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A Night's Adventure

The Orphan went up on the "booms" and found Jarvis, the bearded coxswain, and Plunky Bill busy touching up with black paint any bits of brasswork on the picket-boat which might show in the searchlights. They had already done this once, and were making certain, by the aid of a lantern, that no shiny place had been missed.

As he climbed into her he heard Plunky Bill say saucily: "'Ow about the missus and the six kids? Ain't you going to back out of this 'ere lark in the dark?"

"'Ere, get on with yer black paint," growled Jarvis. "'Ow about yer sweet'earts—five of 'em as I knows on. You ain't going to get yerself killed, are you, and break five bleeding 'earts? Eh, young feller-my-lad?"

They were so cheery that the Orphan lost that funny feeling in his inside that had been so uncomfortable. He climbed on board and went for'ard to have a yarn with old Fletcher, who was busy in the stokehold getting up steam.

"No sparks out of the funnels to-night," he said, stooping down.

"I'll take good care of that, sir," Fletcher answered.

It was a very dark night, with a gentle breeze blowing in towards Smyrna, and as the Orphan straightened himself he saw the glare of the search-lights over the mine-field, and that unpleasant sensation in his stomach would come back. He tried to pretend it was only indigestion, but knew it wasn't.

"Peeping Tom", the nearest, was flickering here, there, and everywhere, but it was a very poor light, and he didn't mind that one; "Squinting Susan" shone, twice as brightly as her brother, right across where the picket-boat must pass; occasionally she swept round to help him, as if she knew he wasn't of much use.

Then right behind these two was that beastly "Glaring Gertrude"—a splendid light. She was lighting up the salt-heaps on the opposite shore most of the time; but when she did turn to have a look out seawards, her beam lighted up the Achates, although the ship was at least five miles away, making the men's faces quite plain to see, and outlining the masts and funnels and rigging in a most unpleasant manner.

A signalman came along with the lantern and some "cod" line. "That will be strong enough, sir, to lash it to the buoy," and he held out the cod line in the dark for the Orphan to feel.

Everything being ready, the picket-boat was lifted out of her crutches, dangled over the side of the ship, and lowered into the water. At seven o'clock she was alongside the darkened ship, and the Sub, in monkey-jacket, blue trousers, and sea boots, climbed down and gave the order to "shove off".

"What ho! my Explorer of Mine-fields—my Lighter of Beacons—this beats the band!" the Sub shouted, as the picket-boat left the shadow of the ship's side, cleared her bow, and headed for the glare of the search-lights and the mine-field.

Close to the Achates lay two trawlers and the Swiftsure's picket-boat—the Orphan could just make out their obscure shadows.

"They're going in to sweep," the Sub told him. "The Swiftsure's picket-boat is going to show them the way. My jumping Jimmy!" he roared, unable to suppress his boisterous excitement. "Isn't this a grand show?"

The steamboat pushed her way along, and soon the dark mass of the Triumph loomed up against the blackness of the high hills behind her.

On she went towards where they knew the Swiftsure herself was lying, and as the Orphan strained his eyes to pierce the darkness in towards the land to find her, a match was struck in the bows, and a splutter of tobacco sparks trailed down over the side. Jarvis shouted angrily: "Put out that pipe!"

"No smoking, you fools!" barked the Sub to the men crouching in the bows; and Jarvis growled: "It's that 'ere Plunky Bill, 'e's a fair terror. 'E's been an' gone an' blacked 'Kaiser Bill'," he added after a pause. "'E said 'e was that shiny 'e'd give the show away. 'E's a comic, that Plunky Bill."

"You haven't brought the tortoise?" the Orphan asked incredulously.

"Grandpa 'as; 'e's got'im down in the stoke'old, the old 'umbug; 'e's fair wild with Plunky Bill; 'arf an 'our it took 'im to get the paint off 'im with a drop of turps and a sweat-rag."

"Hullo! There's the Swiftsure, sir," and the Orphan saw her masts and funnels and cranes ahead of him lighted up for a moment by a quick flash from "Peeping Tom". Almost immediately a flame shot out from her side—a roar—and a shell burst with another splash of flame close to the shore end of that search-light.

"Peeping Tom" disappeared at once.

Then "Squinting Susan" twisted round to see what had fired at her little brother; waggle waggle went her beam trying to find the battleship.

Bang! Flash! Another gun—another shell blazed up somewhere near her, and she too disappeared. "They've doused their glim for 'em," Jarvis grunted.

"My jumping Jimmy! that's good work," the Sub muttered joyously.

