image: 06_slogger.jpg{Illustration: "'GOOD HEAVENS! IT'S OLD SLOGGER.'" [p. 325.}
The next instant a gaunt, jaundiced-featured man was unceremoniously bundled into the room. In spite of his rags, his bent shoulders, and emaciated limbs he bore himself proudly, almost disdainfully, ready to meet whatever the fates doled out with the fortitude of a British officer.
"Good heavens!" exclaimed the bogus baron, in his unbounded astonishment completely forgetting his "Kopenick stunt." "It's old Slogger!"
"WHAT did you say, baron?" asked Major Karl Hoffer.
The supposed von Stopelfeld pulled himself together. Giving the prisoner a swift glance that conveyed a warning, he turned to the Austrian, thankfully remembering that the latter knew no English.
"I told the fellow to stand to attention," replied the "baron" mendaciously. "Himmel!he looks a scarecrow. Nevertheless, he interests me. Do your men speak English?"
"No, baron."
"That is unfortunate. For my part I loathe having to make use of the jargon. I would far rather that others cross-questioned the fellow. Does he speak German?"
"He does, but he won't," replied the major. "A more obstinate mule I never had to deal with."
"You know me, Slogger?" asked the spurious Hun.
"Yes," replied Farrar slowly, almost reluctantly. "You're Sylvester, usually known as the Moke. But since you are wearing an enemy uniform and are presumably a traitor I want no truck with you."
"Don't be an ass, Slogger!" said the Moke hoarsely, in order to keep up the rôle of an arrogant Hun. "And stick to your defiant attitude. I'll explain. Got away from Ruhleben, changed clothes with a Fritz and assumed his name and rank. Quite by accident I came here, and it may prove a fortunate occurrence. Hope so, for I'll do my level best to get you away."
"Sorry I did you an injustice, old bird," said the sub. "I was rattled, I expect. This life is hell.... Think you'll manage it all right? Without landing yourself in the cart, I mean."
"I'll take my chance at that," replied Sylvester. "We'll sink or swim together. Passive resistance is your cue. Now, I must switch off and tackle the commandant."
"What do you think of the prisoner, baron?" inquired Major Hoffer.
"Not much," replied Sylvester brusquely. "He looks to have the strength of a rat. He will be handy, however, with his experience, and he'll be made to work. What a droll situation! Making poison gas to be used against his own country. Oh, yes. Send two men with him. I'll take all responsibility. Now for the register."
Borrowing a blue pencil the bogus Eitel von Stopelfeld went through the list of prisoners' names, former occupations, and present employment, "ticking off" the required number.
"You will require a special train for that crowd, baron," observed Major Hoffer. "After all, would it not be better to send the Englishman with the others?
"Perhaps.... No; I think we will keep to our original plan. I have reasons. That is all, major. It will indeed be a pleasure for me to recommend you to my illustrious master, the German Emperor; so do not be surprised if in due course you receive l'ordre pour le Mérite. You deserve it, upon my word."
"I have already sent the prisoner on foot," explained the Austrian commandant. "The escort will arrive at Judenburg at the same time as your car, so there is no hurry. A bottle of wine?"
The Moke declined.
"My head aches already," he protested. "Perhaps it is the reek of the sulphur fumes. Let me see; there is a train for Salzburg at three?"
"That is so, baron. It arrives at Salzburg at seven, which means that you will be in Munich by nine."
At Judenburg station Sylvester found his chum standing between two heavily built, sullen-featured Magyars, with rifles and fixedbayonets, while a small crowd composed of old men, women, and children gazed in open-mouthed interest at the prisoner and his guards.
Outwardly ignoring the sub's presence Sylvester swaggered into the ticket-office and ordered the woman in charge to issue a pass for an officer and three men to Salzburg.
"Do not answer any questions from any one except with my permission," cautioned the supposititious von Stopelfeld, addressing the Hungarian soldiers.
"Your will is our command, Excellency," replied one of the men in halting German.
Upon the arrival of the train the bogus baron boarded a first-class carriage, while Farrar and his escort were placed in a fourth-class compartment. The Moke had no more intention of going even as far as Salzburg than he had of making for the North Pole. He knew that the escort had no notion of their present destination, and holding the railway pass he could easily browbeat the train officials. He also knew that by not changing at a certain junction he would be carried in the opposite direction, through Klagenfurt and Laibach to Trieste. His plan was to find a pretext for dismissing the two soldiers, obtain a suitable disguise for his chum, and for the pair to slip across the Italian frontier. In any case he had good reasons for not going as far as Trieste.
