the after cabin are tryin’ to beat the door down and threat’nin’ to
fire the ship.”
“I’ll come and attend to them,” said the Captain grimly. But first he
went on the bridge and gave the helmsman the course for Christobal.
VI THE CREW’S SHARE OF THE SPOILS
Next day they sighted a bark. She was English, and, to make up for his
disappointment, the Captain had the pleasure of giving her news of war,
and scaring her nearly to death with the false news of German cruisers
in the vicinity.
The latter trick was played out of spite, owing to her refusal to
relieve him of Wolff and Shiner--still in durance vile.
He had brought the _Penguin_ to within megaphone distance of the
bark--her name was the _Anne Page_--and when he made his request the
answer came roaring back, quite definite:
“I won’t take no German prisoners. I’m full up with pigs and copra;
there ain’t standin’ room scarcely as it is, and we’re short of water
and grub.”
“I’ll supply you,” cried the _Penguin_. “Lower a boat and you’ll have
what you want.”
The _Anne Page_ seemed to meditate a moment, and then again came the
response like that of a deaf man who has failed to catch the meaning of
what is said to him:
“I won’t take no German prisoners. There ain’t no room for them. Why
don’t you keep ’em yourself--you’re big enough?”
On that the Captain gave his news of the German cruisers, and the _Anne
Page_ picked up her skirts and scuttled.
But next day they had better luck. They picked up a real German
schooner, captained by a real Simon-pure German skipper, and eight of
the scallawags of the _Penguin_ had their first exercise under arms.
The _Penguin_ carried a whaleboat for beach work--Wolff had strongly
resented the purchase of this boat, but the Captain had stood firm--and
into it were bundled Wolff and Shiner, eight malefactors armed with
cutlasses and rifles, followed by Blood himself.
The schooner--the _Spreewald_ was her name--would have escaped, but
there was only a five-knot breeze blowing, and the _Penguin_ could make
ten. There was also the threat of ramming. She let herself be boarded,
received the declaration of war, and then submitted to be robbed.
The whole thing was shameful, and painfully like robbing a child of the
milk it is carrying home. She was but a little ship, and the booty was
trifling, some five hundred dollars, some barrels of Bismarck herrings,
a dozen boxes of cigars, and a gold watch and chain. That is what
Blood took from her. But she relieved him of the presence of Wolff and
Shiner, and he reckoned that equal to a lot of plunder.
When they steered off they got five miles away before the _Spreewald_
had fully recovered her senses from the outrage and pulled herself
together. Then they saw her spreading her canvas and altering her
course.
“She was bound for one of the English islands, I expect,” said Blood,
“and now she’s nosing off for some German port of call. Well, I guess
this is the first blood the English have drawn in these seas. I deserve
a bonus on that.”
The money he had in his pocket, also the gold watch and chain; the
Bismarck herrings had gone to the lazaret, and the cigars to the saloon.
He was turning with Harman to go down and enjoy one when a little man
with a red head came aft, touching his cap.
“Please, sir,” said this individual, “I was sent by the crew to ax what
their share in the liftin’ is to be.”
“Oh, you were, were you?” said the Captain. “And a very natural
question, too. I’ll go forward and have a talk with them.”
He found the men clustered round the picking-up gear.
“You sent to ask me what your share in the findings would be,” said
he, “so I thought I’d come and tell you by word of mouth. To begin
with, what do you think yourselves on board of--a pirate? You’ll just
understand one thing: this ship is acting on the square; it’s under
command of a Britisher--that’s me--and whatever we take rightfully
belongs to the British government. But I can promise you this: Your
money you signed on for will be paid when we reach Valparaiso,
one-third of all pickings will be divided among you, leaving two-thirds
for Mr. Harman and me; and, after we coal at Valparaiso, I intend
taking the hooker down to a port I know of and selling her. Half the
money she brings will be divided among her crew, the other half between
Mr. Harman and me.”
“And the British government?” asked the bos’n.
“I’ll settle with the British government,” replied the Captain, with a
wink.
A roar of laughter went up.
The idea of doing the Germans and the British government at the same
time appealed so much to these gentlemen that they forgot to consider
over the terms for the division of the spoil or dispute them.
“And may I ax are we heading for Valparaiso now?” asked the red-headed
man.
“No, we are not; we are heading for a little German island named
Christobal.”
“And what are we goin’ to do there?” asked another of the crowd.
“We are going to collect all the money we can find for the British
government.”
Another howl of laughter.
“And suppose, when we’re landed at this here island, a German ship
comes along and asks us what we are doing?” spoke up a grumbler.
“What’ll us say to that?”
“Why, we’ll say we’re picking mushrooms,” replied the Captain. “Any
more inquiries? Well, then, you can get to work. See here! I want
half a dozen chaps to help me rig up a dummy gun on the bow balks. A
stovepipe is good, but we haven’t got one, so we must just use a big
spar sawed down. There’s a spare yard will do. I’ll go and speak to Mr.
Harman about it.”
He turned off, and in the alleyway he met MacBean looking more serious
and like a Scotch terrier than ever--an Aberdeen. He had been
listening to every word.
“Mon, mon,” said MacBean, “this is an awfu’ business. Fiddlin’ with the
cable was bad, but this is shoockin’, rank piracy, call it what names
you will, and that I did not sign for.”
“What made you sign on at all?” cried the Captain, flashing out.
“Drink,” replied Mac. “The same that made Harman and half the crew
sign on. Mon, this is an unholy ship, a drunk ship that has to keep
sober, goin’ about the ocean with hell in her heart; cable smashin’ and
pirating under the cover of a devastating war--and sober all the time.”
“Jolly good job for you all you have to keep sober.”
“I was not thinkin’ of the goodness or the badness of the job,” said
Mac. “It’s the heepocrisy gets me.”
“Well, if the Germans don’t get you as well you’ll be lucky,” replied
the other, going aft.
He found Harman in the saloon sampling the cigars, and he gave him a
sketch of what he had done and said to the crew.
“A lick of grey paint and an artificial bore, which you can burn out
with a hot iron, and you can’t tell a spar end from the nose of a
four-inch gun,” said he in conclusion.
“From the shore?” said Harman.
“Just so,” replied the Captain. “You didn’t fancy I was going to invite
the blighters aboard to inspect our armaments, did you?”
VII CHRISTOBAL
Christobal Island lay two days’ steaming away. It was a tiny place set
all alone in the wastes of the sea.
There was only one trading station there, and it was run by a German
on behalf of a German firm. This person’s name was Sprengel, and, to
use the words that Blood applied to him some years before the date of
this story, he had everything of the Red Indian about him except the
gentleman.
Sprengel was a Prussian, close-clipped, clever, hard, and persistent
as the east wind that blows over East Prussia in the spring. He had
managed to keep other traders away from Christobal Island. Trade was
his god; he had one ideal only--money, and, with the Teutonic passion
for alien slang, he declared that in Christobal he was the only pebble
on the beach.
The place, though German, was free to all men, absolutely free, yet
Sprengel kept it absolutely German. No one could compete with him.
Other traders had tried, but their business had wilted; antagonistic
influences had worked mysteriously against them.