But in a second or two out shot "Peeping Tom" and hunted about nervously, to switch off again as another shell burst somewhere near him.

As he switched off, "Sister Susan" switched on again, only to vanish as still another shell came along her way.

"What a jest, my Galloping Orphan! We'll get past them both and not be seen."

And so they did. "Peeping Tom's" beam flashed on them once, and they held their breath, but it swept astern and left them in darkness, and before it worked back the Swiftsure's gun had blazed out, and it was switched off even before the shell burst.

"Squinting Susan" was much too anxious to help her brother to find the Swiftsure, and didn't bother her head about anything else; her crew, too, had nerves—very badly.

"We're past them both," the Sub said, chuckling quietly, shaking his huge fist at them, and guffawing loudly as he watched first one and then the other switching on and then switching off—out would shoot one light from shore—bang would go a gun—off switched the light—darkness—the other light would try—and disappear again. "Peeping Tom's" crew were even more flustered than "Squinting Susan's"; they hardly waited to be fired on before switching off.

It was the funniest sight in the world.

"Bet Bubbles is nearly choking himself," the Sub said, "and Uncle Podger making funny remarks."

"They're 'court-martialling' the China Doll in the gun-room," the Orphan told him.

"Oh, of course; I forgot that."

The picket-boat was now steaming in darkness, made more intense by the glare, two miles ahead of her, of "Glaring Gertrude's" huge beam. This light, by a lucky chance that night, never seemed to leave the white salt-heaps on the opposite shore.

"We're right on top of the mines now, sonny. Feeling gay?"

"Ra—ther!" answered the Orphan, the uncomfortable feeling in his stomach entirely forgotten.

"Worth a guinea a minute! My jumping Jimmy, it is!" the Sub kept saying to himself. "Starboard a little! That's the ticket. Keep her as you go. We're nearly past the mines now."

Presently the Orphan could see a dark line to starboard—perhaps a thousand yards away—and knew that this was the low-lying ground which swept along to the right of Yeni Kali fort, the land from which the guns had fired on the trawlers last Saturday.

If only "Glaring Gertrude" would stay where she was and amuse herself counting the salt-heaps all would be well. Once or twice she swept away from them, and the Orphan caught his breath lest she would swing right round on the picket-boat; but every time, just at the critical moment, back she would go to see if the salt-heaps were still there.

The picket-boat throbbed along; hardly any smoke was coming out of her funnel, and only very seldom a spark; old Fletcher might be a humbug, as Jarvis said, but he could stoke.

Then the Sub pointed out, right ahead, the square dark shape of Yeni Kali itself, its upper edge—broken and jagged where shells had crumbled it—silhouetted against "Glaring Gertrude's" beam.

"They're working it from somewhere in the fort itself," he said, speaking very quietly, "and the fort gives us a shadow. Splendid!"

"We've come too far; port your helm and ease her a bit, Orphan. Get that lantern ready—stand by to light it," he told the signalman.

The picket-boat turned in towards the darkness of the land, and moved through the black water with just a little rippling gurgle under her bows, whilst the crew, for'ard, strained their eyes to find the mark-buoy—the mark-buoy which the Turks had shifted.

"We ought to see it—it's white," muttered the Sub impatiently, but their eyes were rather blinded by looking at "Glaring Gertrude", and they could not pick it up.

The Sub kept his eyes shut for a minute, and then looked again.

No result.

The line of shore was very close now, and it was inconceivable that the Turkish look-outs at their guns, all along it, could not see the picket-boat. Round and round, first this way and then that, she steamed, hunting everywhere for that mark-buoy—without success.

To seaward the Swiftsure, "Peeping Tom" and his sister were still keeping up their noisy game of "Peep Bo", I spot you!—Bang! No, you don't!

But for that, and the gurgling under the bows, and the soft grating of the engines, there wasn't a sound. Not a sound came from the shore close to them, not even a dog barked.

The Sub grew restless. He knew that the two trawlers and the Swiftsure's picket-boat must already be sweeping through the mine-field and expecting to see the red light to guide them.

He swore at the Turks, cursed himself, and above all he cursed "Glaring Gertrude" and the fort for making the darkness so pitch black round the picket-boat.

He steered out towards the opposite shore until he almost ran into the big search-light's beam, swung her round, and made another "cast", but the blackness away from the glare and in the shadow of the fort was absolutely inky.

No buoy could he find.

He looked at the luminous face of his wrist watch. "It's getting on for eleven," he said bitterly. "The trawlers must have nearly finished."

"There's a light, sir! Look, sir! To seaward!" a man called excitedly.

