To close in immediate action was plainly the thing, and the
+_Flip_ was turning in to challenge even as she made us a signal
+indicating that this was her decision. A moment more, and we were
+turning into line astern of her.
+
+"Out of the moon-track now, the outlines of the enemy ships were
+indistinct and shadowy, and it was from the dull blur of opacity above
+the slightly phosphorescent glow of the 'bone' in the teeth of the
+leading cruiser that the opening shot was fired. It lighted her up
+brilliantly for the fraction of a second, and the ghostly geyser from
+the bursting shell showed up distinctly a few hundred yards ahead of the
+_Flip_. Both the sharpened image of the cruiser in the light of the
+gun-fire and the time of flight of the shell helped us with the range,
+and the fall of shot from the _Flip's_ opener looked like a very near
+thing. We followed it with one from our fo'c'sl' gun, which was a bit
+short, and the next, if not a hit, was only slightly over. At this
+juncture, all six of the enemy ships came into action with every gun
+they could bring to bear, and the _Flip_ and the _Flop_ did the same.
+For the next few minutes things happened so fast that I can't be sure of
+getting them in anywhere near their actual sequence.
+
+"We began hitting repeatedly, and with good effect, after the first few
+shots, and the _Flip_ also appeared to be throwing some telling ones
+home. The enemy were hitting the both of us about the same time,
+however, and, of course, with many times the weight of metal we were
+getting to him. At this juncture the skipper of the _Flip_, evidently
+figuring that the Austrians, now that they were fully engaged and had a
+good chance of polishing us off, would not break off the fight, turned
+southward with the idea of drawing them toward the other forces which we
+knew would be rushing up in response to the signal we had sent out the
+instant the character of the strange ships was evident.
+
+"The _Flip_, like a big squid, began smoke-screening heavily as she
+turned, the _Flop_ following suit. The sooty oil fumes poured out in
+clouds thick enough to walk on, but unluckily, neither our course nor
+the state of the atmosphere was quite favourable for making it go where
+it would have served us best. Possibly it was because the _Flip_ was
+making a better screen than the _Flop_, or possibly it was because they
+were concentrating on the 'windy corner' just as we were rounding it. At
+any rate, trying to observe through our rather patchy smoke the effect
+of what appeared to be a couple of extremely well-placed shots of ours
+on the leading cruiser, I suddenly became aware that all four of the
+destroyers and the second cruiser were directing all of their fire upon
+the poor little _Flop_. I don't recall exactly whether I twigged this
+before we began to feel the effects of it or not, but I am rather under
+the impression that I seemed to sense it from the brighter brightness--a
+gun firing directly at you makes a more brilliant flash than the same
+gun laid on a target ahead or astern of you--of the flame-spurts even
+before I was aware of the sudden increase of the fall of shot.
+
+"They had us ranged to a yard by this time, of course, and the captain
+turned away a couple of points in an endeavour to throw them off. I
+recall distinctly that it was just as the grind of the ported helm began
+to throb up to the bridge that a full salvo--probably from one of the
+cruisers--came crashing into us. My first impression was that we were
+blown up completely, for of the two shells which had struck for'ard, one
+had brought down the mast and the other had scored a clean hit on the
+forebridge. There was also a hit or two aft, but the immediate effects
+of these were not evident in the chaos caused by the others. This was
+absolutely beyond description.
+
+"The actual shock to a ship of being struck by a shell of even large
+calibre is nothing to compare with that from almost any one of these
+seas that are crashing over us now. But it is the noise of the
+explosion, the rending of metal, and the bang of flying fragments and
+falling gear that makes a heavy shelling so staggering, to mind if not
+to body. Of course everyone on the forebridge was knocked flat by the
+explosion of the shell which hit it, and the worst of it was that the
+most of us didn't get up again. The sub and the middy who were acting as
+Control Officers were blown off their platform and so badly knocked up
+that they were unable to carry on. One signalman and one voice-pipe man
+were killed outright.
+
+"The rest of us were only shaken up or no more than slightly wounded by
+this particular shell, but the one which brought down the mast added not
+a little both to casualties and material damage. The radio aerials came
+down with the mast, of course, and it was some of the wreckage from one
+or the other that fell on the captain, wounding him severely in both
+arms. Dazed and shaken, he still gamely stuck to the wreck of the
+bridge, but the active command now fell to me.
+
+"This damage, serious as it was, was by no means the extent of that
+inflicted by this unlucky salvo. A third shell, as I shortly learned,
+had passed through the fore shell-room and into the fore magazine. In
+which it exploded I could not quite make sure, but both were set on
+fire. This fire got to some of the cordite before it was possible to get
+it away, and the ensuing explosion killed or wounded most of the supply
+parties and the crews of the twelve-pounders. It was brave beyond all
+words, the fight those men made to save the ship down in that
+unspeakable hell-hole, and it was due wholly to their courage and
+devotion that the explosion was no worse than it was. This trouble,
+luckily, was hardly more than local, but a number of good lives was the
+price of keeping it so.
+
+"There was one other consequence of that salvo, and though it sounds
+funny to tell about it now, it might well have made all the difference
+in the world to us. In the bad smashing-up of the bridge of any ship by
+shell-fire the means of communication with the rest of her--the
+voice-pipes, telephones, telegraphs, etc.--are among the first things to
+be knocked out. This means, if there are no alternatives left, that
+directions have to be relayed around by shouting from one to another
+until the order reaches the man to carry it out. This would be an
+awkward enough expedient for a ship that is not under fire and fighting
+for time and her life. What it is with the enemy's shell exploding about
+you, and with your own guns firing, I will leave you to imagine. Well,
+we had all this going on, and besides that a fire raging below that
+always had the possibilities of disaster in it until it was
+extinguished. Also, we were already short-handed from our losses in
+killed and wounded. There wasn't anyone to spare to relay orders about
+in any case. But what capped the climax was this: When the mast was shot
+down, some of the raffle of rigging or radio fouled the wires leading
+back to both of the sirens, turning a full pressure of steam into them
+and starting them blowing continuously. It was almost as though the poor
+maimed and mangled _Flop_ were wailing aloud in her agony.
+
+"I didn't think of it that way at the time, though, for I had my hands
+full wailing loud enough myself to make even the man at the wheel
+understand what I wanted him to do. Luckily, the engine-room telegraph,
+though somewhat cranky, was still in action, and orders to other parts
+of the ship we managed to convey by flash-lamp or messenger. It was ten
+minutes or more before they contrived to hush the sirens--it was cutting
+off their steam that did it, I believe--and by then a new and even more
+serious trouble had developed through the jamming of the helm. It was
+hard over to starboard at that, so that the _Flop_ simply began turning
+round and round like a kitten chasing its tail. This involuntary
+manoeuvre had one favourable effect in that it seemed to throw the
+Austrian gunnery off for a bit, though one shell which penetrated and
+exploded in the after tiller-flat shortly after she began cutting capers
+did not make it any easier to coax the jammed helm into doing its bit
+again.
+
+"Our 'ring-around-the-roses' course had resulted in our coming much
+nearer to the enemy, who, seeing a chance to finish us off, was trying
+to close the range at high speed. Our rotary course brought them on a
+continually shifting bearing, and it was while they were coming up on
+our port bow at a distance of less than a mile that it suddenly became
+evident that the cruisers were about to present us the finest and
+easiest kind of a torpedo target. The captain, who, in spite of his
+wounds, was still trying to stick the show through, saw the opening as
+soon as I did, and, because there was no one else free to attempt the
+trick, tackled it himself. But it was a case of the spirit being willing
+and the flesh weak. With every ounce of nerve in him he tried to make
+his almost useless hands work the forebridge firing-gear. The chance
+passed while he still fumbled frantically but vainly to release the one
+little messenger--a mouldie--that would have been enough to square
+accounts, and with some to spare. It was the hardest thing of all--not
+being able to take advantage of that opening.
+
+"It was twenty minutes before the helm was of any use at all, and the
+Austrians had only their lack of nerve to thank for not putting us down
+while they had a chance. It must have been because they were afraid of
+some kind of a trap, for there were a half-dozen ways in which a force
+of their strength could have disposed of a ship as helpless and
+knocked-out generally as was the _Flop_. The _Flip_ had also been hard
+hit, and when I had a chance for a good look at her again it appeared
+that her mast, like ours, was trailing over the side. She was still
+firing, however, and it was she rather than the enemy that was trying to
+close. We were quite cut off from wireless communication, as all
+attempts to disentangle the aerials from the wreckage of the mast had
+been unsuccessful; but it was evident that help was coming to us, and
+that the Austrians had in some way got wind of it. At any rate, our
+immediate responsibilities were over. We had prevented the enemy from
+reaching his objective, and possibly delayed him long enough for some of
+our other ships to have a chance at harrying his retreat. It was now up
+to us to limp to port on whatever legs we had left.
+
+"We were still a long way from being out of action even now, but with
+the fires continuing to burn fiercely in the fore magazine and
+shell-room, with the helm threatening to jam every time course was
+altered, and with a considerable mixture of water beginning to make its
+presence felt in the oil, there was no telling what complications might
+set in at any moment. As one of the Italian bases in Albania was rather
+nearer than any port on the other side of the Adriatic, it was for that
+we set our still erratic course.
+
+"Our troubles were not yet over, however. Just as the moon came down and
+sat on the sea preliminary to setting, squarely against the round yellow
+background it formed I saw the silhouette of the conning-tower of a
+U-boat. At almost the same instant the helm jammed again. Then it worked
+free for a few seconds, but only to jam presently, just as before. This
+continued during two or three minutes, and just as it was wangled right
+and we began to steady again I saw the wake of a torpedo pass across our
+bows. Half a minute later another one missed us in the same way, and by
+about the same distance. I have always thought that nothing but that
+providential jamming of the helm just then saved us from intercepting
+both of those mouldies.
+
+"The fires in the fore shell-room and magazine were eventually got under
+control by flooding, and we were fairly cushy when we dropped anchor at
+base a little before daybreak."
+
+K---- lurched over to the starboard rail and counted the dark blurs that
+represented the units of the straggling convoy. He was wiping snow and
+spray from his face as he slid back on the roll to our stanchion.
+
+"Fine place, Southern Albania," he muttered. "Plenty of heat and dust
+and sunshine and----"
+
+I never did hear what the rest of those Albanian attractions were. At
+that juncture dusky figures emerging from the deeper gloom of the ladder
+heralded the appearance of the middle watch, and for those relieved,
+including myself, the world held just one thing--a long, narrow bunk,
+with a high side rail to prevent the occupant from rolling out. You go
+at your sleep on a destroyer as a dog dives at a bone, for you never
+know how long it may be before you get another chance.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+PATROL
+
+
+The Senior Naval Officer (or the S.N.O., as they clip it down to) at
+X---- had prepared me for finding an interesting human exhibit in the
+sharp-nosed, stub-sterned little craft snuggled up to the breast of its
+mothership for a drink of petrol, or whatever other life-giving essence
+she lived and laboured on, but hardly for the highly diversified
+assortment that was to reveal itself to me during those memorable days
+we were to rub shoulders and soak up blown brine and grog together as
+they threaded the gusty sea lanes of her winter North Sea patrol.
+
+"I am sending you out on M.L.[D] ----," the S.N.O. had said as he gazed
+down with an affectionate smile at the object of his remarks, "for
+several reasons, but principally on account of the men that are in her.
+You'll find them a living, breathing object-lesson in the adaptability
+of the supposedly stodgy and inflexible Anglo-Saxon race. Her skipper,
+to use one of his own favourite expressions, is a live wire--always
+seems to be able to spark when there's trouble in the wind. He came from
+somewhere in Western Canada, I believe. Seems to have tried farming
+there for a spell, and I think he said something once about running his
+own agricultural tractor. At any rate, in some way or another, he has
+picked up more practical knowledge of petrol engines than many of our
+so-called experts.
+
+[Footnote D: Motor launch.]
+
+"The fact is," continued the S.N.O. as we turned back towards his office
+at the end of the quay, "the fact is that D----, though he never saw
+salt water before he crossed the Atlantic to do his bit in the War, and
+though he never has got and never will get, I'm afraid, his sea-legs, is
+in many respects the most useful M.L. Officer I have ever had to do
+with, and that's saying a good deal, let me assure you.
+
+"He's always sick as a dog from the time he puts to sea to the time he
+returns to port. The only thing that is liable to be more sick is the
+Hun submarine he once gets his nose on. I've heard him say in a joking
+way, two or three times, that he always could scent a Hun as far as he
+could a skunk--I think that's what he calls it; and from some of the
+things he's done I must confess I'm more than half inclined to believe
+him. Perhaps his most remarkable achievement, however, is that of taking
+eight or ten men, just as green as he was himself regarding the sea, and
+making of them a crew that will handle that cranky little lump of a
+craft pretty nearly as smartly as old trawler-men would on the nautical
+side, and at the same time having a fund of resource always on tap that
+is positively uncanny--almost Yankee, in fact," he added with a smile.
+"Indeed, I believe D---- speaks of having knocked about the States a bit,
+which may account for some of the 'wooden-nutmeg' tricks he has played
+on the U-boats. Try to get him to tell you some of them. You'll hardly
+be allowed to write much of them for a while yet--certainly not until
+they have become obsolete through the introduction of new devices; but
+you'll find it good material some day."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+M.L. ---- looked more diminutive than ever as I was rowed out to her
+anchorage in the chill grey mists of the following morning; but a raw
+cold, which had been striking through to the marrow of my bones,
+dissolved, as by magic, before the friendly warmth of the welcome
+which awaited me, when I had clambered up the sawn-off Jacob's Ladder
+and over the wobbly wire rail. A slender but lithely active chap in a
+greasy overall and jumper, to give it the Yankee name, gave me a
+finger-crushing grip with his right hand, while with his left he deftly
+caught and saved from immersion my kit-bag, which had fallen short in
+the toss that had been given it from below. Just for an instant the
+absence of visible insignia of rank made me think that he was a petty
+officer of engineers, or something of the kind; then the magnetism of
+his personality flowed to me through the medium of his hand-clasp, and I
+knew I was looking into the eyes of a man who would not be likely to
+figure for long as anything less than "Number One" on any kind of job he
+ever undertook.
+
+"You're just in time for a 'square,'" he said heartily, leading the
+way to the tiny hatch and preceding me down the ladder. "You'll be
+needing it, too, after that pull with nothing more than that sloppy
+dish-wash kaffy-o-lay that you get at the hotel at this hour of the
+morning on your stomach. Don't try to bluff me that you had anything
+more. I know by sad experience. Now _I'll_ give you something that'll
+stick to your ribs. What do you say to some Boston baked beans and a
+'stack o' hots'? Guess I know what a 'Murican likes. Sorry my maple
+syrup's gone, but here's some dope I synthesised out of melted sugar
+and m'lasses--treacle, they call it over here."
+
+Reaching the lower deck, we edged along to a transom at the end of a
+table which all but filled the tiny dining-cabin.
+
+"Shake hands with Mac," said the skipper by way of introducing me to a
+tall and extremely good-looking youth in a Cardigan jacket, duffel
+trousers, and sea-boots, who rose with a smile of welcome as we dropped
+down beside him. "Mac's a Canuck, like myself," he went on, after asking
+me if I liked my eggs "straight up" or "turned over," and passing the
+order on to a diminutive Cockney with a comedian's face, who came
+tripping in almost as though wafted on the "smell o' cooking" which
+preceded him through the opened galley door.
+
+"Mac learned his sailoring on his dad's yacht on Lake Ontario, and I
+learned mine driving a 'deep-seagoing' side-wheel tractor on a ranch in
+Alberta. Only time I was ever afloat before I became a 'Capt'in in the
+King's Navee' was on a raft on the old Missouri, in Dakota; and that
+isn't really being afloat, you know, for 'bout one half the water of
+that limpid stream is mud and the other half catfish. A great pair of
+old salts, we two--hey, Mac?
+
+"And the rest of the crew's no more 'saline' than its 'orfficers.'
+That's the way they say it, ain't it, Mac? Little 'Arry, the
+galley-slave, was a knock-about artist in the London music-halls before
+he 'eard the sea a-callin', and now he doesn't 'eed nothin' else, do
+you, Harry? And you'll hear the sea a-callin' that nice big breakfast of
+yours just as soon as we get outside the Heads, won't you, Harry? And
+then you won't 'eed nothin' else for quite a while. And so'll Mac hear
+the sea a-calling his breakfast, and so'll I, and so'll all the rest of
+us--every mother's son. It's a fine lot of Jack Tars we are, the whole
+bunch of us. Did I tell you that one of my quartermasters is an
+ex-piano-tuner, and that the other was a Salvation Army captain before
+he entered the Senior Service for the duration? And my Chief--that's him
+you hear alternating between tinkering and swearing at the engines on
+the other side of that bulkhead you're leaning against--owned a
+motor-boat of his own before the War, and appears to have divided his
+waking hours between racing that and his stable of motor-cars? You can
+tell he was a gentleman once by the fluency of his cussing. He's the
+only man I've met over here that could give yours truly any kind of a
+run in dispensing the pungent persiflage; but I had the advantage of
+driving mules as a kid.
+
+"But cussing, though it helps with a lot of things, doesn't make a
+sailor, and the Chief's no more of a Jack Tar than me or Mac or Harry.
+Fact is, that the only man aboard who ever made his living out of the
+sea before the war is a fisherman from the Hebrides; and even the
+glossary in the back of my Bobbie Burns won't translate his lingo. Two
+or three times, when the sea has been kicking up a bit, he has managed
+to tell us that no self-respecting God-fearing sailor would be oot in
+such weather. Possibly he's been right; but, as none of us are sailors,
+we don't feel called on to pay much attention to his ravings. Our duty
+is to harass any Huns that encroach on our beat; and the fact that we've
+had a modicum of success in that line proves you don't have to be a
+sailor to qualify for the job. Which don't mean, though," he concluded
+with a smile of sad resignation as he rose and reached for his
+oil-skins, "that I don't hope and pray that I'll develop the legs and
+stomach of a sailor before the war's over."
+
+When breakfast was eaten, forward and aft, all hands were piped on deck,
+and in less than ten minutes M.L. ---- was under way and threading the
+winding channels of a cliff-begirt Firth to the mist-masked waters of
+the North Sea.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As I picked my way forward to the little glassed-in cabin, which served
+the double purpose of navigating-bridge and wheel-house, I told myself
+that I was sure of two things--first, that the skipper, by birth,
+breeding, residence, and probably citizenship, was an American of
+Americans, and, second, that the chances were he would not admit that
+fact unless I "surprised him with the goods." An Englishman will often
+mistake a Canadian for an American but a Yankee himself will rarely make
+that error. I was sure of my man on a dozen counts, and resolved to lay
+in figurative ambush for him.
+
+I all but had him within the hour. We were clear of the Heads, and the
+skipper, having turned over to Mac, was trying to forget that imperious
+call o' the sea he had chaffed 'Arry about by showing me round. He had
+explained the way a depth-charge was released, and was just beginning to
+elaborate on the functions of an old-fashioned lance-bomb.
+
+"Now this fellow," he said, balancing the ungainly contrivance and
+giving it a gingerly twirl about his head, "is a good deal like the
+sixteen-pound hammer which I used to throw at college."
+
+Knowing that the hammer-throw was not a Canadian event, I promptly cut
+in with "What college?" "Minnesota," he answered readily enough;
+adding, as I began to grin: "A good many Canadians go across there for
+the agricultural courses." I resolved to await a more favourable
+opportunity before bringing my "charge" point-blank. It came that
+afternoon, when I stood beside him on the bridge as he bucked her
+through ten miles of slashing head-sea, which had to be traversed to
+gain the shelter of a land-locked bay beyond a jutting point, where we
+were to lie up for the night. He was telling me U-boat-chasing yarns in
+the patchy intervals between the demands of _mal de mer_ and navigation,
+and one of them ended something like this: "Old Fritz--just as we
+intended he should--caught the reflection of the flame through his
+upturned periscope and, thinking his shells had set us afire, rose
+gleefully to gloat over his Hunnish handiwork. Bing! I let him have it
+just like that."
+
+The motion with which he flung the lemon he had been sucking as an
+antidote for sea-sickness could not have been in the least suggestive of
+what really happened; but that straight-from-the-shoulder,
+elbow-flirting, right-off-the-ends-of-the-fingers action was so like
+another motion with which I had long been familiar, that, with a meaning
+side-squint, I observed promptly:
+
+"So you add baseball to your other accomplishments, do you? Did a bit of
+pitching, if I don't miss my guess? How long have you played?"
+
+"Since I was a kid," he admitted with a grin that sat queerly on the
+waxy saffron of his sea-sick face. "Yes, I even 'tossed the pill' at
+college--that is, until a shoulder I knocked out trying to slide home
+one day spoiled my wing."
+
+I knew I had him the instant that first admission left his lips. "Since
+the kids weren't playing sand-lot baseball in Canada twenty years ago,"
+I said, ducking low to let the spray from a sea which had just broken
+inboard blow over, "you might just as well 'fess up and tell me which
+neck of the Mississippi Valley you hail from. Just as one Yankee to
+another," I pressed, as his piercing eye turned on me a look that seemed
+to bore right through and run up and down my spine; "even as one Middle
+Westerner to another, for I was born in Wisconsin myself."
+
+For an instant his lips hardened into a straight line, and the flexed
+jaw-muscles stood out in white lumps on either side; then his mouth
+softened into a broadening grin, and a moment later he burst into a
+ringing laugh.
