Chapter XVIII A Shrimping Adventure
“Not such a bad take for the first, eh?” said Arnold Bilverstone, emptying the pocket of the shrimping net into the basket between the thwarts. “If you’re fond of shrimps, Seth, you can have a good feed at teatime.”
Seth Newruck, astern at the tiller, bent forward to examine the catch of the dim light of the early dawn.
“I should like them very much better if they weren’t so beastly difficult to peel, sir,” he answered. “I nearly always break them.”
“That is probably because you don’t go the right way about it,” rejoined Mr. Bilverstone, glancing shoreward. “You should press the head and tail firmly towards each other, giving them a gentle half turn. That loosens the scales, and you can draw the shrimp free as easily as drawing your finger out of a glove. Luff!”
Seth luffed, and the lugger came up to the wind and bowled forward with a musical gurgle of water along her strakes.
Mr. Bilverstone was in no hurry to add to the little pile of jumping, wriggling crustaceans in the basket. He was much less intent upon catching shrimps than watching the growing light in the eastern sky and calculating the boat’s distance from Alderwick Knoll.
“When we get abreast of the lighthouse,” he said, “we’ll put out the gear again and creep along the shore. Don’t stare about too much. We must pretend to be tremendously interested in our work. But keep your ears open. When we’ve passed Sunnydene we shall tack out as if we were making for the north end of the shoal. If a periscope pops up, we’ll just go ahead as if we hadn’t noticed it. A submarine couldn’t torpedo a cockleshell like this, and unless she comes up awash we’re just as safe from gunfire.”
“What I don’t understand,” said Seth, “is that, supposing a German submarine to be lying submerged out there in the shoal water; supposing she has come to refill her petrol tanks, how could she get the petrol on board? She couldn’t come alongside the beach; and submarines don’t carry boats.”
“The new German ones do,” Mr. Bilverstone informed him. “They keep a collapsible boat stowed in a hatchway abaft the conning-tower. But, of course, it could only be launched when the submarine is awash. As for getting the petrol aboard, you may be sure they’d manage it somehow if it were still where they think it is.”
“They can’t find out that we’ve removed it, unless they come ashore to look,” Seth reflected.
Mr. Bilverstone paid out the lugsail sheet an inch or two and perched himself on the windward gunwale.
“As a matter of fact,” he said, “I believe they know already. I didn’t tell you; but an hour ago, while you were having a sleep under my writing-table, we had a report from the two marines patrolling Alderwick beach. At about two o’clock they saw an electric light signal flashed from the foreshore, near one of the groins. There were no ships in sight, and no answering signal was seen. Still the light kept on flashing. The two marines crept up, one on either side of the groin. They got so near that one of them called out a challenge. As there was no response he fired. The light went out then. There was no cry, no sound, no movement. Nobody was shot; yet nobody ran away. The two marines and two Territorial sentries searched, but found absolutely no trace of the chap who had been signalling. He had vanished as completely as if the tide had come up and swallowed him.”
“That’s queer!” murmured Seth. “Very queer. There must have been somebody working the hand-lamp, sir.”
“Not necessarily a hand-lamp,” Mr. Bilverstone smiled. “None of the patrol thought of it, but it’s easy to imagine how a tricky German, such as Fritz Seligmann, could plant an electric bulb in the sand or shingle, or even among the timbers of the groin, and work the switch from the top of the cliff by means of a long-distance connection. A spy was caught three nights ago signalling from the air. He flew a kite with an electric current running through the string. Spies wouldn’t be much good if they weren’t tricky.”
Slowly the dawning light in the eastern sky grew brighter, changing from steel grey to gold, tinged with a rosy glow. Again and again Mr. Bilverstone put out the gear. No one seeing the two occupants of the little boat, with its brown lugsail, would have believed them to be anything else than ordinary shrimpers. They both wore tanned canvas overalls and oilskin sou’-westers, and their manner of working contributed to their disguise.
Twice they passed along the leeward fringe of the shoal. Seth Newruck’s eyes searched the ruffled water where the waves broke here and there above the shallows; but he saw nothing unusual.
“I’m afraid we shall have only the shrimps for our trouble, sir,” he remarked with a shiver, for the morning was very cold.
“Don’t be impatient,” nodded his companion, opening a Thermos flask. “We haven’t finished our job yet. Here, have a drink of warm tea; and there are some biscuits in the locker behind you. Come forward here, and I will take the tiller for a spell.”
He took the boat outward, as if he were making for the lightship, leaving the shoal in his wake.
“Don’t look round, sir,” Seth whispered agitatedly. “I can see two periscopes, close together. And there’s a sort of commotion in the water round about them, as if the submarine were rising.”
Mr. Bilverstone put over the tiller, so that the boat yawed and her sail began to flutter. He left the tiller and crept forward over the thwarts, seized the halliard, and lowered the sail, then hauled it up again, returned to the tiller and brought her up to the wind, going on as before.
“What did you do that for, sir?” Seth inquired, amazed at what he took to be an example of bad seamanship. “She was going on all right.”
Mr. Bilverstone took a drink of tea.
“It was a signal,” he explained. “All the time while we’ve been out they’ve been watching us from the naval base. The Kingfisher has had her steam up ready to come out as soon as we should give the sign. We have given it. You will see her presently. What about the periscopes?”
“They’re still there, sir,” Seth answered. “I can see the top of her conning-tower above water. She’s moving. I believe I can hear her engines grunting. So she’s got some petrol left. Hullo! I can see a man’s head and shoulders.”