"Keep quiet, you fool," growled Jarvis, "or you'll wake them Turks."

They all looked back towards the mine-field, and saw a small white light—like a small star twinkling low down on the water—between them and the Swiftsure.

"The trawlers have finished—that's the signal," the Sub swore angrily, "and we've not helped them. Go back to the ship, Orphan. Curse it all!"

And then at last the Turks woke up. Flash! Bang! Flash! Bang! Guns began firing one after the other, and the Orphan ducked as he heard shells whistling through the darkness.

He could have kicked himself for ducking, because the shells were not really coming his way, but bursting hundreds of yards beyond the little white light. It was that the Turks had seen, not the picket-boat. She had, however, to pass it on her way back.

"Which side shall I pass the light?" he asked nervously.

"Keep inside; they won't see us, and they won't hit us if they do—I almost wish they would," the Sub growled miserably. "Shove her along!"

As the picket-boat increased speed and approached the light the noise of shells came much nearer. One especially seemed to be very close, and burst in the water not a hundred yards ahead.

"Confound you! Keep your head still; you aren't a jumping marionette," swore the Sub as the Orphan ducked again.

"Sorry!" he stuttered. "I try, but I can't help it."

"Shove her along! Open her out! Let her rip!" roared the Sub. He was more happy now that there was some danger.

The picket-boat dashed through the water. She came abreast the white light, swinging from a pole on a buoy quite unconcernedly.

"That marks the end of the channel they've swept," the Sub bellowed; but the Sub was much too interested in the shells which were humming and shrieking, right over the boat now, some of them bursting as they struck the sea, others falling in with a "flomp". Another moment and the white light was left behind, wriggling excitedly as the wash of the steamboat made the buoy dance. Another hundred yards and they were out of the line of fire.

There was a sudden shout from the bows: "Something ahead, sir!" and out of the darkness came cries and shouts for help. They steered towards them, stopping engines, and found two men in an almost sinking dinghy—a trawler's dinghy—one of them trying to paddle with bits of bottom board.

They hauled them in and left the boat behind.

The men were numbed and half dazed. One, a signalman, had a cut on his head and was bleeding freely.

"285's blown up, sir; we're the only ones left."

Neither knew anything, except that there had been a great heave under their trawler and they'd found themselves in the water, swum about, found the dinghy, and got into her. One man had started feebly baling her out with his hands, whilst the other had ripped up one of her bottom boards and tried to paddle to the ships.

"She was only a-goin' round in circles and a-drifting inshore," he said.

They hadn't seen any more of the crew, but the Sub stopped engines and halloed into the darkness. No answer coming back, he returned to the Achates at full speed. "Squinting Susan" and "Peeping Tom" had to be passed, but they and the Swiftsure were still busy with their little game, and so no one bothered about them.

Until the Sub brought the news, no one knew of the disaster to trawler No. 285—not even the second trawler, which had already returned. Some of the crew of the Swiftsure's picket-boat had seen a sudden glare on the water—-like a flash running along the surface—which they thought was a shell bursting. Nobody had heard any explosion.

In case there were any more survivors, the Swiftsure's picket-boat went back to search the mine-field, and luckily found the skipper of the trawler and two more men drifting about on wreckage. Even they could give no definite account of what happened. One thought he heard a noise; another that he'd seen a flash; they all remembered a great heave under them and finding themselves in the water.

And so, in this sad way, the night's adventure ended; and the picket-boat having been hoisted in, the Orphan, very miserable, undressed and turned in to his hammock.

The Sub was wretched. He had not found the mark-buoy, and had done nothing to help in any way, and he cursed himself for not searching the mine-field area thoroughly, and for leaving the trawler skipper and those two men.

He wished someone would kick him very hard.

Next forenoon the Orphan was busy in his picket-boat collecting the crews of the other trawlers—some men from each—and bringing them aboard the Achates. He also had to fetch from the Aennie Rickmers her captain—a positively enormous man—and the flying officers, one of whom was a jovial burly Frenchman with a red beard, very proud of being called "Ginger".

On the quarter-deck, officers and men fell in, bare-headed, whilst the little pale-faced Padre read the burial service for those missing from the blown-up trawler.

Nothing more happened that day, but on the Wednesday the wind rose, and by nightfall was blowing hard—a very black night it was—and at about two o'clock in the morning an explosion occurred under the bows of the Aennie Rickmers.