+
+"Sure thing, old man, since you put it on 'sectional' grounds, and since
+we're going to be shipmates for a week, and"--fetching me a thumping
+wallop on the back--"since we both wear the same uniform, anyhow, curly
+stripe and all, I'll make a clean breast of it. I was born in
+Kansas--got a farm there, near a little burg called Stockton,
+to-day--and was never out of the Middle West in my life till I crossed
+over into Canada to enlist in the first year of the war. I felt I had to
+get into the show somehow, and the little old U.S.A. was hanging fire so
+in the matter of coming in that I just couldn't wait. I'll tell you the
+whole story when we're moored for the night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I have never been able to recall my yarn with D---- that evening without
+a hearty guffaw. A rising barometer had cleared the grey smother of mist
+from the sea, but a shift of the wind from south-east to north-east
+exposed us to a blast which, chilled at its fount in the frozen fjords
+of Norway, knocked the bottom out of the thermometer and filled the air
+with needle-like shafts of congealed moisture that seemed to have been
+chipped from the glassy steel dome of the now cloudless sky. There was a
+filigree of frost masking the wheel-house windows before the early
+winter night clapped down its lid, and the men who went forward to pass
+a line through the ring of the mooring-buoy pawed the icy deck with
+their stiff-soled sea-boots without making much more horizontal progress
+than a squirrel treading its wheel.
+
+It would have been bracing enough if there had been a cheery open fire,
+or at least a glowing little sheet-iron stove, to thaw and dry out at,
+as there is on most patrol craft, and even on many trawlers. But in the
+particular type to which M.L. ---- belonged (the units of which are said
+to have been built in fulfilment of a rush order given one winter on
+the assumption that the War would be over before the next) there was no
+refinements and few comforts. Heating is not included among the latter:
+the only stove in the boat being in the galley, where the drying of wet
+togs in restricted quarters is responsible for a queer but strangely
+familiar taste to the pea-soup and Irish stew which you never quite
+account for until you discover the line of grease on the corner of the
+tail of your oilskin or the toe of your sea-boot.
+
+The diminutive electric heaters are true to the first part of their name
+rather than the last: that is to say, while they are undeniably
+electric, it is equally certain that they do not heat. There _is_ a
+certain amount of warmth in them, as I discovered the time I scorched my
+blankets by taking one to bed with me; but that is of use only when you
+can confine it and apply locally, which is rarely practicable in a small
+craft at sea, even when you have the time for it.
+
+It will be readily understood, therefore, why on a M.L., at sea in
+really wintry weather, the only alternative to sitting up and being
+slowly but surely chilled to the marrow is to doff wet togs as soon as
+you come off watch, don dry ones, bolt your dinner, and turn in. This is
+just what we had to do on M.L. ---- that night; for, besides the really
+intense cold, a sea which came through the sky-light of the little
+dining-cabin early in the afternoon had drenched cushions and curtains,
+with enough left over to form an inch or two of swashing swirl upon the
+deck. Poor 'Arry, with the effects of the "call o' the sea" still
+showing in his hollow eyes and pasty cheeks, was not in shape to do much
+either in the way of "slicking up" or "snugging down"; while the extent
+of his culinary effort was limited to a kedgeree of half-boiled rice and
+pale canned salmon, and a platter of eggs fried "straight up," according
+to D----'s order, with the yolks glaring fish-eyedly at you from a
+smooth, waxy expanse of congealed grease. D----, who was still somewhat
+"introspective" himself, turned down the "straightups" straightaway,
+bent a look that was more grieved than angry on the forlorn 'Arry, and
+then, rising shiveringly, started edging along over the sodden divan
+toward his cabin door.
+
+"As principal medical officer of this ship," he said through chattering
+teeth, "I prescribe the only treatment ever found to be efficacious in
+such circumstances as the present--bunk, blankets, and hot toddy."
+
+There were two bunks in D----'s narrow cabin, and it was not until we
+had turned into these--he in the lower, I in the upper--that the
+mounting glow of soul and body thawed the reserve which had again
+threatened to grip him in the matter of where he came from, and set his
+tongue wagging of his life on the old home farm, and from that to a
+sketchy but vivid recital of things that he had done, and hoped still
+to do, as the skipper of a British patrol boat. It is the vision that
+the memory of that recital conjures up: D----, with a Balaclava helmet
+pulled low over his ears, gesticulating excitedly up to where I, the
+unblanketed portion of my anatomy shrouded to the eyes in a wool
+duffel-coat, leaned out over the edge of the bunk above--that I can
+never dwell on without laughing outright.
+
+The story of the way in which it happened that D---- came over to get
+into the game in the first place did not differ greatly from those I
+have heard from a score or more of young Americans who, partly inspired
+by a sense of duty and partly lured by the promise of adventure, sought
+service in the British Army or Navy by passing themselves off as
+Canadians. He had intended to enlist in the Army at first; but when he
+found that six months or more might elapse before he would be sent to
+the other side, he crossed at his own expense on the chance of avoiding
+the delay. At the end of a disappointing month spent in trying to enlist
+in some unit that had a reasonable expectation of going into active
+service at once, the intervention of an old college friend--an able
+young chemical engineer occupying a prominent post in Munitions--secured
+him a sub-lieutenant's commission in the R.N.V.R. Although, as he
+naively put it, the sea was no friend of his, it appears that the M.L.
+game had proved congenial from the outset: so much so, indeed, that
+something like three years of service found him with two decorations and
+innumerable mentions to his credit, to say nothing of the reputation of
+being one of the most resourceful, energetic and generally useful men in
+a service in which all of those qualities are taken more or less as a
+matter of course. He had gone in as a Canadian for fear that he might be
+turned down as a Yankee, and then, to use his own words: "By the time
+the U.S.A. began to take a hand, I had told so many darn lies about
+hunting and fishing and farming in Alberta and British Columbia that I
+concluded it would be less trouble to go on telling them than to start
+in denying them. The boundary between Canada and the U.S.A. is more or
+less of an imaginary line, anyhow, and so is that between the average
+Yankee and Canuck. I reckon I've made it just as hot for the Hun as the
+latter as I would have as the former, and that's really the only thing
+that counts at this stage of the game." It was this last observation, I
+believe, which started D---- talking of his work.
+
+"Generally speaking," he said, reaching up the match with which he had
+just lighted a cigarette to rekindle the tobacco in my expiring pipe,
+"the role of the M.L. is very much more defensive than it is offensive.
+It is supposed to police certain waters, watch for U-boats, report them
+when sighted, and then carry on as best it can till a destroyer, or
+sloop, or some craft with a real punch in it, comes up and takes over.
+Well, my idea from the first has been to make that 'defensive' just as
+'offensive' as possible, and it's really astonishing how obnoxious some
+of us have been able to make ourselves to the Hun. Off-hand, since, with
+his heavier guns, the average Hun is more than a match for us even on
+the surface, there wouldn't seem much that we could do against him
+beyond running and telling one of our big brothers. The perfecting of
+the depth-charge gave us one very formidable weapon, however, and that
+of the lance-bomb another, though the days when Fritz was tame and
+gullible enough to allow himself to be enticed sufficiently near to
+permit the use of the latter are long gone by. The most satisfying job I
+ever did, though, was pulled off with a lance-bomb; and, since there is
+not one chance in a thousand of our ever getting away with the same kind
+of stunt again, there ought to be no kick on my telling you just how it
+happened.
+
+"You see," he went on, pulling a big furry-backed mitten on the hand
+most exposed to the cold in gesticulation, and tucking the fingers of
+the other inside the neck of the Balaclava for warmth, "Fritz is an
+animal of more or less fixed habits, and so the best way to hunt him,
+like any other animal, is to begin by making a study of his little ways.
+I specialised on this for some months, confining myself almost entirely
+to what he did in attacking, or when being attacked by, M.L.s, and
+ignoring his tactics with sloops, trawlers, and other light craft. It
+wasn't long before I discovered that his almost invariable
+practice--when it was a matter of only himself and a M.L.--was to get
+the latter's range as quickly as possible, endeavour to knock it out, or
+at least set it afire, by a few hurried shots, and then to submerge and
+make an approach under water for the purpose of making a closer
+inspection of the damage inflicted. In this way the danger of a hit from
+the M.L.'s gun was reduced to a minimum--an important consideration, as
+a holing by even a light shell might well make it impossible to submerge
+again. And a U-boat incapable of seeking safety in the depths is, in any
+part of the North Sea where it would have been likely to meet a M.L.,
+just as good as done for.
+
+"I also found that when explosions had taken place in the M.L., or when
+it was heavily afire by the time the U-boat drew near, it was the
+practice of the latter to come boldly up and finish the good work at
+leisure, with the addition of any of the inimitable little
+Hunnisms--such as firing on the boats, or ramming them, or running at
+full speed back and forth among the wreckage so as to give the screws a
+good chance to chop up the swimming survivors--of which _Unterseeboot_
+skippers were even then becoming past masters.
+
+[Illustration: A DEPTH CHARGE]
+
+[Illustration: DISABLED DESTROYER IN TOW]
+
+"In short," here D---- paused for a moment while he lifted the little
+electric heater and lighted a fresh cigarette on one of the glowing
+bars, "in short, I studied the vermin in just the same way I did the
+gophers and prairie-dogs when I started to exterminate them on my Kansas
+farm. I found out when they were most likely to come up, when to stay
+down; what things attracted them, and what repelled. Then I went after
+them. Of course, there was no chance for the clean sweep I made of the
+gophers and prairie-dogs, but we've still managed to keep our own little
+section of the beat pretty clear.
+
+"Having satisfied myself regarding the Hun's penchant for stealing up,
+submerged, to gloat over the dying agonies of his victim, it seemed to
+me that the obvious thing to do was to lead him on with an imitation
+death-agony, and then have a proper surprise waiting for him when he
+came up to gloat. The first thing I started working on was how to 'burn
+up' and 'blow up' with sufficient realism to deceive the skipper of a
+submerged U-boat, and still be in shape to spring an effective surprise
+if he could be tempted into laying himself open to it.
+
+"My first plan proved too primitive by far. I reckoned that the
+'blowing-up' touch might be provided by dropping a depth-charge, and
+that of 'burning up' by playing my searchlight on the surface of the
+water on the side the approach was to be expected from. Neither was good
+enough. The 'can' might have been set to explode on the surface, but
+that could not be affected without running the chance of blowing in my
+own stern. But the bing of a depth-charge detonating well under the
+water is quite unmistakable, and the first U-boat I tried to lure with
+one made off forthwith, plainly under the impression that it was the
+object of an active attack. As for the searchlight, I saw that it
+wouldn't do the first time I went down and took a peep at a trial of it
+through the periscope of one of our own submarines. The beam did cast a
+patch of brightness discernible through the upturned 'eye' at a depth of
+from sixty to eighty feet, but it was neither red enough nor fluttery
+enough to suggest anything like a burning ship. I set to work to devise
+something more life-like, without ever waiting for a chance to draw a
+Fritz with it.
+
+"First and last, I tried a goodly variety of 'fire' experiments," D----
+continued, snuggling down for a moment with both arms under the
+blankets, "and I don't mind admitting that I'd like to have a few of
+'em, smoke and all, flaming up all over this refrigerator right now. The
+thing I finally decided to try consisted of nothing more than a light,
+shallow tank of ordinary kerosene--paraffin oil, I believe they call it
+here--made fast to a small, roughly built raft. The _modus operandi_ was
+as simple as the contrivance itself. As soon as a U-boat was sighted,
+the raft was to be launched on the _opposite_ side, and kept about
+thirty feet out by means of a light boom. The next move was to be up to
+Fritz, and it was fairly certain he would do one of two things--submerge
+and make off, or remain on the surface and begin to shell us. In the
+latter case we were to start firing in reply, of course; but that was
+only incidental to the main plan. This was to wait until we were hit,
+or, preferably, until he fired an 'over,' the fall of which, on account
+of his low platform, he could not spot accurately, and then to fire the
+tank of kerosene. A line to a trigger, rigged to explode a
+percussion-cap, made it possible to do this from the rail. As the
+flames, besides giving off a lot of smoke, would themselves leap high
+enough to be seen from the other side, it was reasonable to suppose that
+Fritz would be deluded into thinking we were burning up, and make his
+approach a good deal more carelessly than otherwise. If he persisted in
+closing us on the surface, there would be nothing to it but to make what
+fight we could with our fo'c'sl' gun, and try to make it so hot for him
+that he would have to go down before his heavier shells had done for us.
+But if, following his usual procedure, he made his approach submerged,
+then there were two or three other little optical and aural illusions
+prepared for his benefit. I will tell you of these in describing how we
+actually used them."
+
+D---- lay quiet for a minute, the wrinkles of a baleful grin of
+reminiscence showing on both sides of the aperture of the Balaclava.
+"The first chance we had to try the thing out it nearly did us in," he
+chuckled presently. "No, Fritz had nothing to do with it. _He_, luckily
+for us, submerged and beat it off after firing three or four
+shots--probably through mistaking the smoke of a couple of trawlers just
+under the horizon for that of destroyers. It was all due to bad luck and
+bad judgment--principally the latter, I'm afraid. It was bad luck to the
+extent that the U-boat was sighted down to leeward, so that there was no
+alternative but to put over my 'fire-raft' on the windward side. The bad
+judgment came in through my underestimating the force of the wind and
+the fierceness with which the kerosene would burn when fanned by it.
+Scarcely had it been touched off before there was a veritable
+_Flammen-werfer_ playing against thirty or forty feet of the windward
+side, and in a way which made it impossible for a man to venture there
+to cast off the wire cables which moored the raft. As this class of
+M.L.s have wooden hulls, you will readily see that this was no joke.
+
+"The splash of the beam seas proved an efficacious antidote, so far as
+the hull was concerned, however; but how some other highly inflammable
+material I was carrying 'midships escaped being fired in the minute or
+more that I was swinging her through sixteen points to bring the raft to
+the leeward of her---- Well, I can only chalk that up to the credit of
+the special Providence that is supposed to intervene especially to save
+drunks and fools. You can bet your life I never let myself be tempted
+into making that break again, though it involved a trying exercise of
+self-restraint when it chanced that the very next Fritz I sighted also
+bore down the wind.
+
+"The two or three U-boats which were sighted in the course of the next
+five or six weeks ducked under without firing a shot, and I was
+beginning to think that perhaps they had somehow got wind of my little
+plan and were taking no chances in playing up to it. Then, one fine
+clear morning, up bobs a Fritz about six thousand yards to windward, and
+begins going through his part of the show almost as though he was one of
+our own submarines with which I had been rehearsing. His firing at us
+was about as bad as mine at him; but he finally lobbed one over that was
+close enough, so I knew he couldn't tell whether it was a hit or not,
+and on that I touched off the fire-raft, which was soon spouting up a
+fine pillar of flame and smoke. To discourage his approach on the
+surface, I kept up a brisk firing to give him the impression that we
+were going to live up to British Navy traditions by going down fighting,
+and to convince him that it would be much safer to close under water.
+This came off quite according to plan, and presently I saw the loom of
+his conning-tower dissolve and disappear behind the spout of one of our
+shells, which looked to have been a very close thing.
+
+"I stood on at a speed of five or six knots, but on a course which I
+reckoned he would anticipate and allow for. When I figured that he was
+not over a mile away, I dropped a float over the stern with a time-bomb
+attached to it, the detonation of which in this way I had found by
+experiment to furnish a much more life-like imitation of an internal
+explosion in a ship--when heard in hydrophones, I mean--than that of a
+depth-charge. The periscope which was shortly poked cautiously up for a
+tentative 'look-see' could not, I am pretty nearly dead certain, have
+revealed anything to belie the impression I had laid myself out to
+convey--that M.L. ---- was an explosion-riven, burning, and even
+already, probably a sinking ship. Besides the gay gush of flames from
+the fire-raft, which must have appeared to be roaring amidships, lurid
+tongues of fire were also spouting out of the forrard and after hatches,
+and from several of the ports; while a thirty-degree list to starboard
+might well have indicated that she was about to heel over and go down. I
+had looked at her that way from a periscope myself, while I was studying
+the effect of some 'stage property' flares in comparison with ordinary
+gasoline 'blow-torches,' and knew how much she looked like the real
+thing even when you knew she wasn't. The list? Oh, that was a very
+simple matter. This class of M.L.s is never on an even keel for long,
+anyhow, and the installation of a couple of tanks made it possible to
+pump water back and forth and give her any heel we wanted. We put her
+almost on her beam ends when we were experimenting on the thing, and
+without upsetting things much outside of the galley, which we had
+neglected to warn of what devilry was afoot.
+
+"If we didn't look helpless and harmless enough for any Fritz to run
+right up alongside and 'gloat over,' I'll eat my hat; and that was what
+I was counting on this fellow doing. Indeed, I'll always think that was
+just what he _did_ intend to do eventually; only it was the way he went
+about doing it that was near to upsetting the apple-cart. It seemed
+reasonable to suppose that he would come up and do his gloating on the
+side he approached from, and so that was the side I had prepared to
+receive him on. The heavy list she was under to starboard would have
+made it possible to bring the gun to bear on him until he was almost
+under the rail, and then there would be a chance for a lance-bomb. If he
+came up on the other side by any chance, I had figured that the game
+would be all up; for there was the fire-raft to give it away, while the
+list would be on the wrong slant to give the gun a show. Well, whether
+it was accident or intent, that is just what he did--broached abeam to
+port, about half a cable's length off the sizzling tank of flaming
+kerosene.
+
+"That next minute or two" (D---- sat up in bed in the excitement of the
+memory of that stirring interval, and I felt one of his gesticulating
+fists come with a thump against the bottom of my mattress) "called for
+some of the quickest thinking and acting I was ever responsible for
+pulling off. If he stayed up, it flashed to my mind, there was just the
+chance I might ram him; while if he ducked down, there would probably be
+a good opening for a depth-charge. I rang up full speed at the same time
+I was shouting orders to cast off the fire-raft, and to bash in one end
+of the starboard 'tilting-tank' with an axe. We had considered the
+possibility of this emergency arising, as much as we hoped it wouldn't,
+so that no time was lost in meeting it. The fire-raft, boom and all, was
+cast off clean, and quickly left astern. In scarcely less time was the
+tank emptied, though the sudden flood from it--it was on the upper deck,
+understand--came very near to carrying overboard the man who broached
+it. With motors, of course, we were running all out in 'two jerks,' and
+she was doing several knots over twenty when, with helm
+hard-a-starboard, she began rounding on the startled Fritz.
+
+"There was no doubt about the fact that he _was_ startled, let me tell
+you. And, when you think of it, it must have been a trifle disconcerting
+to see the blown-up and burning boat he had come up to gloat over, and
+perhaps loot before she went down, suddenly settle back on an even keel
+and come charging down on him at twenty-five knots. The 'moony' fat
+phizes that showed above the rail of the bridge were pop-eyed with
+surprise--yes--and indecision, too, for there were several valuable
+seconds lost in deciding whether to come on up--she had risen to the
+surface with only an 'awash' trim--and make a fight with her gun, or to
+dive.
+
+"I don't think it would have made a great deal of difference in his own
+fate which he did, but you can bet it made a lot of difference to me. I
+don't mind telling you that I was never gladder about anything in my
+life--at least anything since the rain that came at the end of a
+three-months' drought to save my corn-crop a few years back--than when
+those moon-faces went into eclipse and I saw him begin to submerge.
+Although it had never formed a part of any plan I had ever worked out, I
+give you my word that I fully intended to ram him, and that would have
+meant--well, about the same thing as one airplane charging into another.
+I should almost certainly have finished him, while at the same
+operation--but I don't need to tell you that a match-box like this was
+never made for bull-at-a-gate tactics. I've never heard of one of this
+class of M.L.s getting home with a good square butt at a U-boat, and I'm
+very happy to say that it didn't happen on this occasion. I don't think
+that we even so much as grazed his 'jump-string'; but the whole length
+of him was in plain sight sloping away from his surface swirl, and it
+was easy as picking ripe pippins to plant an 'ash-can' just where it was
+needed. The only aggravating thing about it was that, although oil came
+boiling up in floods for three days, there was never a Hun, nor even an
+unmistakable fragment of U-boat wreckage, picked up as a souvenir.
+There was never any doubt about the sinking, however, for the trawlers
+located the wreck on the bottom with a sweep, and gave it a few more
+'cans' for luck.
+
+"But the best evidence in my own mind," concluded D----, pulling the
+blankets up higher over his shoulders as he settled back into the bunk,
+"is the fact that, six weeks later, the identical stunt I had tried this
+time actually lured another Fritz up to eat out of my hand almost
+exactly as I had been planning for. Now, if that first one had really
+survived and been able to return to base, it is certain that its skipper
+would have told what he saw, and that there would have been a general
+order (such as came out some months later when they finally did twig the
+game) warning all U-boats against coming up to gloat at close range over
+burning M.L.s. The fact that this second one was such easy picking
+proves beyond a doubt that the other never got back."
+
+"That last was the one you 'threw the hammer' at, wasn't it?" I asked,
+leaning far out to make my words carry down to D----'s now
+blanket-muffled ears.
+
+"Yes," came the wool-dulled answer. "Tell you some other night. Gotta
+get warm now. Toddy can's empty. Make a tent of the blankets with your
+knees, and take the electric heater to bed in it, if you can't stop
+shivering any other way. Good night."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+"Q"
+
+
+At three miles, as seen from the bridge of the battleship, the small
+craft which was steering a course that would bring her across our bows
+in the course of the next few minutes was absolutely nondescript,
+completely defying classification. A mile closer, however, it appeared
+to be as plain as day that she was some ancient fishing boat, but
+bluffer of bow and broader of beam than the oldest of trawlers or
+drifters in the service. It was only when she was right ahead, and but
+six or eight cables' lengths distant, that a vagrant sun-patch came
+dancing along the leaden waters beyond her to form a scintillant
+background against which she stood out as what she was--the
+sweetest-lined little steam yacht that ever split a wave. The
+fishing-boat effect had been obtained by a simple arrangement of colours
+which effectually clipped the clippiness from her clipper bows and
+equally effectually discounted the graceful overhang of her counter.
