HOW THE LIGHTERS FARED
"HOPE the brutes won't konk," thought Sub-lieutenant Jock McIntosh,
R.N.V.R., as he dispassionately surveyed the unlovely outlines of
X-lighters 5 and 6.
After being second-in-command of a crack M.L., McIntosh felt no
violent enthusiasm over his job--to take the two cumbersome craft to
a strange port eighty odd miles along the coast. At a maximum speed
of five knots, it meant a sixteen hours' run; but McIntosh, knowing
the vagaries of the X-lighters' motors, refrained from being sanguine
on the matter.
It was one of the jobs that fall to all branches of the Navy. With a
strange crew, and not having navigated a lighter before, McIntosh was
taking on "some stunt." He had charts and navigating instruments, but
he would have felt easier in his mind had he possessed "local
knowledge" of this part of the coast. On an M.L., where he was under
a competent officer, navigation was fairly simple as far as the Sub
was concerned; but now the whole responsibility of getting his
charges safely into port rested on his shoulders.
It was the morning of von Preussen's visit to Auldhaig. The fog had
dispersed. In its wake had sprung up a fresh southerly breeze, which
in turn gave indications of decreasing in velocity before noon.
Stopping to give his final instructions to the coxwain of No. 6, and
impressing upon him to follow at a cable's length in her consort's
wake, McIntosh boarded the lighter which for the nonce was to be the
leading craft. Already the twin heavy oil engines were "warming up,"
making the decks quiver, and filling the air with oil-laden smoke.
Making his way aft to the rough wooden hut that served as a
wheel-house, the Sub gave the signal to the engine-room staff to
"stand by."
"Rummiest packets that ever sailed under the White Ensign," he
soliloquised, as his eye caught sight of the dingy bunting floating
from the yard-arm of the lighters' stumpy masts. "Ah, well; it's all
in a day's work."
He gave the telegraph lever another jerk.
"Cast off!" he shouted.
Sluggishly the deeply-laden barge gathered way. She had a freeboard
of barely ten inches--a fact that portended wet decks before long.
Having satisfied himself that No. 6 was following, McIntosh devoted
his attention to shaping a course out of harbour, undergoing a dozen
mental thrills as his unwieldy packet scraped past buoys and showed a
decided tendency to commit suicide across the steel stems of a couple
of anchored cruisers.
Once clear of the harbour, the Sub called to a seaman.
"Take her," he ordered, handing over the wheel. "Keep her as she is:
south a half west."
"South a half west it is, sir," replied the man in the time-honoured
formula of the sea.
Free to devote his attention to other things, McIntosh secured the
storm-flap of his oilskin coat and, leaving the shelter of the
wheel-house, looked towards the following boat.
No. 6 was coming along well. The "bone in her teeth" glistened white
as she pushed her snub nose through the waves. Both craft were
"taking it green" as the water flowed over the tarpaulined hatches
and surged along the broad waterways.
"We'll carry our tide for another hour," he said to himself. "Then
it'll be a slow job. One thing, we can't have every blessed thing in
life, but I hope to goodness nothing goes wrong."
He glanced ahead. In an incredibly short space of time, the bold
outlines of Dunkennet Head had vanished. Dead to windward haze,
possibly fog, was bearing down. It was something that McIntosh had
not bargained for. The glass had shown indications of fine weather,
but unfortunately it was not capable of indicating the approach of
mist.
"Hazy ahead," he remarked to the petty officer.
"Yes, sir," was the reply. "Will you be altering course a point or
so, sir? There's a nasty set of the tide inshore about these parts."
"Yes," decided the Sub, and gave the necessary instructions to the
helmsman.
"Get a nun-buoy ready to veer astern," he continued, "and signal to
No. 6 to keep the thing dose under her bows. If she doesn't, we'll be
losing each other."
While the men were making these preparations the hideous clamour of
No. 6's foghorn attracted their attention. The lighters had increased
their distance to nearly a quarter of a mile, and No. 6 was still
dropping astern.
"Ask 'em what's wrong," ordered McIntosh.
A signalman, steadying himself with feet planted widely apart on the
plunging deck, semaphored the message. From No. 6 two red and yellow
hand-flags replied. McIntosh, unable to follow the swift movements of
the flags, was obliged to await the signalman's report:
"Says, sir, she's overheated her bearings. She'll have to stop or her
engines'll seize up."
It was exactly what the Sub was anticipating, and now trouble had
come he met it promptly and resolutely.
"Tell them to stand by and receive a hawser," he ordered, at the same
time ringing down for "Slow." "Look alive, there, with that six-inch
rope."
While the men were engaged in bringing one end of the hawser to the
after "towing-bitts," McIntosh took the helm and began to run to
starboard in order to close with the disabled lighter. He was working
against time, for already the mist was upon them--the outflung
tentacles of a bank of fog. With a range of visibility of three or
four hundred yards, matters were somewhat complicated, but the
manoeuvre of establishing communication with the helpless craft would
be rendered fourfold difficult, should the baffling fog envelop the
two boats.
"All ready with the heaving-line?" shouted the Sub.
"All ready, sir."
Slowly, even for the low-speed lighter, McIntosh, made for the
disabled vessel, which was now lying broadside on to the fairly
confused sea. The Sub was cautious. Strange to the boat, he knew that
there was a vast difference between the manoeuvring capabilities of
an M.L. and a lighter, and with that fact in mind he displayed an
excess of caution.
Almost before he realised the danger, disaster came. Answering too
slowly to her helm, No. 5 crashed heavily against the bluff steel
bows of No. 6. Amidst the hiss of inrushing water, the two engineers
scrambled through the smoke-laden atmosphere of the motor-room and
gained the deck with the tidings that the sea was pouring in like a
mill-race. And to add to the peril the fog was then enveloping the
colliding craft.
There seemed no doubt about it: No. 5 was sinking. Had she been
struck anywhere but right aft, her heavy rubbing-strake would have
saved her. As it was she had been hit in a vital spot--her
engine-room.
As luck would have it, both lighters drifted together, their
metal-bound sides grinding and bumping in the agitated waves. Since
No. 5 was evidently sinking, the only refuge for her crew was the
deck of disabled No. 6.
"Jump for it!" shouted McIntosh. "Every man for himself."
Waiting till the last, the Sub snatched up his confidential papers,
thrust them into the pocket of his oilskins, and, as the two lighters
rolled heavily together, he made a flying leap for the deck of No. 6.
He was not a moment too soon. At the next roll there was a gap of
five or six yards between the two vessels. Separated by a freak eddy
of the tidal stream, they increased their distance more and more,
until the holed lighter, with her stern level with the water, was
lost to sight in the fog.