tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71253118649899196282024-02-19T08:43:13.346+00:00Mr. Carruthers Presents...DailyMr Carruthers Presents...is a ragtag team of loyal supporters gathered together by the enigmatic and shadowy Mr Carruthers.
He has engaged them to write and perform comedy, come and see how they're doing...One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.comBlogger1578125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-90548648704468280252012-12-31T16:15:00.000+00:002013-01-01T15:35:33.357+00:00All Good Things...It's been a while since the last post on the Mr Carruthers Presents...Daily blog and that's sort of the reason for this post. This is isn't necessarily the last post, but it could be.<br />
<br />
We've been very quiet of late and the blog has reflected that all too literally. I considered ending the blog this time last year and then out of the blue came a fully edited version of FistKrammer, which spurred us on for a while. I live in hope that we will work together again soon and then this blog may serve the purpose it was designed for again.<br />
<br />
The pressure to try and come up with something funny here is overwhelming, but I'm sure you'll agree that the first two paragraphs have been pure comedy gold.<br />
<br />
Happy Birthday Andy.<br />
<br />
That's not me being facetious. It really is Andy's birthday. I really do hope he has a happy one. Maybe I should have started with Andy's birthday and then built up to breaking the bad news.<br />
<br />
Happy Birthday Andy. He shares his birthday with Henri Matisse (the French painter, Simon Wiesenthal (Austrian Holocaust survivor and post-war Nazi hunter), Anthony Hopkins (Welsh actor), Ben Kingsley (English actor), Pete Quaife (The Kinks' bassist), Donna Summer (American singer), Alex Salmond (Scottish politician), Bebe Neuwirth (American actress), Val Kilmer (American actor), Konishiki (American sumo wrestler), Dominik Diamond (Scottish TV presenter), Danny McNamara (the lead singer of Embrace) and Lakshmi Tatama (the Indian girl born with eight limbs).<br />
<br />
So a happy birthday to them as well.<br />
<br />
Every other year on this blog I posted a Review Of The Year and 2012 should be no different. Join me in a walk down Memory Lane. We'll stop just short of Nostalgia Avenue and avoid Painful Flashback Alleyway.<br />
<br />
It's the Review Of The Year 2012:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_01_01_archive.html">January</a><br />
We start the year as we meant to go on: Sherlock Holmesing and silly photos.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_02_01_archive.html">February</a><br />
We spent the longest February for four years with quotes and obsessing about <em>The Fast And The Furious</em>. Yep.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_03_01_archive.html">March</a><br />
The Car Go Fast Now cinematic franchise continues to dominate through March, but still alternating with quotes.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_04_01_archive.html">April</a><br />
After some foolishness, more cars, more quotes, more Sherlock Holmes.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_05_01_archive.html">May</a><br />
Quotes and Sherlockiness.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_06_01_archive.html">June</a><br />
Mike rides a duck and we reach 1500 posts.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_07_01_archive.html">July</a><br />
<em>Horsing Around</em>, <em>The Riddle Of The Sands</em> and mis-spelt tattoos.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_08_01_archive.html">August</a><br />
<em>The Riddle Of The Sands</em> interspersed with mis-spelt tattoos and missing posters.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.co.uk/2012_09_01_archive.html">September</a><br />
<em>The Riddle Of The Sands</em> less interspersed with mis-spelt tattoos and missing posters.<br />
<br />
October<br />
Nothing.<br />
<br />
November<br />
Absolutely nothing.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://mrcarrutherspresents.blogspot.com/2012/12/its-been-while-since-last-post-on-on-mr.html">December</a><br />
This. Here. Now.<br />
<br />
And so for the moment that's it.<br />
<br />
I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who ever read this blog or helped us out in any way. I'd make a list here, but there are so many I would hate to miss anyone out. I'm going to miss you all out in the hope that your collective disappointment amounts to less than a grudge might in one of you. You know who I mean. Yes, you. I can see you.<br />
<br />
I still blog a blog <a href="http://davewrotethis.blogspot.co.uk/">here</a> and there are still some Carruthers related subjects I plan to cover on it, but for the moment this is us signing off in hope that we will do this all again some time.<br />
<br />
Happy New Year<br />
<br />
DaveOne of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-44988258380917562562012-09-16T16:14:00.000+01:002012-09-16T16:14:00.590+01:00PostscriptPostscript<br />
March 1903<br />
<br />
IT so happens that while this book was in the press a number of measures have been taken by the Government to counteract some of the very weaknesses and dangers which are alluded to above. A Committee of National Defence has been set up, and the welcome given to it was a truly extraordinary comment on the apathy and confusion which it is designed to supplant. A site on the Forth has been selected for a new North Sea naval base—an excellent if tardy decision; for ten years or so must elapse before the existing anchorage becomes in any sense a 'base'. A North Sea fleet has also been created—another good measure; but it should be remembered that its ships are not modern, or in the least capable of meeting the principal German squadrons under the circumstances supposed above.<br />
<br />
Lastly, a Manning Committee has (among other matters) reported vaguely in favour of a Volunteer Reserve. There is no means of knowing what this recommendation will lead to; let us hope not to the fiasco of the last badly conceived experiment. Is it not becoming patent that the time has come for training all Englishmen systematically either for the sea or for the rifle?<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-53767419911919303422012-09-14T16:16:00.000+01:002012-09-14T16:16:00.252+01:00EpilogueEpilogue<br />
By The Editor<br />
<br />
AN interesting document, somewhat damaged by fire, lies on my study table.<br />
<br />
It is a copy (in cipher) of a confidential memorandum to the German Government embodying a scheme for the invasion of England by Germany. It is unsigned, but internal evidence, and the fact that it was taken by Mr 'Carruthers' from the stove of the villa at Norderney, leave no doubt as to its authorship. For many reasons it is out of the question to print the textual translation of it, as deciphered; but I propose to give an outline of its contents.<br />
<br />
Even this must strain discretion to its uttermost limits, and had I only to consider the instructed few who follow the trend of professional opinion on such subjects, I should leave the foregoing narrative to speak for itself. But, as was stated in the preface, our primary purpose is to reach everyone; and there may be many who, in spite of able and authoritative warnings frequently uttered since these events occurred, are still prone to treat the German danger as an idle 'bogey', and may be disposed, in this case, to imagine that a baseless romance has been foisted on them.<br />
<br />
A few persons (English as well as German) hold that Germany is strong enough now to meet us single-handed, and throw an army on our shores. The memorandum rejects this view, deferring isolated action for at least a decade; and supposing, for present purposes, a coalition of three Powers against Great Britain. And subsequent researches through the usual channels place it beyond dispute that this condition was relied on by the German Government in adopting the scheme. They realized that even if, owing to our widely scattered forces, they gained that temporary command of the North Sea which would be essential for a successful landing, they would inevitably lose it when our standing fleets were concentrated and our reserve ships mobilized. With its sea-communications cut, the prospects of the invading army would be too dubious. I state it in that mild way, for it seems not to have been held that failure was absolutely certain; and rightly, I think, in spite of the dogmas of the strategists—for the ease transcends all experience. No man can calculate the effect on our delicate economic fabric of a well-timed, well-planned blow at the industrial heart of the kingdom, the great northern and midland towns, with their teeming populations of peaceful wage-earners. In this instance, however, joint action (the occasion for which is perhaps not difficult to guess) was distinctly contemplated, and Germany's rôle in the coalition was exclusively that of invader. Her fleet was to be kept intact, and she herself to remain ostensibly neutral until the first shock was over, and our own battle-fleets either beaten, or, the much more likely event, so crippled by a hard-won victory as to be incapable of withstanding compact and unscathed forces. Then, holding the balance of power, she would strike. And the blow? It was not till I read this memorandum that I grasped the full merits of that daring scheme, under which every advantage, moral, material, and geographical, possessed by Germany, is utilized to the utmost, and every disadvantage of our own turned to account against us.<br />
<br />
Two root principles pervade it: perfect organization; perfect secrecy. Under the first head come some general considerations. The writer (who is intimately conversant with conditions on both sides of the North Sea) argued that Germany is pre-eminently fitted to undertake an invasion of Great Britain. She has a great army (a mere fraction of which would suffice) in a state of high efficiency, but a useless weapon, as against us, unless transported over seas. She has a peculiar genius for organization, not only in elaborating minute detail, but in the grasp of a coherent whole. She knows the art of giving a brain to a machine, of transmitting power to the uttermost cog-wheel, and at the same time of concentrating responsibility in a supreme centre. She has a small navy, but very effective for its purpose, built, trained, and manned on methodical principles, for defined ends, and backed by an inexhaustible reserve of men from her maritime conscription. She studies and practises co-operation between her army and navy. Her hands are free for offence in home waters, since she has no distant network of coveted colonies and dependencies on which to dissipate her defensive energies. Finally, she is, compared with ourselves, economically independent, having commercial access through her land frontiers to the whole of Europe. She has little to lose and much to gain.<br />
<br />
The writer pauses here to contrast our own situation, and I summarize his points. We have a small army, dispersed over the whole globe, and administered on a gravely defective system. We have no settled theory of national defence, and no competent authority whose business it is to give us one. The matter is still at the stage of civilian controversy. Co-operation between the army and navy is not studied and practised; much less do there exist any plans, worthy of the name, for the repulse of an invasion, or any readiness worth considering for the prompt equipment and direction of our home forces to meet a sudden emergency. We have a great and, in many respects, a magnificent navy, but not great enough for the interests it insures, and with equally defective institutions; not built or manned methodically, having an utterly inadequate reserve of men, all classes of which would be absorbed at the very outset, without a vestige of preparation for the enrolment of volunteers; distracted by the multiplicity of its functions in guarding our colossal empire and commerce, and conspicuously lacking a brain, not merely for the smooth control of its own unwieldy mechanism, but for the study of rival aims and systems. We have no North Sea naval base, no North Sea Fleet, and no North Sea policy. Lastly, we stand in a highly dangerous economical position.<br />
<br />
The writer then deals with the method of invasion, and rejects the obvious one at once, that of sending forth a fleet of transports from one or more of the North Sea ports. He combats especially the idea of making Emden (the nearest to our shores) the port of departure. I mention this because, since his own scheme was adopted, it is instructive to note that Emden had been used (with caution) as a red herring by the inspired German press, when the subject was mentioned at all, and industriously dragged across the trail. His objections to the North Sea ports apply, he remarks, in reality to all schemes of invasion, whether the conditions be favourable or not. One is that secrecy is rendered impossible—and secrecy is vital. The collection of the transports would be known in England weeks before the hour was ripe for striking; for all large ports are cosmopolitan and swarm with potential spies. In Germany's case, moreover, suitable ships are none too plentiful, and the number required would entail a large deduction from her mercantile marine. The other reason concerns the actual landing. This must take place on an open part of the east coast of England. No other objective is even considered. Now the difficulty of transshipping and landing troops by boats from transports anchored in deep water, in a safe, swift, and orderly fashion, on an open beach, is enormous. The most hastily improvised resistance might cause a humiliating disaster. Yet the first stage is the most important of all. It is imperative that the invaders should seize and promptly intrench a pre-arranged line of country, to serve as an initial base. This once done, they can use other resources; they can bring up transports, land cavalry and heavy guns, pour in stores, and advance. But unless this is done, they are impotent, be their sea-communications never so secure.<br />
<br />
The only logical alternative is then propounded: to despatch an army of infantry with the lightest type of field-guns in big sea-going lighters, towed by powerful but shallow-draught tugs, under escort of a powerful composite squadron of warships; and to fling the flotilla, at high tide, if possible, straight upon the shore.<br />
<br />
Such an expedition could be prepared in absolute secrecy, by turning to account the natural features of the German coast. No great port was to be concerned in any way. All that was required was sufficient depth of water to float the lighters and tugs; and this is supplied by seven insignificant streams, issuing from the Frisian littoral, and already furnished with small harbours and sluice-gates, with one exception, namely, the tidal creek at Norden; for this, it appeared, was one of the chosen seven, and not, as 'Carruthers' supposed, Hilgenriedersiel, which, if you remember, he had no time to visit, and which has, in fact, no stream of any value at all, and no harbour. All of these streams would have to be improved, deepened, and generally canalized; ostensibly with a commercial end, for purposes of traffic with the islands, which are growing health resorts during a limited summer season.<br />
<br />
The whole expedition would be organized under seven distinct sub-divisions—not too great a number in view of its cumbrous character. Seawards, the whole of the coast is veiled by the fringe of islands and the zone of shoals. Landwards, the loop of railway round the Frisian peninsula would form the line of communication in rear of the seven streams. Esens was to be the local centre of administration when the scheme grew to maturity, but not till then. Every detail for the movement of troops under the seven different heads was to be arranged for with secrecy and exactitude many months in advance, and from headquarters at Berlin. It was not expected that nothing would leak out, but care was to be taken that anything that did do so should be attributed to defensive measures—a standing feature in German mobilization being the establishment of a corps of observation along the Frisian coast; in fact, the same machinery was to be used, and its conversion for offence concealed up to the latest possible moment. The same precautions were to be taken in the preliminary work on the spot. There, four men only (it was calculated) need be in full possession of the secret. One was to represent the Imperial Navy (a post filled by our friend von Brüning). Another (Böhme) was to superintend the six canals and the construction of the lighters. The functions of the third were twofold. He was to organize what I may call the local labour—that is, the helpers required for embarkation, the crews of the tugs, and, most important of all, the service of pilots for the navigation of the seven flotillas through the corresponding channels to the open sea. He must be a local man, thoroughly acquainted with the coast, of a social standing not much above the average of villagers and fishermen, and he must be ready when the time was ripe with lists of the right men for the right duties, lists to which the conscription authorities could when required, give instant legal effect. His other function was to police the coast for spies, and to report anything suspicious to von Brüning, who would never be far away. On the whole I think that they found the grim Grimm a jewel for their purpose.<br />
<br />
As fourth personage, the writer designates himself, the promoter of the scheme, the indispensable link between the two nations. He undertakes to furnish reliable information as to the disposition of troops in England, as to the hydrography of the coast selected for the landing, as to the supplies available in its vicinity, and the strategic points to be seized. He proposes to be guide-in-chief to the expedition during transit. And in the meantime (when not otherwise employed) he was to reside at Norderney, in close touch with the other three, and controlling the commercial undertakings which were to throw dust in the eyes of the curious. [Memmert, by the way, is not mentioned in this memorandum.]<br />
<br />
He speaks of the place 'selected for the landing', and proceeds to consider this question in detail. I cannot follow him in his review, deeply interesting though it is, and shall say at once that he reduces possible landing-places to two, the flats on the Essex coast between Foulness and Brightlingsea, and the Wash—with a decided preference for the latter. Assuming that the enemy, if they got wind of an invasion at all, would expect transports to be employed, he chooses the sort of spot which they would be least likely to defend, and which, nevertheless, was suitable to the character of the flotillas, and similar to the region they started from. There is such a spot on the Lincolnshire coast, on the north side of the Wash, known as East Holland. It is low-lying land, dyked against the sea, and bordered like Frisia with sand-flats which dry off at low water. It is easy of access from the east, by way of Boston Deeps, a deep-water channel formed by a detached bank, called the Long Sand, lying parallel to the shore for ten miles. This bank makes a natural breakwater against the swell from the east (the only quarter to be feared); and the Deeps behind it, where there is an average depth of thirty-four feet at low-water, would form an excellent roadstead for the covering squadron, whose guns would command the shore within easy range. It is noted in passing that this is just the case where German first-class battleships would have an advantage over British ships of the same calibre. The latter are of just too heavy a draught to navigate such waters without peril, if, indeed, they could enter this roadstead at all, for there is a bar at the mouth of it with only thirty-one feet at high water, spring tides. The former, built as they were with a view to manœuvring in the North Sea, are just within the margin of safety. East Holland is within easy striking distance of the manufacturing districts, a vigorous raid on which is, the writer urges, the true policy of an invader. He reports positively that there exist (in a proper military sense) no preparations whatever to meet such an attack. East Holland is also the nearest point on the British shores to Germany, excepting the coast of Norfolk; much nearer, indeed, than the Essex flats alluded to, and reached by a simple deep-sea passage, without any dangerous region to navigate, like the mouth of the Channel and the estuary of the Thames from Harwich westwards. The distance is 240 sea-miles, west by south roughly, from Borkum Island, and 280 from Wangeroog. The time estimated for transit after the flotillas had been assembled outside the islands is from thirty to thirty-four hours.<br />
<br />
Embarkation is the next topic. This could and must be effected in one tide. At the six siels there was a mean period of two and a half hours in every twelve, during which the water was high enough. At Norden a rather longer time was available. But this should be amply sufficient if the machinery were in good working order and were punctually set in motion. High water occurs approximately at the same time at all seven outlets, the difference between the two farthest apart, Carolinensiel and Greetsiel, being only half an hour.<br />
<br />
Lastly, the special risks attendant on such an expedition are dispassionately weighed. X—, though keenly anxious to recommend his scheme, writes in no blindly sanguine spirit. There are no modern precedents for any invasion in the least degree comparable to that of England by Germany. Any such attempt will be a hazardous experiment. But he argues that the advantages of his method outweigh the risks, and that most of the risks themselves would attach equally to any other method. Whatever skill in prediction was used, bad weather might overtake the expedition. Yes; but if transports were used transhipment into boats for landing would in bad weather be fraught with the same and a greater peril. But transports could stand off and wait. Delay is fatal in any case; unswerving promptitude is the essence of such an enterprise. The lighters would be in danger of foundering? Beside the point; if the end is worth gaining the risks must be faced. Soldiers' lives are sacrificed in tens of thousands on battlefields. The flotilla would be demoralized during transit by the assault of a few torpedo-boats? Granted; but the same would apply to a fleet of transports, with the added certainty that one lucky shot would send to the bottom ten times the number of soldiers, with less hope of rescue. In both cases reliance must be placed on the efficiency and vigilance of the escort. It is admitted, however, in a passage which might well make my two adventurers glow with triumph, that if by any mischance the British discovered what was afoot in good time, and were able to send over a swarm of light-draught boats, which could elude the German warships and get amongst the flotillas while they were still in process of leaving the siels; it is admitted that in that case the expedition was doomed. But it is held that such an event was not to be feared. Reckless pluck is abundant in the British Navy, but expert knowledge of the tides and shoals in these waters is utterly lacking. The British charts are of no value, and there is no evidence (he reports) that the subject has been studied in any way by the British Admiralty. Let me remark here, that I believe Mr 'Davies's' views, as expressed in the earlier chapters, when they were still among the great estuaries, are all absolutely sound. The 'channel theory', though it only bore indirectly on the grand issue before them, was true, and should be laid to heart, or I should not have wasted space on it.<br />
<br />
One word more, in conclusion. There is an axiom, much in fashion now, that there is no fear of an invasion of the British Isles, because if we lose command of the sea, we can be starved—a cheaper and surer way of reducing us to submission. It is a loose, valueless axiom, but by sheer repetition it is becoming an article of faith. It implies that 'command of the sea' is a thing to be won or lost definitely; that we may have it to-day and lose it for ever to-morrow. On the contrary, the chances are that in anything like an even struggle the command of the sea will hang in the balance for an indefinite time. And even against great odds, it would probably be impossible for our enemies so to bar the avenues of our commerce, so to blockade the ports of our extensive coast-line, and so to overcome the interest which neutrals will have in supplying us, as to bring us to our knees in less than two years, during which time we can be recuperating and rebuilding from our unique internal resources, and endeavouring to regain command.<br />
<br />
No; the better axiom is that nothing short of a successful invasion could finally compel us to make peace. Our hearts are stout, we hope; but facts are facts; and a successful raid, such as that here sketched, if you will think out its consequences, must appal the stoutest heart. It was checkmated, but others may be conceived. In any case, we know the way in which they look at these things in Germany.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-10778166384947960762012-09-12T16:10:00.000+01:002012-09-12T16:10:00.271+01:00We Achieve Our Double AimChapter XXVIII: We Achieve Our Double Aim<br />
<br />
WHEN, exactly, the atmosphere of misunderstanding on the stranded tug was dissipated, I do not know, for by the time I had fitted the rowlocks and shipped sculls, tide and wind had caught me, and were sweeping me merrily back on the road to Norderney, whose lights twinkled through the scud in the north. With my first few strokes I made towards the lighter—which I could see sagging helplessly to leeward—but as soon as I thought I was out of sight of the tug, I pulled round and worked out my own salvation. There was an outburst of shouting which soon died away. Full speed on a falling tide! They were pinned there for five hours sure. It was impossible to miss the way, and with my stout allies heaving me forward, I made short work of the two-mile passage. There was a sharp tussle at the last, where the Riff-Gat poured its stream across my path, and then I was craning over my shoulder, God knows with what tense anxiety, for the low hull and taper mast of the Dulcibella. Not there! No, not where I had left her. I pulled furiously up the harbour past a sleeping ferry-steamer and—praise Heaven!—came on her warped alongside the jetty.<br />
<br />
'Who's that?' came from below, as I stepped on board.<br />
<br />
'Hush! it's me.' And Davies and I were pawing one another in the dark of the cabin.<br />
<br />
'Are you all right, old chap?' said he.<br />
<br />
'Yes; are you? A match! What's the time? Quick!'<br />
<br />
'Good Heavens, Carruthers, what the blazes have you done to yourself?' (I suspect I cut a pretty figure after my two days' outing.)<br />
<br />
'Ten past three. It's the invasion of England! Is Dollmann at the villa?'<br />
<br />
'Invasion?'<br />
<br />
'Is Dollmann at the villa?'<br />
<br />
'Yes.'<br />
<br />
'Is the Medusa afloat?'<br />
<br />
'No, on the mud.'<br />
<br />
'The devil! Are we afloat?'<br />
<br />
'I think so still, but they made me shift.'<br />
<br />
'Think! Track her out! Pole her out! Cut those warps!'<br />
<br />
For a few strenuous minutes we toiled at the sweeps till the Dulcibella was berthed ahead of the steamer, in deeper water. Meanwhile I had whispered a few facts.<br />
<br />
'How soon can you get under way?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'Ten minutes.'<br />
<br />
'When's daylight?'<br />
<br />
'Sunrise about seven, first dawn about five. Where are we bound?'<br />
<br />
'Holland, or England.'<br />
<br />
'Are they invading it now?' said Davies, calmly.<br />
<br />
'No, only rehearsing!' I laughed, wildly.<br />
<br />
'Then we can wait.'<br />
<br />
'We can wait exactly an hour and a half. Come ashore and knock up Dollmann; we must denounce him, and get them both aboard; it's now or never. Holy Saints! man, not as you are!' (He was in pyjamas.) 'Sea clothes!'<br />
<br />
While he put on Christian attire, I resumed my facts and sketched a plan. 'Are you watched?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'I think so; by the Kormoran's men.'<br />
<br />
'Is the Kormoran here?'<br />
<br />
'Yes.'<br />
<br />
'The men?'<br />
<br />
'Not to-night. Grimm called for them in that tug. I was watching. And, Carruthers, the Blitz is here.'<br />
<br />
'Where?'<br />
<br />
'In the roads outside—didn't you see her?'<br />
<br />
'Wasn't looking. Her skipper's safe anyway; so's Böhme, so's the Tertium Quid, and so are the Kormoran's men. The coast's clear—it's now or never.'<br />
<br />
Once more we were traversing the long jetty and the silent streets, rain driving at our backs. We trod on air, I think; I remember no fatigue. Davies sometimes broke into a little run, muttering 'scoundrel' to himself.<br />
<br />
'I was right—only upside down,' he murmured more than once. 'Always really right—those channels are the key to the whole concern. Chatham, our only eastern base—no North Sea base or squadron—they'd land at one of those God-forsaken flats off the Crouch and Blackwater.'<br />
<br />
'It seems a wild scheme,' I observed.<br />
<br />
'Wild? In a way. So is any invasion. But it's thorough; it's German. No other country could do it. It's all dawning on me—by Jove! It will be at the Wash—much the nearest, and as sandy as this side.'<br />
<br />
'How's Dollmann been?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'Polite, but queer and jumpy. It's too long a story.'<br />
<br />
'Clara?'<br />
<br />
'She's all right. By Jove! Carruthers—never mind.'<br />
<br />
We found a night-bell at the villa door and rang it lustily. A window aloft opened, and 'A message from Commander von Brüning—urgent,' I called up.<br />
<br />
The window shut, and soon after the hall was lighted and the door opened by Dollmann in a dressing-gown.<br />
<br />
'Good morning, Lieutenant X—,' I said, in English. 'Stop, we're friends, you fool!' as the door was flung nearly to. It opened very slowly again, and we walked in.<br />
<br />
'Silence!' he hissed. The sweat stood on his steep forehead and a hectic flush on either cheek, but there was a smile—what a smile!—on his lips. Motioning us to tread noiselessly (a vain ideal for me), he led the way to the sitting-room we knew, switched on the light, and faced us.<br />
<br />
'Well?' he said, in English, still smiling.<br />
<br />
I consulted my watch, and I may say that if my hand was an index to my general appearance, I must have looked the most abject ruffian under heaven.<br />
<br />
'We probably understand one another,' I said, 'and to explain is to lose time. We sail for Holland, or perhaps England, at five at the latest, and we want the pleasure of your company. We promise you immunity—on certain conditions, which can wait. We have only two berths, so that we can only accommodate Miss Clara besides yourself.' He smiled on through this terse harangue, but the smile froze, as though beneath it raged some crucial debate. Suddenly he laughed (a low, ironical laugh).<br />
<br />
'You fools,' he said, 'you confounded meddlesome young idiots; I thought I had done with you. Promise me immunity? Give me till five? By God, I'll give you five minutes to be off to England and be damned to you, or else to be locked up for spies! What the devil do you take me for?'<br />
<br />
'A traitor in German service,' said Davies, none too firmly. We were both taken aback by this slashing attack.<br />
<br />
'A tr—? You pig-headed young marplots! I'm in British service! You're wrecking the work of years—and on the very threshold of success.'<br />
<br />
For an instant Davies and I looked at one another in stupefaction. He lied—I could swear he lied; but how make sure?<br />
<br />
'Why did you try to wreck Davies?' said I, mechanically.<br />
<br />
'Pshaw! They made me clear him out. I knew he was safe, and safe he is.'<br />
<br />
There was only one thing for it—a last finesse, to put him to the proof.<br />
<br />
'Very well,' I said, after a moment or two, 'we'll clear out—silence, Davies!—as it appears we have acted in error; but it's right to tell you that we know everything.'<br />
<br />
'Not so loud, curse you! What do you know?'<br />
<br />
'I was taking notes at Memmert the other night.'<br />
<br />
'Impossible!'<br />
<br />
'Thanks to Davies. Under difficulties, of course, but I heard quite enough. You were reporting your English tour—Chatham, you know, and the English scheme of attack, a mythical one, no doubt, as you're on the right side! Böhme and the rest were dealing with the German scheme of defence A to G—I heard it all—the seven islands and the seven channels between them (Davies knows every one of them by heart); and then on land, the ring of railway, Esens the centre, the army corps to mobilize and entrench—all nugatory, wasted, ha! ha!—as you're on the rights—'<br />
<br />
'Not so loud, you fiend of mischief!' He turned his back, and made an irresolute pace or two towards the door, his hands kneading the folds of his dressing-gown as they had kneaded the curtain at Memmert. Twice he began a question and twice broke off. 'I congratulate you, gentlemen,' he said, finally, and with more composure, facing us again, 'you have done marvels in your misplaced zeal; but you have compromised me too much already. I shall have to have you arrested—purely for form's sake—'<br />
<br />
'Thank you,' I broke in. 'We have wasted five minutes, and time presses. We sail at five, and—purely for form's sake—would rather have you with us.'<br />
<br />
'What do you mean?' he snarled.<br />
<br />
'I had the advantage of you at Memmert, in spite of acoustic obstacles. Your friends made an appointment behind your back, and I, in my misplaced zeal, have taken some trouble to attend it; so that I've had a working demonstration on another matter, the invasion of England from the seven siels.' (Davies nudged me.) 'No, I should let that pistol alone; and no, I wouldn't ring the bell. You can arrest us if you like, but the secret's in safe hands.'<br />
<br />
'You lie!' He was right there; but he could not know it.<br />
<br />
'Do you suppose I haven't taken that precaution? But no names are mentioned.' He gave a sort of groan, sank into a chair, and seemed to age and grizzle before our very eyes.<br />
<br />
'What did you say about immunity, and Clara?' he muttered. 'We're friends—we're friends!' burst out Davies, with a gulp in his voice. 'We want to help you both.' (Through a sudden mist that filmed my eyes I saw him impetuously walk over and lay his hand on the other's shoulder.) 'Those chaps are on our track and yours. Come with us. Wake her, tell her. It'll be too late soon.'<br />
<br />
X— shrank from his touch. 'Tell her? I can't tell her. You tell her, boy.' He was huddling back into his chair. Davies turned to me.<br />
<br />
'Where's her room?' I said, sharply.<br />
<br />
'Above this one.'<br />
<br />
'Go up, Carruthers,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'Not I—I shall frighten her into a fit.'<br />
<br />
'I don't like to.'<br />
<br />
'Nonsense, man! We'll both go then.'<br />
<br />
'Don't make a noise,' said a dazed voice. We left that huddled figure and stole upstairs—thickly carpeted stairs, luckily. The door we wanted was half open, and the room behind it lighted. On the threshold stood a slim white figure, bare-footed; bare-throated.<br />
<br />
'What is it, father?' she called in a whisper. 'Whom have you been talking to?' I pushed Davies forward, but he hung back.<br />
<br />
'Hush, don't be frightened,' I said, 'it's I, Carruthers, and Davies—and Davies. May we come in, just for one moment?'<br />
<br />
I gently widened the opening of the door, while she stepped back and put one hand to her throat.<br />
<br />
'Please come to your father,' I said. 'We are going to take you both to England in the Dulcibella—now, at once.'<br />
<br />
She had heard me, but her eyes wandered to Davies.<br />
<br />
'I understand not,' she faltered, trembling and cowering in such touching bewilderment that I could not bear to look at her.<br />
<br />
'For God's sake, say something, Davies,' I muttered.<br />
<br />
'Clara!' said Davies, 'will you not trust us?'<br />
<br />
I heard a little gasp from her. There was a flutter of lace and cambric and she was in his arms, sobbing like a tired child, her little white feet between his great clumsy sea-boots—her rose-brown cheek on his rough jersey.<br />
<br />
'It's past four, old chap,' I remarked, brutally. 'I'm going down to him again. No packing to speak of, mind. They must be out of this in half an hour.' I stumbled awkwardly on the stairs (again that tiresome film!) and found him stuffing some papers pell-mell into the stove. There were only slumbering embers in it, but he did not seem to notice that. 'You must be dressed in half an hour,' I said, furtively pocketing a pistol which lay on the table.<br />
<br />
'Have you told her? Take her to England, you two boys. I think I'll stay.' He sank into a chair again.<br />
<br />
'Nonsense, she won't go without you. You must, for her sake—in half an hour, too.'<br />
<br />
I prefer to pass that half-hour lightly over. Davies left before me to prepare the yacht for sea, and I had to bear the brunt of what followed, including (as a mere episode) a scene with the step-mother, the memory of which rankles in me yet. After all, she was a sensible woman.<br />
<br />
As for the other two, the girl when I saw her next, in her short boating skirt and tam-o'-shanter, was a miracle of coolness and pluck. But for her I should never have got him away. And ah! how good it was to be out in the wholesome rain again, hurrying to the harbour with my two charges, hurrying them down the greasy ladder to that frail atom of English soil, their first guerdon of home and safety.<br />
<br />
Our flight from the harbour was unmolested, unnoticed. Only the first ghastly evidences of dawn were mingling with the strangled moonlight, as we tacked round the pier-head and headed close-reefed down the Riff-Gat on the lees of the ebb-tide. We had to pass under the very quarter of the Blitz, so Davies said; for, of course, he alone was on deck till we reached the open sea. Day was breaking then. It was dead low water, and, far away to the south, between dun swathes of sand, I thought I saw—but probably it was only a fancy—two black stranded specks. Rail awash, and decks streaming, we took the outer swell and clawed close-hauled under the lee of Juist, westward, hurrying westward.<br />
<br />
'Up the Ems on the flood, and to Dutch Delfzyl,' I urged. No, thought Davies; it was too near Germany, and there was a tidal cut through from Buse Tief. Better to dodge in behind Rottum Island. So on we pressed, past Memmert, over the Juister Reef and the Corinne's buried millions, across the two broad and yeasty mouths of the Ems, till Rottum, a wee lonesome wafer of an islet, the first of the Dutch archipelago, was close on the weather-bow.<br />
<br />
'We must get in behind that,' said Davies, 'then we shall be safe; I think I know the way, but get the next chart; and then take a rest, old chap. Clara and I can manage.' (She had been on deck most of the time, as capable a hand as you could wish for, better far than I in my present state of exhaustion.) I crawled along the slippery sloping planks and went below.<br />
<br />
'Where are we?' cried Dollmann, starting up from the lee sofa, where he seemed to have been lying in a sort of trance. A book, his own book, slipped from his knees, and I saw the frontispiece lying on the floor in a pool of oil; for the stove had gone adrift, and the saloon was in a wretched state of squalor and litter.<br />
<br />
'Off Rottum,' I said, and knelt up to find the chart. There was a look in his eyes that I suppose I ought to have understood, but I can scarcely blame myself, for the accumulated strain, not only of the last three days and nights, but of the whole arduous month of my cruise with Davies, was beginning to tell on me, now that safety and success were at hand. I handed up the chart through the companion, and then crept into the reeling fo'c'sle and lay down on the spare sail-bags, with the thunder and thump of the seas around and above me.<br />
<br />
I must quote Davies for the event that happened now; for by the time I had responded to the alarm and climbed up through the fore-hatch, the whole tragedy was over and done with.<br />
<br />
'X— came up the companion,' he says, 'soon after you went down. He held on by the runner, and stared to windward at Rottum, as though he knew the place quite well. And then he came towards us, moving so unsteadily that I gave Clara the tiller, and went to help him. I tried to make him go down again, but he wouldn't, and came aft.<br />
<br />
"'Give me the helm," he said, half to himself. "Sea's too bad outside—there's a short cut here."<br />
<br />
"'Thanks," I said, "I know this one." (I don't think I meant to be sarcastic.) He said nothing, and settled himself on the counter behind us, safe enough, with his feet against the lee-rail, and then, to my astonishment, began to talk over my shoulder jolly sensibly about the course, pointing out a buoy which is wrong on the chart (as I knew), and telling me it was wrong, and so on. Well, we came to the bar of the Schild, and had to turn south for that twisty bit of beating between Rottum and Bosch Flat. Clara was at the jib-sheet, I had the chart and the tiller (you know how absent I get like that); there was a bobble of sea, and we both had heaps to do, and—well—I happened to look round, and he was gone. He hadn't spoken for a minute or two, but I believe the last thing I heard him say (I was hardly attending at the time, for we were in the thick of it) was something about a "short cut" again. He must have slipped over quietly ... He had an ulster and big boots on.'<br />
<br />
We cruised about for a time, but never found him.<br />
<br />
That evening, after threading the maze of shoals between the Dutch mainland and islands, we anchored off the little hamlet of Ostmahorn, gave the yacht in charge of some astonished fishermen, and thence by road and rail, hurrying still, gained Harlingen, and took passage on a steamer to London. From that point our personal history is of no concern to the outside world, and here, therefore, I bring this narrative to an end.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-11527306451693378042012-09-10T16:12:00.000+01:002012-09-10T16:12:00.372+01:00The Luck Of The StowawayChapter XXVII: The Luck Of The Stowaway<br />
<br />
AT Esens Station I reversed my Norden tactics, jumped out smartly, and got to the door of egress first of all, gave up my ticket, and hung about the gate of the station under cover of darkness. Fortune smiled still; there was no vehicle in waiting at all, and there were only half a dozen passengers. Two of these were the cloaked gentlemen who had been so nearly left behind at Norden, and another was von Brüning. The latter walked well in advance of the first pair, but at the gate on to the high road the three showed a common purpose, in that, unlike the rest, who turned towards Esens town, they turned southwards; much to my perplexity, for this was the contrary direction to Bensersiel and the sea. I, with my bundle on my shoulder, had been bringing up the rear, and, as their faithful shadow, turned to the right too, without foreseeing the consequence. When it was too late to turn back I saw that, fifty yards ahead, the road was barred by the gates of a level crossing, and that the four of us must inevitably accumulate at the barrier till the train had steamed away. This, in fact, happened, and for a minute or two we were all in a group, elaborately indifferent to one another, silent, but I am sure very conscious. As for me, 'secret laughter tickled all my soul'. When the gates were opened the three seemed disposed to lag, so I tactfully took my cue, trudged briskly on ahead, and stopped after a few minutes to listen. Hearing nothing I went cautiously back and found that they had disappeared; in which direction was not long in doubt, for I came on a grassy path leading into the fields on the left or west of the road, and though I could see no one I heard the distant murmur of receding voices.<br />
<br />
I took my bearings collectedly, placed one foot on the path, thought better of it, and turned back towards Esens. I knew without reference to the map that that path would bring them to the Benser Tief at a point somewhere near the timber-yard. In a fog I might have followed them there; as it was, the night was none too dark, and I had my strength to husband; and stamped on my memory were the words 'the tide serves'. I judged it a wiser use of time and sinew to anticipate them at Bensersiel by the shortest road, leaving them to reach it by way of the devious Tief, to examine which was, I felt convinced, one of their objects.<br />