+
+In plain words, they had blocked in the lines of a bluff, squatty tug on
+her hull with some kind of paint that was very easy to see, and covered
+the rest of her with a paint that was very hard to see. A few changes
+in rig, and the alteration was complete.
+
+"Quite the cleverest and simplest bit of camouflage I ever saw," said
+the captain, lowering his binoculars. "It's only the fact that we're
+looking down on her from a considerable height against that bright sheet
+of water that gives a chance to follow her real lines at all. From the
+deck--and even more so from the bridge of a submarine, or through its
+periscope--it would be a lot easier to tell what she _isn't_ than what
+she _is_. As a matter of fact, I can't say that I know what she is even
+now. It is evident that she _was_ a yacht, and no end of a beauty at
+that. But now, in that guise--probably some sort of patrol or
+anti-U-boat worker, for a guess, perhaps a 'Q.'"
+
+The officer of the watch turned aside for a moment from the gyro across
+which he had been sighting. "I think she must be the '----,' sir," he
+said. "Some American millionaire had her in the Mediterranean, and,
+wanting to do his bit, brought her up to Portsmouth and turned her over
+to the Admiralty to do what they wanted with her so long as it would
+help to lick the Hun. She's been mixed up in several kinds of stunts,
+and is supposed to have a U-boat or two to her credit. Her present
+skipper's a Yank who came to her from a M.L. They say he's no end of a
+character, but right as rain on his job and with a natural nose for
+trouble. One of his hobbies is making his ship look what she isn't,
+and, in order to see her as she would appear to a U-boat, he goes out
+and studies her through the periscope of one of our own submarines. When
+one of these isn't handy, he sometimes goes out in a whaler and studies
+her through a stubby periscope poked over its gunwale. He got blown
+right out to sea one night when he was making some experiment from a
+whaler in 'moonlight visibility,' and didn't get back till the next
+morning. It had no effect on his enthusiasm, though, for he was out on
+the same stunt the next night. No question about his nerve, nor his
+luck, nor his skill, for that matter. Smart seamanship probably has as
+much to do with the fact that he has never been torpedoed as has his
+fancy camouflage."
+
+I made up my mind at once that here was a man worth meeting and hearing
+the story of, but as the only base he seemed to have was not easy to
+reach, and as his ship was reported at sea on the only occasions I was
+free to go there, some weeks went by before I was able to carry out my
+plan of paying him a visit. Then, one morning, a nondescript craft,
+which might have been anything from a wood-pile to a Chinese junk half a
+mile away, came nosing inconsequentially through the lines of the Grand
+Fleet and moored alongside the very battleship in which I happened to be
+at that time.
+
+"K---- has come in with the '----' to 'swing compasses,'" the
+navigating officer announced to the ward-room. "He's a 'converted
+side-wheel river ferry-boat' this morning, or something of the kind; and
+he's going to get blown to sea in a 'sudden gale,' or something of the
+kind; and he says that, if anyone doesn't believe it, to come aboard and
+he'll give 'em something to stimulate their 'stolid British
+imaginations.'"
+
+As certain lockers of the "----" had not been entirely looted of their
+age-mellowed treasure when the yacht was dismantled for sterner service
+than lounging about limpid Mediterranean harbours, the doubters were,
+naturally, many; but it is pleasant to be able to record that those who
+came to scoff remained--to tea. Indeed, it was not until after tea that
+I had a chance for a half-hour's yarn alone with K---- in the
+"banquet-hall-deserted" splendour of the stripped saloon. It was then
+that he told me how it was he chanced to "come across and get into the
+game."
+
+He used the latter expression several times, I remember, and to no one
+that I can recall having met, either on land or sea, was the grim work
+he was doing more of a "game" than to this brave, resourceful,
+devil-may-care Middle Westerner.
+
+"I had had a fair bit of experience in yachting and boating during the
+last six or eight years before the outbreak of the war," he said,
+settling back at ease in one of the two remaining lounging-chairs, "and
+most of it has stood me in good stead at one time or another since I
+have been on the job over here. I sailed a single sticker on Lake
+Michigan for a number of seasons, and I used to run down from my home in
+Lake Forest to business in Chicago in my own motor-boat on and off
+during the summer. It was what I knew of the latter which got me on a
+'M.L.' without any preliminary hanging about when I first came over
+early in the war. What I knew about sailing has been all to the good
+almost every day I have been at sea, from the time I lured on a U-boat
+by ringing up my 'M.L.' as a disabled fishing-smack to the time when I
+had to bring this poor little old girl into port under canvas after I
+had knocked out her propellers with one of her own depth-charges." It
+was a fantastically amusing tale, that last. "It was the culmination of
+my experiments in scientific camouflage," said K----, with a baleful
+smile. "Up to that time any contrivances to deceive the Hun were getting
+more and more intricate right along; since then they have tended more
+and more toward extreme simplicity. It was this way, you see, that I
+happened to work up to that depth-charge crescendo. From the first I had
+been striving to give the U-boat mixed impressions of me, especially on
+the score of which way I was going. This, as I soon found out from
+studying the thing in the proper way, is much easier to do in the case
+of a man whose observation is limited to a few feet above the water than
+in the case of one who has a more lofty coign of vantage to con from.
+That is to say, it's much easier to convey false impressions, especially
+regarding your direction, to a man with his eye to a periscope than to
+one in the foretop of a battleship, to take the two extremes. Trying now
+one thing and now another as I had more experience, I found that where
+at first every shot fired at me was directed ahead with a more or less
+approximate allowance for the ship's progress in that direction, after a
+while they began to go oftener and oftener astern, indicating they were
+confused as to my rate of change. It was just as I was about to put the
+crowning touch on my efforts in 'mixing direction' that the trouble
+occurred. As the experiments with this particular contrivance never went
+any further, there will hardly be any harm in my telling you what it was
+and how it worked.
+
+"I had already, with the aid of a couple of slanting fins, attached
+something after the fashion of bilge-keels, only just below the
+water-line on either quarter, worked up a fairly satisfactory 'bow wave'
+aft, and I was endeavouring to supplement this by a scheme for making it
+appear as though the sky was moving past her funnel in the direction it
+wasn't. You see, I was working on the same principle which deceives you
+when you think the standing train you are in is in motion when you see
+the one on the next track start up.
+
+"As the U-boat skipper's 'look-see' is often limited to a hurried sort
+of a peep, I figured that if I could contrive to keep a rather
+conspicuous imitation sky of canvas running past the masts and funnels
+in the same direction she was going, only faster, it might create the
+illusion--in the distorted 'worm's eye' vision of the man at the
+periscope--that she was going in the opposite direction. I studied some
+make-shift rigs from water-level through a periscope, and made up my
+mind the scheme was worth trying."
+
+K---- relighted his cigar and resumed with a sad smile.
+
+"I still think the idea was good," he said, "but it took too complicated
+an installation to carry it out, especially on a small craft with a low
+freeboard. There were gearings and transmissions and rollers, and
+heavens knows what not, needed to make the endless strip of canvas 'sky'
+run smoothly, and there were also many wires and ropes. It was one or
+the other of the latter which was responsible for the disaster, for
+while the thing was still in the 'advanced experimental' stage a U-boat
+popped up close by one day--probably a bold attempt on its skipper's
+part to see if he really saw what he thought he had seen--and I spun the
+'----' around on her tail (one of the nice things about her is that she
+will turn in a smaller circle than most destroyers) and tried, first
+choice, to ram him, and, second choice, to drop a depth-charge down the
+hole he had ducked into. I was too late to ram by a few seconds, and
+there must have been a good fathom or two of clearance between my keel
+and the conning-tower I had driven for. The bridge and the two
+periscopes he had 'turtle-necked' in showed clean and sharp in the clear
+water as I leaned over the port side of the bridge--the easiest chance a
+man ever had for kicking off a 'can' just where it ought to go. As I
+turned to the depth-charge release I already had visions of him falling
+apart like a cracked egg, with bobbing bubbles and howling Huns coming
+up to the surface together. It was only a couple of days before that I
+had picked up several British fishermen--all that were left alive after
+a U-boat skipper had vented his morning hate by shelling the boat in
+which they were leaving their sinking trawler--and I was still mad
+enough to want to ram Heligoland if a chance had offered. I felt a kind
+of savage joy in the chance to put that tin of T.N.T. where it would
+wipe out a bit of the score I had been checking up against the Hun, and
+I seemed to see a sort of a Hand of Fate in the fist I was reaching up
+to the handle of the release. It couldn't miss, I told myself,
+and--well, it didn't.
+
+"The explosion 'jolted' at the proper interval all right, but not in the
+proper place, nor in the proper way. I was watching for the up-boil
+squarely in the middle of the right-angling propeller swirl of the
+submarine, but that was receding, smooth and unbroken, when the crash
+came. The fact is, I never did see the spout from that charge--for the
+very good reason that it was tossed up almost under the '----'s'
+counter, where it knocked off the blades of both propellers and all but
+blew in her stern. The depth-charge had fouled a trailing wire from some
+of my 'stage scenery sky' and been dragged along to detonate close
+astern. I saw her taffrail shiver and kick upwards, and the shock was
+strong enough to upset my balance even on the bridge. That last was the
+first thing that made me sure something had slipped up, for, ordinarily,
+the jolt from a properly set 'can' is no more than that from a sharp
+bump against the side of a quay. I mean the jolt as felt on the bridge,
+of course; below, and especially in the engine-room or stokehold, it is
+a good deal more severe. It was the shattering jar of this one that told
+me it had gone wrong, and then, when she began to lose way and refuse to
+answer her helm--the rudder had been knocked out, too, but not enough so
+that it couldn't be tinkered up to serve temporarily--I knew it was
+something serious.
+
+"It was a good deal of a relief to find that, badly buckled as some of
+the plates were, she wasn't making any more water aft than the pumps
+could easily take care of. That was the first thing I looked after, and
+the next was the U-boat; or rather, we were looking out for both at the
+same time. If there was one thing more than another that helped to
+reconcile me to the double disappointment of missing my crack at the
+Hun and knocking my own ship out, it was the fact which soon became
+apparent, that Fritz never knew about the latter. If he _had_ known the
+shape I was in, he could have finished me off a dozen times over during
+the hour or more the '----' was lying helpless, and before the first
+armed trawler showed up in answer to my S.O.S. Just why he didn't, I
+could never make quite sure, but the chances are it was one or both of
+two things. It is quite possible that the biff from the
+depth-charge--which must still have been almost as near to him as it was
+to me when it exploded--may have done the submarine really serious
+injury, perhaps even sinking it. We never found any evidence, however,
+that this had been the case. Whether he was damaged or not, there is no
+doubt that his close call gave him a bad scare. There could have been
+nothing in the explosion to tell him that it did any harm to his enemy,
+and, since he did not have his periscope up, there was no way he could
+see what had happened. Doubtless expecting another 'can' any moment, and
+knowing well that it would be only a matter of an hour or two until
+there would be a lot more craft joining in the chase, it is probable
+that he followed the tactics which you can always count on a U-boat
+following when it knows a hunt is on--that is, to submerge deeply and
+lose no time in making itself just as scarce as possible in the
+neighbourhood where the hue-and-cry has started. That's the only way I
+can account for the fact that this particular pirate didn't have a
+revenge after his own Hunnish heart. We were about evenly matched for
+guns probably, and doubtless I would have had rather better than an even
+break on that score, because a surface craft can stand more holing than
+a submarine. But there was nothing to prevent his taking a sneaking
+sight through his periscope from a safe distance and then slipping a
+mouldie at us, which, helpless as we were for a while, there would have
+been no way of avoiding. A moving ship of almost any class, provided it
+has a gun to make him keep his distance, has a good fighting chance of
+saving herself from being torpedoed by the proper use of her helm; a
+disabled ship, though she has all the guns in the world, has no show if
+the Fritz really thinks she's worth wasting two or three torpedoes on.
+If he has his nerve, and any luck at all, he ought to finish the job
+with one.
+
+"So I think you'll have to admit," said K---- with a whimsical smile,
+"that, under the circumstances and considering what might have happened,
+I felt that I had no legitimate kick coming in having to take her home
+under sail. Fact is, I considered myself in luck to have a ship to take
+home at all. The rudder, luckily, though a good deal bent and twisted,
+had not been blown away. It took a lot of nursing to turn it, and, when
+we finally got her off under mainsail, forestaysail and jib, the
+eccentricities it developed took a lot of getting used to. Although it
+was quite fortuitous on our part, the course we steered during the
+thirty hours we put in returning to base was the most complex and
+baffling lot of zigzagging I ever had anything to do with. If a U-boat
+skipper lying in wait for us could have told what she was going to do
+next, I can only say that he would have known a lot more than I did.
+
+"At the end of an hour or two a couple of trawlers hove in sight and
+closed us to be of what help they could in screening. They made a very
+brave show of it until we got under weigh, and then they were led just
+about the wooziest dance you ever heard tell of. By a lucky chance, for
+me, not for the trawlers, there was a spanking breeze on the port
+quarter (for the mean course to base, I mean); and it wasn't long before
+the little old girl, even under the comparatively light spread of sail
+on her, was slipping away at close to nine miles an hour. That won't
+surprise you if you noticed the lines of her. I've turned back in her
+log and found where she's run for thirty-six hours at fourteen miles,
+even with the drag of her screws, which always knock a knot or two off
+the sailing speed of a yacht with auxiliary power.
+
+"Well, that nine miles an hour was a good bit better than those trawlers
+could do under forced draught, and after falling astern for a while,
+they started to catch up by shortening their courses by cutting my
+zigzags. That was where the fun came in. It would have been easy enough
+if I had been zigzagging according to Hoyle. But where I didn't know
+myself just what she was going to do next, how was I going to signal it
+to them, will you tell me? About every other time that they tried to
+anticipate my course they guessed wrong, and were worse off than before
+as a consequence. They must have been a very thankful pair when one of
+the two destroyers which finally came up took them off to hunt the
+submarine. The other destroyer stood by to escort me in. Her skipper
+offered me a tow, but I was anxious to save face as much as possible by
+returning on my own, and so declined. In case of an attack it would have
+been better to have him screening than towing anyhow. In the end, when
+we got in to where the sea room was restricted, I was glad to take a
+hawser from a tug they sent to meet me to keep from putting her on the
+mud.
+
+"You may well believe that effectually put an end to my experiments with
+'movable sky,' and other similar mechanical complexities," K----
+continued with a laugh. "Indeed, from that time on I have been inclining
+more and more to simpler things, rig outs that are sufficiently free
+from wheels within wheels to leave the mind clear for the real work in
+hand, which, after all, is putting down the Hun, not merely deceiving
+him as to what you are. You see how simple a setting our present one is;
+yet it is very complete in its way, and I have reasonable hopes of
+success with it. No, I can hardly tell you just what I am driving at
+with it, or just how I am going to go about it. In a month or two, when
+its possibilities have been exhausted and it has become a wash-out
+perhaps I shall be a bit freer to talk about it.
+
+"Come and spend a day or two with me at the end of about six weeks, when
+my present round of stunting will probably be over, and I'll tell you
+all the 'Q' yarns that the law allows. The Hun is dead wise to the game
+on principle, so there can't be any point in keeping mum any longer on
+stunts that he's twigged a year or so ago, and which you'd have about as
+much chance of taking him in with as you'd have in trying to sell a gold
+brick on Broadway."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Three months went by before I was able to take advantage of K----'s
+invitation to pay him a visit at what he had called his "business
+headquarters," and as I had naturally expected that she would have
+played many and diverse parts in the interim, it was with some surprise
+that I found the "----" still "dressed" as she had been when I last saw
+her.
+
+"We've never quite been able to pull it off," K---- explained, "and the
+waiting, and the not-quites and the might-have-beens have given me no
+end of a dose of that kind of hope deferred which maketh the heart sick.
+But we've at least been lucky enough not to queer the game by showing
+our hand, so that there's still as good a chance as ever to make good
+with it under favourable circumstances. For that reason, the less we say
+about it for the present the better. That's in regard to this particular
+stunt, I mean. As for the rest of the 'Q' stuff that we've brought off,
+or tried to bring off, during the last three years--I'm at your service
+to-night after dinner. The Germans have been publishing accounts of some
+of the stunts, under the title of 'British Atrocities,' for some months
+now, but as there are slight variations from the truth here and there,
+you may still be interested in getting some of the details a bit nearer
+the original fount.
+
+"They claimed, for instance, that when one of their 'heroic' U-boats ran
+alongside an armed British patrol boat, which had surrendered to it, to
+transfer a boarding-party, an officer of the M.L. rushed on deck and
+threw down on the deck of the submarine what the skipper of the latter
+took to be a packet of secret books, and that this 'packet,' exploding,
+eventually resulted in the sinking of the guileless German craft. Now,
+about the only thing which is correct about that account is the
+statement that a U-boat was sunk. It wasn't an armed M.L. that
+surrendered to Herr Ober-Lootenant--armed M.L.'s don't do that sort of
+thing, take my word for it--but an unarmed, or practically unarmed,
+pleasure yacht, which had apparently become disabled and blown to sea.
+And the trusting U-boat did not come alongside to put aboard a prize
+crew to navigate its captive to a German port as they'd try to make you
+believe, but only to sink it with bombs placed in the hold, so as to
+save shells or a torpedo. And it wasn't a packet of secret books that
+put the pirate down, but a 'baby,' and _my_ baby at that. No, I don't
+mean that I threw a real child of mine to Moloch--I haven't any to
+throw--but only that the idea of this literal _enfant terrible_, with a
+percussion cap on the top of his head and a can of T.N.T. for a body,
+originated under my hat.
+
+"It's not surprising that the Huns didn't get the thing straight at
+first, though I believe one of their later versions does have a child in
+the cast, for none of the Germans present have yet returned to tell just
+what happened. About half of them never will see their beloved
+'Vodderland' again, and I don't mind telling you that I'm not wearing
+any crepe on my sleeve on that account, either. Do you know"--K----'s
+face flushed red and his brow contracted in the anger the thought
+aroused--"that those ---- pirates were going right ahead to sink what
+they thought was nothing but a pleasure yacht, with a number of women
+and children in it, although it was plain as day to them that the one
+boat carried would founder under a quarter of our number? That's your
+Hun every time, and it was just that insensate lust of his to murder
+anything helpless that I reckoned on in baiting my trap. I felt dead
+certain---- But I'll tell you the whole yarn this evening."
+
+Several bits of salvage from the "----'s" pleasure-yacht days figured in
+the little feast K---- had spread that evening, and I remember
+particularly that the Angostura was from a bottle Commodore P---- had
+himself secured at the time when that incomparable bitter was distilled
+in a little ramshackle pile-built factory at Ciudad Bolivar, on the
+upper Orinoco. And the coffee that same genial _bon vivant_ had had
+blended and sealed in glass by an old Arab merchant at Aden, while the
+Benedictine had cost him a climb on foot through an infernally hot
+August afternoon to an ancient monastery inland of Naples. It was
+between sips of Benedictine--from a priceless little Morning
+Glory-shaped curl of Phoenician glass, picked up in Antioch one winter
+by the owner, and overlooked in the "stripping" operations--that K----
+told me the story of the first of what he called his "Q-rious"
+operations.
+
+"There was a story attached to just about every little package of food
+and drink P---- left in the yacht," said K----, unrolling the gold foil
+from a cigar whose band bore the name of a Pinar del Rio factory which
+is famed as accepting no order save from its small but highly select
+list of private customers in various parts of the world; "and in the
+several letters he has written begging me to make free with them he has
+told me most of the yarns. The consequence was that, while the good
+things lasted--they're most of them finished now--I was getting in the
+way of enjoying eating and drinking them, telling where they came from
+and how they were come by, just about as much as good old P---- himself
+must have done. In fact, I think that their possible loss was about my
+worst worry when I tried my first 'Q' stunt on.
+
+"The success of any kind of stunt for harrying the U-boat is very
+largely a matter of psychology, and this is especially so in the 'Q'
+department. The main point of it is to make the enemy think you are more
+harmless than you really are. There is nothing new in the idea, for it
+is precisely the same stunt the old pirate of the Caribbean was on when
+he concealed his gun-ports with strips of canvas and approached his
+victims as a peaceful merchantman. As a matter of fact, I think it was
+the Hun himself who started the game in this war, for I'm almost dead
+sure that we had tried nothing of the kind on--in a systematic way, at
+any rate--up to the time one of his U-boats rigged up a mast and sails
+and lured on victims by posing as a fisherman in distress.
+
+"Obviously, it's a game you can't use any kind of craft that is plainly
+a warship in, and the burning question always is as to how far you will
+sacrifice punishing power to harmlessness of appearance. A light gun or
+two is about as far as you can go in the way of shooting-irons, and
+even these are very difficult to conceal on a small boat. Likewise a
+torpedo tube. I tried that first stunt of mine without either, and
+that's where the psychology came in.
+
+"Most of the 'Q-boats' they were figuring on at that time were of the
+slower freighter type, with a rather powerful gun mounted for'ard and
+concealed as well as possible by something rigged up to look like deck
+cargo.
+
+"That was, however, all well and good as far as it went, I figured, but,
+from such study of the Hun's little ways as I had been able to make, I
+had my doubts as to whether an old cargo boat would prove tempting
+enough bait to put a Fritz in the proper mental state for a real
+'rise'--one in which he'd deliver himself up to you bound and gagged, so
+to speak. _That_ was the kind of a thing I wanted to make a bid for,
+and, by cracky, I pulled it off.
