Читать книгу: «Traffics and Discoveries», страница 6
About noon we saw a thin, high smoke to the southward, such a smoke as a burning house will make in sunshine, and Sikandar Khan, who knows how to take a bearing across a hill, said, "At last we have burned the house of the pumpkin-seller whence they signalled." And I said: "What need now that they have slain my child? Let me mourn." It was a high smoke, and the old man, as I saw, came out into the verandah to behold it, and shook his clenched hands at it. So we lay till the twilight, foodless and without water, for we had vowed a vow neither to eat nor to drink till we had accomplished the matter. I had a little opium left, of which I gave Sikandar Khan the half, because he loved Kurban Sahib. When it was full dark we sharpened our sabres upon a certain softish rock which, mixed with water, sharpens steel well, and we took off our boots and we went down to the house and looked through the windows very softly. The old man sat reading in a book, and the woman sat by the hearth; and the idiot lay on the floor with his head against her knee, and he counted his fingers and laughed, and she laughed again. So I knew they were mother and son, and I laughed, too, for I had suspected this when I claimed her life and her body from Sikandar Khan, in our discussion of the spoil. Then we entered with bare swords… Indeed, these Boer-log do not understand the steel, for the old man ran towards a rifle in the corner; but Sikandar Khan prevented him with a blow of the flat across the hands, and he sat down and held up his hands, and I put my fingers on my lips to signify they should be silent. But the woman cried, and one stirred in an inner room, and a door opened, and a man, bound about the head with rags, stood stupidly fumbling with a gun. His whole head fell inside the door, and none followed him. It was a very pretty stroke – for a Pathan. They then were silent, staring at the head upon the floor, and I said to Sikandar Khan, "Fetch ropes! Not even for Kurban Sahib's sake will I defile my sword." So he went to seek and returned with three long leather ones, and said, "Four wounded lie within, and doubtless each has a permit from a General," and he stretched the ropes and laughed. Then I bound the old man's hands behind his back, and unwillingly – for he laughed in my face, and would have fingered my beard – the idiot's. At this the woman with the swine's eyes and the jowl of a swine ran forward, and Sikandar Khan said, "Shall I strike or bind? She was thy property on the division." And I said, "Refrain! I have made a chain to hold her. Open the door." I pushed out the two across the verandah into the darker shade of the thorn-trees, and she followed upon her knees and lay along the ground, and pawed at my boots and howled. Then Sikandar Khan bore out the lamp, saying that he was a butler and would light the table, and I looked for a branch that would bear fruit. But the woman hindered me not a little with her screechings and plungings, and spoke fast in her tongue, and I replied in my tongue, "I am childless to-night because of thy perfidy, and my child was praised among men and loved among women. He would have begotten men – not animals. Thou hast more years to live than I, but my grief is the greater."
I stooped to make sure the noose upon the idiot's neck, and flung the end over the branch, and Sikandar Khan held up the lamp that she might well see. Then appeared suddenly, a little beyond the light of the lamp, the spirit of Kurban Sahib. One hand he held to his side, even where the bullet had struck him, and the other he put forward thus, and said, "No. It is a Sahibs' war." And I said, "Wait a while, Child, and thou shalt sleep." But he came nearer, riding, as it were, upon my eyes, and said, "No. It is a Sahibs' war." And Sikandar Khan said, "Is it too heavy?" and set down the lamp and came to me; and as he turned to tally on the rope, the spirit of Kurban Sahib stood up within arm's reach of us, and his face was very angry, and a third time he said, "No. It is a Sahibs' war." And a little wind blew out the lamp, and I heard Sikandar Khan's teeth chatter in his head.