The journey was a tedious one. A constantstream of troop trains bound for the Piave front had the effect of holding up the ordinary traffic almost hourly, and it was dusk before the fugitives reached a little out-of-the-way village in Carniola, and about fifty miles from the head of the Adriatic.
Under the pretext that there was nowagon à litattached to the train, and roundly abusing the Austrian railway authorities for their neglect to provide for the comfort of German officers, the Moke ordered the prisoner and escort out of the carriage, redoubling his torrent of invective when he learnt that the village was two miles from the station.
"You will remain here with your prisoner," he ordered, pointing to an isolated farmhouse. "There will be accommodation for you in a stable, and with a strong lock on the door the prisoner will be safe."
"Very good, Excellency," replied the senior soldier.
With the last of the fading daylight glinting dully upon the fixed bayonets the men marched their prisoner towards the house. As they approached there was the piercing shriek of a woman's voice, while almost at the same moment the figure of a man, bending low, darted from the side of the building and fled across the adjoining fields.
"Now what's the trouble?" soliloquised the Moke.
He was not long left in doubt, for a grey-haired woman appeared, wringing her hands and begging the officer to have mercy.
Quickly Sylvester grasped the situation. The man he had seen escaping was a deserter, the woman his mother. Under the impression that the soldiers were coming to arrest her son the woman was frantic, knowing full well the strict penalties for harbouring a deserter and the far more severe punishment for the fugitive, should he be caught.
With reluctantly assumed harshness the Moke questioned the mother at great length, purposely giving the deserter time to get well away. Her son's uniform and equipment, he discovered, were hidden under the hearth-stone.
"Bring them here," ordered the supposed officer. "Is there no one else living here?"
"Only my grandson, and he is but nine years old," replied the woman. "He is asleep."
"Good enough," decided the Moke. "This is a bit of luck, but hanged if I want to get the old dame into trouble. If I lock her up her grandson will release her in the morning; but how about Slogger's escort?"
Ordering the deserter's mother into a room Sylvester locked the door, leaving the key in the lock. Then, making use of the late Baron Eitel von Stopelfeld's official correspondence form, he wrote a request to the Provost-Marshalof Laibach, asking him to keep the bearers of the letter under arrest until he, Major von Stopelfeld, appeared to lay a charge against them of conduct prejudicial to military interests.
"Can either of you read?" demanded the supposed officer, as he rejoined the escort waiting without.
"No, Excellency."
"Thick-headed louts!" grumbled the Moke. "See to what trouble you have put me. Lock the prisoner in yonder barn, and show this letter to the station-master. He will direct you further. Carry out his instructions and deliver this letter to the person to whom it is addressed and none other. You understand?"
"Yes, Excellency."
"Then hasten; you ought to return here by midnight."
The two soldiers, strangers in a strange district, saluted and hurried away, glad to be clear of the obnoxious influence of the Hun who was temporarily their commanding officer.
The Moke waited until he was fairly certain that the coast was clear; then he unlocked the door of his chum's place of incarceration.
"How about a good tuck-in, Slogger?" he asked briskly.
"Right-o, Moke!" was the cheery reply,recalling long-past tuck-shop days in peaceful England.
A search in the farmhouse larder provided a rye loaf, a piece of freshly made cheese, and a portion of a meat-pie. This, with a hastily prepared salad and a bottle of wine, furnished a substantial repast. Both men were hungry, Farrar especially, and hardly a word was exchanged until the sub announced that he was "properly whacked," and "down to Plimsoll line."
"Now change," suggested the Moke, indicating the deserter's uniform. "For the next few hours you are my soldier servant. We'll make for the marshes east of Livenza. According to well-authenticated reports I hear that there are large numbers of Austrian deserters who lurk there and live on the fish that they catch and the food they steal from the Italian peasantry. The Austrians have not sufficient military police to stop the desertions; in fact, several of the policemen desert themselves. If we are stopped before we get there I'll have to spin a plausible yarn."
"That's all very well," objected the sub as he struggled into an ill-fitting tunic; "but the nearer we get to the lines the greater risk we run of being closely examined. I can quite understand your being able to ape the blustering Hun in the interior of the Austrian Empire, but there are numerous German troops on theItalian front, and they are dead nuts on detecting spies. I don't fancy dangling at the end of a rope."
"Nor do I," admitted Sylvester, perhaps for the first time realising the extreme penalty that he had been incurring by his Kopenick stunt. "Can you suggest anything better? That's the main point."
"The sea," replied Farrar. "That's our trump card. Provided we strike the coast at a reasonable distance from Trieste, Fiume, or Pola there's not much risk of being snapped up by the Austrian patrol boats. Our monitors and the Italian destroyers are top-dog in the Adriatic, you'll find."
