For the most part the American destroyers on duty in British and French
waters were doing patrol service, scouting over designated areas in
quest of enemy submarines, meeting and escorting troop and merchant
ships into port, and on occasion, when the S O S calls came, rushing to
the aid of torpedoed or of mined craft.
Even during the short experience Philip Morgan and his chums had had on
the _Colodia_, they had often seen the wreckage-littered waters where
ships had gone down and men and women had suffered exposure in
lifeboats.
The destroyer had roared through the grey seas, in fog and gale and
darkness, in answer to the tragic calls for help. Never, since men went
down to the sea in ships, had there been such adventure on the waves as
in those years of the World War.
For never before had the sharklike submarine abounded nor the airplanes
swept overhead, both carrying death and destruction. When the _Colodia_
left port her crew had small surety that they would return. This present
night call was a new one for them.
The crew of the supposedly wrecked Zeppelin had been possibly five hours
in the sea when the captured Germans told of their comrades’ fate. The
British port admiral had communicated with Commander Lang within a few
minutes of his hearing the tragic tale.
There was perhaps a particular reason why the order to find the wreck of
the Zeppelin and her crew (if they were not drowned) was given to one of
the American destroyers instead of to a British patrol boat.
After all, the Yankees could not feel the same degree of bitterness and
hatred of the Hun and his works as the British sailor did. The murder of
the school children and their teacher was known to every British sailor
in the port. To their horror was added personal bitterness. And this
order sent the _Colodia_ on a mission of mercy!
“The best I can hope for them,” said Morgan to George Belding, who had
been placed in Whistler’s watch and had donned such uniform as the
master-at-arms could supply him, “is that they will all be comfortably
drowned before we find any trace of the Zep. That maybe is wicked; but
it is the way I feel.”
“That would be better than they deserve,” Belding agreed. “Just think
what that spy did to me!”
He was still very much disturbed in his mind regarding the loss of his
letters and valuable papers.
“Why, you can’t tell, Phil,” said he, “what the Huns might try to do. If
they read father’s letters and learned about all that gold----”
“You really mean the _Redbird_ will take out treasure to Bahia?” asked
Whistler in great concern.
“Yes. More gold coin than there is any use talking about,” whispered
Belding. “Father knew I would be interested in all the details, so he
told me.”
“And my sisters and your mother and Lilian going along!” sighed
Whistler.
“Nice mess, isn’t it?” groaned the other. “That spy will make use of the
information sure!--if he can.”
“When will the _Redbird_ sail?”
“Next month, some time. Of course, I’ll try to send father word about
this. But you know what the censor does to a fellow’s letters. And to
cable would be worse.”
“Wait a minute!” cried Whistler. “That spy couldn’t benefit very well by
the information himself. He’s here in England and your father’s ship
will sail from New York, won’t it?”
“I suppose so. From ‘an Atlantic port.’ You know, that’s as near as they
would let him tell in a letter. And don’t worry about the Huns not being
benefited by the information. They’ll find some way. They have wireless
stations along our United States coast. And every U-boat carries a
wireless.”
“So do our subs,” Whistler rejoined. “But they are of small radius. The
English coast is cleaned out of Hun radio stations.”
“They have ’em on the islands off Ireland and Scotland,” returned
Belding. “That spy is some smart chap, Phil. I’m awfully worried. I’ll
write father, of course, as clearly as the censorship will allow. But it
may be too late. The _Redbird_ may have sailed--or a U-boat may sink the
mail ship.”
“You don’t want to lose your courage over it,” advised the Seacove
youth. “We mustn’t expect the worst. Of course, with Phoebe and Alice
aboard I shall be worried until we hear that they have arrived safely at
Bahia.”
“And it takes a long time for a sailing ship to reach that place from
our North Atlantic seaports,” responded Belding.
They talked thus in whispers while hanging to a wire stay. The _Colodia_
was running without lights, every inboard lamp carefully screened,
although the night was black. Before Whistler and Belding went off watch
it had begun to rain, and a fierce, chill wind was blowing. The sea was
beginning to kick up, and a sailor had to be a good acrobat to get into
his hammock on the destroyer.
