OLD FRIENDS COME ABOARD
They were back in Queenstown two mornings later, returning by way of
Fishguard. The _Warren_ was at anchor and waves of heat above her
four grey stacks indicated that she was getting ready for business
once more. That noon the starboard mess was entertained with a vivid
first-hand account of a Zeppelin raid on London. There was a big batch
of mail in the afternoon, and Joe and Steve each fared well. The home
papers proved interesting reading, for they covered a period of nearly
three weeks, during which much had happened back in what Steve called
“the little old U. S. A.” The draft for the National Army had been
made, the government had taken over all merchant ships of twenty-five
hundred tons or more then building and the President had put his
signature to a bill to control the country’s food supply. In Russia,
too, events had transpired, for because of the disaffection of certain
regiments the army was in general retreat in Galicia. But from Flanders
came better news, for the British and French had smashed the German
lines over a twenty-mile front. Rumours of that success had reached
them before, but experience had proved the advisability of discrediting
most rumours. That advance made up for the disruption of the Russian
defences in the east, in Steve’s opinion, but Joe refused to be
placated by it and stated his opinion of the Russians in an earnest
manner that carried conviction. There was no argument forthcoming, for
although his audience consisted of half the starboard watch no one had
the heart to disagree.
The _Warren_ put in an eventful turn on patrol that lasted six days and
nights, most of which were squally. The events, though, were neither
novel nor exciting, but consisted of false alarms, unfruitful chases
and frequent battles with the gales. Back in port Steve came down with
a cold that put him ashore in the hospital for two days, but just
before the destroyer weighed anchor again he came piling back, better
but by no means well. Joe lectured him severely, but Steve only grinned.
The second morning out the wireless picked up a call for help from
an American steamer which had just entered the danger zone on the
eastward passage. The _Warren_ was a good sixty-five miles off, but she
kicked up her heels and started for the scene. The boys will always
remember that bit of steaming, for the destroyer ran straight into the
seas at a gait just under thirty knots for more than two hours. The
waves were high in consequence of the gales which had been lashing the
Atlantic for more than a week and life on the bridge was no better than
a prolonged shower bath. The seas washed the deck clean aft of the
forecastle and every opening of the hatches brought buckets of water
down to the lower deck. There were times when the _Warren_ stuck her
nose so far under that it seemed only a miracle could wrench it out
again. But she always shook herself free and staggered on, leaping and
bucking like a broncho. Even the foretop cage was a spray-drenched
place during those wild hundred and forty minutes. But the _Warren_
did herself proud, and every man-Jack aboard thrilled to the plucky
struggle she made. In the radio hutch such messages as “Hold on, we’re
coming!” “With you in forty minutes!” and “Stick it out!” were sent at
intervals, but there came no reply from the steamer and it seemed that
the destroyer was to be too late. But the Old Man was taking no chances
and as the _Warren_ drew near the scene the bow guns were manned and
the little ship was in readiness.
It was just after six bells when the foretop spotter gave the word that
smoke was ahead. Before that they had heard the sounds of gunfire and a
cheer broke out when the submarine was sighted a mile or so away from
the steamer which lay, evidently helpless, rolling in the seas. The
_Warren_ made straight for the U-boat, but the latter had apparently
got wind of the destroyer’s approach, for she submerged quickly before
the _Warren_ could get within range. Circling repeatedly about the
spot, the destroyer let go five depth-charges, but no signs of the
enemy were seen again.
Later they got the steamer’s story. She had just entered the danger
zone when a lookout reported a submarine on the port bow. Immediately
the U-boat fired a shell which passed a few yards from the steamer’s
stern. The captain then sent out his wireless appeal for help, since
the location of the submarine was such that escape seemed impossible.