So we stayed side by side, the ropes in our hand, a very long while, for we could not shape any words. Then I heard Sikandar Khan open his water- bottle and drink; and when his mouth was slaked he passed to me and said, "We are absolved from our vow." So I drank, and together we waited for the dawn in that place where we stood – the ropes in our hand. A little after third cockcrow we heard the feet of horses and gun wheels very far off, and so soon as the light came a shell burst on the threshold of the house, and the roof of the verandah that was thatched fell in and blazed before the windows. And I said, "What of the wounded Boer-log within?" And Sikandar Khan said, "We have heard the order. It is a Sahibs' war. Stand still." Then came a second shell – good line, but short – and scattered dust upon us where we stood; and then came ten of the little quick shells from the gun that speaks like a stammerer – yes, pompom the Sahibs call it – and the face of the house folded down like the nose and the chin of an old man mumbling, and the forefront of the house lay down. Then Sikandar Khan said, "If it be the fate of the wounded to die in the fire, I shall not prevent it." And he passed to the back of the house and presently came back, and four wounded Boer-log came after him, of whom two could not walk upright. And I said, "What hast thou done?" And he said, "I have neither spoken to them nor laid hand on them. They follow in hope of mercy." And I said, "It is a Sahibs' war. Let them wait the Sahibs' mercy." So they lay still, the four men and the idiot, and the fat woman under the thorn-tree, and the house burned furiously. Then began the known sound of cartouches in the roof – one or two at first; then a trill, and last of all one loud noise and the thatch blew here and there, and the captives would have crawled aside on account of the heat that was withering the thorn-trees, and on account of wood and bricks flying at random. But I said, "Abide! Abide! Ye be Sahibs, and this is a Sahibs' war, O Sahibs. There is no order that ye should depart from this war." They did not understand my words. Yet they abode and they lived.
Presently rode down five troopers of Kurban Sahib's command, and one I knew spoke my tongue, having sailed to Calcutta often with horses. So I told him all my tale, using bazaar-talk, such as his kidney of Sahib would understand; and at the end I said, "An order has reached us here from the dead that this is a Sahibs' war. I take the soul of my Kurban Sahib to witness that I give over to the justice of the Sahibs these Sahibs who have made me childless." Then I gave him the ropes and fell down senseless, my heart being very full, but my belly was empty, except for the little opium.
They put me into a cart with one of their wounded, and after a while I understood that they had fought against the Boer-log for two days and two nights. It was all one big trap, Sahib, of which we, with Kurban Sahib, saw no more than the outer edge. They were very angry, the Durro Muts– very angry indeed. I have never seen Sahibs so angry. They buried my Kurban Sahib with the rites of his faith upon the top of the ridge overlooking the house, and I said the proper prayers of the faith, and Sikandar Khan prayed in his fashion and stole five signalling-candles, which have each three wicks, and lighted the grave as if it had been the grave of a saint on a Friday. He wept very bitterly all that night, and I wept with him, and he took hold of my feet and besought me to give him a remembrance from Kurban Sahib. So I divided equally with him one of Kurban Sahib's handkerchiefs – not the silk ones, for those were given him by a certain woman; and I also gave him a button from a coat, and a little steel ring of no value that Kurban Sahib used for his keys, and he kissed them and put them into his bosom. The rest I have here in that little bundle, and I must get the baggage from the hotel in Cape Town – some four shirts we sent to be washed, for which we could not wait when we went up-country – and I must give them all to my Colonel-Sahib at Sialkote in the Punjab. For my child is dead – my baba is dead!.. I would have come away before; there was no need to stay, the child being dead; but we were far from the rail, and the Durro Muts were as brothers to me, and I had come to look upon Sikandar Khan as in some sort a friend, and he got me a horse and I rode up and down with them; but the life had departed. God knows what they called me – orderly, chaprassi (messenger), cook, sweeper, I did not know nor care. But once I had pleasure. We came back in a month after wide circles to that very valley. I knew it every stone, and I went up to the grave, and a clever Sahib of the Durro Muts (we left a troop there for a week to school those people with purwanas) had cut an inscription upon a great rock; and they interpreted it to me, and is was a jest such as Kurban Sahib himself would have loved. Oh! I have the inscription well copied here. Read it aloud, Sahib, and I will explain the jests. There are two very good ones. Begin, Sahib: —
In Memory of
WALTER DECIES CORBYN
Late Captain 141st Punjab Cavalry
The Gurgaon Rissala, that is. Go on, Sahib
Treacherously shot near this place by
The connivance of the late
HENDRIK DIRK UYS
A Minister of God
Who thrice took the oath of neutrality
And Piet his son,
This little work
Aha! This is the first jest. The Sahib should see this little work!