The new watch went on deck in rubber boots and slickers, and the gun
crews, who were always on duty at sea, day or night, sought such cover
as they could find. It was a nasty voyage, and they were not inspired
with the thought that they might be able to save the Germans’ lives.
The bearings of the spot where the second Zeppelin had fallen had been
given to the port admiral and by him transferred to Commander Lang with
precision. It was a long run to this point, the boys knew. The destroyer
could not possibly make the point indicated before daybreak.
Yet most of the younger members of the crew, whether it was their call
or not, were up in season for five o’clock coffee. The excitement grew
as the light became stronger and more could be seen of the gray, tossing
sea.
It was a bad lookout for rescuing anybody. To put out a boat in such a
sea would be a task that the hardiest of the _Colodia’s_ crew shrank
from. Now and then a comber rose over the destroyer’s rail and tried to
wash her deck. But the thousand-ton fast steamer escaped most of these
“old he waves” as Boatswain Hans Hertig called them.
Hertig was from Seacove, too, and was a particularly good friend of
Whistler and his chums. “Seven Knott” was his nickname aboard the
_Colodia_, and the boys had had many adventures afloat and ashore in his
company.
“I ain’t got much use for them squareheads,” Hans declared, “and after
what they done back there, I dunno as these fellers, what would have
done the same had they reached land, should be helped yet.”
“Not much likelihood of our finding them at all,” one of the other men
said. “Ten hours in the water now! And the bag of the Zep is bound to
fill with water and sink the whole framework. Those Heinies will be
kicking about in pretty wet water.”
This was the attitude of most of the crew; yet there was great curiosity
among them to see what was left of the Zeppelin that had fallen into the
sea. Commander Lang conferred with the navigation officer and his other
chiefs. The _Colodia_ had reached the spot indicated in their orders
from the port admiral.
Now all they could do was to sweep in circles about the designated place
and keep an extra sharp lookout.
In fact, every man who could get on deck was watching the tumbling seas
for any sign of wreck or castaway. After all, as the minutes passed and
nothing at all was descried where they had expected to find survivors of
the Zeppelin, even the roughest members of the crew stopped growling
about “the Heinies.”
It was one thing to give vent to the bitterness they felt against the
Germans in speech, it was another thing to think of those fourteen or
sixteen men struggling for so many hours in the icy water, and finally
being drowned so miserably.
The hammock stowers had just stopped down the hammock cloths and the
boys had got their mess gear preparatory for breakfast at 7:30 A. M.
when there came a hail from the mast. One of the lookouts had descried
something in the east. He pointed, and excitedly yelled his directions
to the watch officer.
The _Colodia’s_ engines began to speed up. When she went her full
thirty-odd knots her hull shook as though she would rattle to pieces.
The life of a destroyer in such work as the _Colodia_ had been doing
since she was launched, can be only a few months. Commander Lang was
already talking to his officers of the time when she would have to be
scrapped.
Meanwhile her record would amply repay the Navigation Bureau for
building her. There was no doubt of that.
Now she pounded away at top speed for the point where the lookout had
seen something afloat on the tumbling seas. All through this trip, not
only the destroyer’s commander, but many of the more thoughtful members
of the crew, had half suspected a German trick.
It would not be outside of possibility, or probability, for the crew of
the Zeppelin brought down ashore to send a rescue ship to sea into a
trap arranged with the usual German ruthlessness. It was possible that
there had been no second Zeppelin at all, but that the _Colodia_ was
steaming at her best pace to a rendezvous with a U-boat prepared to
torpedo her.
Tricks quite as vile had been played before by the Hun. Commander Lang,
with his binoculars to his eyes, got the spot on the sea that the
lookout had observed and kept his glasses trained there. It certainly
was not a periscope they saw, yet it might be some wreckage held
together for the special purpose of masking a periscope.
The gun crews were at their stations and the men handling the depth
bombs were ready on either side, and fore and aft, to drop the deadly
explosives if it was found that the _Colodia_ had run into a trap.