<br />
It was nine o'clock of a fresh wild night, a halo round the beclouded moon. I passed through quiet Esens, and in an hour I was close to Bensersiel, and could hear the sea. In the rooted idea that I should find Grimm on the outskirts, awaiting visitors, I left the road short of the village, and made a circuit to the harbour by way of the sea-wall. The lower windows of the inn shed a warm glow into the night, and within I could see the village circle gathered over cards, and dominated as of old by the assertive little postmaster, whose high-pitched, excitable voice I could clearly distinguish, as he sat with his cap on the back of his head and a 'feine schnapps' at his elbow. The harbour itself looked exactly the same as I remembered it a week ago. The post-boat lay in her old berth at the eastern jetty, her mainsail set and her twin giants spitting over the rail. I hailed them boldly from the shore (without showing them who I was), and was told they were starting for Langeoog in a few minutes; the wind was off-shore, the mails aboard, and the water just high enough. 'Did I want a passage?' 'No, I thought I would wait.' Positive that my party could never have got here so soon, I nevertheless kept an eye on the galliot till she let go her stern-rope and slid away. One contingency was eliminated. Some loiterers dispersed, and all port business appeared to be ended for the night.<br />
<br />
Three-quarters of an hour of strained suspense ensued. Most of it I spent on my knees in a dark angle between the dyke and the western jetty, whence I had a strategic survey of the basin; but I was driven at times to relieve inaction by sallies which increased in audacity. I scouted on the road beyond the bridge, hovered round the lock, and peered in at the inn parlour; but nowhere could I see a trace of Grimm. I examined every floating object in the harbour (they were very few), dropped on to two lighters and pried under tarpaulins, boarded a deserted tug and two or three clumsy rowboats tied up to a mooring-post. Only one of these had the look of readiness, the rest being devoid of oars and rowlocks; a discouraging state of things for a prospective boat-lifter. It was the sight of these rowboats that suggested a last and most distracting possibility, namely, that the boat in waiting, if boat there were, might be not in the harbour at all, but somewhere on the sands outside the dyke, where, at this high state of the tide, it would have water and to spare. Back to the dyke then; but as I peered seaward on the way, contingencies evaporated and a solid fact supervened, for I saw the lights of a steamboat approaching the harbour mouth. I had barely time to gain my coign of vantage before she had swept in between the piers, and with a fitful swizzling of her screw was turning and backing down to a berth just ahead of one of the lighters, and not fifty feet from my hiding-place. A deck-hand jumped ashore with a rope, while the man at the wheel gave gruff directions. The vessel was a small tug, and the man at the wheel disclosed his identity when, having rung off his engines, he jumped ashore also, looked at his watch in the beam of the sidelight, and walked towards the village. It was Grimm, by the height and build—Grimm clad in a long tarpaulin coat and a sou'wester. I watched him cross the shaft of light from the inn window and disappear in the direction of the canal.<br />
<br />
Another sailor now appeared and helped his fellow to tie up the tug. The two together then went aft and began to set about some job whose nature I could not determine. To emerge was perilous, so I set about a job of my own, tearing open my bundle and pulling an oilskin jacket and trousers over my clothes, and discarding my peaked cap for a sou'-wester. This operation was prompted instantaneously by the garb of two sailors, who in hauling on the forward warp came into the field of the mast-head light.<br />
<br />
It was something of a gymnastic masterpiece, since I was lying—or, rather, standing aslant—on the rough sea-wall, with crannies of brick for foothold and the water plashing below me; but then I had not lived in the Dulcibella for nothing. My chain of thought, I fancy, was this—the tug is to carry my party; I cannot shadow a tug in a rowboat, yet I intend to shadow my party; I must therefore go with them in the tug, and the first and soundest step is to mimic her crew. But the next step was a hard matter, for the crew having finished their job sat side by side on the bulwarks and lit their pipes. However, a little pantomime soon occurred, as amusing as it was inspiriting. They seemed to consult together, looking from the tug to the inn and from the inn to the tug. One of them walked a few paces inn-wards and beckoned to the other, who in his turn called something down the engine-room skylight, and then joined his mate in a scuttle to the inn. Even while I watched the pantomime I was sliding off my boots, and it had not been consummated a second before I had them in my arms and was tripping over the mud in my stocking feet. A dozen noiseless steps and I was over the bulwarks between the wheel and the smoke-stack, casting about for a hiding-place. The conventional stowaway hides in the hold, but there was only a stokehold here, occupied moreover; nor was there an empty apple-barrel, such as Jim of Treasure Island found so useful. As far as I could see—and I dared not venture far for fear of the skylight—the surface of the deck offered nothing secure. But on the farther or starboard side, rather abaft the beam, there was a small boat in davits, swung outboard, to which common sense, and perhaps a vague prescience of its after utility, pointed irresistibly. In any case, discrimination was out of place, so I mounted the bulwark and gently entered my refuge. The tackles creaked a trifle, oars and seats impeded me; but well before the thirsty truants had returned I was settled on the floor boards between two thwarts, so placed that I could, if necessary, peep over the gunwale.<br />
<br />
The two sailors returned at a run, and very soon after voices approached, and I recognized that of Herr Schenkel chattering volubly. He and Grimm boarded the tug and went down a companion-way aft, near which, as I peeped over, I saw a second skylight, no bigger than the Dulcibella's, illuminated from below. Then I heard a cork drawn, and the kiss of glasses, and in a minute or two they re-emerged. It was apparent that Herr Schenkel was inclined to stay and make merry, and that Grimm was anxious to get rid of him, and none too courteous in showing it. The former urged that to-morrow's tide would do, the latter gave orders to cast off, and at length observed with an angry oath that the water was falling, and he must start; and, to clinch matters, with a curt good-night, he went to the wheel and rang up his engines. Herr Schenkel landed and strutted off in high dudgeon, while the tug's screw began to revolve. We had only glided a few yards on when the engines stopped, a short blast of the whistle sounded, and, before I had had time to recast the future, I heard a scurry of footsteps from the direction of the dyke, first on the bank, next on the deck. The last of these new arrivals panted audibly as he got aboard and dropped on the planks with an unelastic thud.<br />
<br />
Her complement made up, the tug left the harbour, but not alone. While slowly gathering way the hull checked all at once with a sharp jerk, recovered, and increased its speed. We had something in tow—what? The lighter, of course, that had been lying astern of us.<br />
<br />
Now I knew what was in that lighter, because I had been to see, half an hour ago. It was no lethal cargo, but coal, common household coal; not a full load of it, I remembered—just a good-sized mound amidships, trimmed with battens fore and aft to prevent shifting. 'Well,' thought I, 'this is intelligible enough. Grimm was ostensibly there to call for a load of coal for Memmert. But does that mean we are going to Memmert?' At the same time I recalled a phrase overheard at the depot, 'Only one—half a load.' Why half a load?<br />
<br />
For some few minutes there was a good deal of movement on deck, and of orders shouted by Grimm and answered by a voice from far astern on the lighter. Presently, however, the tug warmed to her work, the hull vibrated with energy, and an ordered peace reigned on board. I also realized that having issued from the boomed channel we had turned westward, for the wind, which had been blowing us fair, now blew strongly over the port beam.<br />
<br />
I peeped out of my eyrie and was satisfied in a moment that as long as I made no noise, and observed proper prudence, I was perfectly safe until the boat was wanted. There were no deck lamps; the two skylights diffused but a sickly radiance, and I was abaft the side-lights. I was abaft the wheel also, though thrillingly near it in point of distance—about twelve feet, I should say; and Grimm was steering. The wheel, I should mention here, was raised, as you often see them, on a sort of pulpit, approached by two or three steps and fenced by a breast-high arc of boarding. Only one of the crew was visible, and he was acting as look-out in the extreme bows, the rays of the masthead lights—for a second had been hoisted in sign of towage—glistening on his oilskin back. The other man, I concluded, was steering the lighter, which I could dimly locate by the pale foam at her bow.<br />
<br />
And the passengers? They were all together aft, three of them, leaning over the taffrail, with their backs turned to me. One was short and stout—Böhme unquestionably; the panting and the thud on the planks had prepared me for that, though where he had sprung from I did not know. Two were tall, and one of these must be von Brüning. There ought to be four, I reckoned; but three were all I could see. And what of the third? It must be he who 'insists on coming', the unknown superior at whose instance and for whose behoof this secret expedition had been planned. And who could he be? Many times, needless to say, I had asked myself that question, but never till now, when I had found the rendezvous and joined the expedition, did it become one of burning import.<br />
<br />
'Any weather' was another of those stored-up phrases that were apropos. It was a dirty, squally night, not very cold, for the wind still hung in the S.S.W.—an off-shore wind on this coast, causing no appreciable sea on the shoal spaces we were traversing. In the matter of our bearings, I set myself doggedly to overcome that paralysing perplexity, always induced in me by night or fog in these intricate waters; and, by screwing round and round, succeeded so far as to discover and identify two flashing lights—one alternately red and white, far and faint astern; the other right ahead and rather stronger, giving white flashes only. The first and least familiar was, I made out, from the lighthouse on Wangeroog; the second, well known to me as our beacon star in the race from Memmert, was the light on the centre of Norderney Island, about ten miles away.<br />
<br />
I had no accurate idea of the time, for I could not see my watch, but I thought we must have started about a quarter past eleven. We were travelling fast, the funnel belching out smoke and the bow-wave curling high; for the tug appeared to be a powerful little craft, and her load was comparatively light.<br />
<br />
So much for the general situation. As for my own predicament, I was in no mood to brood on the hazards of this mad adventure, a hundredfold more hazardous than my fog-smothered eavesdropping at Memmert. The crisis, I knew, had come, and the reckless impudence that had brought me here must serve me still and extricate me. Fortune loves rough wooing. I backed my luck and watched.<br />
<br />
The behaviour of the passengers struck me as odd. They remained in a row at the taffrail, gazing astern like regretful emigrants, and sometimes, gesticulating and pointing. Now no vestige of the low land was visible, so I was driven to the conclusion that it was the lighter they were discussing; and I date my awakening from the moment that I realized this. But the thread broke prematurely; for the passengers took to pacing the deck, and I had to lie low. When next I was able to raise my head they were round Grimm at the wheel, engaged, as far as I could discover from their gestures, in an argument about our course and the time, for Grimm looked at his watch by the light of a hand-lantern.<br />
<br />
We were heading north, and I knew by the swell that we must be near the Accumer Ee, the gap between Langeoog and Baltrum. Were we going out to open sea? It came over me with a rush that we must, if we were to drop this lighter at Memmert. Had I been Davies I should have been quicker to seize certain rigid conditions of this cruise, which no human power could modify. We had left after high tide. The water therefore was falling everywhere; and the tributary channels in rear of the islands were slowly growing impassable. It was quite thirty miles to Memmert, with three watersheds to pass; behind Baltrum, Norderney, and Juist. A skipper with nerve and perfect confidence might take us over one of these in the dark, but most of the run would infallibly have to be made outside. I now better understood the protests of Herr Schenkel to Grimm. Never once had we seen a lighter in tow in the open sea, though plenty behind the barrier of islands; indeed it was the very existence of the sheltered byways that created such traffic as there was. It was only Grimm's métier and the incubus of the lighter that had suggested Memmert as our destination at all, and I began to doubt it now. That tricky hoop of sand had befooled us before.<br />
<br />
At this moment, and as if to corroborate my thought, the telegraph rang and the tug slowed down. I effaced myself and heard Grimm shouting to the man on the lighter to starboard his helm, and to the look-out to come aft. The next order froze my very marrow; it was 'lower away'. Someone was at the davits of my boat fingering the tackles; the forward fall-rope actually slipped in the block and tilted the boat a fraction. I was just wondering how far it was to swim to Langeoog, when a strong, imperious voice (unknown to me) rang out, 'No, no! We don't want the boat. The swell's nothing; we can jump! Can't we, Böhme?' The speaker ended with a jovial laugh. 'Mercy!' thought I, 'are they going to swim to Langeoog?' but I also gasped for relief. The tug rolled lifelessly in the swell for a little, and footsteps retreated aft. There were cries of 'Achtung!' and some laughter, one big bump and a good deal of grinding; and on we moved again, taking the strain of the tow-rope gingerly, and then full-speed ahead. The passengers, it seemed, preferred the lighter to the tug for cruising in; coal-dust and exposure to clean planks and a warm cuddy. When silence reigned again I peeped out. Grimm was at the wheel still, impassively twirling the spokes, with a glance over his shoulder at his precious freight. And, after all, we were going outside.<br />
<br />
Close on the port hand lay a black foam-girt shape, the east of spit Baltrum. It fused with the night, while we swung slowly round to windward over the troubled bar. Now we were in the spacious deeps of the North Sea; and feeling it too in increase of swell and volleys of spray.<br />
<br />
At this point evolutions began. Grimm gave the wheel up to the look-out, and himself went to the taffrail, whence he roared back orders of 'Port!' or 'Starboard!' in response to signals from the lighter. We made one complete circle, steering on each point of the wind in succession, after that worked straight out to sea till the water was a good deal rougher, and back again at a tangent, till in earshot of the surf on the island beach. There the manœuvres, which were clearly in the nature of a trial trip, ended; and we hove to, to transship our passengers. They, when they came aboard, went straight below, and Grimm, having steadied the tug on a settled course and entrusted the wheel to the sailor again, stripped off his dripping oilskin coat, threw it down on the cabin skylight, and followed them. The course he had set was about west, with Norderney light a couple of points off the port bow. The course for Memmert? Possibly; but I cared not, for my mind was far from Memmert to-night. It was the course for England too. Yes, I understood at last. I was assisting at an experimental rehearsal of a great scene, to be enacted, perhaps, in the near future—a scene when multitudes of seagoing lighters, carrying full loads of soldiers, not half loads of coals, should issue simultaneously, in seven ordered fleets, from seven shallow outlets, and, under escort of the Imperial Navy, traverse the North Sea and throw themselves bodily upon English shores.<br />
<br />
Indulgent reader, you may be pleased to say that I have been very obtuse; and yet, with humility, I protest against that verdict. Remember that, recent as are the events I am describing, it is only since they happened that the possibility of an invasion of England by Germany has become a topic of public discussion. Davies and I had never—I was going to say had never considered it; but that would not be accurate, for we had glanced at it once or twice; and if any single incident in his or our joint cruise had provided a semblance of confirmation, he, at any rate, would have kindled to that spark. But you will see how perversely from first to last circumstances drove us deeper and deeper into the wrong groove, till the idea became inveterate that the secret we were seeking was one of defence and not offence. Hence a complete mental somersault was required, and, as an amateur, I found it difficult; the more so that the method of invasion, as I darkly comprehended it now, was of such a strange and unprecedented character; for orthodox invasions start from big ports and involve a fleet of ocean transports, while none of our clues pointed that way. To neglect obvious methods, to draw on the obscure resources of an obscure strip of coast, to improve and exploit a quantity of insignificant streams and tidal outlets, and thence, screened by the islands, to despatch an armada of light-draught barges, capable of flinging themselves on a correspondingly obscure and therefore unexpected portion of the enemy's coast; that was a conception so daring, aye, and so quixotic in some of its aspects, that even now I was half incredulous. Yet it must be the true one. Bit by bit the fragments of the puzzle fell into order till a coherent whole was adumbrated. [The reader will find the whole matter dealt with in the Epilogue.]<br />
<br />
The tug surged on into the night; a squall of rain leapt upon us and swept hissing astern. Baltrum vanished and the strands of Norderney beamed under transient moonlight. Drunk with triumph, I cuddled in my rocking cradle and ransacked every unvisited chamber of the memory, tossing out their dusty contents, to make a joyous bonfire of some, and to see the residue take life and meaning in the light of the great revelation.<br />
<br />
My reverie was of things, not persons; of vast national issues rather than of the poignant human interests so closely linked with them. But on a sudden I was recalled, with a shock, to myself, Davies, and the present.<br />
<br />
We were changing our course, as I knew by variations in the whirl of draughts which whistled about me. I heard Grimm afoot again, and, choosing my moment, surveyed the scene. Broad on the port-beam were the garish lights of Norderney town and promenade, and the tug, I perceived, was drawing in to enter the See-Gat.<br />
<br />
Round she came, hustling through the broken water of the bar, till her nose was south and the wind was on the starboard bow. Not a mile from me were the villa and the yacht, and the three persons of the drama—three, that is, if Davies were safe.<br />
<br />
Were we to land at Norderney harbour? Heavens, what a magnificent climax!—if only I could rise to it. My work here was done. At a stroke to rejoin Davies and be free to consummate our designs!<br />
<br />
A desperate idea of cutting the davit-tackles—I blush to think of the stupidity—was rejected as soon as it was born, and instead, I endeavoured to imagine our approach to the pier. My boat hung on the starboard side; that would be the side away from the quay, and the tide would be low. I could swarm down the davits during the stir of arrival, drop into the sea and swim the few yards across the dredged-out channel, wade through the mud to within a short distance of the Dulcibella, and swim the rest. I rubbed the salt out of my eyes and wriggled my cramped legs ... Hullo! why was Grimm leaving the helm again? Back he went to the cabin, leaving the sailor at the helm. . . We ought to be turning to port now; but no—on we went, south, for the mainland.<br />
<br />
Though one plan was frustrated, the longing to get to Davies, once implanted, waxed apace.<br />
<br />
Our destination was at last beyond dispute. The channel we were in was the same that we had cut across on our blind voyage to Memmert, and the same my ferry-steamer had followed two days ago. It was a cul-de-sac leading to one place only, the landing stage at Norddeich. The only place on the whole coast, now I came to think of it, where the tug could land at this tide. There the quay would be on the starboard side, and I saw myself tied to my eyrie while the passengers landed and the tug and lighter turned back for Memmert; at Memmert, dawn, and discovery.<br />
<br />
There was some way out—some way out, I repeated to myself; some way to reap the fruit of Davies's long tutelage in the lore of this strange region. What would he do?<br />
<br />
For answer there came the familiar frou-frou of gentle surf on drying sands. The swell was dying away, the channel narrowing; dusky and weird on the starboard hand stretched leagues of new-risen sand. Two men only were on deck; the moon was quenched under the vanguard clouds of a fresh squall.<br />
<br />
A madcap scheme danced before me. The time, I must know the time! Crouching low and cloaking the flame with my jacket I struck a match; 2.30 a.m.—the tide had been ebbing for about three hours and a half. Low water about five; they would be aground till 7.30. Danger to life? None. Flares and rescuers? Not likely, with 'him who insists' on board; besides, no one could come, there being no danger. I should have a fair wind and a fair tide for my trip. Grimm's coat was on the skylight; we were both clean shaved.<br />
<br />
The helmsman gazed ahead, intent on his difficult course, and the wind howled to perfection. I knelt up and examined one of the davit-tackles. There was nothing remarkable about it, a double and a single block (like our own peak halyards), the lower one hooked into a ring in the boat, the hauling part made fast to a cleat on the davit itself. Something there must be to give lateral support or the boat would have racketed abroad in the roll outside. The support, I found, consisted of two lanyards spliced to the davits and rove through holes in the keel. These I leaned over and cut with my pocket-knife; the result being a barely perceptible swaying of the boat, for the tug was under the lee of sands and on an even keel. Then I left my hiding-place, climbing out of the stern sheets by the after-davit, and preparing every successive motion with exquisite tenderness, till I stood on the deck. In another moment I was at the cabin skylight, lifting Grimm's long oilskin coat. (A second's yielding to temptation here; but no, the skylight was ground glass, fastened from below. So, on with the coat, up with the collar, and forward to the wheel on tiptoe.) As soon as I was up to the engine-room skylight (that is to say, well ahead of the cabin roof) I assumed a natural step, went up to the pulpit and touched the helmsman on the arm, as I had seen Grimm do. The man stepped aside, grunting something about a light, and I took the wheel from him. Grimm was a man of few words, so I just jogged his satellite, and pointed forward. He went off like a lamb to his customary place in the bows, not having dreamt—why should he?—of examining me, but in him I had instantly recognized one of the crew of the Kormoran.<br />
<br />
My ruse developed in all its delicious simplicity. We were, I estimated, about half-way to Norddeich, in the Buse Tief, a channel of a navigable breadth, at the utmost of two hundred yards at this period of the tide. Two faint lights, one above the other, twinkled far ahead. What they meant I neither knew nor cared, since the only use I put them to was to test the effect of the wheel, for this was the first time I had ever tasted the sweets of command on a steamboat. A few cautious essays taught me the rudiments, and nothing could hinder the catastrophe now.<br />
<br />
I edged over to starboard—that was the side I had selected—and again a little more, till the glistening back of the look-out gave a slight movement; but he was a well-drilled minion, with implicit trust in the 'old man'. Now, hard over! and spoke by spoke I gave her the full pressure of the helm. The look-out shouted a warning, and I raised my arm in calm acknowledgement. A cry came from the lighter, and I remember I was just thinking 'What the dickens'll happen to her?' when the end came; a euthanasia so mild and gradual (for the sands are fringed with mud) that the disaster was on us before I was aware of it. There was just the tiniest premonitory shuddering as our keel clove the buttery medium, a cascade of ripples from either beam, and the wheel jammed to rigidity in my hands, as the tug nestled up to her resting-place.<br />
<br />
In the scene of panic that followed, it is safe to say that I was the only soul on board who acted with methodical tranquillity. The look-out flew astern like an arrow, bawling to the lighter. Grimm, with the passengers tumbling up after him, was on deck in an instant, storming and cursing; flung himself on the wheel which I had respectfully abandoned, jangled the telegraph, and wrenched at the spokes. The tug listed over under the force of the tide; wind, darkness, and rain aggravated the confusion.<br />
<br />
For my part, I stepped back behind the smoke stack, threw off my robe of office, and made for the boat. Long and bitter experience of running aground had told me that that was sure to be wanted. On the way I cannoned into one of the passengers and pressed him into my service; incidentally seeing his face, and verifying an old conjecture. It was one who, in Germany, has a better right to insist than anyone else.<br />
<br />
As we reached the davits there was a report like a pistol-shot from the port-side—the tow-rope parting, I believe, as the lighter with her shallower draught swung on past the tug. Fresh tumult arose, in which I heard: 'Lower the boat,' from Grimm; but the order was already executed. My ally the Passenger and I had each cast off a tackle, and slacked away with a run; that done, I promptly clutched the wire guy to steady myself, and tumbled in. (It was not far to tumble, for the tug listed heavily to starboard; think of our course, and the set of the ebb stream, and you will see why.) The forward fall unhooked sweetly; but the after one lost play. 'Slack away,' I called, peremptorily, and felt for my knife. My helper above obeyed; the hook yielded; I filliped away the loose tackle, and the boat floated away.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-36375199970494265212012-09-08T16:10:00.000+01:002012-09-08T16:10:00.604+01:00The Seven SielsChapter XXVI: The Seven Siels<br />
<br />
SELECTING the very humblest Gasthaus I could discover, I laid down my bundle and called for beer, bread, and Wurst. The landlord, as I had expected, spoke the Frisian dialect, so that though he was rather difficult to understand, he had no doubts about the purity of my own German high accent. He was a worthy fellow, and hospitably interested: 'Did I want a bed?' 'No; I was going on to Bensersiel,' I said, 'to sleep there, and take the morning Postschiff to Langeoog Island.' (I had not forgotten our friends the twin giants and their functions.) 'I was not an islander myself?' he asked. 'No, but I had a married sister there; had just returned from a year's voyaging, and was going to visit her.' 'By the way,' I asked, 'how are they getting on with the Benser Tief?' My friend shrugged his shoulders; it was finished, he believed. 'And the connexion to Wittmund?' 'Under construction still.' 'Langeoog would be going ahead then?' 'Oh! he supposed so, but he did not believe in these new-fangled schemes.' 'But it was good for trade, I supposed? Esens would benefit in sending goods by the "tief"—what was the traffic, by the way?' 'Oh, a few more barge-loads than before of bricks, timber, coals, etc., but it would come to nothing he knew: Aktiengesellschaften (companies) were an invention of the devil. A few speculators got them up and made money themselves out of land and contracts, while the shareholders they had hoodwinked starved.' 'There's something in that,' I conceded to this bigoted old conservative; 'my sister at Langeoog rents her lodging-house from a man named Dollmann; they say he owns a heap of land about. I saw his yacht once—pink velvet and electric light inside, they say——'<br />
<br />
'That's the name,' said mine host, 'that's one of them—some sort of foreigner, I've heard; runs a salvage concern, too, Juist way.'<br />
<br />
'Well, he won't get any of my savings!' I laughed, and soon after took my leave, and inquired from a passer-by the road to Dornum. 'Follow the railway,' I was told.<br />
<br />
With a warm wind in my face from the south-west, fleecy clouds and a half-moon overhead, I set out, not for Bensersiel but for Benser Tief, which I knew must cross the road to Dornum somewhere. A mile or so of cobbled causeway flanked with ditches and willows, and running cheek by jowl with the railway track; then a bridge, and below me the 'Tief'; which was, in fact, a small canal. A rutty track left the road, and sloped down to it one side; a rough siding left the railway, and sloped down to it on the other.<br />
<br />
I lit a pipe and sat on the parapet for a little. No one was stirring, so with great circumspection I began to reconnoitre the left bank to the north. The siding entered a fenced enclosure by a locked gate—a gate I could have easily climbed, but I judged it wiser to go round by the bridge again and look across. The enclosure was a small coal-store, nothing more; there were gaunt heaps of coal glittering in the moonlight; a barge half loaded lying alongside, and a deserted office building. I skulked along a sandy towpath in solitude. Fens and field were round me, as the map had said; willows and osier-beds; the dim forms of cattle; the low melody of wind roaming unfettered over a plain; once or twice the flutter and quack of a startled wild-duck.<br />
<br />
Presently I came to a farmhouse, dark and silent; opposite it, in the canal, a couple of empty barges. I climbed into one of these, and sounded with my stick on the off-side—barely three feet; and the torpedo-boat melted out of my speculations. The stream, I observed also, was only just wide enough for two barges to pass with comfort. Other farms I saw, or thought I saw, and a few more barges lying in side-cuts linked by culverts to the canal, but nothing noteworthy; and mindful that I had to explore the Wittmund side of the railway too, I turned back, already a trifle damped in spirits, but still keenly expectant.<br />
<br />
Passing under the road and railway, I again followed the tow-path, which, after half a mile, plunged into woods, then entered a clearing and another fenced enclosure; a timber-yard by the look of it. This time I stripped from the waist downward, waded over, dressed again, and climbed the paling. (There was a cottage standing back, but its occupants evidently slept.) I was in a timber-yard, by the stacks of wood and the steam saw-mill; but something more than a timber-yard, for as I warily advanced under the shadow of the trees at the edge of the clearing I came to a long tin shed which strangely reminded me of Memmert, and below it, nearer the canal, loomed a dark skeleton framework, which proved to be a half-built vessel on stocks. Close by was a similar object, only nearly completed—a barge. A paved slipway led to the water here, and the canal broadened to a siding or back-water in which lay seven or eight more barges in tiers. I scaled another paling and went on, walking, I should think, three miles by the side of the canal, till the question of bed and ulterior plans brought me to a halt. It was past midnight, and I was adding little to my information. I had encountered a brick-field, but soon after that there was increasing proof that the canal was as yet little used for traffic. It grew narrower, and there were many signs of recent labour for its improvement. In one place a dammed-off deviation was being excavated, evidently to abridge an impossible bend. The path had become atrocious, and my boots were heavy with clay. Bearing in mind the abruptly-ending blue line on the map, I considered it useless to go farther, and retraced my steps, trying to concoct a story which would satisfy an irritable Esens inn-keeper that it was a respectable wayfarer, and not a tramp or a lunatic, who knocked him up at half-past one or thereabouts.<br />
<br />
But a much more practical resource occurred to me as I approached the timber-yard; for lodging, free and accessible, lay there ready to hand. I boarded one of the empty barges in the backwater, and surveyed my quarters for the night. It was of a similar pattern to all the others I had seen; a lighter, strictly, in the sense that it had no means of self-propulsion, and no separate quarters for a crew, the whole interior of the hull being free for cargo. At both bow and stern there were ten feet or so of deck, garnished with bitts and bollards. The rest was an open well, flanked by waterways of substantial breadth; the whole of stout construction and, for a humble lighter, of well-proportioned and even graceful design, with a marked forward sheer, and, as I had observed in the specimen on the stocks, easy lines at the stern. In short, it was apparent, even to an ignorant landsman like myself, that she was designed not merely for canal work but for rough water; and well she might be, for, though the few miles of sea she had to cross in order to reach the islands were both shallow and sheltered, I knew from experience what a vicious surf they could be whipped into by a sudden gale. It must not be supposed that I dwelt on this matter. On limited lines I was making progress, but the wings of imagination still drooped nervelessly at my sides. Otherwise I perhaps should have examined this lighter more particularly, instead of regarding it mainly as a convenient hiding-place. Under the stern-deck was stored a massive roll of tarpaulin, a corner of which made an excellent blanket, and my bundle a good pillow. It was a descent from the luxury of last night; but a spy, I reflected philosophically, cannot expect a feather bed two nights running, and this one was at any rate airier and roomier than the coffin-like bunk of the Dulcibella, and not so very much harder.<br />
<br />
When snugly ensconced, I studied the map by intermittent match-light. It had been dawning on me in the last half-hour that this canal was only one of several; that in concentrating myself on Esens and Bensersiel, I had forgotten that there were other villages ending in siel, also furnished on the chart with corkscrew streams; and, moreover, that Böhme's statistics of depth and distance had been marshalled in seven categories, A to G. The very first match brought full recollection as to the villages. The suffix siel repeated itself all round the coast-line. Five miles eastward of Bensersiel was Neuharlingersiel, and farther on Carolinensiel. Four miles westward was Dornumersiel; and farther on Nessmersiel and Hilgenriedersiel. That was six on the north coast of the peninsula alone. On the west coast, facing the Ems, there was only one, Greetsiel, a good way south of Norden. But on the east, facing the Jade, there were no less than eight, at very close intervals. A moment's thought and I disregarded this latter group; they had nothing to do with Esens, nor had they any imaginable raison d'étre as veins for commerce; differing markedly in this respect from the group of six on the north coast, whose outlook was the chain of islands, and whose inland centre, almost exactly, was Esens. I still wanted one to make seven, and as a working hypothesis added the solitary Greetsiel. At all seven villages streams debouched, as at Bensersiel. From all seven points of issue dotted lines were marked seaward, intersecting the great tidal sands and leading towards the islands. And on the mainland behind the whole sevenfold system ran the loop of railway. But there were manifold minor points of difference. No stream boasted so deep and decisive a blue lintel as did Benser Tief; none penetrated so far into the Hinterland. They varied in length and sinuosity. Two, those belonging to Hilgenriedersiel and Greetsiel, appeared not to reach the railway at all. On the other hand, Carolinensiel, opposite Wangeroog Island, had a branch line all to itself.<br />
<br />
Match after match waxed and waned as I puzzled over the mystic seven. In the end I puzzled myself to sleep, with the one fixed idea that to-morrow, on my way back to Norden, I must see more of these budding canals, if such they were. My dreams that night were of a mighty chain of redoubts and masked batteries couching perdus among the sand-dunes of desolate islets; built, coral-like, by infinitely slow and secret labour; fed by lethal cargoes borne in lighters and in charge of stealthy mutes who, one and all, bore the likeness of Grimm. I was up and away at daylight (the weather mild and showery), meeting some navvies on my way back to the road, who gave me good morning and a stare. On the bridge I halted and fell into torments of indecision. There was so much to do and so little time to do it in. The whole problem seemed to have been multiplied by seven, and the total again doubled and redoubled—seven blue lines on land, seven dotted lines on the sea, seven islands in the offing. Once I was near deciding to put my pretext into practice, and cross to Langeoog; but that meant missing the rendezvous, and I was loth to do that.<br />
<br />
At any rate, I wanted breakfast badly; and the best way to get it, and at the same time to open new ground, was to walk to Dornum. Then I should find a blue line called the Neues Tief leading to Dornumersiel, on the coast. That explored, I could pass on to Nesse, where there was another blue line to Nessmersiel. All this was on the way to Norden, and I should have the railway constantly at my back, to carry me there in the evening. The last train (my time-table told me) was one reaching Norden at 7.15 p.m. I could catch this at Hage Station at 7.5.<br />
<br />
A brisk walk of six miles brought me, ravenously hungry, to Dornum. Road and railway had clung together all the time, and about half-way had been joined on the left by a third companion in the shape of a puny stream which I knew from the map to be the upper portion of Neues Tief. Wriggling and doubling like an eel, choked with sedges and reeds, it had no pretensions to being navigable. At length it looped away into the fens out of sight, only to reappear again close to Dornum in a much more dignified guise.<br />
<br />
There was no siding where the railway crossed it, but at the town itself, which it skirted on the east, a towpath began, and a piled wharf had been recently constructed. Going on to this was a red-brick building with the look of a warehouse, roofless as yet, and with workmen on its scaffolds. It sharpened the edge of my appetite.<br />
<br />
If I had been wise I should have been content with a snack bought at a counter, but a thirst for hot coffee and clues induced me to repeat the experiment of Esens and seek a primitive beer-house. I was less lucky on this occasion. The house I chose was obscure enough, but its proprietor was no simple Frisian, but an ill-looking rascal with shifty eyes and a debauched complexion, who showed a most unwelcome curiosity in his customer. As a last fatality, he wore a peaked cap like my own, and turned out to be an ex-sailor. I should have fled at the sight of him had I had the chance, but I was attended to first by a slatternly girl who, I am sure, called him up to view me. To explain my muddy boots and trousers I said I had walked from Esens, and from that I found myself involved in a tangle of impromptu lies. Floundering down an old groove, I placed my sister this time on Baltrum Island, and said I was going to Dornumersiel (which is opposite Baltrum) to cross from there. As this was drawing a bow at a venture, I dared not assume local knowledge, and spoke of the visit as my first. Dornumersiel was a lucky shot; there was a ferry-galliot from there to Baltrum; but he knew, or pretended to know, Baltrum, and had not heard of my sister. I grew the more nervous in that I saw from the first that he took me to be of better condition than most merchant seamen; and, to make matters worse, I was imprudent enough in pleading haste to pull out from an inner pocket my gold watch with the chain and seals attached. He told me there was no hurry, that I should miss the tide at Dornumersiel, and then fell to pressing strong waters on me, and asking questions whose insinuating grossness gave me the key to his biography: He must have been at one stage in his career a dock-side crimp, one of those foul sharks who prey on discharged seamen, and as often as not are ex-seamen themselves, versed in the weaknesses of the tribe. He was now keeping his hand in with me, who, unhappily, purported to belong to the very class he was used to victimize, and, moreover, had a gold watch, and, doubtless, a full purse. Nothing more ridiculously inopportune could have befallen me, or more dangerous; for his class are as cosmopolitan as waiters and concierges, with as facile a gift for language and as unerring a scent for nationality. Sure enough, the fellow recognized mine, and positively challenged me with it in fairly fluent English with a Yankee twang. Encumbered with the mythical sister, of course I stuck to my lie, said I had been on an English ship so long that I had picked up the accent, and also gave him some words in broken English. At the same time I showed I thought him an impertinent nuisance, paid my score and walked out—quit of him? Not a bit of it! He insisted on showing me the way to Dornumersiel, and followed me down the street. Perceiving that he was in liquor, in spite of the early hour, I dared not risk a quarrelsome scene with a man who already knew so much about me, and might at any moment elicit more. So I melted, and humoured him; treated him in a ginshop in the hope of giving him the slip—a disastrous resource, which was made a precedent for further potations elsewhere. I would gladly draw a veil over our scandalous progress through peaceable Dornum, of the terrors I experienced when he introduced me as his friend, and as his English friend, and of the abasement I felt, too, as, linked arm in arm, we trod the three miles of road coastwards. It was his malicious whim that we should talk English; a fortunate whim, as it turned out, because I knew no fo'c'sle German, but had a smattering of fo'c'sle English, gathered from Cutcliffe Hyne and Kipling. With these I extemporized a disreputable hybrid, mostly consisting of oaths and blasphemies, and so yarned of imaginary voyages. Of course he knew every port in the world, but happily was none too critical, owing to repeated schnappsen.<br />
<br />
Nevertheless, it was a deplorable contretemps from every point of view. I was wasting my time, for the road took a different direction to the Neues Tief, so that I had not even the advantage of inspecting the canal and only met with it when we reached the sea. Here it split into two mouths, both furnished with locks, and emptying into two little mud-hole harbours, replicas of Bensersiel, each owning its cluster of houses. I made straight for the Gasthaus at Dornumersiel, primed my companion well, and asked him to wait while I saw about a boat in the harbour; but, needless to say, I never rejoined him. I just took a cursory look at the left-hand harbour, saw a lighter locking through (for the tide was high), and then walked as fast as my legs would carry me to the outermost dyke, mounted it, and strode along the sea westwards in the teeth of a smart shower of rain, full of deep apprehensions as to the stir and gossip my disappearance might cause if my odious crimp was sober enough to discover it. As soon as I deemed it safe, I dropped on to the sand and ran till I could run no more. Then I sat on my bundle with my back to the dyke in partial shelter from the rain, watching the sea recede from the flats and dwindle into slender meres, and the laden clouds fly weeping over the islands till those pale shapes were lost in mist.<br />
<br />
The barge I had seen locking through was creeping across towards Langeoog behind a tug and a wisp of smoke.<br />