Blood had brought a cargo of trade here once for a friend. The friend,
Samson by name, had put his all into a little schooner and a cargo of
all sorts of “notions”--canned salmon, gin, tobacco, prints, knives,
et cetera. He had taken Blood along as skipper. Bad luck had followed
them to several islands, and here at Christobal had finished them.
Blood rightly had put down their failure to Sprengel, and the glorious
idea of getting even with Sprengel now haunted him so that he could not
sleep.
His one dread was that Sprengel, having made his pile, might have gone
back to Bromberg to enjoy it.
They had finished the “gun” next day, and mounted it on the bow, with
a tarpaulin over the breech as if to protect it from the weather, when
the Captain, who had been superintending the operations, coming aft,
discovered Harman emerging from the saloon companionway in a high state
of excitement.
“I’ve found it,” said Harman. “I knew it was there. I guessed the swine
couldn’t have finished the lot, so I set up a hunt for it. Come you
down and see.”
The Captain followed him below, and there, on the saloon table, he saw
standing three bottles of Pilsener.
“Where did you get those?” said he.
“Get them! I got them out of the locker in Wolff’s cabin; hid away
they were behind some old newspapers. I guessed the pair of those
chaps hadn’t finished all the lush, and I hunted and hunted--first
in Shiner’s locker, then under the mattress in his lower bunk. I
looked into Wolff’s locker twiced, and saw nothin’ but newspapers, and
still I kep’ on. I reckon I must have smelled the stuff to make me so
persistent. Anyhow, I lit on the idea that the stuff might be hid
behind the newspapers, and I went again, and there they were.”
“Fetch some glasses,” said the Captain.
Harman darted off, and returned with two glasses and a corkscrew.
The Captain took the corkscrew, placed a bottle between his knees, and
was on the point of inserting the screw into the cork, when he paused,
stood up, and replaced the bottle and corkscrew on the table.
“What’s the matter now?” asked Harman.
“An idea has struck me,” replied the Captain.
“What’s your idea?”
“We mustn’t drink this stuff.”
“Not drink it!” cried the outraged Harman. “And what on earth do you
want it for if we ain’t to drink it?”
“Bait,” replied the other.
“Bait?”
“To catch Sprengel with. This is Lion brew Pilsener, and it’s a hundred
to one, if he’s still on the island, he hasn’t any of this stuff with
him. There’s no German born could withstand the temptation. It beats
sausages.”
“Well,” said Harman, flying out like a child, “if I’d known you was
going to collar the stuff like that I’d have drunk it before I called
you. It ain’t fair. Here am I with my tongue hangin’ down to my heels
for a drink, and there’s the stuff and the glasses and all. I’m not
given to complain, but it’s too much. I’m speakin’ my mind now. It’s
too much!”
“Can’t you understand that with this stuff I may be able to get the
blighter on board,” said the Captain, “and if I once get him on board
and down to this saloon the whole of the rest of the thing will be
easy. If we try to rush the place with him on shore there may be blood
spilled. With him a prisoner here there won’t be any resistance.
“I’ll take him those three bottles as a present, and then invite him on
board with the promise of a case of it--d’ye see?”
“I’ll tell you what,” said Harman. “I’ll split the difference with you.
Take him two bottles as a present, and we’ll drink the other.”
The Captain considered on this a moment, and then, fearing mutiny as
well as having a thirst, he gave in.
It was his first drink for a long time, and it was excellent beer; the
only drawback was the quantity.
“What I can’t see,” said Harman, finishing his portion of the liquid,
“is what in the nation you want treatin’ the perisher to two bottles
of this stuff; two bottles is too little to take ashore with you as
a present, and it’s one too many if you’re just going to offer him a
drink after he’s caught.”
The Captain joined issue, and the argument went on till thirst joined
with Harman, and the Captain gave in. The second bottle was opened.
And now a strange thing happened. No sooner had the contents of the
second bottle vanished than the Captain himself prepared to finish the
business.
It was the Irishman coming out.
“There’s no use in one bottle,” said he, “and, for the matter of that,
I can get him aboard on the promise of beer. How’s he to know there is
none?”
Harman actually protested--feebly enough, it is true--yet he protested,
holding out his glass at the same time. There was a Scotch strain in
Harman.
When they had finished, they filled the bottles with water and recorked
them.
“They’re just as good like that,” said the Captain, “for Sprengel.”
VIII SPRENGEL
At seven o’clock next morning Christobal showed up on the far horizon,
and by ten o’clock the _Penguin_ was heading for the anchorage, with
the Captain on the bridge and Harman beside him.
It was a lovely island.
A broken reef protected the beach from the full force of the sea, and
the cliffs showed green with foliage and flecked at one point by the
eternal smoke of a torrent. Beyond the beach a white frame house with
a veranda showed, and on either side native houses nestled among the
cocoanut trees and breadfruits. The faint wind blowing from landward
brought the perfume of vanilla and flowers, coloured birds flew in the
blue sky above the trees, while the tune of the blue sea beating on
the reef came like the song of sleep and summer.
A sulphur-tinted butterfly flittered across the water on the wind, as
if to inspect the ship, and flittered away again. On the beach could be
seen several natives standing and watching their approach, motionless
and seemingly incurious.
“It’s all deep water through the break and beyond,” said the Captain.
“We don’t want any pilot.”
“There’s a chap come out on the veranda of the house,” said Harman.
The Captain picked up the glass he had been using, and turned it on the
figure in the veranda.
“That’s him,” said he. “That’s the chap right enough. Take a look.”
Harman put the glass to his eye, and the veranda and the man leaped
within ten feet of him.
The man was short, stout, bull-necked, bullet-headed, wearing a close,
clipped beard and with his hair cut to the bone.
“He ain’t a beauty,” said Harman. “Look, he’s going into the house, and
here he comes out again.”
Sprengel had brought out a pair of marine glasses and was observing the
ship through them.
“Wonder if he recognises me,” said the Captain.
Then he stood silent, whistling now and then, and now and then giving
an order to the fellow at the wheel.
One of the hands was heaving the lead; his hard, thin voice came up to
the bridge in a snarl:
“Mark four! Mark four! Quarter less four!”
The Captain rang the engines to half speed, then to dead slow. The
_Penguin_ passed the opening in the reef. The water she rode on was
like blue satin billowed under by wind; then, in the glassy smooth
beyond, Harman, who was forward attending to the anchor, glancing over
the side, saw the coral floor beneath them clearly as though he were
looking at it through air.
The Captain rang the engines off, the wheel flew to starboard, and the
rumble-tumble of the anchor chain through the hawse pipe came back in
moist echoes from the woods and cliffs.
Then, the ship safely berthed, the Captain had time to turn his
attention to the shore.
Sprengel had vanished into the house, and the few natives on the shore
were still standing about in attitudes of indifference. One had taken
his seat on the sand, and though there were several canoes on the beach
there was no evidence of any thought of launching them.
“It’s a good job we scoffed that Pilsener,” said Harman, who had come
up on the bridge. “It wouldn’t have been no use for this chap. You
won’t get this chap on board without a windlass and a derrick. No, sir!