+
+"From all I could pick up, from the inside and outside, about the ships
+that had already been torpedoed, I came to the conclusion that the Hun
+would go to a lot more trouble, and take a deal bigger chance, to put
+down a vessel with a number of passengers than he would with a
+freighter. And even that early in the War a U-boat had exposed itself to
+being rammed by a destroyer, when it could have avoided the attack
+entirely by foregoing the pleasure of a Parthian shot at a lifeboat
+which was already half-swamped in the heavy seas. _That_ was the little
+trait of the Hun's that I reckoned on playing up to when I began to
+figure on taking the '----' out U-boat strafing without any gun larger
+than a Maxim aboard her. I'd have been glad enough of a good
+four-incher, understand, if there had been any way in the world it could
+have been concealed. But there wasn't, and rather than miss getting into
+the game at all, I was quite content to tackle it with such weapons as
+were available. That was where my 'che-ild' came in.
+
+"On the score of weapons available, there were only two--the lance-bomb
+and the depth-charge. For the kind of game I had in mind, it was to the
+former that I pinned my faith. It was powerful enough to do all the
+damage needful to the shell of a submarine if only a chance to get home
+with it could be contrived. 'Getting it home' has always been the great
+difficulty with the lance-bomb, and up to that time the only chap to
+have any luck with it was the skipper of a M.L.--another Yank, by the
+way, who came over and got into the game in the same way, and about the
+same time, that I did. He had been the champion sixteen-pound
+hammer-thrower in some Middle Western college only a year or two before,
+and, by taking a double turn on his heeling deck, managed to chuck the
+bomb (which is on the end of a wooden handle, much like the old throwing
+hammer) about three times as far as anyone ever dreamed of, and cracked
+in the nose of a lurking U-boat with it.
+
+"Unluckily, I was not a hammer-thrower, and so had to try to bring about
+an easier shot. It was with this purpose in view that I submitted a
+proposal to reconvert the '----' temporarily to the outward seeming of a
+pleasure yacht; to make her appear so tempting a bait that the Hun's
+lust for _schrecklichkeit_, or whatever they call it, would lure him
+close enough to give me a chance at him. They were rather inclined to
+scoff at the plan at first, principally on the ground that the enemy,
+knowing that there was no pleasure yachting going on in the North Sea,
+would instantly be suspicious of a craft of that character. I pointed
+out that there was still a bit of yachting going on in the Norfolk
+Broads, which the Hun, with his comprehensive knowledge of the East
+Coast, might well know of, and that there would be nothing strange in a
+craft from there being blown to sea in a spell of nor'west weather. Of
+course, the '----' isn't a Broads type by a long way, but I didn't
+expect the Hun to linger over fine distinctions any more than the trout
+coming up for a fly does. The sequel fully proved that I was right.
+
+"It was largely because the stunt I had in mind promised to cost little
+more than a new coat of paint and a few rehearsals, which could easily
+be carried on in the course of our ordinary patrol duties, that I
+finally received somewhat grudging authorisation to go ahead with it. It
+was not till the whole show was over that I learned from the laughing
+admission of the officer who helped secure that authorization, that the
+fact that the output of real M.L.'s was becoming large enough so that
+they were about independent of the use of yachts and other pleasure
+craft for patrol work, also had a good deal to do with the granting of
+it.
+
+"I already had several well-trained machine-gunners in the crew, so that
+about the only addition I had to make to the ship's company was a
+half-dozen boys to masquerade as ladies. As they were not meant to stand
+inspection at close range, nothing elaborate in the way of costume or
+makeup was necessary. They wore middy jackets, with short duck skirts,
+which gave them plenty of liberty of action. Most of them (as there was
+nothing much below the waist going to show anyway) simply rolled up
+their sailor breeches and went barelegged, and one who went in for white
+stockings and tennis shoes was considered rather a swanker. Their
+millinery was somewhat variegated, the only thing in common to the
+motley units of head-gear being conspicuousness. There was a much
+beribboned broad-brimmed straw, a droopy Panama, a green and a purple
+motor veil, and a very chic yachting effect in a converted cap of a
+lieutenant of Marines with a red band round it. Less in keeping, if more
+striking, was a Gainsborough, with magenta ostrich plumes, a remnant
+from some 'ship' theatricals.
+
+"Hair wasn't a very important item, but they all seemed to take so much
+pleasure in 'coiffeuring' that I took good care not to discourage their
+efforts in that direction. The spirit that you enter that kind of a game
+in makes all the difference in the world in its success, and these
+lads--and, indeed, the whole lot of us--were like children playing
+house. All of them were blondes--even a boy born in Durban, who had more
+than a touch of the 'tar brush,' and one--a roly-poly young Scot, who
+had made himself a pair of tawny braids from rope ravellings--looked
+like a cross between 'Brunnhilde' and 'The Viking's Daughter.'
+
+"It was only during rehearsals, of course, that these lads were 'ladies
+of leisure.' The rest of the time I kept them on brass polishing and
+deck-scrubbing, with the result that the little old '----' regained,
+outwardly at least, much of her pristine ship-shapiness. The 'gentlemen
+friends' of the 'ladies' were even more of a 'make-ship' product than
+the latter.
+
+"Indeed, they were really costumes rather than individuals. I don't mean
+that we used dummies, but only that there were eight or ten flannel
+jackets and boater hats laid ready, and these were to be worn more or
+less indiscriminately by any of the regular crew not on watch. Their
+role was simply to loll on the quarterdeck with the 'ladies' while the
+U-boat was sizing us up, then to join for a few minutes in the 'panic'
+following the hoped-for attack, and finally to beat it to their action
+stations.
+
+"That a 'baby' was by far the most effective disguise for the first
+lance-bomb we hoped to chuck home was obvious at the outset. Both of
+them had heads, their general shapes (when dressed) were not dissimilar,
+while the 'long clothes' of the infant was found to have a real
+steadying effect on the missile, on the same principle that 'streamers'
+act to bring an air-bomb down nose-first. Of course, a child in arms,
+like this one was to be, wasn't just the kind of thing one would take
+pleasure yachting; but I knew the Huns took their nurslings to beer
+gardens, and thought that that might make them think that the
+Englanders--who were incomprehensible folk anyhow--might take this
+strange way of accustoming their young to the waves which they sang so
+loudly of ruling.
+
+"The decisive consideration, however, was the fact a baby was the only
+thing except a jewel-case that a panicky woman in fear of being
+torpedoed would stick to. As you can't get a lance-bomb in a jewel-case,
+it was plainly 'baby' or nothing.
+
+"In the end, because I was afraid that none of the feminine make-ups was
+quite good enough not to awaken suspicion at close range--I decided that
+the heaving over of the 'baby' should be done by a 'gentleman' instead
+of by a 'lady.' As one of the seamen put it, it was only 'nateral that
+the nipper's daddy 'ud be lookin' arter 'im in time of danger,' and I
+had read of sailors being entrusted with children on sinking ships. The
+man I picked for the job--the 'father of the che-ild,' as he soon came
+to be called--was not the one who had proved the best in distance
+throwing in the trials, but rather one on whose cold-blooded nerve I
+knew I could count in any extremity.
+
+"He was a Seaman Gunner, named R----, and was lost a year ago when a
+rather desperate 'Q' stunt he had volunteered for miscarried. He had
+just the touch of the histrionic desirable for the intimate little
+affair in question, and the way he played his part fully justified my
+selecting him."
+
+K---- leaned back in his chair and blew smoke rings for a minute before
+resuming his story. "There are some kind of stunts, like this one I've
+been trying to bring off for the last two or three months," he said,
+"that always seem to hang fire; and there are others where, from first
+to last, everything comes up to the scratch on time, just like a film
+drama. That first one I'm telling you about was like that,
+everybody--even to the U-boat--coming on to its cue. Indeed, when I
+think of it now, the whole show seems more like a big movie than
+anything else.
+
+"By the time we were letter perfect in our parts, there came two or
+three days of just the kind of a storm I wanted to make a good excuse
+for a dinky little pleasure boat being out in the middle of the North
+Sea. I took care, of course, to be 'blown' to the last position at
+which an enemy submarine had been reported.
+
+"Then, where a destroyer or a M.L. might have cruised round for a month
+without sighting anything but fog and the smoke of some of our own ships
+on the horizon, we picked up a Fritz running brazenly on the surface the
+first morning. That was first blood for my harmless appearance right
+there, for he must have seen us some time previously of course, and had
+we looked in the least warlike, would have submerged before even our
+lookout spotted his conning-tower.
+
+"As it was, he simply began closing us at full speed, firing as he came.
+It was rotten shooting at first, as shooting from the very poor platform
+a submarine affords usually is, but, at about three thousand yards, he
+put a shell through the fo'c'sl', luckily above the water-line. The next
+minute or two was the most anxious time I had, for, if he made up his
+mind to do it that way, there was nothing to prevent his sticking off
+there and putting us down with shell-fire.
+
+"Perhaps if the two or three shots which followed had been hits, that is
+what he would have done. It was probably his disgust at the fact that
+they were all 'overs' that determined him to close in and finish the job
+with bombs. Possibly, also, the fact that I appeared to be starting to
+abandon ship at this juncture convinced him finally that the yacht had
+no fight in her, and it may well be that the temptation to loot had
+something to do with his decision. I could never make quite sure on
+those points, for Herr Skipper never confided what was in his mind to
+the one officer who survived him. At any rate, he came nosing
+nonchalantly in and did just what I had been praying for the last month
+he would do--poked right up alongside. The heavy sea that had been
+running for the last two or three days had gone down during the night,
+so that he was able to stand in pretty close without running much danger
+of bumping.
+
+"The extent of my abandoning ship had been to follow the old sea rule of
+saving the women and children first. Or rather, we put the women off in
+our only boat; the baby, I won't need to tell you, was somehow
+'overlooked.' The boat was lowered in full view of the Hun, who was
+about fifteen hundred yards distant at the moment, and there was a
+little unrehearsed incident in connection with it that must have done
+its part in convincing him that what he was witnessing was a genuine
+piece of 'abandon.' One of the girls--it was the blonde 'Brunnhilde,' I
+believe--not wanting to miss any of the fun, started to hang back and
+tried to bluff them into letting her stay by swearing that she'd rather
+face the Hun than desert her child. As a matter of fact, the
+'Gainsborough' had more claim on the kid than 'Brunnhilde,' for she--I
+mean he--had cadged its clothes from a sweetheart who worked in a
+draper's shop. If I had been there personally, I'm afraid
+'Brunnhilde's' little bluff would have won through, for a man whose wits
+are keen enough to spring a joke at a crisis has always made an especial
+appeal to me. To the bo'sun, however, orders were orders, and his answer
+to the recalcitrant blonde's insubordination was to rush her to the rail
+by the slack of her middy jacket, and to help her over it with the toe
+of his boot.
+
+"The 'K----'s' low freeboard made the drop a short one, and, luckily,
+'Brunnhilde' missed the gun'nel' of the whaler and landed gently in the
+water, from where she was dragged by the ready hands of her sisters a
+few moments later. They do say, though, that she turned a complete
+flip-flop in the air, and that there was a display of--well, if a Goerz
+prism binocular won't reveal the difference between a pair of blue
+sailor's breeches and French lingerie at under a mile, all I can say is
+that we've much overrated German optical glass. As I learned later,
+however, the Huns, observing only the fall and missing the revealing
+details, merely concluded that the Englanders were jumping overboard in
+panic, and dismissed their last lingering doubts and suspicions.
+
+"The girls were already instructed that they were to lie low and keep
+their peroxide curls out of sight as long as they were within a mile or
+so of the submarine, so as not to tempt the latter to follow them up for
+a look-see at closer range. The boat had orders to pull astern for a
+while, and then, if the Hun was observed to come alongside the '----' as
+hoped, to turn eight or ten points to port and head up in the direction
+from which he had appeared. The reason for this manoeuvre, which was
+carried out precisely as planned, you will understand in a moment.
+
+"On came Fritz, coolly contemptuous, and on went the show, like the
+unrolling of a movie scenario. For a while I was fearful that he might
+order back my boat to use in boarding me with, but as soon as he was
+close enough to be sure that I had no gun he must have decided so much
+trouble was superfluous. He had only one gun, it was evident--the
+gunners kept sweeping it back and forth to cover from about the bridge
+to the engine-room as they drew nearer--and presently I saw men, armed
+with short rifles, coming up through both fore and after hatches. Far
+from exhibiting any signs of belligerency, I still kept three or four of
+my 'flannelled fools' mildly panicking. Or, rather, I _ordered_ them to
+panic mildly. As a matter of fact, they did it rather violently--a good
+deal more like movie rough stuff than the real thing.
+
+"Little difference it made to Fritz, though, who seemed to take it quite
+as a matter of course that the British yachtsman should show his terror
+like a Wild West film drama heroine. On he stood, and when he came
+within hailing distance, a burly ruffian on the bridge--doubtless the
+skipper--shouted something in guttural German-English which I never
+quite made out, but which was probably some kind of warning or other. I
+don't think I saw any of my crew exactly 'Kamerading', but I needn't
+tell you that every man in sight was doing his best to register
+'troubled passivity', or something like that. I had anticipated that I
+might not be in a position to signal his cue to R----, and so had
+arranged that he should keep watch from a cabin port, and to use his own
+judgment about the time of his 'entrance.' I was afraid to have him on
+deck all the time for fear the 'che-ild' might be subjected to too
+careful a scrutiny. R---- was just in flannels, understand, so there was
+nothing suspicious in his own appearance. He did both his play-acting
+and his real acting to perfection, neither overdoing nor underdoing one
+or the other.
+
+"The U-boat was close alongside, rapidly easing down under reversed
+propellers, before R---- appeared, just as natural an anguished father
+with a child as you could possibly ask for. Two or three of the Huns
+covered him with their carbines as he dashed out of the port door of the
+saloon--that one just behind you--but lowered the muzzles again when
+they saw it was apparently only a half-distracted parent trying to
+signal for the boat to come back for him and his babe. I have no doubt
+that there were some very sarcastic remarks passed on that U-boat at
+this juncture about the courage of the English male. _If_ there were,
+the next act of the coolest and bravest boy I ever knew literally
+forced the words down their throats.
+
+"The whaler which, following its instructions, had been pulling easterly
+for some minutes, now bore about four points on the port quarter, so
+that R----, in his apparent endeavour to call its attention to the
+deserted babe, could not have seemed to have been doing anything
+suspicious when he swung the bundle above his head and rushed to the
+rail almost opposite the U-boat's conning-tower. That rotary upward and
+backward swing was absolutely necessary for getting distance with, and
+without it there was no way that forty or fifty pound infant could have
+been hurled the fifteen feet or more which still intervened. As it was,
+it landed, fair and square, in the angle formed by the after end of the
+conning-tower and the deck. At the same instant our machine-guns opened
+up through several of the port scuttles, which had been specially
+enlarged and masked with that end in view, and in a few seconds there
+was not an unwounded Hun in sight. The gunners had been the first ones
+sprayed, with the result that they were copped before firing a shot.
+Their torpedoes, or course, were too close, and not bearing properly
+enough to launch.
+
+"Immediately following the explosion of the bomb and the opening of the
+machine-gun fire a strange thing happened. I saw the U-boat's
+bow-rudders begin to slant, saw her begin to gather way, heard the hum
+of motors as the rattle of the Maxims (their work completed) died out,
+and--down she went, and with three hatches open, and a ragged hole abaft
+the conning-tower where the 'baby' had exploded in its final tantrum. I
+could never get any sure explanation of this from any of the survivors
+we fished up out of the water, but everything points to the probability
+that the skipper--perhaps inadvertently, as the up-kick of the bomb blew
+him overboard--pulled the diving klaxon, and the officer in the central
+control room, not knowing just how things stood above, proceeded to
+submerge as usual. Doubtless the men who should have been standing by to
+close the hatches in such an emergency had been caught by the
+machine-gun fire. With every man below tied down with his duties in
+connection with submerging her, it is quite conceivable that nothing
+could be done, once she was below the surface, to stop the inrush of
+water, and that she was quickly beyond all hope of bringing up again. I
+didn't have a fair chance to size up the hole ripped open by the bomb,
+but rather think that also was large enough to have admitted a good deal
+of water.
+
+"It was rather disappointing in a way, having her go down like that, for
+as things had turned out, it was a hundred to one we should otherwise
+have captured her almost unharmed. There was a good deal of solace,
+however, in the fact that none of the Huns were getting back to tell
+what happened to them, so that this identical stunt was left open for
+use again. As a matter of fact, variations of it were used a number of
+times, by one kind of craft or another, before an unlucky slip-up--the
+one which finished poor R----, by the way--gave the game away and
+started us veering off on other tacks. I have had a number of successes
+since that time," concluded K----, pouring me a glass of the yacht's
+1835 Cognac as a night cap, "but never a one which was quite so much
+like taking candy from a child as that 'opener.'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE _WHACK_ AND THE _SMACK_
+
+
+There was always a strange and distinctive fascination to me in standing
+on the bridge of one ship and watching other ships--and especially lines
+of ships--push up and sharpen to shape above the edge of the sea.
+
+This feeling, strong enough in ordinary times--when it was but a
+peaceful merchantman one watched from and but peaceful merchantmen that
+one saw--is intensified manifold when it is a warship's bridge one
+paces, and only the silhouettes of ships of war that notch the far
+horizon. Battleship, battle cruiser, light cruiser, destroyer, sloop,
+trawler, and all the other kinds and classes of patrol craft--each has
+its own distinctive smudge of smoke, its own peculiar way of revealing
+its identity by a blurred foretop, funnel, or superstructure long before
+its hull has lifted its amorphous mass above the sky-line.
+
+And now to the sky-line riddles one was given to read, and to be
+thrilled by as the puzzle revealed itself, had been added the great
+troop convoy from America, my first sight of one of which was just
+unfolding. H.M.S. _Buzz_, in which I chanced to be out at the time, was
+not one of the escorting destroyers, and it was only by accident that
+the course she was steering to join up with a couple of other ships of
+her flotilla on some kind of "hunting" stunt took her across that of the
+convoy, and passed it in inspiring panoramic review before our eyes.
+From dusky blurs of smoke trailing low along the horizon, ship after
+ship--from ex-floating palaces with famous names to angular craft of
+strange design which were evidently the latest word in standardised
+construction--they rose out of the sea (as our quartering course brought
+us nearer) until a wide angle of our seaward view was blocked by an
+almost solid wall of steadily steaming steel.
+
+There was a lot to stir the imagination in that sight--aye, fairly to
+grip you by the throat as a dawning sense of what it portended sank
+home. In the abstract it was the living, breathing symbol of the
+relentless progress of America's mighty effort, a tangible sign of the
+fact that her aid to the Allies would not arrive too late. What it stood
+for concretely is best expressed in the words of the young R.N.R.
+sub-lieutenant who was officer of the watch at the time.
+
+"It looks to me," he said, with a pleased smile, as he lowered his glass
+after a long scrutiny of the advancing lines of ships, "as though
+there'd be jolly near forty thousand new Yanks to be catered for in
+Liverpool by to-morrow evening."
+
+"Yes," I said somewhat dubiously, my mind suddenly assailed by a
+misgiving awakened by the thousands of yards of torpedo target presented
+by the sides of those placidly ploughing ships, "that is, assuming that
+they get there safely. But they're only just entering the danger zone
+now, and there's a lot of water got to stream under their keels before
+they berth in the Mersey.
+
+"I don't know anything about convoys, or the ways of protecting them;
+but all the same, it looks to me as though that bunch of troopers would
+offer a mark like the map of Ireland to a U-boat, and a lot more
+vulnerable one."
+
+Young P---- laughed as he bent, squint-eyed, to take a bearing on a
+destroyer zigzagging jauntily with high-flung wake in the van of the
+approaching fleet.
+
+"That's what everyone--even an old sailor--says the first time he sights
+one of the big transatlantic convoys," he said; "and if there are any
+skippers new to the job in that lot there, that's just what _they're_
+saying. It's all through failure to appreciate--indeed, no one who has
+not seen the ins and outs of it would be in a position to
+appreciate--the effectiveness of the whole anti-submarine scheme, and,
+especially, what almost complete protection thoroughly up-to-the-minute
+screening--with adequate destroyers and other light craft--really
+affords. As a matter of fact, every soldier in that convoy is probably a
+good deal safer now--and right on in through this so-called danger zone
+to harbour--than he was marching down Broadway to the pier--at least, if
+Broadway is like it was when I used to put in to New York as a kid in
+the _Baltic_."
+
+"But will you tell me," I protested, "how a U-boat, firing two or three
+torpedoes from, say, just about where we are now, could possibly miss a
+mark like that?"
+
+"Well, it would take a bit of missing from hereabouts, I admit," was the
+reply; "only, if there is any Fritz still in the game with the nerve to
+try it, he would also be missing himself."
+
+"What would happen to him?" I asked.
+
+"One or all of two or three things might happen,----" P---- answered,
+after ordering a point or two alteration in course to give safe berth to
+the nearing destroyer.
+
+"He might get his hide holed by gunfire, he might get split open by a
+depth-charge, he might get rammed, and he might get several other
+things. With all the luck in his favour, he might even get a transport.
+But there's one thing I can assure you he wouldn't get--and that's back
+to his base. There may be two or three bearings from which one of these
+big convoys appears to present a mark as wide and unbroken as the map of
+Ireland; but there's nothing in heaven or earth to save the Fritz who
+hasn't learned by the sad example of no small number of his mates that
+it is quick suicide for him to slip a mouldie down one of them."
+
+"You mean that he doesn't try it? that he's afraid to take the chance?"
+I asked somewhat incredulously, for I had somehow come to regard Fritz,
+though a pirate, as a dashing and daring one when the stake was high
+enough.