Was accomplished in partial
And inadequate recognition of their loss
By some men who loved him
Si monumentum requiris circumspice
That is the second jest. It signifies that those who would desire to behold a proper memorial to Kurban Sahib must look out at the house. And, Sahib, the house is not there, nor the well, nor the big tank which they call dams, nor the little fruit-trees, nor the cattle. There is nothing at all, Sahib, except the two trees withered by the fire. The rest is like the desert here – or my hand – or my heart. Empty, Sahib – all empty!
"THEIR LAWFUL OCCASIONS"
THE WET LITANY
When the water's countenance
Blurrs 'twixt glance and second glance;
When the tattered smokes forerun
Ashen 'neath a silvered sun;
When the curtain of the haze
Shuts upon our helpless ways —
Hear the Channel Fleet at sea;
Libera nos domine!
When the engines' bated pulse
Scarcely thrills the nosing hulls;
When the wash along the side
Sounds, a sudden, magnified
When the intolerable blast
Marks each blindfold minute passed.
When the fog-buoy's squattering flight
Guides us through the haggard night;
When the warning bugle blows;
When the lettered doorways close;
When our brittle townships press,
Impotent, on emptiness.
When the unseen leadsmen lean
Questioning a deep unseen;
When their lessened count they tell
To a bridge invisible;
When the hid and perilous
Cliffs return our cry to us.
When the treble thickness spread
Swallows up our next-ahead;
When her siren's frightened whine
Shows her sheering out of line;
When, her passage undiscerned,
We must turn where she has turned —
Hear the Channel Fleet at sea;
Libera nos Domine!
"THEIR LAWFUL OCCASIONS"
PART I
… "And a security for such as pass on the seas upon their lawful occasions."
– Navy Prayer.
Disregarding the inventions of the Marine Captain, whose other name is Gubbins, let a plain statement suffice.
H.M.S. Caryatid went to Portland to join Blue Fleet for manoeuvres. I travelled overland from London by way of Portsmouth, where I fell among friends. When I reached Portland, H.M.S. Caryatid, whose guest I was to have been, had, with Blue Fleet, already sailed for some secret rendezvous off the west coast of Ireland, and Portland breakwater was filled with Red Fleet, my official enemies and joyous acquaintances, who received me with unstinted hospitality. For example, Lieutenant-Commander A.L. Hignett, in charge of three destroyers, Wraith, Stiletto, and Kobbold, due to depart at 6 P.M. that evening, offered me a berth on his thirty-knot flagship, but I preferred my comforts, and so accepted sleeping-room in H.M.S. Pedantic (15,000 tons), leader of the second line. After dining aboard her I took boat to Weymouth to get my kit aboard, as the battleships would go to war at midnight. In transferring my allegiance from Blue to Red Fleet, whatever the Marine Captain may say, I did no wrong. I truly intended to return to the Pedantic and help to fight Blue Fleet. All I needed was a new toothbrush, which I bought from a chemist in a side street at 9:15 P. M. As I turned to go, one entered seeking alleviation of a gum-boil. He was dressed in a checked ulster, a black silk hat three sizes too small, cord-breeches, boots, and pure brass spurs. These he managed painfully, stepping like a prisoner fresh from leg-irons. As he adjusted the pepper-plaster to the gum the light fell on his face, and I recognised Mr. Emanuel Pyecroft, late second-class petty officer of H.M.S. Archimandrite, an unforgettable man, met a year before under Tom Wessel's roof in Plymouth. It occurred to me that when a petty officer takes to spurs he may conceivably meditate desertion. For that reason I, though a taxpayer, made no sign. Indeed, it was Mr. Pyecroft, following me out of the shop, who said hollowly: "What might you be doing here?"