He’s one of the retirin’ kind. He won’t trade, and he won’t be civil. I
reckon you’d better get that spar gun trained on the beach and some of
our chaps ready for a landin’ with the rifles, scoop all the money and
valuables we can find, and cut stick.”
“I’ve been thinking so myself,” said the Captain. “There’s no use
wasting time enticing this chap on board. Train the gun and get the
landing party ready with rifles and cutlasses.”
He came down from the bridge, and went aft to his cabin to put on his
best coat. When he came up again the whaleboat was lowered and the
landing party getting into her.
They certainly were a most terrific-looking lot, and when the boat’s
nose touched the sand and they scrambled out and lined up under
the direction of Harman, the natives looking on lost their look of
indifference, turned, and bolted for the woods.
“They don’t like the look of us,” said the Captain. “Now then, you
chaps, no chasing them. You follow after me, and do what Mr. Harman
bids you. Let one man of you disobey orders and he’ll have to settle
with me.”
He produced a navy revolver from his pocket. It was the only
serviceable weapon of the expedition, barring the cutlasses; they knew
it, and they knew him, and they followed like lambs as he walked toward
the house on whose veranda Sprengel had reappeared.
Ten yards away he ordered the others to halt, and advanced alone,
putting the revolver back in his pocket.
Sprengel was in pajamas, and he had been perspiring with the heat; he
was also in a bad temper and a bit frightened, all of which conditions
did not add to the beauty of his appearance.
“Mr. Sprengel, I believe,” said the Captain, opening the business.
“That is my name,” replied the other. “And who are you, may I ask, and
what is your ship doing here and these men?”
“We will go into the house and talk,” said the Captain, “if you will
kindly lead the way. I am the Captain of a British auxiliary cruiser
come to have a few words with you.”
He followed on the heels of Sprengel, who evidently had not recognised
him in the least, into a large, airy room floored with native matting
and furnished with American rockers, a bamboo couch, a table, and
island headdresses and spears for wall decorations.
“You did not recognise me outside,” said the Captain. “Perhaps because
I had my hat on. Do you not recognise me now?”
“Not from Adam,” replied Sprengel in a violent tone. “I only know that
you have landed on my beach with armed men and that you had but till
just now a pistol in your hand. Also, I recognise that your ship has a
gun trained on my house. Are you aware that this is a German island?”
“That’s just the point, my dear man,” said the Captain, taking a seat
unasked. “Are you aware that England is at war with Germany?”
“Eh, what!” said Sprengel, turning more fully on the other. “What you
say? England at war with Germany!”
“England at war with Germany. Yes. That is what I said, and I have come
to take your island in the name of the British government.”
Sprengel sat down in a chair and mopped himself. Sprengel had been
practically monarch of Christobal for a long time.
And now the English had come.
It was an eventuality he had always feared, always reckoned with. He
knew that war was in the air. He also knew international law, and he
was not so much put out as might have been expected.
Indeed, he was frankly impudent.
“Well, I did not make the war,” said he. “I am an honest trader
going about my business. If Christobal is English--well, it cannot
be helped--till we take it back from England. I claim the rights of
international law. My property is sacred.”
“International law, what is that?” asked Blood.
“Something you would not understand, but which your peddling government
fears _and_ respects. Something which they would like to put to one
side, _but_ which they cannot.”
“Oh, can’t they? Do you mean to imply that your property can’t be
touched because of international law?”
“Ab-so-_lu_tely.”
“We’ll soon see about that,” said Blood, “for I’ve come to take
away every rag you’ve got and every penny. I’ll leave you, for you
ain’t very good, and you can keep the house and the good will of the
business, but I want your money.”
He stood up.
So did Sprengel. Say what we may about the Prussians, they are
certainly plucky enough.
Threatened with spoliation, all the latent fury of the man flamed out
and centred on Blood. He stood for a moment visibly swelling; then he
charged.
Had that charge gone home it would have been the worse for the
Captain. Instead of meeting it, however, he stepped aside; Sprengel
met the wall, nearly bringing the house down, and Harman, who had been
listening on the veranda, rushed in.
He had brought some signal halyard line with an eye for eventualities,
and they bound the enemy without much trouble.
“Listen to him!” said Harman. “Listen to him chatterin’ about outrages
to noncombatants. What are ye yourself but an outrage, you fat
Proosian! Capt’in, lend me your wipe.”
The Captain handed over his handkerchief, and Harman, with suspicious
dexterity, rolled it into a gag. “That’ll stop your tongue,” said he.
“And now for the plunder.”
They found the safe where the unfortunate Sprengel kept his money.
There were five thousand dollars there in silver and American gold
coin, and a bank book showing a huge balance at a Berlin bank. Also
securities for large amounts. They respected these, as they were
useless, and took only the coin.
Then they went over the house and grounds adjoining, and the total loot
tabulated roughly ran to:
The amount of coin already specified.
Five thousand cigars.
A suit of new pajamas and a safety razor in case.
A case of Florida water, six bottles of eau de Cologne, all the native
headdresses adorning the sitting room.
A live parrot in a cage, half a dozen chickens, and half a boatload of
vegetables.
It was not much, but it was all that they could lay hands on. Harman
wanted to include a native girl who had come out from among the trees
with a basket of fruit on her head, not knowing what was going on, but
the Captain vetoed him. He only took the fruit.
Then they pushed off, having first ungagged their victim, unbound him,
and locked him in the house.
“And the funny thing is,” said the Captain when they had gained the
deck and the boat was being winched on board, “he never remembered me,
and he doesn’t know yet who I am.”
“Why didn’t you tell him?” said Harman.
“I thought of it, and then I held my tongue. There might be a chance of
him making mischief when the war is over if he knew my name.”
“But how in the nation could he make mischief?” said the simple-minded
Harman. “Germany bust or England bust, it’s all the same. What you done
was in war time, and so doesn’t count.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” said the Captain. “I am not at all too
sure of that. All that blab of Sprengel’s about the property of
nonbelligerents may have something in it. I’m not sure that it mayn’t.
It seems to me I’ve heard something about it before. Blast all
nonbelligerents; there’s always some thorn in the rose.
“Then, leaving the question of nonbelligerents aside, we have to think
of our own position. We haven’t a letter of marque, we have no more
right to go hoofing about the seas gobbling German property than you
have to go down Broadway lifting folk’s watches.”
“Well, what right have we to anything at all?” cut in the exasperated
Harman. “Accordin’ to you, we haven’t the right to breathe nor live.”
“Well, it’s this way,” said Blood. “We have a perfect right to breathe
and live as long as we can keep our necks out of the noose.”
“D’ye mean to say they’d hang us?”
“It’s highly probable. The Germans would, anyhow.”
Harman had been attending to the unloading of the boat all through this
talk. He now went and spat over the side, and then came back to his
companion.
“That’s cheerful,” said he.
“They might give you the choice of shooting instead of hanging,”
went on the Captain. “For myself, I prefer hanging, I think, if it’s
properly done.”
“Oh, Lord, no!” said Harman. “I’ve seen three fellows hanged, and I’ve
swore I would never get hanged if I could help it. Give me shootin’,
but shootin’ or hangin’ there’s one thing fixed.”