+
+"Except under very favourable circumstances, yes," was the reply; "and
+now that, with the coming of the American destroyers and patrol boats,
+we are able to do the thing the way we want to, what Fritz might reckon
+as 'very favourable circumstances' are becoming increasingly fewer and
+farther between. Now a few months ago, when we were just getting the
+convoy system under weigh, and when there was a shortage of every kind
+of screening craft, things were different. Fritz's _moral_ was better
+then than it is now, and we didn't have the means of shaking it that we
+have piled up since. At our first convoys, straggling and little
+schooled in looking after themselves, he used to take a chance as often
+as not, if he happened to sight them; but even then he rarely got back
+to tell what happened to him. There was the one that tried to celebrate
+the advent of 'Peace-on-Earth-Good-Will-to-Men' last Christmas Day by
+sinking the _Amperi_, which was one of a convoy the _Whack_ (in which I
+was Number Two at the time) was helping to escort. Well, I couldn't say
+much for his 'Good-Will-toward-Men,' but he certainly found a short cut
+to 'Peace-on-Earth,' or at least the bottom of the sea.
+
+"Now that chap took a real sporting chance, and got his reward for
+it--both ways. I mean to say, that he sunk the ship he went after all
+right--which was his reward one way; and that we then sunk him--which
+was his reward the other way. There was a funny coincidence in
+connection with that little episode which might amuse you. We were----"
+
+He paused for a moment while he spelled out for himself the "Visual"
+which one of the escorting destroyers was flashing to the convoy leader,
+but presently, with a smile of pleased reminiscence, took up the thread
+of his yarn. This is the story that young Sub-Lieutenant P----, R.N.R.,
+told me the while we leaned on the lee rail of the bridge and watched
+the passing of those miles-long lines of packed troopers as, silently
+sure of purpose, superbly contemptuous of danger, they steamed steadily
+on to deliver their cargoes of human freight one step further towards
+the fulfilment of its destiny.
+
+"It was Christmas Day, as I told you," he said, bracing comfortable
+against the roll, "and a cold, blustering, windy day it was. Several
+days previously we had picked up a small slow convoy off a West African
+port, and were escorting it to a port on the West Coast of England. The
+escort consisted only of the _Whack_ and the _Smack_, the skipper of the
+latter, as the senior officer, being in command. None of the ships--they
+were mostly slow freighters--had had much convoy experience to speak of
+at the time, and we were having our hands full all the way keeping them
+in any kind of formation. They seemed to be getting worse rather than
+better in this respect as we got into the waters where U-boat attacks
+might be expected, but this may have been largely due to the weather,
+which was--well, about the usual mid-winter brand in those latitudes. In
+fact, we were just becoming hopeful that the rising wind and sea, both
+were about 'Force 6,' might make it impossible for submarines to operate
+during the day or so that still must elapse before reaching port, when
+trouble began.
+
+"All the morning the _Plato_, which had been a bad straggler throughout,
+had been falling astern, and finally the _Smack_ ordered _Whack_ back to
+prod her on and do what could be done in the way of screening her. She
+still continued to lose distance, however, so that, at noon, we were
+nearly out of sight of the main convoy, of which little more than smoke
+and topmasts could be seen on the northern horizon.
+
+"At that hour the _Smack_, doubtless because he had received some report
+of the presence of U-boats in his vicinity, ordered us to rejoin the
+convoy. We left an armed trawler to do what it could for the loitering
+_Plato_, and started off at the best rate the weather would allow to
+make up the distance lost. It was at this juncture that the amusing
+little coincidence I mentioned a while ago occurred.
+
+"A patrol-boat, of course, does not carry a padre, any more than it does
+a number of the other comforts and luxuries provided in cruisers and
+battleships, and for that reason we hadn't been able to do very much in
+the way of a Christmas service. Several of the ship's company were
+somewhat religiously inclined, however, and these, in lieu of anything
+better, had asked for and received permission to hold a bit of a song
+service, in case there was opportunity for it, during the day. As the
+morning had been a rather full one, no suitable interval offered until
+their rather poor apology for a Christmas dinner was out of the way, and
+we were headed back to join the convoy. Then they went to it with a
+will, and for the next hour or more fragments of Yuletide songs came
+drifting back to my cabin to mingle with a number of other things
+conspiring to disturb the forty winks I was trying to snatch while the
+going was good. After a while, it appears, having run through their
+repertoire of Christmas songs, they started in on Easter ones, 'Bein'
+that they was mo' or less on the same subject,' as one of them explained
+to me later. They had just boomed the last line of a chorus which
+concluded with 'We shall seek our risen Lord,' when a signal was
+received stating that a periscope had been sighted by some ship of the
+convoy, and, sure enough, off they had to go to seek--well, I wouldn't
+take the Hun quite so near his own valuation of himself to put it as the
+song does, but all the same that quick new kick of the screws told me as
+plain as any words, even before I read the signal, that the old _Whack_
+was jumping away to seek _something_ that had risen.
+
+"The convoy was dead ahead of us at a distance of about seven miles when
+I reached the bridge, and, the visibility being unusually good for that
+time of year, I could see all of the ships distinctly, as they steamed
+in two columns of three abreast. I was even able to recognise the
+_Amperi_ in the centre of the leading line. We were just comforting each
+other with the assurance that it was getting too rough for a U-boat to
+run a torpedo with any chance of finding its mark, when a huge spout of
+water jumped skyward right in the middle of the convoy. When it
+subsided, the _Amperi_, with a heavy list to port, could be seen heading
+westward, evidently with her engines and steering gear disabled, while
+the rest of the convoy, smoke rolling from their funnels, were
+'starring' on northerly courses.
+
+"The alarm was rung, and as the men rushed to action stations a signal
+was made to the _Smack_ asking what was wrong. She replied, '_Amperi_
+torpedoed; join me with all dispatch.' This, of course, we had already
+started to do, though the wind and sea were knocking a good many knots
+off our best speed. It was evident enough that the _Amperi_ had
+received a death-blow, so that we were not surprised to find them
+abandoning ship as we began to close her.
+
+"Rotten as the weather was for it, this was being conducted most coolly
+and skilfully, and three boats had already left her before we came
+driving down to her assistance. _Smack_ had signalled us to pick up
+survivors, and we had stood in, at reduced speed, to 250 yards of the
+now heavily heeling ship, with the intention of proceeding on down, to
+the leeward of her to the aid of two of her boats, when we sighted three
+or four feet of periscope sticking out of the water, one point on the
+starboard bow and at a distance of about a couple of hundred yards. To
+see anything at all in rough water like that, you understand, a
+periscope has to be poked well above the slap of the waves, and that
+about equalizes the greater difficulty there is in picking up the
+'feather' when it's choppy.
+
+"I was at my action station with the 12-pounder batteries at this
+juncture, but as it looked like a better chance for the depth-charges
+than the guns, no order to open fire was given just yet. The captain
+ordered the helm to be steadied, and rang up 'Full speed ahead' to the
+engine-room. We passed the periscope ten yards on the port side, and
+when the stern was just coming abreast it, two charges were released
+together. As they were both set for the same depth it is probable that
+the one staggeringly powerful explosion we felt was caused by their
+detonating simultaneously. The shock was as solid as though we had
+struck a rock, and I could feel a distinct lift to the ship before the
+impact of it. There was something so substantially satisfying about that
+muffled jar that it seemed only in the natural course of things that it
+effected what it was intended to. The bow of the U-boat broke surface
+almost immediately, the fact that it showed before the conning-tower
+proving at once that she was hard hit and heavily down by the stern.
+Indeed, the deck of her from the conning-tower aft was fated never again
+to feel the rush of sea air.
+
+"She was now less than a hundred yards right astern of us, and heading,
+in a wobbly sort of way, like a half-stunned porpoise floundering away
+from the 'boil' of a depth-charge, on just about the course the _Whack_
+had been on when she kicked loose her 'cans.'
+
+[Illustration: THE LOOK-OUT ON A DESTROYER AND PART OF HIS VIEW]
+
+"The skipper put the helm hard-a-starboard, with the idea of turning to
+ram, at the same time ordering me to open fire with the port
+twelve-pounder. That was what I had been waiting for. The gun-crew was
+down to three--through the others having been detailed for boat work in
+connection with picking up the survivors from the _Amperi_--but that
+didn't bother a good deal in a short and sweet practice like this one.
+The ship was bobbing like a cork from the seas, in addition to her heavy
+heel from the short turn and the vibration from the grind of the helm.
+But neither did any of these little things matter materially, for
+we'd always made a point of carrying out our target practice under the
+worst conditions.
+
+"The first round, fired at three hundred yards, was an 'over' by a
+narrow margin, but the second, at two hundred yards, was a clean hit on
+the conning-tower, carrying away the periscope and the stays supporting
+it. The explosion of this shell appeared to split the whole
+superstructure of the conning-tower, from the bridge to the deck. I did
+not see anyone on the bridge at this moment, and if there had been he
+must certainly have been killed. The fact that the submarine seemed to
+have been blown to the surface by the force of our exploding
+depth-charges rather than to have come up voluntarily, may account for
+the fact that no head was poked above the bridge rail as she emerged. If
+she had come up deliberately it would have been the duty of the skipper
+and a signalman to pop out on to the bridge at once to be ready for
+eventualities. Evidently they had no chance to do so on this occasion,
+and as a consequence spun out their thread o' life by anywhere from
+twenty to thirty seconds--whatever that was worth to them.
+
+"My third shot plumped into her abaft the conning-tower, and the
+explosion which followed it had a good deal more behind it than the
+charge of a twelve-pounder shell. Before I had a chance to see what had
+blown up, however, we had rammed her, and whatever damage that shot had
+caused dissolved in the chaos of what proved the real _coup de grace_.
+That ramming was undoubtedly one of the prettiest little jobs of its
+kind, one of the most neatly finessed, ever brought off.
+
+"Since running over the submarine and dropping the depth-charges the
+captain had turned the _Whack_ through thirty-two points, a complete
+circle. This brought her back to a course just at right angles to the
+beam of the now helpless enemy, toward which she was driven to the limit
+of the last kick of the engines. Just before the moment of impact the
+screws were stopped dead, so as to sink the bow and reduce the chance of
+riding over the U-boat and rolling it under her stem, as has
+occasionally happened, instead of cutting it straight in two. The jar,
+when it came, was terrific, throwing from his feet every man not holding
+to something; yet there was that in the clean, sweet crunch of it that
+told me that it had accomplished all the heart could desire, even before
+the next second furnished graphic ocular evidence of it.
+
+"The sharp, fine bows of the _Whack_ drove home well abaft the
+conning-tower, and--though the staggering jar told of the resistance
+met--for all the eye could see, cut through like a knife in soft butter.
+Indeed, the amazing cleanness of the cut has always seemed to me the
+most remarkable feature of the whole show. The bow end of the U-boat,
+with the conning-tower, was the section which was cut off on my
+side--port--and the even cross-section of it that gaped up at me was
+very little different from that I once saw when one of our own
+submarines was being sawed through amidships in connection with some
+repairs. Even the plating did not appear to be bent or buckled. The
+impression that ring of shining clean-cloven steel left on my mind was
+of a cut as true and even as could have been done in dock with an
+acetylene flame. This was largely imagination, of course; and yet how
+photographic my mind-picture is you may judge from the fact that I have
+distinct recollection of seeing the thin circle of red lead where it
+showed all the way round beneath the grey of the outer paint.
+
+"The heavily tilted main deck of the interior of this section of the
+U-boat did not appear to be flooded at this juncture, though any water
+that had been shipped, of course, would have been in the now submerged
+bows. I have a jumbled recollection of wheels and levers and
+switchboards, fittings of brass and steel, and what I took to be three
+torpedoes--one on the port side, and two, one above the other, on the
+starboard. The most arresting thing of all, however, was the figure of a
+solitary man, the only one, strange to say, that anybody reports having
+seen. He was scrambling upward toward the opening, and I have never been
+quite sure whether he was 'Kamerad-ing' with his uplifted hands, or
+whether they were raised preparatory to the dive it is quite probable he
+intended to make into the sea.
+
+"Whichever the attitude was, it had no chance to serve its purpose. The
+stern section of the U-boat--the one most heavily damaged by the
+depth-charges--was seen to sink abreast the starboard 12-pounder battery
+by the crew of that gun, but the forward part--the one with the
+conning-tower, which I had seen into the interior of--buoyed up by the
+water-tight compartments in the bows, continued to float. Observing
+this, the Captain ordered the helm put a-starboard, and as we turned,
+the 4-inch gun and my 12-pounder opened up together. My very first
+round, fired over the port quarter, hit and exploded fairly inside the
+gaping end of the section, right where I had last seen the man with
+upraised hands. That, and the two or three smashing hits by the 4-inch
+gun, finished the job. A whirlpool in the sea marked the rush of water
+into the severed end, and this section--for all the world as though it
+had been a complete submarine--tossed its bows, with their
+elephant-ear-like rudders, skyward, and planed off on an easy angle
+toward the bottom. Its disappearance was complete. There were no
+survivors, and practically no floating wreckage. Only a spreading film
+of oil and a tangle of torn wakes slowly dissolving in the wash of the
+driving seas marked the scene of the action. It had lasted something
+over ten minutes.
+
+"The _Whack_ suffered considerable damage from the impact with the
+submarine, though not enough to give us serious worry, even in so heavy
+a sea. The stem was bent over to port, like a broken nose, and the
+buckling plates caused her to make quite a bit of water. We had no
+trouble coping with this, however, and made port, with the survivors of
+the _Amperi_ aboard, without difficulty. There we soon had the--well,
+not unmixedly unpleasant--news that the _Whack's_ wounds were of a
+nature somewhat comparable to what the Tommy in France calls a
+'Blighty.' Without having any real permanent harm done her, she was
+still enough banged up to need a special refit, the period of which, of
+course, the most of us would be able to spend at home on leave. Yes,
+indeed," he concluded, grinning pleasedly, "that was a ripping piece of
+ramming in more ways than one."
+
+P---- went over and bent above the shivering "Gyro," for a moment, took
+a long look through his glasses at the last of the now receding convoy,
+and then came back and rejoined me by the rail.
+
+"There was one little thing I neglected to tell you about," he said
+presently, "and that was the part the _Smack_ played in that show.
+Although the _Whack_ got all the _kudos_ for the sinking, there is a
+decided possibility that a bit of a stunt the _Smack_ brought off before
+ever we came up may have been largely if not entirely responsible for us
+getting the chance we did.
+
+"_Smack_, you see, was near at hand when the _Amperi_ was torpedoed, and
+the instant her Captain saw the spout of water shoot up in the air, he
+altered course and drove at full speed for the point he reckoned the
+submarine would be most likely to be encountered. He reports that he had
+the good fortune to hit it, while it was still submerged, and that the
+shock was severe enough to throw men off their balance. Shortly after
+that a periscope appeared, and it was this that gave the _Whack_ her
+chance to drop her depth-charges.
+
+"Now, not unnaturally, the Captain of the _Smack_ had good reason to
+believe that his striking the U-boat, even if he only grazed her, had
+something to do with her reappearance on the surface at a moment when
+she must have known a strenuous hunt for her was in progress. Unluckily,
+for his claim, however, the bows of the _Smack_, when she came to be
+docked, did not show sufficient evidences of having been in heavy
+collision to warrant the conclusion that the U-boat had been enough
+damaged to have gone to the surface from that cause alone. Under the
+circumstances, therefore, there wasn't anything else to do but give the
+credit for bringing her up to _Whack's_ depth-charges, while of course,
+the fact that it was also the _Whack_ that rammed her was obvious
+enough. The consequence was, as I said, that _we_ got all the _kudos_."
+
+He gazed for a few moments at the back-curling bow-wave, before
+resuming. "Yes, _we_ got all the _kudos_," he said slowly; "but, all the
+same, I've never been able to figure why Fritz didn't douse his
+periscope and try to dive deeper when he saw the _Whack_ rounding toward
+him, if it wasn't because there was something pretty radically wrong
+with him already. I can't help thinking that the old _Smack_ had a lot
+to do with starting that Fritz on his downward path, even if it was the
+_Whack_ that gave him the final shove."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was very characteristic, that last little explanation of P----'s. If
+there is one thing more than another that has impressed me in hearing
+these young British destroyer officers tell the "little games they have
+played with Fritz," it is the fine sporting spirit in which they
+invariably insist in sharing the credit of an achievement with every
+other officer, and man, and ship that has in any way figured in the
+action. It was the fault of the Hun that we could no longer treat the
+enemy as we would an opponent in sport; but that only makes it all the
+more inspiring to see the fellow-players still keeping alive the old
+spirit among themselves.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+BOMBED!
+
+
+It was generally admitted by flying-men, even before the failure of the
+attempts to destroy the _Goeben_ while ashore in the Dardanelles early
+in '18, that the air-bomb was a most uncertain and ineffective weapon
+against a large ship of any class, but especially so against a warship
+with deck armour.
+
+The principal reason for this is that the blunt-nosed air-bomb, no
+matter from how high it may be dropped, has neither the velocity nor the
+structure to penetrate the enclosed spaces of a ship where its explosive
+charge would find something to exert itself against.
+
+This is why an 18-pounder shell, penetrating to a casemate or
+engine-room, for instance, may easily do more damage to a warship than
+an air-bomb of ten times that weight expending its force more or less
+harmlessly upon an upper deck.
+
+Merchant ships, with their inflammable and comparatively flimsy upper
+works, are more vulnerable to air-bombs than are warships, but even of
+these very few indeed have been completely destroyed as a consequence
+of aerial attack. Some of the gamest fights of the war on the sea have
+been those of merchant skippers who, in the days before their ships had
+guns of any description to keep aircraft at a distance, brought their
+vessels through by the exercise of the boundless resource which
+characterises their kind, usually by sheer skill in manoeuvring. A
+very remarkable instance of this character I heard of a few days ago
+from a Royal Naval Reserve officer who figured in it.
+
+"I was in a British ship temporarily in the Holland-South American
+service at the time," he said, "and we were outward bound from Rotterdam
+after discharging a cargo of wheat from Montevideo. It was before the
+Huns had raised any objection to ships bound for Dutch ports using the
+direct route by the English Channel, and also before the U-boats had
+begun to sink neutrals on that run. Except for the comparatively slight
+risk of encountering a floating mine, we reckoned we were just about as
+safe in the North Sea as in the South Atlantic. Of course, we carried no
+gun of any kind--no heavy gun, I mean. We _did_ have a rifle or two, as
+I will tell you of presently.
+
+"Why the attack was made we never had any definite explanation. In fact,
+the Germans themselves probably never knew, for they tumbled over
+themselves to assure the Holland Government that there was some
+misunderstanding, and that they would undertake that nothing of the
+kind should occur again.
+
+"My personal opinion has always been that it was a sheer case of running
+amuck on the part of the Hun aviator responsible for the outrage; for,
+as I have said, we were empty of cargo, our marks were unmistakable, and
+we were steering a course several points off the one usually followed by
+the Dutch boats to England. Anyway, he paid the full penalty for his
+descent to barbarism.
+
+"It was a clear afternoon, with a light wind and lighter sea, and we
+were steaming comfortably along at about nine knots, heading for the
+Straits of Dover, when the look-out at the mast-head reported a squadron
+of 'planes approaching from the south.
+
+"Presently we sighted them from the bridge--five seaplanes, three or
+four points off our starboard bow. There had been reports of noonday
+raids on Calais for several days, and I surmised that those were Hun
+machines returning from some such stunt.
+
+"Holding to an even course, the squadron passed over a mile or more to
+the starboard of us, and it was already some distance astern when I saw
+one of the machines--I think it was the one leading the 'V'--detach
+itself from the others and head swiftly back in our direction. There was
+nothing out of the way in this action at a time when every ship was held
+in more or less suspicion by both belligerents, and it seemed to me so
+right and proper that the chap should come and have a look at us, in
+case he had some doubts, that I did not even think it necessary to call
+the 'Old Man' to the bridge, or even send him word of what I took to be
+no more than a passing incident.
+
+"Descending swiftly as he approached, the Hun passed over the ship
+diagonally--from port quarter to starboard bow--at a height of six or
+eight hundred feet.
+
+"'That'll end it,' I thought. 'Our marks, and the fact that we're in
+ballast, ought to satisfy him.'
+
+"But no. Back he came. This time he was a hundred feet or so lower, and
+flying on a line directly down our course, passing over us from bow to
+stern. Again he swung round and repeated the manoeuvre in reverse,
+this time at a height of not more than four hundred feet. He had done
+this five or six times before it occurred to me that he was taking
+practice sights for bombing; but not even then, when I saw him with his
+eye glued to his dropping-instrument, did it occur to me that he was
+doing anything more than trying his sights. It was at the next 'run' or
+two that the thing began to get on my nerves, and I called up the
+skipper on the voice-pipe and told him I did not quite like the look of
+the circus.
+
+"The Old Man was in the middle of his afternoon siesta, but he tumbled
+out and came puffing up to the bridge at the double. He was no more
+inclined to take the thing seriously than I was, but, on the
+off-chance--which your careful skipper is always thinking of in the back
+of his brain-box--he rang up 'More steam' on the engine-room telegraph,
+and ordered the quartermaster to start zig-zagging, a stunt we had
+already practised a bit in the event of a submarine attack.
+
+"'If he's just trying his eye,' said the Old Man, 'it'll give him all
+the better practice to follow us; while, it he's up to mischief, it may
+fuss him a bit.'