"I'm going on manoeuvres in the Pedantic," I replied.
"Ho!" said Mr. Pyecroft. "An' what manner o' manoeuvres d'you expect to see in a blighted cathedral like the Pedantic? I know 'er. I knew her in Malta, when the Vulcan was her permanent tender. Manoeuvres! You won't see more than 'Man an' arm watertight doors!' in your little woollen undervest."
"I'm sorry for that."
"Why?" He lurched heavily as his spurs caught and twanged like tuning- forks. "War's declared at midnight. Pedantics be sugared! Buy an 'am an' see life!"
For the moment I fancied Mr. Pyecroft, a fugitive from justice, purposed that we two should embrace a Robin Hood career in the uplands of Dorset. The spurs troubled me, and I made bold to say as much. "Them!" he said, coming to an intricate halt. "They're part of the prima facie evidence. But as for me – let me carry your bag – I'm second in command, leadin'-hand, cook, steward, an' lavatory man, with a few incidentals for sixpence a day extra, on No. 267 torpedo-boat."
"They wear spurs there?"
"Well," said Mr. Peycroft, "seein' that Two Six Seven belongs to Blue Fleet, which left the day before yesterday, disguises are imperative. It transpired thus. The Right Honourable Lord Gawd Almighty Admiral Master Frankie Frobisher, K.C.B., commandin' Blue Fleet, can't be bothered with one tin-torpedo-boat more or less; and what with lyin' in the Reserve four years, an' what with the new kind o' tiffy which cleans dynamos with brick-dust and oil (Blast these spurs! They won't render!), Two Six Seven's steam-gadgets was paralytic. Our Mr. Moorshed done his painstakin' best – it's his first command of a war-canoe, matoor age nineteen (down that alleyway, please!) but be that as it may, His Holiness Frankie is aware of us crabbin' ourselves round the breakwater at five knots, an' steerin' pari passu, as the French say. (Up this alley-way, please!) If he'd given Mr. Hinchcliffe, our chief engineer, a little time, it would never have transpired, for what Hinch can't drive he can coax; but the new port bein' a trifle cloudy, an' 'is joints tinglin' after a post-captain dinner, Frankie come on the upper bridge seekin' for a sacrifice. We, offerin' a broadside target, got it. He told us what 'is grandmamma, 'oo was a lady an' went to sea in stick-and string-batteaus, had told him about steam. He throwed in his own prayers for the 'ealth an' safety of all steam-packets an' their officers. Then he give us several distinct orders. The first few – I kept tally – was all about going to Hell; the next many was about not evolutin' in his company, when there; an' the last all was simply repeatin' the motions in quick time. Knowin' Frankie's groovin' to be badly eroded by age and lack of attention, I didn't much panic; but our Mr. Moorshed, 'e took it a little to heart. Me an' Mr. Hinchcliffe consoled 'im as well as service conditions permits of, an' we had a résumé-supper at the back o' the Camber – secluded an' lugubrious! Then one thing leadin' up to another, an' our orders, except about anchorin' where he's booked for, leavin' us a clear 'orizon, Number Two Six Seven is now – mind the edge of the wharf – here!"
By mysterious doublings he had brought me out on to the edge of a narrow strip of water crowded with coastwise shipping that runs far up into Weymouth town. A large foreign timber-brig lay at my feet, and under the round of her stern cowered, close to the wharf-edge, a slate-coloured, unkempt, two-funnelled craft of a type – but I am no expert – between the first-class torpedo-boat and the full-blooded destroyer. From her archaic torpedo-tubes at the stern, and quick-firers forward and amidship, she must have dated from the early nineties. Hammerings and clinkings, with spurts of steam and fumes of hot oil, arose from her inside, and a figure in a striped jersey squatted on the engine-room gratings.
"She ain't much of a war-canoe, but you'll see more life in 'er than on an whole squadron of bleedin' Pedantics."