“And what’s that?”
“We’ve got the boodle. I ain’t one of your clever chaps, and I’ve no
education to speak of, but I’ve noticed in life that the chaps who get
on are the chaps who get a thing fixed and stand on it, same as a chap
stands on a scaffolding and builds from it, same as a chap builds a
house and doesn’t care a durn for the future.
“Now we’ve got the boodle fixed,” Mr. Harman went on, “there’s no use
in bothering whether we’re to be shot or die natural in our bunks.
We’ve gone a certain distance, and what I says is, now we’ve gone so
far let’s go the whole hog. Let’s rob every one we can lay hands on.
That’s my idea.”
“Germans, you mean?”
“I ain’t particular about Germans,” said Mr. Harman. “Anything with
money to it is good enough for me, but if it eases your mind we’ll call
’em Germans.”
The Captain whistled for a moment over this broad plan. Then he went to
superintend the fellows who were making ready to get the anchor in.
There were no capstan bars on board the _Penguin_; a steam winch did
the business. He gave the signal for steam to be turned on, and then
went up on the bridge.
The rattle and rasp of the winch pawls and the links of the anchor
chain as it was hauled through the hawse pipe roused echoes from the
shore. The gulls fishing on the little harbour made by the protecting
reef rose, clamouring and beating their wings, and, as though the sound
of the anchor chain had managed to free Sprengel, he appeared, having
managed to work his way out of a window.
He came running down to the beach, shaking his fist and shouting till
the Captain, more for the fun of the thing than any other reason,
picked up a rifle and aimed it at him.
Then he turned and vanished into the woods.
The slack of the anchor chain was now in, and now the anchor itself
left the water and was hoisted, dripping, to the catheads. The Captain
rang on the engines, and the _Penguin_ began to back out. She could
have turned, but it was easier to back her out, especially as the sea
was so smooth.
Outside the reef, as she slued round, she let go her siren.
Three times its echoes returned from the moist-throated woods and
cliffs; then, full speed ahead, she went toward the east.
IX THE “MINERVA”
Next morning early, Harman, standing on the bridge by the Captain,
pointed to a smudge on the eastern horizon. The smoke of a steamer.
The Captain glanced at the spot indicated, shading his eyes with his
hand; then he took the glass from its sling.
“I can’t make her clearly out,” said he. “The wind is covering her with
her own smoke.”
“She’s maybe the mail boat that runs to Samoa,” said Harman, “or maybe
she’s just a tramp. What are you goin’ to do?”
“How d’you mean?”
“Well, I mean just that. Are we goin’ to let her slip through our
hands?”
“Harman,” said the Captain, “when I signed on for this cruise I knew
I was going in for a shady job; still, there didn’t seem much to it,
anyway. I knew Shiner was going to tinker up a cable, and I judged he
was clever enough to pull the business through safely and give us all a
big profit. Well, that scheme is all gone, and now I’m a bloody pirate,
it seems. The war with Germany started me on the road, and there’s
no use in crying out and saying, or pretending, we’re privateers. We
aren’t; we’re pirates. That’s the long and the short of it. We aren’t
making war on Germany; we are just collecting dibbs for ourselves. I’m
not proud of it, not by a long way; but we’re in for it now and may as
well make the most of it. You ask me what I am going to do with this
vessel? Well, I’m going to go through her.”
“Good!” said Harman. “I’m not one for runnin’ extra risks, but we’ve
risked so much already it’s a pity not to risk a bit more when we have
the chance. For it’s not once in a lifetime a chance comes to sailormen
like this.”
“I don’t suppose it is,” said Blood. “It’s not every day that
chaps like Shiner and Wolff fit out a cable-cutting party and get
information of war right first thing through the cut cable. Ah, the
smoke’s clearing and her hull’s coming out; let’s see what she’s like.”
He put the glass to his eye and examined the distant ship; then as he
looked he began to whistle.
“Well,” said he, taking the glass from his eye, “I reckon we won’t go
through her--she’s a man-o’-war.”
“Whatcha say!” cried Harman, seizing the glass. He looked. Then he said:
“I reckon you’re right; she’s a fightin’ ship sure enough. I guess
we’ll let her go this time, our armaments bein’ so unequal; she’s
headin’ right for us, and if you ask for my advice I’d advise a shift
of helm.”
“Yes,” said Blood, “and don’t you know that the first thing she’d do if
we shifted our helm without a reason would be to come smelling round
us? Don’t you know that a man-o’-war has no business to do at all but
to look after other folk’s businesses? She’s not due to time anywhere;
she’s got no cargo to deliver, no owners to grumble at her if she’s
a day late. No, her business is to keep her eye out on the watch for
shady people like you and me, and of course for the enemy if it’s war
time. No, I reckon we’ll keep straight on, but there’s one thing we’ll
do, and that is dismantle the spar gun. I reckon a dummy gun would be a
difficult thing to explain away, and that, backed by the faces of our
chaps and the fact that we haven’t a yard of cable in our tanks and no
log except the one I faked up and forgot to keep to date more’n a week
ago. Might get us into very serious trouble.”
“Is she a Britisher, do you think?” asked Harman, still ogling the
approaching vessel through the glass.
“We’ll soon see,” replied the Captain.
He came down from the bridge, and hustled the fellows round, making
them remove the dummy gun and place it down below on the cable deck.
Then he came back on to the bridge.
The stranger had ceased firing up, and had cleared herself of
smoke. She was a cruiser right enough, one of the modern, swift,
small-tonnage cruisers that can yet sink you with a broadside or
cripple you most effectually with a bow chaser and from the distance of
four miles.
Blood laughed as he looked at her.
“I expect she can do her twenty-five knots,” said he. “Piracy!
Who could do anything with piracy these days between wireless and
things like that. Harman, I guess I’m sick of this business and the
uncertainty of it. I guess if this chap passes us and leaves us alone
I’ll make tracks for home--which means Frisco. We can get rid of the
_Penguin_ somehow or ’nother and crawl up home through Central America.
Crawl up home, those are my sentiments now, for I’ve got a feeling down
my spine that this chap is going to stop and speak to us.”
“Why should she do that?” said Harman. “Wish you wouldn’t be _drawin’_
bad luck by prophesying it. Why in the nation should she stop a
harmless cable ship?”
“Well, if she’s a German she’d stop us to see if we are English, and
then sink us, and if she’s a Britisher she’d stop us to see if we were
German. I wouldn’t mind in either case only for the _Spreewald_ and
Christobal Island _and_ Wolff and Shiner. If the Germans were to take
us, and Wolff and Shiner were to get news of our capture they’d make
things pretty warm for us.”
“Let’s hope she’s a Britisher,” said Harman.
A mile off the stranger, who had obviously slackened speed, ported her
helm slightly to give the _Penguin_ a view of what she was saying.
She was saying, in the language of coloured flags:
“Lay to till I board you----”
“She doesn’t ask to be invited,” said Blood. “Run up the Stars and
Stripes--thank God she’s English!--but then we’re German; at least
we’re owned by Wolff and Shiner, and _they’re_ German as sausages. Of
course, they may have become naturalised Americans, but a British ship
is not likely to go into the family history of Shiner or Wolff. Down
with you, Harman, anyway, and get the ship’s papers together and have
a box of cigars on the table for the chap that is sure to come aboard.