+
+"The Hun had just whirled about three or four cables' length ahead of
+us, when the smoke rolling up from the funnel and the swinging bow must
+have told him that we were trying to give him a bit more of a run for
+his money. Circling on a wider turn, he came charging straight down the
+line of our new course, flying at what I should say was between two and
+three times the height of our masts. We were looking at the machine at
+an angle of about forty-five degrees--so that he must have been about as
+far ahead of us as he was high, say, a hundred yards--when I saw a small
+dark object detach itself from under the fuselage and begin to come
+directly towards us, almost as though shot from a gun.
+
+"It was the only bomb I ever saw fall while I was in a sufficiently
+detached state of mind to mark what it looked like. 'Fall' hardly
+conveys a true picture of the way the thing seemed to approach, for the
+swift machine, speeding at perhaps a hundred miles an hour, must have
+imparted, at the instant of releasing, a good deal of lateral velocity.
+
+"At first it was coming almost head on to the way I was looking at it,
+and, greatly foreshortened, it had so much the appearance of a round
+sand-bag that it is not surprising that the skipper took it for some
+kind of practice dummy. 'Probably a dud,' I remember him saying; 'but
+don't let it hit you. Stand by to duck!'
+
+"My next recollection is of the thing beginning to wobble a bit,
+probably as the nose began to tilt downward; but still it seemed to be
+coming straight toward us rather than simply falling. I seem to recall
+that the seaplane passed overhead an appreciable space before the bomb,
+but I must have heard it rather than seen it, for I never took my eye
+off the speeding missile.
+
+"The latter seemed at the least from fifty to a hundred feet above my
+head as it hurtled over the starboard end of the bridge, and I saw it
+with startling distinctness silhouetted against a cloud that was bright
+with the light of the sun it had just obscured. It was still wobbling,
+but apparently tending to steady under the combined influence of the
+downward pull of the heavy head and the backward drag of the winged
+tail. It appeared to be revolving.
+
+"I have since thought, however, that I may have got the latter
+impression from a 'spinner' that is often attached to this type of bomb
+to unwind, with the resistance of the air, and expose the detonator.
+
+"Down it came until it whanged against some of the standing rigging of
+the foremast--seeming to deflect inboard and downward slightly as a
+consequence--missed the mainmast by a few feet, and struck squarely
+against the side of the deckhouse on the poop.
+
+"The scene immediately after the explosion of the bomb is photographed
+indelibly on my memory; the events which followed are more of a jumble.
+The detonation was a good deal less sharp than I had expected, and so
+was the shock from it. The latter was not nearly so heavy as that from
+many a wave that had crashed over her bows, but, coming from aft rather
+than for'ard, the jolt had a distinctly different feel, and by a man
+'tween decks would hardly have been mistaken for that from a sea.
+
+"It was the flash of the explosion--a huge spurt of hot, red flame--that
+was the really astonishing thing. It seemed to embrace the whole
+afterpart of the ship, and everything one of the forked tongues of fire
+was projected against burst into flame itself.
+
+"The ramshackle deckhouse, which had been reduced to kindling wood by
+the explosion, roared like a furnace in the middle of the poop. Even the
+deck itself was blazing. I had once been near an incendiary bomb in a
+London air raid, and knew that nothing else could have produced so
+sudden and so fierce a fire.
+
+"But I also knew that the first burst of flame is the worst in such a
+case, and that most of the fire came from the inflammable stuff in the
+bomb itself.
+
+"As I had always heard that sand was better than water in putting out a
+fire of this kind, and knowing we carried several barrels of it for
+scrubbing the decks, I ordered it to be brought up and thrown on the
+flames, but stood by on the bridge myself in case the skipper, who was
+bawling down the engine-room voice-pipe for more steam, needed me for
+anything else.
+
+"Luckily the sand was close at hand, and they were scattering it from
+buckets over the blazing deck within a minute or two. Except for the
+debris of the deckhouse, the fire was put out almost as quickly as it
+was started, and, between sand and water, even that was being rapidly
+got under control, when suddenly the Hun, whom I had almost forgotten in
+the rush of undoing his dirty work, flashed into sight again.
+
+"The skipper had our ship zigzagging so short and sharp by this time
+that her wake looked like the teeth of a big, crazy saw, and this the
+Hun was unable to follow closely enough to get a fore-and-aft sight down
+her as he had done the first time.
+
+"Coming up astern, he kicked out a bomb just before he was over her port
+quarter, but it only shot across her diagonally, and struck the water on
+her starboard side, about a hundred feet away. It went off with, if
+anything, a sharper crack than the one which had struck the poop, and
+the foam geyser the explosion shot up flashed a bloody red for the
+instant the water took to chill the glow of the molten thermit.
+
+"Vanishing even more quickly was a ragged red star which fluttered for a
+moment beneath the surface of the water itself as the flame stabs shot
+out in all directions from the central core of the explosion.
+
+"No water was thrown aboard us, and, near as I was to the explosion on
+the bridge, the rush of air could hardly be felt. Something that came
+tinkling down after striking the side of the charthouse, however--I
+picked it up when the show was over--turned out to be a thin fragment of
+the steel casing of the bomb.
+
+"A similar fragment, twisted into a peculiar shape, struck the chest of
+a man leaning over the rail in the waist of the ship, inflicting a
+slight flesh wound the exact shape of a ragged capital 'C.'
+
+"That any kind of a living man could really be trying to destroy a mere
+merchant ship in cold blood seemed to me so monstrous, so utterly
+impossible, that, until the second bomb was dropped, I was almost ready
+to believe that the first had been launched by accident. From then on
+we knew it was a fight for life.
+
+"The Hun took a broader swerve in bringing his machine round for the
+next charge, and, ten times quicker on his helm than we were,
+anticipated our next shift of course, and came darting down on an almost
+straight fore-and-aft line again. The sudden cloud of our foreblown
+smoke--there was a following wind on the 'leg' they had put her on at
+the moment--which engulfed him at the instant his third bomb was
+released was the one thing in the world that could have made him miss so
+easy a 'sitter.' The quick 'side-flip' the sharply-banked 'plane gave to
+the dropped missile threw it wide by twice the distance the second had
+missed us. Though the detonation rang sharp and clear, and though a
+vicious spout of foam shot up, I could note no effect of the thing
+whatever on the ship. Whether that was his last bomb or not we could
+never be quite sure. At any rate, it was the last he tried to drop upon
+us, or upon any other ship for that matter.
+
+"Just why he returned to the attack with his machine-gun we could only
+guess. It may have been, as is probable, that he was at the end of the
+small supply of bombs left from the raid he was doubtless returning
+from.
+
+"Again, however, it is just possible that the fact that the fire was
+being got under control on the poop impelled him to adopt an attack
+calculated to drive the plucky chaps who were fighting it to cover.
+
+"Anyhow, flying just high enough to clear the tops of the masts, he came
+swooping back, and it was upon the men trying to put out the fire--now
+confined to the wreckage--of the deckhouse--that he seemed to
+concentrate his attack. Two or three of these I saw fall under the rain
+of bullets, and among them was our freight clerk, who had also been
+knocked down by the explosion of the first bomb, but who, being hardly
+stunned by the shock, was soon on his feet again and leading the
+fire-fighters.
+
+"He was a good deal of a character, this freight clerk. Although well
+educated, he had led a free and easy existence in various parts of the
+world. For a year previous to the war he had been a cowboy, and some
+queer trait in his character made him still cling to the _poncho_, or
+shoulder blanket, and baggy trousers, which are the main features of the
+Argentine cow-puncher's rigout. It was the Wild West rig that made me
+notice him when he was knocked down by the bomb and later by the
+machine-gun fire.
+
+"He was scarcely more hurt the second time than the first, but the
+bullet which had grooved the outer covering of his brain-box seemed also
+to have put a new idea inside it. I saw him pull himself together in a
+dazed sort of way after the seaplane had passed, and then shake off the
+hand of a man who tried to help him, and dash off down the ladder,
+tumbling to cover, I thought.
+
+"It must have been a minute or two later that I saw him, legs wide apart
+to keep his balance, pumping back at the Hun (who had swung close again
+in the interim) with a rifle--a weapon which I later learned was an old
+Winchester, which had been rusting on the wall of the freight clerk's
+cabin. He appeared to have had the worst of the exchange, for when I
+looked again he was sitting, with one leg crumpled crookedly under him,
+propped up against a bitt.
+
+"He looked still full of fight, though, and seemed to be replenishing
+the magazine of the rifle from his bandoliers.
+
+"The skipper sent me below to stir things up a bit in the engine-room at
+this juncture, and I did not see my cowboy friend until he had fought
+two or three more unequal rounds and was squaring away, groggy, but
+still unbeaten, for what proved the final one.
+
+"I don't know whether he ever got credit for it or not, but the Old
+Man's plan of action at this juncture must pretty nearly have marked a
+mile-post in merchant ship defence against aerial attack. We had been
+instructed in, and had practised the zigzag before this, but that was
+about the limit of our resources in this line. 'Squid' tactics--smoke
+screening--had hardly been more than thought of for anything but
+destroyers. Yet the wily old skipper, literally on a moment's notice,
+brought off a stunt that could not have been improved upon if it had
+been the result of a year's thought and experience.
+
+"The instant the Hun 'stumbled' when he struck the cloud of smoke that
+was pouring ahead of us, the skipper's ready mind began evolving a plan
+still further to besmudge the atmosphere. Today, with special
+instructions and special stuff ready to hand, a merchant captain, if he
+needed it, would simply tell the chief engineer to 'make smoke screen.'
+
+"On this occasion the Old Man meant the same thing when I heard him
+yelling down the engine-room voice-pipe to 'Smoke up like hell!'
+
+"About all the chief could do under the circumstances was to stoke
+faster and cut down the draught. This he did to the best of his ability,
+but the screen did not bear much resemblance to one of those almost
+solid streams of soot a modern destroyer can turn out by spraying oil
+freely and shutting off the air.
+
+"Such as it was, however, the Old Man made the most of, and by steaming
+down the wind accomplished the double purpose of cutting down the
+draught fanning the fire on the poop and keeping a maximum of smoke
+floating above the ship.
+
+"The smudge bothered the Hun, but by no means put an end to his
+machine-gun practice. Except for the freight clerk, who was still
+pumping back at the seaplane every time it swooped over, every one on
+the poop had been killed, wounded, or driven to cover, and, with no one
+to fight it, the fire was beginning to gain new headway.
+
+"'Not good 'nuf by a mile,' I heard the Old Man muttering to himself as
+he eyed the quickly thinning trail of smoke from the funnels. 'Must do
+better'n that or 'taint no good.' Then I saw his bronzed old face light
+up.
+
+"'X----!' he shouted, beckoning me to his side, 'duck below, clean out
+all the stuff in the paint lockers and chuck it in the furnaces,
+'specially the oils and turps. Jump lively!'
+
+"This was the job I went on when I said I saw the cowboy crumpled up
+against a bitt, but still full of fight.
+
+"Linseed oil, turpentine, and some tins of fine lubricants--I had them
+all turned out of the fore-peak and carried, rolled, dragged, or tossed
+down to the stokehold.
+
+"Most of the stuff was in kegs or cans small enough to go through a
+furnace door, and these we threw in without broaching them. The Old Man
+called me up twice--the first time to say that there was no increase in
+smoke, and wanting to know why I was so slow; and the second time to say
+that he had just got a bullet through his shoulder, and ordering me to
+come up and take over, as he was beginning to feel groggy.
+
+"There was an ominous crackling and sputtering in the furnaces as I
+sprang for the ladder, and before my foot was on the lowermost rung, one
+of the doors jumped violently up on its top-swing hinges from the kick
+of an exploding tin or keg of oil. As it fell back with a clang the
+swish of sudden flame smote my ears, and then a regular salvo of muffled
+detonations. The last picture I had of the boiler-room was of the
+stokers trying to confine the infernos they had created by wedging shut
+the doors with their scoops.
+
+"The whole ship was a-shiver with the roaring conflagration in her
+furnaces as I reached the upper deck, and, above a tufty, white frizzle
+of escaping steam, rolled a greasy jet of smoke that looked thick enough
+for a man to dance a hornpipe on it without sinking above his ankles. I
+found the Old Man, with a dazed sort of look in his eyes, and his jaw
+set like grim death, hanging on to the binnacle when I gained the
+bridge, and all he had the strength to say, before slithering down in a
+heap, was, 'Damn good smoke! Carry on--zigzag down wind! Think blighter
+has finished. Look to--fire.'
+
+"The fact that the Hun was now circling the ship at considerable
+distance had evidently made the skipper believe that he had come to the
+end of his cartridges, and in this I am inclined to think the Old Man
+was right.
+
+"Which fire, however, he referred to I was not quite sure about, but, in
+my own mind, I was rather more concerned about the one I had started
+with the ship's paint than the one the Hun's incendiary bomb had set
+going. Indeed, the 'fire brigade,' which had taken advantage of the lull
+to get a hose playing on the conflagration on the poop, was rapidly
+reducing the latter to a black mass of steaming embers. The cowboy was
+still snuggled up against the bitt, which he used to rest his right
+elbow on in the occasional shots he was lobbing over at the now
+distantly circling enemy. When I learned later what a crack shot the
+chap really was, I cannot say that I blamed the Hun for his discretion.
+
+"What tempted him to make that fatal final swoop we never knew. It may
+have been sheer bravado, or he may have been trying to frighten off the
+fire-fighters again. Anyhow, back he came, allowing plenty of leeway to
+miss my smoke screen, and only high enough to clear the masts by forty
+or fifty feet.
+
+"The cowboy saw him coming, and I can picture him yet as he lay there
+waiting, with his cheek against the stock of that old Winchester, and
+following the nearing 'plane through its sights. With the rare good
+sense of your real hunter, he didn't run any risk of frightening off his
+quarry with any premature shots. He just laid doggo, and held his fire.
+
+"If the Hun had been content to sit tight and keep his head out of
+sight, the chances are nothing would have happened to him; but the
+temptation to have a closer look at his handiwork and to jeer at his
+'beaten enemy' was too much for him. Banking as sharply as his big
+'plane would stand, he leaned out head and shoulders above the wrecked
+poop, gave a jaunty wave of the hand, and opened his mouth to shout what
+was probably some sort of Hunnish pleasantry.
+
+"The crack of the old Winchester reached my ears above the roar of the
+seaplane's engine, and the next thing I was clearly conscious of was the
+machine's swerving--sidewise and downward--and plunging straight into
+the trailing column of black smoke. The tip of its left wing fouled the
+main truck, but it still kept enough balance and headway to carry past
+and clear of the ship.
+
+"It then slammed down into the water two or three hundred feet off our
+starboard bow, and it only took a point or two of alteration to bring it
+under our forefoot.
+
+"The old ship struck the mark so fair that she cut the wreckage into two
+parts, and I saw fragments of wings and fuselage boiling up on both
+sides of our wake astern. I gave the order in hot blood, but I would do
+the same thing again if I had a week to think it over in, just as I
+would go out of my way to kill a poisonous snake.
+
+"Of course we never knew definitely who was responsible for polishing
+off the Hun. For a while I thought it probable that the cowboy had only
+wounded him, and that his swerve into the smoke had been responsible for
+the dive into the sea, where the ship put the finishing touches on the
+job. But from the day that the cowboy showed me that he could hit
+tossed-up shillings with a target-rifle four times out of five I have
+been inclined to believe his assertion that he 'plunked the bloomin'
+blighter straight through the nut,' and that I and my smoke had nothing
+to do with it.
+
+"Neither the skipper nor the cowboy were much hurt, and as for the ship,
+she probably suffered, in the long run, more from the loss of her paint
+and oil supply than from the Hun's bomb and the fire it started."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+AGAINST ODDS
+
+
+The news from all the Fronts had been discouraging for several days, and
+it only needed that staggering announcement of the destruction of
+practically a whole convoy and its escort, in the North Sea, to cap the
+climax of gloom. This is what I had read in the fog-hastened autumn
+twilight, by the feeble glow of a paint-masked street lamp, in the Stop
+Press column of the evening paper a Strand newsboy had shoved into my
+hand.
+
+     "Two very fast and heavily-armed German raiders attacked a convoy
+     in the North Sea, about midway between the Shetland Islands and the
+     Norwegian coast, on October 17th. Two British destroyers--H.M.
+     ships _Mary Rose_ (Lieutenant-Commander Charles L. Fox) and
+     _Strongbow_ (Lieutenant-Commander Edward Brooke)--which formed the
+     anti-submarine escort, at once engaged the enemy vessels, and
+     fought until sunk after a short and unequal engagement. Their
+     gallant action held the German raiders sufficiently long to enable
+     three of the merchant vessels to effect their escape. It is
+     regretted, however, that five Norwegian, one Danish, and three
+     Swedish vessels--all unarmed--were thereafter sunk by gunfire
+     without examination or warning of any kind and regardless of the
+     lives of their crew or passengers.... Anxious to make good their
+     escape before British forces could intercept them, no effort was
+     made to rescue the crews of the sunk British destroyers or the
+     doomed merchant ships, but British patrol craft which arrived
+     shortly afterward rescued some thirty Norwegians and others of whom
+     details are not yet known.... The enemy raiders succeeded in
+     evading the British watching squadrons on the long dark nights,
+     both in their hurried outward dash and homeward flight.
+
+     "It is regretted that all the eighty-eight officers and men of
+     H.M.S. _Mary Rose_ and forty-seven officers and men of H.M.S.
+     _Strongbow_ were lost. All the next-of-kin have been informed."
+
+A few days later a second Admiralty report announced that ten survivors
+of the _Mary Rose_ had reached Norway in an open boat, and also gave a
+few further particulars of the action in which she had been lost. From
+this it appeared that she had been many miles ahead of the main convoy
+when the latter was attacked, and that, possessed of the speed, with
+many knots to spare, to have avoided an action in which the odds were a
+thousand to one against her, she had yet deliberately steamed back and
+thrown down the gage of battle to the heavily armed German cruisers.
+Just why her captain chose the course he did was not, and never will be,
+fully explained. He went down with his ship, and to none of those who
+survived had he disclosed what was in his mind. It was certainly not
+"war," the critics said, but they also agreed that it was "magnificent"
+enough to furnish the one ray of brightness striking athwart the sombre
+gloom of the whole disheartening tragedy. "He held on unflinchingly,"
+concluded an all-too-brief story of the action issued to the public
+through the Admiralty, some time later, "and he died, leaving to the
+annals of his service an episode not less glorious than that in which
+Sir Richard Grenville perished."
+
+From the time I read these Admiralty announcements I had the feeling
+that some, if not all, of those ten survivors of the _Mary Rose_ would
+surely be able to offer more of an explanation of why her captain took
+her into battle against such hopeless odds than any that had yet been
+suggested to the public, and in the months which followed I made what
+endeavour I could to locate and have a talk with one of them. It was not
+long before the ten were scattered in as many different ships, however,
+and though I had the names and official numbers of two or three, almost
+a year went by before I chanced upon the first of them. Indeed, it was
+but a day or two previous to the first anniversary of the loss of the
+_Mary Rose_ and _Strongbow_ and the destruction of the Norwegian convoy
+that, in the course of a visit to a Submarine Depot Ship at one of the
+East Coast bases, I sauntered forward one evening and fell into
+conversation with a sturdily built, steady-eyed young seaman--some kind
+of torpedo rating, evidently, by the red worsted "mouldie" on his
+sleeve--who had just clambered up to the forecastle from the deck of a
+hulking "L" moored alongside.
+
+"How do you like submarin-ing?" I had asked him, by way of getting
+acquainted.
+
+"Not so bad, sir," he replied with a smile, "though it's a bit stuffy
+and rather slow after destroyers. With them there's something doing all
+the time. I was in one of the 'M' class before I volunteered for
+submarines. P'raps you've heard of her--the _Mary Rose_, sunk a year
+this month, in----"
+
+"Wait a moment," I cut in, as the ribbon he was wearing caught my eye;
+"you're one of the men I've been looking for for a number of months. Ten
+to one you're Able Seaman Bailey, who received the D.S.M. for his part
+in the action, and who is specially mentioned in the Admiralty story"
+(refreshing my memory from a note-book) "for having, 'despite severe
+shrapnel wounds in the leg, persisted in taking his turn at an oar' of
+the Norwegian lifeboat which picked up the _Mary Rose_ survivors, and
+for his 'invincible light-heartedness throughout.'"
+
+A flush spread under his "submarine pallor" at that broadside, but he
+admitted, with an embarrassed grin, that his name was Bailey, and that
+his decoration was awarded for something or other in connection with
+the last fight of the _Mary Rose_, though for just what he had never
+quite been able to figure out. In the hour we leaned over the forecastle
+rail and watched the North Sea fog-bank roll up the estuary with the
+incoming tide, this is the account he gave me of the things which he
+himself saw of what is perhaps the most gallantly tragic of all the
+naval actions of the war.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"They hadn't got convoying at that time down to the system it is carried
+on under now," he began, by way of explanation, "and the only fighting
+ships with this one were the _Mary Rose_ and _Strongbow_. The _Mary_ was
+of the same class as the 'M ...' over there, very large and fast and
+well armed for a destroyer, but never, of course, built for anything
+like a give-and-take fight with any kind of a cruiser.
+
+"There was also an armed trawler somewhere about, but it had no chance
+to do anything but pick up survivors. We were an anti-submarine escort,
+nothing more, and were not intended to stand off surface raiders. Of
+course provision was made against these, too, but--well, when you
+consider the size of the North Sea and the length and blackness of the
+winter nights, the only wonder is that the Huns can't buck up their
+nerve to trying for a convoy twice a week instead of twice a year.
+
+"We had escorted the north-bound convoy across to Bergen, and, on the
+afternoon of the 16th of October, had picked up the south-bound and
+headed back for one of the home ports. Escorting even a squadron of
+warships which know how to keep station is no picnic for destroyers, but
+with merchantmen it is a dozen times worse. It is bad enough even now,
+but a year ago, before these little packets had had much experience, it
+was enough to drive a man crazy. Between the faster ships trying to push
+on, and the slower ones falling astern, and breakdowns, and the chance
+of trickery, it was one continual round of worry from the time we left
+Base to our return.