“She’s bound to come up and work her petrol engines to generate electricity,” said Mr. Bilverstone, going on a fresh tack. “Haul in the net, quick! Those Germans will guess we had a hand in it when they see the gunboat coming after them.”
Seth got the gear inboard, and again his companion tacked. The boat was making for home, with both wind and tide in her favour.
Mr. Bilverstone could now watch the submarine. She was awash, and her petrol engines, making a great clatter, were evidently working up to full speed. Two of her crew had come out on the platform of her conning-tower. One was in officer’s uniform. The sun, piercing the mist, shone upon his brass buttons and the gold badge on his cap. He stood looking southward to where two plumes of smoke from a steamer’s funnels rose into the morning air over the lighthouse point. It could be seen that he had his left arm in a sling.
“She’s coming after us, sir!” cried Seth. “She’ll sink us!”
“She’s trying to escape from the gunboat,” declared Mr. Bilverstone. “You see, she can’t submerge until her electric batteries are charged, and she can go quicker on the surface. Look! There comes the Kingfisher!”
The officer disappeared for some moments, but returned with a pair of binoculars, which he levelled upon the gunboat. The submarine quickly increased her speed, sending up a great fountain of foam as she cut through the water. She passed so close to the shrimp boat that it rocked on the waves she left in her wake. Seth Newruck saw the number on her side—U50. He also caught a glimpse of the face of the young officer on the deck of her conning-tower.
“Look!” he cried excitedly. “Look, sir! It’s Max Hilliger himself!”
Hardly had he spoken when there was a spurt of fire and smoke from one of the Kingfisher’s 4.7 guns; a shell whistled through the air and sent up a tall column of spray as it fell midway between the submarine and the shrimping boat. The submarine, now fully on the surface and racing along at eighteen-knot speed, offered a good target; but she manoeuvred, steering a zig-zag course, seldom exposing her broadside. A gun was raised from its concealed hatchway on her after platform, and she replied to the Kingfisher’s fire without visible effect.
Arnold Bilverstone, nervously gripping the boat’s gunwale, was leaning forward, gazing fixedly northward along the coast.
“That’s good!” he exclaimed. “There’s a couple of destroyers coming out from Buremouth. They’ll head her off.”
The chase continued. Suddenly the submarine’s gun disappeared. The two men on her conning-tower went below. She seemed to be slowing down. A shell from one of the two destroyers fell perilously near her, deluging her with spray.
“She’s hit!” cried Seth Newruck. “See! she’s sinking!”
“Submerging,” corrected Mr. Bilverstone, watching the conning-tower slowly disappear.
The Kingfisher, going at her best speed of twenty knots, was soon abreast of the shrimper, separated by hardly more than fifty yards. Just in time her course was altered; she went abruptly to starboard, and so luckily avoided the torpedo which was aimed at her from the submerged enemy. Seth saw the disturbance of the water as the deadly weapon sped on its fruitless errand.
The gunboat gave up the dangerous chase and steamed a confusing, irregular course until she rounded the southern extremity of Alderwick Shoal, and thus got the protection of the sandbank between her and the submarine. But of the submarine herself and her periscopes no more was seen.
Arnold Bilverstone steered alongside the gunboat. Both he and Seth Newruck were taken on board, their boat being hoisted on deck with its catch of shrimps, which were consigned to the seamen’s quarters. Later on that same day, on his way home up the High Street, Seth Newruck encountered Constable Challis.
“I thought you’d be interested to knew,” said the constable, “as that dug-out at Green Croft came into use this mornin’, when them naval guns were firin’. Mrs. Daplin-Gennery made sure it was the Germans comin’ to make an invasion. She got all her household, includin’ three Belgian refugees, into the shelter in double quick time; and there they remained until long after the firin’ had ceased. Between ourselves, they might have remained comfortable in their beds. There was no cause for alarm. It was only that the Kingfisher discovered an enemy ship layin’ explosive mines off the coast and gave chase and sent her to the bottom.”
Seth smiled to himself. Constable Challis was curiously astray in his information.
“Did you see what took place, constable?” he inquired, assuming ignorance.
Challis shook his head regretfully.
“I wasn’t on duty at the time,” he answered. “Anyhow, Mrs. Daplin-Gennery had a rare fright. I’m told, indeed, that she’s had a disturbed night from beginnin’ to end. No sooner had she got her refugees to bed, when somebody or other had the impudence to knock her up askin’ to use her telephone. At two o’clock in the mornin’ she was again alarmed by hearin’ a rifle shot on the denes. Then there was the naval guns. What the rifle shot was about I don’t know. Inspector Jenner was up there on special duty shortly afterwards, but knew nothin’ about it.”
“Oh!” nodded Seth, with new interest. “And what was the special duty?”
Constable Challis bent nearer to the boy and lowered his voice.
“Strictly between ourselves,” he said. “There’s a rumour goin’ about that one of the Germans has come back to Sunnydene—that secretary—and that he’s been up to some spyin’ tricks. Inspector Jenner, with assistance, went to arrest him. They broke into the house and made a thorough search, but he wasn’t there. There wasn’t a trace of him on the premises.”
“Still,” said Seth, “I suppose the police will keep a watch?”
“You may take it from me,” declared Challis, “if that there Seligmann is anywhere about Haddisport, we shall nab him.”