And mind, you know nothing; pretend to be a bit silly, though that
doesn’t need much pretence. Keep your mouth closed and refer everything
to me. I guess this situation will require some fancy work in the way
of lying.”
“I’ll be mum,” said Harman.
He slid down the bridge steps, and scuttered along the deck to the
saloon companionway, while Blood, alone in his glory on the bridge, and
trying to assume the dignity that he did not feel, gave his orders to
the crew.
He rang the engines to half speed, and then to dead slow; then he rang
them off, and the _Penguin_, whose heart had stopped beating, one
might have fancied through fright, lay moving slightly to the swell
and waiting for the attentions of the _Minerva_, for that was the
stranger’s name.
She formed a pretty picture across the blue water despite her ugly
colouring and her singular lines. One knows it to be bad taste to
praise enthusiastically the new engines of warfare on land or sea. All
the same, a twenty-five-knot cruiser, with her teeth showing, gives one
a picture of power and speed combined hard to beat in the present, and
perfectly unbeaten by the past.
Blood was not thinking things like this. He was taking the measure of
the six-inch guns that seemed straining their long necks to get at
him; also of the little guns that showed their fangs at all sorts of
loopholes and unexpected places. He had never been so close up to the
business side of a warship in all his sea experience, and he noticed
everything with the freshness and the vividness and the deep, deep
interest that objects assume for us when they suddenly become bound up
with our most vital interests and our lives.
I can fancy Charles the First quite disregarding Bishop Juxon, the
crowd, and all the great considerations that must have crowded about
the scaffold erected in Whitehall; disregarding all these while he
fixed his eyes on the axe with its handle of good English beachwood
and its blade of British iron. That axe spoke to him if anything ever
spoke to him, and it said, in words as well as deed: I am the symbol of
the British people.
To Blood the _Minerva_ was saying the same thing.
Blood was a Nationalist--when he had any politics at all--and
maintained a sentimental dislike for Britannia. He really did not
dislike her, but he fancied he did. In reality, he admired her. He
admired her as a lady whom, to use his own language, you may belt about
the head as much as you like, but who is sure to give you the knock-out
blow in the long, long end.
The _Minerva_ was one of the things she hit people with, and the weapon
impressed him. The incongruity of the fact that he had been robbing
Germans in the name of England did not strike him at all.
There are all sorts of subtleties in the Irish character that no
foreigner, be he Englishman or German or Frenchman or Scot or Welshman,
can understand.
Blood, then, though he had been out of Ireland long enough to lose his
brogue almost entirely, though England had “betrayed his country in the
past,” and had never done much for him in the present would, had he
seen an English and a German ship in action, have joined in on the side
of England. He had often abused England, yet at a pinch he would have
fought for her.
That is the Irish attitude, and it is unalterable. Ireland is, as a
matter of fact, bound to England in wedlock. John Bull married her
forcibly a great many years ago, and treated her cruelly bad after the
marriage. She is always flinging the fact at his head, and she will
go on doing so till doomsday, but she is his wife, and no matter what
she says she is always ready, at a pinch, to go for any stranger that
interferes with him.
When Blood declared war against the Germans he did so in all good faith
as an ally of England. Cold reflection, however, told him that England
would certainly not recognise that alliance, nor would she recognise
the _Penguin_ as one of her fighting ships, official or unofficial,
that with her peculiar ideas as to the rights of belligerents and
nonbelligerents she might be as bad a party to be captured by as
Germany.
He knew quite well now that between the _Spreewald_ affair and the
Sprengel business, to say nothing of the original cable-cutting
adventure, he would have an exceedingly bad time were this cruiser to
clap the shackles on him.
He watched her now as she dropped a boat; then he leaned over and
shouted to Harman, who had come on deck again, to have the companionway
lowered.
Then, as the boat came alongside, he came down from the bridge to meet
his fate.
A young, fresh-looking individual came up the steps--a full lieutenant
by his stripes--saluted the quarter-deck in a perfunctory manner,
recognised Blood at once as the skipper, and addressed him without
ceremony.
“What’s the name of your ship?” asked the lieutenant.
“The _Penguin_,” replied Blood.
“The deuce it is! Are you sure it’s not the _Sea Horse_?”
“The which horse?” inquired Blood, whose temper was beginning to rise.
It was his first experience of British navy ways with merchantmen, ways
which are usually decided and heralded by language which is usually
abrupt.
“_Sea Horse_--_Sea Horse_--ah!” His eye had fallen on a life buoy
stamped with the word “Penguin.” “You _are_ the _Penguin_. You
will excuse me, but we were looking after something like you--a
fifteen-hundred-ton grey-painted boat. The _Sea Horse_. Tramp steamer
gone off her head and turned pirate, looted a German vessel under
pretence that war had broken out between England and Germany.”
“Well, it wasn’t us,” laughed the Captain. “Couldn’t you see we were a
cable ship by the gear on deck?”
“Yes, but the message came to us by wireless with bare details. What
was your last port?”
“Christobal Island, quite close here--we have only left it a few hours,
and by the same token there was news there that war had broken out
between Germany and England.”
“How did they get it?”
“Well, the fellow there--Sprengel is his name--has a wireless
installation, and he picked up a message some days ago.”
“He picked up a lie. It has been all over the Pacific, seems to me.
There’s been a sort of dust-up over a place called Agadir, but there’s
no small chance of war, worse luck. The business has been settled. We
had the news only yesterday.”
No news could have been more dumfounding to the unfortunate Blood than
this. The cable message that had so upset Shiner and Wolff had been
some lying news-agency rumour. On the strength of it he had done all he
had done. More than that was the mystery of the _Sea Horse_. What on
earth did it mean? Had another ship gone pirating on the same rumour?
He managed, however, to keep a cheerful countenance and even to speak.
“Well,” said he, “I’m right glad to hear that. War may be all right for
you, but it’s no good to our business.”
“No, I don’t suppose it is,” said the lieutenant. “Well, I suppose you
are all right, but just as a matter of form I’ll have a glance at your
log.”
“Of course,” said Blood, with death in his heart. “If you’ll come down
to the saloon I’ll have the greatest pleasure in showing it to you.”
The lieutenant followed him below.
Harman had put out the log and the cigar box on the saloon table. The
lieutenant refused a cigar, but showed interest at the sight of the
log. He sat down and opened it.
“Why, good heavens,” said he, “you haven’t been writing it up for days
and weeks! Where’s your first officer’s log?”
“Harman doesn’t keep one,” said Blood, whose anger was beginning to
rise against the situation and his visitor.
“Who’s Harman?” inquired the other, his eyes running over the entries.
“My first officer.”
“Oh, doesn’t he? H’m--h’m! Most extraordinary--what’s this? ‘Reached
the Spot.’ What spot?”
“The spot on the cable we were due to work on.”
“What cable?”
“You must ask the owners that. It’s private business.”
“Who are the owners?”
“Shiner & Wolff.”
“Where are they?”
Blood did not know where the precious pair might be at that moment, but
he answered:
“Frisco.”