She made signals of distress, and began to sink rapidly by the head. There had been rumours for some days that two Austrian submarines had escaped from the Adriatic; it might be a torpedo from one of them, or perhaps from some Turkish torpedo-boat. Some suggested floating mines; others that an explosion had occurred inside the Aennie Rickmers herself. No one knew exactly what had happened. All that anyone did know, when Captain Macfarlane took the Achates close to her, was that she was sinking; that her "dago" crew of Levantine nondescripts had deserted in all her boats; and that her English officers, the flying officers, their men, and the four wounded from the Achates were left without any means of saving themselves.

A most unpleasant hour-and-a-half followed.

The first the China Doll knew of it was being roughly punched in the ribs and shaken. He woke to hear men passing from hammock to hammock, singing out: "Turn out, sir, turn out; submarines about; all hands on deck, sir!"

He didn't lie long after that. He was down, had pulled on his trousers, found a coat and cap, fumbled in his chest until he found his swimming-collar, and was blowing it up round his neck before he was really awake.

Bubbles, whose hammock was slung next to his, had gone to sleep again. He prodded him feverishly. "Submarines, Bubbles! All hands on deck! Get your swimming-collar!" he squeaked.

"Oh, bother! Curse you!" grunted Bubbles. "You aren't pulling my leg? Oh, hang it!" he grumbled, as he saw all the other snotties tumbling into their clothes, officers coming out of their cabins into the dark, crowded "half-deck", and heard the banging down of armoured hatches. "I do hate this beastly war. Breakfast at seven; then a cold bath at two in the morning. Beastly!"

The China Doll went up on the dark quarter-deck and hunted round for someone to talk to. His teeth were chattering and his knees were trembling—it was so dark and cold.

"What's happened?" he asked, stumbling across Uncle Podger.

"Something blown a hole in the Aennie Rickmers, and the Sub's gone across in the cutter to bring back our wounded."

"What did it? Was it a submarine?"

"Don't bother; no one knows. Come and have a look at her."

He took him round to the other side of the turret, into the wind, and out in the pitch-black night they could just make out the darker mass of the hydroplane ship, apparently tipped up by the stern, and a signal-lamp flashing on board her. They heard shrieks coming from her, and the China Doll's heart beat fearfully fast.

Near them, on the quarter-deck, the querulous voice of Dr. O'Neill, the Fleet-Surgeon, was lamenting that he had ever come to sea. "Mother of Moses!" he groaned, as "Glaring Gertrude" turned her light towards the Achates and everybody's face showed up, and the turret and the superstructure, the masts and the funnels, stood out clearly against it. "Mother of Moses, they'll torpedo us next if we wait here much longer! They must see the ship every time that beastly thing passes across us."

As "Glaring Gertrude" swept away, and everybody and everything was left in darkness again, the Fleet-Paymaster's loud, cheery voice bellowed: "Cheer up, old 'C.D.'; if you have to take to the water, you won't find any whisky in it!"

The officers and men standing by tittered, for they well knew that Dr. O'Neill was a rabid teetotaler, and that "C.D." stood for "Converted Drunkard".

"I've never tasted the beastly stuff in my life, and know it you do!" snapped the Doctor furiously.

"Sadly lacking in the sense of humour you are, old C.D. What could be funnier than the whole seven hundred and fifty of us to go drifting ashore, under those salt-heaps, with swimming-collars round our necks?"

The Fleet-Surgeon stalked away, muttering angrily: "I hate fools."

By this time everything that could be done to make the Achates safe, in case she was attacked, had been done; water-tight doors and hatches were all closed; the Orphan was under the fore-bridge with his 6-pounder guns' crews; Bubbles was on the after-shelter deck with his; look-out men, all round the quarter-deck and fo'c'sle, peered into the darkness; the Sub had gone across to rescue the wounded men and, if need be, bring back everybody from the Aennie Rickmers, and all the officers and men who had no jobs to do stood waiting for whatever was going to happen.

To those who realized what might happen, and who thought it more than probable that whatever had fired a torpedo at the hydroplane ship—and by now everybody said it was a torpedo which had blown a hole in her—would come back out of the darkness, wait for that search-light to show up the Achates, and then take a pot-shot at her;—to those, that next hour-and-a-half was probably the most trying, and longest, in their lives. The wind blew so fiercely, and the water was so cold and dark, that there was very little chance of anyone being picked up once the Achates did sink, as there was every prospect of her doing—the poor old ship—once a torpedo got home.

Fortunately most people have not vivid imaginations, and to go into the battery during this time no one would have imagined that anything at all out of the way was happening. The men crowded there, just discernible by the blue-stained fighting-lights, walked up and down or stood in knots, smoking, and talking quietly about everything under the sun except what was going on. It was only when that hateful search-light passed along the ship, and one saw that practically all these men had their swimming-collars blown up round their necks, that one realized that they did know what the next few moments might bring them, and that, knowing this, they did not worry about it.