"But she's laid up here – and Blue Fleet have gone," I protested. "Precisely. Only, in his comprehensive orders Frankie didn't put us out of action. Thus we're a non-neglectable fightin' factor which you mightn't think from this elevation; an' m'rover, Red Fleet don't know we're 'ere. Most of us" – he glanced proudly at his boots – "didn't run to spurs, but we're disguised pretty devious, as you might say. Morgan, our signaliser, when last seen, was a Dawlish bathing-machine proprietor. Hinchcliffe was naturally a German waiter, and me you behold as a squire of low degree; while yonder Levantine dragoman on the hatch is our Mr. Moorshed. He was the second cutter's snotty —my snotty – on the Archimandrite– two years – Cape Station. Likewise on the West Coast, mangrove swampin', an' gettin' the cutter stove in on small an' unlikely bars, an' manufacturin' lies to correspond. What I don't know about Mr. Moorshed is precisely the same gauge as what Mr. Moorshed don't know about me – half a millimetre, as you might say. He comes into awful opulence of his own when 'e's of age; an' judgin' from what passed between us when Frankie cursed 'im, I don't think 'e cares whether he's broke to-morrow or – the day after. Are you beginnin' to follow our tattics? They'll be worth followin'. Or are you goin' back to your nice little cabin on the Pedantic– which I lay they've just dismounted the third engineer out of – to eat four fat meals per diem, an' smoke in the casement?"
The figure in the jersey lifted its head and mumbled.
"Yes, Sir," was Mr. Pyecroft's answer. "I 'ave ascertained that Stiletto, Wraith, and Kobbold left at 6 P. M. with the first division o' Red Fleet's cruisers except Devolotion and Cryptic, which are delayed by engine-room defects." Then to me: "Won't you go aboard? Mr. Moorshed 'ud like some one to talk to. You buy an 'am an see life."
At this he vanished; and the Demon of Pure Irresponsibility bade me lower myself from the edge of the wharf to the tea-tray plates of No. 267.
"What d'you want?" said the striped jersey.
"I want to join Blue Fleet if I can," I replied. "I've been left behind by – an accident.
"Well?"
"Mr. Pyecroft told me to buy a ham and see life. About how big a ham do you need?"
"I don't want any ham, thank you. That's the way up the wharf. Good– night."
"Good-night!" I retraced my steps, wandered in the dark till I found a shop, and there purchased, of sardines, canned tongue, lobster, and salmon, not less than half a hundredweight. A belated sausage-shop supplied me with a partially cut ham of pantomime tonnage. These things I, sweating, bore out to the edge of the wharf and set down in the shadow of a crane. It was a clear, dark summer night, and from time to time I laughed happily to myself. The adventure was preordained on the face of it. Pyecroft alone, spurred or barefoot, would have drawn me very far from the paths of circumspection. His advice to buy a ham and see life clinched it. Presently Mr. Pyecroft – I heard spurs clink – passed me. Then the jersey voice said: "What the mischief's that?"
"'Asn't the visitor come aboard, Sir? 'E told me he'd purposely abandoned the Pedantic for the pleasure of the trip with us. Told me he was official correspondent for the Times; an' I know he's littery by the way 'e tries to talk Navy-talk. Haven't you seen 'im, Sir?"
Slowly and dispassionately the answer drawled long on the night; "Pye, you are without exception the biggest liar in the Service!"
"Then what am I to do with the bag, Sir? It's marked with his name." There was a pause till Mr. Moorshed said "Oh!" in a tone which the listener might construe precisely as he pleased.
"He was the maniac who wanted to buy a ham and see life – was he? If he goes back to the Pedantic– "
"Pre-cisely, Sir. Gives us all away, Sir."
"Then what possessed you to give it away to him, you owl?"
"I've got his bag. If 'e gives anything away, he'll have to go naked."
At this point I thought it best to rattle my tins and step out of the shadow of the crane.
"I've bought the ham," I called sweetly. "Have you still any objection to my seeing life, Mr. Moorshed?"
"All right, if you're insured. Won't you come down?"
I descended; Pyecroft, by a silent flank movement, possessing himself of all the provisions, which he bore to some hole forward.