“Are they a cable company or simple cable repairers?”
“Repairers, I think.”
“Where are the rest of the ship’s papers?”
Blood tramped off to his cabin, and returned with a bundle of all sorts
of documents.
“Well,” said the lieutenant, “I can’t go through them now. I must get
back and report. I’ll take these with me for reference.” He bundled log
and papers together and put them under his arm.
“Look here!” said Blood. “Are you taking those off the ship?”
“Only for reference,” replied the other. “They will be quite safe, and
you can have them back when I have reported.”
“Very well,” said Blood.
“And now I’d just like to have a look round. Follow me, please.”
This was a new departure. A command. Blood followed, sick at heart, but
cigar still in mouth.
The lieutenant evidently knew all about cable ships.
He stopped at the after-cable tank.
“Cable tank--how much have you on board?”
“Not an inch,” replied Blood.
“H’m! But you want some spare cable for mending purposes.”
“We used it all.”
The officer passed on through the square where the forward cable tank
was situated, then down to the cable deck.
Here the first thing he spotted was the infernal spar gun.
He smelled round it, and inquired its use.
“I don’t know,” said Blood. “It was on the ship when I joined--some
truck left over from the last voyage, I believe.”
This suddenly recalled the inquisitor to something he had
forgotten--Blood’s Board of Trade certificates.
Blood produced them, having to go back to his own cabin for them. They
told their tale of long unemployment.
The lieutenant was a gentleman, and having glanced them over returned
them without comment. Then he left the ship with the log and the papers
under his arm, and was rowed back to the _Minerva_.
“What’s up?” asked Harman.
“We are,” said Blood. “There’s no war; the whole thing was a lying
rumour those two guys sucked in over the cable. There was a good
chance of war, but it was patched up, and it’s now peace, perfect
peace, with us perched on top of it like a pair of blame fools.” He
told the whole tale that we know. Then suddenly light broke upon him.
“The _Sea Horse_,” said he. “I see the whole thing now--when we fired
those two blighters off the ship and shoved them on the _Spreewald_
it was their interest not to give the show away. We were nose on to
the _Spreewald_, so she couldn’t see our name. Shiner and Wolff would
be the last men to give their own names, considering what they’d been
doing and the latitude they were found in. They’d be sure to pose as
innocents taken off some other ship by us. They’d fake up a yarn, and
they’d fake up a new name for the old _Penguin_.”
They had gone on to the bridge again and they were talking like this
with an eye always upon the _Minerva_, that arbiter of their destinies.
“That’s easy enough to understand,” said Harman. “What gets me is how
to understand our position. What the deuce did that scuffy want,
cartin’ off the log and the ship’s papers for? Ain’t there no law to
protect an innocent vessel bein’ manhandled by a durned British cruiser
in times of peace? What’s to become of peaceful tradin’ if such things
is allowed? Where’s the rights of neutrals if a monkey on a stick like
that blue-an’-gold outrage on the name of a sailor can walk on board
you an’ walk off with the log book in his pocket? That’s what I want to
know. I’m not a man that wants much in this here world. I only wants
justice.”
“Faith, and I think you are going to get it,” said the Captain. “Bare
justice, as the little boy’s mother said when she let down his pants.
I’m not saying I didn’t do most of the inciting to the piracy and
plundering, but whether or no we are all in the soup, and the chap with
the ladle is fishing for us, and there’s no use in bothering or laying
blame--we’d have shared equally in the profits.”
“Oh, I’m makin’ no remarks,” said Harman. “I’m not the man to fling
back at a pal, and I guess I can take the kicks just the same as the
ha’pence, but you’ve a better headpiece than me, and what I say is,
be on the lookout to get the weather gauge of these jokers so be it’s
possible. You can do it if any man can--get out of the soup and be a
pineapple.”
“Give us a chance,” said the Captain. “I’m not going to haul my colours
down without a fight for it.”
They stood watching the _Minerva_. Men were cleaning brasswork on board
of her, a squad of sailors were doing Swedish exercises; the ship’s
work was going on as unconcernedly as though she were lying in harbour,
and this vision of cold method and absolute indifference to all things
but duty and routine did not uplift the hearts of the gazers.
“They’re stuffed with pride, those chaps,” said the single-minded
Harman. “They potter about and potter about the seas with their noses
in the air, lookin’ down at the likes of us who do all the work’s to be
done in the world. And what do they do? Nothin’! They never carry an
ounce of grain or a hoof or hide, or mend a cable or fetch a letter,
and they looks down on us that do as dirt. _You_ saw that josser in
the brass-bound coat and the way he come aboard--they’re all alike.”
“She’s moving up to us,” said the Captain, suddenly changing his
position. “She’s going to speak us.”
The _Minerva_, with a few languid flaps of her propeller, was indeed
moving up to them. When she came ranging alongside, within megaphone
distance, a thing--a midshipman, Blood said--speaking through a
megaphone nearly as big as itself addressed the _Penguin_.
“Ship ahoy! You are to follow us down to Christobal Island.”
“Good Lord!” said Harman. The Captain said nothing, merely raising his
hand to signify that he had understood.
“What’s your speed?” came again the voice through the megaphone.
The Captain seized the bridge megaphone.
“Ten knots,” he answered.
“Right!” came the reply. “Follow us at full speed.”
The blue water creamed at the _Minerva’s_ forefoot as her speed
developed. She drew away rapidly, and the _Penguin_ slowly and sulkily
began to move, making a huge circle to starboard.
When she got into line the _Minerva_ was a good two miles ahead.
Said Harman, for the Captain was speechless:
“I call this playing it pretty low down. _Jumping_ Jeehoshophat, but
we’ll be had before Sprengel! He won’t rub his hands--oh, no! I guess
he won’t rub his hands! And the old _Penguin_ is going as if she liked
it. Ain’t there no gunpowder aboard to blow a hole in her skin an’ sink
her? And that durned British cruiser as tight fixed to us as though she
was towing us with a forty-foot hawser. I reckon if I had some poison
I’d pour it out and drink it. I would that! I feel that way low down
I’d pour it out and drink it.”
“Oh, _shut_ your head!” said the Captain. “You carry on like an old
woman with the stomach ache. We’re caught and we’re being lugged along
by the police officer, and there’s no use in clutching at the railings
or making a disturbance. The one good thing is that we haven’t any of
those chaps on board us, sitting with fixed bayonets on the saloon
hatch and we in the saloon. The first thing to be done is to steal as
much distance out of her as we can without her kicking.”
He went to the engine-room speaking tube:
“Below there, heave any muck you think likely to make smoke in the
furnaces; there’s a lot of old rubber and canvas waste on the cable
deck. I’ll tell Mr. Harman to have it sent down to you. I want to ’pear
as if we were doin’ more than our best--yes, we’re caught and bein’ led
to port, and we mean to have a try to get loose; keep a good head of
steam, and keep your eye on the engine-room telegraph. I’ll be altering
the speed now and then.”
He sent Harman to do what he said; then he stood watching the distant
_Minerva_. She was now about two and a quarter miles ahead. The two
vessels were going at about equal speed, with the balance perhaps in
favour of the _Minerva_. He ordered the engines to half speed, and
kept them so for a couple of minutes, then put them on to full speed
again. The result of this proceeding was an almost imperceptible gain
on the part of the cruiser.