<br />
No more exploration by daylight! That was my first resolve, for I felt as if the country must be ringing with reports of an Englishman in disguise. I must remain in hiding till dusk, then regain the railway and slink into that train to Norden. Now directly I began to resign myself to temporary inaction, and to centre my thoughts on the rendezvous, a new doubt assailed me. Nothing had seemed more certain yesterday than that Norden was the scene of the rendezvous, but that was before the seven siels had come into prominence. The name Norden now sounded naked and unconvincing. As I wondered why, it suddenly occurred to me that all the stations along this northern line, though farther inland than Norden, were equally 'coast stations', in the sense that they were in touch with harbours (of a sort) on the coast. Norden had its tidal creek, but Esens and Dornum had their 'tiefs' or canals. Fool that I had been to put such a narrow and literal construction on the phrase 'the tide serves!' Which was it more likely that my conspirators would visit—Norden, whose intrusion into our theories was purely hypothetical, or one of these siels to whose sevenfold systems all my latest observations gave such transcendent significance?<br />
<br />
There was only one answer; and it filled me with profound discouragement. Seven possible rendezvous!—eight, counting Norden. Which to make for? Out came the time-table and map, and with them hope. The case was not so bad after all; it demanded no immediate change of plan, though it imported grave uncertainties and risks. Norden was still the objective, but mainly as a railway junction, only remotely as a seaport. Though the possible rendezvous were eight, the possible stations were reduced to five—Norden, Hage, Dornum, Esens, Wittmund—all on one single line. Trains from east to west along this line were negligible, because there were none that could be called night trains, the latest being the one I had this morning fixed on to bring me to Norden, where it arrived at 7.15. Of trains from west to east there was only one that need be considered, the same one that I had travelled by last night, leaving Norden at 7.43 and reaching Esens at 8.50, and Wittmund at 9.13. This train, as the reader who was with me in it knows, was in correspondence with another from Emden and the south, and also, I now found, with services from Hanover, Bremen, and Berlin. He will also remember that I had to wait three-quarters of an hour at Norden, from 7 to 7.43.<br />
<br />
The platform at Norden Junction, therefore, between 7.15, when I should arrive at it from the east, and 7.43 when Böhme and his unknown friend should leave it for the east; there, and in that half-hour, was my opportunity for recognizing and shadowing two at least of the conspirators. I must take the train they took, and alight where they alighted. If I could not find them at all I should be thrown back on the rejected view that Norden itself was the rendezvous, and should wait there till 10.46.<br />
<br />
In the meantime it was all very well to resolve on inaction till dusk; but after an hour's rest, damp clothes and feet, and the absence of pursuers, tempted me to take the field again. Avoiding roads and villages as long as it was light, I cut across country south-westwards—a dismal and laborious journey, with oozy fens and knee-deep drains to course, with circuits to be made to pass clear of peasants, and many furtive crouchings behind dykes and willows. What little I learnt was in harmony with previous explorations, for my track cut at right angles the line of the Harke Tief, the stream issuing at Nessmersiel. It, too, was in the nature of a canal, but only in embryo at the point I touched it, south of Nesse. Works on a deviation were in progress, and in a short digression down stream I sighted another lighter-building yard. As for Hilgenriedersiel, the fourth of the seven, I had no time to see anything of it at all. At seven o'clock I was at Hage Station, very tired, wet, and footsore, after covering nearly twenty miles all told since I left my bed in the lighter.<br />
<br />
From here to Norden it was a run in the train of ten minutes, which I spent in eating some rye bread and smoked eel, and in scraping the mud off my boots and trousers. Fatigue vanished when the train drew up at the station, and the momentous twenty-eight minutes began to run their course. Having donned a bulky muffler and turned up the collar of my pea-jacket, I crossed over immediately to the up-platform, walked boldly to the booking-office, and at once sighted—von Brüning—yes, von Brüning in mufti; but there was no mistaking his tall athletic figure, pleasant features, and neat brown beard. He was just leaving the window, gathering up a ticket and some coins. I joined a queue of three or four persons who were waiting their turn, flattened myself between them and the partition till I heard him walk out. Not having heard what station he had booked for, I took a fourth-class ticket to Wittmund, which covered all chances. Then, with my chin buried in my muffler, I sought the darkest corner of the ill-lit combination of bar and waiting-room where, by the tiresome custom in Germany, would-be travellers are penned till their train is ready. Von Brüning I perceived sitting in another corner, with his hat over his eyes and a cigar between his lips. A boy brought me a tankard of tawny Munich beer, and, sipping it, I watched. People passed in and out, but nobody spoke to the sailor in mufti. When a quarter of an hour elapsed, a platform door opened, and a raucous voice shouted: 'Hage, Dornum, Esens, Wittmund!' A knot of passengers jostled out to the platform, showing their tickets. I was slow over my beer, and was last of the knot, with von Brüning immediately ahead of me, so close that his cigar smoke curled into my face. I looked over his shoulder at the ticket he showed, missed the name, but caught a muttered double sibilant from the official who checked it; ran over the stations in my head, and pounced on Esens. That was as much I wanted to know for the present; so I made my way to a fourth-class compartment, and lost sight of my quarry, not venturing, till the last door had banged, to look out of the window. When I did so two late arrivals were hurrying up to a carriage—one tall, one of middle height; both in cloaks and comforters. Their features I could not distinguish, but certainly neither of them was Böhme. They had not come through the waiting-room door, but, plainly, from the dark end of the platform, where they had been waiting. A guard, with some surly remonstrances, shut them in, and the train started.<br />
<br />
Esens—the name had not surprised me; it fulfilled a presentiment that had been growing in strength all the afternoon. For the last time I referred to the map, pulpy and blurred with the day's exposure, and tried to etch it into my brain. I marked the road to Bensersiel, and how it converged by degrees on the Benser Tief until they met at the sea. 'The tide serves!' Longing for Davies to help me, I reckoned, by the aid of my diary, that high tide at Bensersiel would be about eleven, and for two hours, I remembered (say from ten to twelve to-night), there were from five to six feet of water in the harbour.<br />
<br />
We should reach Esens at 8.50. Would they drive, as von Brüning had done a week ago? I tightened my belt, stamped my mud-burdened boots, and thanked God for the Munich beer. Whither were they going from Bensersiel, and in what; and how was I to follow them? These were nebulous questions, but I was in fettle for anything; boat-stealing was a bagatelle. Fortune, I thought, smiled; Romance beckoned; even the sea looked kind. Ay, and I do not know but that Imagination was already beginning to unstiffen and flutter those nerveless wings.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-42605517235349843852012-09-06T16:08:00.000+01:002012-09-06T16:08:00.200+01:00I Double BackChapter XXV: I Double Back<br />
<br />
'GOOD-BYE, old chap,' called Davies.<br />
<br />
'Good-bye,' the whistle blew and the ferry-steamer forged ahead, leaving Davies on the quay, bareheaded and wearing his old Norfolk jacket and stained grey flannels, as at our first meeting in Flensburg station. There was no bandaged hand this time, but he looked pinched and depressed; his eyes had black circles round them; and again I felt that same indefinable pathos in him.<br />
<br />
'Your friend is in low spirits,' said Böhme, who was installed on a seat beside me, voluminously caped and rugged against the biting air. It was a still, sunless day.<br />
<br />
'So am I,' I grunted, and it was the literal truth. I was only half awake, felt unwashed and dissipated, heavy in head and limbs. But for Davies I should never have been where I was. It was he who had patiently coaxed me out of my bunk, packed my bag, fed me with tea and an omelette (to which I believe he had devoted peculiarly tender care), and generally mothered me for departure. While I swallowed my second cup he was brushing the mould and smoothing the dents from my felt hat, which had been entombed for a month in the sail-locker; working at it with a remorseful concern in his face. The only initiative I am conscious of having shown was in the matter of my bag. 'Put in my sea clothes, oils, and all,' I had said; 'I may want them again.' There was mortal need of a thorough consultation, but this was out of the question. Davies did not badger or complain, but only timidly asked me how we were to meet and communicate, a question on which my mind was an absolute blank.<br />
<br />
'Look out for me about the 26th,' I suggested feebly.<br />
<br />
Before we left the cabin he gave me a scrap of pencilled paper and saw that it went safely into my pocket-book. 'Look at it in the train,' he said.<br />
<br />
Unable to cope with Böhme, I paced the deck aimlessly as we swung round the See-Gat into the Buse Tief, trying to identify the point where we crossed it yesterday blindfold. But the tide was full, and the waters blank for miles round till they merged in haze. Soon I drifted down into the saloon, and crouching over a stove pulled out that scrap of paper. In a crabbed, boyish hand, and much besmudged with tobacco ashes, I found the following notes:<br />
<br />
(1) Your journey. Norddeich 8.58, Emden 10.32, Leer 11.16 (Böhme changes for Bremen), Rheine 1.8 (change), Amsterdam 7.17 p.m. Leave again via Hook 8.52, London 9 am.<br />
<br />
(2) The coast-station—their rondezvous—querry is it Norden? (You pass it 9.13)—there is a tidal creek up to it. High-water there on 25th, say 10.30 to 11 p.m. It cannot be Norddeich, which I find has a dredged-out low-water channel for the steamer, so tide 'serves' would not apply.<br />
<br />
(3) Your other clews (tugs, pilots, depths, railway, Esens, seven of something). Querry; Scheme of defence by land and sea for North Sea Coast?<br />
<br />
Sea—7 islands, 7 channels between (counting West Ems), very small depths (what you said) in most of them. Tugs and pilots for patrol work behind islands, as I always said. Querry; Rondezvous is for inspecting channels?<br />
<br />
Land—Look at railway (map in ulster pocket) running in a loop all round Friesland, a few miles from coast. Querry: To be used as line of communication for army corps. Troops could be quickly sent to any threatened point. Esens the base? It is in top centre of loop. Von Brooning dished us fairly over that at Bensersiel.<br />
<br />
Chatham—D. was spying after our naval plans for war with Germany.<br />
<br />
Von Brooning runs naval part over here.<br />
<br />
Where does Burmer come in? Querry—you go to Breman and find out about him?<br />
<br />
I nodded stupidly over this document—so stupidly that I found myself wondering whether Burmer was a place or a person. Then I dozed, to wake with a violent start and find the paper on the floor. Panic-stricken, I hid it away, and went on deck, when I found we were close to Norddeich, running up to the bleakest of bleak jetties thrown out from the dyke-bound polders of the mainland. Böhme and I landed together, and he was at my elbow as I asked for a ticket for Amsterdam, and was given one as far as Rheine, a junction near the Dutch frontier. He was ensconced in an opposite corner to me in the railway carriage, looking like an Indian idol. 'Where do you come in?' I pondered, dreamily. Too sleepy to talk, I could only blink at him, sitting bolt upright with my arms folded over my precious pocket-book. Finally, I gave up the struggle, buttoned my ulster tightly up, and turning my back upon him with an apology, lay down to sleep, the precious pocket nethermost. He was at liberty to rifle my bag if he chose, and I dare say he did. I cannot say, for from this point till Rheine, for the best part of four hours, that is, I had only two lucid intervals.<br />
<br />
The first was at Emden, where we both had to change. Here, as we pushed our way down the crowded platform, Böhme, after being greeted respectfully by several persons, was at last buttonholed without means of escape by an obsequious gentleman, whose description is of no moment, but whose conversation is. It was about a canal; what canal I did not gather, though, from a name dropped, I afterwards identified it as one in course of construction as a feeder to the Ems. The point is that the subject was canals. At the moment it was seed dropped in unreceptive soil, but it germinated later. I passed on, mingling with the crowd, and was soon asleep again in another carriage where Böhme this time did not follow me.<br />
<br />
The second occasion was at Leer, where I heard myself called by name, and woke to find him at the window. He had to change trains, and had come to say good-bye. 'Don't forget to go to Lloyd's,' he grated in my ear. I expect it was a wan smile that I returned, for I was at a very low ebb, and my fortress looked sarcastically impregnable. But the sapper was free; 'free' was my last conscious thought.<br />
<br />
Even after Rheine, where I changed for the last time, a brutish drowsiness enchained me, and the afternoon was well advanced before my faculties began to revive.<br />
<br />
The train crept like a snail from station to station. I might, so a fellow-passenger told me, have waited three hours at Rheine for an express which would have brought me to Amsterdam at about the same time; or, if I had chosen to break the journey farther back, two hours at either Emden or Leer would still have enabled me to catch the said express at Rheine. These alternatives had escaped Davies, and, I surmised, had been suppressed by Böhme, who doubtless did not want me behind him, free either to double back or to follow him to Bremen.<br />
<br />
The pace, then, was execrable, and there were delays; we were behind time at Hengelo, thirty minutes late at Apeldoorn; so that I might well have grown nervous about my connexions at Amsterdam, which were in some jeopardy. But as I battled out of my lethargy and began to take account of our position and prospects, quite a different thought at the outset affected me. Anxiety to reach London was swamped in reluctance to quit Germany, so that I found myself grudging every mile that I placed between me and the frontier. It was the old question of urgency. To-day was the 23rd. The visit to London meant a minimum absence of forty-eight hours, counting from Amsterdam; that is to say, that by travelling for two nights and one day, and devoting the other day to investigating Dollmann's past, it was humanly possible for me to be back on the Frisian coast on the evening of the 25th. Yes, I could be at Norden, if that was the 'rendezvous', at 7 p.m. But what a scramble! No margin for delays, no physical respite. Some pasts take a deal of raking up—other persons may be affected; men are cautious, they trip you up with red tape; or the man who knows is out at lunch—a protracted lunch; or in the country—a protracted week-end. Will you see Mr So-and-so, or leave a note? Oh! I know those public departments—from the inside! And the Admiralty! ... I saw myself baffled and racing back the same night to Germany, with two days wasted, arriving, good for nothing, at Norden, with no leisure to reconnoitre my ground; to be baffled again there, probably, for you cannot always count on fogs (as Davies said). Esens was another clue, and 'to follow Burmer'—there was something in that notion. But I wanted time, and had I time? How long could Davies maintain himself at Norderney? Not so very long, from what I remembered of last night. And was he even safe there? A feverish dream recurred to me—a dream of Davies in a diving-dress; of a regrettable hitch in the air-supply—Stop, that was nonsense! ... Let us be sane. What matter if he had to go? What matter if I took my time in London? Then with a flood of shame I saw Davies's wistful face on the quay, heard his grim ejaculation: 'He's our game or no one's'; and my own sullen 'Oh, I'll keep the secret!' London was utterly impossible. If I found my informant, what credentials had I, what claim to confidences? None, unless I told the whole story. Why, my mere presence in Whitehall would imperil the secret; for, once on my native heath, I should be recognized—possibly haled to judgement; at the best should escape in a cloud of rumour—'last heard of at Norderney'; 'only this morning was raising Cain at the Admiralty about a mythical lieutenant.' No! Back to Friesland, was the word. One night's rest—I must have that—between sheets, on a feather bed; one long, luxurious night, and then back refreshed to Friesland, to finish our work in our own way, and with none but our own weapons.<br />
<br />
Having reached this resolve, I was nearly putting it into instant execution, by alighting at Amersfoort, but thought better of it. I had a transformation to effect before I returned North, and the more populous centre I made it in the less it was likely to attract notice. Besides, I had in my mind's eye a perfect bed in a perfect hostelry hard by the Amstel River. It was an economy in the end.<br />
<br />
So, at half-past eight I was sipping my coffee in the aforesaid hostelry, with a London newspaper before me, which was unusually interesting, and some German journals, which, 'in hate of a wrong not theirs', were one and all seething with rancorous Anglophobia. At nine I was in the Jewish quarter, striking bargains in an infamous marine slop-shop. At half-past nine I was despatching this unscrupulous telegram to my chief—'Very sorry, could not call Norderney; hope extension all right; please write to Hôtel du Louvre, Paris.' At ten I was in the perfect bed, rapturously flinging my limbs abroad in its glorious redundancies. And at 8.28 on the following morning, with a novel chilliness about the upper lip, and a vast excess of strength and spirits, I was sitting in a third-class carriage, bound for Germany, and dressed as a young seaman, in a pea-jacket, peaked cap, and comforter.<br />
<br />
The transition had not been difficult. I had shaved off my moustache and breakfasted hastily in my bedroom, ready equipped for a journey in my ulster and cloth cap. I had dismissed the hotel porter at the station, and left my bag at the cloak-room, after taking out of it an umber bundle and substituting the ulster. The umber bundle, which consisted of my oilskins, and within them my sea-boots and a few other garments and necessaries, the whole tied up with a length of tarry rope, was now in the rack above me, and (with a stout stick) represented my luggage. Every article in it—I shudder at their origin—was in strict keeping with my humble métier, for I knew they were liable to search at the frontier custom-house; but there was a Baedeker of Northern Germany in my jacket pocket.<br />
<br />
For the nonce, if questions were asked, I was an English seaman, going to Emden to join a ship, with a ticket as far as the frontier. Beyond that a definite scheme of action had still to be thought out. One thing, however, was sure. I was determined to be at Norden to-morrow night, the 25th. A word about Norden, which is a small town seven miles south of Norddeich. When hurriedly scanning the map for coast stations in the cabin yesterday, I had not thought of Norden, because it did not appear to be on the coast, but Davies had noticed it while I slept, and I now saw that his pencilled hint was a shrewd one. The creek he spoke of, though barely visible on the map, flowed into the Ems Estuary in a south-westerly direction. The 'night train' tallied to perfection, for high tide in the creek would be, as Davies estimated, between 10.30 and 11 p.m. on the night of the 25th; and the time-table showed that the only night train arriving at Norden was one from the south at 10.46 p.m. This looked promising. Emden, which I had inclined to on the spur of the moment, was out of court in comparison, for many reasons; not the least being that it was served by three trains between 9 p.m. and 1 a.m., so that the phrase 'night train' would be ambiguous and not decisive as with Norden.<br />
<br />
So far good; but how was I to spend the intervening time? Should I act on Davies's 'querry' and go to Bremen after Böhme? I soon dismissed that idea. It was one to act upon if others failed; for the present it meant another scramble. Bremen is six hours from Norden by rail. I should spend a disproportionate amount of my limited time in trains, and I should want a different disguise. Besides, I had already learnt something fresh about Böhme; for the seed dropped at Emden Station yesterday had come to life. A submarine engineer I knew him to be before; I now knew that canals were another branch of his labours—not a very illuminating fact; but could I pick up more in a single day?<br />
<br />
There remained Esens, and it was thither I resolved to go to-night—a tedious journey, lasting till past eight in the evening; but there I should only be an hour from Norden by rail.<br />
<br />
And at Esens?<br />
<br />
All day long I strove for light on the central mystery, collecting from my diary, my memory, my imagination, from the map, the time-table, and Davies's grubby jottings, every elusive atom of material. Sometimes I issued from a reverie with a start, to find a phlegmatic Dutch peasant staring strangely at me over his china pipe. I was more careful over the German border. Davies's paper I soon knew by heart. I pictured him writing it with his cramped fist in his corner by the stove, fighting against sleep, absently striking salvos of matches, while I snored in my bunk; absently diverging into dreams, I knew, of a rose-brown face under dewy hair and a grey tam-o'-shanter; though not a word of her came into the document. I smiled to see his undying faith in the 'channel theory' reconciled at the eleventh hour, with new data touching the neglected 'land'.<br />
<br />
The result was certainly interesting, but it left me cold. That there existed in the German archives some such scheme of defence for the North Sea coast was very likely indeed. The seven islands, with their seven shallow channels (though, by the way, two of them, the twin branches of the Ems, are by no means so shallow), were a very fair conjecture, and fitted in admirably with the channel theory, whose intrinsic merits I had always recognized; my constant objection having been that it did not go nearly far enough to account for our treatment. The ring of railway round the peninsula, with Esens at the apex, was suggestive, too; but the same objection applied. Every country with a maritime frontier has, I suppose, secret plans of mobilization for its defence, but they are not such as could be discovered by passing travellers, not such as would warrant stealthy searches, or require for their elaboration so recondite a meeting-place as Memmert. Dollmann was another weak point; Dollmann in England, spying. All countries, Germany included, have spies in their service, dirty though necessary tools; but Dollmann in such intimate association with the principal plotters on this side; Dollmann rich, influential, a power in local affairs—it was clear he was no ordinary spy.<br />
<br />
And here I detected a hesitation in Davies's rough sketch, a reluctance, as it were, to pursue a clue to its logical end. He spoke of a German scheme of coast defence, and in the next breath of Dollmann spying for English plans in the event of war with Germany, and there he left the matter; but what sort of plans? Obviously (if he was on the right track) plans of attack on the German coast as opposed to those of strategy on the high seas. But what sort of an attack? Obviously again, if his railway-ring meant anything, an attack by invasion on that remote and desolate littoral which he had so often himself declared to be impregnably secure behind its web of sands and shallows. My mind went back to my question at Bensersiel, 'Can this coast be invaded?' to his denial and our fruitless survey of the dykes and polders. Was he now reverting to a fancy we had both rejected, while shrinking from giving it explicit utterance? The doubt was tantalizing.<br />
<br />
A brief digression here about the phases of my journey. At Rheine I changed trains, turned due north and became a German seaman. There was little risk in a defective accent—sailors are so polyglot; while an English sailor straying about Esens might excite curiosity. Yesterday I had paid no heed to the landscape; to-day I neglected nothing that could conceivably supply a hint.<br />
<br />
From Rheine to Emden we descended the valley of the Ems; at first through a land of thriving towns and fat pastures, degenerating farther north to spaces of heathery bog and moorland—a sad country, but looking at its best, such as that was, for I should mention here that the weather, which in the early morning had been as cold and misty as ever, grew steadily milder and brighter as the day advanced; while my newspaper stated that the glass was falling and the anticyclone giving way to pressure from the Atlantic.<br />
<br />
At Emden, where we entered Friesland proper, the train crossed a big canal, and for the twentieth time that day (for we had passed numbers of them in Holland, and not a few in Germany), I said to myself, 'Canals, canals. Where does Böhme come in?' It was dusk, but light enough to see an unfamiliar craft, a torpedo-boat in fact, moored to stakes at one side. In a moment I remembered that page in the North Sea Pilot where the Ems-Jade Canal is referred to as deep enough to carry gun-boats, and as used for that strategic purpose between Wilhelmshaven and Emden, along the base, that is, of the Frisian peninsula. I asked a peasant opposite; yes, that was the Ems-Jade Canal. Had Davies forgotten it? It would have greatly strengthened his halting sketch.<br />
<br />
At the bookstall at Emden I bought a pocket ordnance map of Friesland, on a much larger scale than anything I had used before, and when I was unobserved studied the course of the canal, with an impatience which, alas! quickly cooled. From Emden northwards I used the same map to aid my eyesight, and with its help saw in the gathering gloom more heaths and bogs once a great glimmering lake, and at intervals cultivated tracts; a watery land as ever; pools, streams and countless drains and ditches. Extensive woods were marked also, but farther inland. We passed Norden at seven, just dark. I looked out for the creek, and sure enough, we crossed it just before entering the station. Its bed was nearly dry, and I distinguished barges lying aground in it. This being the junction for Esens, I had to wait three-quarters of an hour, and then turned east through the uttermost northern wilds, stopping at occasional village stations and keeping five or six miles from the sea. It was during this stage, in a wretchedly lit compartment, and alone for the most part, that I finally assembled all my threads and tried to weave them into a cable whose core should be Esens; 'a town', so Baedeker said, 'of 3,500 inhabitants, the centre of a rich agricultural district. Fine spire.'<br />
<br />
Esens is four miles inland from Bensersiel. I reviewed every circumstance of that day at Bensersiel, and boiled to think how von Brüning had tricked me. He had driven to Esens himself, and read me so well that he actually offered to take me with him, and I had refused from excess of cleverness. Stay, though; if I had happened to accept he would have taken very good care that I saw nothing important. The secret, therefore, was not writ large on the walls of Esens. Was it connected with Bensersiel too, or the country between? I searched the ordnance map again, standing up to get a better light and less jolting. There was the road northwards from Esens to Bensersiel, passing through dots and chess-board squares, the former meaning fen, the latter fields, so the reference said. Something else, too, immediately caught my eye, and that was a stream running to Bensersiel. I knew it at once for the muddy stream or drain we had seen at the harbour, issuing through the sluice or siel from which Bensersiel took its name. But it arrested my attention now because it looked more prominent than I should have expected. Charts are apt to ignore the geography of the mainland, except in so far as it offers sea-marks to mariners. On the chart this stream had been shown as a rough little corkscrew, like a sucking-pig's tail. On the ordnance map it was marked with a dark blue line, was labelled 'Benser Tief', and was given a more resolute course; bends became angles, and there were what appeared to be artificial straightnesses at certain points. One of the threads in my skein, the canal thread, tingled sympathetically, like a wire charged with current. Standing astraddle on both seats, with the map close to the lamp, I greedily followed the course of the 'tief' southward. It inclined away from the road to Esens and passed the town about a mile to the west, diving underneath the railway. Soon after it took angular tacks to the eastward, and joined another blue line trending south-east, and lettered 'Esens—Wittmunde Canal.' This canal, however, came to an abrupt end halfway to Wittmund, a neighbouring town.<br />
<br />
For the first time that day there came to me a sense of genuine inspiration. Those shallow depths and short distances, fractions of metres and kilometres, which I had overheard from Böhme's lips at Memmert, and which Davies had attributed to the outside channels—did they refer to a canal? I remembered seeing barges in Bensersiel harbour. I remembered conversations with the natives in the inn, scraps of the post-master's pompous loquacity, talks of growing trade, of bricks and grain passing from the interior to the islands: from another source—was it the grocer of Wangeroog?—of expansion of business in the islands themselves as bathing resorts; from another source again—von Brüning himself, surely—of Dollmann's personal activity in the development of the islands. In obscure connexion with these things, I saw the torpedo-boat in the Ems-Jade Canal.<br />
<br />
It was between Dornum and Esens that these ideas came, and I was still absorbed in them when the train drew up, just upon nine o'clock, at my destination, and after ten minutes' walk, along with a handful of other passengers, I found myself in the quiet cobbled streets of Esens, with the great church steeple, that we had so often seen from the sea, soaring above me in the moonlight.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-90305750196550864162012-09-04T16:06:00.000+01:002012-09-04T16:06:00.403+01:00Finesse<br />
<br />
Chapter XXIV: Finesse<br />
<br />
THE door of a room on the ground floor was opened to us by a man-servant. As we entered the rattle of a piano stopped, and a hot wave of mingled scent and cigar smoke struck my nostrils. The first thing I noticed over Davies's shoulder, as he preceded me into the room, was a woman—the source of the perfume I decided—turning round from the piano as he passed it and staring him up and down with a disdainful familiarity that I at once hotly resented. She was in evening dress, pronounced in cut and colour; had a certain exuberant beauty, not wholly ascribable to nature, and a notable lack of breeding. Another glance showed me Dollmann putting down a liqueur glass of brandy, and rising from a low chair with something of a start; and another, von Brüning, lying back in a corner of a sofa, smoking; on the same sofa, vis-à-vis to him, was—yes, of course it was—Clara Dollmann; but how their surroundings alter people, I caught myself thinking. For the rest, I was aware that the room was furnished with ostentation, and was stuffy with stove-engendered warmth. Davies steered a straight course for Dollmann, and shook his hand with businesslike resolution. Then he tacked across to the sofa, abandoning me in the face of the enemy.<br />
<br />
'Mr—?' said Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'Carruthers,' I answered, distinctly. 'I was with Davies in the boat just now, but I don't think he introduced me. And now he has forgotten again,' I added, dryly, turning towards Davies, who, having presented himself to Fräulein Dollmann, was looking feebly from her to von Brüning, the picture of tongue-tied awkwardness. (The commander nodded to me and stretched himself with a yawn.)<br />
<br />
'Von Brüning told me about you,' said Dollmann, ignoring my illusion, 'but I was not quite sure of the name. No; it was not an occasion for formalities, was it?' He gave a sudden, mirthless laugh. I thought him flushed and excitable: yet, seen in a normal light, he was in some respects a pleasant surprise, the remarkable conformation of the head giving an impression of intellectual power and restless, almost insanely restless, energy.<br />
<br />
'What need?' I said. 'I have heard so much about you from Davies—and Commander von Brüning—that we seem to be old friends already.'<br />
<br />
He shot a doubtful look at me, and a diversion came from the piano.<br />
<br />
'And now, for Heaven's sake,' cried the lady of the perfume, 'let us join Herr Böhme at supper!'<br />
<br />
'Let me present you to my wife,' said Dollmann.<br />
<br />
So this was the stepmother; unmistakably German, I may add. I made my bow, and underwent much the same sort of frank scrutiny as Davies, only that it was rather more favourable to me, and ended in a carmine smile.<br />
<br />
There was a general movement and further introductions. Davies was led to the stepmother, and I found myself confronting the daughter with quickened pulses, and a sudden sense of added complexity in the issues. I had, of course, made up my mind to ignore our meeting of yesterday, and had assumed that she would do the same. And she did ignore it—we met as utter strangers; nor did I venture (for other eyes were upon us) to transmit any sign of intelligence to her. But the next moment I was wondering if I had not fallen into a trap. She had promised not to tell, but under what circumstances? I saw the scene again; the misty flats, the spruce little sail-boat and its sweet young mistress, fresh as a dewy flower, but blanched and demoralized by a horrid fear, appealing to my honour so to act that we three should never meet again, promising to be silent, but as much in her own interest as ours, and under that implied condition which I had only equivocally refused. The condition was violated, not by her fault or ours, but violated. She was free to help her father against us, and was she helping him? What troubled me was the change in her; that she—how can I express it without offence?—was less in discord with her surroundings than she should have been; that in dress, pose and manner (as we exchanged some trivialities) she was too near reflecting the style of the other woman; that, in fact, she in some sort realized my original conception of her, so brutally avowed to Davies, so signally, as I had thought, falsified. In the sick perplexity that this discovery caused me I dare say I looked as foolish as Davies had done, and more so, for the close heat of the room and its tainted atmosphere, succeeding so abruptly to the wholesome nip of the outside air, were giving me a faintness which this moral check lessened my power to combat. Von Brüning's face wore a sneering smile that I winced under; and, turning, I found another pair of eyes fixed on me, those of Herr Böhme, whose squat figure had appeared at a pair of folding doors leading to an adjoining room. Napkin in hand, he was taking in the scene before him with fat benevolence, but exceeding shrewdness. I instantly noticed a faint red weal relieving the ivory of his bald head; and I had suffered too often in the same quarter myself to mistake its origin, namely, our cabin doorway.<br />
<br />
'This is the other young explorer, Böhme,' said von Brüning. 'Herr Davies kidnapped him a month ago, and bullied and starved him into submission; they'll drown together yet. I believe his sufferings have been terrible.'<br />
<br />
'His sufferings are over,' I retorted. 'I've mutinied—deserted—haven't I, Davies?' I caught Davies gazing with solemn gaucherie at Miss Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'Oh, what?' he stammered. I explained in English. 'Oh, yes, Carruthers has to go home,' he said, in his vile lingo.<br />
<br />
No one spoke for a moment, and even von Brüning had no persiflage ready.<br />
<br />
'Well, are we never going to have supper?' said madame, impatiently; and with that we all moved towards the folding doors. There had been little formality in the proceedings so far, and there was less still in the supper-room. Böhme resumed his repast with appetite, and the rest of us sat down apparently at random, though an underlying method was discernible. As it worked out, Dollmann was at one end of the small table, with Davies on his right and Böhme on his left; Frau Dollmann at the other, with me on her right and von Brüning on her left. The seventh personage, Fräulein Dollmann, was between the commander and Davies on the side opposite to me. No servants appeared, and we waited on ourselves. I have a vague recollection of various excellent dishes, and a distinct one of abundance of wine. Someone filled me a glass of champagne, and I confess that I drained it with honest avidity, blessing the craftsman who coaxed forth the essence, the fruit that harboured it, the sun that warmed it.<br />
<br />
'Why are you going so suddenly?' said von Brüning to me across the table.<br />
<br />
'Didn't I tell you we had to call here for letters? I got mine this morning, and among others a summons back to work. Of course I must obey.' (I found myself speaking in a frigid silence.) 'The annoying thing was that there were two letters, and if I had only come here two days sooner I should have only got the first, which gave me an extension.'<br />
<br />
'You are very conscientious. How will they know?'<br />
<br />
'Ah, but the second's rather urgent.'<br />
<br />
There was another uncomfortable silence, broken by Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'By the way, Herr Davies,' he began, 'I ought to apologize to you for—'<br />
<br />
This was no business of mine, and the less interest I took in it the better; so I turned to Frau Dollmann and abused the fog.<br />
<br />
'Have you been in the harbour all day?' she asked, 'then how was it you did not visit us? Was Herr Davies so shy?' (Curiosity or malice?)<br />
<br />
'Quite the contrary; but I was,' I answered coldly; 'you see, we knew Herr Dollmann was away, and we really only called here to get my letters; besides, we did not know your address.' I looked at Clara and found her talking gaily to von Brüning, deaf seemingly to our little dialogue.<br />
<br />
'Anyone would have told you it,' said madame, raising her eyebrows.<br />
<br />
'I dare say; but directly after breakfast the fog came on, and—well, one cannot leave a yacht alone in a fog,' I said, with professional solidity.<br />
<br />
Von Brüning pricked up his ears at this. 'I'll be hanged if that was your maxim,' he laughed; 'you're too fond of the shore!'<br />
<br />
I sent him a glance of protest, as though to say: 'What's the use of your warning if you won't let me act on it?'<br />
<br />
For, of course, my excuses were meant chiefly for his consumption, and Fräulein Dollmann's. That the lady I addressed them to found them unpalatable was not my fault.<br />
<br />
'Then you sat in your wretched little cabin all day?' she persisted.<br />
<br />
'All day,' I said, brazenly; 'it was the safest thing to do.' And I looked again at Fräulein Dollmann, frankly and squarely. Our eyes met, and she dropped hers instantly, but not before I had learnt something; for if ever I saw misery under a mask it was on her face. No; she had not told.<br />
<br />
I think I puzzled the stepmother, who shrugged her white shoulders, and said in that case she wondered we had dared to leave our precious boat and come to supper. If we knew Frisian fogs as well as she did—Oh, I explained, we were not so nervous as that; and as for supper on shore, if she only knew what a Spartan life we led—<br />
<br />
'Oh, for mercy's sake, don't tell me about it!' she cried, with a grimace; 'I hate the mention of yachts. When I think of that dreadful Medusa coming from Hamburg—' I sympathized with half my attention, keeping one strained ear open for developments on my right. Davies, I knew, was in the thick of it, and none too happy under Böhme's eye, but working manfully. 'My fault'—'sudden squall'—'quite safe', were some of the phrases I caught; while I was aware, to my alarm, that he was actually drawing a diagram of something with bread-crumbs and table-knives. The subject seemed to gutter out to an awkward end, and suddenly Böhme, who was my right-hand neighbour, turned to me. 'You are starting for England to-morrow morning?' he said.<br />
<br />
'Yes,' I answered; 'there is a steamer at 8.15, I believe.'<br />
<br />
'That is good. We shall be companions.'<br />
<br />
'Are you going to England, too, sir?' I asked, with hot misgivings.<br />
<br />
'No, no! I am going to Bremen; but we shall travel together as far as—you go by Amsterdam, I suppose?—as far as Leer, then. That will be very pleasant.' I fancied there was a ghoulish gusto in his tone.<br />
<br />
'Very,' I assented. 'You are making a short stay here, then?'<br />
<br />
'As long as usual. I visit the work at Memmert once a month or so, spend a night with my friend Dollmann and his charming family' (he leered round him), 'and return.'<br />
<br />
Whether I was right or wrong in my next step I shall never know, but obeying a strong instinct, 'Memmert,' I said; 'do tell me more about Memmert. We heard a good deal about it from Commander von Brüning; but—'<br />
<br />
'He was discreet, I expect,' said Böhme.<br />
<br />
'He left off at the most interesting part.'<br />
<br />
'What's that about me?' joined in von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'I was saying that we're dying to know more about Memmert, aren't we, Davies?'<br />
<br />
'Oh, I don't know,' said Davies, evidently aghast at my temerity; but I did not mind that. If he roughed my suit, so much the better; I intended to rough his.<br />
<br />
'You gave us plenty of history, commander, but you did not bring it up to date.' The triple alliance laughed, Dollmann boisterously.<br />
<br />
'Well,' said von Brüning; 'I gave you very good reasons, and you acquiesced.'<br />
<br />
'And now he is trying to pump me,' said Böhme, with his rasping chuckle.<br />
<br />
'Wait a bit, sir; I have an excuse. The commander was not only mysterious but inaccurate. I appeal to you, Herr Dollmann, for it was apropos of you. When we fell in with him at Bensersiel, Davies asked him if you were at home, and he said "No." When would you be back? Probably soon; but he did not know when.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, he said that?' said Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'Well, only three days later we arrive at Norderney, and find you have returned that very day, but have gone to Memmert. Again (by the way) the mysterious Memmert! But more than ever mysterious now, for in the evening, not only you and Herr Böhme—'<br />
<br />
'What penetration!' laughed von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'But also Commander von Brüning, pay us a visit in his launch, all coming from Memmert!'<br />
<br />
'And you infer?' said von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'Why, that you must have known at Bensersiel—only three days ago—exactly when Herr Dollmann was coming back, having an appointment at Memmert with him for to-day.'<br />
<br />
'Which I wished to conceal from you?'<br />
<br />
'Yes, and that's why I'm so inquisitive; it's entirely your own fault.'<br />
<br />
'So it seems,' said he, 'with mock humility; 'but fill your glass and go on, young man. Why should I want to deceive you?'<br />
<br />
'That's just what I want to know. Come, confess now; wasn't there something important afoot to-day at Memmert? Something to do with the gold? You were inspecting it, sorting it, weighing it? Or I know! You were transporting it secretly to the mainland?'<br />
<br />
'Not a very good day for that! But softly, Herr Carruthers; no fishing for admissions. Who said we had found any gold?'<br />
<br />
'Well, have you? There!'<br />
<br />
