A Lively Bit of the Front Part 13

The airs.h.i.+p was flying rapidly "down wind" at an alt.i.tude of about two hundred feet. As it pa.s.sed almost overhead the fuselage appeared to sc.r.a.pe the _Pomfret Castle's_ main truck by inches. Presently the Blimp swung round and faced the wind, keeping on a course slightly diverging from that of the convoy. Plugging away dead in the eye of the wind its progress was not more than twenty miles an hour "over the ground", which in reality was a portion of the English Channel.

Suddenly the _Pomfret Castle_ starboarded helm and broke out of line. The alteration of course had the effect of causing the huge vessel to list outwards. As she did so a long trail of foam almost parallel to the starboard side of the s.h.i.+p shot ahead until it was lost to sight in the distance.

For some moments not a single man moved. Attention had been s.h.i.+fted from the Blimp to the milk-white track in the water--the wake of the torpedo.

Only by prompt use of her helm had the _Pomfret Castle_ escaped destruction. Even in home waters she had to run the gauntlet, despite the encircling line of destroyers.

With the utmost audacity a U-boat had lain submerged across the track of the convoy, trusting to be able to launch her bolt and disappear before even the swift destroyers could take her bearings, and close upon the spot where the tips of her periscopes had appeared when the torpedo had been discharged.

She had seen the escorting vessels and had taken the risk, but she had reckoned without the far-seeing eyes of the Blimp.

Already the airs.h.i.+p had spotted a dark elongated shape beneath the waves. Invisible when viewed at a narrow angle to the surface, the submarine stood out clearly against the grey waste of waters when seen from above.

Something, glittering in the dull light, shot from beneath the fuselage of the alert Blimp. With a mighty splash the missile struck the surface of the sea and disappeared.

For five long-drawn seconds nothing appeared to happen. Unseen by the watchers on the troop-s.h.i.+p, a deadly aerial torpedo was worming its way through the water until it reached a depth of sixty feet.

Before the spray cast up by the impact of the missile had subsided, another and far greater column of water leapt a hundred feet or more into the air. A cloud of smoke hid the Blimp from view, while, out of the breaking spout of upheaved water, appeared a solid, dark-grey substance--the after part of a U-boat!

For a brief instant the wreckage was revealed to view. Even the horizontal and vertical rudders and the twin propellers were visible. Then, as if reluctant to sink into obscurity, the strafed U-boat disappeared from mortal ken for all time.

No need for the destroyers to tear at full speed across the ever-widening circle of oil; no need for explosive grapnels to trail over the downward path of the vertically-descending pirate craft.

The diabolical _Spurlos versenkt_ policy had recoiled with a vengeance upon yet another of the Kaiser's _Unterseebooten_.

A hoa.r.s.e roar of cheering broke from the throats of the men.

Tommies, Anzacs, South Africans, and Maoris vied with each other as to who could produce the greatest and most prolonged volume Of sound. Other vessels of the convoy took up the hearty "Hip, hip, hurrah!" until the watchers on the distant Cornish cliffs must have heard the strenuous demonstrations of exultation.

Meanwhile the destroyers, their crews grimly silent, merely "carried on". The men whose lives they were guarding might well let themselves go, but these units of the great silent navy meant business. Time for shouting when the German navy ceased to exist as a fighting force--and "The Day" was yet to come.

The Blimp, also scorning to display any indications of its triumphant success, turned and flew serenely over the convoy, outwardly indifferent to the work of destruction it had accomplished. Not until the last of the convoy pa.s.sed the western end of the breakwater, and gained the security of Plymouth Sound, did the modern counterpart of the

"Little cherub that sits up aloft, To keep guard o'er the life of poor Jack"

relinquish its task. Then, amid a farewell outburst of cheering, the Blimp flew eastwards, to disappear from view behind the lofty Staddon Heights.

CHAPTER XIII

News of Peter

Malcolm's first impressions on landing in Old England were far from agreeable. A drizzling rain was falling. It was yet early, and beyond a few dock hands Millbay Pier was deserted. No crowds of enthusiastic spectators waited to welcome the men who had made a perilous voyage of thousands of miles to take part in the fight for freedom. In almost complete silence the securing-ropes were made fast and the gangways run out by apathetic workmen, while with the utmost dispatch the disembarkation of men and stores began.

Wearing grey Balaclava helmets instead of their smart uniform hats, and without their accoutrements, the three New Zealanders found themselves drawn up in the rear of their Australian comrades.

"Who are these men?" enquired an embarkation Officer of the Anzac major who accompanied him.

"Three New Zealanders who missed their transport at Cape Town, sir,"

replied the latter.

"What regiment?"

The Australian turned to Fortescue and repeated the question.

The embarkation officer consulted a doc.u.ment.