In the next two hours, by the skilful use of this device, the distance
between the two ships was increased to at least three and a half
miles. Blood was content with that; so gradually had the increase
been made that the _Minerva_, suspecting nothing, stood it, but Blood
instinctively felt that she would not stand any more. The man had a
keen psychological sense.
He was reckoning on a change of weather.
The wind had fallen absolutely dead, and the heat was terrific, simply
because the air was charged with moisture. The captain knew these
latitudes.
“I don’t see what you’re after,” said Harman, coming up on the bridge.
“What’s the good of stealin’ a few cable len’ths out of her? We can’t
get rid of her by day, for her guns can hit us at six miles, and if we
made a show to bolt she’d turn and be on us like a cat pouncin’. She
can do twenty-five knots to our twelve. Then at sundown she’s sure to
close with us and keep us tied tight to her tail.”
“Maybe,” said the Captain.
He said nothing more.
An hour later he had his reward.
The horizon to westward and beyond the _Minerva_ had become slightly
indistinct; the horizon to eastward and behind them was still brilliant
and hard.
He knew what was happening. A slight change of temperature was stealing
from the west, precipitating the moisture as it came in the form of
haze.
He put his hand on the lever of the telegraph and rang the engines off.
Harman said nothing. He went to the side and spat into the sea. Then he
came back and stood watching.
“There’s nothing like haze to knock gun firing on the head,” said the
Captain.
Harman said nothing, but moistened his lips. A minute passed, and then
the _Minerva_, all at once, like a person showing the faintest sign of
indecision, showed the faintest change in definition. The faint haze
had touched her.
At the same moment the Captain rang up the engines, and ordered the
helm to be put hard astarboard. The _Penguin_ forged ahead, and began
to turn.
“They’re so busy cleaning brasswork and saluting each other that they
haven’t noticed Mr. Haze,” said the Captain. “They’re new to this
station and don’t know that Mr. Fog is sure coming on her heels. Ah,
she’s seen us, and she’s turning.”
The _Minerva_, in fact, had also put her helm hard astarboard.
She was making a half circle, and as small a half circle as she
possibly could, but the _Penguin_ had got a quarter circle start on
her, and while the _Minerva_ was still going about the _Penguin_ was
off.
If hares ever chased ducks this business might be compared to a lame
duck being chased by a hare. The _Minerva_ could steam ten miles to
the _Penguin’s_ five and over; her guns even now could have sunk
the _Penguin_ with ease, though they might not have made very good
shooting, owing to the haze; that elusive, delusive haze.
“Below there,” cried the Captain through the engine-room speaking tube.
“Shake yourself up, MacBean! Whack the engines up--give us fifteen or
burst! What’s the matter? We’re being chased by that British cruiser,
and it’s the penitentiary for the lot of us if we’re caught--that’s
all.”
He turned, and at that moment the _Minerva_ spoke.
A plume of smoke showed at her bow, there came a shrill, long-drawn
“whoo-oooo” like a hysterical woman “going off” somewhere in the sky,
then a jet of spume and a lather of foam in the sea two cable lengths
to port.
It was a practice shell, and it left the water and made another plume a
mile and a half ahead and yet another a mile beyond that.
It was her first and last useful word, for now the haze had her,
destroying her for war purposes as efficiently as a bursting shell in
her magazine.
The haze had also taken the _Penguin_; everything seemed clear all
around, but all distant things had nearly vanished.
Another shell came whooing and whining from the spectred _Minerva_
before the white Pacific fog blotted her out.
A faint wind was bringing it, less a wind than a travelling chillness,
a fall of temperature, moving from east to west.
The Captain, having given his instructions to the helmsman, left the
bridge, and went down below.
X THE LAST OF THE “PENGUIN”
South of Chiloe Island, on the Chile coast, there lies a little harbour
which shall be nameless.
Here, six days later, the _Penguin_ was hurriedly coaling--on the
_Spreewald’s_ dollars.
It was at eight o’clock on a glorious and summerlike morning that she
put out of this place with her bunkers only half full, her stores just
rushed aboard cumbering the deck, and a man swung over the stern on a
board, painting her name out above the thunder and pow-wow of the screw.
Blood would never have wasted paint and time in the attempt to alter
the name of his ship had it been the English he dreaded now. As a
matter of fact, word had come to the chief official at the little
nameless port above indicated that the Germans were out looking for a
fifteen-hundred-ton cable boat named the _Penguin_, grey-painted and
captained by a master mariner named Michael Blood.
The bleating of the infernal _Spreewald_ had been heard all over the
Pacific. Sprengel’s bad language was following it. The _Minerva_ had
communicated by wireless with the German gunboat _Blitz_, lying at the
German island of Savaii, in the Navigators. The _Blitz_ had spoken to
the cruiser _Homburg_, lying at Tongatabu; from Tongatabu it had been
flashed to Fiji, and from there to Sydney. From Sydney it went to San
Francisco, reaching the City of the Golden Gate in time for the morning
newspapers; from there it passed in dots and dashes down the west
American seaboard to Valparaiso and Valdivia.
Added to all the turmoil, the cable company whose cable had been broken
smelled the truth and were howling for the _Penguin’s_ blood.
Marconi waves from Valparaiso had found the German cruiser squadron far
at sea, and they had started on the hunt.
This was the news that had come to the chief official at the little
Chilean port, and which, being friendly toward Blood and unfriendly
toward Germany, he communicated to the former. There was also the
matter of a tip, which left the coffers of the _Penguin_ completely
empty after the account for coal, provisions, and harbour dues had also
been settled.
“What’s the course?” asked Harman as the coast line faded behind them.
“Straight out to sea,” replied Blood. “Due west till we cut the track
from Taliti to the Horn; then southeast for the Straits of Magellan.
Ramirez is going to fake them with the news that we have gone north.”
“Why not go straight for the Straits down the coast instead of puttin’
out like this?”
“They’ll be hunting the coast; sure to send a ship south. They’ll never
think of us going west; the last thing they’d think of.”
“Are you sure Ramirez is safe?”
“Oh, he’s safe enough. He hates the Germans, and he has taken my money.
He’ll stick to his bargain. I wish we were as safe. Good Lord, every
cent gone and nothing to show for it but this old hooker which we can’t
sell, and the sure and certain prospect of the penitentiary if we don’t
work a miracle--and even then we are lost dogs. Frisco is closed to us.
We never can show our noses in Frisco again.”
“I wouldn’t have come on this cruise if I’d known things was goin’ to
pan out like this,” said the ingenuous Harman. “No, indeedy! I’d have
stuck to somethin’ more honest. What I want to know is this: What’s the
use of war, anyway? When it has a chance of doin’ a man a good turn
the blighted thing holds off, whereas if you and me had been runnin’
a peace concern it’s chances that it’d have come on. No, blamed if I
don’t turn a Methodis’ passon if I ever get out o’ this benighted job.