'That's better! Nothing like candour, my young investigator. But I am afraid, having no authority, I cannot assist you at all. Better try Herr Böhme again. I'm only a casual onlooker.'<br />
<br />
'With shares.'<br />
<br />
'Ah! you remember that? (He remembers everything!) With a few shares, then; but with no expert knowledge. Now, Böhme is the consulting engineer. Rescue me, Böhme.'<br />
<br />
'I cannot disclaim expert knowledge,' said Böhme, with humorous gravity; 'but I disclaim responsibility. Now, Herr Dollmann is chairman of the company.'<br />
<br />
'And I,' said Dollmann, with a noisy laugh, 'must fall back on the shareholders, whose interests I have to guard. One can't be too careful in these confidential matters.'<br />
<br />
'Here's one who gives his consent,' I said. 'Can't he represent the rest?'<br />
<br />
'Extorted by torture,' said von Brüning. 'I retract.'<br />
<br />
'Don't mind them, Herr Carruthers,' cried Frau Dollmann, 'they are making fun of you; but I will give you a hint; no woman can keep a secret—'<br />
<br />
'Ah!' I cried, triumphantly, 'you have been there?'<br />
<br />
'I? Not I; I detest the sea! But Clara has.' Everyone looked at Clara, who in her turn looked in naive bewilderment from me to her father.<br />
<br />
'Indeed?' I said, more soberly, 'but perhaps she is not a free agent.'<br />
<br />
'Perfectly free!' said Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'I have only been there once, some time ago,' said she, 'and I saw no gold at all.'<br />
<br />
'Guarded,' I observed. 'I beg your pardon; I mean that perhaps you only saw what you were allowed to see. And, in any case, the fräulein has no expert knowledge and no responsibility, and, perhaps, no shares. Her province is to be charming, not to hold financial secrets.'<br />
<br />
'I have done my best to help you,' said the stepmother.<br />
<br />
'They're all against us, Davies.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, chuck it, Carruthers!' said Davies, in English.<br />
<br />
'He's insatiable,' said von Brüning, and there was a pause; clearly, they meant to elicit more.<br />
<br />
'Well, I shall draw my own conclusions,' I said.<br />
<br />
'This is interesting,' said von Brüning, 'in what sense?'<br />
<br />
'It begins to dawn on me that you made fools of us at Bensersiel. Don't you remember, Davies, what an interest he took in all our doings? I wonder if he feared our exploring propensities might possibly lead us to Memmert?'<br />
<br />
'Upon my word, this is the blackest ingratitude. I thought I made myself particularly agreeable to you.'<br />
<br />
'Yes, indeed; especially about the duck shooting! How useful your local man would have been—both to us and to you!'<br />
<br />
'Go on,' said the commander, imperturbably.<br />
<br />
'Wait a moment; I'm thinking it out.' And thinking it out I was in deadly earnest, for all my levity, as I pressed my hand on my burning forehead and asked myself where I was to stop in this seductive but perilous fraud. To carry it too far was to court complete exposure; to stop too soon was equally compromising.<br />
<br />
'What is he talking about, and why go on with this ridiculous mystery?' said Frau Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'I was thinking about this supper party, and the way it came about,' I pursued, slowly.<br />
<br />
'Nothing to complain of, I hope?' said Dollmann.<br />
<br />
'Of course not! Impromptu parties are always the pleasantest, and this one was delightfully impromptu. Now I bet you I know its origin! Didn't you discuss us at Memmert? And didn't one of you suggest—'One would almost think you had been there,' said Dollmann. 'You may thank your vile climate that we weren't,' I retorted, laughing. 'But, as I was saying, didn't one of you suggest—which of you? Well, I'm sure it wasn't the commander—'<br />
<br />
'Why not?' said Böhme.<br />
<br />
'It's difficult to explain—an intuition, say—I am sure he stood up for us; and I don't think it was Herr Dollmann, because he knows Davies already, and he's always on the spot; and, in short I'll swear it was Herr Böhme, who is leaving early to-morrow, and had never seen either of us. It was you, sir, who proposed that we should be asked to supper to-night—for inspection?'<br />
<br />
'Inspection?' said Böhme; 'what an extraordinary idea!'<br />
<br />
'You can't deny it, though! And one thing more; in the harbour just now—no—this is going too far; I shall mortally offend you.' I gave way to hearty laughter.<br />
<br />
'Come, let's have it. Your hallucinations are diverting.'<br />
<br />
'If you insist; but this is rather a delicate matter. You know we were a little surprised to find you all on board; and you, Herr Böhme, did you always take such a deep interest in small yachts? I am afraid that it was at a certain sacrifice of comfort that you inspected ours!' And I glanced at the token he bore of his encounter with our lintel. There was a burst of pent-up merriment, in which Dollmann took the loudest share.<br />
<br />
'I warned you, Böhme,' he said.<br />
<br />
The engineer took the joke in the best possible part. 'We owe you apologies,' he conceded.<br />
<br />
'Don't mention it,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'He doesn't mind,' I said; 'I'm the injured one. I'm sure you never suspected Davies, who could?' (Who indeed? I was on firm ground there.)<br />
<br />
'The point is, what did you take me for?'<br />
<br />
'Perhaps we take you for it still,' said von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'Oho! Still suspicious? Don't drive me to extremities.'<br />
<br />
'What extremities?'<br />
<br />
'When I get back to London I shall go to Lloyd's! I haven't forgotten that flaw in the title.' There was an impressive silence.<br />
<br />
'Gentlemen,' said Dollmann, with exaggerated solemnity, 'we must come to terms with this formidable young man. What do you say?'<br />
<br />
'Take me to Memmert,' I exclaimed. 'Those are my terms!'<br />
<br />
'Take you to Memmert? But I thought you were starting for England to-morrow?'<br />
<br />
'I ought to; but I'll stay for that.'<br />
<br />
'You said it was urgent. Your conscience is very elastic.'<br />
<br />
'That's my affair. Will you take me to Memmert?'<br />
<br />
'What do you say, gentlemen?' Böhme nodded. 'I think we owe some reparation. Under promise of absolute secrecy, then?'<br />
<br />
'Of course, now that you trust me. But you'll show me everything—honour bright—wreck, depot, and all?'<br />
<br />
'Everything; if you don't object to a diver's dress.'<br />
<br />
'Victory!' I cried, in triumph. 'We've won our point, Davies. And now, gentlemen, I don't mind saying that as far as I am concerned the joke's at an end; and, in spite of your kind offer, I must start for England to-morrow' under the good Herr Böhme's wing. And in case my elastic conscience troubles you (for I see you think me a weather-cock) here are the letters received this morning, establishing my identity as a humble but respectable clerk in the British Civil Service, summoned away from his holiday by a tyrannical superior.' (I pulled out my letters and tossed them to Dollmann.) 'Ah, you don't read English easily, perhaps? I dare say Herr Böhme does.'<br />
<br />
Leaving Böhme to study dates, post-marks, and contents to his heart's content, and unobserved, I turned to sympathize with my fair neighbour, who complained that her head was going round; and no wonder. But at this juncture, and very much to my surprise, Davies struck in.<br />
<br />
'I should like to go to Memmert,' he said.<br />
<br />
'You?' said von Brüning. 'Now I'm surprised at that.'<br />
<br />
'But you won't be staying here either, Davies,' I objected.<br />
<br />
'Yes, I shall,' said Davies. 'Why, I told you I should. If you leave me in the lurch like this I must have time to look round.'<br />
<br />
'You needn't pretend that you cannot sail alone,' said von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'It's much more fun with two; I think I shall wire for another friend. Meanwhile, I should like to see Memmert.'<br />
<br />
'That's only an excuse, I'm afraid,' said I.<br />
<br />
'I want to shoot ducks too,' pursued Davies, reddening. 'I always have wanted to; and you promised to help in that, commander.'<br />
<br />
'You can't get out of it now,' I laughed.<br />
<br />
'Certainly not,' said he, unmoved; 'but, honestly, I should advise Herr Davies, if he is ever going to get home this season, to make the best of this fine weather.'<br />
<br />
'It's too fine,' said Davies; 'I prefer wind. If I cannot get a friend I think I shall stop cruising, leave the yacht here, and come back for her next year.<br />
<br />
There was some mute telegraphy between the allies.<br />
<br />
'You can leave her in my charge,' said Dollmann, 'and start with your friend to-morrow.'<br />
<br />
'Thanks; but there is no hurry,' said Davies, growing redder than ever. 'I like Norderney—and we might have another sail in your dinghy, fräulein,' he blurted out.<br />
<br />
'Thank you,' she said, in that low dry voice I had heard yesterday; 'but I think I shall not be sailing again—it is getting too cold.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, no!' said Davies, 'it's splendid.' But she had turned to von Brüning, and took no notice.<br />
<br />
'Well, send me a report about Memmert, Davies,' I laughed, with the idea of drawing attention from his rebuff. But Davies, having once delivered his soul, seemed to have lost his shyness, and only gazed at his neighbour with the placid, dogged expression that I knew so well. That was the end of those delicate topics; and conviviality grew apace.<br />
<br />
I am not indifferent at any time to good wine and good cheer, nor was it for lack of pressing that I drank as sparingly as I was able, and pretended to a greater elation than I felt. Nor certainly was it from any fine scruples as to the character of the gentleman whose hospitality we were receiving—scruples which I knew affected Davies, who ate little and drank nothing. In any case he was adamant in such matters, and I verily believe would at any time have preferred our own little paraffin-flavoured messes to the best dinner in the world. It was a very wholesome caution that warned me not to abuse the finest brain tonic ever invented by the wit of man. I had finessed Memmert, as one finesses a low card when holding a higher; but I had too much respect for our adversaries to trade on any fancied security we had won thereby. They had allowed me to win the trick, but I credited them with a better knowledge of my hand than they chose to show. On the other hand I hugged the axiom that in all conflicts it is just as fatal to underrate the difficulties of your enemy as to overrate your own. Their chief one—and it multiplied a thousandfold the excitement of the contest—was, I felt sure, the fear of striking in error; of using a sledge-hammer to break a nut. In breaking it they risked publicity, and publicity, I felt convinced, was death to their secret. So, even supposing they had detected the finesse, and guessed that we had in fact got wind of imperial designs; yet, even so, I counted on immunity so long as they thought we were on the wrong scent, with Memmert, and Memmert alone, as the source of our suspicions.<br />
<br />
Had it been necessary I was prepared to encourage such a view, admitting that the cloth von Brüning wore had made his connexion with Memmert curious, and had suggested to Davies, for I should have put it on him, with his naval enthusiasms, that the wreck-works were really naval-defence works. If they went farther, and suspected that we had tried to go to Memmert that very day, the position was worse, but not desperate; for the fear that they would take the final step and suppose that we had actually got there and overhead their talk, I flatly refused to entertain, until I should find myself under arrest.<br />
<br />
Precisely how near we came to it I shall never rightly know; but I have good reason to believe that we trembled on the verge. The main issue was fully enough for me, and it was only in passing flashes that I followed the play of the warring under-currents. And yet, looking back on the scene, I would warrant there was no party of seven in Europe that evening where a student of human documents would have found so rich a field, such noble and ignoble ambitions, such base and holy fears, aye, and such pitiful agonies of the spirit. Roughly divided though we were into separate camps, no two of us were wholly at one. Each wore a mask in the grand imposture; excepting, I am inclined to think, the lady on my left, who, outside her own well-being, which she cultivated without reserve, had, as far as I could see, but one axe to grind—the intimacy of von Brüning and her stepdaughter—and ground it openly.<br />
<br />
Not even Böhme and von Brüning were wholly at one; and as moral distances are reckoned, Davies and I were leagues apart. Sitting between Dollmann and Dollmann's daughter, the living and breathing symbols of the two polar passions he had sworn to harmonize, he kept an equilibrium which, though his aims were nominally mine, I could not attain to. For me the man was the central figure; if I had attention to spare it was on him that I bestowed it; groping disgustfully after his hidden springs of action, noting the evidences of great gifts squandered and prostituted; questioning where he was most vulnerable; whom he feared most, us or his colleagues; whether he was open to remorse or shame; or whether he meditated further crime. The girl was incidental. After the first shock of surprise I had soon enough discovered that she, like the rest, had assumed a disguise; for she was far too innocent to sustain the deception; and yesterday was fresh in my memory. I was forced to continue turning her assumed character to account; but it would be pharisaical in me to say that I rose to any moral heights in her regard—wine and excitement had deadened my better nature to that extent. I thought she looked prettier than ever, and, as time passed, I fell into a cynical carelessness about her. This glimpse of her home life, and the desperate expedients to which she was driven (whether by compulsion or from her own regard for Davies) to repel and dismiss him, did not strike me as they might have done as the crowning argument in favour of the course we had adopted the night before, that of compassing our end without noise and scandal, disarming Dollmann, but aiding him to escape from the allies he had betrayed. To Davies, the man, if not a pure abstraction, was at most a noxious vermin to be trampled on for the public good; while the girl, in her blackguardly surroundings, and with her sinister future, had become the very source of his impulse.<br />
<br />
And the other players? Böhme was my abstraction, the fortress whose foundations we were sapping, the embodiment of that systematized force which is congenital to the German people. In von Brüning, the personal factor was uppermost. Callous as I was this evening, I could not help wondering occasionally, as he talked and laughed with Clara Dollmann, what in his innermost thoughts, knowing her father, he felt and meant. It is a point I cannot and would not pursue, and, thank Heaven, it does not matter now; yet, with fuller knowledge of the facts, and, I trust, a mellower judgement, I often return to the same debate, and, by I know not what illogical bypaths, always arrive at the same conclusion, that I liked the man and like him still.<br />
<br />
We behaved as sportsmen in the matter of time, giving them over two hours to make up their minds about us. It was only when tobacco smoke and heat brought back my faintness, and a twinge of cramp warned me that human strength has limits, that I rose and said we must go; that I had to make an early start to-morrow. I am hazy about the farewells, but I think that Dollmann was the most cordial, to me at any rate, and I augured good therefrom. Böhme said he should see me again. Von Brüning, though bound for the harbour also, considered it was far too early to be going yet, and said good-bye.<br />
<br />
'You want to talk us over,' I remember saying, with the last flicker of gaiety I could muster.<br />
<br />
We were in the streets again, under a silver, breathless night; dizzily footing the greasy ladder again; in the cabin again, where I collapsed on a sofa just as I was, and slept such a deep and stringent sleep that the men of the Blitz's launch might have handcuffed and trussed and carried me away, without incommoding me in the least.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-37683665218947144362012-09-03T16:05:00.000+01:002012-09-03T16:05:00.831+01:00Charge!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_J7TaJBDULBKcU3pYR5RRl4j-7yFpa5JvlihXGtHLHsFQVQ9d15B-C9T_k5J44ri0gB8zfqbGzAOWItuUmefSI_4A17SfJqjPKV3TLRrkheWc1ts3HEpQ6CyqrtOEQvs6afiWh-QxjJIK/s1600/DSCF0055.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_J7TaJBDULBKcU3pYR5RRl4j-7yFpa5JvlihXGtHLHsFQVQ9d15B-C9T_k5J44ri0gB8zfqbGzAOWItuUmefSI_4A17SfJqjPKV3TLRrkheWc1ts3HEpQ6CyqrtOEQvs6afiWh-QxjJIK/s400/DSCF0055.JPG" width="300" /></a></div><br />
And then Re-Charge.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-71528459639459056572012-09-02T16:04:00.000+01:002012-09-02T16:04:00.447+01:00A Change Of TacticsChapter XXIII: A Change Of Tactics<br />
<br />
WE pushed off without a word, and paddled out of sight of the beach. A voice was approaching, hailing us. 'Hail back,' whispered Davies; 'pretend we're a galliot.'<br />
<br />
'Ho-a,' I shouted, 'where am I?'<br />
<br />
'Off Memmert,' came back. 'Where are you bound?'<br />
<br />
'Delfzyl,' whispered Davies.<br />
<br />
'Delf-zyl,' I bawled.<br />
<br />
A sentence ending with 'anchor' was returned.<br />
<br />
'The flood's tearing east,' whispered Davies; 'sit still.'<br />
<br />
We heard no more, and, after a few minutes' drifting 'What luck?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'One or two clues, and an invitation to supper.'<br />
<br />
The clues I left till later; the invitation was the thing, and I explained its urgency.<br />
<br />
'How will they get back?' said Davies; 'if the fog lasts the steamer's sure to be late.'<br />
<br />
'We can count for nothing,' I answered. 'There was some little steamboat off the depot, and the fog may lift. Which is our quickest way?'<br />
<br />
'At this tide, a bee-line to Norderney by compass; we shall have water over all the banks.'<br />
<br />
He had all his preparations made, the lamp lit in advance, the compass in position, and we started at once; he at the bow-oar, where he had better control over the boat's nose; lamp and compass on the floor between us. Twilight thickened into darkness—a choking, pasty darkness—and still we sped unfalteringly over that trackless waste, sitting and swinging in our little pool of stifled orange light. To drown fatigue and suspense I conned over my clues, and tried to carve into my memory every fugitive word I had overheard.<br />
<br />
'What are there seven of round here?' I called back to Davies once (thinking of A to G). 'Sorry,' I added, for no answer came.<br />
<br />
'I see a star,' was my next word, after a long interval. 'Now it's gone. There it is again! Right aft!'<br />
<br />
'That's Borkum light,' said Davies, presently; 'the fog's lifting.' A keen wind from the west struck our faces, and as swiftly as it had come the fog rolled away from us, in one mighty mass, stripping clean and pure the starry dome of heaven, still bright with the western after-glow, and beginning to redden in the east to the rising moon. Norderney light was flashing ahead, and Davies could take his tired eyes from the pool of light.<br />
<br />
'Damn!' was all he uttered in the way of gratitude for this mercy, and I felt very much the same; for in a fog Davies in a dinghy was a match for a steamer; in a clear he lost his handicap.<br />
<br />
It was a quarter to seven. 'An hour'll do it, if we buck up,' he pronounced, after taking a rough bearing with the two lights. He pointed out a star to me, which we were to keep exactly astern, and again I applied to their labour my aching back and smarting palms.<br />
<br />
'What did you say about seven of something?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'What are there seven of hereabouts?'<br />
<br />
'Islands, of course,' said Davies. 'Is that the clue?'<br />
<br />
'Maybe.'<br />
<br />
Then followed the most singular of all our confabulations. Two memories are better than one, and the sooner I carved the cipher into his memory as well as mine the better record we should have. So, with rigid economy of breath, I snapped out all my story, and answered his breathless questions. It saved me from being mesmerized by the star, and both of us from the consciousness of over-fatigue.<br />
<br />
'Spying at Chatham, the blackguard?' he hissed.<br />
<br />
'What do you make of it?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'Nothing about battleships, mines, forts?' he said.<br />
<br />
'No.'<br />
<br />
'Nothing about the Ems, Emden, Wilhelmshaven?'<br />
<br />
'No.'<br />
<br />
'Nothing about transports?'<br />
<br />
'No.'<br />
<br />
'I believe—I was right—after all—something to do—with the channels—behind islands.'<br />
<br />
And so that outworn creed took a new lease of life; though for my part the words that clashed with it were those that had sunk the deepest.<br />
<br />
'Esens,' I protested; 'that town behind Bensersiel.'<br />
<br />
'Wassertiefe, Lotsen, Schleppboote,' spluttered Davies.<br />
<br />
'Kilometre—Eisenbahn,' from me, and so on.<br />
<br />
I should earn the just execration of the reader if I continued to report such a dialogue. Suffice to say that we realized very soon that the substance of the plot was still a riddle. On the other hand, there was fresh scent, abundance of it; and the question was already taking shape—were we to follow it up or revert to last night's decision and strike with what weapons we had? It was a pressing question, too, the last of many—was there to be no end to the emergencies of this crowded day?—pressing for reasons I could not define, while convinced that we must be ready with an answer by supper-time to-night.<br />
<br />
Meantime, we were nearing Norderney; the See-Gat was crossed, and with the last of the flood tide fair beneath us, and the red light on the west pier burning ahead, we began insensibly to relax our efforts. But I dared not rest, for I was at that point of exhaustion when mechanical movement was my only hope.<br />
<br />
'Light astern,' I said, thickly. 'Two—white and red.'<br />
<br />
'Steamer,' said Davies; 'going south though.'<br />
<br />
'Three now.'<br />
<br />
A neat triangle of gems—topaz, ruby, and emerald—hung steady behind us.<br />
<br />
'Turned east,' said Davies. 'Buck up—steamer from Juist. No, by Jove! too small. What is it?'<br />
<br />
On we laboured, while the gems waxed in brilliancy as the steamer overhauled us.<br />
<br />
'Easy,' said Davies, 'I seem to know those lights—the Blitz's launch—don't let's be caught rowing like madmen in a muck sweat. Paddle inshore a bit.' He was right, and, as in a dream, I saw hurrying and palpitating up the same little pinnace that had towed us out of Bensersiel.<br />
<br />
'We're done for now,' I remember thinking, for the guilt of the runaway was strong in me; and an old remark of von Brüning's about 'police' was in my ears. But she was level with and past us before I could sink far into despair.<br />
<br />
'Three of them behind the hood,' said Davies: 'what are we to do?'<br />
<br />
'Follow,' I answered, and essayed a feeble stroke, but the blade scuttered over the surface.<br />
<br />
'Let's wait about for a bit,' said Davies. 'We're late anyhow. If they go to the yacht they'll think we're ashore.'<br />
<br />
'Our shore clothes—lying about.'<br />
<br />
'Are you up to talking?'<br />
<br />
'No; but we must. The least suspicion'll do for us now.'<br />
<br />
'Give me your scull, old chap, and put on your coat.'<br />
<br />
He extinguished the lantern, lit a pipe, and then rowed slowly on, while I sat on a slack heap in the stern and devoted my last resources of will to the emancipation of the spirit from the tired flesh.<br />
<br />
In ten minutes or so we were rounding the pier, and there was the yacht's top-mast against the sky. I saw, too, that the launch was alongside of her, and told Davies so. Then I lit a cigarette, and made a lamentable effort to whistle. Davies followed suit, and emitted a strange melody which I took to be 'Home, Sweet Home,' but he has not the slightest ear for music.<br />
<br />
'Why, they're on board, I believe,' said I; 'the cabin's lighted. Ahoy there!' I shouted as we came up. 'Who's that?'<br />
<br />
'Good evening, sir,' said a sailor, who was fending off the yacht with a boat-hook. 'It's Commander von Brüning's launch. I think the gentlemen want to see you.'<br />
<br />
Before we could answer, an exclamation of: 'Why, here they are!' came from the deck of the Dulcibella, and the dim form of von Brüning him self emerged from the companion-way. There was something of a scuffle down below, which the commander nearly succeeded in drowning by the breeziness of his greeting. Meanwhile, the ladder creaked under fresh weight, and Dollmann appeared.<br />
<br />
'Is that you, Herr Davies?' he said.<br />
<br />
'Hullo! Herr Dollmann,' said Davies; 'how are you?'<br />
<br />
I must explain that we had floated up between the yacht and the launch, whose sailors had passed her a little aside in order to give us room. Her starboard side-light was just behind and above us, pouring its green rays obliquely over the deck of the Dulcibella, while we and the dinghy were in deep shadow between. The most studied calculation could not have secured us more favourable conditions for a moment which I had always dreaded—the meeting of Davies and Dollmann. The former, having shortened his sculls, just sat where he was, half turned towards the yacht and looking up at his enemy. No lineament of his own face could have been visible to the latter, while those pitiless green rays—you know their ravaging effect on the human physiognomy—struck full on Dollmann's face. It was my first fair view of it at close quarters, and, secure in my background of gloom, I feasted with a luxury of superstitious abhorrence on the livid smiling mask that for a few moments stooped peering down towards Davies. One of the caprices of the crude light was to obliterate, or at any rate so penetrate, beard and moustache, as to reveal in outline lips and chin, the features in which defects of character are most surely betrayed, especially when your victim smiles. Accuse me, if you will, of stooping to melodramatic embroidery; object that my own prejudiced fancy contributed to the result; but I can, nevertheless, never efface the impression of malignant perfidy and base passion, exaggerated to caricature, that I received in those few instants. Another caprice of the light was to identify the man with the portrait of him when younger and clean-shaven, in the frontispiece of his own book; and another still, the most repulsively whimsical of all, was to call forth a strong resemblance to the sweet young girl who had been with us yesterday.<br />
<br />
Enough! I shall never offend again in this way. In reality I am much more inclined to laugh than shudder over this meeting; for meanwhile the third of our self-invited guests had with stertorous puffing risen to the stage, for all the world like a demon out of a trap-door, specially when he entered the zone of that unearthly light. And there they stood in a row, like delinquents at judgement, while we, the true culprits, had only passively to accept explanations. Of course these were plausible enough. Dollmann having seen the yacht in port that morning had called on his return from Memmert to ask us to supper. Finding no one aboard, and concluding we were ashore, he had meant to leave a note for Davies in the cabin. His friend, Herr Böhme, 'the distinguished engineer', was anxious to see over the little vessel that had come so far, and he knew that Davies would not mind the intrusion. Not at all, said Davies; would not they stop and have drinks? No, but would we come to supper at Dollmann's villa? With pleasure, said Davies, but we had to change first. Up to this point we had been masters of the situation; but here von Brüning, who alone of the three appeared to be entirely at his ease, made the retour offensif.<br />
<br />
'Where have you been?' he asked.<br />
<br />
'Oh, rowing about since the fog cleared,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
I suppose he thought that evasion would pass muster, but as he spoke, I noticed to my horror that a stray beam of light was playing on the bunch of white cotton-waste that adorned one of the rowlocks: for we had forgotten to remove these tell-tale appendages. So I added: 'After ducks again'; and, lifting one of the guns, let the light flash on its barrel. To my own ears my voice sounded husky and distant.<br />
<br />
'Always ducks,' laughed von Brüning. 'No luck, I suppose?'<br />
<br />
'No,' said Davies; 'but it ought to be a good time after sunset—'<br />
<br />
'What, with a rising tide and the banks covered?'<br />
<br />
'We saw some,' said Davies, sullenly.<br />
<br />
'I tell you what, my zealous young sportsmen, you're rash to leave your boat at anchor here after dark without a light. I came aboard to find your lamp and set it.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, thanks,' said Davies; 'we took it with us.'<br />
<br />
'To see to shoot by?'<br />
<br />
We laughed uncomfortably, and Davies compassed a wonderful German phrase to the effect that 'it might come in useful'. Happily the matter went no farther, for the position was a strained one at the best, and would not bear lengthening. The launch went alongside, and the invaders evacuated British soil, looking, for all von Brüning's flippant nonchalance, a rather crestfallen party. So much so, that, acute as was my anxiety, I took courage to whisper to Davies, while the transhipment of Herr Böhme was proceeding: 'Ask Dollmann to stay while we dress.'<br />
<br />
'Why?' he whispered.<br />
<br />
'Go on.'<br />
<br />
'I say, Herr Dollmann,' said Davies, 'won't you stay on board with us while we dress? There's a lot to tell you, and—and we can follow on with you when we're ready.'<br />
<br />
Dollmann had not yet stepped into the launch. 'With pleasure,' he said; but there followed an ominous silence, broken by von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'Oh, come along, Dollmann, and let them alone,' he said brusquely. 'You'll be horribly in the way down there, and we shall never get any supper if you keep them yarning.'<br />
<br />
'And it's now a quarter-past eight o'clock,' grumbled Herr Böhme from his corner behind the hood. Dollmann submitted, and excused himself, and the launch steamed away.<br />
<br />
'I think I twig,' said Davies, as he helped, almost hoisted, me aboard. 'Rather risky though—eh?'<br />
<br />
'I knew they'd object—only wanted to make sure.'<br />
<br />
The cabin was just as we had left it, our shore clothes lying in disorder on the bunks, a locker or two half open.<br />
<br />
'Well, I wonder what they did down here,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
For my part I went straight to the bookshelf.<br />
<br />
'Does anything strike you about this?' I asked, kneeling on the sofa.<br />
<br />
'Logbook's shifted,' said Davies. 'I'll swear it was at the end before.'<br />
<br />
'That doesn't matter. Anything else?'<br />
<br />
'By Jove!—where's Dollmann's book?'<br />
<br />
'It's here all right, but not where it should be.' I had been reading it, you remember, overnight, and in the morning had replaced it in full view among the other books. I now found it behind them, in a wrenched attitude, which showed that someone who had no time to spare had pushed it roughly inwards.<br />
<br />
'What do you make of that?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
He produced long drinks, and we allowed ourselves ten minutes of absolute rest, stretched at full length on the sofas.<br />
<br />
'They don't trust Dollmann,' I said. 'I spotted that at Memmert even.'<br />
<br />
'How?'<br />
<br />
'First, when they were talking about you and me. He was on his defence, and in a deuce of a funk, too. Böhme was pressing him hard. Again, at the end, when he left the room followed by Grimm, who I'm certain was sent to watch him. It was while he was away that the other two arranged that rendezvous for the night of the 25th. And again just now, when you asked him to stay. I believe it's working out as I thought it would. Von Brüning, and through him Böhme (who is the 'engineer from Bremen'), know the story of that short cut and suspect that it was an attempt on your life. Dollmann daren't confess to that, because, morality apart, it could only have been prompted by extreme necessity—that is, by the knowledge that you were really dangerous, and not merely an inquisitive stranger. Now we know his motive; but they don't yet. The position of that book proves it.'<br />
<br />
'He shoved it in?'<br />
<br />
'To prevent them seeing it. There's no earthly reason why they should have hidden it.'<br />
<br />
'Then we're getting on,' said Davies. 'That shows they know his real name, or why should he shove the book in? But they don't know he wrote a book, and that I have a copy.'<br />
<br />
'At any rate he thinks they don't; we can't say more than that.'<br />
<br />
'And what does he think about me—and you?'<br />
<br />
'That's the point. Ten to one he's in tortures of doubt, and would give a fortune to have five minutes' talk alone with you to see how the land lies and get your version of the short cut incident. But they won't let him. They want to watch him in our company and us in his; you see it's an interesting reunion for you and him.'<br />
<br />
'Well, let's get into these beastly clothes for it,' groaned Davis. 'I shall have a plunge overboard.'<br />
<br />
Something drastic was required, and I followed his example, curious as the hour was for bathing.<br />
<br />
'I believe I know what happened just now,' said I, as we plied rough towels in the warmth below. 'They steamed up and found nobody on board. "I'll leave a note," says Dollmann. "No independent communications," say they (or think they), "we'll come too, and take the chance of inspecting this hornets' nest." Down they go, and Dollmann, who knows what to look for first, sees that damning bit of evidence staring him in the face. They look casually at the shelf among other things—examine the logbook, say—and he manages to push his own book out of sight. But he couldn't replace it when the interruption came. The action would have attracted attention then, and Böhme made him leave the cabin in advance, you know.'<br />
<br />
'This is all very well,' said Davies, pausing in his toilet, 'but do they guess how we've spent the day? By Jove, Carruthers, that chart with the square cut out; there it is on the rack!'<br />
<br />
'We must chance it, and bluff for all we're worth,' I said. The fact was that Davies could not be brought to realize that he had done anything very remarkable that day; yet those fourteen sinuous miles traversed blindfold, to say nothing of the return journey and my own exploits, made up an achievement audacious and improbable enough to out-distance suspicion. Nevertheless, von Brüning's banter had been disquieting, and if an inkling of our expedition had crossed his mind or theirs, there were ways of testing us which it would require all our effrontery to defeat.<br />
<br />
'What are you looking for?' said Davies. I was at the collar and stud stage, but had broken off to study the time-table which we had bought that morning.<br />
<br />
'Somebody insists on coming by the night train to somewhere, on the 25th,' I reminded him. 'Böhme, von Brüning, and Grimm are to meet the Somebody.'<br />
<br />
'Where?'<br />
<br />
'At a railway station! I don't know where. They seemed to take it for granted. But it must be somewhere on the sea, because Böhme said, "the tide serves."'<br />
<br />
'It may be anywhere from Emden to Hamburg.'<br />
<br />
'No, there's a limit; it's probably somewhere near. Grimm was to come, and he's at Memmert.'<br />
<br />
'Here's the map... Emden and Norddeich are the only coast stations till you get to Wilhelmshaven—no, to Carolinensiel; but those are a long way east.'<br />
<br />
'And Emden's a long way south. Say Norddeich then; but according to this there's no train there after 6.15 p.m.; that's hardly "night". When's high tide on the 25th?'<br />
<br />
'Let's see—8.30 here to-night—Norddeich'll be the same. Somewhere between 10.30 and 11 on the 25th.'<br />
<br />
'There's a train at Emden at 9.22 from Leer and the south, and one at 10.50 from the north.'<br />
<br />
'Are you counting on another fog?' said Davies, mockingly.<br />
<br />
'No; but I want to know what our plans are.'<br />
<br />
'Can't we wait till this cursed inspection's over?'<br />
<br />
'No, we can't; we should come to grief.' This was no barren truism, for I was ready with a plan of my own, though reluctant to broach it to Davies.<br />
<br />
Meanwhile, ready or not, we had to start. The cabin we left as it was, changing nothing and hiding nothing; the safest course to take, we thought, in spite of the risk of further search. But, as usual, I transferred my diary to my breast-pocket, and made sure that the two official letters from England were safe in a compartment of it.<br />
<br />
'What do you propose?' I asked, when we were in the dinghy again.<br />
<br />
'It's a case of "as you were",' said Davies. 'To-day's trip was a chance we shall never get again. We must go back to last night's decision—tell them that we're going to stay on here for a bit. Shooting, I suppose we shall have to say.'<br />
<br />
'And courting?' I suggested.<br />
<br />
'Well, they know all about that. And then we must watch for a chance of tackling Dollmann privately. Not to-night, because we want time to consider those clues of yours.'<br />
<br />
'"Consider"?' I said: 'that's putting it mildly.'<br />
<br />
We were at the ladder, and what a languid stiffness oppressed me I did not know till I touched its freezing rungs, each one of which seared my sore palms like red-hot iron.<br />
<br />
The overdue steamer was just arriving as we set foot on the quay. 'And yet, by Jove! why not to-night?' pursued Davies, beginning to stride up the pier at a pace I could not imitate.<br />
<br />
'Steady on,' I protested; 'and, look here, I disagree altogether. I believe to-day has doubled our chances, but unless we alter our tactics it has doubled our risks. We've involved ourselves in too tangled a web. I don't like this inspection, and I fear that foxy old Böhme who prompted it. The mere fact of their inviting us shows that we stand badly; for it runs in the teeth of Brüning's warning at Bensersiel, and smells uncommonly like arrest. There's a rift between Dollmann and the others, but it's a ticklish matter to drive our wedge in; as to to-night, hopeless; they're on the watch, and won't give us a chance. And after all, do we know enough? We don't know why he fled from England and turned German. It may have been an extraditable crime, but it may not. Supposing he defies us? There's the girl, you see—she ties our hands, and if he once gets wind of that, and trades on our weakness, the game's up.'<br />
<br />
'What are you driving at?'<br />
<br />
'We want to detach him from Germany, but he'll probably go to any lengths rather than abandon his position here. His attempt on you is the measure of his interest in it. Now, is to-day to be wasted?' We were passing through the public gardens, and I dropped on to a seat for a moment's rest, crackling dead leaves under me. Davies remained standing, and pecked at the gravel with his toe.<br />
<br />
'We have got two valuable clues,' I went on; 'that rendezvous on the 25th is one, and the name Esens is the other. We may consider them to eternity; I vote we act on them.'<br />
<br />
'How?' said Davies. 'We're under a searchlight here; and if we're caught—'<br />
<br />
'Your plan—ugh!—it's as risky as mine, and more so,' I replied, rising with a jerk, for a spasm of cramp took me. 'We must separate,' I added, as we walked on. 'We want, at one stroke, to prove to them that we're harmless, and to get a fresh start. I go back to London.'<br />
<br />
'To London!' said Davies. We were passing under an arc lamp, and, for the dismay his face showed, I might have said Kamchatka.<br />
<br />
'Well, after all, it's where I ought to be at this moment,' I observed.<br />
<br />
'Yes, I forgot. And me?'<br />
<br />
'You can't get on without me, so you lay up the yacht here—taking your time.'<br />
<br />
'While you?'<br />
<br />
'After making inquiries about Dollmann's past I double back as somebody else, and follow up the clues.'<br />
<br />
'You'll have to be quick,' said Davies, abstractedly.<br />
<br />
'I can just do it in time for the 25th.'<br />
<br />
'When you say "making inquiries",' he continued, looking straight before him, 'I hope you don't mean setting other people on his track?'<br />
<br />
'He's fair game!' I could not help saying; for there were moments when I chafed under this scrupulous fidelity to our self-denying ordinance.<br />
<br />
'He's our game, or nobody's,' said Davies, sharply.<br />
<br />
'Oh, I'll keep the secret,' I rejoined.<br />
<br />
'Let's stick together,' he broke out. 'I shall make a muck of it without you. And how are we to communicate—meet?'<br />
<br />
'Somehow—that can wait. I know it's a leap in the dark, but there's safety in darkness.'<br />
<br />
'Carruthers! what are we talking about? If they have the ghost of a notion where we have been to-day, you give us away by packing off to London. They'll think we know their secret and are clearing out to make use of it. That means arrest, if you like!'<br />
<br />
'Pessimist! Haven't I written proof of good faith in my pocket—official letters of recall, received to-day? It's one deception the less, you see; for those letters may have been opened; skilfully done it's impossible to detect. When in doubt, tell the truth!'<br />
<br />
'It's a rum thing how often it pays in this spying business,' said Davies, thoughtfully.<br />
<br />
We had been tramping through deserted streets under the glare of electricity, I with my leaden shuffle, he with the purposeful forward stoop and swinging arms that always marked his gait ashore.<br />
<br />
'Well, what's it to be?' I said. 'Here's the Schwannallée.'<br />
<br />
'I don't like it,' said he; 'but I trust your judgement.'<br />
<br />
We turned slowly down, running over a few last points where prior agreement was essential. As we stood at the very gate of the villa: 'Don't commit yourself to dates,' I said; 'say nothing that will prevent you from being here at least a week hence with the yacht still afloat.' And my final word, as we waited at the door for the bell to be answered, was: 'Don't mind what I say. If things look queer we may have to lighten the ship.'<br />
<br />
'Lighten?' whispered Davies; 'oh, I hope I shan't bosh it.'<br />
<br />
'I hope I shan't get cramp,' I muttered between my teeth.<br />
<br />
It will be remembered that Davies had never been to the villa before.<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-40971142814784667042012-09-01T16:03:00.000+01:002012-09-01T16:03:00.302+01:00Snake Bake<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Legless loaf.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-26147826365470520582012-08-31T16:02:00.000+01:002012-08-31T16:02:00.089+01:00The QuartetteChapter XXII: The Quartette<br />
<br />
HIS tour de force was achieved, and for the moment something like collapse set in.<br />
<br />
'What in the world have we come here for?' he muttered; 'I feel a bit giddy.'<br />
<br />
I made him drink some whisky, which revived him; and then, speaking in whispers, we settled certain points.<br />
<br />
I alone was to land. Davies demurred to this out of loyalty, but common sense, coinciding with a strong aversion of his own, settled the matter. Two were more liable to detection than one. I spoke the language well, and if challenged could cover my retreat with a gruff word or two; in my woollen overalls, sea-boots, oilskin coat, with a sou'-wester pulled well over my eyes, I should pass in a fog for a Frisian. Davies must mind the dinghy; but how was I to regain it? I hoped to do so without help, by using the edge of the sand; but if he heard a long whistle he was to blow the foghorn.<br />
<br />
'Take the pocket-compass,' he said. 'Never budge from the shore without using it, and lay it on the ground for steadiness. Take this scrap of chart, too—it may come in useful; but you can t miss the depot, it looks to be close to the shore. How long will you be'?'<br />
<br />
'How long have I got'?'<br />
<br />
'The young flood's making—has been for nearly an hour—that bank (he measured it with his eye) will be covering in an hour and a half.'<br />
<br />
'That ought to be enough.'<br />
<br />
