"My hat!" remarked the Adjutant as Vane reported his return to the depot.
"Can this thing be true? Giving up leave. . . ."
Vane grinned, and seated himself on the edge of the table.
"'There are more things, Horatio,'" he quoted genially.
"For the love of Pete--not that hoary motto," groaned the other. "Want a
job of work?"
"My hat!" laughed Vane. "Can this thing be true? Work at the depot?"
"Try my job," grunted Vallance. "Of all the bandy-legged crowd of C3
perishers I've ever seen, this crowd fills the bill. . . . Why one damn
fellow who's helping in the cook-house--peeling potatoes--says it gives
him pains in the stummick. . . . Work too hard. . . . And in civil life
he was outside porter in a goods yard." He relapsed into gloomy silence.
"What about this job?" prompted Vane.
The Adjutant lit a cigarette. "I can easily send over a subaltern, if
you like," he said; "but you might find it a good trip. It's a draft for
the sixth battalion in Ireland; you'll have to cross and hand 'em over in
Dublin."
Vane thought for a moment and then nodded.
"I'd like it," he said. "I rather want something to do at the
moment. . . ."
"Right, old boy. Start to-morrow. Come round about ten, and I'll give
you the papers."
Vane saluted and left the orderly room. The prospect of the trip pleased
him; as he had said, at the moment he wanted something to do. Though it
was only the day before that he had left her, the temptation to go back
to Joan--or at any rate write to her--was growing in strength. Already
he was cursing himself as a fool for having acted as he had; and yet he
knew that he had done right. It had to be left for her to decide. . . .
And if. . . . Vane shrugged his shoulders at the thought.
Three days later he had safely shepherded his flock across the water, and
handed it over to his relief. The trip had been uneventful, save for the
extraordinary feat of two of the men who had managed to become incapably
drunk on Government beer; and Vane having spent a night in Dublin, and
inspected the scene of the Sackville Street fighting with a sort of
amazed surprise, prepared to board the S.S. "Connaught" for the return
crossing.
Was it not all written in the Book of the Words?
He might have stopped for a day's cubbing--but he did not; he might have
crossed the preceding evening--but he had not. He merely went on board
the "Connaught," and had an early lunch, which, in all conscience, was a
very normal proceeding. There were a few soldiers on board, but for the
most part the passengers consisted of civilians, with a heavy percentage
of women and children. There were a few expensive-looking gentlemen in
fur coats, who retired early to their cabins, and whom Vane decided must
be Members of Parliament. The smoking-room was occupied by a party of
six young Irishmen, all of them of military age, who announced freely for
the benefit of anyone who cared to listen--and it was not easy to avoid
doing so--that they were Sinn Feiners. For a while Vane studied them,
more to distract his own thoughts than for any interest in their
opinions. It struck him that they were the exact counterpart of the new
clique of humanity which has sprung up recently on this side of the Irish
Sea; advanced thinkers without thought--the products of a little
education without the ballast of a brain. Wild, enthusiastic in their
desire for change, they know not what they want as the result of the
change. Destructive without being constructive, they bemuse themselves
with long words, and scorn simplicity. No scheme is too wild or lunatic
for them, provided they themselves are in the limelight. . . . And as
for the others--_qu'importe_? . . . Self is their God; the ill-digested,
half-understood schemes of great thinkers their food; talk their
recreation. And they play overtime. . . .
He opened the smoking-room door and stepped out on to the deck. For a
few moments he stood still watching the water slip by, and drawing in
great mouthfuls of fresh air. He felt he wanted to purge himself of the
rotten atmosphere he had just left. Then with slow, measured steps he
began to pace up and down the deck. The majority of the passengers were
sitting muffled up in deck chairs, but, unlike the Boulogne boat, there
was plenty of room to walk; and Vane was of the particular brand who
always think more easily when they move.
And he wanted to think of Joan. He had not thought of much else since he
had left her--but the subject never tired. He could feel her now as she
had lain in his arms; he could still smell the soft fragrance of her
hair. The wind was singing through the rigging, and suddenly the wonder
of her came over him in a great wave and he stared over the grey sea with
shining eyes.
After a while he tapped out his pipe, and prepared to fill it again. It
was as he stood, with his tobacco pouch open in his hand, that something
in the sea attracted his attention. He grew rigid, and stared at it--and
at the same moment a frantic ringing of the engine-room bell showed that
the officer on the bridge had seen it too. Simultaneously everyone
seemed to become aware that something was wrong--and for a brief second
almost a panic occurred. The ship was swinging to port, but Vane
realised that it was hopeless: the torpedo must get them. And the
sea-gulls circling round the boat shrieked discordantly at him. . . . He
took a grip of the rail, and braced himself to meet the shock.
Involuntarily he closed his eyes--the devil . . . it was worse than a
crump--you could hear that coming--and this. . . .