+
+"This time was no exception to the rule, even before the big smash. One
+of the Swedes--there were Norwegian and Danish as well as Swedish ships
+in the convoy, but we called them all 'Swedes,' probably because it was
+shorter and easier to say than Scandinavian--well, one of the Swedes
+shifted cargo along about dark of the 16th, with the result that the
+slower ships, and this included most of the convoy, lagged back, while
+several of the faster ones kept on.
+
+"I don't know whether this was done by order, or whether it just
+happened. Anyhow, the _Strongbow_ remained behind with the slower
+section, while the _Mary Rose_ pushed on as an escort for the faster. It
+was the first lot--the main convoy--that the raiders attacked first, but
+just what happened I did not see, for we had drawn a long way ahead of
+them in the course of the night.
+
+"When I came up to stand my watch as anti-submarine lookout, on the
+after searchlight platform, at four in the morning of the 17th, I
+remember that it was cloudy and thick overhead, but with very fair
+visibility on the water. We were steaming along comfortably with two
+boilers, which gave us a big margin of speed over everything needed to
+cut our zigzags round the comparatively slow packets we were escorting.
+The sea was rough but almost dead astern, so that it made little
+trouble--for the moment, that is. We had enough of it a little later.
+
+"Along toward six o'clock the visibility began to extend as it grew
+lighter, but there was no sign of the main convoy when, at exactly
+five-fifty, I sighted flashes of light fluttering along the northern
+horizon. Although my ears caught no sound but the throb of the engines
+and the churning of the screws, I had no doubt they were from gun-fire,
+and reported them at once by voice-pipe to the Officer of the Watch--it
+was Gunner T., if I remember right--on the bridge. The captain was
+called, and must have concluded the same, for he at once ordered her put
+about and sounded 'Action Stations.' That took me to the foremost
+torpedo tubes, where my station was on the seat between the tubes, with
+the voice-pipe gear fitted to my ears. Most of what followed I saw from
+there.
+
+"In some of the published accounts of the action it was stated that the
+captain of the _Mary Rose_ thought that the flashes he saw were from
+the gun of a submarine shelling the convoy, so that when he turned back
+it was with the expectation of meeting a U-boat rather than powerful
+raiding cruisers. I don't know anything definite on this score, of
+course, as I only heard the captain speak once or twice (and then to
+give orders) before he went down with his ship, but I don't think it
+could possibly have been true. There is a sort of fluttering ripple to
+the flash of a salvo that you can't possibly mistake for that of the
+discharge of a single gun, and the flashes which we continued to see for
+some time were plainly those of salvo answering salvo. The flashes from
+the mingled salvoes of the heavy guns of the Hun raiders could not have
+been confused with those from the few light guns of the _Strongbow_ any
+more than these could have been taken to come from the single gun of a
+U-boat. Everything pointed to just what we learned had taken place--a
+cruiser raid on the convoy. There was nothing in the flashes to suggest
+a submarine was firing, and I can't see how the captain could have had
+any such impression. It was enough for him--yes, and for all of us--to
+know that our consort was in trouble, and I shall always think that he
+turned back to help the _Strongbow_ with the full knowledge that he
+would have to face hopeless odds. He was a proper gentleman, was Captain
+Fox, and so there was nothing else that he _could_ have done; and,
+what's more, there's nothing else that we men in the _Mary Rose_--or
+any other British sailors, for that matter--would have had him do. It
+would have been against all the traditions of the Navy to have done
+anything else but stick by a consort to the last."
+
+Able Seaman Bailey smote resoundingly the hollow palm of his left hand
+with the fist of his right as he spoke those last words, and then, in a
+quieter voice, took up the thread of the story again.
+
+"That turn through sixteen points brought the seas, which we had been
+running before all night, right ahead, and all in a minute she was being
+swept fore-and-aft by every second or third of them. Anxious as the
+captain was to drive her full speed (which would have been a pretty
+terrific gait, let me tell you, for the 'Ms' are very fast), it was no
+use.
+
+"Plates and rivets simply wouldn't stand the strain of the green water
+that anything like full speed would have bored her into, and she was
+finally slowed down to about twenty knots as the best she could do
+without flooding the decks and making it impossible to serve the guns
+and torpedo tubes. As she was good for a lot more than this with two
+boilers, I doubt very much if the third was ever 'flashed up.'
+
+"The first I saw of the ships which turned out to be the enemy was some
+masts and funnels to the north'ard and about a couple of points on the
+starboard bow. They were making very little smoke, probably because
+they were oil-burners. As we were steering on practically opposite
+courses, we closed each other very quickly, and they must have been
+about four miles off when the captain, evidently becoming suspicious of
+their appearance, challenged. As there was no reply, fire was opened
+immediately afterward by the foremost gun, the course at the same time
+being altered a point or two to starboard, so that the other two guns
+would bear. The rest of our firing was, I think, by salvoes, or rather,
+it was until all but the after gun were knocked out by the Hun's shells.
+
+"Our first shots, fired at about 7,000 yards, were short; but as the
+salvoes which followed began to fall closer to their targets, I saw the
+Huns alter to a course more or less parallel to ours, but plainly
+veering away so as to open out the range. This gave me the first
+silhouette view I had, and I did not need a glass to recognize them at
+once as German, the three straight funnels and the 'swan' bows being
+quite unmistakable. Some of our shots fell close, but I saw nothing I
+could be certain of calling a hit.
+
+"However, I knew that it was not the guns the captain was counting on,
+but that he was trying to close to a range and bearing that might offer
+a chance to get home with a torpedo.
+
+"Why the Huns did not open fire before they did I have never quite been
+able to figure out, unless it was that they hoped to avoid an action and
+so be free to pursue and sink the leading ships of the convoy--the
+faster ones the _Mary Rose_ had been escorting--without interference. If
+that is so, Captain Fox's sacrifice was not in vain, for all of these
+ships escaped destruction and reached port in safety. Even as it was,
+they had no stomach for an action at any range close enough to give us
+any chance to damage them either with gun-fire or torpedoes. Their
+plan--proper enough in its way, I suppose--was simply to pound us to
+pieces with the shells of their powerful long-range guns, and not to
+close to finish us off until all our guns and torpedo tubes were out of
+action. As one good salvo from either of them was more than enough to do
+the job, there wasn't much hope of our getting in close enough to do
+them serious harm. It was a bold bid the captain made for it, though.
+
+"The course we were now on brought the seas more abeam than ahead, so
+that we had been able to shake out several more knots of speed, and this
+the captain tried to use to shorten the range. We were actually closing
+them at a good rate (though I wouldn't go so far as to say they were
+putting on all their speed to avoid it), when the Huns began firing
+their ranging shots. By this time we had reached a position from which
+there was a very fair bearing to launch a mouldie, and we were busy
+getting one ready to slip while the fall of shot came bounding nearer
+and nearer to us. I remember, in a vague sort of way, that the first
+salvo was short by a long way, that the second was much nearer, and
+that the third, closely bunched and exploding loudly on striking the
+sea, threw up smoke-stained spouts which fell back into each other to
+form a wall of water which completely blotted out the enemy for a second
+or two. Then we turned loose the torpedo, and at almost the same instant
+two or three shells from a 'straddling' salvo hit fair and square and
+just about lifted the poor little _Mary_ out of the water.
+
+"All in a second the ship seemed to disappear in clouds of smoke and
+escaping steam, and it is only natural that my recollections of the
+order in which things happened after that are a good deal confused.
+
+"I seem to have some memory of receiving from the bridge the order to
+fire that torpedo, but if that was so, it was the last order I did
+receive from there, for the explosion of one of the shells carried the
+voice-pipe away (though I did not twig it at the time), and from then on
+it was mostly the sizzle of spurting steam that came to my ears.
+
+"There are two reasons why I know that first salvo hit us _after_ the
+torpedo was launched, though there could not have been more than a
+fraction of a second between one and the other. The first is that one of
+the shells carried away the lip of the tube before penetrating the deck
+and cutting a steam-pipe. If the mouldie had been in the tube it could
+not have missed being exploded; or, if by a miracle that had not
+happened, the tube was so much buckled that it could not have been
+operated. The second reason was that fragments from that shell, besides
+wounding me in the leg, even killed or blew overboard the rest of the
+crew, so that there would have been no one to get a mouldie away even if
+the tubes had been in working order. I remember distinctly seeing the
+torpedo hit the water, but I have no recollection of seeing it steady to
+depth and begin to run. As that is the main thing you always watch for,
+I can only account for the fact I did not see it by supposing that first
+hit came before the torpedo began to run.
+
+"The shock of the explosion did not knock me off my seat, and a wound
+from a jagged piece of shell casing, though it was serious enough to put
+me out of commission for five months, felt only like a sharp prick on my
+leg. My pal, Able Seaman French, collapsed in a limp heap under the
+tubes, and though I saw no blood or signs of a wound, and though I never
+saw a man killed before, I knew he was done for. I don't know to this
+day where he was hit. The man whose station was at the breech-blocks I
+never saw again, living or dead, so I think he must have caught the
+unbroken force of the explosion and been blown back right over the
+starboard side.
+
+"This shell, in bursting the main steam-pipe, probably had the most to
+do with bringing us to stop, though another (I think of the same salvo)
+exploded in Number Three boiler-room and started a big fire, probably
+from the oil. The clouds of black smoke and steam rising 'midships made
+it impossible to see what was going on there. I saw some of the crew of
+the 'midships gun struggling in the water, and took it that they must
+have been blown there.
+
+"That gun was out of action, anyway, and, because I did not hear it
+firing, I assumed that the foremost one had also gone wrong. The after
+gun was firing for all it was worth, though, and continued to do so
+right up to the end.
+
+"That one salvo pretty well finished the _Mary Rose_ as a fighting ship,
+and as soon as the Huns saw the shape we were in, they began to close,
+firing as they came. But even then they were careful to choose a
+direction of approach on which the after gun could not be brought to
+bear. With the foremost tubes out of action, and no crew to serve them
+in any case, there was nothing for me to do but sit tight and wait for
+orders. So I just chucked my head-gear, which was no longer of use with
+the voice-pipes gone, and settled back in my seat to watch the show and
+wait till I was wanted. There was really nothing to stay there for, but
+it was my 'Action Station,' and I knew it was the place I would be
+looked for if I was needed. On the score of cover, one place is as good
+an another--in a destroyer, anyhow.
+
+"It must have been the fact that the after gun was the only one still
+in action that brought the captain back from the bridge. There was
+really nothing to keep him on the bridge, anyway. He seemed to be making
+a sort of general round, trying to see what shape things were in and
+bucking everybody up. He was as cool and cheery as if it was an ordinary
+target practice, with no Hun cruisers closing in to blow us out of the
+water. I saw him clapping some of the after gun's crew on the back, and
+when he came along to the foremost tubes, not noticing probably that I
+was the only one left there, he sung out: 'Stick it, lads; we're not
+done yet.' Those were his exact words. I remember grinning to myself at
+being called 'lads.'
+
+"But we _were_ done, even then. The Huns were inside of a mile by now,
+and firing for the water-line, evidently trying to put us down just as
+quickly as they could.
+
+"All their misses were 'shorts.' I don't remember a single 'over.' They
+were still taking no unnecessary chances. As soon as they were close
+enough to see that our torpedo tubes were probably jammed to port, they
+altered course and crossed our bows and steamed past the other side,
+where there was no chance of our slipping over a mouldie at them.
+
+"We were already settling rapidly, with a heavy list to port, and as
+soon as the captain saw she was finished, he gave the order: 'Abandon
+ship. Every man for himself!' Those were the last words I heard him
+speak. He went below just after that to see about ditching the secret
+books, I believe, and when I saw him again it was just before she sank,
+and he was pacing the quarterdeck and talking quietly with the First
+Lieutenant.
+
+"As our only boat had been smashed to kindling-wood, there was nothing
+to it but to take to the Carley Floats, and the first thing I did after
+hearing the order to abandon ship was to see to cutting one of these
+loose. On account of our oilskins and life-preservers, neither myself
+nor any of the three or four lads from the after gun's crew that ran to
+the float with me could get at our clasp-knives. Luckily, one of the
+Ward Room stewards came to the rescue with three silver-plated
+butter-knives from the pantry, and with these we finally managed to
+worry our way through the lashings. Then we pitched the little webbed
+'dough-nut' (as the Carley Floats are called) over the settling stern
+and jumped after it. Four or five minutes later, after heeling slowly to
+port through fifty or sixty degrees, she gave a sudden lurch and went
+down, turning completely over as she sank, so that her bottom showed for
+a few seconds. The captain, who could have followed us just as well as
+not, seemed to make no effort to save himself, and must have gone down
+with her. I can't help believing that was the way he wanted it to
+happen.
+
+"We had clambered into the float as fast as we could, and I think some
+one must have said something about the danger of being caught over an
+exploding depth-charge, for we were paddling (all of these floats have
+short-handled paddles lashed to their webbing) away from the ship as
+fast as we could when she went down. Someone remembered that one of the
+'ash cans' had been set on the 'ready' when we went to 'Action
+Stations,' and no one recalled seeing it thrown back to 'safe' before we
+went overboard. It was an anxious moment, waiting after she ducked under
+the sea, for we had not been able to paddle more than a hundred yards,
+and the detonation of a depth-charge had been known to paralyse men
+swimming in the water at twice that distance. Luckily, this particular
+charge must have been set for a considerable depth, and it is also
+possible that the hull of the ship absorbed or deflected some of its
+force. At any rate, the shock of it, when it came, though it knocked us
+violently against each other and left a tingling sensation on the skin
+of all the submerged part of one's body, did not do anyone serious
+injury.
+
+[Illustration: SHE CAME BOWLING ALONG UNDER SAIL]
+
+"When we came to count noses, there turned out to be eight of us on the
+float--two sub-lieutenants, the captain's steward, myself, and the
+remnants of the crew of the after gun. A few minutes later we sighted a
+couple of men who looked to be struggling in the water, but turned out
+to be supporting themselves on a fragment of 'dough-nut,' which had
+broken loose when the ship sank. That, strange to say, was the only
+bit of wreckage that came to the surface. We took these men aboard, and
+the ten of us weighted the overloaded float so that is submerged till
+the water reached our armpits. We were a good deal better off than it
+would seem, though, for the most of us were heavily dressed, and the
+animal heat of a man keeps him warm for a long time under oilskins and
+wool. The only ones that suffered much were a couple of lads who didn't
+have any more sense than to ditch most of their togs before they went
+over the side. They said it was so as not to be hampered in swimming--as
+if they expected to do the 'Australian crawl' to Norway or the
+Shetlands! These two _did_ begin to get a bit down-hearted and 'shivery'
+when the cold struck into the marrow of their bones, and it was with the
+idea of bucking them up a peg or two that we started singing. No, I
+don't just remember all that we did warble, except, I'm glad to say,
+that 'Tipperary' wasn't on the programme, and that this did include two
+or three hymns. You're quite right. There's nothing very warming to a
+chilled man in hymns, and I'm not trying to account for why we sang
+them. The fact remains that we _did_, just the same, and that we all,
+including the chaps in their underclothes, lived to sing again.
+
+"There was a bit of a disappointment when an armed trawler, which was
+evidently searching for survivors, passed within a mile without sighting
+us or hearing our shouts, but with the life-boat of one of the sunk
+Norwegian steamers we had better luck. She came bowling along under sail
+about ten o'clock in the morning, and, on sighting the black silk
+handkerchief we hoisted at the end of a paddle-blade, eased off her
+sheet and stood over to pick us up. As there were only six men in her,
+we were not badly off for room, while the store of biscuit and potted
+stuff--to say nothing of smokes--they had managed to throw aboard before
+their ship sunk was more than enough for the two days that it took us to
+row and sail to Bergen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+ROUNDING UP FRITZ
+
+
+There are only two or three conditions under which a destroyer can hope
+to surprise a U-boat on the surface, and none of these is approximated
+at the end of a clear North Sea summer afternoon with the stalking craft
+trying to approach from a direction which silhouettes its leanly
+purposeful profile against the golden glimmer of the sunset clouds. This
+particular capsule of Kultur, rising with typical Hunnish effrontery for
+his evening constitutional in an especially well-watched area while it
+was yet broad daylight, still had the advantage of visibility
+sufficiently on his side to make the thing a good deal less risky than
+it looked. The skipper, doubtless coolly puffing his pipe as he lounged
+over the rail of the bridge and filled his lungs with fresh air, must
+have seen the masts and funnels of the speeding _Flash_ for a good half
+hour before the latter's look-out sang out that he had picked up the
+conning-tower of what looked to be a U-boat two points off the starboard
+bow; so that all that was needed was the change of course which followed
+that report to give Fritz fair warning that it was time to hide his
+head for a while. Indeed, he must have been going down even as he was
+sighted, for it was the matter of but a very few seconds more before the
+_Flash_ found herself tearing at upwards of a thousand yards a minute
+into an empty sea.
+
+Under the circumstances, it is probable we gave that Fritz a fairly good
+run for his money in showering the spot where he had disappeared with
+what depth-charges we could spare, and then, like a fox-terrier after a
+rat, standing by and "watching the hole." Unluckily, we had used a good
+part of our stock of "cans" the day before, when a rather more promising
+opportunity for attack had offered itself, while as for "watching the
+hole," this particular patch of the North Sea chanced to be one in which
+that way of playing the game was fraught with special difficulties
+because it was sufficiently shallow for a submarine to lie doggo on the
+bottom without danger of having its shell crushed in by the pressure of
+the water. This defeated the uncannily sure way of tracking the U-boat
+down by "listening," and demanded another form of special treatment,
+which we were not, however, at the moment prepared to administer.
+
+Slim as the chance was, the captain was reluctant to leave while any
+hope remained, and it was only a signal ordering the _Flash_ to join in
+some other work that had turned up (a destroyer is subject to as many
+kinds of summons as a country doctor) that took him off in the end.
+Mooring a buoy to mark the spot for "future reference," the captain saw
+her headed off on the course she was to hold till daybreak, and then
+took me down to the Chart House for a bowl of ship's cocoa before
+turning in. It was some question I asked about the practice of placing
+buoys over possible U-boat graveyards, to make it easy to resume
+investigations if desired, that started him on a train of anti-submarine
+reminiscence that led back to one of the smartest achievements of its
+kind in the whole course of the sea war.
+
+"There are times," he said, leaning back on the narrow couch that served
+as his "sea-bed," and bracing with outstretched legs against the
+twisting roll, "that a Fritz will do things that would lead a
+superficial observer to think that he had a sense of humour. Of course,
+we know that he hasn't anything of the kind (any more than he has
+honour, sportsmanship, decency, or any other of the attributes of a
+normal civilised human being). But the illusion is there just the same,
+especially when he tries on such little stunts as the one he incubated a
+couple of months ago in connection with a buoy I dropped to mark the
+spot where there was a chance that my depth-charges might have sent him
+to the bottom.
+
+"It was just about such an 'indeterminate' sort of a strafe as the one
+we've just had--no chance for gun-fire, not much to go by for planting
+depth-charges, and, in the end, nothing definite to indicate that any
+good has been done. So, in case it was decided that my report was of a
+nature to justify further looking into, I left a securely moored buoy to
+furnish a guide as to where to begin, quite as we have to-night. Well,
+it chanced that the S.N.O. at Base reckoned that there was just enough
+of a hope to warrant following up. Indeed, you may be sure there isn't
+much that isn't followed up these days, now that we've got our whole
+comprehensive plan into operation and adequate craft to support it with.
+So he sent out quite a little fleet of us--craft fitted to do all the
+various little odds and ends of things that help to make sure one way or
+the other what has really happened to Fritz. Luckily, _Flash_ was able
+to return with them. If she had not--if someone who had not seen the lay
+of things after the strafe the night before had not been along to 'draw
+comparisons'--Fritz's little joke might have turned out a good deal more
+pointed than it did.
+
+"We picked up the buoy without any difficulty, as the day was fine and
+the sea fairly smooth--just the weather one wanted for that kind of
+work. While we were still a mile or more distant, the lookout reported a
+broad patch of oil spreading out from the buoy for several hundred yards
+on all sides. This became visible from the bridge presently, and at
+almost the same time my glass showed fragments of what appeared to be
+wreckage floating both in and beyond the 'sleek' of oil. Now if there
+had been any evidence whatever of either oil or wreckage the night
+before I should not have failed to hail this morning's exhibit with a
+glad whoop and nose right in to investigate. But as, when I gave up the
+fight, I had dropped that buoy into an extremely clean patch of
+water--even after the stirring my depth-charges had given it--the
+plenitude of flotsam did not fail to arouse a certain amount of
+suspicion.
+
+"Ordering the sloops and trawlers to stand-off-and-on at a safe
+distance, I went with the _Flash_ to have a look at a number of
+fragments that were floating a couple of cables' lengths away from the
+buoy. A piece of box--evidently a preserved fruit or condensed milk
+case--with German letters stencilled across one end was undoubtedly of
+enemy origin, as was also a biscuit tin with patches of its gaudy paper
+still adhering to it. I did not like the careful way the cover of the
+latter had been put on, however, and, besides, tins and cases are quite
+the sort of thing any submarine throws over just as fast as it is
+through with them. It was some real wreckage I was looking for, and this
+it presently appeared that I had found when the bow wave threw aside a
+deeply floating fragment of what--even before we picked it up--I
+recognised as newly split teak. Closer inspection revealed the fact that
+it was newly split all right, but also the fact that an axe or hatchet
+had had a good deal to do with the splitting. What had probably been a
+part of a bunk or locker had apparently been prised off with a bar and
+then chopped up into jagged strips. Attempts to obliterate the marks of
+bar and axe by pounding them against some rough metal surface had been
+too hasty and crude to effect their purpose.