"But we can't swim across to Italy," objected the Moke. "Even Leander wouldn't have taken on that contract—not for a dozen Heros."
"There's bound to be a fishing-boat we can collar," continued the now optimistic sub. "You pilot me to the coast, Moke, and I'll pilot you across the ditch."
"All right," agreed Sylvester. "Let's make a move."
Just as they were about to leave the farmhouse Sylvester suddenly had an idea. He went upstairs and knocked on the door of the room in which the old woman was under lock and key.
"I have decided not to report your son'sdesertion, or your complicity," he announced. "For reasons best known to myself I have formed this decision. If you mention a word of the matter to any one the consequences will be extremely serious to all parties concerned. You will therefore deny all knowledge of any person or persons visiting this house to-night."
With copious blessings and thanks the Austrian mother faithfully promised to carry out Herr Offizier's instructions, and the Moke departed with the firm conviction that he had covered his tracks in this direction. By the time Farrar's late escort had been released and had told their story, he reflected, the men would be so thoroughly bewildered that it was a question whether they would remember where they had been, much less recognise the house, while they knew nothing of the deserter's flight.
Satisfied on that score Sylvester rejoined his companion and, steering a course by the stars, walked briskly towards the still distant coast, the two taking turns at carrying the Baron's portmanteau. Knowing the valuable nature of its contents the Moke was reluctant to abandon the trophy.
Avoiding the villages and keeping at a distance from the indifferent roads the fugitives "carried on" for the best part of two days, until just as the sun was on the point of setting they reached the summit of a long, rugged range of hills. Beyond they could see what appeared to bea bank of mist, tinted crimson in the declining rays. To the Moke it was a fog bank and nothing else; but to the sub the sight meant something far different.
"Thalassa!" he exclaimed joyously.
THE ecstasy of Xenophon's Ten Thousand at the sight of the sea could not have exceeded the sub's feelings of thankfulness at the distant view of the placid waters of the Adriatic. To him the sea called—the welcome greeting of freedom. Beyond was England, Home, and Beauty—the latter personified in the name of Winifred Greenwood. True, there was a large slice of land intervening, but what mattered that the breadth of Italy and France lay between him and England? The sea was the key to freedom.
Sylvester hardly regarded the expanse of water in the same light. For one thing he was a bad sailor, for another he had grave doubts about being able to make a passage across the huge land-locked sea without being overhauled and recaptured by an enemy craft. Personally he would have preferred hours, perhaps days, of discomfort in the Piave marshes, and take the chance of gaining the Italian lines, rather than trust himself to the mercies of wind, waves, and the enemy craft.
Acting solely off his own bat he was resolute and resourceful; but in the presence of the sublieutenant the latter's forceful personality held almost absolute sway.
"Only another five miles," declared Farrar. "We'll have to go slow. If this coast is patrolled only half so efficiently as that of the British Isles it will be no walk over. When do we discard this gear?"
He indicated the uniform they were wearing: The Moke smiled grimly. Since his chum had been obliged to ask his advice his directive force reasserted itself.
"When we have decent clothes to put on," he replied. "Meanwhile, until we get afloat—and that's where you direct operations—I am still Baron Eitel von Stopelfeld, and you are my Austrian servant and lug my gear. Imagine yourself a fag again, Slogger."
"But my rotten German would give me away as soon as I opened my mouth," objected the sub. "Have you considered that flaw in the contract, Moke, my festive?"
"Certainly," replied Sylvester gravely. "It occurred to me almost as soon as we left the farm. You'll have to be deaf and dumb through shell-shock. I'll do the explaining."
The chums relapsed into silence, which was for them a fortunate circumstance; for on gaining the outskirts of a small wood they ran up against a block-house.
The levelled bayonet of a sentry brought them up all standing. Flight was practically impossible, for the starlight was so bright that there was an almost certainty of being shot down before they could run half a dozen yards.
"It's all right," declared the Moke. "I am a German officer on special service, bound for Trieste, but my car has broken down."
The sentry made no effort to recover his arms. Without replying he whistled softly, and a sergeant and half a dozen men issued from the outpost.
"Your papers, Herr Offizier?" demanded the non-com.
"Certainly, if your instructions require you to see them," replied the pseudo German major.
The sergeant inspected them by the light of the lantern. He made no attempt to read them, for the simple reason that he was one of the Austrian army's high percentage of illiterates.
"These are quite in order, Herr Major," he exclaimed. "But this man —who is he?"
"My servant," replied the Moke, high-handedly. "He is deaf and dumb, having been, I understand, an artillery man at the Skroda Works.Donnerwetter!Why such a dolt was foisted on to me I cannot imagine."
"But he wears an infantryman's uniform," persisted the sergeant, holding the lantern above his head and peering into Farrar's face.