"Thirty-somethingth reinforcements, eh? Dash it all, you men! You've arrived before they have. I don't know what to do with them, Major."

He spoke wearily. Dealing with absentees and men who had "got adrift" had occupied a good part of his time during the last two years. It was getting decidedly monotonous.

"Let them entrain with our boys, sir," suggested the kindly Anzac major. "I'll be responsible for them as far as Salisbury. They're for Codford, I suppose?"

"Very well," acceded the embarkation officer, glad to find an easy solution to the difficulty. "You are the senior non-com., I suppose," he asked, addressing Fortescue. "Here, take this, and when you arrive in camp report yourselves."

He handed Fortescue a yellow paper, and hurried off to find shelter from the downpour. The entrainment was a slow process. The men were hungry. They wished in vain for the breakfast that the majority had forgone when the _Pomfret Castle_ sighted land. There were rumours that tea and coffee were to be served out at a way-side station, but promises, Fortescue observed, do not fill an empty stomach.

In vain Malcolm looked for Te Paheka. Already the Maori contingent had been spirited away--to what immediate destination he knew not.

Handcuffed and under a strong escort, the spy arrested under the name of Pieter Waas was hurried along the slippery quay--the bent, dejected figure of a man who, although uncondemned, knows that his life is forfeit. Who and what he was yet remained to be proved, unless, like many a nameless spy, he went to his death preferring that the mystery that surrounded his life should accompany him to the Great Beyond.

Packed like sardines in a tin, the Anzacs filled the long train to overflowing. Again under cover, their mercurial spirits rose, and when at length the rain ceased, and the train rumbled betwixt the red-earthed, verdant coombes of Devon, bathed in brilliant suns.h.i.+ne, the Anzacs unanimously voted that there were worse places on earth than the Old Country.

It was late in the afternoon when Malcolm and his two chums alighted at Codford station, and, making their way by a roundabout route along the main street of the village, where old-time cottages and hideous wooden shanties stood cheek by jowl, arrived at the vast array of tin huts that comprised the camp.

Things turned out better than either of the three chums had expected. They were reprimanded, but for the time being they were not deprived of their stripes. Until the arrival of the Thirty-somethingth reinforcements they were given light duties and a generous amount of leisure time.

"Malcolm Carr, by all that's blue and pink!"

This was the greeting hurled at Malcolm a few hours after his arrival in camp. At that time there were comparatively few troops at Codford. Heavy drafts had just been sent to Sling Camp, preparatory to proceeding to France, while the expected reinforcements had not yet put in an appearance. Yet one of the first men young Carr met that evening was a Christchurch acquaintance who lived but a few doors away from Malcolm's parents.

"By Jove, this is great, Tommy!" exclaimed Malcolm. "Never thought I'd run against you here. You know Selwyn, of course? This is Fortescue, one of the boys--and one of the best. An old Christchurch chum, Tommy Travers."

"When did you blow in?" enquired Travers, as the four made their way along a narrow plank gangway between the lines of huts--the only means of preventing men sinking above their ankles in mud.

"Arrived at Plymouth this morning," replied Malcolm. "And you? Been across yet?"

Travers touched his coat-sleeve, on which was a faded gold stripe.

"Yes," he answered; "five months of it. I got this bucks.h.i.+e in that sc.r.a.p in Delville Wood, when our brigade captured Flers. Shrap," he added laconically. "It was h.e.l.l let loose, and our boys copped it.

Six weeks in hospital, and then I came here. Managed to get dropped when the last draft went to Sling, so I suppose I'll be off with the next crush. Any news Christchurch way?"

"Did you hear that my brother Peter is wounded and missing?" asked Malcolm, after a flow of conversation on strictly personal subjects.

"Yes," replied Travers. "He was sergeant of my platoon. I think I was one of the last of our chaps to see him. It was like this: our battalion cleared the southern portion of Delville Wood in grand style. We fairly put the wind up Fritz. Bombs and bayonets all the time. We had a lot of casualties, though. When we rushed our objective your brother Peter was senior non-com. There were two subalterns left, but they weren't fit for much. Both hit, but too plucky to chuck their hands in. Well, we began digging ourselves in on the edge of the wood when the Boches started to pump in high-explosive, shrap, and gas sh.e.l.ls. There was precious little left of the wood. Not a leaf to be seen, and at most a crowd of charred tree-trunks, many of 'em still blazing."

"Why Fritz treated us to an extra special dose goodness only knows.

The battalion lying on our right barely copped it at all, and the Tommy regiment on our left came off lightly until the Huns had finished with us. We had little or no cover. The ground was chock-full of big roots, and we hadn't time to remove them. The trees were flying in big and little chunks all over the show, and all the cover we could get were a few sh.e.l.l-holes."