All had been done that could be done; of course, the Aennie Rickmers and their own wounded messmates aboard her could not be left in danger, and old "Yellow Beard", as they called Captain Macfarlane, was on the bridge up there above them.

So why bother?—and they didn't.

Uncle Podger, going up on the boat deck—really to get away from the China Doll, who would worry him with questions—stumbled against someone crawling on his hands and knees. The search-light sweeping round just then, he saw that it was Fletcher. "What are you hunting about there for?" he asked him.

"I can't find the tortoise, sir," the old man said. "I did not want to leave him behind if anything happened."

"He can swim, can't he? You'll be able to hold on to him, and he'll tow you ashore!" Uncle Podger laughed, and tried to help find "Kaiser Bill", waiting for "Glaring Gertrude" to come back again and throw a little light into the corners the "savage" beast most frequented. He left Fletcher still looking for him, and on his way for'ard to pass the time with the Orphan, collided with the Pimple stumbling along from the bridge.

"She's safe—she's only got her fore compartment flooded—-the bulkhead's holding. Our wounded are coming across in the cutter. The Captain's sent me to tell the Fleet-Surgeon," and away the Pimple dashed.

A few minutes later the cutter with the wounded splashed alongside. They were hoisted in and taken to the sick-bay. Two of these—Cookey, the chief cook, and the leading stoker—both of whom had had their legs smashed, were very big men indeed; and no one who has not had to do it can imagine the difficulty of handling helpless men of that great size and weight, and lowering them into, or hoisting them out of small boats even in daylight. In darkness it is much more tedious and awkward; yet, abandoned by their crew, and with the ship apparently sinking under them, the first thing the officers of the Aennie Rickmers and the French and English flying officers and men did, after they had been thrown out of their bunks by the force of the explosion, was to get the wounded ready to be lowered over the side, and, directly the Achates' cutter had come alongside, to lower them safely into it. This was an incident of quiet, unostentatious coolness and courage which deserves recording. It is, perhaps, easy to be courageous at 2 p.m.; at 2 a.m. it is a very different matter.

And another thing must be put down. As the first of those two helpless men was being carried for'ard, an officer—the first he met, and it was not the Fleet-Surgeon—took off his own swimming-collar, pushed it into his hands, and disappeared in the dark before he could give it back.

Shortly afterwards the miserable "dago" crew came screaming alongside and begged to be taken on board. They were; and they'll never forget the "feel" of the ammunition boots of the tender-hearted marines who shepherded them that night into a casemate and locked them up inside. Then off went the Achates to get out of the limit of "Glaring Gertrude's" range of vision, and to lose herself in the pitch-black night, where neither torpedo-boat nor submarine could find her.

The Sub had been left behind in the damaged ship, to shore up that fore bulkhead and to keep an eye on it all night. He was as happy as a "fiddler" to be able to make a good job of it and "wash out" the recollection of his bad luck and judgment two nights previously.

The remainder of the Honourable Mess crowded down into the gun-room with the joyous relief of danger past, demanding sardines, onions, and beer. They got them, too, at that unearthly hour of half-past three in the morning, for the purple-faced Barnes and the miserable little messman knew from long experience what would be wanted, and had spent the last half-hour preparing for them. It all went down as "extras", so the messman didn't mind.

The Pimple brought the news that it was a torpedo-boat that had attacked the Aennie Rickmers. "A signalman saw her dropping astern directly after the noise—the Navigator says he saw it too," he told them.

"Have an onion, Pimple?" they jeered.

The China Doll, at the first rumour of "sharks and onions", had dashed down from the quarter-deck, entirely forgetting that his swimming-collar was still round his neck; and they made him keep it there—blown up, too—so that he had the very greatest difficulty to swallow his fair share of the food—as for his glass of beer, Rawlinson drank half that—before the Commander sent the sentry to tell the Pink Rat to "'out lights' in the gun-room and stop that confounded noise!"

Then they crept noisily to their hammocks in the half-deck, and, marvellous to relate, slept like tops.

This finally concluded the operations off Smyrna—they were only intended temporarily to divert the Turks' attention—and a few days later the Swiftsure and Triumph, with the trawlers, were recalled to the Dardanelles, and the Achates ordered to Port Said to repair her small damages, leaving "Peeping Tom" and "Squinting Susan" to play "I spy you" by themselves, and "Glaring Gertrude" to go on counting her salt-heaps on the opposite shore or not, just as she pleased.