"Do you doubt a German officer's word, numbskull?" thundered the "baron" in the typically blustering tone in which the military caste address their rank and file, "Have you never heard of a man being transferred from one branch of the army to another? You are wasting my time. I feel inclined to report the delay. Is there a field officer anywhere about?"
"Pardon, Herr Major," stammered the overwhelmed sergeant. "Pray overlook the matter."
"For this once, then," said the Moke magnanimously. "Now tell me: can I obtain a conveyance of any sort to take me to Trieste?"
The sergeant pondered.
"I am afraid not, Herr Major. It is a very rough road. But——"
"But what?" demanded Sylvester, doing his level best to flurry the already disconcerted man.
"One of the coast patrol boats puts into the fishing port here on her way to Trieste. She is due at a few minutes after midnight. They might give you a passage."
"I loathe sea passages," objected the Moke. "Is it a large craft?"
"Fairly, Herr Major. She carries only three men—a petty officer, a seaman, and a motor mechanician; occasionally she carries military officers from the various ports when they wish to visit Trieste. I will send and ask my commanding officer's permission for you to take a passage in her."
"Major Aufferich has gone to Laibach, sergeant," announced one of the men in a stage whisper.
"Then I can give you authority on my own responsibility, Herr Major," continued the non-com. "I will also send a man to guide you to the fishing-port."
He seemed most anxious to make amends for the affront he had occasioned in a perfectly legitimate display of zeal. The Moke pondered over the matter, until catching Farrar's eye he plainly read the sub's acceptance of the proposal.
"All right, sergeant," decided the spurious Hun. "Send a man, by all means. He can help my man to carry my luggage, but he'll find him a most uncommunicative comrade."
A thought flashed across the Moke's mind.
"What is the countersign, sergeant?" he asked.
"Good man," thought Farrar. "The old Moke's 'cuteness has developed enormously. There are no flies on him, by Jove!"
"The countersign isScharfschutze und Huszar, Herr Major," announced the sergeant; then turning to one of his men: "Josef, conduct His Excellency to the harbour. Inform Corporal Herz that he is to signal the patrol boat to wait and embark an illustrious passenger.... Everything will now be in order, Herr Major."
The guard stood rigidly at attention until the Moke's increased party had covered the regulated distance. Then the sergeant's voice was heard ordering the men to dismiss, and with a heavy tramping of feet and clattering of accoutrements the men returned to the shelter of the block-house.
Once during the journey to the coast the Austrian offered some remark to his supposed fellow-soldier. The Moke turned on him sharply.
"Silence, fool!" he hissed. "Did you not hear me say that my servant is deaf and dumb? Take the luggage from him. He is tired."
The soldier slung his rifle and relieved Farrar of the portmanteau. The sub was glad of the respite, since he had had more than his fair share of carrying it.
"It is infernally dark just here," grumbled the "baron," as they came to a narrow part of the road as it wound between two rocky heights. "Lead on, and show me the way."
Taking advantage of the Austrian being some ten paces ahead, the Moke withdrew the defunct von Stopelfeld's automatic pistol from his holster and handed it to the sub.
"That's more in your line," he whispered.
Farrar nodded. Although the weapon was of a different pattern from those to which he was accustomed, he felt confident that he could make use of it effectually if occasion offered.In any case it would be useful for purposes of intimidation.
The countersign passed them through the lines surrounding the fishing hamlet, and by the time they gained the water's edge it was close on midnight.
Being a port of slight military importance, a corporal's guard was deemed sufficient to maintain order, the non-com.'s duty being chiefly to prevent any of the fishing craft entering or leaving the harbour between sunset and sunrise, while at regular intervals an Austrian naval patrol boat looked in to ascertain that the military maintained watch and ward.
Corporal Herz received the sergeant's instructions without emotion, and as a long dark grey boat crept with throttled engines round the southern headland of the harbour, two red lights were hoisted from a flagstaff at the extremity of the rough wharf.
Cautiously, as if afraid of the locality, the motor-launch drew alongside the flight of stone steps. The coxswain gripped the handrail with his boathook, while the bowman performed a similar duty for'ard. Although the boat displayed no lights, there was sufficient starlight to enable the fugitives to satisfy themselves that on this occasion the boat carried no other passengers.
"Any orders, Herr Major?" asked thecoxswain, as the Moke, Farrar, and the portmanteau were deposited in the spacious stern sheets.
"None," replied Sylvester curtly. "You have plenty of petrol, I hope. Last time one of your patrol boats caused me to miss a court of inquiry from a lack of petrol."