It’s crool hard to be choused like this by a cus’t underhand trick
served on one just as a chance turns up to make a bit. Why couldn’t
they have fought and been done with it? What’s the good of all them
guns and cannons, and all them ships? What in the nation’s the good of
them ships? Seems to me the only good of them is to go snuffin’ and
smellin’ round the seas, pokin’ their guns into other folk’s affairs
and spoilin’ their jobs. Well, there’s an end of it. I’m a peace party
man now and forever more. Blest if it ain’t enough to make a man turn a
Bible Christian!”
“You’d better go and see to the stowing of the stores,” said the
Captain. “There’s no use in carrying on like that. I didn’t make war,
or else I guess I’d have made it more limber on its legs. Come! Hurry
up!”
They stood two days to the west, and then they turned to the south
coast and made their dash for the Straits.
The weather had changed. It was steadily blowing up from the westward.
The sea, under a dull sky, had turned to the colour of lead, and the
heavy swell told of what was coming.
They had not sighted a ship since leaving the Chilean coast, but three
days after altering their course the smoke of a steamer appeared, blown
high by the wind and far to westward. The wind had scarcely increased
in force, but the sea was tremendous and spoke of what was coming.
The Captain, on the bridge, stood with a glass to his eye, trying to
make out the stranger. He succeeded, and then, without comment, handed
the glass to Harman.
Harman, steadying himself against the rolling and pitching of the ship,
looked.
A waste of tempestuous water leaped at him through the glass, and then,
bursting a wave top to foam with her bows, grey as the seas she rode
came a ship of war.
A cruiser, with guns nosing at the sky as if sniffing after the traces
of the _Penguin_. She was coming bow on, and now, falling a point or
two, her fore funnel seemed to broaden out and break up. It was the
three funnels showing, now _en masse_ and now individually. Then, as
she came to again, the three funnels became one.
“She’s a three-funnel German,” said Harman, “and she has spotted us.”
Even as he spoke the wind suddenly increased in violence.
“I’m not bothering about her much,” said the Captain. “I’m bothering
about what’s in front of us.”
“Whacher mean?”
“Mean! Look at the sea and the stuff that’s coming. Could we put the
ship about in this sea? No, we couldn’t. You know very well the old
rolling log would turn turtle. Well, what’s before us? A lee shore. If
we don’t reach the opening of the Straits of Magellan before sundown
we’re dead men all. Germans! I wish I were safe in the hold of a good
German ship.”
The truth of his words burst upon Harman. There are no lights at the
entrance of the Magellan Straits; the entrance is not broad; to hit it
in the darkness would be next door to impossible, and not to hit it
would be certain death.
It was impossible to put the ship about. Harman’s extraordinary mind
did not seem much upset at the discovery.
“D’ye think we’ll do it?” asked he.
“I don’t know,” said the Captain. “We may and we mayn’t. You see, we
haven’t a patent log. I haven’t had a sight of the sun for two days.
I can’t figure things to a nicety. But if I had ten patent logs I
wouldn’t use them now. I’d be afraid to--what would be the good? Mac is
whacking up the engines for all they’re worth.”
“Well, maybe we’ll do it,” said Harman, applying his eye again to the
glass. Then: “She’s going about.”
The Captain took the glass.
The cruiser was turning from her prey before it was too late. It was a
terrific spectacle, and once the Captain thought she was gone. The foam
was bursting as high as her fighting tops and the grey water pouring in
tons over her decks.
Yet she did it, and the last Blood saw of her was the kick of her
propellers through sheets of foam.
At four o’clock that day they knew that they could not do it. There
was no grog on board, so they were having a cup of tea in the saloon.
The Captain sat at the head of the table, before the tin teapot and a
plate of fancy biscuits.
The Captain and Harman were the only two men on board with a knowledge
of what was coming.
“Another lump of sugar in mine,” said Harman. “I don’t hold with tea; I
never did hold with tea. The only thing that can be said for it is it’s
a drink. And how some of them blighters ashore lives suckin’ it day and
night gets me.”
He was drinking out of his saucer.
“Oh, tea’s all right. I reckon tea’s all right,” said the Captain in an
absent-minded manner.
“Maybe it is, but give me a hot whisky and you may take your tea to
them that like it,” replied Harman.
He lit his pipe and went on deck. The Captain followed. They could not
keep away from the fascination up above.
The bos’n was on the bridge, and they relieved him.
Not a sign of land was in sight, and the sea was running higher than
ever.
“You see,” said the Captain, “we can’t make it. It’ll be sundown in an
hour. We’ll strike the coast some time after dark, and God have mercy
on our souls.”
“You ain’t tellin’ the hands?” said Harman.
“No use tellin’ them. I told Mac, so that he might get the best out of
the engines.”
“And there’s no bit of use gettin’ out life belts,” said Harman. “I
know this coast; rocks as big as churches an’ cliffs that nuthin’ but
flies could crawl up; and b’sides which if a chap found himself ashore
he’d either starve or be et by niggers. They’re the curiosest chaps,
those blighters down here. I guess the A’mighty spoiled them in the
bakin’ and shoved them down here by the Horn to hide them from sight.
Wonder what Wolff and Shiner is doin’ by this?”
“God knows!” said the Captain.
The darkness fell without a sight of the land, and, leaving the bos’n
on the bridge, they came down for a while to the engineroom for a warm.
Mac just inquired if there was any sight of land, and said nothing
more.
The engines were no longer being pressed, and they smoked and watched
the projection and retraction of the piston rods, the revolution of
the cranks, and all the labours of this mighty organism so soon to be
pounded and ground to death on the hard rocks ahead.
It was toward midnight that the coast spoke, so that all men could hear
on board the _Penguin_.
Its voice came through the yelling blackness of the night like the roar
of a railway train in the distance.
The crew were gathered aft and in the alleyways, for all forward of the
bridge the decks were swept. Harman and the Captain were on the bridge.
Mac had the word to give her every ounce of steam he could get out of
the boilers, in the desperate idea that the harder she was pressed the
higher she might be driven on the rocks, and the tighter she might
stick.
The roaring of the breakers seemed now all around them, and the Captain
and Harman were clinging to the bridge rails, bracing themselves
for the coming shock, when--just as a curtain is drawn aside in a
theatre--the rushing clouds drew away from the moon.
The white, placid full moon whose light showed the foam-dashed coast to
either side of them, and right ahead clear water.
They had struck the Magellan Straits by some miracle, just as the
bullet strikes the bull’s-eye of a target, and right to port they saw a
great white ghost rising in the moonlight and falling again to the sea.
It was the foam breaking on the Westminster Hall.
It was breaking three hundred feet high, and Harman, as he was hurled
along to the safety of the Straits, caught a glimpse of the great rock
itself after a wave had fallen from it, glistening in the moonlight
desolately, as slated roofs glisten after rain.
That was a sight which no man, having once seen, could ever forget.
* * * * *
I met Blood last year. He was exceedingly prosperous, or seemed so.
He told me this story, and I have so mixed names and places that
he himself would scarcely recognise the chief actor, much less his
enemies. As to the fate of the _Penguin_, I could only get him to say
that she “went down” somewhere south of Rio, but that all hands were
saved. Harman, he said, had turned religious.
* * * * *