"Quick--get it over." He did not know he had spoken . . . and then it
came. . . . There was a great rending explosion--curiously muffled, Vane
thought, compared with a shell. But it seemed so infinitely more
powerful and destructive; like the upheaval of some great monster, slow
and almost dignified compared with the snapping fury of a smaller beast.
It seemed as if the very bowels of the earth had shaken themselves and
irrupted.
The ship staggered and shook like a stricken thing, and Vane opened his
eyes. Already she was beginning to list a little, and he saw the gaping
hole in her side, around which floated an indescribable litter of small
objects and bits of wood. The torpedo had hit her forward, but with the
headway she still had the vessel drifted on, and the litter of débris
came directly underneath Vane. With a sudden narrowing of his eyes, he
saw what was left of a girl turning slowly over and over in the still
seething water.
Then he turned round and looked at the scene on deck. The crew were
going about their job in perfect silence, and amongst the passengers a
sort of stunned apathy prevailed. The thing had been so sudden, that
most of them as yet hardly realised what had happened.
He saw one man--a funny little, pimply man with spectacles, of the type
he would have expected to wring his hands and wail--take off his boots
with the utmost composure, and place them neatly side by side on the deck.
Then a large, healthy individual in a fur coat came past him demanding to
see the Captain, and protesting angrily when he was told to go to hell.
"It's preposterous, sir," he said to Vane; "absolutely preposterous. I
insist on seeing the Captain. . .."
"Don't be more of a fool than you can help," answered Vane rudely. "It's
not the Captain's 'At home' day. . . ."
And once again it struck him as it had so often struck him in France,
what an impossible thing it is to guess beforehand how danger will affect
different men. A woman beside him was crying quietly, and endeavouring
to soothe a little boy who clung to her with wide-open, frightened
eyes. . . .
"Do you think there's any danger, sir?" She turned to Vane and looked at
him imploringly.
"I hope not," he answered reassuringly. "There should be enough boats to
go round. . . . Ah! look--there is the swine."
Rolling a little, and just awash, the conning tower of the submarine
showed up out of the sea about half a mile away, and suddenly Vane heard
a voice beside him cursing it bitterly and childishly. He turned, to
find one of the smoking-room patriots shaking his fist at it, while the
weak tears of rage poured down his face. Afterwards, on thinking the
experience over, Vane decided that that one spectacle had made it almost
worth while. . . .
Two boats were pulling away from the ship, which had already begun to
settle by the bows, and two more were in the process of being launched,
when the Hun lived up to his rightful reputation. There are times when
one is nauseated and sickened by the revolting cant of a repentant
Germany; by the hypocritical humbug that, at heart, the German is a
peace-loving, gentle being who has been led away by those above him. And
as Vane watched grimly the path of the second, and so unnecessary
torpedo, he felt an overmastering longing that some of the up-holders of
the doctrine could be on board.
The "Connaught" was done for; that much was obvious to the veriest
land-lubber. And the second torpedo could have but one purpose--the
wanton destruction of so many more helpless women. Besides, it revolted
his sense of sport; it was like blowing a sitting bird to pieces with a
shot gun. . . .
He saw it strike amidships; he had a fleeting vision of a screaming,
struggling boat load--of curses and shouts, and then he knew no more.
There was a roaring in his ears, and he seemed to be travelling through
great spaces. Lights danced and flashed before his brain, and suddenly
he felt very cold. The noise had ceased, and everything was very still
and silent. . . . The cold grew more intense, till it seemed to eat into
him, and his head grew curiously light. Almost as if it was bursting
with some unaccustomed pressure. Then, just as it seemed as if it was
the end, and that his skull would literally fly to pieces, relief came
with a great rush, and Vane found himself gasping and blowing on the
surface of the water. Around him was a mass of débris, and instinctively
he struck out for a deck chair that was floating close by. He reached
it, and for a long time he clutched it, with only his head out of the
water--content to draw great gulps of the air into his panting lungs.
Then after a while he raised himself in the water and looked round.
About fifty yards away the "Connaught" was sinking rapidly, and Vane
wondered feebly how he had got where he was. People were still
struggling and scrambling over her slanting decks, and he watched a man
slashing with a knife at the falls of a partially filled boat.
He heard a voice cursing the man for a fool, and wondered who it was who
spoke. Then the boat crashed downwards stern first, shooting its load
into the water, and the same voice croaked, "I told you so, you bloody
fool. I told you so." It was then he realised that the voice was his
own. . . .
Vane closed his eyes, and tried to think. Presumably the wireless
messenger had sent out an S.O.S.; presumably, in time, someone would
arrive on the scene. Until that happened he must concentrate on saving
himself. His head was still swimming from the force of the explosion,
and for a long while he lay supporting himself mechanically on the
half-submerged chair. Then he felt that he was moving, and opening his
eyes he realised that the ship had disappeared. Very soon the suction
stopped, and he found himself alone on the grey, sullen water. In the
distance, bobbing up and down on the short swell, he could see half a
dozen boats; but close at hand there was nothing save the flotsam and
wreckage from the ship. The submarine, as far as he could tell, had
disappeared; at any rate, he was too low in the water to see her. After
a while the ship's boats, too, pulled out of sight, and for the first
time Vane began to feel afraid. What if the S.O.S. was not answered?