"Enough for four hours' run at fifty kilometres an hour, Herr Major," replied the cox swain obsequiously. He was a little, fussily important man who, the Moke decided, was like a gasbag; the bowman was of a different type—tall, broad-shouldered, and stolid. The third member of the crew, the artificer in the motor-room, was invisible. It was unlikely that he would cause much trouble.
"Cannot I have a lamp in the cabin?" asked Sylvester.
"I will see to it, Herr Major," replied the petty officer. "If the windows are screened it is permissible, but there would be much trouble if a single ray of light were allowed to escape."
He shouted an order to the bowman. The latter, his immediate work completed, had laid aside his boat-hook and was meditating a retirement to the fore-peak. Presently he came aft with an unlighted lantern. This he fixed in the cabin, drew shutters over the square panes of glass in the sides of the raised cabin-top, and finally lighted the lamp.
"It is ready, Herr Major," reported the coxswain.
The patrol boat was now clear of the harbour. The open sea was as smooth as a mill-pond. Not another craft of any description was in sight.
Farrar, shivering in the night air in his thin, shoddily made uniform, watched his companion with envious eyes as Sylvester entered the cabin. In the rôle of officer's servant he was experiencing several of the inconveniences that it is the lot of a common soldier to have to grin and bear.
There was no time to be lost, for the sooner the Moke put his plan into execution the better. Every revolution of the motor-boat's twin propellers was taking her nearer Trieste—and Trieste was a most unhealthy locality as far as the bogus Baron Eitel von Stopelfeld was concerned.
A hasty glance round the cabin revealed the presence of three revolvers in a rack. Jerking back the chambers Sylvester discovered that they were fully loaded. Deftly he extracted the cartridges from two of the weapons and put them in his pocket, grimly reflecting that there was a time, not so very far distant, when the mechanism of a revolver was a mystery to him. Not that he never wanted to know "how it worked," but because he had a horror of the sight of firearms of any description.
The three revolvers he slipped into the outside pocket of his great-coat, since the pistol would not fit the holster from which he had taken the automatic to give to his chum.
Stepping from the cabin into the cockpit the Moke waited until his eyes grew accustomed to the comparative darkness of the night; then he turned abruptly and addressed the coxswain.
"Any craft in sight?" he asked.
"No, Herr Major," replied the man.
"That is good," rejoined Sylvester. "I want you to steer due west."
For once at least the petty officer hesitated to obey orders. His illustrious passenger had authority, but whether a German military officer could issue peremptory instructions to an Austrian petty officer was a proposition that gave rise to doubts in the coxswain's mind. If he disobeyed, the consequences might be serious, if on returning to Trieste his superior upheld the German's action. That was one of the many curses that the hated Teutons' lust of world power had laid upon their none too enthusiastic Allies. On the other hand, if he complied with the military officer's behest, he might be "hauled over the coals" by his own superiors.
"Due west," repeated the Moke sternly.
The coxswain looked up into Sylvester's face. His flabby features turned a ghastly greyishhue, his beady eyes were almost starting from his head. Drops of perspiration on his bulging forehead glistened in the starlight; his teeth were chattering audibly.
"Pardon, Herr Major," he stammered; then like a weak-willed individual under mesmeric influence he put the helm hard over.
Travelling at high speed the patrol boat heeled violently to starboard, so much so that the Moke was within an ace of being shot out of the cockpit, while the bowman, his curiosity aroused by the unwonted change of direction, thrust head and shoulders out of the oval-shaped hatchway in the fore-deck.
"See to that chap, Slogger!" shouted the Moke, all need for silence being past.
Pistol in hand the sub leapt from the cockpit, making his way along the narrow waterway by the wall of the motor-room coaming, and levelled his weapon full at the bowman's head.
"Rechts Sie unter!" ordered Farrar in his execrable German.
Whether the Austrian seaman understood the words or not, the sub's gesture was sufficient. Taken completely at a disadvantage the broad-shouldered sailor withdrew his head and shoulders and disappeared from view.
In a trice the sub shut and secured the metal lid of the aperture. He guessed that the boat was built with water-tight transverse bulkheads, and in that case there was no directcommunication between the fore-cabin and the motor-room.
The mechanician remained to be dealt with. Had not it been for the fact that the bowman began to shout and hammer at the steel partition the former would have "carried on" in blissful ignorance of the change of masters; but hearing the clamour he began to climb through the narrow opening which gave access to the open air.
The sub, on his way aft, turned just in time to see a powerfully built man grasping a heavy spanner. Promptly he levelled his pistol, but the fellow showed no sign of temerity. He was all but clear of the hatchway when Farrar, hesitating to shoot a man labouring under a great disadvantage, struck him fairly between his eyes. Like a felled ox the Austrian tumbled inertly upon the deck, with his legs dangling down the motor-room hatchway.