+
+"'That settles it,' I said to myself. 'Fritz is trying to play a little
+joke on us by making us think he is lying blown-up on the bottom, while,
+in fact, he is probably lying off somewhere waiting to slip a slug into
+one of the most likely looking of the salvage ships. Now that we've
+twigged the game, however, we'll have to do what we can to defeat it.'
+As senior officer, I ordered the three destroyers present to start
+screening in widening circles, while--on the off-chance that there
+really was a wreck on the bottom--a pair of trawlers were sent to drag
+about the bottom under the messy patch with an 'explosive sweep.'
+
+"My diagnosis was quite correct as far as it went, but it did not go
+quite far enough; still--by the special intervention of the sweet little
+cherubim who sits up aloft to keep watch o'er the life of poor Jack--my
+plan of operation was quite as sound as if I had all the facts of the
+case spread out before me. Had the U-boat really been lurking round
+waiting for a pot at some of the ships trying to save his supposed
+remains--something that we never gathered any definite evidence on--our
+screening tactics would probably have prevented his success; while the
+trawlers, with their sweep, furnished the best antidote for the little
+surprise party that he already _had_ prepared for us.
+
+"Scarcely had the trawlers entered the oily area than the jar of a heavy
+under-sea explosion jolted against the bottom of the _Flash_, which, a
+thousand yards distant, was just beginning to work up to full speed.
+Almost immediately three or four other explosions followed, coming so
+close together as to make one rippling detonation of tremendous
+violence. An instant later I saw several columns of grimy foam shoot
+skyward, two or three of them so close together that they seemed to
+'boil' into each other as they spilled and spread in falling. Although
+neither of the trawlers appeared to be immediately over any of the
+explosions, both of them received terrific shocks. One of them I
+distinctly saw rear up till it seemed almost to be balanced on its
+rudder-post as a round hump of green water drove under it, while the
+scuppers of the other spurted white as they cleared the flood that a
+spreading foam geyser had thrown upon the deck. It seemed impossible
+that either of them could survive such shocks as I knew they must have
+received, and I fully expected to see nothing better than two foundering
+wrecks emerge from the smother which hovered above the scene of the
+explosions. Imagine my surprise, then, when two junk-like profiles (they
+were both of the marvellously sea-worthy 'Iceland trawler' type) came
+bobbing serenely into sight again, and I noted with my glass that
+neither appeared to have suffered serious damage. On the score of lives,
+a tom-cat has nothing the best of a trawler. If it had been otherwise
+our whole fleet of them--and they, with the drifters, form the main
+strands of the finer meshes of our anti-U-boat net--would have been
+wiped out many times over.
+
+"At the instant the jar of the first explosion made itself felt, the
+thought flashed through my mind that there actually was a U-boat lying
+on the bottom, and that the explosive charge on the sweep had been
+detonated against its hull. The 'bunched' explosions immediately
+following also lent themselves to this theory, and it was not till the
+distinct columns of blown water began rising in the air that I surmised
+the real cause of them--mines, probably laid so close together that the
+explosion of the first had set off the others. This fact we were shortly
+able to establish beyond a doubt.
+
+"What had happened, as nearly as we could reconstruct it, was this: The
+U-boat had been a mine-layer, probably interrupted on its way to lay its
+eggs off one of our main fleet bases. The chances are that it had been
+sufficiently injured by my depth-charges to make it more of a risk than
+its skipper cared to take to proceed farther from his base; quite
+likely, indeed, he had to put back at once. Then the chance of preparing
+a little surprise party for the ship responsible for his trouble must
+have occurred to him, and the result was that a snug little nest of
+mines was laid all the way around the marking buoy. Having more mines
+than he needed to barrage the buoy, he had scuttled several of those
+remaining after the first job was completed, and these had been the ones
+set off by the explosive charge on the trawlers' sweep. The spreading of
+wreckage as bait around the trap was probably an afterthought, for it
+was so hurriedly done that it really defeated the end it was intended to
+accomplish. I am inclined to think, in fact, that, if the mines had laid
+round the buoy, with no spread of oil or wreckage left to decoy us into
+them, they might have had a victim or two to their credit. They were
+laid shallow enough to have bumped both sloops and destroyers, and the
+exploding of a mine against the bows of one or the other of these may
+well have been the first warning we had of Fritz's little joke. As it
+was, that part of the show was so crudely done that it gave away that
+something was wrong.
+
+"Yes, I have always thought of that as 'Fritz's little joke,'" continued
+the captain, bracing himself at a new angle to meet a rollicking
+cork-screw action that was working into the ship's wallowings. "It was
+just the sort of a plant I would like to have left for Fritz, if our
+roles had been reversed, and for a while I felt rather more kindly
+toward all Fritzes on account of having knocked up against it. That
+feeling persisted until three or four months later, when the fortunes of
+war--in the shape of a luckily-planted depth-charge--paved the way for
+an opportunity for me to tell the story to a certain Hun _Unterseeboot_
+officer during the hour or two he was my guest on the way to base. He
+spoke English fairly, and understood it well; so that I was able to run
+through the yarn just about as I have told it to you. He gave vent to
+his approval in guttural 'Ya's' and grunts of satisfaction until I ended
+by asking him if he didn't think it was a jolly clever little joke. And
+what do you think he said to that?
+
+"'Choke,' he boomed explosively; 'choke, vy, mein frent, dot vos not ein
+choke ad all. He vos dryin to zink your destroy'r. Dot ist no choke.'"
+
+The captain stretched himself with a whimsical smile. "How unpleasant it
+would be to be shipmates with a chap like that who couldn't see the
+funny side of being blown up," he observed presently.
+
+"Just as unpleasant," I replied, "as it is pleasant to be shipmates with
+a man who _could_."
+
+After thus rising to the occasion, I was emboldened to ask the captain
+to tell me a little more about that "luckily-planted depth-charge" he
+had referred to so casually, and its train of consequences.
+
+"Here is the result," he said with a smile, handing me several small
+kodak prints from his pocketbook. "What little yarn there is to tell
+I'll rattle off for you with pleasure after I've been up to the bridge
+for a bit of a 'look-see.' Seems as if she is banging into it harder
+than she ought for this course and speed."
+
+The light went out as the automatic switch cut off the current with the
+opening of the door, and when it flashed on again, as the door was
+slammed shut, I found myself alone, with the prints lying in the middle
+of the chart of the North Sea. Two of these showed a thin sliver of a
+submarine that might have been of almost any type. A third, however,
+showed an unmistakable U-boat, heeling slightly, and with a whaler
+alongside, evidently in the act of taking off some of the men crowded
+upon the narrow forward deck. And in the background of this print was
+lying a long slender four-funneled destroyer that I recognised at once
+as either the _Flash_ or another of the same class. On the back of this
+print was written "Quarter view of U.C.--at 14.10. _Flash's_ whaler
+transferring prisoners; _Splash's_ whaler's crew clearing decks of
+wounded."
+
+A fourth print, similar to the third but much covered with arrows and
+writing, appeared to be a kind of key to the latter. An angling sort of
+bar, which appeared as a black line above the bows in the photograph,
+was labelled "Nut Cutter," and several other characteristic U-boat
+devices were similarly indicated. These all established points of great
+technical value, doubtless, but a keener human interest attached to the
+legends penciled at the feather ends of arrows pointing to two figures
+on the deck of the submarine, just abaft the conning-tower. Opposite the
+one that appeared to be leaning over a light rail, with one arm extended
+as though he was in the act of giving a command, was written, "Deceased
+captain of submarine." Against the other, a sprawling inert heap huddled
+up against the conning-tower, appeared, "Man with both legs shot off
+(alive)."
+
+There was a lot of history crowded into that scrawled-over print, and I
+was still gazing at it with awed fascination when the opening door
+winked off the light, and then closed again to reveal the captain,
+dripping with the blown brine of the wave that the _Flash_ had put her
+nose into at the moment he was coming down the ladder.
+
+"Rather more of a sea than I expected to-night," he said as he pulled
+his duffel-coat over his head and sat down to kick off his sea-boots;
+"so I've slowed her down a few knots and we'll jog along easy till
+daylight." Then, as he recognised the photo in my hand, "Rather a grim
+story that little kodak tells, isn't it? You'll find just about all of
+the yarn you were asking for down there in black and white."
+
+"Not quite," I replied hastily, recognising from long experience the
+forerunning signs of a modest man trying to side-step going into details
+respecting some episode in which he happens to have played a leading
+part. "Not quite. It chances that I've heard something of the bagging of
+U.C.--from Admiral ---- not long after it occurred, and he said it was
+one of the cleverest bits of work of the kind that anyone has pulled
+off. I didn't connect you and the _Flash_ with it, though. But now that
+you're caught with the goods, the chance to hear several of the details
+the Admiral had failed to learn is too good to miss. How did you manage
+to slip up on her in the first place, and did you wing her skipper at
+the outset, and----?"
+
+Evidently figuring it would be best not to let me pile up too big a lead
+of questions for him to answer, the captain sat down resignedly and took
+up the thread of the story at somewhere near the beginning.
+
+"How did we manage to slip up on her?" he repeated. "Well, principally,
+I should say, because she was 'preoccupied.' I told you last night that
+I used to get away for a bit of tiger shooting while I was on Eastern
+stations, and you mentioned that you'd had a go at it yourself now and
+then. So we both have probably picked up a smattering of the ways of
+tigers. Now I've always maintained that the fact that I had given a bit
+of study to the ways of man-eaters was a big help to me in understanding
+the ways of Huns. A hungry tiger, on the prowl for something to devour,
+is about the hardest brute in the world to stalk successfully; while, on
+the other hand, one that has made its kill and is sating its bloody
+lust upon it is just about the easiest. It's just the same with a
+U-boat. The one best chance we have of surprising one on the surface is
+while it is in the act of sinking a merchantman by bombs or shell-fire,
+or just after the victim has been torpedoed and the pirate is
+standing-by to fire on the boats and pick up any officers it may think
+worth while to take prisoner. That was what was responsible for the luck
+that befell me in the instance in question. The U.C.--a day or two
+previously to the one on which she was slated to meet her finish, had
+sunk the British merchantman _Hilda Bronson_, and carried off as
+prisoners the captain and mate. These men, after we rescued them, were
+able to give us some account of how their hosts spent the morning of the
+day on which they encountered the _Flash_. Their general practice, of
+course, was to submerge in the daytime and run on the surface, charging
+batteries, during the night. Emboldened by two or three recent successes
+in sinking small merchantmen by gun-fire and bombs, they appeared to
+have become very contemptuous of our anti-submarine measures, and
+declared that they were just as safe on the surface in the daytime as at
+night. Bearing out the probability that these words were by no means
+spoken in jest, is the fact that they did not dive at daybreak, but
+continued to cruise on the surface on the look out for unarmed ships
+which could be safely sunk without risking the loss of a torpedo or
+damage to themselves by gun-fire. This class of ships--fortunately,
+there are few of them left save under neutral flags--was the U-boat's
+favourite prey.
+
+"About eight o'clock their search was rewarded. The two British sailors
+heard a number of shots, and presently understood the U-boat skipper to
+declare that he had just put down a small Norwegian steamer with
+shell-fire. As they were still full up with the stores looted from the
+_Hilda Bronson_, no attempt was made to take off anything from the
+sinking Norwegian. All morning the pirate continued cruising on the
+surface, diving only once. Great attention was given to surroundings,
+stops being made about once an hour to heave the lead. In this they
+displayed good sense beyond a doubt, for it is worth a lot to a
+submarine to know whether it can dive straight on to the bottom without
+encountering a pressure strong enough to crush it in.
+
+"About noon another helpless victim--this time a British merchant
+steamer--was sighted, and the imprisoned sailors counted nine shots
+before tremendous consternation and confusion spread through the
+submarine as fire was opened on her by some ship coming up from the same
+direction as the merchantman bore, and she dived with all possible
+dispatch. This was where the _Flash_ began to take a hand in the game.
+
+"Now the fact that this particular Fritz ought easily to have sighted us
+at twice the distance at which we opened with our foremost 12-pounder
+bears out exactly what I said about the traits the Hun and the tiger
+have in common. They are both 'foul-feeders,' and begin to see so red,
+once the blood-lust of prospective satiation is upon them, that they are
+half blinded to everything else. If this fellow hadn't been so absorbed
+in doing that little steamer to death he need never have let us get
+within a range that would have permitted more than a swift shot or two
+at his disappearing conning-tower. It was his sheer 'blood-drunkenness'
+that gave us our chance.
+
+"It was a day of very low visibility--not over a mile and a half, or two
+miles at the outside--and I was out on a bit of an escort stunt of small
+importance. The first intimation I had that anything out of the usual
+run was afoot came in the form of sharp gun-fire on my starboard beam.
+It sounded fairly close at hand, and though no ship was visible, there
+was just a hint of luminosity in the mist-curtain to indicate the
+direction of the gun-flashes. The helm was immediately put hard-a-port
+and the telegraphs at Full Speed, and off went the _Flash_ to
+investigate. Scarcely had I turned than a wireless signal was brought to
+me on the bridge repeating the calls of assistance of a steamer that was
+being shelled by an enemy submarine. That little 'flying start' of mine,
+which involved leaving the ship I was escorting and jumping out without
+waiting for orders, gave me the minute or so to the good which probably
+made all the difference between success and failure. But that is quite
+characteristic of destroyer work; more than in any other class of ship,
+you are called on to decide for yourself, to jump out on your own.
+
+"The first thing I saw was the dim blur of a small merchantman taking
+shape in the mist, and as the image sharpened, the splash of falling
+projectiles became visible. She was throwing out a cloud of smoke and
+zigzagging in a panicky sort of way in an endeavour to avoid the shells
+which were exploding nearer and nearer at every shot. As she caught
+sight of the _Flash_ she altered course and headed straight up for us,
+and, busy as my mind was at the moment, I could not help thinking how
+like her action was to that of an Aberdeen pup I used to own when he saw
+me coming to extricate him from his daily scrap with a neighbour's fox
+terrier.
+
+"It was just at the moment that the merchantman turned up to get under
+our wing that the sharpening gun-flashes began revealing the
+conning-tower of a submarine. We had gone to Action Stations at once, of
+course, and I am practically certain that the opening shot of the
+fo'c'sl' gun was the first warning Fritz had that his little kultur
+course was about to be interrupted. Under the circumstances, the fact
+that he effected his disappearing act in from thirty to forty seconds
+indicates very smart handling; too smart, indeed, to give us a fair
+chance to get in a hit with a shell, although the gunners made a very
+keen bid for it. Their turn came a few moments later, however.
+
+"Once Fritz had passed from sight there was only one thing to do, the
+thing we _tried_ to do to-night--depth-charge him. And there really was
+no difference in what we did on the one occasion and what we did on the
+other--nothing, I mean to say, except the result. Estimating his course
+from the point of submergence, I steered directly over where I judged he
+would be and let go one of those very useful type '----' charges.
+Well,"--the captain smiled in a deprecatory sort of way--"the
+depth-charge isn't exactly what you'd call a 'weapon of precision,' and
+so it follows that when you hit what you are after with one it must be
+largely a matter of luck. Judgment? Oh, yes, a certain amount of it, but
+I'd rather have luck than judgment any day. At any rate, this was my
+lucky day. Within fifteen seconds from the moment I felt the jolt of the
+detonating charge Fritz's conning-tower was breaking surface on my
+starboard beam. Helm had been put hard-a-port as the charge was dropped,
+so that all the starboard guns were bearing on the conning-tower the
+instant it bobbed up. This was right on the outer rim of the 'boil' of
+the explosion--just where it would be expected--and, of course, it
+presented an easy target. To say it was riddled would be putting it
+mildly. One shot alone from the foremost six-pounder would have made it
+out of the question for it to dive again, even had other complications
+which had already set in left it in shape to face submergence.
+
+"A second or two more, and the whole length of our bag was showing,
+riding fairly level fore-and-aft, but with a slight list to starboard.
+We had now turned, and from our position on the submarine's port quarter
+could plainly see the crew come bobbing out of the hatch on to the deck.
+Each of them had his hands lifted in the approved 'Kamerad' fashion, and
+took good care to keep them there as long as they noticed any active
+movement around the business ends of our guns. As a matter of fact, as
+there had been no colours flying to strike, those lifted hands were the
+only tangible tokens of surrender we received. As we had her at our
+mercy, however, they looked conclusive enough for me, and I sent a boat
+away as quickly as it could be lowered and manned.
+
+"It was not until this boat returned that I learned of the two British
+merchant marine officers who had been aboard her through it all. The
+Huns had crowded them out in their stampede for the hatches, so that
+they had been the very last to reach the deck. Mr. X----, who was in
+charge of the whaler, compensated as fully as he could for this by
+taking them off first. The experiences they had been through had been
+just about as terrible as men could ever be called upon to face; and
+yet, when they clambered aboard _Flash_, they were smiling, clear of
+head and eye, and altogether quite unshaken. You've certainly got to
+take off your hat to these merchant marine chaps; they've fought half
+the battle for the Navy.
+
+"The story they had to tell of what they had seen and heard during their
+enforced cruise in the U-boat was an interesting one, but on the final
+act--largely because the curtain had been rung down so quickly--there
+was little they could add to what had passed before my own eye. The
+shock from the depth-charge--which appears to have detonated just about
+right to have the maximum effect--was terrific. The whole submarine
+seemed to have been forced sideways through the water by the jolt, and
+just as all the lights went out one of them said that he saw the
+starboard side of the compartment he was in--it was what would
+correspond to the Ward Room, I believe, a space more or less reserved
+for the officers--bending inward before the pressure. Instantly the
+spurt of water was heard flooding in both fore and aft, and that alone
+was sufficient to make it imperative for her to rise at once. As it was
+only a minute or two since she submerged, everyone was at station for
+bringing her to the surface again, so that not a second was lost in
+spite of the inevitable confusion following the sudden dive and the
+explosion of the depth-charge.
+
+"There had been a mad lot of rushes for the ladders and hatches, but the
+skipper, it appears, got up first, through the conning-tower to the
+bridge, as the official leader of the 'Kamerad Parade.' He was just in
+time to connect with the first shell from our foremost six-pounder, and
+that, or one of the succeeding projectiles which were fired before it
+was evident they were trying to surrender, accounted for several others
+in the van of the opening rush. The officer in charge of the whaler
+reported seeing several dead bodies lying on the deck and floating in
+the water, among these being that of the captain, which was taken back
+to Base and given a naval funeral. There were also two or three wounded.
+Of unwounded there were fifteen men and two officers, out of something
+like twenty-four in the original crew. One of the officers claimed to be
+a relation of Prince Henry of Prussia, but why he didn't claim the
+Kaiser himself, who is full brother to Prince Henry, I could never quite
+make out. As this was the same officer I told you of as not being able
+to see a joke, I didn't think it worth while to try to follow the
+ramifications of his family tree any farther. The engineer asserted that
+he had already been in eight warships which had been destroyed, these
+including a battleship and two or three cruisers and motor launches. I
+did the best I could to comfort him by telling him that, in case the
+_Flash_ wasn't put down by a U-boat in the three or four hours which
+would elapse before we made Base, he need have no further worries on the
+sinking score for some time to come. Just the same," he concluded, with
+a shake of the head, "I was glad to see that chap safely over the side.
+No sailor likes to be shipmates with a 'Jonah,' especially in times like
+these.
+
+"By the time we had finished transferring the prisoners the _Splash_ had
+joined us, and her captain, being my senior, took charge of the rest of
+the show. On my reporting that I had several severely wounded Huns
+aboard, he ordered me to return to Base with them.
+
+"I think that's about all there is to the yarn," said the captain,
+rising and starting to pull on his sea-togs preparatory to going up for
+another "look-see" before turning in. Then something flashed to his mind
+as an afterthought, and he relaxed for a moment, red of face and
+breathless, from a struggle with a refractory boot.
+
+"There was one thing I shall always be glad about in connection with
+that little affair," he said thoughtfully, a really serious look in his
+eyes for almost the first time since I had seen him directing the
+dropping of the depth-charges early in the evening; "and that is that I
+didn't know in advance that those two British merchant marine officers
+were imprisoned in the U.C. '----' with the Huns when we came driving
+down to drop a 'can' on her. My duty would have been quite clear, of
+course, and, as you doubtless know, some of our chaps have faced harder
+alternatives than that without flinching or deviating an iota from the
+one thing that it was up to them to do; but, just the same, I'm not
+half certain that the instinct, or whatever you want to call it, which
+seemed to jog my elbow at the psychological moment that charge had to be
+let go to do its best work--I'm not at all sure that instinct would have
+served me so well had I known that success might have to be purchased by
+sending two of my own countrymen--yes, more than that, two sailors like
+myself--to eternity with the pirates who held them as hostages. Yes, it
+was a mercy that I didn't have that on my mind at the moment when I
+needed all the wits and nerve I had to get that 'can' off in the right
+place."
+
+Visibly embarrassed at having allowed his feelings to betray him--a
+British naval officer--into a display of something almost akin to
+emotion, the captain stamped noisily into the stuck sea-boot and
+disappeared, behind a slammed door, into the night.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
+
+1. Numerous inconsistencies in capitalization, hyphenation and spelling
+have been retained as in the original publication.
+
+2. The four brief footnotes have been moved to the end of the
+relevant paragraph.
+
+3. The sole occurrence of bold text has been marked with = =.
+
+4. oe-Diphthongs have been changed to a simple "oe".
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea-Hounds, by Lewis R. Freeman
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