What if only the boats were picked up, and he was never found? . . .
An overwhelming panic seized him and he commenced to shout--a puny little
noise lost in the vastness around him, and drowned by the shrieking of a
countless swarm of gulls, that fought over the prize that had come to
them. Then with a great effort he pulled himself together. He must keep
his head and save his strength--he must. . . . Any boat coming up would
be attracted to the scene of the disaster by the gulls, he repeated to
himself over and over again--and then they would see him.
He took a fresh grip of the chair and swam a few strokes to keep warm.
That was the next point that came into his mind--how long could he last
before, numbed with the cold, his grip on the chair would relax and he
would only have his life-belt to rely on? He must not get cold, he must
swim steadily and quietly to keep up his circulation--always keeping near
the gulls. He argued it out carefully in his mind, unconsciously talking
aloud, and when he had decided what he was going to do he nodded his head
in complete agreement. And then he laughed--a strange, croaking laugh
and apostrophised a gull which was circling above his head. "How damn
funny, old bird," he said still chuckling; "how damn funny. . . ." The
humour of the situation had struck him suddenly. After the long years in
France to be drowned like a bally hen inside a coop! . . .
Undoubtedly a man clinging to a deck chair did look rather like a hen in
a coop--a bedraggled hen, most certainly, very bedraggled. Not at all
the sort of hen that should be dished up at the Carlton or the Savoy for
dinner. A cheap and nasty hen, Vane decided. . . .
A splash of water hit him in the mouth and made him splutter and cough.
"Pull yourself together, man," he cried fiercely; "for God's sake, pull
yourself together!" He realised that his mind had been wandering; he
realised that that way lay Death. He started to swim steadily, keeping
near the main mass of wreckage, and pushing the chair in front of him.
Several times they bumped into things, and once Vane found himself
looking through the bars of the back of the chair at something which
rolled and sogged in the water. And then it half turned, and he saw it
was a woman. Some of her hair, sodden and matted, came through the
openings of his chair, and he watched the floating tendrils
uncomprehendingly for a while. Dead . . . of course, she was dead . . .
with the water splashing ceaselessly over her face. . . . At peace; she
had chucked her hand in--given up the useless struggle.
What chance was there anyway of a boat coming in time? What a fool he
was to go on, when he felt so tired and so cold? . . . That woman did
not mind--the one lying there in the water so close to him. She was
perfectly happy . . . while he was numb and exhausted. Why not just lie
on the water and go to sleep? . . . He would keep the woman company, and
he would be happy just like her, instead of having to force his frozen
hands to hold that cursed slippery wood. . . .
And Joan would be happy, because she would have saved Blandford; and
Baxter, damn him, he would be happy; and the whole blessed outfit would
be happy as well as him when he had just dropped on to sleep. . . .
He would never have done as a husband for Margaret; the idea was
ridiculous. Imagine sitting down and writing a book, while she took the
pennies at the door--or did he have to take the pennies? Anyway, this
settled the matter, and saved him the trouble of explanation. He loathed
explanations; all he wanted was peace and quiet and rest. . . .
What a farce it all was; man thinking he could struggle against science.
Science ruled the universe--aeroplanes, gas, torpedoes. And it served
men right for inventing them; they should have been more careful. The
smile on the dead German airman's face, as he lay on the ground near
Poperinghe, floated before him, and he nodded his head portentously.
"You're right, old bean," he croaked. "The man I want to meet is the
fool who doesn't think it's funny . . . ."
And then Vane crossed the Valley of the Shadow, as far as a man may cross
and yet return. Strange figures crowded around him hemming him in on
every side. The Boche whose brains he had blown out near Arras was there
with his shattered skull, holding out a hand of greeting--and Baxter,
grinning sardonically. Margaret--with a wealth of pity and love shining
on her face, and Joan with her grey eyes faintly mocking . . . . And his
tailor with the wart on his nose, and Mrs. Green, and Binks. . . . They
were all there, and then gradually they faded into the great
darkness. . . . Everything was growing still, and peaceful--the rest he
wanted had come.
Then suddenly they came back again--the Boche and Baxter and the rest of
them--and started pulling him about. He cursed and swore at them, but
they paid no heed; and soon the agony he was suffering became almost
unbearable. In God's name, why could not they leave him alone? . . . He
raved at them, and sobbed, but it was of no avail. They went on
inexorably and the creaking of the oars in the rowlocks of the boat that
had picked him up seemed to him to be the creaking of his arms and
legs. . . .