"Beastly inconsiderate of him," exclaimed the sub, addressing his chum. "He's chucked his hand in, so I suppose I must take on his job. Push Little Willie into the cabin and come and bear a hand. The boat will take care of herself for a brace of shakes."
The coxswain suffered himself to be precipitated unceremoniously down the three metal-edged steps of the companion-ladder, and under lock and key in the cabin he was left to puzzle his addled brains over the obviousdisadvantage of German domination, for he had not yet "tumbled to" the true cause of the fracas. Consoling himself that the onus of the affair rested upon the shoulders of the military authorities for having ordered him to embark the truculent and domineering Prussians, he decided upon the policy of passive resistance.
With Sylvester's assistance Farrar contrived to lower the senseless motor-engineer down the hatchway into the fore-peak, the bowman making no attempt either to break out or to help his comrade. Under the mistaken impression that the latter had been murdered, he cowered in the farthermost corner of the recess formed by the boat's flaring bows, nor did he stir till long after the hatch had been replaced and secured.
"Now you had better take over, Slogger," suggested the Moke, as the chums returned to the cockpit. "I'm no hand at this game," and he indicated the unattended steering-wheel.
The sub glanced at the compass bowl, and then steadied the boat on her course.
"Sorry," he replied. "I'll have to be popping below to the engines. Didn't bargain for that, but one must take things as they come. I'll put you through a lightning course of helmsmanship. She's right now—with the lubber's line immediately on the point west.... Nowshe's off it; so turn the wheel to starboard.... There, she's back again."
"Horrible strain watching the compass," complained the Moke.
Farrar took the wheel out of his companion's hands.
"Now," he continued, "she's on her course, You'll notice her head's pointing to a certain star. Keep her on that for a few minutes at a time and occasionally check the direction of the compass. A few quarter-points out won't make much difference, but remember that star has a movement of its own. That's right; you're getting the hang of it. I'll nip below and see how things are going. Whistle if you want me; this voice-tube communicates with the motor-room."
For the best part of two hours nothing unusual occurred. The motor-boat was not doing her best, but considering that the sub had to deal with a strange engine, it was not to be wondered at. Farrar estimated her speed at twenty knots, a rate that if maintained ought to bring the fugitives within sight of the Italian coast shortly after daylight.
Presently Sylvester chanced to glance astern. As he did so he caught sight of a white light blinking rapidly.
"Say, Slogger, old man!" he shouted to his chum in the motor-room. "Come on deck, will you?"
The sub rejoined the amateur helmsman with the utmost promptitude.
"Look!" continued the latter, pointing astern.
"Dash it all, Moke!" exclaimed the sub. "We're in for something. If I'm not very much mistaken, we are being chased by an Austrian destroyer."
SEIZING the steering-wheel Farrar flung the boat hard to port, in the hope that he might shake off pursuit by running at right angles to his former course. By so doing he was taking her farther from Venice, but in this matter he had little option. Had he ported helm the change of direction would have brought the patrol boat athwart the course of the destroyer.
"Take her," he exclaimed hurriedly, and hied him to the motor-room, letting the engines "all out" with full throttle.
When he returned on deck the hostile craft had also altered helm. She was gaining steadily. Columns of flame-tinged smoke poured from her four funnels, while her outlines were faintly discernible against the starlit sea as she came bows on to the fugitives.
Again she signalled, throwing out a code message.
"She doesn't like to open fire," declared the sub. "She's puzzled. Thinks we might beone of her patrol boats. We are, as far as the craft's concerned. Ah, I thought so: a warning shot."
A spurt of flame leapt from the destroyer's fo'c'sle, and, almost as soon as the sharp report, a 12-centimetre shell struck the water a cable's length away from the patrol boat's starboard quarter.
"A miss is as good as a mile," observed Sylvester. Nevertheless he ducked beneath the coaming, as if the thin teak plank was a sufficient protection from a powerful shell.
"It was intended as a miss," rejoined Farrar. "She'll get nearer than that, I fancy. Moke, old man, it's 'No Surrender.'"
"No Surrender," repeated Sylvester firmly. He had had quite enough of prison life in an enemy country to wish not to repeat the experience. Then, "How about those chaps?" he inquired, indicating the fore-peak, from which frantic shouts punctuated by loud beats upon the hatchway floated aft.
The sub pondered for a moment only.
"I'll give them the option of jumping overboard or hanging on here," he decided. "There are lifebelts... the destroyer will, I take it, stop and pick up some of her own crowd. Of course it's a toss-up."
Pistol in hand the sub crept for'ard. For a minute or so, during which interval another shell burst astern of the boat, he exchangedwords with the two men. Then he unbolted the hatch and came aft.