A long range battle began between the two craft, the steamer firing
at nine thousand yards and the submarine manœuvring to keep out of
range and at the same time keeping up a running fire. The steamer’s
shells fell short, but the U-boat made several hits, wounding four
men. After the battle had gone on almost two hours, during which
the steamer’s gun crews fired two hundred and sixty shots and the
submarine two hundred and thirty-four, the latter made a lucky hit,
exploding a shell in the engine room and putting the vessel out of
commission. The submarine had then approached nearer and had continued
to rain shots, but for some reason, perhaps in the hope of taking the
steamer afloat, had fired no torpedoes. The steamer’s wireless had
been disabled shortly after the beginning of the engagement and the
_Warren’s_ messages had not reached her. Consequently the captain had
been as surprised as delighted when he had seen a low streak of black
smoke to the northeastward and, later, the destroyer ploughing toward
him head-on. He had given up all hope of saving his vessel at the time
of the destroyer’s unexpected appearance.
The surgeon and two assistants made a perilous trip across to the
steamer and attended to the wounded, after which the _Warren_ stood by
while engine repairs were made with great difficulty. Toward night the
two ships started for the French coast. They lost each other once but
came together again soon after daylight and the _Warren_ steamed within
sight until the steamer was safely in-shore.
That incident was fairly typical of the sort of work that fell to
the _Warren_, although sometimes she arrived at the scene too late
and sometimes, as on a later occasion, her services went for nought
because of the pigheadedness of a skipper. That time the _Warren_ was
convoying a steamer with new engines which had never been properly
worked in. Instead of keeping in column she kept up a series of zig-zag
excursions to port and starboard that puzzled the _Warren’s_ commander
considerably. When she had crossed the destroyer’s bows the fourth
time in less than an hour the _Warren_ signalled and the reply came
back that she couldn’t slow down to the destroyer’s pace. “You’ll have
to,” replied the _Warren_. “Dangerous channel ahead. Keep astern and
follow.” So said the destroyer’s blinker in the semi-darkness of early
morning. Whether the cargo boat read the signal aright or, reading,
couldn’t make up her mind to obey, wasn’t apparent just then. But the
natural thing happened, for the steamer piled herself up on a reef and
went down with three thousand tons of much needed coal. The _Warren_
rescued the crew of thirty men and, metaphorically shrugging her
shoulders, went off on her business.
There was another case of pigheadedness soon after which, however,
did not end disastrously. The convoy in that case was an American
freighter, a rusty old junk of a ship that almost racked herself to
pieces in the effort to keep her place in the column. The first night
the _Warren’s_ lookout observed, to his horror, that the tramp was
showing a stern light that might easily have been seen twenty miles
away.
“Dim that stern light!” ordered the destroyer’s captain.
“It’s only what we always carry,” was the response.
“Dim it,” was the prompt reply, “or I’ll blow it off you!”
It was dimmed.
The _Warren_ picked up strange guests at times. One bright and blowy
morning a trampish-looking steamer came close and signalled that she
was under sealed orders from London and had on board survivors from
the crew of a British steamer torpedoed at daylight. She asked if
the _Warren_ would take them aboard. The executive gestured despair,
but a whaleboat was lowered from the tramp and the survivors of the
_Castle Something_――no one there ever found out her exact name――were
tumbled into it. They were a strange looking lot when they reached the
_Warren’s_ deck. Cingalese, they were, with black skins and straight
hair matted from hours in the water. Most were clad only in blankets
and iodine-stained bandages. They were washed and freshly bandaged and
fed hot coffee and stowed forward, fourteen philosophical Mohammedan
castaways who expressed neither resentment at Fate nor gratitude for
rescue. They ate and dozed and jabbered softly amongst themselves and
were finally put ashore on the west coast of Ireland in a drizzly dusk.
And so life went with the “Suicide Fleet.” In three months of service
the American flotilla had collectively steamed over five hundred
thousand miles in British waters, and so far without the loss of a life
or a serious mishap. Patrolling the sea lanes, convoying merchantmen
and troop-ships, fighting the submarines, rescuing survivors of
torpedoed craft: that was their duty and they performed it well. And
meanwhile they gained by experience, officers and men. They learned new
things constantly, such as smoke-screening, hardly more than a theory
with them before, and the use of depth-charges. And gunnery improved
day by day. The _Warren_ in September had a record of a shattered
periscope at two thousand yards. That was Number Four gun, and there
was no living with that crew for days afterwards!
Steve and Joe became first-class seamen in due time, and, to get ahead
of our story somewhat, in the Autumn Joe received his reward for the
_Sundsvall_ exploit when he was made a gunner’s mate of the second
class and blossomed forth proudly in his rating badge of spread eagle,
crossed guns and two chevrons. Steve was divided between pride in his
chum and envy of his fortune, and secretly determined to win his petty
officership too. Whether he did or did not does not belong to this
narrative. Nor does the way in which he did it!
It was well toward the last of August and on a beautifully warm day
that the _Warren_, skimming a leisurely path across a shining ocean
with almost no swell, sighted a speck in the distance. They were some
three hundred and forty miles off the Irish coast. Steve had just
finished his turn aloft and was standing near the port torpedo tube
in conversation with Jack Higgins when the word went down to the
bridge and was answered by the straining of the steering cables as the
_Warren_ turned her nose to starboard.
“Wonder what it’ll be this time,” muttered Jack when they could see
the object from the deck and had made her out a small boat. “Maybe
Chinese, eh! We haven’t had any Chinese yet. Awfully careless of the
Old Man, too.”
Twenty minutes later eighteen chattering, half-starved men were helped
over the side: seamen, firemen, a ship’s steward and two lads in the
bedraggled uniform of the United States Naval Reserve. Of the latter
one carried the mark of a gun-pointer and the other of a seaman gunner.
Steve, watching curiously and sympathetically as the pale-faced throng
came aboard, suddenly gave a startled exclamation.
“_Phil!_” he gasped.
The lad with the gun-pointer’s insignia on his sleeve turned and looked
along the deck in the direction of the voice. Then his tired face
lighted up and a tremulous smile flitted across it as he held up a hand
in greeting. Steve, scarcely believing his eyes, edged nearer. The
second Reserve gunner was looking, too, now, and he also grinned and
formed words with his lips that Steve couldn’t read. Then they were all
hustled below and Steve set excitedly forth to find Joe. He hadn’t far
to go, for Joe was one of a group looking on from further aft. Steve
grabbed him and pulled him around.
“Did you see?” he cried.
“See? See what?”
“See who came aboard!”
“Sure. A dozen and a half hungry――――”
“No, but the fellows in Reserve uniforms! Did you recognise them!”
“Not a bit. Who were they? Say, what’s the big idea, Steve? You look
all upset.”
“It’s Phil and Harry!” declared Steve in a breath.
“Finnan haddie? _What’s_ Finnan haddie? Say, for the love of――――”
“Oh, dry up and listen! _Phil and Harry_, I said! Phil ... and....”
“Never!”
“Honest!”
“_Get out!_”
“Cross my heart, Joe! What do you know about it, eh?”
“Where are they?” Joe started toward the hatch, but Steve seized him.
“Wait! No use going down now. The Old Man’ll have them, I guess. Wait
till they’ve had some eats. They saw me. I yelped right out when
I caught sight of Phil, and the junior luff looked daggers at me.
Couldn’t help it. Say, honest, doesn’t it beat everything?”
“It sure does! Still, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t be here,
you know. I suppose they got strafed.”
“Do you really? Aren’t you the bright little laddie? What made you
think that?” Steve was too excited to talk sense. “Just because
they were in a life-boat a-floating around the ocean you jump at
the conclusion that they’ve been strafed. Gee, but you’re a regular
Sherlock W. Holmes, you are, Joe! Think of old Phil and Harry turning
up like this! I wonder what happened.”
“So do I,” replied Joe resolutely, “and I mean to find out.” And,
avoiding Steve’s grasp he strode to the hatch, squeezed through and
tumbled down the ladder. Steve followed on his heels, but it wasn’t
until a full hour later that the four members of the Adventure Club
found themselves together in the lee of the stern gun and that Steve
and Joe heard the story of the sinking of the _Arapahoe_.