'Don't run it too fine. It's steep here, but it may shelve farther on. If you have to wade you'll never find me, and you'll make a deuce of a row. Got your watch, matches, knife? No knife? Take mine; never go anywhere without a knife.' (It was his seaman's idea of efficiency.)<br />
<br />
'Wait a bit, we must settle a place to meet at in case I'm late and can't reach you here.'<br />
<br />
'Don't be late. We've got to get back to the yacht before we're missed.'<br />
<br />
'But I may have to hide and wait till dark—the fog may clear.'<br />
<br />
'We were fools to come, I believe,' said Davies, gloomily. 'There are no meeting-places in a place like this. Here's the best I can see on the chart—a big triangular beacon marked on the very point of Memmert. You'll pass it.'<br />
<br />
'All right. I'm off.'<br />
<br />
'Good luck,' said Davies, faintly.<br />
<br />
I stepped out, climbed a miry glacis of five or six feet, reached hard wet sand, and strode away with the sluggish ripple of the Balje on my left hand. A curtain dropped between me and Davies, and I was alone—alone, but how I thrilled to feel the firm sand rustle under my boots; to know that it led to dry land, where, whatever befell, I could give my wits full play. I clove the fog briskly.<br />
<br />
Good Heavens! what was that? I stopped short and listened. From over the water on my left there rang out, dulled by fog, but distinct to the ear, three double strokes on a bell or gong. I looked at my watch.<br />
<br />
'Ship at anchor,' I said to myself. 'Six bells in the afternoon watch.' I knew the Balje was here a deep roadstead, where a vessel entering the Eastern Ems might very well anchor to ride out a fog.<br />
<br />
I was just stepping forward when another sound followed from the same quarter, a bugle-call this time. Then I understood—only men-of-war sound bugles—the Blitz was here then; and very natural, too, I thought, and strode on. The sand was growing drier, the water farther beneath me; then came a thin black ribbon of weed—high-water mark. A few cautious steps to the right and I touched tufts of marram grass. It was Memmert. I pulled out the chart and refreshed my memory. No! there could be no mistake; keep the sea on my left and I must go right. I followed the ribbon of weed, keeping it just in view, but walking on the verge of the grass for the sake of silence. All at once I almost tripped over a massive iron bar; others, a rusty network of them, grew into being above and around me, like the arms of a ghostly polyp.<br />
<br />
'What infernal spider's web is this?' I thought, and stumbled clear. I had strayed into the base of a gigantic tripod, its gaunt legs stayed and cross-stayed, its apex lost in fog; the beacon, I remembered. A hundred yards farther and I was down on my knees again, listening with might and main; for several little sounds were in the air—voices, the rasp of a boat's keel, the whistling of a tune. These were straight ahead. More to the left, seaward, that is, I had aural evidence of the presence of a steamboat—a small one, for the hiss of escaping steam was low down. On my right front I as yet heard nothing, but the depot must be there.<br />
<br />
I prepared to strike away from my base, and laid the compass on the ground—NW. roughly I made the course. ('South-east—south-east for coming back,' I repeated inwardly, like a child learning a lesson.) Then of my two allies I abandoned one, the beach, and threw myself wholly on the fog.<br />
<br />
'Play the game,' I said to myself. 'Nobody expects you; nobody will recognize you.'<br />
<br />
I advanced in rapid stages of ten yards or so, while grass disappeared and soft sand took its place, pitted everywhere with footmarks. I trod carefully, for obstructions began to show themselves—an anchor, a heap of rusty cable; then a boat bottom upwards, and, lying on it, a foul old meerschaum pipe. I paused here and strained my ears, for there were sounds in many directions; the same whistling (behind me now), heavy footsteps in front, and somewhere beyond—fifty yards away, I reckoned—a buzz of guttural conversation; from the same quarter there drifted to my nostrils the acrid odour of coarse tobacco. Then a door banged.<br />
<br />
I put the compass in my pocket (thinking 'south-east, southeast'), placed the pipe between my teeth (ugh! the rank savour of it!) rammed my sou'-wester hard down, and slouched on in the direction of the door that had banged. A voice in front called, 'Karl Schicker'; a nearer voice, that of the man whose footsteps I had heard approaching, took it up and called 'Karl Schicker': I, too, took it up, and, turning my back, called 'Karl Schicker' as gruffly and gutturally as I could. The footsteps passed quite close to me, and glancing over my shoulder I saw a young man passing, dressed very like me, but wearing a sealskin cap instead of a sou'-wester. As he walked he seemed to be counting coins in his palm. A hail came back from the beach and the whistling stopped.<br />
<br />
I now became aware that I was on a beaten track. These meetings were hazardous, so I inclined aside, but not without misgivings, for the path led towards the buzz of talk and the banging door, and these were my only guides to the depot. Suddenly, and much before I expected it, I knew rather than saw that a wall was in front of me; now it was visible, the side of a low building of corrugated iron. A pause to reconnoitre was absolutely necessary; but the knot of talkers might have heard my footsteps, and I must at all costs not suggest the groping of a stranger. I lit a match—two—and sucked heavily (as I had seen navvies do) at my pipe, studying the trend of the wall by reference to the sounds. There was a stale dottle wedged in the bowl, and loathsome fumes resulted. Just then the same door banged again; another name, which I forget, was called out. I decided that I was at the end of a rectangular building which I pictured as like an Aldershot 'hut', and that the door I heard was round the corner to my left. A knot of men must be gathered there, entering it by turns. Having expectorated noisily, I followed the tin wall to my right, and turning a corner strolled leisurely on, passing signs of domesticity, a washtub, a water-butt, then a tiled approach to an open door. I now was aware of the corner of a second building, also of zinc, parallel to the first, but taller, for I could only just see the eave. I was just going to turn off to this as a more promising field for exploration, when I heard a window open ahead of me in my original building.<br />
<br />
I am afraid I am getting obscure, so I append a rough sketch of the scene, as I partly saw and chiefly imagined it. It was window (A) that I heard open. From it I could just distinguish through the fog a hand protrude, and throw something out—cigar-end? The hand, a clean one with a gold signet-ring, rested for an instant afterwards on the sash, and then closed the window.<br />
<br />
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<br />
My geography was clear now in one respect. That window belonged to the same room as the banging door (B); for I distinctly heard the latter open and shut again, opposite me on the other side of the building. It struck me that it might be interesting to see into that room. 'Play the game,' I reminded myself, and retreated a few yards back on tiptoe, then turned and sauntered coolly past the window, puffing my villainous pipe and taking a long deliberate look into the interior as I passed—the more deliberate that at the first instant I realized that nobody inside was disturbing himself about me. As I had expected (in view of the fog and the time) there was artificial light within. My mental photograph was as follows: a small room with varnished deal walls and furnished like an office; in the far right-hand corner a counting-house desk, Grimm sitting at it on a high stool, side-face to me, counting money; opposite him in an awkward attitude a burly fellow in seaman's dress holding a diver's helmet. In the middle of the room a deal table, and on it something big and black. Lolling on chairs near it, their backs to me and their faces turned towards the desk and the diver, two men—von Brüning and an older man with a bald yellow head (Dollmann's companion on the steamer, beyond a doubt). On another chair, with its back actually tilted against the window, Dollmann.<br />
<br />
Such were the principal features of the scene; for details I had to make another inspection. Stooping low, I crept back, quiet as a cat, till I was beneath the window, and, as I calculated, directly behind Dollmann's chair. Then with great caution I raised my head. There was only one pair of eyes in the room that I feared in the least, and that was Grimm's, who sat in profile to me, farthest away. I instantly put Dollmann's back between Grimm and me, and then made my scrutiny. As I made it, I could feel a cold sweat distilling on my forehead and tickling my spine; not from fear or excitement, but from pure ignominy. For beyond all doubt I was present at the meeting of a bona-fide salvage company. It was pay-day, and the directors appeared to be taking stock of work done; that was all.<br />
<br />
Over the door was an old engraving of a two-decker under full sail; pinned on the wall a chart and the plan of a ship. Relics of the wrecked frigate abounded. On a shelf above the stove was a small pyramid of encrusted cannon-balls, and supported on nails at odd places on the walls were corroded old pistols, and what I took to be the remains of a sextant. In a corner of the floor sat a hoary little carronade, carriage and all. None of these things affected me so much as a pile of lumber on the floor, not firewood but unmistakable wreck-wood, black as bog-oak, still caked in places with the mud of ages. Nor was it the mere sight of this lumber that dumbfounded me. It was the fact that a fragment of it, a balk of curved timber garnished with some massive bolts, lay on the table, and was evidently an object of earnest interest. The diver had turned and was arguing with gestures over it; von Brüning and Grimm were pressing another view. The diver shook his head frequently, finally shrugged his shoulders, made a salutation, and left the room. Their movements had kept me ducking my head pretty frequently, but I now grew almost reckless as to whether I was seen or not. All the weaknesses of my theory crowded on me—the arguments Davies had used at Bensersiel; Fräulein Dollmann's thoughtless talk; the ease (comparatively) with which I had reached this spot, not a barrier to cross or a lock to force; the publicity of their passage to Memmert by Dollmann, his friend, and Grimm; and now this glimpse of business-like routine. In a few moments I sank from depth to depth of scepticism. Where were my mines, torpedoes, and submarine boats, and where my imperial conspirators? Was gold after all at the bottom of this sordid mystery? Dollmann after all a commonplace criminal? The ladder of proof I had mounted tottered and shook beneath me. 'Don't be a fool,' said the faint voice of reason. 'There are your four men. Wait.'<br />
<br />
Two more employés came into the room in quick succession and received wages; one looking like a fireman, the other of a superior type, the skipper of a tug, say. There was another discussion with this latter over the balk of wreck-wood, and this man, too, shrugged his shoulders. His departure appeared to end the meeting. Grimm shut up a ledger, and I shrank down on my knees, for a general shifting of chairs began. At the same time, from the other side of the building, I heard my knot of men retreating beachwards, spitting and chatting as they went. Presently someone walked across the room towards my window. I sidled away on all fours, rose and flattened myself erect against the wall, a sickening despondency on me; my intention to slink away south-east as soon as the coast was clear. But the sound that came next pricked me like an electric shock; it was the tinkle and scrape of curtain-rings.<br />
<br />
Quick as thought I was back in my old position, to find my view barred by a cretonne curtain. It was in one piece, with no chink for my benefit, but it did not hang straight, bulging towards me under the pressure of something—human shoulders by the shape. Dollmann, I concluded, was still in his old place. I now was exasperated to find that I could scarcely hear a word that was said, not even by pressing my ear against the glass. It was not that the speakers were of set purpose hushing their voices—they used an ordinary tone for intimate discussion—but the glass and curtain deadened the actual words. Still, I was soon able to distinguish general characteristics. Von Brüning's voice—the only one I had ever heard before—I recognized at once: he was on the left of the table, and Dollmann's I knew from his position. The third was a harsh croak, belonging to the old gentleman whom, for convenience, I shall prematurely begin to call Herr Böhme. It was too old a voice to be Grimm's; besides, it had the ring of authority, and was dealing at the moment in sharp interrogations. Three of its sentences I caught in their entirety. 'When was that?' 'They went no farther?' and 'Too long; out of the question.' Dollmann's voice, though nearest to me, was the least audible of all. It was a dogged monotone, and what was that odd movement of the curtain at his back? Yes, his hands were behind him clutching and kneading a fold of the cretonne. 'You are feeling uncomfortable, my friend,' was my comment. Suddenly he threw back his head—I saw the dent of it—and spoke up so that I could not miss a word. 'Very well, sir, you shall see them at supper to-night; I will ask them both.'<br />
<br />
(You will not be surprised to learn that I instantly looked at my watch—though it takes long to write what I have described—but the time was only a quarter to four.) He added something about the fog, and his chair creaked. Ducking promptly I heard the curtain-rings jar, and: 'Thick as ever.'<br />
<br />
'Your report, Herr Dollmann,' said Böhme, curtly. Dollmann left the window and moved his chair up to the table; the other two drew in theirs and settled themselves.<br />
<br />
'Chatham,' said Dollmann, as if announcing a heading. It was an easy word to catch, rapped out sharp, and you can imagine how it startled me. 'That's where you've been for the last month!' I said to myself. A map crackled and I knew they were bending over it, while Dollmann explained something. But now my exasperation became acute, for not a syllable more reached me. Squatting back on my heels, I cast about for expedients. Should I steal round and try the door? Too dangerous. Climb to the roof and listen down the stove-pipe? Too noisy, and generally hopeless. I tried for a downward purchase on the upper half of the window, which was of the simple sort in two sections, working vertically. No use; it resisted gentle pressure, would start with a sudden jar if I forced it. I pulled out Davies's knife and worked the point of the blade between sash and frame to give it play—no result; but the knife was a nautical one, with a marlin-spike as well as a big blade.<br />
<br />
Just now the door within opened and shut again, and I heard steps approaching round the corner to my right. I had the presence of mind not to lose a moment, but moved silently away (blessing the deep Frisian sand) round the corner of the big parallel building. Someone whom I could not see walked past till his boots clattered on tiles, next resounded on boards. 'Grimm in his living-room,' I inferred. The precious minutes ebbed away—five, ten, fifteen. Had he gone for good? I dared not return otherwise. Eighteen—he was coming out! This time I stole forward boldly when the man had just passed, dimly saw a figure, and clearly enough the glint of a white paper he was holding. He made his circuit and re-entered the room.<br />
<br />
Here I felt and conquered a relapse to scepticism. 'If this is an important conclave why don't they set guards?' Answer, the only possible one, 'Because they stand alone. Their employés, like everyone we had met hitherto, know nothing. The real object of this salvage company (a poor speculation, I opined) is solely to afford a pretext for the conclave.' 'Why the curtain, even?' 'Because there are maps, stupid!'<br />
<br />
I was back again at the window, but as impotent as ever against that even stream of low confidential talk. But I would not give up. Fate and the fog had brought me here, the one solitary soul perhaps who by the chain of circumstances had both the will and the opportunity to wrest their secret from these four men.<br />
<br />
The marlin-spike! Where the lower half of the window met the sill it sank into a shallow groove. I thrust the point of the spike down into the interstice between sash and frame and heaved with a slowly increasing force, which I could regulate to the fraction of an ounce, on this powerful lever. The sash gave, with the faintest possible protest, and by imperceptible degrees I lifted it to the top of the groove, and the least bit above it, say half an inch in all; but it made an appreciable difference to the sounds within, as when you remove your foot from a piano's soft pedal. I could do no more, for there was no further fulcrum for the spike, and I dared not gamble away what I had won by using my hands.<br />
<br />
Hope sank again when I placed my cheek on the damp sill, and my ear to the chink. My men were close round the table referring to papers which I heard rustle. Dollmann's 'report' was evidently over, and I rarely heard his voice; Grimm's occasionally, von Brüning's and Böhme's frequently; but, as before, it was the latter only that I could ever count on for an intelligible word. For, unfortunately, the villains of the piece plotted without any regard to dramatic fitness or to my interests. Immersed in a subject with which they were all familiar, they were allusive, elliptic, and persistently technical. Many of the words I did catch were unknown to me. The rest were, for the most part, either letters of the alphabet or statistical figures, of depth, distance, and, once or twice, of time. The letters of the alphabet recurred often, and seemed, as far as I could make out, to represent the key to the cipher. The numbers clustering round them were mostly very small, with decimals. What maddened me most was the scarcity of plain nouns.<br />
<br />
To report what I heard to the reader would be impossible; so chaotic was most of it that it left no impression on my own memory. All I can do is to tell him what fragments stuck, and what nebulous classification I involved. The letters ran from A to G, and my best continuous chance came when Böhme, reading rapidly from a paper, I think, went through the letters, backwards, from G, adding remarks to each; thus: 'G. . . completed.' 'F. . . bad. . . 1.3 (metres?). . .2.5 (kilometres?).' 'E . . . thirty-two. . . 1.2.' 'D. . . 3 weeks. . . thirty.' 'C. . .'and soon.<br />
<br />
Another time he went through this list again, only naming each letter himself, and receiving laconic answers from Grimm—answers which seemed to be numbers, but I could not be sure. For minutes together I caught nothing but the scratching of pens and inarticulate mutterings. But out of the muck-heap I picked five pearls—four sibilant nouns and a name that I knew before. The nouns were 'Schleppboote' (tugs); 'Wassertiefe' (depth of water); 'Eisenbahn' (railway); 'Lotsen' (pilots). The name, also sibilant and thus easier to hear, was 'Esens'.<br />
<br />
Two or three times I had to stand back and ease my cramped neck, and on each occasion I looked at my watch, for I was listening against time, just as we had rowed against time. We were going to be asked to supper, and must be back aboard the yacht in time to receive the invitation. The fog still brooded heavily and the light, always bad, was growing worse. How would they get back? How had they come from Juist? Could we forestall them? Questions of time, tide, distance—just the odious sort of sums I was unfit to cope with—were distracting my attention when it should have been wholly elsewhere. 4.20—4.25—now it was past 4.30 when Davies said the bank would cover. I should have to make for the beacon; but it was fatally near that steamboat path, etc., and I still at intervals heard voices from there. It must have been about 4.35 when there was another shifting of chairs within. Then someone rose, collected papers, and went out; someone else, without rising (therefore Grimm), followed him.<br />
<br />
There was silence in the room for a minute, and after that, for the first time, I heard some plain colloquial German, with no accompaniment of scratching or rustling. 'I must wait for this,' I thought, and waited.<br />
<br />
'He insists on coming,' said Böhme.<br />
<br />
'Ach!' (an ejaculation of surprise and protest from von Brüning).<br />
<br />
'I said the 25th.'<br />
<br />
'Why?'<br />
<br />
'The tide serves well. The night-train, of course. Tell Grimm to be ready—' (An inaudible question from von Brüning.) 'No, any weather.' A laugh from von Brüning and some words I could not catch.<br />
<br />
'Only one, with half a load.'<br />
<br />
'. . .meet?'<br />
<br />
'At the station.'<br />
<br />
'So—how's the fog?'<br />
<br />
This appeared to be really the end. Both men rose and steps came towards the window. I leapt aside as I heard it thrown up, and covered by the noise backed into safety. Von Brüning called 'Grimm!' and that, and the open window, decided me that my line of advance was now too dangerous to retreat by. The only alternative was to make a circuit round the bigger of the two buildings—and an interminable circuit it seemed—and all the while I knew my compass-course 'south-east' was growing nugatory. I passed a padlocked door, two corners, and faced the void of fog. Out came the compass, and I steadied myself for the sum. 'South-east before—I'm farther to the eastward now—east will about do'; and off I went, with an error of four whole points, over tussocks and deep sand. The beach seemed much farther off than I had thought, and I began to get alarmed, puzzled over the compass several times, and finally realized that I had lost my way. I had the sense not to make matters worse by trying to find it again, and, as the lesser of two evils, blew my whistle, softly at first, then louder. The bray of a foghorn sounded right behind me. I whistled again and then ran for my life, the horn sounding at intervals. In three or four minutes I was on the beach and in the dinghy.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-52101200277041349312012-08-30T16:01:00.000+01:002012-08-30T16:01:00.456+01:00Missing?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Where's?One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-84536990915256308662012-08-29T16:00:00.000+01:002012-08-29T16:00:09.488+01:00Blindfold To MemmertChapter XXI: Blindfold To Memmert<br />
'HERE she comes,' said Davies. It was nine o'clock on the next day, 22nd October, and we were on deck waiting for the arrival of the steamer from Norddeich. There was no change in the weather—still the same stringent cold, with a high barometer, and only fickle flaws of air; but the morning was gloriously clear, except for a wreath or two of mist curling like smoke from the sea, and an attenuated belt of opaque fog on the northern horizon. The harbour lay open before us, and very commodious and civilized it looked, enclosed between two long piers which ran quite half a mile out from the land to the road-stead (Riff-Gat by name) where we lay. A stranger might have taken it for a deep and spacious haven; but this, of course, was an illusion, due to the high water. Davies knew that three-quarters of it was mud, the remainder being a dredged-out channel along the western pier. A couple of tugs, a dredger, and a ferry packet with steam up, were moored on that side—a small stack of galliots on the other. Beyond these was another vessel, a galliot in build, but radiant as a queen among sluts; her varnished sides and spars flashing orange in the sun. These, and her snow-white sail-covers and the twinkle of brass and gun-metal, proclaimed her to be a yacht. I had already studied her through the glasses and read on her stern Medusa. A couple of sailors were swabbing her decks; you could hear the slush of the water and the scratching of the deck-brooms. 'They can see us anyway,' Davies had said.<br />
<br />
For that matter all the world could see us—certainly the incoming steamer must; for we lay as near to the pier as safety permitted, abreast of the berth she would occupy, as we knew by a gangway and a knot of sailors.<br />
<br />
A packet boat, not bigger than a big tug, was approaching from the south.<br />
<br />
'Remember, we're not supposed to know he's coming,' I said; 'let's go below.' Besides the skylight, our 'coach-house' cabin top had little oblong side windows. We wiped clean those on the port side and watched events from them, kneeling on the sofa.<br />
<br />
The steamer backed her paddles, flinging out a wash that set us rolling to our scuppers. There seemed to be very few passengers aboard, but all of them were gazing at the Dulcibella while the packet was warped alongside. On the forward deck there were some market-women with baskets, a postman, and a weedy youth who might be an hotel waiter; on the after-deck, standing close together, were two men in ulsters and soft felt hats.<br />
<br />
'There he is!' said Davies, in a tense whisper; 'the tall one.' But the tall one turned abruptly as Davies spoke and strode away behind the deck-house, leaving me just a lightning impression of a grey beard and a steep tanned forehead, behind a cloud of cigar smoke. It was perverse of me, but, to tell the truth, I hardly missed him, so occupied was I by the short one, who remained leaning on the rail, thoughtfully contemplating the Dulcibella through gold-rimmed pince-nez: a sallow, wizened old fellow, beetlebrowed, with a bush of grizzled moustache and a jet-black tuft of beard on his chin. The most remarkable feature was the nose, which was broad and flat, merging almost imperceptibly in the wrinkled cheeks. Lightly beaked at the nether extremity, it drooped towards an enormous cigar which was pointing at us like a gun just discharged. He looked wise as Satan, and you would say he was smiling inwardly.<br />
<br />
'Who's that?' I whispered to Davies. (There was no need to talk in whispers, but we did so instinctively.)<br />
<br />
'Can't think,' said Davies. 'Hullo! she's backing off, and they've not landed.'<br />
<br />
Some parcels and mail-bags had been thrown up, and the weedy waiter and two market-women had gone up the gangway, which was now being hauled up, and were standing on the quay. I think one or two other persons had first come aboard unnoticed by us, but at the last moment a man we had not seen before jumped down to the forward deck. 'Grimm!' we both ejaculated at once.<br />
<br />
The steamer whistled sharply, circled backwards into the road-stead, and then steamed away. The pier soon hid her, but her smoke showed she was steering towards the North Sea.<br />
<br />
'What does this mean?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'There must be some other quay to stop at nearer the town,' said Davies. 'Let's go ashore and get your letters.'<br />
<br />
We had made a long and painful toilette that morning, and felt quite shy of one another as we sculled towards the pier, in much-creased blue suits, conventional collars, and brown boots. It was the first time for two years that I had seen Davies in anything approaching a respectable garb; but a fashionable watering-place, even in the dead season, exacts respect; and, besides, we had friends to visit.<br />
<br />
We tied up the dinghy to an iron ladder, and on the pier found our inquisitor of the night before smoking in the doorway of a shed marked 'Harbour Master'. After some civilities we inquired about the steamer. The answer was that it was Saturday, and she had, therefore, gone on to Juist. Did we want a good hotel? The 'Vier Jahreszeiten' was still open, etc.<br />
<br />
'Juist, by Jove!' said Davies, as we walked on. 'Why are those three going to Juist?'<br />
<br />
'I should have thought it was pretty clear. They're on their way to Memmert.'<br />
<br />
Davies agreed, and we both looked longingly westward at a straw-coloured streak on the sea.<br />
<br />
'Is it some meeting, do you think?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'Looks like it. We shall probably find the Kormoran here, wind-bound.'<br />
<br />
And find her we did soon after, the outermost of the stack of galliots, on the farther side of the harbour. Two men, whose faces we took a good look at, were sitting on her hatch, mending a sail.<br />
<br />
Flooded with sun, yet still as the grave, the town was like a dead butterfly for whom the healing rays had come too late. We crossed some deserted public gardens commanded by a gorgeous casino, its porticos heaped with chairs and tables; so past kiosques and cafés, great white hotels with boarded windows, bazaars and booths, and all the stale lees of vulgar frivolity, to the post-office, which at least was alive. I received a packet of letters and purchased a local time-table, from which we learned that the steamer sailed daily to Borkum via Norderney, touching three times a week at Juist (weather permitting). On the return journey to-day it was due at Norderney at 7.30 p.m. Then I inquired the way to the 'Vier Jahreszeiten'. 'For whatever your principles, Davies,' I said, 'we are going to have the best breakfast money can buy! We've got the whole day before us.'<br />
<br />
The 'Four Seasons' Hotel was on the esplanade facing the northern beach. Living up to its name, it announced on an illuminated sign-board, 'Inclusive terms for winter visitors; special attention to invalids, etc.' Here in a great glass restaurant, with the unruffled blue of ocean spread out before us, we ate the king of breakfasts, dismissed the waiter, and over long and fragrant Havanas examined my mail at leisure.<br />
<br />
'What a waste of good diplomacy!' was my first thought, for nothing had been tampered with, so far as we could judge from the minutest scrutiny, directed, of course, in particular to the franked official letters (for to my surprise there were two) from Whitehall.<br />
<br />
The first in order of date (6th Oct.) ran: 'Dear Carruthers.—Take another week by all means.—Yours, etc.'<br />
<br />
The second (marked 'urgent') had been sent to my home address and forwarded. It was dated 15th October, and cancelled the previous letter, requesting me to return to London without delay—'I am sorry to abridge your holiday, but we are very busy, and, at present, short-handed.—Yours, etc.' There was a dry postscript to the effect that another time I was to be good enough to leave more regular and definite information as to my whereabouts when absent.<br />
<br />
'I'm afraid I never got this!' I said, handing it to Davies.<br />
<br />
'You won't go, will you?' said he, looking, nevertheless, with unconcealed awe at the great man's handwriting under the haughty official crest. Meanwhile I discovered an endorsement on a corner of the envelope: 'Don't worry; it's only the chief's fuss.—M—' I promptly tore up the envelope. There are domestic mysteries which it would be indecent and disloyal to reveal, even to one's best friend. The rest of my letters need no remark; I smiled over some and blushed over others—all were voices from a life which was infinitely far away. Davies, meanwhile, was deep in the foreign intelligence of a newspaper, spelling it out line by line, and referring impatiently to me for the meaning of words.<br />
<br />
'Hullo!' he said, suddenly; 'same old game! Hear that siren?' A curtain of fog had grown on the northern horizon and was drawing shorewards slowly but surely.<br />
<br />
'It doesn't matter, does it?' I said.<br />
<br />
'Well, we must get back to the yacht. We can't leave her alone in the fog.'<br />
<br />
There was some marketing to be done on the way back, and in the course of looking for the shops we wanted we came on the Schwannallée and noted its position. Before we reached the harbour the fog was on us, charging up the streets in dense masses. Happily a tramline led right up to the pier-head, or we should have lost our way and wasted time, which, in the event, was of priceless value. Presently we stumbled up against the Harbour Office, which was our landmark for the steps where we had tied up the dinghy. The same official appeared and good-naturedly held the painter while we handed in our parcels. He wanted to know why we had left the flesh-pots of the 'Vier Jahreszeiten'. To look after our yacht, of course. There was no need, he objected; there would be no traffic moving while the fog lasted, and the fog, having come on at that hour, had come to stay. If it did clear he would keep an eye on the yacht for us. We thanked him, but thought we would go aboard.<br />
<br />
'You'll have a job to find her now,' he said.<br />
<br />
The distance was eighty yards at the most, but we had to use a scientific method, the same one, in fact, that Davies had used last night in the approach to the eastern pier.<br />
<br />
'Row straight out at right angles to the pier,' he said now. I did so, Davies sounding with his scull between the strokes. He found the bottom after twenty yards, that being the width of the dredged-out channel at this point. Then we turned to the right, and moved gently forward, keeping touch with the edge of the mud-bank (for all the world like blind men tapping along a kerbstone) and taking short excursions from it, till the Dulcibella hove in view. 'That's partly luck,' Davies commented; 'we ought to have had the compass as well.'<br />
<br />
We exchanged shouts with the man on the pier to show we had arrived.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
'It's very good practice, that sort of thing,' said Davies, when we had disembarked.<br />
<br />
'You've got a sixth sense,' I observed. 'How far could you go like that?'<br />
<br />
'Don't know. Let's have another try. I can't sit still all day. Let's explore this channel.'<br />
<br />
'Why not go to Memmert?' I said, in fun.<br />
<br />
'To Memmert?' said Davies, slowly; 'by Jove! that's an idea!'<br />
<br />
'Good Heavens, man! I was joking. Why, it's ten mortal miles.'<br />
<br />
'More,' said Davies, absently. 'It's not so much the distance—what's the time? Ten fifteen; quarter ebb—What am I talking about? We made our plans last night.'<br />
<br />
But seeing him, to my amazement, serious, I was stung by the splendour of the idea I had awakened. Confidence in his skill was second nature to me. I swept straight on to the logic of the thing, the greatness, the completeness of the opportunity, if by a miracle it could be seized and used. Something was going on at Memmert to-day; our men had gone there; here were we, ten miles away, in a smothering, blinding fog. It was known we were here—Dollmann and Grimm knew it; the crew of the Medusa knew it; the crew of the Kormoran knew it; the man on the pier, whether he cared or not, knew it. But none of them knew Davies as I knew him. Would anyone dream for an instant—?<br />
<br />
'Stop a second,' said Davies; 'give me two minutes.' He whipped out the German chart. 'Where exactly should we go?' ('Exactly!' The word tickled me hugely.)<br />
<br />
'To the depot, of course; it's our only chance.'<br />
<br />
'Listen then—there are two routes: the outside one by the open sea, right round Juist, and doubling south—the simplest, but the longest; the depot's at the south point of Memmert, and Memmert's nearly two miles long.'<br />
<br />
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<br />
'How far would that way be?'<br />
<br />
'Sixteen miles good. And we should have to row in a breaking swell most of the way, close to land.'<br />
<br />
'Out of the question; it's too public, too, if it clears. The steamer went that way, and will come back that way. We must go inside over the sands. Am I dreaming, though? Can you possibly find the way?'<br />
<br />
'I shouldn't wonder. But I don't believe you see the hitch. It's the time and the falling tide. High water was about 8.15: it's now 10.15, and all those sands are drying off. We must cross the See-Gat and strike that boomed channel, the Memmert Balje; strike it, freeze on to it—can't cut off an inch—and pass that "watershed" you see there before it's too late. It's an infernally bad one, I can see. Not even a dinghy will cross it for an hour each side of low water.'<br />
<br />
'Well, how far is the "watershed"?'<br />
<br />
'Good Lord! What are we talking for? Change, man, change! Talk while we're changing.' (He began flinging off his shore clothes, and I did the same.) 'It's at least five miles to the end of it; six, allowing for bends; hour and a half hard pulling; two, allowing for checks. Are you fit? You'll have to pull the most. Then there are six or seven more miles—easier ones. And then—What are we to do when we get there?'<br />
<br />
'Leave that to me,' I said. 'You get me there.'<br />
<br />
'Supposing it clears?'<br />
<br />
'After we get there? Bad; but we must risk that. If it clears on the way there it doesn't matter by this route; we shall be miles from land.'<br />
<br />
'What about getting back?'<br />
<br />
'We shall have a rising tide, anyway. If the fog lasts—can you manage in a fog and dark?'<br />
<br />
'The dark makes it no more difficult, if we've a light to see the compass and chart by. You trim the binnacle lamp—no, the riding-light. Now give me the scissors, and don't speak a word for ten minutes. Meanwhile, think it out, and load the dinghy—(by Jove! though, don't make a sound)—some grub and whisky, the boat-compass, lead, riding-light, matches, small boat-hook, grapnel and line.'<br />
<br />
'Foghorn?'<br />
<br />
'Yes, and the whistle too.'<br />
<br />
'A gun?'<br />
<br />
'What for?'<br />
<br />
'We're after ducks.'<br />
<br />
'All right. And muffle the rowlocks with cotton-waste.'<br />
<br />
I left Davies absorbed in the charts, and softly went about my own functions. In ten minutes he was on the ladder, beckoning.<br />
<br />
'I've done,' he whispered. 'Now shall we go?'<br />
<br />
'I've thought it out. Yes,' I answered.<br />
<br />
This was only roughly true, for I could not have stated in words all the pros and cons that I had balanced. It was an impulse that drove me forward; but an impulse founded on reason, with just a tinge, perhaps, of superstition; for the quest had begun in a fog and might fitly end in one.<br />
<br />
It was twenty-five minutes to eleven when we noiselessly pushed off. 'Let her drift,' whispered Davies, 'the ebb'll carry her past the pier.'<br />
<br />
We slid by the Dulcibella, and she disappeared. Then we sat without speech or movement for about five minutes, while the gurgle of tide through piles approached and passed. The dinghy appeared to be motionless, just as a balloon in the clouds may appear to its occupants to be motionless, though urged by a current of air. In reality we were driving out of the Riff-Gat into the See-Gat. The dinghy swayed to a light swell.<br />
<br />
'Now, pull,' said Davies, under his breath; 'keep it long and steady, above all steady—both arms with equal force.'<br />
<br />
I was on the bow-thwart; he vis-à-vis to me on the stern seat, his left hand behind him on the tiller, his right forefinger on a small square of paper which lay on his knees; this was a section cut out from the big German chart. On the midship-thwart between us lay the compass and a watch. Between these three objects—compass, watch, and chart—his eyes darted constantly, never looking up or out, save occasionally for a sharp glance over the side at the flying bubbles, to see if I was sustaining a regular speed. My duty was to be his automaton, the human equivalent of a marine engine whose revolutions can be counted and used as data by the navigator. My arms must be regular as twin pistons; the energy that drove them as controllable as steam. It was a hard ideal to reach, for the complex mortal tends to rely on all the senses God has given him, so unfitting himself for mechanical exactitude when a sense (eyesight, in my case) fails him. At first it was constantly 'left' or 'right' from Davies, accompanied by a bubbling from the rudder.<br />
<br />
'This won't do, too much helm,' said Davies, without looking up. 'Keep your stroke, but listen to me. Can you see the compass card?'<br />
<br />
'When I come forward.'<br />
<br />
'Take your time, and don't get flurried, but each time you come forward have a good look at it. The course is sou'-west half-west. You take the opposite, north-east half-east, and keep her stern on that. It'll be rough, but it'll save some helm, and give me a hand free if I want it.'<br />
<br />
I did as he said, not without effort, and our progress gradually became smoother, till he had no need to speak at all. The only sound now was one like the gentle simmer of a saucepan away to port—the lisp of surf I knew it to be—and the muffled grunt of the rowlocks. I broke the silence once to say 'It's very shallow.' I had touched sand with my right scull.<br />
<br />
'Don't talk,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
About half an hour passed, and then he added sounding to his other occupations. 'Plump' went the lead at regular intervals, and he steered with his hip while pulling in the line. Very little of it went out at first, then less still. Again I struck bottom, and, glancing aside, saw weeds. Suddenly he got a deep cast, and the dinghy, freed from the slight drag which shallow water always inflicts on a small boat, leapt buoyantly forward. At the same time, I knew by boils on the smooth surface that we were in a strong tideway.<br />
<br />
'The Buse Tief,' muttered Davies. 'Row hard now, and steady as a clock.'<br />
<br />
For a hundred yards or more I bent to my sculls and made her fly. Davies was getting six fathom casts, till, just as suddenly as it had deepened, the water shoaled—ten feet, six, three, one—the dinghy grounded.<br />
<br />
'Good!' said Davies. 'Back her off! Pull your right only.' The dinghy spun round with her bow to N.N.W. 'Both arms together! Don't you worry about the compass now; just pull, and listen for orders. There's a tricky bit coming.'<br />
<br />
He put aside the chart, kicked the lead under the seat, and, kneeling on the dripping coils of line, sounded continuously with the butt-end of the boat-hook, a stumpy little implement, notched at intervals of a foot, and often before used for the same purpose. All at once I was aware that a check had come, for the dinghy swerved and doubled like a hound ranging after scent.<br />
<br />
'Stop her,' he said, suddenly, 'and throw out the grapnel.'<br />
<br />
I obeyed and we brought up, swinging to a slight current, whose direction Davies verified by the compass. Then for half a minute he gave himself up to concentrated thought. What struck me most about him was that he never for a moment strained his eyes through the fog; a useless exercise (for five yards or so was the radius of our vision) which, however, I could not help indulging in, while I rested. He made up his mind, and we were off again, straight and swift as an arrow this time, and in water deeper than the boat-hook. I could see by his face that he was taking some bold expedient whose issue hung in the balance ... Again we touched mud, and the artist's joy of achievement shone in his eyes. Backing away, we headed west, and for the first time he began to gaze into the fog.<br />
<br />
'There's one!' he snapped at last. 'Easy all!'<br />
<br />
A boom, one of the usual upright saplings, glided out of the mist. He caught hold of it, and we brought up.<br />
<br />
'Rest for three minutes now,' he said. 'We're in fairly good time.'<br />
<br />
It was 11.10. I ate some biscuits and took a nip of whisky while Davies prepared for the next stage.<br />
<br />
We had reached the eastern outlet of Memmert Balje, the channel which runs east and west behind Juist Island, direct to the south point of Memmert. How we had reached it was incomprehensible to me at the time, but the reader will understand by comparing my narrative with the dotted line on the chart. I add this brief explanation, that Davies's method had been to cross the channel called the Buse Tief, and strike the other side of it at a point well south of the outlet of the Memmert Balje (in view of the northward set of the ebb-tide), and then to drop back north and feel his way to the outlet. The check was caused by a deep indentation in the Itzendorf Flat; a cul-de-sac, with a wide mouth, which Davies was very near mistaking for the Balje itself. We had no time to skirt dents so deep as that; hence the dash across its mouth with the chance of missing the upper lip altogether, and of either being carried out to sea (for the slightest error was cumulative) or straying fruitlessly along the edge.<br />
<br />
The next three miles were the most critical of all. They included the 'watershed', whose length and depth were doubtful; they included, too, the crux of the whole passage, a spot where the channel forks, our own branch continuing west, and another branch diverging from it north-westward. We must row against time, and yet we must negotiate that crux. Add to this that the current was against us till the watershed was crossed; that the tide was just at its most baffling stage, too low to allow us to risk short cuts, and too high to give definition to the banks of the channel; and that the compass was no aid whatever for the minor bends. 'Time's up,' said Davies, and on we went. I was hugging the comfortable thought that we should now have booms on our starboard for the whole distance; on our starboard, I say, for experience had taught us that all channels running parallel with the coast and islands were uniformly boomed on the northern side. Anyone less confident than Davies would have succumbed to the temptation of slavishly relying on these marks, creeping from one to the other, and wasting precious time. But Davies knew our friend the 'boom' and his eccentricities too well; and preferred to trust to his sense of touch, which no fog in the world could impair. If we happened to sight one, well and good, we should know which side of the channel we were on. But even this contingent advantage he deliberately sacrificed after a short distance, for he crossed over to the south or unboomed side and steered and sounded along it, using the ltzendorf Flat as his handrail, so to speak. He was compelled to do this, he told me afterwards, in view of the crux, where the converging lines of booms would have involved us in irremediable confusion. Our branch was the southern one, and it followed that we must use the southern bank, and defer obtaining any help from booms until sure we were past that critical spot.<br />
<br />
For an hour we were at the extreme strain, I of physical exertion, he of mental. I could not get into a steady swing, for little checks were constant. My right scull was for ever skidding on mud or weeds, and the backward suck of shoal water clogged our progress. Once we were both of us out in the slime tugging at the dinghy's sides; then in again, blundering on. I found the fog bemusing, lost all idea of time and space, and felt like a senseless marionette kicking and jerking to a mad music without tune or time. The misty form of Davies as he sat with his right arm swinging rhythmically forward and back, was a clockwork figure as mad as myself, but didactic and gibbering in his madness. Then the boat-hook he wielded with a circular sweep began to take grotesque shapes in my heated fancy; now it was the antenna of a groping insect, now the crank of a cripple's self-propelled perambulator, now the alpenstock of a lunatic mountaineer, who sits in his chair and climbs and climbs to some phantom 'watershed'. At the back of such mind as was left me lodged two insistent thoughts: 'we must hurry on,' 'we are going wrong.' As to the latter, take a link-boy through a London fog and you will experience the same thing: he always goes the way you think is wrong. 'We're rowing back!' I remember shouting to Davies once, having become aware that it was now my left scull which splashed against obstructions. 'Rubbish,' said Davies. 'I've crossed over'; and I relapsed.<br />
<br />
By degrees I returned to sanity, thanks to improved conditions. It is an ill wind that blows nobody good, and the state of the tide, though it threatened us with total failure, had the compensating advantage that the lower it fell the more constricted and defined became our channel; till the time came when the compass and boat-hook were alike unnecessary, because our hand-rail, the muddy brink of the channel, was visible to the eye, close to us; on our right hand always now, for the crux was far behind, and the northern side was now our guide. All that remained was to press on with might and main ere the bed of the creek dried.<br />
<br />
What a race it was! Homeric, in effect; a struggle of men with gods, for what were the gods but forces of nature personified'? If the God of the Falling Tide did not figure in the Olympian circle he is none the less a mighty divinity. Davies left his post, and rowed stroke. Under our united efforts the dinghy advanced in strenuous leaps, hurling miniature-rollers on the bank beside us. My palms, seasoned as they were, were smarting with watery blisters. The pace was too hot for my strength and breath.<br />
<br />
'I must have a rest,' I gasped.<br />
<br />
'Well, I think we're over it,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
We stopped the dinghy dead, and he stabbed over the side with the boat-hook. It passed gently astern of us, and even my bewildered brain took in the meaning of that.<br />
<br />
'Three feet and the current with us. Well over it,' he said. 'I'll paddle on while you rest and feed.'<br />
<br />
It was a few minutes past one and we still, as he calculated, had eight miles before us, allowing for bends.<br />
<br />
'But it's a mere question of muscle,' he said.<br />
<br />
I took his word for it, and munched at tongue and biscuits. As for muscle, we were both in hard condition. He was fresh, and what distress I felt was mainly due to spasmodic exertion culminating in that desperate spurt. As for the fog, it had more than once shown a faint tendency to lift, growing thinner and more luminous, in the manner of fogs, always to settle down again, heavy as a quilt.<br />
<br />
Note the spot marked 'second rest' (approximately correct. Davies says) and the course of the channel from that point westward. You will see it broadening and deepening to the dimensions of a great river, and finally merging in the estuary of the Ems. Note, too, that its northern boundary, the edge of the now uncovered Nordland Sand, leads, with one interruption (marked A), direct to Memmert, and is boomed throughout. You will then understand why Davies made so light of the rest of his problem. Compared with the feats he had performed, it was child's play, for he always had that visible margin to keep touch with if he chose, or to return to in case of doubt. As a matter of fact—observe our dotted line—he made two daring departures from it, the first purely to save time, the second partly to save time and partly to avoid the very awkward spot marked A, where a creek with booms and a little delta of its own interrupts the even bank. During the first of these departures—the shortest but most brilliant—he let me do the rowing, and devoted himself to the niceties of the course; during the second, and through both the intermediate stages, he rowed himself, with occasional pauses to inspect the chart. We fell into a long, measured stroke, and covered the miles rapidly, scarcely exchanging a single word till, at the end of a long pull through vacancy, Davies said suddenly:<br />
<br />
'Now where are we to land?'<br />
<br />
A sandbank was looming over us crowned by a lonely boom.<br />
<br />
'Where are we?'<br />
<br />
'A quarter of a mile from Memmert.'<br />
<br />
'What time is it?'<br />
<br />
'Nearly three.'One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-81090639071747423162012-08-28T15:59:00.000+01:002012-08-28T15:59:00.586+01:00Have You Seen This Bird?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
Crazy.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-21615582339963398192012-08-27T15:58:00.000+01:002012-08-27T15:58:00.572+01:00The Little Drab BookChapter XX: The Little Drab Book<br />
<br />
I FOUND Davies at the cabin table, surrounded with a litter of books. The shelf was empty, and its contents were tossed about among the cups and on the floor. We both spoke together.<br />
<br />
'Well, what was it?'<br />
<br />
'Well, what did she say?'<br />
<br />
I gave way, and told my story briefly. He listened in silence, drumming on the table with a book which he held.<br />
<br />
'It's not good-bye,' he said. 'But I don't wonder; look here!' and he held out to me a small volume, whose appearance was quite familiar to me, if its contents were less so. As I noted in an early chapter, Davies's library, excluding tide-tables, 'pilots', etc., was limited to two classes of books, those on naval warfare, and those on his own hobby, cruising in small yachts. He had six or seven of the latter, including Knight's Falcon in the Baltic, Cowper's Sailing Tours, Macmullen's Down Channel, and other less-known stories of adventurous travel. I had scarcely done more than look into some of them at off-moments, for our life had left no leisure for reading. This particular volume was—no, I had better not describe it too fully; but I will say that it was old and unpretentious, bound in cheap cloth of a rather antiquated style, with a title which showed it to be a guide for yachtsmen to a certain British estuary. A white label partly scratched away bore the legend '3d.' I had glanced at it once or twice with no special interest.<br />
<br />
'Well?' I said, turning over some yellow pages.<br />
<br />
'Dollmann!' cried Davies. 'Dollmann wrote it.' I turned to the title-page, and read: 'By Lieut. X—, R.N.' The name itself conveyed nothing to me, but I began to understand. Davies went on: The name's on the back, too—and I'm certain it's the last she looked at.'<br />
<br />
'But how do you know?'<br />
<br />
'And there's the man himself. Ass that I am not to have seen it before! Look at the frontispiece.'<br />
<br />
It was a sorry piece of illustration of the old-fashioned sort, lacking definition and finish, but effective notwithstanding; for it was evidently the reproduction, though a cheap and imperfect process, of a photograph. It represented a small yacht at anchor below some woods, with the owner standing on deck in his shirt sleeves: a well-knit, powerful man, young, of middle height, clean shaved. There appeared to be nothing remarkable about the face; the portrait being on too small a scale, and the expression, such as it was, being of the fixed 'photographic' character.<br />
<br />
'How do you know him? You said he was fifty, with a greyish beard.'<br />
<br />
'By the shape of his head; that hasn't changed. Look how it widens at the top, and then flattens—sort of wedge shaped—with a high, steep forehead; you'd hardly notice it in that' (the points were not very noticeable, but I saw what Davies meant). 'The height and figure are right, too; and the dates are about right. Look at the bottom.'<br />
<br />
Underneath the picture was the name of a yacht and a date. The publisher's date on the title-page was the same.<br />
<br />
'Sixteen years ago,' said Davies. 'He looks thirty odd in that, doesn't he? And fifty now.'<br />
<br />
'Let's work the thing out. Sixteen years ago he was still an Englishman, an officer in Her Majesty's Navy. Now he's a German. At some time between this and then, I suppose, he came to grief—disgrace, flight, exile. When did it happen?'<br />
<br />
'They've been here three years; von Brüning said so.'<br />
<br />
'It was long before that. She has talked German from a child. What's her age, do you think—nineteen or twenty?'<br />
<br />
'About that.'<br />
<br />
'Say she was four when this book was published. The crash must have come not long after.'<br />
<br />
'And they've been hiding in Germany since.<br />
<br />
'Is this a well-known book?'<br />
<br />
'I never saw another copy; picked this up on a second-hand bookstall for threepence.'<br />
<br />
'She looked at it, you say?'<br />
<br />
'Yes, I'm certain of it.'<br />
<br />
'Was she never on board you in September?'<br />
<br />
'No; I asked them both, but Dollmann made excuses.'<br />
<br />
'But he—he came on board? You told me so.'<br />
<br />
'Once; he asked himself to breakfast on the first day. By Jove! yes; you mean he saw the book?<br />
<br />
'It explains a good deal.'<br />
<br />
'It explains everything.'<br />
<br />
We fell into deep reflexion for a minute or two.<br />
<br />
'Do you really mean everything?' I said. 'In that case let's sail straight away and forget the whole affair. He's only some poor devil with a past, whose secret you stumbled on, and, half mad with fear, he tried to silence you. But you don't want revenge, so it's no business of ours. We can ruin him if we like; but is it worth it?'<br />
<br />
'You don't mean a word you're saying,' said Davies, 'though I know why you say it; and many thanks, old chap. I didn't mean "everything". He's plotting with Germans, or why did Grimm spy on us, and von Brüning cross-examine us? We've got to find out what he's at, as well as who he is. And as to her—what do you think of her now?'<br />
<br />
I made my amende heartily. 'Innocent and ignorant,' was my verdict. 'Ignorant, that is, of her father's treasonable machinations; but aware, clearly, that they were English refugees with a past to hide.' I said other things, but they do not matter. 'Only,' I concluded, 'it makes the dilemma infinitely worse.'<br />
<br />
'There's no dilemma at all,' said Davies. 'You said at Bensersiel that we couldn't hurt him without hurting her. Well, all I can say is, we've got to. The time to cut and run, if ever, was when we sighted her dinghy. I had a baddish minute then.'<br />
<br />
'She's given us a clue or two after all.'<br />
<br />
'It wasn't our fault. To refuse to have her on board would have been to give our show away; and the very fact that she's given us clues decides the matter. She mustn't suffer for it.'<br />
<br />
'What will she do?'<br />
<br />
'Stick to her father, I suppose.'<br />
<br />
'And what shall we do?'<br />
<br />
'I don't know yet; how can I know? It depends,' said Davies, slowly. 'But the point is, that we have two objects, equally important—yes, equally, by Jove!—to scotch him, and save her.'<br />
<br />
There was a pause.<br />
<br />
'That's rather a large order,' I observed. 'Do you realize that at this very moment we have probably gained the first object? If we went home now, walked into the Admiralty and laid our facts before them, what would be the result?'<br />
<br />
'The Admiralty!' said Davies, with ineffable scorn.<br />
<br />
'Well, Scotland Yard, too, then. Both of them want our man, I dare say. It would be strange if between them they couldn't dislodge him, and, incidentally, either discover what's going on here or draw such attention to this bit of coast as to make further secrecy impossible.'<br />
<br />
'It's out of the question to let her betray her father, and then run away! Besides, we don't know enough, and they mightn't believe us. It's a cowardly course, however you look at it.'<br />
<br />
'Oh! that settles it,' I answered, hastily. 'Now I want to go back over the facts. When did you first see her?'<br />
<br />
'That first morning.'<br />
<br />
'She wasn't in the saloon the night before?'<br />
<br />
'No; and he didn't mention her.'<br />
<br />
'You would have gone away next morning if he hadn't called?'<br />
<br />
'Yes; I told you so.'<br />
<br />
'He allowed her to persuade you to make that voyage with them?'<br />
<br />
'I suppose so.'<br />
<br />
'But he sent her below when the pilotage was going on?'<br />
<br />
'Of course.'<br />
<br />
'She said just now, "Father said you would be safe." What had you been saying to her?'<br />
<br />
'It was when I met her on the sand. (By the way, it wasn't a chance meeting; she had been making inquiries and heard about us from a skipper who had seen the yacht near Wangeroog, and she had been down this way before.) She asked at once about that day, and began apologizing, rather awkwardly, you know, for their rudeness in not having waited for me at Cuxhaven. Her father found he must get on to Hamburg at once.'<br />
<br />
'But you didn't go to Cuxhaven; you told her that? What exactly did you tell her? This is important.'<br />
<br />
'I was in a fearful fix, not knowing what he had told her. So I said something vague, and then she asked the very question von Brüning did, "Wasn't there a schrecklich sea round the Scharhorn?"'<br />
<br />
'She didn't know you took the short cut, then?'<br />
<br />
'No; he hadn't dared to tell her.'<br />
<br />
'She knew that they took it?'<br />
<br />
'Yes. He couldn't possibly have hidden that. She would have known by the look of the sea from the portholes, the shorter time, etc.'<br />
<br />
'But when the Medusa hove to and he shouted to you to follow him—didn't she understand what was happening?'<br />
<br />
'No, evidently not. Mind you, she couldn't possibly have heard what we said, in that weather, from below. I couldn't cross-question her, but it was clear enough what she thought; namely, that he had hove to for exactly the opposite reason, to say he was taking the short cut, and that I wasn't to attempt to follow him.'<br />
<br />
'That's why she laid stress on waiting for you at Cuxhaven?'<br />
<br />
'Of course; mine would have been the longer passage.'<br />
<br />
'She had no notion of foul play?'<br />
<br />
'None—that I could see. After all, there I was, alive and well.'<br />
<br />
'But she was remorseful for having induced you to sail at all that day, and for not having waited to see you arrived safely.'<br />
<br />
'That's about it.'<br />
<br />
'Now what did you say about Cuxhaven?'<br />
<br />
'Nothing. I let her understand that I went there, and, not finding them, went on to the Baltic by the Eider river, having changed my mind about the ship canal.'<br />
<br />
'Now, what about her voyage back from Hamburg? Was she alone?'<br />
<br />
'No; the stepmother joined her.'<br />
<br />
'Did she say she had inquired about you at Brunsbüttel?'<br />
<br />
'No; I suppose she didn't like to. And there was no need, because my taking the Eider explained it.'<br />
<br />
I reflected. 'You're sure she hadn't a notion that you took the short cut?'<br />
<br />
'Quite sure; but she may guess it now. She guessed foul play by seeing that book.'<br />
<br />
'Of course she did; but I was thinking of something else. There are two stories afloat now—yours to von Brüning, the true one, that you followed the Medusa to the short cut; and Dollmann's to her, that you went round the Scharhorn. That's evidently his version of the affair—the version he would have given if you had been drowned and inquiries were ever made; the version he would have sworn his crew to if they discovered the truth.'<br />
<br />
'But he must drop that yarn when he knows I'm alive and back again.'<br />
<br />
'Yes; but meanwhile, supposing von Brüning sees him before he knows you're back again, and wants to find out the truth about that incident. If I were von Brüning I should say, "By the way, what's become of that young Englishman you decoyed away to the Baltic?" Dollmann would give his version, and von Brüning, having heard ours, would know he was lying, and had tried to drown you.'<br />
<br />
'Does it matter? He must know already that Dollmann's a scoundrel.'<br />
<br />
'So we've been supposing; but we may be wrong. We're still in the dark as to Dollmann's position towards these Germans. They may not even know he's English, or they may know that and not know his real name and past. What effect your story will have on their relations with him we can't forecast. But I'm clear about one thing, that it's our paramount interest to maintain the status quo as long as we can, to minimize the danger you ran that day, and act as witnesses in his defence. We can't do that if his story and yours don't tally. The discrepancy will not only damn him (that may be immaterial), but it will throw doubt on us.'<br />
<br />
'Why?'<br />
<br />
'Because if the short cut was so dangerous that he dared not own to having led you to it, it was dangerous enough to make you suspect foul play; the very supposition we want to avoid. We want to be thought mere travellers, with no scores to wipe out, and no secrets to pry after.'<br />
<br />
'Well, what do you propose?'<br />
<br />
'Hitherto I believe we stand fairly well. Let's assume we hoodwinked von Brüning at Bensersiel, and base our policy on that assumption. It follows that we must show Dollmann at the earliest possible moment that you have come back, and give him time to revise his tactics before he commits himself. Now—'<br />
<br />
'But she'll tell him we're back,' interrupted Davies.<br />
<br />
'I don't think so. We've just agreed to keep this afternoon's episode a secret. She expects never to see us again.'<br />
<br />
Now, he comes to-morrow by the morning boat, she said. What did that mean? Boat from where?'<br />
<br />
'I know. From Norddeich on the mainland opposite. There's a railway there from Norden, and a steam ferry crosses to the island.'<br />
<br />
'At what time?'<br />
<br />
'Your Bradshaw will tell us—here it is: "Winter Service, 8.30 a.m., due at 9.5."'<br />
<br />
'Let's get away at once.'<br />
<br />
We had a tussle with the tide at first, but once over the watershed the channel improved, and the haze lightened gradually. A lighthouse appeared among the sand-dunes on the island shore, and before darkness fell we dimly saw the spires and roofs of a town, and two long black piers stretching out southwards. We were scarcely a mile away when we lost our wind altogether, and had to anchor. Determined to reach our destination that night we waited till the ebb stream made, and then towed the yacht with the dinghy. In the course of this a fog dropped on us suddenly, just as it had yesterday. I was towing at the time, and, of course, stopped short; but Davies shouted to me from the tiller to go on, that he could manage with the lead and compass. And the end of it was that, at about nine o'clock, we anchored safely in the five-fathom roadstead, close to the eastern pier, as a short reconnaissance proved to us. It had been a little masterpiece of adroit seamanship.<br />
<br />
There was utter stillness till our chain rattled down, when a muffled shout came from the direction of the pier, and soon we heard a boat groping out to us. It was a polite but sleepy portofficer, who asked in a perfunctory way for our particulars, and when he heard them, remembered the Dulcibella's previous visit.<br />
<br />
'Where are you bound to?' he asked.<br />
<br />
'England—sooner or later,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
The man laughed derisively. 'Not this year,' he said; 'there will be fogs for another week; it is always so, and then storms. Better leave your yawl here. Dues will be only sixpence a month for you.<br />
<br />
'I'll think about it,' said Davies. 'Good-night.'<br />
<br />
The man vanished like a ghost in the thick night.<br />
<br />
'Is the post-office open?' I called after him.<br />
<br />
'No; eight to-morrow,' came back out of the fog.<br />
<br />
We were too excited to sup in comfort, or sleep in peace, or to do anything but plan and speculate. Never till this night had we talked with absolute mutual confidence, for Davies broke down the last barriers of reserve and let me see his whole mind. He loved this girl and he loved his country, two simple passions which for the time absorbed his whole moral capacity. There was no room left for casuistry. To weigh one passion against the other, with the discordant voices of honour and expediency dinning in his ears, had too long involved him in fruitless torture. Both were right; neither could be surrendered. If the facts showed them irreconcilable, tant pis pour les faits. A way must be found to satisfy both or neither.<br />
<br />
I should have been a spiritless dog if I had not risen to his mood. But in truth his cutting of the knot was at this juncture exactly what appealed to me. I, too, was tired of vicarious casuistry, and the fascination of our enterprise, intensified by the discovery of that afternoon, had never been so strong in me. Not to be insincere, I cannot pretend that I viewed the situation with his single mind. My philosophy when I left London was of a very worldly sort, and no one can change his temperament in three weeks. I plainly said as much to Davies, and indeed took perverse satisfaction in stating with brutal emphasis some social truths which bore on this attachment of his to the daughter of an outlaw. Truths I call them, but I uttered them more by rote than by conviction, and he heard them unmoved. And meanwhile I snatched recklessly at his own solution. If it imparted into our adventure a strain of crazy chivalry more suited to knights-errant of the Middle Ages than to sober modern youths—well, thank Heaven, I was not too sober, and still young enough to snatch at that fancy with an ardour of imagination, if not of character; perhaps, too, of character, for Galahads are not so common but that ordinary folk must needs draw courage from their example and put something of a blind trust in their tenfold strength.<br />
<br />
To reduce a romantic ideal to a working plan is a very difficult thing.<br />
<br />
'We shall have to argue backwards,' I said. 'What is to be the final stage? Because that must govern the others.'<br />
<br />
There was only one answer—to get Dollmann, secrets and all, daughter and all, away from Germany altogether. So only could we satisfy the double aim we had set before us. What a joy it is, when beset with doubts, to find a bed-rock necessity, however unattainable! We fastened on this one and reasoned back from it. The first lesson was that, however many and strong were the enemies we had to contend with, our sole overt foe must be Dollmann. The issue of the struggle must be known only to ourselves and him. If we won, and found out 'what he was at', we must at all costs conceal our success from his German friends, and detach him from them before he was compromised. (You will remark that to blithely accept this limitation showed a very sanguine spirit in us.) The next question, how to find out what he was at, was a deal more thorny. If it had not been for the discovery of Dollmann's identity, we should have found it as hard a nut to crack as ever. But this discovery was illuminating. It threw into relief two methods of action which hitherto we had been hazily seeking to combine, seesawing between one and the other, each of us influenced at different times by different motives. One was to rely on independent research; the other to extort the secret from Dollmann direct, by craft or threats. The moral of to-day was to abandon the first and embrace the second.<br />
<br />
The prospects of independent research were not a whit better than before. There were only two theories in the field, the channel theory and the Memmert theory. The former languished for lack of corroboration; the latter also appeared to be weakened. To Fräulein Dollmann the wreck-works were evidently what they purported to be, and nothing more. This fact in itself was unimportant, for it was clear as crystal that she was no party to her father's treacherous intrigues, if he was engaged in such. But if Memmert was his sphere for them, it was disconcerting to find her so familiar with that sphere, lightly talking of a descent in a diving-bell—hinting, too, that the mystery as to results was only for local consumption. Nevertheless, the charm of Memmert as the place we had traced Grimm to, and as the only tangible clue we had obtained, was still very great. The really cogent objection was the insuperable difficulty, known and watched as we were, of learning its significance. If there was anything important to see there we should never be allowed to see it, while by trying and failing we risked everything. It was on this point that the last of all misunderstandings between me and Davies was dissipated. At Bensersiel he had been influenced more than he owned by my arguments about Memmert; but at that time (as I hinted) he was biased by a radical prejudice. The channel theory had become a sort of religion with him, promising double salvation—not only avoidance of the Dollmanns, but success in the quest by methods in which he was past master. To have to desert it and resort to spying on naval defences was an idea he dreaded and distrusted. It was not the morality of the course that bothered him. He was far too clear-headed to blink at the essential fact that at heart we were spies on a foreign power in time of peace, or to salve his conscience by specious distinctions as to our mode of operation. The foreign power to him was Dollmann, a traitor. There was his final justification, fearlessly adopted and held to the last. It was rather that, knowing his own limitations, his whole nature shrank from the sort of action entailed by the Memmert theory. And there was strong common sense in his antipathy.<br />
<br />
So much for independent research.<br />
<br />
On the other hand the road was now clear for the other method. Davies no longer feared to face the imbroglio at Norderney; and that day fortune had given us a new and potent weapon against Dollmann; precisely how potent we could not tell, for we had only a glimpse of his past, and his exact relations with the Government were unknown to us. But we knew who he was. Using this knowledge with address, could we not wring the rest from him? Feel our way, of course, be guided by his own conduct, but in the end strike hard and stake everything on the stroke? Such at any rate was our scheme to-night. Later, tossing in my bunk, I be-thought me of the little drab book, lit a candle, and fetched it. A preface explained that it had been written during a spell of two months' leave from naval duty, and expressed a hope that it might be of service to Corinthian sailors. The style was unadorned, but scholarly and pithy. There was no trace of the writer's individuality, save a certain subdued relish in describing banks and shoals, which reminded me of Davies himself. For the rest, I found the book dull, and, in fact, it sent me to sleep.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-46459345630605497462012-08-26T15:57:00.000+01:002012-08-26T15:57:00.504+01:00Lost Unicorn<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHPuJ3IB1rCByuyQ3UOUQwYgfTx80Ie3dOGonRwTrH0X9wCWRfUsUFGGnQGY3emJRAx7-4CE6MlBQgTtqwVGp9ooLtYr47WEPPj5xWM1jzbF5BADSjRDd3ffxAWjETyXgqiJ5e9xh8fRsM/s1600/aflyerdrugs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHPuJ3IB1rCByuyQ3UOUQwYgfTx80Ie3dOGonRwTrH0X9wCWRfUsUFGGnQGY3emJRAx7-4CE6MlBQgTtqwVGp9ooLtYr47WEPPj5xWM1jzbF5BADSjRDd3ffxAWjETyXgqiJ5e9xh8fRsM/s320/aflyerdrugs.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Drugs and equestrian are a dangerous pairing.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-77734748067747032342012-08-25T15:56:00.000+01:002012-08-25T15:56:00.356+01:00The RubiconChapter XIX: The Rubicon<br />
<br />
IT was a cold, vaporous dawn, the glass rising, and the wind fallen to a light air still from the north-east. Our creased and sodden sails scarcely answered to it as we crept across the oily swell to Langeoog. 'Fogs and calms,' Davies prophesied. The Blitz was astir when we passed her, and soon after steamed out to sea. Once over the bar, she turned westward and was lost to view in the haze. I should be sorry to have to explain how we found that tiny anchor-buoy, on the expressionless waste of grey. I only know that I hove the lead incessantly while Davies conned, till at last he was grabbing overside with the boat-hook, and there was the buoy on deck. The cable was soon following it, and finally the rusty monster himself, more loathsome than usual, after his long sojourn in the slime.<br />
<br />
'That's all right,' said Davies. 'Now we can go anywhere.'<br />
<br />
'Well, it's Norderney, isn't it? We've settled that.'<br />
<br />
'Yes, I suppose we have. I was wondering whether it wouldn't be shortest to go inside the Langeoog after all.'<br />
<br />
'Surely not,' I urged. 'The tide's ebbing now, and the light's bad; it's new ground, with a "watershed" to cross, and we're safe to get aground.'<br />
<br />
'All right—outside. Ready about.' We swung lazily round and headed for the open sea. I record the fact, but in truth Davies might have taken me where he liked, for no land was visible, only a couple of ghostly booms.<br />
<br />
'It seems a pity to miss over that channel,' said Davies with a sigh; 'just when the Kormoran can't watch us.' (We had not seen her at all this morning.)<br />
<br />
I set myself to the lead again, averse to reopening a barren argument. Grimm had done his work for the present, I felt certain, and was on his way by the shortest road to Norderney and Memmert.<br />
<br />
We were soon outside and heading west, our boom squared away and the island sand-dunes just apparent under our lee. Then the breeze died to the merest draught, and left us rolling inert in a long swell. Consumed with impatience to get on I saw fatality in this failure of wind, after a fortnight of unprofitable meanderings, when we had generally had too much of it, and always enough for our purpose. I tried to read below, but the vile squirting of the centre-board drove me up.<br />
<br />
'Can't we go any faster?' I burst out once. I felt that there ought to be a pyramid of gauzy canvas aloft, spinnakers, flying jibs, and what not.<br />
<br />
'I don't go in for speed,' said Davies, shortly. He loyally did his best to 'shove her' along, but puffs and calms were the rule all day, and it was only by towing in the dinghy for two hours in the afternoon that we covered the length of Langeoog, and crept before dark to an anchorage behind Baltrum, its slug-shaped neighbour on the west. Strictly, I believe, we should have kept the sea all night; but I had not the grit to suggest that course, and Davies was only too glad of an excuse for threading the shoals of the Accumer Ee on a rising tide. The atmosphere had been slowly clearing as the day wore on; but we had scarcely anchored ten minutes before a blanket of white fog, rolling in from seaward, swallowed us up. Davies was already afield in the dinghy, and I had to guide him back with a foghorn, whose music roused hosts of sea birds from the surrounding flats, and brought them wheeling and complaining round us, a weird invisible chorus to my mournful solo.<br />
<br />
The fog hung heavy still at daybreak on the 20th, but dispersed partially under a catspaw from the south about eight o'clock, in time for us to traverse the boomed channel behind Baltrum, before the tide left the watershed.<br />
<br />
'We shan't get far to-day,' said Davies, with philosophy. 'And this sort of thing may go on for any time. It's a regular autumn anti-cyclone—glass thirty point five and steady. That gale was the last of a stormy equinox.'<br />
<br />
We took the inside route as a matter of course to-day. It was now the shortest to Norderney harbour, and scarcely less intricate than the Wichter Ee, which appeared to be almost totally blocked by banks, and is, in fact, the most impassable of all these outlets to the North Sea. But, as I say, this sort of navigation, always puzzling to me, was utterly bewildering in hazy weather. Any attempt at orientation made me giddy. So I slaved at the lead, varying my labour with a fierce bout of kedge-work when we grounded somewhere. I had two rests before two o'clock, one of an hour, when we ran into a patch of windless fog; another of a few moments, when Davies said, 'There's Norderney!' and I saw, surmounting a long slope of weedy sand, still wet with the receding sea, a cluster of sandhills exactly like a hundred others I had seen of late, but fraught with a new and unique interest.<br />
<br />
The usual formula, 'What have you got now?' checked my reverie, and 'Helm's a-lee,' ended it for the time. We tacked on (for the wind had headed us) in very shoal water.<br />
<br />
Suddenly Davies said: 'Is that a boat ahead?'<br />
<br />
'Do you mean that galliot?' I asked. I could plainly distinguish one of those familiar craft about half a mile away, just within the limit of vision.<br />
<br />
'The Kormoran, do you think?' I added. Davies said nothing, but grew inattentive to his work. 'Barely four,' from me passed unnoticed, and we touched once, but swung off under some play of the current. Then came abruptly, 'Stand by the anchor. Let go,' and we brought up in mid-stream of the narrow creek we were following. I triced up the main-tack, and stowed the headsails unaided. When I had done Davies was still gazing to windward through his binoculars, and, to my astonishment, I noticed that his hands were trembling violently. I had never seen this happen before, even at moments when a false turn of the wrist meant death on a surf-battered bank.<br />
<br />
'What is it?' I asked; 'are you cold?'<br />
<br />
'That little boat,' he said. I gazed to windward, too, and now saw a scrap of white in the distance, in sharp relief.<br />
<br />
'Small standing lug and jib; it's her, right enough,' said Davies to himself, in a sort of nervous stammer.<br />
<br />
'Who? What?'<br />
<br />
'Medusa's dinghy.'<br />
<br />
He handed, or rather pushed, me the glasses, still gazing.<br />
<br />
'Dollmann?' I exclaimed.<br />
<br />
'No, it's hers—the one she always sails. She's come to meet m—, us.'<br />
<br />
Through the glasses the white scrap became a graceful little sail, squared away for the light following breeze. An angle of the creek hid the hull, then it glided into view. Someone was sitting aft steering, man or woman I could not say, for the sail hid most of the figure. For full two minutes—two long, pregnant minutes—we watched it in silence. The damp air was fogging the lenses, but I kept them to my eyes; for I did not want to look at Davies. At last I heard him draw a deep breath, straighten himself up, and give one of his characteristic 'h'ms'. Then he turned briskly aft, cast off the dinghy's painter, and pulled her up alongside.<br />
<br />
'You come too,' he said, jumping in, and fixing the rowlocks. (His hands were steady again.) I laughed, and shoved the dinghy off.<br />
<br />
'I'd rather you did,' he said, defiantly.<br />
<br />
'I'd rather stay. I'll tidy up, and put the kettle on.' Davies had taken a half stroke, but paused.<br />
<br />
'She oughtn't to come aboard.' he said.<br />
<br />
'She might like to,' I suggested. 'Chilly day, long way from home, common courtesy—'<br />
<br />
'Carruthers,' said Davies, 'if she comes aboard, please remember that she's outside this business. There are no clues to be got from her.'<br />
<br />
A little lecture which would have nettled me more if I had not been exultantly telling myself that, once and for all, for good or ill, the Rubicon was passed.<br />
<br />
'It's your affair this time,' I said; 'run it as you please.'<br />
<br />
He sculled away with vigorous strokes. 'Just as he is,' I thought to myself: bare head, beaded with fog-dew, ancient oilskin coat (only one button); grey jersey; grey woollen trousers (like a deep-sea fisherman's) stuffed into long boots. A vision of his antitype, the Cowes Philanderer, crossed me for a second. As to his face—well, I could only judge by it, and marvel, that he was gripping his dilemma by either horn, as firmly as he gripped his sculls.<br />
<br />
I watched the two boats converging. They would meet in the natural course about three hundred yards away, but a hitch occurred. First, the sail-boat checked and slewed; 'aground,' I concluded. The row-boat leapt forward still; then checked, too. From both a great splashing of sculls floated across the still air, then silence. The summit of the watershed, a physical Rubicon, prosaic and slimy, had still to be crossed, it seemed. But it could be evaded. Both boats headed for the northern side of the creek: two figures were out on the brink, hauling on two painters. Then Davies was striding over the sand, and a girl—I could see her now—was coming to meet him. And then I thought it was time to go below and tidy up.<br />
<br />
Nothing on earth could have made the Dulcibella's saloon a worthy reception-room for a lady. I could only use hurried efforts to make it look its best by plying a bunch of cotton-waste and a floor-brush; by pitching into racks and lockers the litter of pipes, charts, oddments of apparel, and so on, that had a way of collecting afresh, however recently we had tidied up; by neatly arranging our demoralized library, and by lighting the stove and veiling the table under a clean white cloth.<br />
<br />
I suppose about twenty minutes had elapsed, and I was scrubbing fruitlessly at the smoky patch on the ceiling, when I heard the sound of oars and voices outside. I threw the cotton-waste into the fo'c'sle, made an onslaught on my hands, and then mounted the companion ladder. Our own dinghy was just rounding up alongside, Davies sculling in the bows, facing him in the stern a young girl in a grey tam-o'-shanter, loose waterproof jacket and dark serge skirt, the latter, to be frigidly accurate, disclosing a pair of workman-like rubber boots which, mutatis mutandis, were very like those Davies was wearing. Her hair, like his, was spangled with moisture, and her rose-brown skin struck a note of delicious colour against the sullen Stygian background.<br />
<br />
'There he is,' said Davies. Never did his 'meiner Freund, Carruthers,' sound so pleasantly in my ears; never so discordantly the 'Fräulein Dollmann' that followed it. Every syllable of the four was a lie. Two honest English eyes were looking up into mine; an honest English hand—is this insular nonsense? Perhaps so, but I stick to it—a brown, firm hand—no, not so very small, my sentimental reader—was clasping mine. Of course I had strong reasons, apart from the racial instinct, for thinking her to be English, but I believe that if I had had none at all I should at any rate have congratulated Germany on a clever bit of plagiarism. By her voice, when she spoke, I knew that she must have talked German habitually from childhood; diction and accent were faultless, at least to my English ear; but the native constitutional ring was wanting.<br />
<br />
She came on board. There was a hollow discussion first about time and weather, but it ended as we all in our hearts wished it to end. None of us uttered our real scruples. Mine, indeed, were too new and rudimentary to be worth uttering, so I said common-sense things about tea and warmth; but I began to think about my compact with Davies.<br />
<br />
'Just for a few minutes, then,' she said.<br />
<br />
I held out my hand and swung her up. She gazed round the deck and rigging with profound interest—a breathless, hungry interest—touching to see.<br />
<br />
'You've seen her before, haven't you?' I said.<br />
<br />
'I've not been on board before,' she answered.<br />
<br />
This struck me in passing as odd; but then I had only too few details from Davies about his days at Norderney in September.<br />
<br />
'Of course, that is what puzzled me,' she exclaimed, suddenly, pointing to the mizzen. 'I knew there was something different.'<br />
<br />
Davies had belayed the painter, and now had to explain the origin of the mizzen. This was a cumbrous process, and his hearer's attention soon wandered from the subject and became centred in him—his was already more than half in her—and the result was a golden opportunity for the discerning onlooker. It was very brief, but I made the most of it; buried deep a few regrets, did a little heartfelt penance, told myself I had been a cynical fool not to have foreseen this, and faced the new situation with a sinking heart; I am not ashamed to admit that, for I was fond of Davies, and I was keen about the quest.<br />
<br />
She had never been a guilty agent in that attempt on Davies. Had she been an unconscious tool or only an unwilling one? If the latter, did she know the secret we were seeking? In the last degree unlikely, I decided. But, true to the compact, whose importance I now fully appreciated, I flung aside my diplomatic weapons, recoiling, as strongly, or nearly as strongly, let us say, from any effort direct or indirect to gain information from such a source. It was not our fault if by her own conversation and behaviour she gave us some idea of how matters stood. Davies already knew more than I did.<br />
<br />
We spent a few minutes on deck while she asked eager questions about our build and gear and seaworthiness, with a quaint mixture of professional acumen and personal curiosity.<br />
<br />
'How did you manage alone that day?' she asked Davies, suddenly.<br />
<br />
'Oh, it was quite safe,' was the reply. 'But it's much better to have a friend.'<br />
<br />
She looked at me; and—well, I would have died for Davies there and then.<br />
<br />
'Father said you would be safe,' she remarked, with decision—a slight excess of decision, I thought. And at that turned to some rope or block and pursued her questioning. She found the compass impressive, and the trappings of that hateful centre-board had a peculiar fascination for her. Was this the way we did it in England? was her constant query.<br />
<br />
Yet, in spite of a superficial freedom, we were all shy and constrained. The descent below was a welcome diversion, for we should have been less than human if we had not extracted some spontaneous fun from the humours of the saloon. I went down first to see about the tea, leaving them struggling for mutual comprehension over the theory of an English lifeboat. They soon followed, and I can see her now stooping in at the doorway, treading delicately, like a kitten, past the obstructive centre-board to a place on the starboard sofa, then taking in her surroundings with a timid rapture that broke into delight at all the primitive arrangements and dingy amenities of our den. She explored the cavernous recesses of the Rippingille, fingered the duck-guns and the miscellany in the racks, and peeped into the fo'c'sle with dainty awe. Everything was a source of merriment, from our cramped attitudes to the painful deficiency of spoons and the 'yachtiness' (there is no other word to describe it) of the bread, which had been bought at Bensersiel, and had suffered from incarceration and the climate. This fact came out, and led to some questions, while we waited for the water to boil, about the gale and our visit there. The topic, a pregnant one for us, appeared to have no special significance to her. At the mention of von Brüning she showed no emotion of any sort; on the contrary, she went out of her way, from an innocent motive that anyone could have guessed, to show that she could talk about him with dispassionate detachment.<br />
<br />
'He came to see us when you were here last, didn't he?' she said to Davies. 'He often comes. He goes with father to Memmert sometimes. You know about Memmert? They are diving for money out of an old wreck.'<br />
<br />
Yes, we had heard about it.<br />
<br />
'Of course you have. Father is a director of the company, and Commander von Brüning takes great interest in it; they took me down in a diving-bell once.'<br />
<br />
I murmured, 'Indeed!' and Davies sawed laboriously at the bread. She must have misconstrued our sheepish silence, for she stopped and drew herself up with just a touch of momentary hauteur, utterly lost on Davies. I could have laughed aloud at this transient little comedy of errors.<br />
<br />
'Did you see any gold?' said Davies at last, with husky solemnity. Something had to be said or we should defeat our own end; but I let him say it. He had not my faith in Memmert.<br />
<br />
'No, only mud and timber—oh, I forgot—'<br />
<br />
'You mustn't betray the company's secrets,' I said, laughing; 'Commander von Brüning wouldn't tell us a word about the gold.' ('There's self-denial!' I said to myself.)<br />
<br />
'Oh, I don't think it matters much,' she answered, laughing too. 'You are only visitors.'<br />
<br />
'That's all,' I remarked, demurely. 'Just passing travellers.'<br />
<br />
'You will stop at Norderney?' she said, with naive anxiety. 'Herr Davies said—'<br />
<br />
I looked to Davies; it was his affair. Fair and square came his answer, in blunt dog-German.<br />
<br />
'Yes, of course, we shall. I should like to see your father again.'<br />
<br />
Up to this moment I had been doubtful of his final decision; for ever since our explanation at Bensersiel I had had the feeling that I was holding his nose to a very cruel grindstone. This straight word, clear and direct, beyond anything I had hoped for, brought me to my senses and showed me that his mind had been working far in advance of mine; and more, shaping a double purpose that I had never dreamt of.<br />
<br />
'My father?' said Fräulein Dollmann; 'yes, I am sure he will be very glad to see you.<br />
<br />
There was no conviction in her tone, and her eyes were distant and troubled.<br />
<br />
'He's not at home now, is he?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'How did you know?' (a little maidenly confusion). 'Oh, Commander von Brüning.'<br />
<br />
I might have added that it had been clear as daylight all along that this visit was in the nature of an escapade of which her father might not approve. I tried to say 'I won't tell,' without words, and may have succeeded.<br />
<br />
'I told Mr Davies when we first met,' she went on. 'I expect him back very soon—to-morrow in fact; he wrote from Amsterdam. He left me at Hamburg and has been away since. Of course, he will not know your yacht is back again. I think he expected Mr Davies would stay in the Baltic, as the season was so late. But—but I am sure he will be glad to see you.'<br />
<br />
'Is the Medusa in harbour?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'Yes; but we are not living on her now. We are at our villa in the Schwannallée—my stepmother and I, that is.' She added some details, and Davies gravely pencilled down the address on a leaf of the log-book; a formality which somehow seemed to regularize the present position.<br />
<br />
'We shall be at Norderney to-morrow,' he said.<br />
<br />
Meanwhile the kettle was boiling merrily, and I made the tea—cocoa, I should say, for the menu was changed in deference to our visitor's tastes. 'This is fun!' she said. And by common consent we abandoned ourselves, three youthful, hungry mariners, to the enjoyment of this impromptu picnic. Such a chance might never occur again—carpamus diem.<br />
<br />
But the banquet was never celebrated. As at Belshazzar's feast, there was a writing on the wall; no supernatural inscription, but just a printed name; an English surname with title and initials, in cheap gilt lettering on the back of an old book; a silent, sneering witness of our snug party. The catastrophe came and passed so suddenly that at the time I had scarcely even an inkling of what caused it; but I know now that this is how it happened. Our visitor was sitting at the forward end of the starboard sofa, close to the bulkhead. Davies and I were opposite her. Across the bulkhead, on a level with our heads, ran the bookshelf, whose contents, remember, I had carefully straightened only half an hour ago, little dreaming of the consequence. Some trifle, probably the logbook which Davies had reached down from the shelf, called her attention to the rest of our library. While busied with the cocoa I heard her spelling out some titles, fingering leaves, and twitting Davies with the little care he took of his books. Suddenly there was a silence which made me look up, to see a startled and pitiful change in her. She was staring at Davies with wide eyes and parted lips, a burning flush mounting on her forehead, and such an expression on her face as a sleep-walker might wear, who wakes in fear he knows not where.<br />
<br />
Half her mind was far away, labouring to construe some hideous dream of the past; half was in the present, cringing before some sickening reality. She remained so for perhaps ten seconds, and then—plucky girl that she was—she mastered herself, looked deliberately round and up with a circular glance, strangely in the manner of Davies himself, and spoke. How late it was, she must be going—her boat was not safe. At the same time she rose to go, or rather slid herself along the sofa, for rising was impossible. We sat like mannerless louts, in blank amazement. Davies at the outset had said, 'What's the matter?' in plain English, and then relapsed into stupefaction. I recovered myself the first, and protested in some awkward fashion about the cocoa, the time, the absence of fog. In trying to answer, her self-possession broke down, poor child, and her retreat became a blind flight, like that of a wounded animal, while every sordid circumstance seemed to accentuate her panic.<br />
<br />
She tilted the corner of the table in leaving the sofa and spilt cocoa over her skirt; she knocked her head with painful force against the sharp lintel of the doorway, and stumbled on the steps of the ladder. I was close behind, but when I reached the deck she was already on the counter hauling up the dinghy. She had even jumped in and laid hands on the sculls before any check came in her precipitate movements. Now there occurred to her the patent fact that the dinghy was ours, and that someone must accompany her to bring it back.<br />
<br />
'Davies will row you over,' I said.<br />
<br />
'Oh no, thank you,' she stammered. 'If you will be so kind, Herr Carruthers. It is your turn. No, I mean, I want—'<br />
<br />
'Go on,' said Davies to me in English.<br />
<br />
I stepped into the dinghy and motioned to take the sculls from her. She seemed not to see me, and pushed off while Davies handed down her jacket, which she had left in the cabin. Neither of us tried to better the situation by conventional apologies. It was left to her, at the last moment, to make a show of excusing herself, an attempt so brave and yet so wretchedly lame that I tingled all over with hot shame. She only made matters worse, and Davies interrupted her.<br />
<br />
'Auf Wiedersehen,' he said, simply.<br />
<br />
She shook her head, did not even offer her hand, and pulled away; Davies turned sharp round and went below.<br />
<br />
There was now no muddy Rubicon to obstruct us, for the tide had risen a good deal, and the sands were covering. I offered again to take the sculls, but she took no notice and rowed on, so that I was a silent passenger on the stem seat till we reached her boat, a spruce little yacht's gig, built to the native model, with a spoon-bow and tiny lee-boards. It was already afloat, but riding quite safely to a rope and a little grapnel, which she proceeded to haul in.<br />
<br />
'It was quite safe after all, you see,' I said.<br />
<br />
'Yes, but I could not stay. Herr Carruthers, I want to say something to you.' (I knew it was coming; von Brüning's warning over again.) 'I made a mistake just now; it is no use your calling on us to-morrow.'<br />
<br />
'Why not?'<br />
<br />
'You will not see my father.'<br />
<br />
'I thought you said he was coming back?'<br />
<br />
'Yes, by the morning steamer; but he will be very busy.'<br />
<br />
'We can wait. We have several days to spare, and we have to call for letters anyhow.'<br />
<br />
'You must not delay on our account. The weather is very fine at last. It would be a pity to lose a chance of a smooth voyage to England. The season—'<br />
<br />
'We have no fixed plans. Davies wants to get some shooting.<br />
<br />
'My father will be much occupied.'<br />
<br />
'We can see you.'<br />
<br />
I insisted on being obtuse, for though this fencing with an unstrung girl was hateful work, the quest was at stake. We were going to Norderney, come what might, and sooner or later we must see Dollmann. It was no use promising not to. I had given no pledge to von Brüning, and I would give none to her. The only alternative was to violate the compact (which the present fiasco had surely weakened), speak out, and try and make an ally of her. Against her own father? I shrank from the responsibility and counted the cost of failure—certain failure, to judge by her conduct. She began to hoist her lugsail in a dazed, shiftless fashion, while our two boats drifted slowly to leeward.<br />
<br />
'Father might not like it,' she said, so low and from such tremulous lips that I scarcely caught her words. 'He does not like foreigners much. I am afraid ... he did not want to see Herr Davies again.'<br />
<br />
'But I thought—'<br />
<br />
'It was wrong of me to come aboard—I suddenly remembered; but I could not tell Herr Davies.'<br />
<br />
'I see,' I answered. 'I will tell him.'<br />
<br />
'Yes, that he must not come near us.<br />
<br />
'He will understand. I know he will be very sorry, but,' I added, firmly, 'you can trust him implicitly to do the right thing.' And how I prayed that this would content her! Thank Heaven, it did.<br />
<br />
'Yes,' she said, 'I am afraid I did not say good-bye to him. You will do so?' She gave me her hand.<br />
<br />
'One thing more,' I added, holding it, 'nothing had better be said about this meeting?'<br />
<br />
'No, no, nothing. It must never be known.'<br />
<br />
I let go the gig's gunwale and watched her tighten her sheet and make a tack or two to windward. Then I rowed back to the Dulcibella as hard as I could.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-69253066445903521292012-08-24T15:45:00.000+01:002012-08-24T15:45:00.095+01:00Lost And Found<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Please be careful.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-75531784869629500132012-08-23T15:54:00.000+01:002012-08-23T15:54:00.969+01:00Imperial EscortChapter XVIII: Imperial Escort<br />
<br />
MEMMERT gripped me, then, to the exclusion of a rival notion which had given me no little perplexity during the conversation with von Brüning. His reiterated advice that we should lose no time in picking up our anchor and chain had ended by giving me the idea that he was anxious to get us away from Bensersiel and the mainland. At first I had taken the advice partly as a test of our veracity (as I gave the reader to understand), and partly as an indirect method of lulling any suspicions which Grimm's midnight visit may have caused. Then it struck me that this might be over-subtlety on my part, and the idea recurred when the question of our future plans cropped up, and hampered me in deciding on a course. It returned again when von Brüning offered to tow us out in the evening. It was in my mind when I questioned him as to his business ashore, for it occurred to me that perhaps his landing here was not solely due to a wish to inspect the crew of the Dulcibella. Then came his perfectly frank explanation (with its sinister double entente for us), coupled with an invitation to me to accompany him to Esens. But, on the principle of 'tinieo Danaos' etc., I instantly smelt a ruse, not that I dreamt that I was to be decoyed into captivity; but if there was anything here which we two might discover in the few hours left to us, it was an ingenious plan to remove the most observant of the two till the hour of departure.<br />
<br />
Davies scorned them, and I had felt only a faint curiosity in these insignificant hamlets, influenced, I am afraid, chiefly by a hankering after terra firma which the pitiless rigour of his training had been unable to cure.<br />
<br />
But it was imprudent to neglect the slightest chance. It was three o'clock, and I think both our brains were beginning to be addled with thinking in close confinement. I suggested that we should finish our council of war in the open, and we both donned oilskins and turned out. The sky had hardened and banked into an even canopy of lead, and the wind drove before it a fine cold rain. You could hear the murmur of the rising flood on the sands outside, but the harbour was high above it still, and the Dulcibella and the other boats squatted low in a bed of black slime. Native interest seemed to be at last assuaged, for not a soul was visible on the bank (I cannot call it a quay); but the top of a black sou'wester with a feather of smoke curling round it showed above the forehatch of the Kormoran.<br />
<br />
'I wish I could get a look at your cargo, my friend,' I thought to myself.<br />
<br />
We gazed at Bensersiel in silence.<br />
<br />
'There can't be anything here?' I said.<br />
<br />
'What can there be?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'What about that dyke?' I said, with a sudden inspiration.<br />
<br />
From the bank we could see all along the coast-line, which is dyked continuously, as I have already said. The dyke was here a substantial brick-faced embankment, very similar, though on a smaller scale, to that which had bordered the Elbe near Cuxhaven, and over whose summit we had seen the snouts of guns.<br />
<br />
'I say, Davies,' I said, 'do you think this coast could be invaded? Along here, I mean, behind these islands?'<br />
<br />
Davies shook his head. 'I've thought of that,' he said. 'There's nothing in it. It's just the very last place on earth where a landing would be possible. No transport could get nearer than where the Blitz is lying, four miles out.'<br />
<br />
'Well, you say every inch of this coast is important?'<br />
<br />
'Yes, but it's the water I mean.'<br />
<br />
'Well, I want to see that dyke. Let's walk along it.'<br />
<br />
My mushroom theory died directly I set foot on it. It was the most innocent structure in the world—like a thousand others in Essex and Holland—topped by a narrow path, where we walked in single file with arms akimbo to keep our balance in the gusts of wind. Below us lay the sands on one side and rank fens on the other, interspersed with squares of pasture ringed in with ditches. After half a mile we dropped down and came back by a short circuit inland, following a mazy path—which was mostly right angles and minute plank bridges, till we came to the Esens road. We crossed this and soon after found our way barred by the stream I spoke of. This involved a détour to the bridge in the village, and a stealthy avoidance of the post-office, for dread of its garrulous occupant. Then we followed the dyke in the other direction, and ended by a circuit over the sands, which were fast being covered by the tide, and so back to the yacht.<br />
<br />
Nobody appeared to have taken the slightest notice of our movements.<br />
<br />
As we walked we had tackled the last question, 'What are we to do?' and found very little to say on it. We were to leave to-night (unless the Esens police appeared on the scene), and were committed to sailing direct to Norderney, as the only alternative to duck shooting under the espionage of a 'trustworthy' nominee of von Brüning's. Beyond that—vagueness and difficulty of every sort.<br />
<br />
At Norderney I should be fettered by my letter. If it seemed to have been opened and it ordered my return, I was limited to a week, or must risk suspicion by staying. Dollmann was away (according to von Brüning), 'would probably be back soon'; but how soon? Beyond Norderney lay Memmert. How to probe its secret? The ardour it had roused in me was giving way to a mortifying sense of impotence. The sight of the Kormoran, with her crew preparing for sea, was a pointed comment on my diplomacy, and most of all on my ridiculous survey of the dykes. When all was said and done we were protégés of von Brüning, and dogged by Grimm. Was it likely they would let us succeed?<br />
<br />
The tide was swirling into the harbour in whorls of chocolate froth, and as it rose all Bensersiel, dominated as before by Herr Schenkel, straggled down to the quay to watch the movements of shipping during the transient but momentous hour when the mud-hole was a seaport. The captain's steam-cutter was already afloat, and her sailors busy with sidelights and engines. When it became known that we, too, were to sail, and under such distinguished escort, the excitement intensified.<br />
<br />
Again our friend of the customs was spreading out papers to sign, while a throng of helpful Frisians, headed by the twin giants of the post-boat, thronged our decks and made us ready for sea in their own confused fashion. Again we were carried up to the inn and overwhelmed with advice, and warnings, and farewell toasts. Then back again to find the Dulcibella afloat, and von Brüning just arrived, cursing the weather and the mud, chaffing Davies, genial and débonnaire as ever.<br />
<br />
'Stow that mainsail, you won't want it,' he said. 'I'll tow you right out to Spiekeroog. It's your only anchorage for the night in this wind—under the island, near the Blitz, and that would mean a dead beat for you in the dark.'<br />
<br />
The fact was so true, and the offer so timely, that Davies's faint protests were swept aside in a torrent of ridicule.<br />
<br />
'And now I think of it,' the commander ended, 'I'll make the trip with you, if I may. It'll be pleasanter and drier.'<br />
<br />
We all three boarded the Dulcibella, and then the end came. Our tow-rope was attached, and at half-past six the little launch jumped into the collar, and amidst a demonstration that could not have been more hearty if we had been ambassadors on a visit to a friendly power, we sidled out through the jetties.<br />
<br />
It took us more than an hour to cover the five miles to Spiekeroog, for the Dulcibella was a heavy load in the stiff head wind, and Davies, though he said nothing, showed undisguised distrust of our tug's capacities. He at once left the helm to me and flung himself on the gear, not resting till every rope was ready to hand, the mainsail reefed, the binnacle lighted, and all ready for setting sail or anchoring at a moment's notice. Our guest watched these precautions with infinite amusement. He was in the highest and most mischievous humour, raining banter on Davies and mock sympathy on me, laughing at our huge compass, heaving the lead himself, startling us with imaginary soundings, and doubting if his men were sober. I offered entertainment and warmth below, but he declined on the ground that Davies would be tempted to cut the tow-rope and make us pass the night on a safe sandbank. Davies took the raillery unmoved. His work done, he took the tiller and sat bareheaded, intent on the launch, the course, the details, and chances of the present. I brought up cigars and we settled ourselves facing him, our backs to the wind and spray. And so we made the rest of the passage, von Brüning cuddled against me and the cabin-hatch, alternately shouting a jest to Davies and talking to me in a light and charming vein, with just that shade of patronage that the disparity in our ages warranted, about my time in Germany, places, people, and books I knew, and about life, especially young men's life, in England, a country he had never visited, but hoped to; I responding as well as I could, striving to meet his mood, acquit myself like a man, draw zest instead of humiliation from the irony of our position, but scarcely able to make headway against a numbing sense of defeat and incapacity. A queer thought was haunting me, too, that such skill and judgement as I possessed was slipping from me as we left the land and faced again the rigours of this exacting sea. Davies, I very well knew, was under exactly the opposite spell—a spell which even the reproach of the tow-rope could not annul. His face, in the glow of the binnacle, was beginning to wear that same look of contentment and resolve that I had seen on it that night we had sailed to Kiel from Schlei Fiord. Heaven knows he had more cause for worry than I—a casual comrade in an adventure which was peculiarly his, which meant everything on earth to him; but there he was, washing away perplexity in the salt wind, drawing counsel and confidence from the unfailing source of all his inspirations—the sea.<br />
<br />
'Looks happy, doesn't he?' said the captain once. I grunted that he did, ashamed to find how irritated the remark made me.<br />
<br />
'You'll remember what I said,' he added in my ear.<br />
<br />
'Yes,' I said. 'But I should like to see her. What is she like?'<br />
<br />
'Dangerous.' I could well believe it.<br />
<br />
The hull of the Blitz loomed up, and a minute later our kedge was splashing overboard and the launch was backing alongside.<br />
<br />
'Good-night, gentlemen,' said our passenger. 'You're safe enough here, and you can run across in ten minutes in the morning and pick up your anchor, if it's there still. Then you've a fair wind west—to England if you like. If you decide to stay a little longer in these parts, and I'm in reach, count on me to help you, to sport or anything else.'<br />
<br />
We thanked him, shook hands, and he was gone.<br />
<br />
'He's a thundering good chap, anyhow,' said Davies; and I heartily agreed.<br />
<br />
The narrow vigilant life began again at once. We were 'safe enough' in a sense, but a warp and a twenty-pound anchor were poor security if the wind backed or increased. Plans for contingencies had to be made, and deck-watches kept till midnight, when the weather seemed to improve, and stars appeared. The glass was rising, so we turned in and slept under the very wing, so to speak, of the Imperial Government.<br />
<br />
'Davies,' I said, when we were settled in our bunks, 'it's only a day's sail to Norderney, isn't it?'<br />
<br />
'With a fair wind, less, if we go outside the islands direct.'<br />
<br />
'Well, it's settled that we do that to-morrow?'<br />
<br />
'I suppose so. We've got to get the anchor first. Good-night.'One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-78005669972487734422012-08-22T15:53:00.000+01:002012-08-22T15:53:00.204+01:00Have You Seen This Woman?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Weirdo.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-86758661706288338202012-08-21T15:52:00.000+01:002012-08-21T15:52:00.838+01:00Clearing The AirChapter XVII: Clearing The Air<br />
<br />
'HAS he gone to get the police, do you think?' said Davies, grimly.<br />
<br />
'I don't think so,' said I. 'Let's go aboard before that customs fellow buttonholes us.'<br />
<br />
A diminished row of stolid Frisians still ruminated over the Dulcibella. Friend Grimm was visible smoking on his forecastle. We went on board in silence.<br />
<br />
'First of all, where exactly is Memmert?' I said.<br />
<br />
Davies pulled down the chart, said 'There,' and flung himself at full length on a sofa.<br />
<br />
The reader can see Memmert for himself. South of Juist, abutting on the Ems delta, lies an extensive sandbank called Nordland, whose extreme western rim remains uncovered at the highest tides; the effect being to leave a C-shaped island, a mere paring of sand like a boomerang, nearly two miles long, but only 150 yards or so broad, of curiously symmetrical outline, except at one spot, where it bulges to the width of a quarter of a mile. On the English chart its nakedness was absolute, save for a beacon at the south; but the German chart marked a building at the point where the bulge occurs. This was evidently the depot. 'Fancy living there!' I thought, for the very name struck cold. No wonder Grimm was grim; and no wonder he was used to seek change of air. But the advantages of the site were obvious. It was remarkably isolated, even in a region where isolation is the rule; yet it was conveniently near the wreck, which, as we had heard, lay two miles out on the Juister Reef. Lastly, it was clearly accessible at any state of the tide, for the six-fathom channel of the Ems estuary runs hard up to it on the south, and thence sends off an eastward branch which closely borders the southern horn, thus offering an anchorage at once handy, deep, and sheltered from seaward gales.<br />
<br />
Such was Memmert, as I saw it on the chart, taking in its features mechanically, for while Davies lay there heedless and taciturn, a pretence of interest was useless. I knew perfectly well what was between us, but I did not see why I should make the first move; for I had a grievance too, an old one. So I sat back on my sofa and jotted down in my notebook the heads of our conversation at the inn while it was fresh in my memory, and strove to draw conclusions. But the silence continuing and becoming absurd, I threw my pride to the winds, and my notebook on the table.<br />
<br />
'I say, Davies,' I said, 'I'm awfully sorry I chaffed you about Fräulein Dollmann.' (No answer.) 'Didn't you see I couldn't help it?'<br />
<br />
'I wish to Heaven we had never come in here,' he said, in a hard voice; 'it comes of landing ever.' (I couldn't help smiling at this, but he wasn't looking at me.) 'Here we are, given away, moved on, taken in charge, arranged for like Cook's tourists. I couldn't follow your game—too infernally deep for me, but—'That stung me.<br />
<br />
'Look here,' I said, 'I did my best. It was you that muddled it. Why did you harp on ducks?'<br />
<br />
'We could have got out of that. Why did you harp on everything idiotic—your letter, the Foreign office, the Kormoran, the wreck, the—?'<br />
<br />
'You're utterly unreasonable. Didn't you see what traps there were? I was driven the way I went. We started unprepared, and we're jolly well out of it.'<br />
<br />
Davies drove on blindly. 'It was bad enough telling all about the channels and exploring—'<br />
<br />
'Why, you agreed to that yourself!'<br />
<br />
'I gave in to you. We can't explore any more now.<br />
<br />
'There's the wreck, though.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, hang the wreck! It's all a blind, or he wouldn't have made so much of it. There are all these channels to be—'<br />
<br />
'Oh, hang the channels! I know we wanted a free hand, but we've got to go to Norderney some time, and if Dollmann's away—'<br />
<br />
'Why did you harp on Miss Dollmann?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
We had worked round, through idle recrimination, to the real point of departure. I knew Davies was not himself, and would not return to himself till the heart of the matter was reached.<br />
<br />
'Look here,' I said, 'you brought me out here to help you, because, as you say, I was clever, talked German, and—liked yachting (I couldn't resist adding this). But directly you really want me you turn round and go for me.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, I didn't mean all that, really,' said Davies; 'I'm sorry—I was worried.'<br />
<br />
'I know; but it's your own fault. You haven't been fair with me. There's a complication in this business that you've never talked about. I've never pressed you because I thought you would confide in me. You—'<br />
<br />
'I know I haven't,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'Well, you see the result. Our hand was forced. To have said nothing about Dollmann was folly—to have said he tried to wreck you was equal folly. The story we agreed on was the best and safest, and you told it splendidly. But for two reasons I had to harp on the daughter—one because your manner when they were mentioned was so confused as to imperil our whole position. Two, because your story, though the safest, was, at the best, suspicious. Even on your own showing Dollmann treated you badly—discourteously, say: though you pretended not to have seen it. You want a motive to neutralize that, and induce you to revisit him in a friendly way. I supplied it, or rather I only encouraged von Brüning to supply it.'<br />
<br />
'Why revisit him, after all?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'Oh, come—'<br />
<br />
'But don't you see what a hideous fix you've put me in? How caddish I feel about it?'<br />
<br />
I did see, and I felt a cad myself, as his full distress came home to me. But I felt, too, that, whosesoever the fault, we had drifted into a ridiculous situation, and were like characters in one of those tiresome plays where misunderstandings are manufactured and so carefully sustained that the audience are too bored to wait for the dénouement. You can do that on the stage; but we wanted our dénouement.<br />
<br />
'I'm very sorry,' I said, 'but I wish you had told me all about it. Won't you now? Just the bare, matter-of-fact truth. I hate sentiment, and so do you.'<br />
<br />
'I find it very difficult to tell people things,' said Davies, 'things like this.' I waited. 'I did like her—very much.' Our eyes met for a second, in which all was said that need be said, as between two of our phlegmatic race. 'And she's—separate from him. That was the reason of all my indecisions.' he hurried on. 'I only told you half at Schlei. I know I ought to have been open, and asked your advice. But I let it slide. I've been hoping all along that we might find what we want and win the game without coming to close quarters again.'<br />
<br />
I no longer wondered at his devotion to the channel theory, since, built on conviction, it was thus doubly fortified.<br />
<br />
'Yet you always knew what might happen,' I said. 'At Schlei you spoke of "settling with" Dollmann.'<br />
<br />
'I know. When I thought of him I was mad. I made myself forget the other part.'<br />
<br />
'Which recurred at Brunsbüttel?' I thought of the news we had there.<br />
<br />
'Yes.'<br />
<br />
'Davies, we must have no more secrets. I'm going to speak out. Are you sure you've not misunderstood her? You say—and I'm willing to assume it—that Dollmann's a traitor and a murderer.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, hang the murder part!' said Davies, impatiently. 'What does that matter?'<br />
<br />
'Well, traitor. Very good; but in that case I suspect his daughter. No! let me go on. She was useful, to say the least. She encouraged you—you've told me that—to make that passage with them.'<br />
<br />
'Stop, Carruthers,' said Davies, firmly. 'I know you mean kindly; but it's no use. I believe in her.'<br />
<br />
I thought for a moment.<br />
<br />
'In that case,' I said, 'I've something to propose. When we get out of this place let's sail straight away to England.' '(There, Commander von Brüning,' I thought, 'you never can say I neglected your advice.')<br />
<br />
'No!' exclaimed Davies, starting up and facing me. 'I'm hanged if we will. Think what's at stake. Think of that traitor—plotting with Germans. My God!'<br />
<br />
'Very good,' I said. 'I'm with you for going on. But let's face facts. We must scotch Dollmann. We can't do so without hurting her.'<br />
<br />
'Can't we possibly?'<br />
<br />
'Of course not; be sensible, man. Face that. Next point; it's absurd to hope that we need not revisit them—it's ten to one that we must, if we're to succeed. His attempt on you is the whole foundation of our suspicions. And we don't even know for certain who he is yet. We're committed, I know, to going straight to Norderney now; but even if we weren't, should we do any good by exploring and prying? It's very doubtful. We know we're watched, if not suspected, and that disposes of nine-tenths of our power. The channels? Yes, but is it likely they'll let us learn them by heart, if they're of such vital importance, even if we are thought to be bona fide yachtsmen? And, seriously, apart from their value in war, which I don't deny, are they at the root of this business? But we'll talk about that in a moment. The point now is, what shall we do if we meet the Dollmanns?'<br />
<br />
Beads of sweat stood on Davies's brow. I felt like a torturer, but it could not be helped. 'Tax him with having wrecked you? Our quest would be at an end! We must be friendly. You must tell the story you told to-day, and chance his believing it. If he does, so much the better; if he doesn't, he won't dare say so, and we still have chances. We gain time, and have a tremendous hold on him—if we're friendly.' Davies winced. I gave another turn to the screw. 'Friendly with them both, of course. You were before, you know; you liked her very much—you must seem to still.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, stop your infernal logic.'<br />
<br />
'Shall we chuck it and go to England?' I asked again, as an inquisitor might say, 'Have you had enough?' No answer. I went on: 'To make it easier, you do like her still.' I had roused my victim at last.<br />
<br />
'What the devil do you mean, Carruthers? That I'm to trade on my liking for her—on her innocence, to—good God! what do you mean?'<br />
<br />
'No, no, not that. I'm not such a cad, or such a fool, or so ignorant of you. If she knows nothing of her father's character and likes you—and you like her—and you are what you are—oh Heavens! man, face it, realize it! But what I mean is this: is she, can she be, what you think? Imagine his position if we're right about him; the vilest creature on God's earth—a disgraceful past to have been driven to this—in the pay of Germany. I want to spare you misery.' I was going to add: 'And if you're on your guard, to increase our chances.' But the utter futility of such suggestions silenced me. What a plan I had foreshadowed! An enticing plan and a fair one, too, as against such adversaries; turning this baffling cross-current to advantage as many a time we had worked eddies of an adverse tide in these difficult seas. But Davies was Davies, and there was an end of it; his faith and simplicity shamed me. And the pity of it, the cruelty of it, was that his very qualities were his last torture, raising to the acutest pitch the conflict between love and patriotism. Remember that the latter was his dominant life-motive, and that here and now was his chance—if you would gauge the bitterness of that conflict.<br />
<br />
It was in its last throes now. His elbows were on the table, and his twitching hands pressed on his forehead. He took them away.<br />
<br />
'Of course we must go on. It can't be helped, that's all.'<br />
<br />
'And you believe in her?'<br />
<br />
'I'll remember what you've said. There may be some way out. And—I'd rather not talk about that any more. What about the wreck?'<br />
<br />
Further argument was futile. Davies by an effort seemed to sweep the subject from his thoughts, and I did my best to do the same. At any rate the air was cleared—we were friends; and it only remained to grapple with the main problem in the light of the morning's interview.<br />
<br />
Every word that I could recollect of that critical conversation I reviewed with Davies, who had imperfectly understood what he had not been directly concerned in; and, as I did so, I began to see with what cleverness each succeeding sentence of von Brüning's was designed to suit both of two contingencies. If we were innocent travellers, he was the genial host, communicative and helpful. If we were spies, his tactics had been equally applicable. He had outdone us in apparent candour, hiding nothing which he knew we would discover for ourselves, and contriving at the same time both to gain knowledge and control of our movements, and to convey us warnings, which would only be understood if we were guilty, that we were playing an idle and perilous game, and had better desist. But in one respect we had had the advantage, and that was in the version Davies had given of his stranding on the Hohenhörn. Inscrutable as our questioner was, he let it appear not only that the incident was new to him, but that he conjectured at its sinister significance. A little cross-examination on detail would have been fatal to Davies's version; but that was where our strength lay; he dared not cross-examine for fear of suggesting to Davies suspicions which he might never have felt. Indeed, I thought I detected that fear underlying his whole attitude towards us, and it strengthened a conviction which had been growing in me since Grimm's furtive midnight visit, that the secret of this coast was of so important and delicate a nature that rather than attract attention to it at all, overt action against intruders would be taken only in the last resort, and on irrefragable proofs of guilty intention.<br />
<br />
Now for our clues. I had come away with two, each the germ of a distinct theory, and both obscured by the prevailing ambiguity. Now, however, as we thumbed the chart and I gave full rein to my fancy, one of them, the idea of Memmert, gained precision and vigour every moment. True, such information as we had about the French wreck and his own connection with it was placed most readily at our disposal by von Brüning; but I took it to be information calculated only to forestall suspicion, since he was aware that we already associated him with Dollmann, possibly also with Grimm, and it was only likely that in the ordinary course we should learn that the trio were jointly concerned in Memmert. So much for the facts; as for the construction he wished us to put on them, I felt sure it was absolutely false. He wished to give us the impression that the buried treasure itself was at the root of any mystery we might have scented. I do not know if the reader fully appreciated that astute suggestion—the hint that secrecy as to results was necessary owing both to the great sum at stake and the flaw in the title, which he had been careful to inform us had passed through British hands. What he meant to imply was, 'Don't be surprised if you have midnight visitors; Englishmen prowling along this coast are suspected of being Lloyd's agents.' An ingenious insinuation, which, at the time it was made, had caused me to contemplate a new and much more commonplace solution of our enigma than had ever occurred to us; but it was only a passing doubt, and I dismissed it altogether now.<br />
<br />
The fact was, it either explained everything or nothing. As long as we held to our fundamental assumption—that Davies had been decoyed into a death-trap in September—it explained nothing. It was too fantastic to suppose that the exigencies of a commercial speculation would lead to such extremities as that. We were not in the South Sea Islands; nor were we the puppets of a romance. We were in Europe, dealing not only with a Dollmann, but with an officer of the German Imperial Navy, who would scarcely be connected with a commercial enterprise which could conceivably be reduced to forwarding its objects in such a fashion. It was shocking enough to find him in relations with such a scoundrel at all, but it was explicable if the motive were imperial—not so if it were financial. No; to accept the suggestion we must declare the whole quest a mare's nest from beginning to end; the attempt on Davies a delusion of his own fancy, the whole structure we had built on it, baseless.<br />
<br />
'Well,' I can hear the reader saying, 'why not? You, at any rate, were always a little sceptical.'<br />
<br />
Granted; yet I can truthfully say I scarcely faltered for a moment. Much had happened since Schlei Fiord. I had seen the mechanism of the death-trap; I had lived with Davies for a stormy fortnight, every hour of which had increased my reliance on his seamanship, and also, therefore, on his account of an event which depended largely for its correct interpretation on a balanced nautical judgement. Finally, I had been unconsciously realizing, and knew from his mouth to-day, that he had exercised and acted on that judgement in the teeth of personal considerations, which his loyal nature made overwhelming in their force.<br />
<br />
What, then, was the meaning of Memmert? At the outset it riveted my attention on the Ems estuary, whose mouth it adjoins. We had always rather neglected the Ems in our calculations; with some excuse, too, for at first sight its importance bears no proportion to that of the three greater estuaries. The latter bear vessels of the largest tonnage and deepest draught to the very quays of Hamburg, Bremerhaven, and the naval dockyard of Wilhelmshaven; while two of them, the Elbe and the Weser, are commerce carriers on the vastest scale for the whole empire. The Ems, on the other hand, only serves towns of the second class. A glance at the chart explains this. You see a most imposing estuary on a grander scale than any of the other three taken singly, with a length of thirty miles and a frontage on the North Sea of ten miles, or one-seventieth, roughly, of the whole seaboard; encumbered by outlying shoals, and blocked in the centre by the island of Borkum, but presenting two fine deep-water channels to the incoming vessel. These roll superbly through enormous sheets of sand, unite and approach the mainland in one stately stream three miles in breadth. But then comes a sad falling off. The navigable fairway shoals and shrinks, middle grounds obstruct it, and shelving foreshores persistently deny it that easy access to the land that alone can create great seaboard cities. All the ports of the Ems are tidal; the harbour of Delfzyl, on the Dutch side, dries at low water, and Emden, the principal German port, can only be reached by a lock and a mile of canal.<br />
<br />
But this depreciation is only relative. Judged on its merits, and not by the standard of the Elbe, it is a very important river. Emden is a flourishing and growing port. For shallow craft the stream is navigable far into the interior, where, aided by tributaries and allied canals (notably the connection with the Rhine at Dortmund, then approaching completion), it taps the resources of a great area. Strategically there was still less reason for underrating it. It is one of the great maritime gates of Germany; and it is the westernmost gate, the nearest to Great Britain and France, contiguous to Holland. Its great forked delta presents two yawning breaches in that singular rampart of islets and shoals which masks the German seaboard—a seaboard itself so short in proportion to the empire's bulk, that, as Davies used to say, 'every inch of it must be important.' Warships could force these breaches, and so threaten the mainland at one of its few vulnerable points. Quay accommodation is no object to such visitors; intricate navigation no deterrent. Even the heaviest battleships could approach within striking distance of the land, while cruisers and military transports could penetrate to the level of Emden itself. Emden, as Davies had often pointed out, is connected by canal with Wilhelmshaven on the Jade, a strategic canal, designed to carry gunboats as well as merchandise.<br />
<br />
Now Memmert was part of the outer rampart; its tapering sickle of sand directly commanded the eastern breach; it must be connected with the defence of this breach. No more admirable base could be imagined; self-contained and isolated, yet sheltered, accessible—better than Juist and Borkum. And supposing it were desired to shroud the nature of the work in absolute secrecy, what a pretext lay to hand in the wreck and its buried bullion, which lay in the offing opposite the fairway!<br />
<br />
On Memmert was the depot for the salvage operations. Salvage work, with its dredging and diving, offered precisely the disguise that was needed. It was submarine, and so are some of the most important defences of ports, mines, and dirigible torpedoes. All the details of the story were suggestive: the 'small local company'; the 'engineer from Bremen' (who, I wondered, was he?); the few shares held by von Brüning, enough to explain his visits; the stores and gear coming from Wilhelmshaven, a naval dockyard.<br />
<br />
Try as I would I could not stir Davies's imagination as mine was stirred. He was bent on only seeing the objections, which, of course, were numerous enough. Could secrecy be ensured under pretext of salving a wreck? It must be a secret shared by many—divers, crews of tugs, employees of all sorts. I answered that trade secrets are often preserved under no less difficult conditions, and why not imperial secrets?<br />
<br />
'Why the Ems and not the Elbe?' he asked.<br />
<br />
'Perhaps,' I replied, 'the Elbe, too, holds similar mysteries.' Neuerk Island might, for all we knew, be another Memmert; when cruising in that region we had had no eyes for such things, absorbed in a preconceived theory of our own. Besides, we must not take ourselves too seriously. We were amateurs, not experts in coast defence, and on such vague grounds to fastidiously reject a clue which went so far as this one was to quarrel with our luck. There was a disheartening corollary to this latter argument that in my new-born zeal I shut my eyes to. As amateurs, were we capable of using our clue and gaining exact knowledge of the defences in question? Davies, I knew, felt this strongly, and I think it accounted for his lukewarm view of Memmert more than he was aware. He clung more obstinately than ever to his 'channel theory', conscious that it offered the one sort of opportunity of which with his peculiar gifts he was able to take advantage. He admitted, however, that it was under a cloud at present, for if knowledge of the coastwise navigation were a crime in itself we should scarcely be sitting here now. 'It's something to do with it, anyhow!' he persisted.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-90867916288098447052012-08-19T15:50:00.000+01:002012-08-19T15:50:00.840+01:00Commander Von BrüningChapter XVI: Commander Von Brüning<br />
<br />
TO RESUME my story in narrative form.<br />
<br />
I was awakened at ten o'clock on the 19th, after a long and delicious sleep, by Davies's voice outside, talking his unmistakable German. Looking out, in my pyjamas, I saw him on the quay above in conversation with a man in a long mackintosh coat and a gold-laced navy cap. He had a close-trimmed auburn beard, a keen, handsome face, and an animated manner. It was raining in a raw air.<br />
<br />
They saw me, and Davies said: 'Hullo, Carruthers! Here's Commander von Brüning from the Blitz—that's "meiner Freund" Carruthers.' (Davies was deplorably weak in terminations.)<br />
<br />
The commander smiled broadly at me, and I inclined an uncombed head, while, for a moment, the quest was a dream, and I myself felt unutterably squalid and foolish. I ducked down, heard them parting, and Davies came aboard.<br />
<br />
'We're to meet him at the inn for a talk at twelve,' he said.<br />
<br />
His news was that the Blitz's steam-cutter had come in on the morning tide, and he had met von Brüning when marketing at the inn. Secondly, the Kormoran had also come in, and was moored close by. It was as clear as possible, therefore, that the latter had watched us, and was in touch with the Blitz, and that both had seized the opportunity of our being cooped up in Bensersiel to take further stock of us. What had passed hitherto? Nothing much. Von Brüning had greeted Davies with cordial surprise, and said he had wondered yesterday if it was the Dulcibella that he had seen anchored behind Langeoog. Davies had explained that we had left the Baltic and were on our way home; taking the shelter of the islands.<br />
<br />
'Supposing he comes on board and asks to see our log?' I said.<br />
<br />
'Pull it out,' said Davies, 'It's rot, this hiding, after all. I say. I rather funk this interview; what are we to say? It's not in my line.'<br />
<br />
We resolved abruptly on an important change of plan, replaced the log and charts in the rack as the first logical step. They contained nothing but bearings, courses, and the bare data of navigation. To Davies they were hard-won secrets of vital import, to be lied for, however hard and distasteful lying was. I was cooler as to their value, but in any case the same thing was now in both our minds. There would be great difficulties in the coming interview if we tried to be too clever and conceal the fact that we had been exploring. We did not know how much von Brüning knew. When had our surveillance by the Kormoran begun? Apparently at Wangeroog, but possibly in the estuaries, where we had not fired a shot at duck. Perhaps he knew even more—Dollmann's treachery, Davies's escape, and our subsequent movements—we could not tell. On the other hand, exploration was known to be a fad of Davies's, and in September he had made no secret of it.<br />
<br />
It was safer to be consistent now. After breakfast we determined to find out something about the Kormoran, which lay on the mud at the other side of the harbour, and accordingly addressed ourselves to two mighty sailors, whose jerseys bore the legend 'Post', and who towered conspicuous among a row of stolid Frisians on the quay, all gazing gravely down at us as at a curious bit of marine bric-à-brac. The twins (for such they proved to be) were most benignant giants, and asked us aboard the post-boat galliot for a chat. It was easy to bring the talk naturally round to the point we wished, and we soon gained some most interesting information, delivered in the broadest Frisian, but intelligible enough. They called the Kormoran a Memmert boat, or 'wreck-works' boat. It seemed that off the western end of Juist, the island lying west of Norderney, there lay the bones of a French war-vessel, wrecked ages ago. She carried bullion which has never been recovered, in spite of many efforts. A salvage company was trying for it now, and had works on Memmert, an adjacent sand-bank. 'That is Herr Grimm, the overseer himself,' they said, pointing to the bridge above the sluice-gates. (I call him 'Grimm' because it describes him exactly.) A man in a pilot jacket and peaked cap was leaning over the parapet.<br />
<br />
'What's he doing here?' I asked.<br />
<br />
They answered that he was often up and down the coast, work on the wreck being impossible in rough weather. They supposed he was bringing cargo in his galliot from Wilhelmshaven, all the company's plant and stores coming from that port. He was a local man from Aurich; an ex-tug skipper.<br />
<br />
We discussed this information while walking out over the sands to see the channel at low water.<br />
<br />
'Did you hear anything about this in September?' I asked.<br />
<br />
'Not a word. I didn't go to Juist. I would have, probably, if I hadn't met Dollmann.'<br />
<br />
What in the world did it mean? How did it affect our plans?<br />
<br />
'Look at his boots if we pass him,' was all Davies had to suggest.<br />
<br />
The channel was now a ditch, with a trickle in it, running north by east, roughly, and edged by a dyke of withies for the first quarter of a mile. It was still blowing fresh from the north-east, and we saw that exit was impossible in such a wind.<br />
<br />
So back to the village, a paltry, bleak little place. We passed friend Grimm on the bridge; a dark, clean-shaved, saturnine man, wearing shoes. Approaching the inn:<br />
<br />
'We haven't settled quite enough, have we?' said Davies. 'What about our future plans?'<br />
<br />
'Heaven knows, we haven't,' I said. 'But I don't see how we can. We must see how things go. It's past twelve, and it won't do to be late.'<br />
<br />
'Well, I leave it to you.'<br />
<br />
'All right, I'll do my best. All you've got to do is to be yourself and tell one lie, if need be, about the trick Dollmann played you.'<br />
<br />
The next scene: von Brüning, Davies, and I, sitting over coffee and Kümmel at a table in a dingy inn-parlour overlooking the harbour and the sea, Davies with a full box of matches on the table before him. The commander gave us a hearty welcome, and I am bound to say I liked him at once, as Davies had done; but I feared him, too, for he had honest eyes, but abominably clever ones.<br />
<br />
I had impressed on Davies to talk and question as freely and naturally as though nothing uncommon had happened since he last saw von Brüning on the deck of the Medusa. He must ask about Dollmann—the mutual friend—at the outset, and, if questioned about that voyage in his company to the Elbe, must lie like a trooper as to the danger he had been in. This was the one clear and essential necessity, where much was difficult. Davies did his duty with precipitation, and blushed when he put his question, in a way that horrified me, till I remembered that his embarrassment was due, and would be ascribed, to another cause.<br />
<br />
'Herr Dollmann is away still, I think,' said von Brüning. (So Davies had been right at Brunsbüttel.) 'Were you thinking of looking him up again?' he added.<br />
<br />
'Yes,' said Davies, shortly.<br />
<br />
'Well, I'm sure he's away. But his yacht is back, I believe—and Fräulein Dollmann, I suppose.'<br />
<br />
'H'm!' said Davies; 'she's a very fine boat that.'<br />
<br />
Our host smiled, gazing thoughtfully at Davies, who was miserable. I saw a chance, and took it mercilessly.<br />
<br />
'We can call on Fräulein Dollmann, at least, Davies,' I said, with a meaning smile at von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'H'm!, said Davies; 'will he be back soon, do you think?'<br />
<br />
The commander had begun to light a cigar, and took his time in answering. 'Probably,' he said, after some puffing, 'he's never away very long. But you've seen them later than I have. Didn't you sail to the Elbe together the day after I saw you last?'<br />
<br />
'Oh, part of the way,' said Davies, with great negligence. 'I haven't seen him since. He got there first; outsailed me.'<br />
<br />
'Gave you the slip, in fact?'<br />
<br />
'Of course he beat me; I was close-reefed. Besides—'<br />
<br />
'Oh, I remember; there was a heavy blow—a devil of a heavy blow. I thought of you that day. How did you manage?'<br />
<br />
'Oh, it was a fair wind; it wasn't far, you see.'<br />
<br />
'Grosse Gott! In that.' He nodded towards the window whence the Dulcibella's taper mast could be seen pointing demurely heavenwards.<br />
<br />
'She's a splendid sea-boat,' said Davies, indignantly.<br />
<br />
'A thousand pardons!' said von Brüning, laughing.<br />
<br />
'Don't shake my faith in her,' I put in. 'I've got to get to England in her.'<br />
<br />
'Heaven forbid; I was only thinking that there must have been some sea round the Scharhorn that day; a tame affair, no doubt, Herr Davies?'<br />
<br />
'Scharhorn?' said Davies, who did not catch the idiom in the latter sentence. 'Oh, we didn't go that way. We cut through the sands—by the Telte.'<br />
<br />
'The Telte! In a north-west gale!' The commander started, ceased to smile, and only stared. (It was genuine surprise; I could swear it. He had heard nothing of this before.)<br />
<br />
'Herr Dollmann knew the way,' said Davies, doggedly. 'He kindly offered to pilot me through, and I wouldn't have gone otherwise.' There was an awkward little pause.<br />
<br />
'He led you well, it seems?' said von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'Yes; there's a nasty surf there, though, isn't there? But it saves six miles—and the Scharhorn. Not that I saved distance. I was fool enough to run aground.'<br />
<br />
'Ah!' said the other, with interest.<br />
<br />
'It didn't matter, because I was well inside then. Those sands are difficult at high water. We've come back that way, you know.'<br />
<br />
('And we run aground every day,' I remarked, with resignation.)<br />
<br />
'Is that where the Medusa gave you the slip?' asked von Brüning, still studying Davies with a strange look, which I strove anxiously to analyze.<br />
<br />
'She wouldn't have noticed,' said Davies. 'It was very thick and squally—and she had got some way ahead. There was no need for her to stop, anyway. I got off all right; the tide was rising still. But, of course, I anchored there for the night.'<br />
<br />
'Where?'<br />
<br />
'Inside there, under the Hohenhörn,' said Davies, simply.<br />
<br />
'Under the what?'<br />
<br />
'The Hohenhörn.'<br />
<br />
'Go on—didn't they wait for you at Cuxhaven?'<br />
<br />
'I don't know; I didn't go that way.' The commander looked more and more puzzled.<br />
<br />
'Not by the ship canal, I mean. I changed my mind about it, because the next day the wind was easterly. It would have been a dead beat across the sands to Cuxhaven, while it was a fair wind straight out to the Eider River. So I sailed there, and reached the Baltic that way. It was all the same.'<br />
<br />
There was another pause.<br />
<br />
'Well done, Davies,' I thought. He had told his story well, using no subtlety. I knew it was exactly how he would have told it to anyone else, if he had not had irrefutable proof of foul play.<br />
<br />
The commander laughed, suddenly and heartily.<br />
<br />
'Another liqueur?' he said. Then, to me: 'Upon my word, your friend amuses me. It's impossible to make him spin a yarn. I expect he had a bad time of it.'<br />
<br />
'That's nothing to him,' I said; 'he prefers it. He anchored me the other day behind the Hohenhörn in a gale of wind; said it was safer than a harbour, and more sanitary.'<br />
<br />
'I wonder he brought you here last night. It was a fair wind for England; and not very far.'<br />
<br />
'There was no pilot to follow, you see.'<br />
<br />
'With a charming daughter—no.'<br />
<br />
Davies frowned and glared at me. I was merciful and changed the subject.<br />
<br />
'Besides,' I said, 'we've left our anchor and chain out there.' And I made confession of my sin.<br />
<br />
'Well, as it's buoyed, I should advise you to pick it up as soon as you can,' said von Brüning, carelessly; 'or someone else will.'<br />
<br />
'Yes, by Jove! Carruthers,' said Davies, eagerly, 'we must get out on this next tide.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, there's no hurry,' I said, partly from policy, partly because the ease of the shore was on me. To sit on a chair upright is something of a luxury, however good the cause in which you have crouched like a monkey over a table at the level of your knees, with a reeking oil-stove at your ear.<br />
<br />
'They're honest enough about here, aren't they?' I added. While the words were on my lips I remembered the midnight visitor at Wangeroog, and guessed that von Brüning was leading up to a test. Grimm (if he was the visitor) would have told him of his narrow escape from detection, and reticence on our part would show we suspected something. I could have kicked myself, but it was not too late. I took the bull by the horns, and, before the commander could answer, added:<br />
<br />
'By Jove! Davies, I forgot about that fellow at Wangeroog. The anchor might be stolen, as he says.'<br />
<br />
Davies looked blank, but von Brüning had turned to me.<br />
<br />
'We never dreamed there would be thieves among these islands,' I said, 'but the other night I nearly caught a fellow in the act. He thought the yacht was empty.'<br />
<br />
I described the affair in detail, and with what humour I could. Our host was amused, and apologetic for the islanders.<br />
<br />
'They're excellent folk,' he said, 'but they're born with predatory instincts. Their fathers made their living out of wrecks on this coast, and the children inherit a weakness for plunder. When Wangeroog lighthouse was built they petitioned the Government for compensation, in perfect good faith. The coast is well lighted now, and windfalls are rare, but the sight of a stranded yacht, with the owners ashore, would inflame the old passion; and, depend upon it, someone has seen that anchor-buoy.'<br />
<br />
The word 'wrecks' had set me tingling. Was it another test? Impossible to say; but audacity was safer than reserve, and might save trouble in the future.<br />
<br />
'Isn't there the wreck of a treasure-ship somewhere farther west?' I asked. 'We heard of it at Wangeroog' (my first inaccuracy). 'They said a company was exploiting it.'<br />
<br />
'Quite right,' said the commander, without a sign of embarrassment. 'I don't wonder you heard of it. It's one of the few things folk have to talk about in these parts. It lies on Juister Riff, a shoal off Juist. She was a French frigate, the Corinne, bound from Hamburg to Havre in 1811, when Napoleon held Hamburg as tight as Paris. She carried a million and a half in gold bars, and was insured in Hamburg; foundered in four fathoms, broke up, and there lies the treasure.'<br />
<br />
'Never been raised?'<br />
<br />
'No. The underwriters failed and went bankrupt, and the wreck came into the hands of your English Lloyd's. It remained their property till '75, but they never got at the bullion. In fact, for fifty years it was never scratched at, and its very position grew doubtful, for the sand swallowed every stick. The rights passed through various hands, and in '86 were held by an enterprising Swedish company, which brought modern appliances, dived, dredged, and dug, fished up a lot of timber and bric-à-brac, and then broke. Since then, two Hamburg firms have tackled the job and lost their capital. Scores of lives have been spent over it, all told, and probably a million of money. Still there are the bars, somewhere.'<br />
<br />
'And what's being done now?'<br />
<br />
'Well, recently a small local company was formed. It has a depot at Memmert, and is working with a good deal of perseverance. An engineer from Bremen was the principal mover, and a few men from Norderney and Emden subscribed the capital. By the way, our friend Dollmann is largely interested in it.'<br />
<br />
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Davies's tell-tale face growing troubled with inward questionings.<br />
<br />
'We mustn't get back to him,' I said, laughing. 'It's not fair to my friend. But all this is very interesting. Will they ever get those bars?'<br />
<br />
'Ah! that's the point,' said von Brüning, with a mysterious twinkle. 'It's an undertaking of immense difficulty; for the wreck is wholly disintegrated, and the gold, being the heaviest part of it, has, of course, sunk the deepest. Dredging is useless after a certain point; and the divers have to make excavations in the sand, and shore them up as best they can. Every gale nullifies half their labour, and weather like this of the last fortnight plays the mischief with the work. Only this morning I met the overseer, who happens to be ashore here. He was as black as thunder over prospects.'<br />
<br />
'Well, it's a romantic speculation,' I said. 'They deserve a return for their money.'<br />
<br />
'I hope they'll get it,' said the commander. 'The fact is, I hold a few shares myself.'<br />
<br />
'Oh, I hope I haven't been asking indiscreet questions?'<br />
<br />
'Oh, dear no; all the world knows what I've told you. But you'll understand that one has to be reticent as to results in such a case. It's a big stake, and the title is none too sound. There has been litigation over it. Not that I worry much about my investment; for I shan't lose much by it at the worst. But it gives one an interest in this abominable coast. I go and see how they're getting on sometimes, when I'm down that way.'<br />
<br />
'It is an abominable coast,' I agreed, heartily, 'though you won't get Davies to agree.'<br />
<br />
'It's a magnificent place for sailing,' said Davies, looking wistfully out over the storm-speckled grey of the North Sea. He underwent some more chaff, and the talk passed to our cruising adventures in the Baltic and the estuaries. Von Brüning cross-examined us with the most charming urbanity and skill. Nothing he asked could cause us the slightest offence; and a responsive frankness was our only possible course. So, date after date, and incident after incident, were elicited in the most natural way. As we talked I was astonished to find how little there was that was worth concealing, and heartily thankful that we had decided on candour. My fluency gave me the lead, and Davies followed me; but his own personality was really our tower of strength. I realized that as I watched the play of his eager features, and heard him struggle for expression on his favourite hobby; all his pet phrases translated crudely into the most excruciating German. He was convincing, because he was himself.<br />
<br />
'Are there many like you in England?' asked von Brüning once.<br />
<br />
'Like me? Of course—lots,' said Davies.<br />
<br />
'I wish there were more in Germany; they play at yachting over here—on shore half the time, drinking and loafing; paid crews, clean hands, white trousers; laid up in the middle of September.'<br />
<br />
'We haven't seen many yachts about, said Davies, politely.<br />
<br />
For my part, I made no pretence of being a Davies. Faithful to my lower nature, I vowed the Germans were right, and, not without a secret zest, drew a lurid picture of the horrors of crewless cruising, and the drudgery that my remorseless skipper inflicted on me. It was delightful to see Davies wincing when I described my first night at Flensburg, for I had my revenge at last, and did not spare him. He bore up gallantly under my jesting, but I knew very well by his manner that he had not forgiven me my banter about the 'charming daughter'.<br />
<br />
'You speak German well,' said von Brüning.<br />
<br />
'I have lived in Germany,' said I.<br />
<br />
'Studying for a profession, I suppose?'<br />
<br />
'Yes,' said I, thinking ahead. 'Civil Service,' was my prepared answer to the next question, but again (morbidly, perhaps) I saw a pitfall. That letter from my chief awaiting me at Norderney? My name was known, and we were watched. It might be opened. Lord, how casual we have been!<br />
<br />
'May I ask what?'<br />
<br />
'The Foreign Office.' It sounded suspicious, but there it was. 'Indeed—in the Government service? When do you have to be back?'<br />
<br />
That was how the question of our future intentions was raised, prematurely by me; for two conflicting theories were clashing in my brain. But the contents of the letter dogged me now, and 'when at a loss, tell the truth', was an axiom I was finding sound. So I answered, 'Pretty soon, in about a week. But I'm expecting a letter at Norderney, which may give me an extension. Davies said it was a good address to give,' I added, smiling.<br />
<br />
'Naturally,' said von Brüning, dryly; the joke had apparently ceased to amuse him. 'But you haven't much time then, have you?' he added, 'unless you leave your skipper in the lurch. It's a long way to England, and the season is late for yachts.'<br />
<br />
I felt myself being hurried.<br />
<br />
'Oh, you don't understand,' I explained; 'he's in no hurry. He's a man of leisure; aren't you, Davies?'<br />
<br />
'What?' said Davies.<br />
<br />
I translated my cruel question.<br />
<br />
'Yes,' said Davies, with simple pathos.<br />
<br />
'If I have to leave him I shan't be missed—as an able seaman, at least. He'll just potter on down the islands, running aground and kedging-off, and arrive about Christmas.'<br />
<br />
'Or take the first fair gale to Dover,' laughed the commander.<br />
<br />
'Or that. So, you see, we're in no hurry: and we never make plans. And as for a passage to England straight, I'm not such a coward as I was at first, but I draw the line at that.'<br />
<br />
'You're a curious pair of shipmates; what's your point of view, Herr Davies?'<br />
<br />
'I like this coast,' said Davies. 'And—we want to shoot some ducks.' He was nervous, and forgot himself. I had already satirized our sporting armament and exploits, and hoped the subject was disposed of. Ducks were pretexts, and might lead to complications. I particularly wanted a free hand.<br />
<br />
'As to wild fowl,' said our friend, 'I would like to give you gentlemen some advice. There are plenty to be got, now that autumn weather has set in (you wouldn't have got a shot in September, Herr Davies; I remember your asking about them when I saw you last). And even now it's early for amateurs. In hard winter weather a child can pick them up; but they're wild still, and want crafty hunting. You want a local punt, and above all a local man (you could stow him in your fo'c'sle), and to go to work seriously. Now, if you really wish for sport, I could help you. I could get you a trustworthy—'<br />
<br />
'Oh, it's too good of you,' stammered Davies, in a more unhappy accent than usual. 'We can easily find one for ourselves. A man at Wangeroog offered—'<br />
<br />
'Oh, did he?' interrupted von Brüning, laughing. 'I'm not surprised. You don't know the Frieslanders. They're guileless, as I said, but they cling to their little perquisites.' (I translated to Davies.) 'They've been cheated out of wrecks, and they're all the more sensitive about ducks, which are more lucrative than fish. A stranger is a poacher. Your man would have made slight errors as to time and place.'<br />
<br />
'You said they were odd in their manner, didn't you, Davies?' I put in. 'Look here, this is very kind of Commander von Brüning; but hadn't we better be certain of my plans before settling down to shoot? Let's push on direct to Norderney and get that letter of mine, and then decide. But we shan't see you again, I suppose, commander?'<br />
<br />
'Why not? I am cruising westwards, and shall probably call at Norderney. Come aboard if you're there, won't you? I should like to show you the Blitz.'<br />
<br />
'Thanks, very much,' said Davies, uneasily.<br />
<br />
'Thanks, very much,' said I, as heartily as I could.<br />
<br />
Our party broke up soon after this.<br />
<br />
'Well, gentlemen, I must take leave of you,' said our friend. 'I have to drive to Esens. I shall be going back to the Blitz on the evening tide, but you'll be busy then with your own boat.'<br />
<br />
It had been a puzzling interview, but the greatest puzzle was still to come. As we went towards the door, von Brüning made a sign to me. We let Davies pass out and remained standing.<br />
<br />
'One word in confidence with you, Herr Carruthers,' he said, speaking low. 'You won't think me officious, I hope. I only speak out of keen regard for your friend. It is about the Dollmanns—you see how the land lies? I wouldn't encourage him.'<br />
<br />
'Thanks,' I said, 'but really—'<br />
<br />
'It's only a hint. He's a splendid young fellow, but if anything—you understand—too honest and simple. I take it you have influence with him, and I should use it.'<br />
<br />
'I was not in earnest,' I said. 'I have never seen the Dollmanns; I thought they were friends of yours,' I added, looking him straight in the eyes.<br />
<br />
'I know them, but'—he shrugged his shoulders—'I know everybody.'<br />
<br />
'What's wrong with them?' I said, point-blank.<br />
<br />
'Softly! Herr Carruthers. Remember, I speak out of pure friendliness to you as strangers, foreigners, and young. You I take to have discretion, or I should not have said a word. Still, I will add this. We know very little of Herr Dollmann, of his origin, his antecedents. He is half a Swede, I believe, certainly not a Prussian; came to Norderney three years ago, appears to be rich, and has joined in various commercial undertakings. Little scope about here? Oh, there is more enterprise than you think—development of bathing resorts, you know, speculation in land on these islands. Sharp practice? Oh, no! he's perfectly straight in that way. But he's a queer fellow, of eccentric habits, and—and, well, as I say, little is known of him. That's all, just a warning. Come along.'<br />
<br />
I saw that to press him further was useless.<br />
<br />
'Thanks; I'll remember,' I said.<br />
<br />
'And look here,' he added, as we walked down the passage, 'if you take my advice, you'll omit that visit to the Medusa altogether.' He gave me a steady look, smiling gravely.<br />
<br />
'How much do you know, and what do you mean?' were the questions that throbbed in my thoughts; but I could not utter them, so I said nothing and felt very young.<br />
<br />
Outside we joined Davies, who was knitting his brow over prospects.<br />
<br />
'It just comes of going into places like this,' he said to me. 'We may be stuck here for days. Too much wind to tow out with the dinghy, and too narrow a channel to beat in.'<br />
<br />
Von Brüning was ready with a new proposal.<br />
<br />
'Why didn't I think of it before?' he said. 'I'll tow you out in my launch. Be ready at 6.30; we shall have water enough then. My men will send you a warp.'<br />
<br />
It was impossible to refuse, but a sense of being personally conducted again oppressed me; and the last hope of a bed in the inn vanished. Davies was none too effusive either. A tug meant a pilot, and he had had enough of them.<br />
<br />
'He objects to towage on principle,' I said.<br />
<br />
'Just like him!' laughed the other. 'That's settled, then!' A dogcart was standing before the inn door in readiness for von Brüning. I was curious about Esens and his business there. Esens, he said, was the principal town of the district, four miles inland.<br />
<br />
'I have to go there,' he volunteered, 'about a poaching case—a Dutchman trawling inside our limits. That's my work, you know—police duty.'<br />
<br />
Had the words a deeper meaning?<br />
<br />
'Do you ever catch an Englishman?' I asked, recklessly. 'Oh, very rarely; your countrymen don't come so far as this—except on pleasure.' He bowed to us each and smiled.<br />
<br />
'Not much of that to be got in Bensersiel,' I laughed. 'I'm afraid you'll have a dull afternoon. Look here. I know you can't leave your boat altogether, and it's no use asking Herr Davies; but will you drive into Esens with me and see a Frisian town—for what it's worth? You're getting a dismal impression of Friesland.' I excused myself, said I would stop with Davies we would walk out over the sands and prospect for the evening', sail.<br />
<br />
'Well, good-bye then,' he said, 'till the evening. Be ready for the warp at 6.30.'<br />
<br />
He jumped up, and the cart rattled off through the mud, crossed the bridge, and disappeared into the dreary hinterland.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-42389433170091151242012-08-18T15:49:00.000+01:002012-08-18T15:49:00.218+01:00Toasted<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Charred.One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7125311864989919628.post-29747182722890292662012-08-17T15:48:00.000+01:002012-08-17T15:48:00.471+01:00BensersielChapter XV: Bensersiel<br />
<br />
THE decisive incidents of our cruise were now fast approaching. Looking back on the steps that led to them, and anxious that the reader should be wholly with us in our point of view, I think I cannot do better than give extracts from my diary of the next three days:<br />
<br />
'16th Oct. (up at 6.30, yacht high and dry). Of the three galliots out at anchor in the channel yesterday, only one is left ... I took my turn with the breakers this morning and walked to Wangeroog, whose village I found half lost in sand drifts, which are planted with tufts of marram-grass in mathematical rows, to give stability and prevent a catastrophe like that at Pompeii. A friendly grocer told me all there is to know, which is little. The islands are what we thought them—barren for the most part, with a small fishing population, and a scanty accession of summer visitors for bathing. The season is over now, and business slack for him. There is still, however, a little trade with the mainland in galliots and lighters, a few of which come from the "siels" on the mainland. "Had these harbours?" I asked. "Mud-holes!" he replied, with a contemptuous laugh. (He is a settler in these wilds, not a native.) Said he had heard of schemes for improving them, so as to develop the islands as health-resorts, but thought it was only a wild speculation.<br />
<br />
'A heavy tramp back to the yacht, nearly crushed by impedimenta. While Davies made yet another trip, I stalked some birds with a gun, and obtained what resembled a specimen of the smallest variety of jack-snipe, and small at that; but I made a great noise, which I hope persuaded somebody of the purity of our motives.<br />
<br />
'We weighed anchor at one o'clock, and in passing the anchored galliot took a good look at her. Kormoran was on her stern; otherwise she was just like a hundred others. Nobody was on deck.<br />
<br />
'We spent the whole afternoon till dark exploring the Harle, or gap between Wangeroog and Spiekeroog; the sea breaking heavily on the banks outside ... Fine as the day was, the scene from the offing was desolate to the last degree. The naked spots of the two islands are hideous in their sterility: melancholy bits of wreck-wood their only relief, save for one or two grotesque beacons, and, most bizarre of all, a great church-tower, standing actually in the water, on the north side of Wangeroog, a striking witness to the encroachment of the sea. On the mainland, which was barely visible, there was one very prominent landmark, a spire, which from the chart we took to be that of Esens, a town four miles inland.<br />
<br />
'The days are growing short. Sunset is soon after five, and an hour later it is too dark to see booms and buoys distinctly. The tides also are awkward just now.<br />
<br />
(I exclude all the technicalities that I can, but the reader should take note that the tide-table is very important henceforward.)<br />
<br />
'High-water at morning and evening is between five and six—just at twilight. For the night, we groped with the lead into the Muschel Balge, the tributary channel which laps round the inside of Spiekeroog, and lay in two fathoms, clear of the outer swell, but rolling a little when the ebb set in strong against the wind.<br />
<br />
'A galliot passed us, going west, just as we were stowing sails; too dark to see her name. Later, we saw her anchor-light higher up our channel.<br />
<br />
'The great event of the day has been the sighting of a small German gunboat, steaming slowly west along the coast. That was about half-past four, when we were sounding along the Harle.<br />
<br />
'Davies identified her at once as the Blitz, Commander von Brüning's gunboat. We wondered if he recognized the Dulcibella, but, anyway, she seemed to take no notice of us and steamed slowly on. We quite expected to fall in with her when we came to the islands, but the actual sight of her has excited us a good deal. She is an ugly, cranky little vessel, painted grey, with one funnel. Davis is contemptuous about her low freeboard forward; says he would rather go to sea in the Dulce. He has her dimensions and armament (learnt from Brassey) at his fingers' ends: one hundred and forty feet by twenty-five, one 4.9 gun, one 3.4, and four maxims—an old type. Just going to bed; a bitterly cold night.<br />
<br />
'17th Oct.—Glass falling heavily this morning, to our great disgust. Wind back in the SW and much warmer. Starting at 5.30 we tacked on the tide over the "water-shed" behind Spiekeroog. So did the galliot we had seen last night, but we again missed identifying her, as she weighed anchor before we came up to her berth. Davies, however, swore she was the Kormoran. We lost sight of her altogether for the greater part of the day, which we spent in exploring the Otzumer Ee (the gap between Langeoog and Spiekeroog), now and then firing some perfunctory shots at seals and sea-birds... (nautical details omitted). . . In the evening we were hurrying back to an inside anchorage, when we made a bad mistake; did, in fact, what we had never done before, ran aground on the very top of high water, and are now sitting hard and fast on the edge of the Rute Flat, south of the east spit of Langeoog. The light was bad, and a misplaced boom tricked us; kedging-off failed, and at 8 p.m. we were left on a perfect Ararat of sand, and only a yard or two from that accursed boom, which is perched on the very summit, as a lure to the unwary. It is going to blow hard too, though that is no great matter, as we are sheltered by banks on the sou'-west and nor'-west sides, the likely quarters. We hope to float at 6.15 to-morrow morning, but to make sure of being able to get her off, we have been transferring some ballast to the dinghy, by way of lightening the yacht—a horrid business handling the pigs of lead, heavy, greasy, and black. The saloon is an inferno, the deck like a collier's, and ourselves like sweeps.<br />
<br />
'The anchors are laid out, and there is nothing more to be done.<br />
<br />
'18th Oct.—Half a gale from the sou'-west when we turned out, but it helped us to float off safely at six. The dinghy was very nearly swamped with the weight of lead in it, and getting the ballast back into the yacht was the toughest job of all. We got the dinghy alongside, and Davies jumped in (nearly sinking it for good), balanced himself, fended off, and, whenever he got a chance, attached the pigs one by one on to a bight of rope, secured to the peak halyards, on which I hoisted from the deck. It was touch and go for a few minutes, and then easier.<br />
<br />
'It was nine before we had finished replacing the pigs in the hold, a filthy but delicate operation, as they fit like a puzzle, and if one is out of place the floor-boards won't shut down. Coming on deck after it, we saw to our surprise the Blitz, lying at anchor in the Schill Balje, inside Spiekeroog, about a mile and a half off. She must have entered the Otzumer Ee at high-water for shelter from the gale: a neat bit of work for a vessel of her size, as Davies says she draws nine-foot-ten, and there can't be more than twelve on the bar at high-water neaps. Several smacks had run in too, and there were two galliots farther up our channel, but we couldn't make out if the Kormoran was one.<br />
<br />
'When the banks uncovered we lay more quietly, so landed and took a long, tempestuous walk over the Rute, with compass and notebooks. Returning at two, we found the glass tumbling down almost visibly.<br />
<br />
'I suggested running for Bensersiel, one of the mainland villages south-west of us, on the evening flood, as it seemed just the right opportunity, if we were to visit one of those "siels" at all. Davies was very lukewarm, but events overcame him. At 3.30 a black, ragged cloud, appearing to trail into the very sea, brought up a terrific squall. This passed, and there was a deathly pause of ten minutes while the whole sky eddied as with smoke-wreaths. Then an icy puff struck us from the north-west, rapidly veering till it reached north-east; there it settled and grew harder every moment.<br />
<br />
'"Sou'-west to north-east—only the worst sort do that," said Davies.<br />
<br />
'The shift to the east changed the whole situation (as shifts often have before), making the Rute Fiats a lee shore, while to windward lay the deep lagoons of the Otzumer Ee, bounded indeed by Spiekeroog, but still offering a big drift for wind and sea. We had to clear out sharp, to set the mizzen. It was out of the question to beat to windward, for it was blowing a hurricane in a few minutes. We must go to leeward, and Davies was for running farther in well behind the Jans sand, and not risking Bensersiel. A blunder of mine, when I went to the winch to get up anchor, settled the question. Thirty out of our forty fathoms of chain were out. Confused by the motion and a blinding sleet-shower that had come on, and forgetting the tremendous strain on the cable, I cast the slack off the bitts and left it loose. There was then only one turn of the chain round the drum, enough in ordinary weather to prevent it running out. But now my first heave on the winch-lever started it slipping, and in an instant it was whizzing out of the hawse-pipe and overboard. I tried to stop it with my foot, stumbled at a heavy plunge of the yacht, heard something snap below, and saw the last of it disappear. The yacht fell off the wind, and drifted astern. I shouted, and had the sense to hoist the reefed foresail at once. Davies had her in hand in no time, and was steering south-west. Going aft I found him cool and characteristic.<br />
<br />
'"Doesn't matter," he said; "anchor's buoyed. (Ever since leaving the Elbe we had had a buoy-line on our anchor against the emergency of having to slip our cable and run. For the same reason the end of the chain was not made permanently fast below.) We'll come back to-morrow and get it. Can't now. Should have had to slip it anyhow; wind and sea too strong. We'll try for Bensersiel. Can't trust to a warp and kedge out here."<br />
<br />
'An exciting run it was, across country, so to speak, over an unboomed watershed; but we had bearings from our morning's walk. Shoal water all the way and a hollow sea breaking everywhere. We soon made out the Bensersiel booms, but even under mizzen and foresail only we travelled too fast, and had to heave to outside them, for the channel looked too shallow still. We lowered half the centre-board and kept her just holding her own to windward, through a most trying period. In the end had to run for it sooner than we meant, as we were sagging to leeward in spite of all, and the light was failing. Bore up at 5.15, and raced up the channel with the booms on our left scarcely visible in the surf and rising water. Davies stood forward, signalling—port, starboard, or steady—with his arms, while I wrestled with the helm, flung from side to side and flogged by wave-tops. Suddenly found a sort of dyke on our right just covering with sea. The shore appeared through scud, and men on a quay shouting. Davies brandished his left arm furiously; I ported hard, and we were in smoother water. A few seconds more and we were whizzing through a slit between two wood jetties. Inside a small square harbour showed, but there was no room to round up properly and no time to lower sails. Davies just threw the kedge over, and it just got a grip in time to check our momentum and save our bowsprit from the quayside. A man threw us a rope and we brought up alongside, rather bewildered.<br />
<br />
'Not more so than the natives, who seemed to think we had dropped from the sky. They were very friendly, with an undercurrent of disappointment, having expected salvage work outside, I think. All showed embarrassing helpfulness in stowing sails, etc. We were rescued by a fussy person in uniform and spectacles, who swept them aside and announced himself as the customhouse officer (fancy such a thing in this absurd mud-hole!), marched down into the cabin, which was in a fearful mess and wringing wet, and producing ink, pen, and a huge printed form, wanted to know our cargo, our crew, our last port, our destination, our food, stores, and everything. No cargo (pleasure); captain, Davies; crew, me; last port, Brunsbüttel; destination, England. What spirits had we? Whisky, produced. What salt? Tin of Cerebos, produced, and a damp deposit in a saucer. What coffee? etc. Lockers searched, guns fingered, bunks rifled. Meanwhile the German charts and the log, the damning clues to our purpose, were in full evidence, crying for notice which they did not get. (We had forgotten our precautions in the hurry of our start from the Rute.) When the huge form was as full as he could make it, he suddenly became human, talkative, and thirsty; and, when we treated him, patronizing. It seemed to dawn on him that, under our rough clothes and crust of brine and grime, we were two mad and wealthy aristocrats, worthy protégés of a high official. He insisted on our bringing our cushions to dry at his house, and to get rid of him we consented, for we were wet, hungry, and longing to change and wash. He talked himself away at last, and we hid the log and charts; but he returned, in the postmaster's uniform this time before we had finished supper, and haled us and our cushions up through dark and mud to his cottage near the quay. To reach it we crossed a small bridge spanning what seemed to be a small river with sluice-gates, just as we had thought.<br />
<br />
'He showed his prizes to his wife, who was quite flustered by the distinguished strangers, and received the cushions with awe; and next we were carried off to the Gasthaus and exhibited to the village circle, where we talked ducks and weather. (Nobody takes us seriously; I never felt less like a conspirator.) Our friend, who is a feather-headed chatterbox, is enormously important about his ridiculous little port, whose principal customer seems to be the Langeoog post-boat, a galliot running to and fro according to tide. A few lighters also come down the stream with bricks and produce from the interior, and are towed to the islands. The harbour has from five to seven feet in it for two hours out of twelve! Herr Schenkel talked us back to the yacht, which we found resting on the mud—and here we are. Davies pretends there are harbour smells, and says he won't be able to sleep; is already worrying about how to get away from here. Ashore, they were saying that it's impossible, under sail, in strong north-east winds, the channel being too narrow to tack in. For my part I find it a huge relief to be in any sort of harbour after a fortnight in the open. There are no tides or anchors to think about, and no bumping or rolling. Fresh milk to-morrow!'<br />One of Themhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00951810331940402067noreply@blogger.com0