Presently the bowman and the motor-artificer (who had quite recovered consciousness) crawled through the hatchway, dragging lifebelts after them; While they were donning the life-saving gear a third shell pitched so close to the bows that the boat drove through the descending column of spray.
A similar proposition to the coxswain was rejected. Nothing would induce the little man to emerge from the cabin, where he was lying at full length upon the floor.
"We'll leave the door unlocked," declared the sub. "He's not likely to give trouble, and we can't be accused of leaving a prisoner to drown in a boxed-in cabin—like the Huns have an unpleasant habit of doing. Hullo what's that?"
The two men for'ard were shouting an pointing aft. In spite of the roar of the engine, Farrar understood. They were afraid of being caught in the suction of the rapidly revolving propellers.
"Quite a reasonable fear," muttered the sub. "I've felt the same sort of thing myself; but I'm sorry I can't stop to let them dive in gracefully. I'll slow down a bit, although it's jolly risky for us."
By means of the reverse gear lever in the cockpit—a supplementary device to enablethe motor to be regulated in the event of the mechanism being incapacitated—Farrar threw the propeller' shafts out of clutch. The boat began to lose way appreciably.
"Beeilen Sie sich!" shouted the sub.
The two Austrians required no second bidding. Both leapt feet foremost into the water, striking out with the utmost vigour, as if afraid that their late captors would restart the propellers and "do them in."
The patrol boat quickly worked up to her previous speed, but the pursuing craft had decreased the intervening distance to about a mile. Already the first gleam of dawn was stealing across the eastern sky, silhouetting the dark outlines of the destroyer against the grey blend of sea and air in the distant horizon.
"Good business!" exclaimed Farrar. "She's reversing engines to pick those fellows up."
The Austrian skipper was no novice at the job, nor was he a man to waste time in stopping to pick two seamen out of the water when there were greater issues at stake, Merely stopping the engines he steered the still swiftly moving craft close to the swimmers; bowlines were thrown them, and in a very brief space of time they were both hauled on board.
Yet during this manoeuvre the destroyer lost more than the patrol boat had done when Farrar humanely declutched the propellers. Thedistance between pursuer and pursued had increased to nearly two miles.
All hope of shaking off the destroyer in the darkness was now at an end. North, south, east, and west the sky line was unbroken save by the grim outlines of the enemy craft. Every minute it was growing lighter, thus decreasing the slight advantage held by the patrol boat. It might be on this account that the larger craft was withholding her fire, for her guns were now silent; or, perhaps, the men rescued from the sea had informed the captain of the destroyer that there was another compatriot on the mysteriously captured boat.
The upper disc of the sun appeared above the horizon, a blood-red arc of fire. Farrar found himself wondering whether he was about to look upon the orb of day for the last time, yet, in spite of his resolution to fight to a finish, he mechanically put on a lifebelt which his companion had handed him.
A clanking sound from the motor-room, audible above the purr of the machinery and the throb of the pistons, roused the sub to a state of activity.
"Knocking badly!" he exclaimed. "Half a minute, Moke; I'll see what's to be done."
Even as he moved towards the hatchway there came an ear-splitting crash. The bows of the boat rose high out of the water, and subsided heavily in a smother of smoke andfoam. A cloud of steam issuing from the motor-room indicated that an inrush of sea water had come in contact with the hot cylinders. The ignition failed, and the propellers ceased to revolve.
Then, with a sickening, shuddering movement the stricken craft heeled over on her side, with her bows level with the water. Momentarily recovering from her list, she slid beneath the surface, leaving the two chums floundering in a maelstrom of oil and foam.
"That's done it!" ejaculated the sub, addressing the well-nigh breathless Moke, who was choking and coughing from the effects of swallowing a mouthful of particularly greasy fluid. "What's that you're hanging on to?"
"Only the p-p-portmanteau," spluttered Sylvester. "It won't s-s-sink, dash it!"
The sub swam to his chum's side.
"We'll open it. The thing's watertight as it is," he said. "Won't do to let that fall into the hands of the enemy."
Even as he fumbled with the sliding locks a terrific roar rent the air. Where the destroyer had been but a brief instant before there was nothing but a cloud of smoke and a shower of flying debris, while, at an altitude of about five hundred feet and rocking violently in the agitated air, was a large flying-boat.
"Hang on to the bag, Moke," exclaimedFarrar. "'We needn't scuttle it now. Hullo, here's Little Willie."