"Have you known Mr. Pyecroft long?" said my host.
"Met him once, a year ago, at Devonport. What do you think of him?"
"What do you think of him?"
"I've left the Pedantic– her boat will be waiting for me at ten o'clock, too – simply because I happened to meet him," I replied.
"That's all right. If you'll come down below, we may get some grub."
We descended a naked steel ladder to a steel-beamed tunnel, perhaps twelve feet long by six high. Leather-topped lockers ran along either side; a swinging table, with tray and lamp above, occupied the centre. Other furniture there was none.
"You can't shave here, of course. We don't wash, and, as a rule, we eat with our fingers when we're at sea. D'you mind?"
Mr. Moorshed, black-haired, black-browed, sallow-complexioned, looked me over from head to foot and grinned. He was not handsome in any way, but his smile drew the heart. "You didn't happen to hear what Frankie told me from the flagship, did you? His last instructions, and I've logged them here in shorthand, were" – he opened a neat pocket-book – "'Get out of this and conduct your own damned manoeuvres in your own damned tinker fashion! You're a disgrace to the Service, and your boat's offal.'"
"Awful?" I said.
"No – offal – tripes – swipes – ullage." Mr. Pyecroft entered, in the costume of his calling, with the ham and an assortment of tin dishes, which he dealt out like cards.
"I shall take these as my orders," said Mr. Moorshed. "I'm chucking the Service at the end of the year, so it doesn't matter."
We cut into the ham under the ill-trimmed lamp, washed it down with whisky, and then smoked. From the foreside of the bulkhead came an uninterrupted hammering and clinking, and now and then a hiss of steam.
"That's Mr. Hinchcliffe," said Pyecroft. "He's what is called a first- class engine-room artificer. If you hand 'im a drum of oil an' leave 'im alone, he can coax a stolen bicycle to do typewritin'."
Very leisurely, at the end of his first pipe, Mr. Moorshed drew out a folded map, cut from a newspaper, of the area of manoeuvres, with the rules that regulate these wonderful things, below.
"Well, I suppose I know as much as an average stick-and-string admiral," he said, yawning. "Is our petticoat ready yet, Mr. Pyecroft?"
As a preparation for naval manoeuvres these councils seemed inadequate. I followed up the ladder into the gloom cast by the wharf edge and the big lumber-ship's side. As my eyes stretched to the darkness I saw that No. 267 had miraculously sprouted an extra pair of funnels – soft, for they gave as I touched them.
"More prima facie evidence. You runs a rope fore an' aft, an' you erects perpendick-u-arly two canvas tubes, which you distends with cane hoops, thus 'avin' as many funnels as a destroyer. At the word o' command, up they go like a pair of concertinas, an' consequently collapses equally 'andy when requisite. Comin' aft we shall doubtless overtake the Dawlish bathin'-machine proprietor fittin' on her bustle."
Mr. Pyecroft whispered this in my ear as Moorshed moved toward a group at the stern.
"None of us who ain't built that way can be destroyers, but we can look as near it as we can. Let me explain to you, Sir, that the stern of a Thorneycroft boat, which we are not, comes out in a pretty bulge, totally different from the Yarrow mark, which again we are not. But, on the other 'and, Dirk, Stiletto, Goblin, Ghoul, Djinn, and A-frite– Red Fleet dee-stroyers, with 'oom we hope to consort later on terms o' perfect equality —are Thorneycrofts, an' carry that Grecian bend which we are now adjustin' to our arriere-pensée– as the French would put it – by means of painted canvas an' iron rods bent as requisite. Between you an' me an' Frankie, we are the Gnome, now in the Fleet Reserve at Pompey – Portsmouth, I should say."
"The first sea will carry it all away," said Moorshed, leaning gloomily outboard, "but it will do for the present."
"We've a lot of prima facie evidence about us," Mr. Pyecroft went on. "A first-class torpedo boat sits lower in the water than a destroyer. Hence we artificially raise our sides with a black canvas wash-streak to represent extra freeboard; at the same time paddin' out the cover of the forward three-pounder like as if it was a twelve-pounder, an' variously fakin' up the bows of 'er. As you might say, we've took thought an' added a cubic to our stature. It's our len'th that sugars us. A 'undred an' forty feet, which is our len'th into two 'undred and ten, which is about the Gnome's, leaves seventy feet over, which we haven't got."
"Is this all your own notion, Mr. Pyecroft?" I asked.
"In spots, you might say – yes; though we all contributed to make up deficiencies. But Mr. Moorshed, not much carin' for further Navy after what Frankie said, certainly threw himself into the part with avidity."
"What the dickens are we going to do?"
"Speaking as a seaman gunner, I should say we'd wait till the sights came on, an' then fire. Speakin' as a torpedo-coxswain, L.T.O., T.I., M.D., etc., I presume we fall in – Number One in rear of the tube, etc., secure tube to ball or diaphragm, clear away securin'-bar, release safety-pin from lockin-levers, an' pray Heaven to look down on us. As second in command o' 267, I say wait an' see!"
"What's happened? We're off," I said. The timber ship had slid away from us.
"We are. Stern first, an' broadside on! If we don't hit anything too hard, we'll do."
"Come on the bridge," said Mr. Moorshed. I saw no bridge, but fell over some sort of conning-tower forward, near which was a wheel. For the next few minutes I was more occupied with cursing my own folly than with the science of navigation. Therefore I cannot say how we got out of Weymouth Harbour, nor why it was necessary to turn sharp to the left and wallow in what appeared to be surf.
"Excuse me," said Mr. Pyecroft behind us, "I don't mind rammin' a bathin'-machine; but if only one of them week-end Weymouth blighters has thrown his empty baccy-tin into the sea here, we'll rip our plates open on it; 267 isn't the Archimandrite's old cutter."
"I am hugging the shore," was the answer.
"There's no actual 'arm in huggin', but it can come expensive if pursooed."
"Right-O!" said Moorshed, putting down the wheel, and as we left those scant waters I felt 267 move more freely.
A thin cough ran up the speaking-tube.
"Well, what is it, Mr. Hinchcliffe?" said Moorshed.
"I merely wished to report that she is still continuin' to go, Sir."
"Right-O! Can we whack her up to fifteen, d'you think?"
"I'll try, Sir; but we'd prefer to have the engine-room hatch open – at first, Sir."
Whacked up then she was, and for half an hour was careered largely through the night, turning at last with a suddenness that slung us across the narrow deck.
"This," said Mr. Pyecroft, who received me on his chest as a large rock receives a shadow, "represents the Gnome arrivin' cautious from the direction o' Portsmouth, with Admiralty orders."
He pointed through the darkness ahead, and after much staring my eyes opened to a dozen destroyers, in two lines, some few hundred yards away.
"Those are the Red Fleet destroyer flotilla, which is too frail to panic about among the full-blooded cruisers inside Portland breakwater, and several millimetres too excited over the approachin' war to keep a look- out inshore. Hence our tattics!"
We wailed through our siren – a long, malignant, hyena-like howl – and a voice hailed us as we went astern tumultuously.
"The Gnome– Carteret-Jones – from Portsmouth, with orders – mm – mm – Stiletto," Moorshed answered through the megaphone in a high, whining voice, rather like a chaplain's.
"Who?" was the answer.
"Carter – et – Jones."
"Oh, Lord!"
There was a pause; a voice cried to some friend, "It's Podgie, adrift on the high seas in charge of a whole dee-stroyer!"
Another voice echoed, "Podgie!" and from its note I gathered that Mr.
Carteret-Jones had a reputation, but not for independent command.
"Who's your sub?" said the first speaker, a shadow on the bridge of the Dirk.
"A gunner, at present, Sir. The Stiletto– broken down – turns over to us."
"When did the Stiletto break down?"
"Off the Start, Sir; two hours after – after she left here this evening, I believe. My orders are to report to you for the manoeuvre signal-codes, and join Commander Hignett's flotilla, which is in attendance on Stiletto."