The last remark referred to the coxswain of the patrol boat. More fortunate than his former messmates he was floating upon the surface at a distance of less than twenty yards from the sub and his companion. Not only had he lashed a lifebelt round his waist but others encircled each leg. A fourth he grasped with his left hand, while his right arm was waving frantically to attract the attention of the aircraft that had strafed a vessel flying the ensign under which he served.
"Wonder if it's the 'Avenger'?" soliloquised the sub. "Shouldn't be surprised, but they are all so beautifully alike. Can't tell t'other from which."
He was not long left in doubt. The flyingboat circled above the scene of her latest success; then spotting the immersed men, she shut off her motors and glided gracefully downwards, alighting with a healthy splash at a distance of nearly half a mile from the sub and his companions.
Then the motors throbbed again, and under the action of her hydrostatic propeller the flying-boat glided on the surface towards the spot where the patrol craft had foundered.
"By Jove!" ejaculated the sub. "We're in luck's way. It is the 'Avenger,' and there's old Barcroft, bless his chirpy figurehead!"
"Who's Barcroft?" inquired the Moke.
"Pal of mine, and a thundering good sort," replied Farrar. "Don't let that portmanteau go now."
"I don't mean to," declared Sylvester grimly. The "Avenger" eased down. Maintaining a precarious hold on her flaring sides a bluejacket "stood by" with a coil of rope.
"A bloomin' crowd of Fritzes, sir," he reported. "One of them an officer. Rummy sort o' goings on, that destroyer sinking some of her own side."
The Austrian coxswain was the first to be rescued, his array of lifebelts causing unrestrained hilarity amongst the British crew of the flying-boat. The Moke, still hanging on to Baron Eitel von Stopelfeld's property, was the next to be hauled on board, Farrar following, attired only in a coarse blue-grey shirt and soldier's ill-fitting trousers.
"Come aboard, sir," he announced according to the custom of the Senior Service, as he saluted the astonished flight-lieutenant.
"Farrar, by all that's wonderful!" ejaculated the astonished Billy. "Bless my soul, man, I little thought that I was hauling you out of the ditch. We heard that you had been done in.... Reported missing; believed killed. Come along for'ard; I'll see if I can kit you out in dry rig. And these are chums of yours?"
"Yes," replied the irrepressible sub. "The one hugging that bag is Tony Sylvester, alias Baron Eitel von Stopelfeld, otherwise known as the Moke—highly intelligent animal, I can assure you, for if it hadn't been for him I shouldn't be here. The other—we've dubbed him Little Willie—is a scratch acquaintance. You needn't be afraid of passing remarks about him in his presence, for he wouldn't tumble to it."
Since the flying-boat did not carry a liberal wardrobe Sylvester, on discarding the saturated German officer's uniform, had perforce to be rigged out in a duffel suit, while Farrar was accommodated with a bluejacket's trousers and a great-coat belonging to Kirkwood, Billy's second-in-command, who was on the point of turning in to make up arrears of sleep.
The "Avenger" was temporarily attached to the British squadron acting in concert with the Italian fleet in the Gulf of Venice, and was returning from a twelve-hours' patrol flight when she sighted the Austrian destroyer. So intent was the latter on her pursuit of the seized motor-boat that she failed to notice the "Avenger," the noise of the latter's aerial propellers being out-voiced by the noise of the destroyer's engines. A powerful bomb, dropped with unerring accuracy, did the trick most effectually and so rapidly that the majority of the hostile crew had no idea ofwhat strafed them. Literally blown in two amidships the ill-fated craft had foundered with all hands.
"You'll be home again in three or four days with reasonable luck, Mr. Sylvester," observed Barcroft. "The train service is absolutely rotten, but I suppose it's the stock excuse—'owing to the war.' After three years of captivity I suppose you won't mind three days in a railway carriage."
"It will feel like three centuries," declared the Moke seriously. "The sudden change from being a fugitive in a hostile country to a free man is so bewildering that I know I shall be grousing every minute of the journey. By Jove! If ever I get home I don't think I'll want to go outside England for the rest of my natural life. Wonder what London's like? According to the Boche guards at Ruhleben, half the city is in ruins, 25 per cent. of the population are blown to bits, and the remaining 75 per cent. are either cowering in the Tubes or else have bolted for the country to get away from the Gothas."
Barcroft laughed. There was a confident ring in his merriment.
"London was much the same when I was there last," he observed. "What say you, Farrar? In one or two places it looks as if the L.C.C. workmen have started to pull down some buildings instead of pulling up the roadway.I went on a 'bus from Fulham to the Bank, and never saw a sign of damage. As for the population having cold feet—here, read this, it's a letter from a girl friend of my wife's; sixteen I think's her age."
The flight-lieutenant drew a crumpled envelope from his pocket and handed it to the Moke.
The letter was written in pencil as follows: