Mr. Midshipman Glover, R.N.: A Tale of the Royal Navy of To-day
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Title: Mr. Midshipman Glover, R.N.: A Tale of the Royal Navy of To-day
Creator: T. T. Jeans
Illustrator: E. S. Hodgson
Release date: July 28, 2014 [eBook #46441]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46441
Credits: Produced by Al Haines
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MR. MIDSHIPMAN GLOVER, R.N.: A TALE OF THE ROYAL NAVY OF TO-DAY ***
Produced by Al Haines.
[Illustration: Cover art]
[Illustration: HE WILDLY TORE AT EVERYTHING AND HURLED IT DOWN
ON HIS PURSUERS _Page_ 86 _Frontispiece_]
Mr. Midshipman Glover, R.N.
A Tale of the Royal Navy of To-day
BY
SURGEON REAR-ADMIRAL
T. T. JEANS, C.M.G., R.N.
Author of "John Graham, Sub-Lieutenant, R.N."
"A Naval Venture" &c.
_Illustrated by Edward S. Hodgson_
BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
LONDON AND GLASGOW
1908
By
Surgeon Rear-Admiral
T. T. Jeans
The Gun-runners.
John Graham, Sub-Lieutenant, R.N.
A Naval Venture.
Gunboat and Gun-runner.
Ford of H.M.S. "Vigilant".
On Foreign Service.
Mr. Midshipman Glover, R.N.
_Printed in Great Britain by Blackie & Son, Ltd., Glasgow_
*Preface*
In this story of the modern Royal Navy I have endeavoured, whilst
narrating many adventures both ashore and afloat, to portray the habits
of thought and speech of various types of officers and men of the Senior
Service who live and serve under the White Ensign to-day.
To do this the more graphically I have made some of the leading
characters take up, from each other, the threads of the story and
continue the description of incidents from their own points of view; the
remainder of the tale is written in the third person as by an outside
narrator.
I hope that this method will be found to lend additional interest to the
book.
I have had great assistance from several Gunnery, Torpedo, and Engineer
Lieutenants, who have read the manuscripts as they were written,
corrected many errors of detail, and made many useful suggestions.
The story may therefore claim to be technically correct.
T. T. JEANS,
SURGEON REAR-ADMIRAL, ROYAL NAVY
*Contents*
CHAP.
I. The Luck of Midshipman Glover
II. Helston receives a Strange Letter
III. The Fitting Out of a Squadron
IV. The Pirates are not Idle
V. The Squadron leaves hurriedly
VI. The Voyage East
VII. The Pursuit of the Patagonian
VIII. Mr. Ping Sang is Outwitted
IX. Captain Helston Wounded
X. Destroyer "No. 1" Meets her Fate
XI. The Action off Sin Ling
XII. A Council of War
XIII. The Avenging of Destroyer "No. 1"
XIV. Night Operations
XV. Mr. Midshipman Glover Tells how he was Wounded
XVI. Captain Helston's Indecision
XVII. Spying Out the Pirates
XVIII. The Escape from the Island
XIX. Cummins Captures One Gun Hill
XX. The Fight for One Gun Hill
XXI. On One Gun Hill
XXII. The Final Attack on the Hill
XXIII. The Attack on the Forts
XXIV. The Capture of the Island
XXV. The Fruits of Victory
XXVI. Home Again
*Illustrations*
He wildly tore at everything and hurled it down on his pursuers . . .
_Frontispiece_
I struck at him with my heavy malacca stick
The sinking of the Pirate Torpedo-Boat
The Commander and Jones overpower the Two Sentries
Map Illustrating the Operations Against the Pirates
[Illustration: MAP ILLUSTRATING THE OPERATIONS AGAINST THE PIRATES]
*CHAPTER I*
*The Luck of Midshipman Glover*
Ordered Abroad. Hurrah!
_Midshipman Glover explains how Luck came to him_
It all started absolutely unexpectedly whilst we were on leave and
staying with Mellins in the country.
When I say "we", I mean Tommy Toddles and myself. His real name was
Foote, but nobody ever called him anything but "Toddles", and I do
believe that he would almost have forgotten what his real name actually
was if it had not been engraved on the brass plate on the lid of his sea
chest, and if he had not been obliged to have it marked very plainly on
his washing.
We had passed out of the _Britannia_ a fortnight before--passed out as
full-blown midshipmen, too, which was all due to luck--and were both
staying with Christie at his pater's place in Somerset.
It was Christie whom we called Mellins, because he was so tremendously
fat; and though he did not mind us doing so in the least, it was rather
awkward whilst we were staying in his house, for we could hardly help
calling his pater "Colonel Mellins".
You see, he was even fatter than Mellins himself, and the very first
night we were there--we were both just a little nervous--Toddles did
call him Colonel Mellins when we wished him "Good-night", and he glared
at us so fiercely, that we slunk up to our room and really thought we'd
better run away.
We even opened the window and looked out, feeling very miserable, to see
if it was possible to scramble down the ivy or the rusty old water-spout
without waking everybody, when Mellins suddenly burst in with a pillow
he had screwed up jolly hard, and nearly banged us out of the window. By
the time we had driven him back to his room at the other end of the
corridor, and flattened him out, we had forgotten all about it, and we
crept back like mice, and went to sleep.
It was just at this time that the papers came out with those
extraordinary yarns about the increase of piracy on the Chinese coast,
and how some Chinese merchants had clubbed together to buy ships in
England and fit out an expedition to clear the sea again.
You can imagine how interested we three were, especially as fifty years
ago Toddles's father had taken part in a great number of scraps with the
Cantonese pirates, and Toddles rattled off the most exciting yarns which
his father had told him.
We saw in the papers that the Admiralty was about to lend naval officers
to take command, but it never struck us that we might possibly get a
look in, till one morning a letter came for me from Cousin Milly, whose
father is an old admiral and lives at Fareham, and isn't particularly
pleasant when I go to see him.
My aunt! weren't we excited! Why, she actually wrote that if I wanted
to go she thought she could get me appointed to the squadron, as the
captain who was going in charge was a great friend of hers.
You can imagine what I wrote, and how I buttered her up and called her a
brick, and said she was a "perfect ripper". I ended up by saying that
"Mr. Arthur Bouchier Christie, midshipman, and Mr. Thomas Algernon
Foote, midshipman, chums of mine, would like to go too".
I was very careful to give their full names to prevent mistakes, and put
"midshipman" after their names just to show that they had also passed
out of the _Britannia_. near the top of the list, and so must be pretty
good at chasing "X and Y", which, of course, is a great "leg up" in the
navy.
Two mornings after this Milly sent me a postcard: "Hope to manage it for
the three of you".
We were so excited after that, that we did nothing but wait about for
the postman, and even went down to the village post-office and hung
about there, almost expecting a telegram.
Well, you would hardly believe it! The very next morning our
appointments were in the papers.
I have the list somewhere stowed away even now, and it began:
"The under-mentioned officers of the Royal Navy have been placed on
half-pay and lent to the Imperial Chinese Government for special
services".
Down at the bottom of the list was "Midshipmen", and we nearly tore
Colonel Christie's paper in our excitement as we read, in very small
print and among a lot of other names, Arthur B. Christie, Harold S.
Glover (that was myself--hurrah!), and Thomas A. Foote.
Well, I can't tell you much of what happened after that, for we were
simply mad with delight; but I do remember that when I rushed off home
my father and mother rather threw a damper over it all.
And when my gear had been packed and driven down to the station, I felt
rather a brute because everyone cried, and even my father was a little
husky when I wished him good-bye. I think something must have got into
my eye too, a fly, probably, but it wasn't there when the train ran into
Portsmouth Harbour station, and Mellins and Toddles met me and dragged
me to the end of the pier to get our first view of our new ship, which
was lying at Spithead.
Now you will have to read how all these things came about, or you will
never properly understand them.
*CHAPTER II*
*Helston receives a Strange Letter*
Helston's Bad Luck--Ping Sang tells of Pirates--Ping Sang makes
an Offer--Helston Jubilant
In the year 1896 two naval officers were living a somewhat humdrum,
monotonous existence in the quiet little Hampshire village of Fareham,
which nestles under the fort-crowned Portsdown Hills, and is almost
within earshot of the ceaseless clatter of riveting and hammering in the
mighty dockyards of Portsmouth.
These two men had both served many years before in the small gun-boat
_Porcupine_ out in China, and their many escapades and adventures had
frequently drawn down on their heads the wrath of the Admiral commanding
that station. Wherever the _Porcupine_ went, trouble of some sort or
another was sure to follow. At one place an indignant Taotai[#]
complained that all the guns--obsolete old muzzle-loaders--in his fort
had been tumbled into the ditch one night; at another they only just
escaped with their lives from an infuriated mob whilst actually carrying
from the temple a highly grotesque, but still more highly revered, joss,
at which desecration they had cajoled and bribed the local priests to
wink.
[#] Taotai = military magistrate.
Comrades in every adventure, and mess-mates during these four exciting
years, they had ultimately drifted together on half-pay, and, with their
old marine servant Jenkins, a taciturn old man, to look after them, had
settled down in this village.
Both men were below the age of forty, though a more accurate estimate
would have been difficult, for the shorter of the two bore himself with
the vigour and alertness of thirty, yet his face was old with the lines
and furrows of care and sadness, whilst the tall, gaunt figure of the
second was not held so erect, nor were his actions so vigorous, yet the
youthful fire in his eyes gave to his sea-tanned face and his thin,
tight-drawn lips and prominent jaw the appearance of a man who had not
yet reached the zenith of his manhood.
The shorter man was named Fox, a doctor, who had left the service when
he married, only to lose his wife a year later, and with her his whole
joy of existence. Settling down in this village, near her grave, he had
worked up a small practice, which occupied but little of his time, and
lived a life from which his great grief seemed to have removed any trace
of his former ambition.
Not so the taller man, Helston, a commander, who had been invalided and
placed on half-pay, suffering from the effects of fevers picked up
whilst cruising off the West Coast of Africa, in China, and in the
Mediterranean. Though his body was weakened by disease, he was for ever
buoyant at the prospects of being restored to health and full-pay, and
dreamed eagerly of the time when once more he could go afloat and
eventually command his own ship.
He, however, generally found a most unsympathetic audience in the
Doctor, who listened, with ill-concealed boredom, to his rose-coloured
plans, and cynically would say, "Who goes to sea for enjoyment would go
to jail for a pastime. Take my advice and get a snug billet in the
coast-guard, and don't bother the sea any more. It's not done you much
good."
"It's all my bad luck, Doc, old chap," Helston would answer; "no fault
of the sea. I played the idiot when I was a youngster, was always in
disgrace up at the Admiralty, and now, with this rotten fever in me,
they won't employ me again."
But he would always finish with, "Well, I've waited patiently enough for
the last three years, and luck must turn soon".
On one such occasion, when the warmth and brightness of a May day had
made Helston more than usually enthusiastic as to his chances of
full-pay service, Dr. Fox, knocking the ashes out of his pipe, growled,
"Next ship, indeed! You talk of nothing but ships and sea, sea and
ships, when you ought to be buying a Bath chair to be wheeled about in."
"Never mind, old chap, I'm not as bad as that, and I'll bet you that
they give me a ship in less than six months!"
"If they do, I will come with you," jeered the Doctor, as he stalked
moodily to bed.
"That's a bargain," shouted Helston cheerfully after him.
Now one reason why Helston had settled down here with the Doctor, and
the great source of his ambitious dreams, was a certain lady named
Milly, who, with her father--his name is not necessary, for he was
always spoken of as "the Admiral", or "Miss Milly's father"--lived close
to the village. He had wooed her constantly for many years, and had
known her since she was born, but the somewhat disdainful little lady
had refused him many times, though not without giving him some slight
hope of better success if ever he were promoted to the rank of captain.
However, as Mistress Milly never personally enters this story, nothing
more need be said of her than that she was one of the most bewitching
little flirts who ever tyrannized over an old father, or played havoc
with the heart of every man she met.
A few weeks after this incident, and whilst the two were at breakfast,
the old village postman stumbled up the path leading to their house, and
Jenkins, a sombre, morose man of few words, brought in a big official
envelope.
"What did I say, old chap?" cried Helston excitedly, tearing it open.
"Didn't I say my luck would change? Hullo! this isn't an ordinary
appointment. Whatever is it?" A large number of papers fell on the
table, and, the Doctor showing some signs of interest, the two men
hurriedly examined them, Jenkins standing behind at attention in order
to learn the news.
The first one was from the Admiralty, informing Helston that the
enclosures had been received through the Chinese Embassy, and ordering
him to report himself at Whitehall immediately. These enclosures were
lists of ships supposed to be wrecked on the Chinese coast during the
last few years, lists of Chinese men-of-war supposed to have been
destroyed during the Chino-Japanese war, and papers showing the gradual
rise in insurance rates for the Chinese coasting trade.
"Where's your appointment?" sneered the Doctor. "I'm off to see my
patients."
"I've got it, Doc; look here! Do you remember that old mandarin we got
out of a scrape at Cheefoo once? Well, here's a letter from him.
Listen!" Saying which, Helston sat on the table and read it aloud,
whilst the Doctor filled his pipe impatiently:--
"DEAR COMMANDER HELSTON,--Perhaps you remember saving my life at Cheefoo
many years ago? Now perhaps I can do you a good turn.
"For the last three or four years there has been a very large number of
steamers, ships, and junks employed on the coast trade which have left
port under favourable circumstances and apparently in good condition,
yet have never been heard of since. The number has rapidly become so
great, that myself and several friends interested in the shipping trade
have suspected that these disappearances were not due to natural causes.
This year, for instance, three of our newest steamers have left Nagasaki
full of valuable cargo, and, though none of them could have experienced
bad weather, yet none have been heard of since. All three, strangely
enough, carried a large quantity of military stores for Pekin, which had
been transhipped from German steamers, and all three left within three
weeks. The captains were Englishmen--very good men, too--and what adds
to the peculiarity of their disappearance is, that the captain of the
English mail-steamer which followed the last out of harbour, and should
have passed her eight hours later if she had been on her proper course,
never sighted her. We searched the coast ineffectually for any trace of
wreckage, and it is only within the last two months that we have
obtained a clue.
"One of our large junks from Formosa, being short of water, made for an
island, previously reported as being only occasionally inhabited by
Korean fishermen. A few men went ashore to fill the casks, found the
fishing-nets deserted and no water, so followed a path leading inland
and winding up a hill. When nearly at the top they came across four
dead Chinamen hanging from trees, and although very frightened, they
still pushed on until they came in sight of the natural harbour on the
other side of the island. They swear solemnly that, lying at anchor,
they saw twenty or thirty steamers and several men-of-war, and that on
shore there were many storehouses (go-downs) and huts, and a very large
number of natives. They were just going down for water when one of these
men, who fortunately had formerly been one of the crew of the
_Tslai-ming_, our crack steamer, recognized her lying there. He is a
cute fellow, and at once jumped to the conclusion that these were
pirates (you remember how terribly frightened they are of 'pilons'?),
and ran back with his fellows to their boat.
"They brought this news to us.
"Four years ago, when this island was last visited, it was reported as
uninhabited. Personally I did not doubt the men's tale. In fact, they
are so frightened, and have spread their story so freely, that it is
difficult to get a crew together for any port south of Amoy.
"I have made very careful enquiries to account for the presence of the
men-of-war, and have discovered that many of the war-ships, and nearly
all the torpedo-boats which were run ashore to escape capture during the
late war, had disappeared.
"The local mandarins and officials of course know nothing, but from the
natives living near I find that large ships came and stayed near the
stranded ships for some weeks, and finally towed them away. There is no
doubt that two, if not three, cruisers in bad plight have been sold to a
couple of Europeans, and have disappeared, where, no one knows. A
couple of the Yangtze corvettes have also mysteriously vanished.
"I memorialized the throne, but they would do nothing, and made fun of
my report. The mandarins got hold of my informants, tortured them till
they denied the truth of their story, and then of course laughed at me.
"Trade was practically at a stand-still, so we decided to send one of
our best captains, an Englishman, to see if the men's story was correct.
He landed at night from a junk, disguised as a native, and spent a day
on the island, running great risks of detection, and being taken off
next night. He reports that there are certainly three cruisers and
seven torpedo-boats anchored there, and at least twenty coasting
steamers, among them being the three that disappeared when laden with
military stores. Great numbers of coolies were working at the narrow
entrance to the harbour, and, as far as he could see, they were mounting
guns behind earthworks. He thought he could distinguish some Europeans,
but is not certain. He brought a rough plan of the harbour, marking the
positions of ships, buildings, and guns.
"I decided to take him next day to some of the ministers whom I knew
personally, thinking that they would pay more attention to the word of
an Englishman. I must tell you that the three natives who first brought
the news and were tortured to deny it, have disappeared, and as they
were very honest, faithful men, I suspected some underhanded dealing,
and, thinking to keep the Englishman safe made him sleep in my _yamen_
that night. Next morning he had disappeared, and his body was found two
days later in a low quarter of the town, stripped of all valuables
including the plan, which he had in his pocket-book, although this
itself was not taken. The gatekeeper saw him go out, and there is no
doubt his habits were unsteady, but for all that his death is very
suspicious.
"Naturally I had no proof good enough for the Government, but my friends
and myself subscribed ten million dollars, and asked the Government for
another five millions, to fit out an expedition and destroy these
pirates, offering to hand over to them the men-of-war we intended
buying, and also a percentage of our recaptures. They refused at first,
but thinking money was to be made out of it, promised us four millions,
the protection of the Imperial flag, and the use of their dockyards.
"We had thought of applying to some European power to take the matter
up; but you know the great tension of affairs out here at the present,
and the acute international jealousies; we therefore came to the
conclusion that it would take years to bring this about through the
ordinary diplomatic channels, and as every year's trade is worth from
L10,000,000 to L20,000,000 for us, we cannot afford to wait.
"I, therefore, as President of the China Trading Defence Committee, am
authorized to offer you the control of this money if you will accept the
responsibility of organizing a small expedition with the greatest
possible speed to rid us of this unbearable piracy which is destroying
our trade.
"You will get this letter and the enclosed lists and tables from our
Ambassador in London, who will give you every facility for granting
Imperial commissions for your ships and officers, and every information
he can.
"I know enough of your service to think that if you take command of this
expedition you will advance your prospects, and the opportunity of doing
this I have very great pleasure in giving you.
"Wire me your decision and plans; don't worry about money--haste is the
great thing.--Your sincere friend,
"PING SANG.
"TIENTSIN, _17th March._
"_P.S._--If you do not accept the command it will be offered to
Lieutenant Albrecht of the Imperial German Navy.
"I hope the Doctor with the broad shoulders and terrible fists is well.
Give him my 'chin chin', and bring him with you if you can."
Helston finished reading, and both men stared at each other in blank
amazement, whilst Jenkins commenced stealthily to remove the breakfast
things.
"Well, of all the hare-brained, foolish schemes I ever heard of!" gasped
the Doctor.
"There's something in it, old chap. Ping Sang was one of the richest
mandarins in China when we were out there many years ago. A splendid
chap, as you remember, and practically an Englishman in his ideas--he
went to Charterhouse when he was a boy--and besides, his Government has
taken it up, and I have to report myself to the Admiralty; so they
believe in it, evidently. Why, old man," continued Helston, "if this is
all true I shall get promotion out of it, and that means--you know as
well as I do--that means Milly." And he danced about the room as if he
never had had fever in his rheumatic legs.
"Stop that tomfoolery, and go off to London and find out whether it's
all a mare's nest or not," said the Doctor. "Jenkins, go and get the
Commander's things ready at once."
"For China, sir?"
"No. For London, you fool!"
"Very good, sir," and off went Jenkins.
"Well, good-bye, Helston, I'm off round the practice. Don't make an ass
of yourself, and let me know the result."
By the time the Doctor returned Helston had disappeared, and it was late
that evening when a telegram brought news of him. The Doctor hurriedly
opened it: "Job genuine--accepted command. Send all clothes--cannot
return--too busy."
Three days later he received a long letter. In it Helston wrote that he
had been backwards and forwards from the Admiralty, the Foreign Office,
and the Chinese Embassy the whole of the last few days settling
preliminary details. "The Bank of England has one and a half million to
my credit, on the advice of the Ambassador and Ping Sang, so the money
is safe enough, and I am trying to get hold of any ship which will be
ready in the next three months. Our Admiralty did not at first wish me
to take command, and wanted to give me some captains, just as advisers,
but I knew what that meant. They would get all the kudos; I should get
none. So I told them that if I did not take command, absolutely and
entirely, I would throw it up, and, of course, that meant that the
Germans would get a look in. That stuck in their gizzards, so they
piped down, and I am to be my own boss and have any officers I want, and
a large proportion of men, from the navy. They have given me an office
and a couple of clerks, and already I'm terribly busy.
"From what I can gather, their idea seems to be that a couple of
cruisers of the _Apollo_ type and two or three destroyers will be
sufficient for my purpose and well within my means; that if I find
myself unable to destroy the pirates, whose existence they still doubt,
I shall at least be able to blockade the island till the present tension
of political affairs is somewhat relaxed, when they hope to be able to
detach some ships from our fleet to help me, more especially if I prove
conclusively the existence of these pirates. You may bet your boots,"
Helston concluded, "if I can get away from England and past Hong-Kong
without interference, I sha'n't wait for other help. My luck is at the
top now, and if only it will remain there for eighteen months or so, I
shall be a made man. Will it? that is the question."
"Silly fool!" thought the Doctor; "he's always brooding on his ill-luck.
If people would only look more on the bright side of things, we should
hear less about this fatal ill-luck which they always fancy follows
them."
When he returned from the round of his very limited practice and opened
the London paper waiting for him, he swore angrily when he saw that two
columns were devoted to the proposed expedition. "Silly fool! giving
himself away to these interviewers. It may make him notorious, but the
Admiralty won't like it; and if there _are_ pirates, they will learn his
schemes and plans almost as soon as he knows them himself."
*CHAPTER III*
*The Fitting Out of a Squadron*
Helston Tricks the Doctor--Valuable Information--The Doctor
makes a Bargain--The Squadron Assembles
A month had passed by, during which time the Doctor saw by the papers
that Helston had acquired a cruiser at Elswick, built on "spec", an
armoured cruiser being built by Laird's, for a South American republic
which had waived its claim to her, and three destroyers which were being
completed at Yarrow's, Thorneycroft's, and Laird's works respectively.
At the end of the month he ran up to London, in response to a telegram,
and met Helston at Waterloo.
"I should hardly have known you," he said, grasping his hand; "you look
twice the man you did six weeks ago. What fool's errand have you brought
me here for?"
"Going to show you round my little fleet, old chap. How's Milly and her
old father?"
"She's all right. Asked after her Don Quixote the last time I saw her;
but confound you, I'm hungry, I don't want to see your ships. I've seen
enough in my lifetime; you ought to have known that."
"Come along then, old chap, we'll have some grub and put you in a better
temper," answered Helston, smiling, and took him to his hotel.
They visited Yarrow's yard that afternoon, and next day went up the
river to Chiswick, where Thorneycroft's destroyer lay almost ready for
launching, with her engines and boilers on board. "Funny state of
affairs, Doc, old boy," began Helston, as he patted her smooth sides,
"for me to be buying ships. Fancy imagining six weeks ago that I should
ever be signing cheques to the value of three-quarters of a million and
thinking nothing of it!"
"How much did this one cost you?" asked the Doctor grimly.
"Just over L40,000--a mere fleabite," laughed Helston; "and she's to do
her trials next week--a guaranteed thirty knots. That would shake up
your wretched liver, Doc, rushing along at more than thirty-five miles
an hour! It's a funny thing, but they have had several bids for her
during the last few days, so I wrote out a cheque on the spot and got
her. The others were a little doubtful about cash."
"Some of these smaller republics always are," laughed the manager, who
was standing near them.
"It was Patagonia, too, of all others," continued Helston. "She tried to
get all my ships, and, strangely enough, has never been in the market
before, and doesn't possess such a thing as a ship."
"I expect she wants to become as civilized as some of her neighbours,
and get up a rebellion against the army," added the manager.
After dinner that night Helston showed the Doctor a list of officers he
had chosen, among whom there were several they had known in the old
days. The Admiralty had put them all on half-pay and lent them to the
Chinese Government for eighteen months directly Helston had made out
their temporary commissions for the squadron he was fitting out. The
Chinese ambassador had been empowered to sign their commissions, and the
ships were to fly the Yellow Dragon.
"I see you have no doctors yet," said the Doctor. "I suppose no one has
been such a fool as to volunteer."
Helston opened a drawer in his desk.
"There you are, nearly five hundred of them, men in the navy, army, and
from every corner of the world."
"I didn't know there were so many fools on earth," growled the Doctor.
"To whom are you going to give the opportunity of being drowned or blown
up?"
"Oh, I'm not going to select them. I leave that job to my principal
medical officer."
"What idiot have you managed to get hold of to do that?"
"You, old chap," replied Helston, slapping him on the shoulder; "you
were the very first to volunteer."
"I!" said the Doctor angrily. "Why, I'd as soon think of volunteering
for a trip to the moon!"
"Can't help that, Doc; you told me that night at Fareham, when you were
in such a bad temper, that you would come with me if I got a ship, and
here's your commission made out--'all belong ploper, savez'. Come on,
old fellow, don't leave me in the lurch; come and have another look at
China. We will look in at our old places in Japan and fancy ourselves
young again. I'll make you as comfortable as you possibly can be on
board a ship."
"Well, you have played a trick on me," answered the Doctor, after he had
stamped and fumed about the room, "and if you were not steeped in fever
and ague, I would see you at Jericho first; but I'll see you safely
through this foolery--more for Milly's sake, though, than for yours, you
sly brute."
"I knew you'd come, Doc; you aren't doing yourself any good moping down
at Fareham, and the practice can manage itself pretty well, can't it?
You'll get fleet-surgeon's pay, and Jenkins will be able to look after
us both."
So this being settled, the two men discussed plans far into the night.
On the way to Newcastle next morning, and as the train was leaving
King's Cross, a man jumped hurriedly into their carriage, his bags were
thrown after him, and the door slammed violently.
"I'm sort of intruding," he said, by way of introduction and apology.
He was a young and very handsome man, typically American from the long
hair brushed off his forehead to his long pointed boots, his Western
accent very strong and nasal.
"Guess you two ain't lived all your lives on land. I've been six years
in the United States navy, and can spot a navy man like a pointer."
"Yes, we are both in the navy," answered Helston, smiling.
"There you are; you Britishers always call _your_ navy _the_ navy. Why,
our American ships--ship for ship--would give 'em all points and knock
spots out of them. We ain't got so many just now, but we're just
scurrying around, and we've got the iron and the brains, and Congress
will find the dollars. I'm quit of the navy. The guv'nor curled up and
left me a pile, so I just sent in my commission and been enjoying myself
ever since--that's four years ago next fall. Going out to China in a
few weeks--shake up the oil business. The old man was in oil--see!
Ever been in China--Asiatic station we call it--and met the old
_Monocacy_?"
"Twice," said Helston, much amused.
"Well, I was a cadet for two years in that old packet--Reginald S.
Hopkins, my tally--and I guess we have mutual acquaintances out there."
"My name is Helston."
"Helston!" ejaculated the American. "Why, I know your face--couldn't
guess where I'd seen it before seen your picture in every illustrated
journal I've taken up for the last ten days--shake, sir, shake," and he
grasped Helston's hand warmly. "Very pleased to make your acquaintance.
I reckon you're just about the most talked-of man walking the face of
this earth just now."
The conversation naturally turned on the approaching expedition, in
which Hopkins was keenly interested. "I guess I can give you some
middling-sized information about those ships the Chinese ran ashore. I
was out with the Japs at Wei-hai-wei, just looking round--kind of
correspondent for a Boston journal--and went on board some of them. I
reckon the silly idiot who bought that lot of scrap iron wished he had
left 'em there. There ain't a dockyard in the States that could make
'em keep pace with a funeral. Why, I went aboard one of the
torpedo-boats--high and dry she was--I'm mighty inquisitive, I tell
you--her boiler had burst and blown up her deck, when she went aground,
I reckon. I've never seen such a mess as the engines were--two horrid
staring corpses been there a week, too--ugh!"
"Very lucky that I met you," Helston said eagerly. "I've telegraphed to
a dozen men who were up there, and none know anything beyond doubtful
rumours."
"I guess most of the Europeans were just searching around about that
particular time, and looting or getting quit of the place, if they'd
been aiding the Pigtails," drawled the stranger.
"You didn't hear anything about the cruisers which went ashore, I
suppose?" asked Helston.
"Didn't I! Didn't I! I knocked up against a little Scotchman--chief
engineer aboard the _Mao Yuen_ when her old skipper shoved her nose on
shore and cut. He was just about in a hair-raising funk, for the
mandarins wanted his head, and the Japs his body. I packed him off in a
steamer, and he was mighty glad to take his head with him, you bet!"
"Did he tell you anything of the condition of his ship?" asked Helston,
"for she is one of those which have disappeared."
"Didn't he!" roared the American, smacking his thigh. "Why, all the time
he was under my wing he kept shouting out, 'Oh God! Oh God!--two
hundred dead bodies on board, burning fore and aft--they'll kill me if I
go on deck--the boilers won't stand the pressure, and my home's in
Glasgy'. He was just on being properly crazed, and during the night
woke me by shrieking, 'We're on the rocks, we're on the rocks--the
steam-pipe's burst, and I can't get on deck--the steam, the steam', and
I found him trying to climb up the wall."
"She must have damaged herself very badly if the shock smashed her main
steam-pipe," said Helston; "and they tell me at the Embassy that the
_Yao Yuen_, her sister ship, which was also reported refloated, was
completely gutted. It seems to me that any amount of patching up won't
make these two much of fighting ships."
"You've just hit it, Captain. Give me the old _Monocacy_--you remember
the old tub--and I reckon I'd wash out the whole crowd."
He left the carriage at their first stopping-place.
"Lucky we met him, Doc," said Helston; "his information may be very
valuable, and he seems a fine type of an American naval officer."
"They are all tarred with the same brush," growled the Doctor--"think
their own country the only one in the world, and they themselves its
brightest ornament. A conceited, bragging liar I should call him."
"Liver bad this morning," thought Helston.
They went down to Elswick that afternoon and inspected the cruiser which
Armstrong's had almost completed. She was, in fact, preparing for her
engine and gun trials. She had been built as a speculation, and Helston
had eagerly snapped her up for a trifle of L290,000. "We should have
made another L20,000 if you hadn't settled at once," said the manager
ruefully, "for the Patagonian agent offered us L310,000 next morning."
They next travelled to Birkenhead and saw Laird's destroyer, which was
nearly ready for sea, and the armoured cruiser which was to be Helston's
flagship, and had been promised in two months.
They were inspecting the cabins aft.
"If I'm coming with you, you'll have to knock those two into one," said
the Doctor. "I'm not going to be cramped up in the ordinary cabin at my
time of life."
"All right, old chap," replied Helston, giving the necessary directions,
"what will happen if you don't get your own way?"
"Invalid myself home," answered the Doctor, with a twinkle in his eye.
"Did the Patagonians want this one?"
"Did their best," smiled Helston, "but ready money did the trick."
"It seems to me that someone is very anxious you should not buy your
ships, Helston. Somewhat fishy, isn't it?" suggested the Doctor, on
their way back to London.
Two days later the papers published lists of temporary commissions
granted by the Chinese Government to officers in the Royal Navy lent to
a squadron now fitting out in England.
To Helston the Admiralty had granted leave to assume the rank of captain
whilst he was in command of his squadron.
The rest of the officers, commanders, lieutenants, doctors, engineers,
paymasters, marines, and warrant officers were all detailed for various
duties--fitting out the ships, buying and supervising stores and
provisions, and recruiting the crews.
The Admiralty lent the entire crews for the three destroyers and
skeleton crews for the two cruisers, consisting of petty officers,
seamen gunners, engine-room artificers, armourers, and also a small
detachment of marines, whilst, acting on the advice of the Foreign
Office and the Chinese Embassy, both of which threw out hints of the
possibility of treachery, the remainder of the crews were taken
exclusively from Naval Reserve men of known good character.
During the following three weeks several suspicious incidents occurred
which suggested that influences were at work to retard or damage the
expedition.
Thorneycroft's destroyer broke down on two occasions. On the second
trial the finding of a loose nut in the high-pressure cylinder whilst
the engines were being preliminarily turned, averted a terrible
catastrophe. It was highly probable that it had been placed there
intentionally.
Laird's cruiser developed several small break-downs, attributed to
improperly fastened locking nuts, whilst the main bearings of one of her
screw shafts became almost red-hot, and it was found that sand had been
mixed with the water that was pumped over it during the full speed
trial. This alone delayed the departure of the expedition for a month,
as the huge casting had to be removed. Laird's destroyer was also run
down one night by a tug-boat whilst lying anchored off Birkenhead, and
as it was a perfectly clear night, and she was not in the usual course
of tugs, this was very suspicious. Fortunately the damage was not
serious.
Most serious of all was the discovery of a man, dressed as a dockyard
labourer, tampering with the magazine locks of Armstrong's cruiser, with
many yards of fuse and a dynamite cartridge in his pocket, which
naturally he could not account for.
However, three months after the receipt of Ping Sang's letter,
Armstrong's cruiser, named by Helston the _Strong Arm_, the three
destroyers "No. 1", "No. 2", and "No. 3", and a stout little merchant
steamer, the _Sylvia_, to be used as store-ship, were lying at Spithead,
gaily flying the Yellow Dragon at their ensign staffs, and only awaiting
the completion of the repairs to Laird's ship, which Helston named the
_Laird_.
Helston, the Doctor, and two or three officers were still remaining in
London completing the work of fitting out the squadron.
*CHAPTER IV*
*The Pirates are not Idle*
A Disaster--"The Mysterious Three"--Suspicions Confirmed--Three
Chinamen--Helston Desperate
One night after dinner, whilst they were playing billiards, the folding
doors were flung open and Hopkins, whom Helston had not seen since he
had first met him on his way to Newcastle, rushed in, nearly upsetting
the waiter.
"Excuse me, Captain," he said, as he warmly gripped Helston's hand.
"I'm always just busting with energy; only landed on the Island three
hours gone; tracked you here, and now mighty glad to meet you again.
Been bustling round Europe for the last two months; done the capitals
and the crowned heads and other sights; and now come here to pack my
traps and off again. Say, Captain, how's your picnic progressing; just
booming, I reckon?"
"Oh, fairly well," answered Helston, pleased to see him and introducing
him to the others. "There have been several strange mishaps lately,
which look suspiciously as if somebody was already working against us,
but I think we shall be off in a week or two."
"Well, I call that just prompt; couldn't do it slicker in the United
States. Maybe those accidents are simple coincidences."
"They may be, but they are very worrying, all the same," replied
Helston, opening a telegram a waiter had brought him. He scanned it
carelessly, but his jaw dropped. It was from the captain of the _Strong
Arm_: "Regret to report Government powder barge fouled ram 8.15
to-night; drifted astern and sank, blowing up as she went down. Ship
making water and down by the head. Must dock for examination.
Explosion caused minor damages after-part of ship and stove in starboard
plates of 'No. 1' destroyer. Regret report three men 'No. 1' killed.
Crew of barge took to dinghy and pulled ashore."
Helston read it aloud, to the consternation of the others. "That means
our departure delayed indefinitely," he said bitterly. "I must be off
to Portsmouth at once." He went up to his room to pack a bag.
Presently there was a knock at the door and Hopkins came in.
"Excuse me bothering you just now, Captain, but I've gotten an idea that
this explosion ain't all fair and square, and I just want to fix up a
contract with you."
"Well, what is it?" asked Helston, amused at his earnestness.
"Well, I reckoned this affair was going to be a simple slap-up picnic,
and if there's devilry about now there will be a jolly sight more before
you've squared yards, and I'm just keen to be in it. I'm a bit of a
sailor and picked up a bit of the lingo, so I should be worth my
nose-bag. Will you take me on, sir, if you find this explosion was due
to treachery?"
"I'll see about it when I come back," replied Helston.
"Thank you, sir. Good-night;" and Hopkins disappeared.
"I don't care for that man," said the Doctor, as he saw Helston off to
Portsmouth (they were talking of Hopkins). "He talks too much, and I
hate foreigners. I hope you won't take him."
However, Hopkins himself was apparently confident that he would be
taken, for next morning at breakfast he joined their table, quite
unasked, and kept forcing his conversation on the Doctor. Now there was
one thing the Doctor would never do, and that was, talk at breakfast;
not even till he had had his after-breakfast pipe was it safe to address
him, and he happened to be especially "livery" that morning. He was
boiling over with wrath when the meal was over.
"Bad temper, I suppose it is," growled the Doctor, as, later, he jumped
into a hansom and drove to the U.S. Legation; "a villainous liver that
makes me dislike that fellow. At any rate, if he comes with us we had
better know all about him."
At the Embassy he managed to get hold of several old navy lists, and
found the name Reginald S. Hopkins given as a cadet on board the
_Monocacy_ in 1885, but no mention of it in later years.
He enquired whether the Naval Attache was in the building, and, as luck
would have it, he was, and could give the Doctor more information.
"A naval officer yourself, Doctor?" said the Attache, looking at his
card.
"Yes; belong to the 'pirate-catchers', as we are called, and this man
Hopkins is very anxious to join us."
"Well, I see by my books that he retired, by permission, from the
_Monocacy_ in 1885."
"I found that out down below; but you know nothing more about him, I
suppose?"
"Well, not officially, you know; but three or four years ago I was Flag
Lieutenant of our Asiatic squadron, and we heard that he had been mixed
up with the China-Japanese war, was in a Chinese ship at the battle of
Yalu, and was afterwards said to have made a pile of money by buying the
wrecked ships and selling them as old iron. He'd probably be a useful
man for you to get hold of, I should think."
"I think he would," said the Doctor gravely. "I suppose you never met
him?"
"No, never; but there were rumours that he led a wild kind of
adventurous life among the Chinese with two partners, an Englishman and
a German, prospecting for mines or running expeditions against
rebellious provincial rebels. They used to be called the 'Mysterious
Three' at the Tientsin Club, if I remember rightly, and were said to be
hand in glove with many of the highest officials."
"It was a bad temper and a worse liver before," muttered the Doctor, as
he drove away and directed the cab to a well-known detective agent, "but
after hearing this--whether it's curiosity or suspicion, I'm going to
find out more about that young man."
Next morning he received a letter from Helston at Portsmouth, which
confirmed his fears that another and successful attempt had been made to
damage the expedition. What was left of the powder barge had been
examined by divers, who had reported that it certainly was not like the
usual Government barges. The crew of three had disappeared, though they
must have landed safely, as their dinghy had been hauled up the beach at
Southsea, and this fact enhanced suspicions. Both "No. 1" and the
_Strong Arm_ had been docked by Admiralty permission at Portsmouth, and
the repairs, which were being pushed forward night and day, would take
at least six weeks in the case of "No. 1", though the cruiser was found
to have suffered but minor damage.
"The bill will be tremendous," wrote Helston, rather despairingly, "not
so much for the actual repairs, but it means keeping and feeding all the
crews for six weeks more than I had calculated. At any rate they are, I
am glad to say, all the keener after this affair to get to close
quarters with the scoundrels, who have hit them below the belt. After
the funeral of the three men of the destroyer who were killed, I went
aboard each ship, fell the men in aft, and told them that any man who
wished to back out of the job could give in his name to the
master-at-arms. They broke out into cheers, and not a man has done so."
"Foul play after all, Hopkins," said the Doctor later, when he met the
American.
"Well, I can't say I'm sorry about it," he answered frankly, "if it
gives me a chance of a look in at the game."
Every day the detectives employed by the Doctor reported to him
Hopkins's movements, but nothing suspicious whatever occurred for some
days. He spent his time visiting business houses especially connected
with the China trade, and in the evenings was either at the hotel or a
theatre. Then, however, he was reported to have visited, the previous
evening, after dark, a large "doss-house" near the Millwall docks, a
place kept by a Chinaman for the use of the Chinese firemen and the deck
hands employed in the ships trading to the East. He had stayed there
nearly two hours, shoved several papers into his pocket as he came out,
and was accompanied to the door by two Chinese, who appeared to treat
him with the greatest respect.
It happened that he had hurried away from dinner that night on the
pretence of going to a theatre.
"He's a liar, at any rate," thought the Doctor, but his suspicions
turned into a different and more startling channel before the morning
was over.
There were two little American boys staying in the hotel who had struck
up a great friendship with Hopkins. Going down the main staircase he
came upon these two--fighting as usual. "Clear out of this, you young
rascals!" growled the Doctor, and the two boys ran away. Two steps
lower down the Doctor noticed a brightly coloured stamp on the carpet,
stooped down, and found it was one of a new issue of the Patagonian
Republic. "Please, sir," said one of the boys coming back, "that's
ours. Mr. Hopkins, the big man who sits at your table, gave it us this
morning--tore it off a big envelope."
"I've never seen one before," said the Doctor, thinking of the strange
coincidence.
"Mr. Hopkins has a big crackly paper with an enormous green sealing-wax
seal just like it," chimed in the boy. "You ought to see it--it's
lovely!"
"Phew! that's odd," he muttered. "What's Hopkins doing with Patagonian
letters? And a 'big crackly paper with an enormous green seal' means an
official document, so I should think. I hardly heard of the name till
Helston told me they were trying to buy his ships. Phew! I wonder if
he had anything to do with that? I'll find out."
But the Patagonian agency knew nothing of Hopkins. An Austrian by the
name of Von Grootze had been engaged in the negotiations for ships, so
the Doctor returned puzzled.
A few days later the detectives reported that Hopkins had again visited
the "doss-house" in Millwall, and that next day a very large number of
Chinese had shipped for Antwerp.
"Well, he seems to have something to do with these Chinese, receives
communications from Patagonia, is a known adventurer, and, perhaps most
convincing of all, I don't like him," thought the Doctor. "Helston is
coming back to-morrow, and I'll have a long yarn with him about this
business."
So next day he told Helston all the details that were arousing his
suspicions, adding, "I don't suppose there is much in it, but I am a
beastly suspicious fellow and don't like him."
"Well," answered Helston very gravely, "do you know what was found in
that powder barge? A dead Chinaman!--unrecognizable except for his
pigtail. We've managed to keep the fact very quiet, but this somehow
seems to connect things, doesn't it?"
The best thing to be done, they both agreed, was to keep their eye on
Hopkins, and to do that more easily Helston decided to make out his
commission as secretary to himself. Later, when he gave it to Hopkins,
no one could deny that his expressions of extreme pleasure were genuine.
Two nights later, however, the Doctor, coming back to the hotel at
midnight, went up to Helston's room with a very grave face.
"Pretty late to turn a fellow out," said Helston, switching on the
light. "Hullo, man, you look pretty scared! What's in the wind now?"
"I've just come from that doss-house of which I told you. I pretended
to the boss that I wanted a Chinese cook to take out with me. He was an
ugly old Cantonese, and took me into his little room--pugh! how the
place did reek of garlic and stale clothes--and went off to try and find
one. Whilst I was waiting I heard a shrill argument going on in the
next room--there was only a wooden partition between--and presently I
heard a voice, which I would swear anywhere was Hopkins's, ordering
silence."
"He told us he was off to the theatre," interposed Helston, now
thoroughly awake.
"You can imagine I was on the qui vive then, and did my best to hear
what was going on. Two Chinamen were evidently trying to extort money
from him, but they were talking so shrilly and so fast--you know how
they talk when they are excited--that I could not make out much of it
till another voice chimed in, and I distinctly heard: 'He smokee too
muchee opium, massa. Me go shakee him--no can move--vely big man--no
can wait--go topside plenty quick--jump in boat--all plenty chop,
chop--then makee blow up. Ah Tung belong dead man--you pay blother
fifty dollars can do--all belong ploper.' You know their
pidgin-English?"
"Can you swear it was Hopkins's voice?" asked Helston. "That must have
been the brother of the man killed in the powder barge."
"I would swear to that beastly nasal twang anywhere."
It was early next morning when the two separated, and then they had
decided not to let Hopkins suspect that they knew his treachery, and
still to allow him to reckon on joining the expedition.
"In fact," said Helston, "to have him on board will be our best
safeguard, and we must see that he does not give us the slip."
The detective reported that Hopkins had been to the "doss-house" the
night before, adding, with a smile, "which you probably know already,
sir, for you were there too".
As the Doctor and Helston were leaving the hotel--Helston going to his
office and the Doctor for a walk--Hopkins joined them. "Any work for
your secretary, Captain?" he asked good-humouredly. "I guess I'm just
aching for a bit of quill-driving. I'm just about the cut of a
secretary, am I not?" and he opened out his broad shoulders and smacked
his chest vigorously.
"Not till we get afloat, thanks," said Helston.
"All right; I'll just come along with you to the corner, and then I'll
be off. Have to make a few dollars--you Britishers aren't half
smart--before I go sailoring again."
As they came to the end of the street they saw a small crowd curiously
gazing at three Chinamen looking in at an A.B.C. shop.
"I'll pull those three fellows' legs," said the American, and, as they
forced their way through the little crowd, he whistled the first line of
"Chin, Chin, Chinaman".
The crowd recognized the tune at once, and there were shouts of "Chin,
Chin, Chinaman!"
The Chinese turned round with fury in their eyes, whilst the crowd
jeered at them.
The Yankee, laughing loudly, wished his friends good-bye. "Guess a
Chinaman won't learn manners in London, anyhow."
"Well, he's not a gentleman, at any rate," said Helston, when he had
gone. "Funny those three being there; you don't often see them so far
from the docks."
"My blessed aunt!" said the Doctor excitedly, "it was a put-up job. I
see it clearly. Hopkins wanted them to be able to recognize us again.
Didn't you notice that they looked at us and no one else; and, now I
think of it, he put his arm through yours just at the time--that was to
point you out more particularly."
"Stuff and nonsense, Doc! You must not jump to conclusions like that.
It was all done too naturally; I can't believe it."
"You always were an idiot," growled the Doctor. "I'd bet you anything
I'm right."
However, every day after this, Helston met these Chinese--not always the
same, he felt sure--and they always gave him a cold, impassive stare
from under their slit-like lids as they passed him going to or coming
from the office. Did he go round a back, unfrequented way, they were
waiting for him outside his office when he left it. Did he walk on the
other side of the road, they crossed over to gaze at him. There was no
doubt left in Helston's or in the Doctor's mind that these men were in
Hopkins's pay, and were being made familiar with Helston's appearance,
in order to be able to kidnap or kill him when Hopkins gave the signal.
Naturally it was exceedingly difficult to remain on friendly terms with
this man, whose presence seemed to make their flesh creep, but outwardly
there was no change in their relationship, or, if there was, Hopkins did
not seem to notice it.
A month later and the incessant strain of being constantly watched
wherever he went, and the endless worries and delays attending the
expedition, began to have their effect on Helston, who was visibly
losing the vigour his new appointment had first given him.
"Let us get out of this, old chap," he almost gasped one day when,
coming back to the hotel, they had been met by three more villainous
Chinese standing almost inside the door.
"Pour me out something to drink, Doc, to take the taste of the ugly
brutes out of my mouth. If I don't get away soon my luck will desert me
again, and they will murder me somehow or other. I can't stand them
much longer."
Helston paced up and down in a very agitated manner, and it was very
evident that the strain of the last few weeks was wearing him to a
shadow.
"Look here, old chap," he said, coming to a halt, and turning abruptly
to Dr. Fox, "it's my idea that if Hopkins intends mischief he will wait
till the last few days before either disappearing himself or setting
those sneaking Chinese dogs on to me. If we can only get him aboard and
start several days before he expects the expedition to sail, his
treacherous schemes may fail.
"Now, my idea is this. The _Laird_ runs her after-repair trials
to-morrow, and I will telegraph to her Captain and order him to report
defects requiring twelve days to repair, and make arrangements as if our
departure would be delayed till then, and give the information to the
Press.
"The scheme is this, Doc," he continued excitedly. "'No. 1' destroyer
runs her trials on Saturday next after coming out of dock. My idea is
for us to go down to Portsmouth, take Hopkins with us--as if only for
the trial, you understand--and, when we are out at Spithead, signal to
the remainder of the squadron to prepare for sea, and to send a telegram
to the _Laird_ at Birkenhead ordering her to meet me at a certain
rendezvous."
"That fellow Hopkins is a greater fool than I take him for if he is
deceived by that," growled Dr. Fox.
"Perhaps you are right, but I will try; and I will wire to Cummins of
the _Laird_ at once."
"You had better use the cipher code," Dr. Fox suggested.
The twenty-four hours which followed the despatch of this telegram
seemed like the same number of days.
Helston could not sleep. Twice during the night he came to Dr. Fox's
room, with wild suggestions for warding off the blow he now felt certain
was impending, and haggard and irresolute he paced to and fro in the
smoking-room after breakfast next morning.
At one moment he would decide to rush off to Birkenhead himself; at
another, that he would pack up and go aboard the _Strong Arm_ at
Spithead and await results there. Finally, he did not stir from the
hotel till the evening, when the reply to his telegram arrived.
"Full-speed trial successful; sundry small defects; condenser-tubes
require fourteen days to repair."
It was Hopkins who brought in the telegram.
"Confound him!" cried Helston, with well simulated wrath. "We shall
never get to sea at this rate."
Orders were made out that the squadron would sail from Spithead in
fifteen days' time, and the date of sailing was communicated to the
Press.
It was only Helston and Dr. Fox who knew that it would actually sail a
week earlier.
"Thank God," exclaimed Helston, "there are only a few more days of these
hateful Chinese!"
*CHAPTER V*
*The Squadron leaves hurriedly*
A Break-down Averted--The "Sylvia" and the Destroyers
_The Narrative is continued by Lieutenant Hugo John
Pattison, R.N._
My name is Pattison, and I'm lieutenant in command of destroyer "No. 1",
belonging to Captain Helston's squadron; and trouble enough I had to get
her, and shouldn't have done so after all, but for a jolly little girl
living at Fareham, who knew the Skipper when he was on half-pay.
"No. 1", of course, you remember, was damaged by the explosion out at
Spithead, and had spent weeks in Portsmouth repairing. At last
everything was ship-shape again, and on 16th October we were lying
alongside the basin waiting for the Skipper, who was coming out on our
trials, with steam blowing off in clouds and Elridge, our Engineer,
getting very impatient. Presently down came Captain Helston, looking
pretty well fagged out, and with him surly old Dr. Fox, and his Yankee
secretary. Directly they got aboard, I cast off and threaded my way
down the harbour and out to Spithead. As we were passing the end of
Southsea pier the Captain borrowed my telescope, and saying, "There they
are again", handed it to me.
"Those three Chinese, sir?" I asked him.
"Yes; they followed me down from town, and have been shadowing me for
the last four weeks. You can imagine I am thankful to get afloat once
more."
On our way to the measured mile we had to pass close to the rest of the
squadron anchored at Spithead, and we stopped engines alongside the
_Strong Arm_, whilst a boat came across for orders.
When we started again the Skipper seemed much relieved, and I quickly
knew why, for he came for'ard to the bridge and told me to make for a
rendezvous 250 miles s.w. of the Needles, and that there we should be
joined by the rest of the fleet. "Thank God, Pattison, I'm at sea once
more!"
"Not going back, sir?" I asked, naturally very surprised.
"No, Pattison, no. I'm sorry to inconvenience everybody, but it was
absolutely necessary. Haven't you wished your people good-bye yet?"
"No," I answered, getting rather red in the face, for I was thinking
that I had never even thanked the little girl who had got me my
appointment.
"Nor have I, nor have I," half sighed the Skipper to himself.
The Doctor was apparently in the secret, but Hopkins, the Yankee, seemed
terribly cut up, as he had made arrangements for a week's leave on very
urgent private affairs, and in fact was only waiting for "No. 1" to get
back to Portsmouth to start. How strange it is that Americans never
seem to have any idea of discipline? He took it almost as a personal
insult that he had not been informed previously, and for a second I
thought he would fly at the Captain, he looked so angry. However, he
calmed down quickly enough.
The orders that the Captain had sent aboard the _Strong Arm_ were to
direct Captain Hunter to proceed to the given rendezvous at easy speed,
weighing as soon as possible after sending a boat ashore to telegraph to
the Captain of the _Laird_.
They were exceedingly prompt in obeying this last order, for before five
minutes elapsed, we saw their picket-boat tearing along in the direction
of Portsmouth.
Hopkins is a careless fellow, and nearly brought us to grief. He had
been down below poking about in the engine-room, and, just before we
began to settle down to our trial, Elridge came up to the bridge to
report to the Captain. As he was going away again he jokingly said to
Hopkins: "It's lucky I went round after you. You know those lubricator
feeds you couldn't understand? I found that you'd left every oil-cock
turned off, and our starboard crank bearings would have been red-hot in
a few minutes. You are a careless beggar."
"I'm so mighty inquisitive," apologized Hopkins, and asked Elridge to
let him come down below again.
"Certainly not; I want you up here," said Captain Helston, in so angry a
manner that everyone was quite astonished.
The news that we were not going back soon spread amongst my men, and
Captain Helston ordered me to fall them in, just abaft the bridge, and
made them a little speech--just the right thing--no big words and
high-sounding phrases. He told them he was very sorry they wouldn't
have the opportunity of wishing their friends good-bye, said he relied
on them to do their duty, and held out the probability of prize-money.
He has a fine, tall, commanding figure, and his speech went down with
the men very well.
Nothing important happened. We never pressed the engines to full speed,
and after a short time dropped to fifteen knots, which we kept up all
through the afternoon, steering out of the usual course of ships running
up or down channel till we reached the rendezvous and stopped engines.
Next morning "No. 2" and "No. 3" joined us. Late that afternoon the
_Strong Arm_ and the _Sylvia_, armed store-ship, joined company, and,
ten hours later, we were all exceedingly pleased to sight the _Laird_.
Captain Helston, his secretary, and Dr. Fox went aboard her as soon as
possible, and the squadron, now united for the first time, steamed for
Gibraltar.
I rather fancy we were all somewhat disappointed at sneaking away in the
dark, as it were, and had rather expected, and looked forward to, a
hearty send-off. There wasn't much time for regrets, however, for we
had all our time taken up keeping station with the next ships ahead and
astern, and plenty to think about.
Our little squadron made a brave show. First came the _Laird_. She was
a cruiser of 6500 tons, with a narrow 4-inch belt all round her
water-line. On her fo'c'stle she carried an 8-inch Q.F., another on the
poop, and on each broadside were six 6-inch Q.F.--three on each side of
the main deck in casemates, and three above on the upper deck behind
shields.
Besides these she had eight 12-pounders and six 3-pounders, three in her
fore-top and three in the maintop of her military masts. Four Maxims
were mounted on the two bridges, and she also carried two 12-pounder
field-guns. She had Belleville boilers, and had done 22-1/2 knots on
her trial. She did not carry much coal, however, everything being
sacrificed to armour, guns, and speed, so that her total coal stowage
was only 900 tons.
After her came the _Strong Arm_: 3600 tons, eight 6-inch Q.F., ten
6-pounder Q.F., three 1-pounders; speed, 20 knots.
She had a search-light platform, with a fighting-top under it, on each
mast, and these gave her a somewhat clumsy appearance; but she was a
fine heavily armed little cruiser, and excellent in a sea-way.
The third in the line was the _Sylvia_, a trim, looking, strongly built
merchant steamer, with a raking funnel and two pole masts.
She had four 12-pounders mounted on her sides and in addition carried
two more field-guns and a couple of Maxim guns on field-carriages, which
two guns were destined to play a very important part.
Besides 2000 tons of coal, she carried great supplies of provisions,
ammunition, and stores of all kinds. On board also were the torpedoes
and torpedo-tubes of the destroyers, for these had been taken out to
lighten them during the long voyage to Hong-Kong. "No. 1", "No. 2", and
"No. 3", in this order, brought up the rear of the line. Each of us
carried one 12-pounder on our bridges, and five 6-pounders in addition.
As it happened, though otherwise almost indistinguishable, my boat, "No.
1", had four funnels; "No. 2", two large ones, far apart; whilst "No. 3"
had three. The identity of each could therefore be seen at a glance.
"No. 2" had actually made the highest speed on her trial, 29.6 knots,
"No. 3" had just touched 29.5, and my boat 28.9; but probably in a long
race there would not be much to choose between them. We could
practically keep up between 25 and 27 knots indefinitely, and be able
occasionally to get another two knots for a short burst.
As to the men who formed the crews, there were on board:
*Laird* ................... 463
*Strong Arm* .............. 312
*Sylvia* .................. 40
Three destroyers .......... 177
----
Total ................. 992
The _Laird_ carried 80 Marine Light Infantry and 100 naval petty
officers and men; all the rest of the crew were picked from the Naval
Reserve.
The _Strong Arm_ had 40 Royal Marine Artillery and 60 Royal Navy men.
All the crews of the destroyers were men of the Royal Navy, previously
trained in these delicate, fragile little craft.
Such was the composition of the little squadron, which, manned by nearly
a thousand men, all volunteers, slowly steamed away from the rendezvous
late on the afternoon of 18th October, and, painted a dull olive-green
from truck to water-line, shaped its course for Gibraltar, and soon
disappeared in the rapidly closing twilight.
*CHAPTER VI*
*The Voyage East*
A Gun-room "Sing-song"--The Dumpling gets Wet--Hopkins
Disappears--Off in Chase--Escape of One Patagonian--Off to
Colombo
_The Narrative of Mr. Harold Swinton Glover, Midshipman, R.N.,
serving on board the Imperial Chinese ship "Laird"_
You heard about all the rum things that happened to us before we left
England, and how we all went to sea suddenly, no one knew why. We
thought we were safe then; but not a bit of it, and just before we got
into Gibraltar they found a dynamite cartridge down in the stoke-hold,
mixed up with a lot of coal. It was jolly lucky they found it, for
Ogston--that's our Assistant Engineer--says there would have been an
"awful catastrophe" if it had got into a furnace. Don't think we were
in a funk, because we weren't--at any rate not all of us--but it is such
a beastly feeling to know that you may be blown up any minute.
The Skipper was terribly worried even before we got to Gibraltar, but
you should have seen his face when I took him down some telegrams they
brought off to the ship. I was midshipman of the watch. He gasped like
a dying fish, and sang out to the old Doctor, who was there: "They've
killed the Paymaster, and taken all his papers--mine and Hopkins's; did
it at Lyons, in the boat express."
They both looked so scared that I crept up on deck.
Afterwards I heard that the Paymaster had been left behind to bring some
valuable papers across Europe, and to join us at Port Said.
Well, we got into Malta, and more telegrams came aboard; but I wasn't on
watch, and didn't take them down. They must have been pretty serious,
though, for whilst we were all shifting into plain clothes in the
gun-room flat to go ashore, the Commander's messenger came running down
the ladder and sang out: "No leave for anybody!" So we had just to
shove our things back into our chests and get into our dirtiest uniform,
for the coal lighters were already alongside, and we were being
smothered with coal dust. Jolly sick of life we were, too, I can tell
you, for we had arranged to get ponies at Red Saliba's, down in the
moat, and were off for a picnic to St. Paul's Bay.
"Some of us would probably have been killed or broken up, so p'raps it's
all for the best," said Mellins (his real name was Christie, as I told
you before, a tremendously fat cadet, who always saw the cheerful side
of things), "and, now we've got the grub, we'll have a jolly good 'blow
out' afterwards."
Then we all had to nip on deck, where we found any amount of row going
on aft on the quarter-deck. The Skipper and Commander were there,
looking very serious, with two marines close to them, holding a Chinaman
covered with coal dust and in a terrible funk. You should have seen him
roll his eyes.
I asked the side-boy what the row was, and he told me that a stoker had
spotted him as a Chinaman, although his pigtail was coiled all round his
head and he had a big cap over it, had searched him, just for luck, and
found three dynamite cartridges in his pockets.
That was partly why our leave had been stopped, and one of us midshipmen
had to stand at each coaling-port, with a couple of petty officers and a
marine with fixed bayonet, examine every basket of coal, and prevent
anybody coming on board, whilst others had to go down in the lighters
themselves. "No blow out now," said Mellins sorrowfully, as he climbed
down past me into the lighter; "but won't it come in handy afterwards?"
We examined that coal pretty thoroughly, you bet! Directly it came
aboard it had to be upset on the deck, and we had to look through it
carefully. But didn't it take a time, that's all! and weren't we jolly
sick of it, especially when we couldn't get away for seven-bell tea?
Directly it got dark we knocked off, and then I had to go away in my
cutter and patrol the starboard side, with nothing to eat except a tin
of sardines, which Mellins passed out of the gun-room scuttle, and which
I shared with the coxswain. He got the best of it, for he drank the
oil.
We were relieved by another crew in an hour, and Mellins had saved me a
bit of grub, which I tucked into, whilst the others started a good old
gun-room sing-song.
Jeffreys, our Sub-lieutenant, who runs the show in the gun-room,
suggested it. "Just show the beggars we don't mind, and cheer the men
up. They've got dynamite on the brain."
When they heard our row some of the ward-room officers came down and
joined in, and Hopkins, the Skipper's secretary, a jolly Yankee, gave a
rattling good song. My eye! didn't we make a noise! and soon after the
men began a concert of their own, forward on the fo'c'stle. Presently
the Master-at-Arms came down to order "lights out", and Jeffreys asked
for another half-hour (Jeffreys is a good chap, though he does lay it
into us midshipmen if anything goes wrong), and the Clerk banged away at
the piano again.
Then who should come down but the Skipper; and we made way for him to
get a seat near the piano, and he joined in the chorus. When it was
over, he got up and said: "Thank you, gentlemen, your sing-song was a
good idea. Good-night!" And as he went away we gave him three cheers
and "For he's a jolly good fellow", and went to sleep on our chests and
in odd corners, for the ship and we were much too dirty to sling our
hammocks.
We were at it again soon after sunrise, looking at every lump that came
aboard, and some time after breakfast, whilst we were having a
stand-easy, three destroyers came slowly in, flying a funny flag, which
none of us had seen before, but which the signalman told me was the
Patagonian.
We could not help laughing, for the first one was towing both the
others, and one of these had a great list to port. It was a very
comical sight. Hopkins borrowed my glass. "I reckon that ain't much of
an advertise for the man who built those craft," he said in his funny
Yankee drawl; nor was it, for they had evidently broken down.
Well, we got all our coal in by noon, had an hour for dinner, and then
were hard at it cleaning down. It's really not bad fun, when you are
horribly coal-dusty and it's jolly hot, to paddle about in bare feet,
with your trousers tucked up above your knees, and the fire-hoses
splish-splashing on the deck and washing the coal dust away--you get
very wet, and it's jolly refreshing. I was bossing the quarter-deck,
and the old quarter-master and I were watching the newly arrived
destroyers, now busily coaling.
"What's them colours, sir?" said the wiry old man. "I never see'd 'em
afore, and I've been nigh twenty-four years at sea, man and boy."
"Patagonian," I answered, and he borrowed a telescope and looked at
them.
"Sure, there's some dirty Chinamen on board that craft, sir. Look at
their heads poking out of the engine-room 'atchway."
Sure enough, there were five or six unmistakable Chinese faces, and I
could see one coiling his pigtail round his head.
Of course we had Chinese on the brain rather badly, and Dunning (we
called him Suet Dumpling, because his name was Cyril--a sneaking,
under-handed, little midshipman, who couldn't pull himself up once on
the horizontal bar), who was standing by us, ran and told the lieutenant
on watch what we had seen, just as if he'd made the discovery himself,
and he was sent down to tell the Skipper.
Up came the Skipper, for he couldn't see the destroyers out of his
stern-ports, and stood looking at them, with that ass, Suet Dumpling,
grinning with importance just behind him. "Tell the Commander I want to
see him in my cabin," said the Skipper, and went down below again with a
very grim-looking face.
The Dumpling ran forward to find the Commander. Now the man who was
using the hose was washing down the battery-screen, close to the battery
door, and, just as the Dumpling was disappearing through it, I called
out to the man, and he turned round with the hose in his hand, just as I
wanted, Dumpling getting it all in his back--he had just shifted into a
clean white tunic, too. He was pretty wild, for he knew I had done it on
purpose, but didn't say anything, though I thought I had better not
sleep in my hammock that night, lest he should cut me down.
We slipped from our buoys at four o'clock and went to sea, passing quite
close to the Patagonians, but there were no Chinese to be seen, and men
were very busy on the two disabled ones, and the pumps on the one with
the list to port were going for alt they were worth.
Of course we were all excited, the men especially, for we'd become so
suspicious of Chinamen, that when everyone knew that there were some
aboard these destroyers, we felt sure there must be something wrong
about them.
"Why, Patagonia doesn't possess a single ship!" said Hammond, another of
our Assistant Engineers, a jolly little fellow, who is a walking
_Brassey's Naval Annual_, and knows every man-of-war in the world by
name, and what guns she has, and all that. "Rather odd these three
being there, and having Chinamen on board."
Then a rumour spread that the skipper had been heard to say to the
Doctor; "If they _are_, they won't give us much trouble, for two of them
seem badly broken down".
It was the detestable Dumpling who brought the news. "What did the
Doctor say then?" we asked.
"'Whatever they are, they've stopped me going ashore, hang them!
Everyone seems to have Chinese, pirates, dynamite, and Patagonia on the
brain,'" said Dumpling, imitating the Doctor's irritable way of talking.
We all laughed. "Just like the old Doc," said Mellins. "I had to go
for'ard to the sick bay this morning with stomach-ache, and he made me
take some beastly castor-oil on the spot. I hate the stuff," and he
grinned and said: "That's for kicking up that wretched row last night
down in the gun-room. Kept me awake till midnight."
"The selfish old brute," we all agreed; "he doesn't care what happens,
so long as he makes himself comfortable."
We were so excited about these destroyers, that I fancy most of us
imagined we should see them suddenly tearing after us.
Whatever the Skipper thought, he was at any rate not going to be caught
napping, and directly it was dark we altered course till we were twenty
miles north of the usual track, and not a single light was allowed to be
shown. I had to go round all the starboard cabins and see that the
dead-lights were down, and in the middle watch, which I kept aft on the
quarter-deck, I was responsible that they were kept closed. Funnily
enough, Mr. Hopkins wouldn't seem to understand that he mustn't show a
light, and twice I saw his scuttle lighted up during the night. I was
afraid the Skipper might come on deck and see it and drop on him, so
went down into his cabin. He seemed very bad-tempered, couldn't go to
sleep on account of the heat, and must have his scuttle open to get
fresh air, and his light burning to try to read himself to sleep. At
last I told him straight that I should report him to the lieutenant on
watch, and he then seemed to understand it really was necessary.
Nothing happened in the night, nothing indeed till we reached Port Said,
where, right in front of us, were the three Patagonians coaling again!
The Skipper got more telegrams here, and it soon leaked out that the
destroyers had all left Malta only two hours after us, all three
steaming very fast in our direction. The harbour-master told us they
had been in Port Said for two days, going out at dusk and not returning
till morning; so we then felt sure that the break-down at Malta was all
rot, and that they had simply been waiting for us off Port Said.
Luckily the Skipper had refused to go near Port Said in the dark, but
had waited about all night a long way to the north and east--the most
unlikely place for us to be.
As soon as we made fast to a buoy, I was sent away in the second cutter
and ordered to board the P. & O. _Isis_, which was lying off the Suez
Canal offices (she had come in early that morning from Brindisi with the
mails), and bring back a lieutenant who was to join us--a Mr. Staunton,
who had been left behind in London with the Paymaster, who was killed at
Lyons.
When I forced my way through the crowd of boats alongside, I slipped up
the ladder and asked for him. The quarter-master, however, said he had
gone in a man-of-war's boat several hours before, so I pulled back and
reported. Then I was sent over to H.M.S. _Hebe_, one of our own
gun-boats, doing guardship there, but they knew nothing of him--they had
sent a boat for mails to the _Isis_, but she certainly had brought back
no passengers. This was very strange, so I made my boat's crew lay back
to their oars, and reported to the Commander as soon as possible.
He took me down to the Skipper, who looked very vexed when he heard the
news. After that I and two other midshipmen had to go ashore and make
enquiries at the consuls and all the hotels--a terribly hot day, too, it
was, with an awful glare which fagged us all--but we could hear nothing
of him. When we got back to the ship the three Patagonians had gone,
and not only that, but Hopkins had disappeared, and, I can tell you,
there was tremendous excitement on board.
Everyone, of course, felt sure that Mr. Staunton was on board one of the
Patagonian destroyers and now miles down the canal, and many thought
that probably Mr. Hopkins too had been somehow decoyed away. You see he
was just the man they would want, for he was the Skipper's secretary and
would know everything. Whilst we three were trying to get something to
eat, the Commander's messenger sang out for me and Toddles (Toddles was
the next senior midshipman), so up we had to go again.
"Get a few warm things together, and be ready to leave the ship in five
minutes," he said. "You, Mr. Foote, are lent to 'No. 1', and you, Mr.
Glover, to 'No. 3'." As we left the cabin to hurry down below he called
out: "Don't forget flannel shirts and sea boots".
"All right, sir, thank you," we answered joyfully.
I borrowed one of Dumpling's bags, which I found lying about (I didn't
ask him), and we were ready before the boat came alongside, Mellins
giving us a basketful of grub as we shoved off. Toddles was put aboard
"No. 1", and then they put me aboard "No. 3", where I reported to Mr.
Parker, the lieutenant in command.
Luckily for me, Toddles in his hurry had forgotten his share of the
grub.
I was sent aft to look after the stern ropes and see that everything was
"clear" astern, for we were on the point of shoving off.
"What's up? Where are we off to?" I asked two men standing aft.
"Going after them pirates, sir, I expect. I heard Mr. Parker tell the
Sub-lootenant that we 'ad to follow them as 'ard as we could."
I hadn't any time to ask more, for Mr. Parker sang out from the bridge
"Let go aft!" and we hauled in the slip on the buoy astern. When the
rope was clear of her screws and rudder I shouted out "All clear astern,
sir", and away we went, following close behind "No. 2".
As we went past the other three ships the men crowded to the side and
cheered us, for they had got wind of what we were going to do. It does
make you feel ripping to hear and see people cheering you.
From the _Laird_ Mellins made a semaphore signal with his arms, "Is grub
safe?" so I waved back "Yes", and on we went into the canal. It soon
became dark, and our French pilot made us run our search-light, though
it wasn't much good, as the bridge got in the way. However, it lighted
up both sides of the steep sandy banks, and we followed "No. 2" somehow
or other. Of course we wanted to go as fast as we could, and the pilot
nearly had apoplexy, shrieking and gesticulating with fright or anger,
whenever "No. 2" forged too far ahead and we had to put on a few more
revolutions to close up. "The wash, it will damage the banks!" he
yelled. "They will make you pay. I give up my authority--I wipe my
hands." Then we would slow down again and he would be quiet.
We reached the Great Bitter Lake about eleven o'clock and there changed
pilots. The Patagonians were only two hours ahead, and we simply tore
through this part of the canal. I felt jolly nervous, I can tell you,
for everything looked all the darker on account of the searchlight, and
we were simply sticking on to the stern of "No. 2". If she or "No. 1"
had stopped suddenly we should have been all in a heap. I expect "No.
1" had an English pilot on board, or a Norwegian, perhaps. Our
Frenchman was paralysed with funk.
We quieted down when we got into the narrow canal again.
We had to tie up once to let a big British India mail steamer pass us,
and did not get out of the canal till ten next morning.
The Patagonians, we were told, had left three hours before; so after
them we bustled, only stopping to let our pilots be taken off.
"Steam for full speed" was signalled from "No. 1", and down below dived
Mr. Chapman, our engineer, to superintend things in the stokehold.
"They have three hours' start," said Mr. Parker to the Sub, "and it will
be a very long stern chase."
"What have we to do if we catch them?" he asked.
"Search them," replied Mr. Parker.
"But what if they won't let us?"
"Search them," replied Mr. Parker, with a queer twinkle in his eye, and
then I knew that there might be a fight. It gave me a funny feeling in
my stomach, but I knew I was jolly lucky to get the chance and so ought
to feel glad, and I really think I did.
We were all going it now with a vengeance. The smoke from "No. 1" and
"No. 2" nearly blinded us, and we were shaking and throbbing as the hum
of the engines gradually rose, our bows coming out of the water, and our
stern squatting down in a mass of foam as we rushed into the wake of the
others ahead of us.
I had never been so fast in my life, and was holding on to the bridge
rails to avoid being blown away.
We went on like this for hours, and I felt too excited to go down below
and get anything to eat. That shows what a ripping thing it is to be
rushing along in a destroyer with an enemy ahead.
Presently we formed line abreast, "No. 2" on the starboard and we on the
port side of "No. 1", about three miles away from each other, so as to
cover more ground.
As it was getting dark we saw "No. 1" slow down to speak a small
merchant steamer going north, and directly afterwards we were ordered
back to Suez to inform Captain Helston that all three Patagonians had
been sighted steaming south very fast.
Round went our helm, we heeled well over, our stern swung round, and we
were off on our way back before you could say "knife"; but you should
have heard what Mr. Parker and the Sub said, and the quarter-master too,
for that matter, only he didn't do it so loudly.
We made our number to the _Laird_ at Suez early next morning, having
kept up nearly twenty-seven knots for the last twenty hours--a jolly
good performance. We hadn't to wait long, for we ran alongside the
_Sylvia_, filled up with coal, took ten tons in bags on deck, and away
we went for Aden at twenty knots--quite an easy, comfortable speed.
I had to see the coal aboard, and made myself beastly dirty, and much
missed the gun-room bath on board the _Laird_.
We got into Aden on the third afternoon without meeting any adventures.
"No. 2" and "No. 1" were there, and so were two of the three
Patagonians.
Mr. Pattison and Mr. Lang, the Skippers of "No. 1" and "No. 2", came
aboard of us directly. They told us that they had reached Aden only
four hours after the Patagonians.
They immediately made arrangements to coal, and meanwhile had gone on
board the two Patagonians in frock coats and swords, and been received
in a very friendly manner, and shown all over both, and not a trace of
Staunton, Hopkins, or Chinese, for the matter of that, could they see.
"We felt rather sold, you can imagine," said Mr. Pattison, "at having
our long chase for nothing--a very tame ending."
The third destroyer, we were told by people on shore, had left an hour
before we came, and was sighted from the top of the rock making east,
till she disappeared below the horizon steaming at great speed.
"I could not follow her," continued Mr. Pattison, "for of course we had
no coal, and some of our condenser-tubes were leaking badly, and both of
us required a few days in harbour to put things right down in the
engine-room. And not only that, but I dare not let these two
Patagonians out of my sight, for Captain Helston thinks they will
probably lie in wait for him in the Straits to the westward."
"We can go on directly we've coaled," interposed Mr. Parker eagerly,
"for there is nothing the matter with us. Is there, Chapman?"
"No, rather not," answered our Engineer, adding, "we're Laird's built,
you know."
"Very good," said Mr. Pattison, who was the senior of the three
Lieutenants and therefore took command, "off you go to Colombo as soon
as you have coaled, watered, and provisioned. The third Patagonian has
most probably shipped Staunton, Hopkins, and all the Chinese to allay
our suspicions of these other two, and whatever course she steers, if
she is going out to the East, she must fetch up at Colombo. If she
won't allow you to search her there, follow her out to sea and compel
her to heave-to."
"Very good, sir," replied Mr. Parker, saluting.
"Well, good-bye, old chap; wish you good luck. Lang and I will be off,
for here come your coal-lighters. When you are ready to shove off I'll
make you a misleading signal, which you must act upon till out of sight
of land, for those fellows can probably read our semaphore, and will be
standing by to get any information possible."
*CHAPTER VII*
*The Pursuit of the Patagonian*
We Sight Her--A Stern Chase--We Overhaul Her--We Have to
Apologize--Spinning the Yarn
_Mr. Midshipman Glover's Narrative continued_
For the next two hours we were hard at work, and when we signalled that
we were ready for sea, and hoisted the "permission to weigh and proceed
in pursuance of previous orders", "No. 1" semaphored, "Inform _Laird_
that I cannot meet squadron, as condensers require repair".
"That's the misleading signal," Mr. Parker said, as he and the Sub spelt
it out; "I only hope those fellows read and swallow it, for if they do
they will imagine we are going up the Red Sea again."
To "create a diversion", as the Sub put it, we steered W. after clearing
the harbour till out of sight of land, as if we were going to meet the
squadron, then we steered S.E. for a couple of hours, and finally
altered our course for Colombo.
It was very hot, very tedious, and very monotonous work steaming across
the Indian Ocean. We had to go slow to economize our coal, and all
fresh food gave out two days after we left Aden, and I hate tinned stuff
altogether. I had to do my share of watch-keeping during the day, and
soon learnt to handle "No. 3" as easily as a ship's steam-boat. You can
imagine we grew excited as we began to approach Colombo. Whether we
caught her or not depended almost entirely on whether they had believed
the misleading signal at Aden, for if they thought we were on our way to
Colombo, they would have, of course, hurried her away by telegraph.
"If we don't catch her now we never shall, for there are any number of
places she can hide in and coal between Colombo and Singapore or
Saigon," said Mr. Parker.
"Well, shall we shove her on a little?" suggested Mr. Chapman. "At this
rate we shall get in to-morrow evening with eighteen tons of coal on
board. I could give you another knot and a half if you like."
There was a long discussion about it--I was too young, of course, and
did not have anything to say--but they finally decided it would be safer
to have some few tons in hand.
"You see," argued Mr. Parker, as all three leant up against the bridge
rails, "if they sight us before they know by telegram that we are on our
way, they may think that we have no coal left and may 'clear out',
imagining that we can't chase them. That would be certainly their most
reasonable plan, wouldn't it? That's what I should do if I were in
their shoes. We will just shove on every knot you can give us, Chapman,
directly we sight the lighthouse, and that won't give them much time to
get away."
I had the morning watch from four till eight, and had gone below to get
some breakfast--sardines, jam, and ship's biscuit--when suddenly I heard
the engine-room gong clang, and could feel the engines whizzing round.
The plates began dancing about the table, and my coffee was nearly all
spilt before I could drink it. I stuffed down the last two sardines in
one mouthful and rushed up on deck. All the men were crowding forward
under the bridge, gesticulating and pointing ahead. Climbing up to the
bridge, I could make out the lighthouse and the long breakwater of
Colombo.
"Is she coming out, sir?" I asked, for I could not see anything through
my telescope--we were shaking so, and the ship was so unsteady. "The
signalman says she is," said Mr. Parker, with his eye glued to his
telescope. "Yes, there she goes! Look at that dark patch on the
breakwater. That's smoke, and she's underneath it. My eye! she's
getting up speed pretty quickly."
In another half-minute we could see her with the naked eye. She was
showing up dark against the white breakwater, and was tearing through
the water, running almost at right angles to us till she cleared the
breakwater and the rocks. We were drawing rapidly together when she put
her helm over. We saw her heel over, swing round, right herself as she
settled down on her proper course, and away she flew, the Patagonian
flag stiffening out astern.
"Follow her, Davis," sang out Mr. Parker to the petty officer at the
wheel, as he tried to light his pipe behind the chart table. "Go to
quarters, Collins (the Sub), and pass up ammunition." The Gunner and
Mr. Collins flew down on deck to see everything prepared, leaving only
Mr. Parker and myself on the bridge.
He shouted down the engine-room voice tube, "How much coal have you
left, Chapman?"
"Nearly fourteen tons."
"How long will that last at full speed?"
"Rather more than an hour and a half," came the muffled reply.
"Then give me every ounce of steam you can raise."
At the time the Patagonian had altered course there was about one mile
and a half between us, but she was rapidly gaining, for we had not yet
reached our highest speed, and she was evidently doing all she knew.
She was almost hidden under a great cloud of smoke, and occasionally
entirely hidden by spray, for a slight choppy head sea, which we had not
noticed before when going slowly, was now covering us fore and aft with
spray.
Down I had to go to see the boats all ready for lowering, and when this
was done run several messages to the Sub, who by this time had men at
all the guns, and plenty of ammunition on deck. There wasn't much doubt
that Mr. Chapman and his men were doing their utmost, for now we could
feel the engines humming round like sewing machines, the ship began to
throb and vibrate with a funny wriggle which you could almost see when
you looked aft along the deck from the bridge. It was just as much as I
could do to hang on to the bridge rails with one hand and keep my cap on
with the other, whilst the spray wetted us from head to foot. The
12-pounder's gun crew had come up to the bridge and fondly cleared her
away and loaded her. Then I felt that funny sensation in my stomach
again, the sardines and the wobbling I expect it was, and hung on to the
bridge and gasped for breath between the showers of spray.
You should have seen our funnels! What paint was left on them came off
just like the skin of scarlet fever people when they peel, great roaring
flames licked out of them, and clouds of smoke went rushing aft, whilst
astern was a huge mass of churned-up foam, looking as if it would fall
on board.
We must have been chasing her for nearly half an hour, and did not
appear to be gaining. Mr. Parker kept on anxiously looking at his watch
as we rushed along--now leaving Colombo behind us and running away from
the dark belt of trees which marked the shore.
Presently Mr. Chapman came up on deck, sweating all over. "She's doing
as many revolutions as she did on her trials," he shouted; "her engines
won't take any more steam, I'm only blowing it off," and he pointed to
clouds of steam hissing away from each funnel.
"Make a signal, 'I wish to communicate and send a boat', and keep it
flying," roared Mr. Parker to the signalman, who was evidently prepared,
for he had already bent the proper flags and pendants to the halyards
and quickly hoisted them, the bunting stiffening in the wind like
painted steel. I forgot to say that the Chinese ensign, the Yellow
Dragon, was flying at our stern. How we did wish it was our own white
ensign.
We all watched for a reply, but none came. There was no doubt we were
now gaining--we could plainly make out a few men on her bridge looking
at us from time to time--and judging from the great masses of smoke
which were pouring from her funnels, the stokers must have been working
desperately hard to escape from us.
"We're well out of the three-mile limit, I think, Collins?" shouted Mr.
Parker.
"Yes, sir--ten miles away."
"Then try a shot at twelve hundred yards, Jones (the 'No. 1' of the
12-pounder). Go as close to her as you can without hitting her."
"Very good, sir." And Jones, a huge muscular man pressed his shoulder
against the mounting and bent over the sights. How we did throb and
pitch--the muzzle of the gun never seemed still, and it seemed ages
before Jones fired. There was a beastly sharp crack, the cordite smoke
drove back into our eyes, and we all strained to see the result. The
shell burst half a mile ahead of the Patagonian as it struck the water.
"No one can shoot from a platform like this," Collins said angrily;
"we're dancing about like a lot of marionettes."
Jones fired another shot, which burst astern, but not the slightest
effect had either--still no answer to our signal, and no attempt to
lessen speed.
Just then Mr. Chapman reported that he only had two more tons left, and
had swept every bunker. Mr. Parker groaned, "She'll get away, and I
can't even get back to Colombo. Carry on firing as fast as you can,
Collins, with your two for'ard 6-pounders."
Then we heard, below us, the joyful voice of the Gunner singing out,
"Target, right ahead, at one thousand--independent firing--commence."
Wasn't there a banging. But I was too excited to mind the noise, and we
all cheered as every now and again one of our little shells burst close
to the Patagonian. We were closing rapidly, and could see all but two
of her men clear rapidly down below. Then one of our shells struck a
boat they had stowed inboard near the stern, and great pieces of it flew
into the air. Didn't we cheer, for at this they had evidently had
enough of it, and clouds of steam came roaring out of their funnels as
they stopped their engines. We were going so fast that we were almost on
top of them before Collins jumped for the telegraph, and put the engines
full speed astern and the helm hard over. With a great trembling and
shaking our way was stopped, we swung clear, and lay still not fifty
yards away from our prize. There was hardly need to use the engine-room
telegraph to stop the engines, for they were gradually slowing down.
Our fires were burning low, and there was no coal to replenish them.
"Train every gun that will bear on her," sung out Mr. Parker, "and stand
by to fire. Get out the boats."
In two minutes the dinghy was in the water, and Mr. Parker was bobbing
across the fifty yards that separated us. I had to follow him with six
men in the collapsable Berthon boat, each of them armed with cutlass and
rifle.
I felt jolly proud, you can imagine. We were alongside in a "jiffy".
"You first, sir," said the coxswain, and shoved me up the smooth side,
and I climbed aboard, followed by two of the men.
Mr. Parker was listening to a horrid little officer who was
gesticulating and talking very furiously.
"Take six of your men to the fore bridge and don't leave it till I give
you orders, and kick everyone else out of it," he ordered, so up we
climbed and kicked the two men still left there down the ladder. They
didn't want much kicking.
In a few minutes Mr. Parker went below, followed by the little officer,
still stamping and swearing. He seemed to stay there for ages, and I
was wondering whether I had not better send some of my men down after
him, but could not disobey his orders, and of course there was "No. 3"
with her guns trained on us not fifty yards away, and that was
reassuring.
Presently up he came on deck, followed by Hopkins and a man I knew must
be Mr. Staunton. The men in "No. 3" saw them and raised a great cheer;
indeed, it was splendid to have rescued them, and so jolly lucky too,
for we could not have caught her if she had run away for another five
minutes.
But the best part of the "show" was to come, for presently up poured a
number of Chinamen, I should think quite fifty, and they were taken
across to "No. 3" in small parties till there wasn't one left. I felt
jolly sorry for Mellins and the others of the _Laird_ that they weren't
there to see that little man stamp and fume and curse, whilst Mr. Parker
looked on perfectly unconcernedly, and my six men kept their rifles at
the present. I made 'em do this--I thought it would look better. When
all the Chinese had gone, Mr. Chapman and his stokers came across, and
the last boat-load towed over a grass hawser. With this they hauled
aboard one of "No. 3's" cables, and then it dawned upon me that the
Patagonian was going to tow us back to Colombo, for, of course, as I
said before, we had no coal left, and were perfectly helpless.
It seemed rather rash to trust all those Chinese on board "No. 3" with
only the very few hands left in her, but the leading seaman I had with
me said, "Why, bless your 'eart, sir, them devils is all doves and
sucklings now", and as he had been out on the Chinese station and knew
them, that settled it.
Well, we got back to Colombo all right, and tied up to buoys inside the
breakwater, and then there was a proper row. The skipper of the
Patagonian went ashore and wired to his Government, and they wired to
Peking, and Peking wired to us, and the result was that Mr. Parker had
to put on his No. 1 frock coat and apologize very humbly for his
"unwarrantable and high-handed proceeding". The fact was, you see, that
the little man, who had been an officer in the Mexican navy, really had
all his papers in order, and no doubt had a commission from the
Patagonian Government. He swore he knew nothing about Mr. Staunton and
Hopkins except that they had been put aboard at Aden from the other two
destroyers, "and they take away all my good men there and give me
Chinese pigs". That explained why we had seen no Chinese in Aden on
board the other two.
Mr. Staunton told us his adventures, and how he had been captured at
Port Said.
When the _Isis_, bringing Mr. Staunton from Brindisi, had anchored at
Port Said, a man-of-war's whaler manned by men dressed as English
blue-jackets, and flying the Yellow Dragon, had come alongside for him.
Without the least suspicion he had been pulled across to a destroyer
also flying the Chinese colours, naturally thinking it was one of our
own.
Directly he climbed aboard he was seized and tumbled down below. They
had not misused him, but you can imagine what his feelings must have
been; and he said the food was awful, although they gave him whatever
they could. "How that destroyer did stink on the way across from Aden,
with all that crowd of Chinese on board!" he said, grimacing with
disgust at the very thought of it.
Mr. Hopkins told his adventures too. "Just hustled ashore to have a
squint at those cunning weasels alongside the coal wharf, guessed they'd
played us a mighty smart trick way back at Malta, and was mighty
inquisitive to see 'the cut of their jibs'. Ain't been looking at 'em
time enough to see a cat jump, when round came two hands in front of my
face, fingers on 'em, too, like steel claws, and laid hold of my
windpipe as loving as a mother-in-law.
"Then someone caught me a whack behind the knees which brought me down,
and before I could say 'Johnny Jones' I was lifted up, bundled on board,
and plumped on deck like a bag of spuds." Mighty pleased they both were
to be rescued, and Mr. Hopkins kept on smacking his thigh and roaring
with laughter. "My snakes, how those black-livered, herring-gutted,
fried-up tar-brushes of Patagonians did get to wind'ard of you at Malta!
Just about won this round though, Parker?"
"I should just think we had," answered Mr. Parker, smiling.
Well, in the middle of all this off came a Cingalee telegraph boy with
what turned out to be a telegram from Captain Helston. Mr. Parker came
on deck after he had deciphered it, with a very grave face, and said:
"Mr. Hopkins, I am ordered by Captain Helston to inform you that you
must consider yourself under arrest for going ashore without leave at
Port Said. I must request you to go below."
This was a facer for everybody; but Mr. Hopkins, with a look of
amazement, obeyed immediately, leaving us on deck wondering why Captain
Helston had been so severe. "His worries must have made him confoundedly
strict," said Mr. Parker.
For the next days we lay at this buoy, keeping our eyes on the
Patagonian, and with steam "up" in case she tried to leave.
We had a jolly good time ashore, and the dinners at the Grand Oriental
Hotel in the cool of the evening, with the punkahs swinging to and fro,
were simply ripping.
Then along came the rest of the squadron safe and sound, much to our
delight, and Mr. Staunton and Mr. Hopkins were sent over to the _Laird_.
The latter was certain to get a terrible wigging from Captain Helston,
and we all felt very sorry for him.
Mellins and a lot of other midshipmen came over from the _Laird_, and
Tommy Toddles from "No. 1", bringing a big cake his mater had sent out
by the mail. We had a tremendous chin wag, and it was jolly to meet
them all again, and spin them the yarn of our chase and capture of the
Patagonian. How they did envy me!
Whenever I see a big cake now, I always think of that afternoon, sitting
round the after 6-pounder gun platform, with the awning over our heads,
and the big scavenger-birds (Bromley kites we call them) swooping round
us as we ate our way through Tommy's cake.
A big P. & O. liner, too, homeward bound--she had waited an hour to take
our mails--passed close to us, and the passengers all came to the side
and cheered us, so we midshipmen gave a loud whoop all together, which
brought Mr. Parker up on deck to order us to "chuck it".
They went back to their ship soon, and we had to patrol the mouth of the
harbour after sunset, in case those other two Patagonians came in.
*CHAPTER VIII*
*Mr. Ping Sang is Outwitted*
Helston's Letter--A Tsi has Information--Ping Sang Acts
Quickly--Ping Sang Watches--Ping Sang in Trouble--A Tsi
Escapes--A Tsi Sights the Squadron--A Tsi Gives Warning
Mr. Ping Sang lived usually at Shanghai, but on hearing of the departure
of Helston's squadron from Colombo, he had hurried down to Hong-Kong to
confer with a friend of his, a wealthy merchant named Ho Ming, and to
arrange for the rapid provisioning and refitting of the ships.
It was very necessary for the squadron to complete its task without
delay, because the expenses of its maintenance were an enormous drain on
the resources of the Trading Association, and also the depredations of
the pirates had become so frequent, and their raids so successful, that
coastal trade by Chinese-owned ships was at a stand-still. One thing
was very clear, only ships belonging to Chinese subjects were attacked,
and the most tempting bait, if belonging to Europeans, was left severely
alone. Not a month ago a fine new steamer of 5000 tons had disappeared
without leaving a trace whilst running from Amoy to Swatow--in fine
weather, too--and it appeared that the pirates had begun to extend their
operations to the northern part of the coast, for several ships had
lately vanished near the mouth of the Yangtze in the most unaccountable
manner.
An English gun-boat cruising among the Chusan Islands had reported
meeting three ships flying the Chinese colours, ships which they were
almost positive did not belong to the Chinese Government; but when a
further search was made for them, they had disappeared.
Ping Sang was also anxious that the stay of the squadron at Hong-Kong
should be as short as possible, for he was convinced that if the pirates
intended making any more attempts to destroy the ships, they would
choose that harbour in which to do it. One reason was that, ready to
hand among the crews of the myriad of junks always assembled there, were
hundreds of cut-throats from the lower reaches of the West river only
too willing to commit any crime for money; and he was especially anxious
to confer with Ho Ming, for this merchant owned a large fleet of junks
trading up the river beyond Canton, and their captains and crews would
probably be better able to obtain information as to the presence or
suspicious movements of these desperadoes than even the police
authorities themselves.
These two--Ping Sang and Ho Ming--were sitting in the latter's
smoking-room on the evening of December 21 smoking their after-dinner
cigars, whilst A Tsi, Ho Ming's confidential clerk and comprador, was
detailing the results of his enquiries among the native floating
population.
They were interrupted by an obsequious, white-gowned butler, who
advanced through the mat-screened doorway and handed a letter to Ping
Sang--a letter which Captain Helston had written from Singapore.
"The Imperial Chinese Ship _Laird_,
Singapore, _14th December_.
DEAR MR. PING SANG,
My last letter reporting the proceedings of my squadron was written from
Colombo on my arrival. I left that harbour on the morning of December
2, and proceeded to sea at easy speed, leaving destroyer 'No. 1' to
await the arrival of the two Patagonian destroyers left behind at Aden,
and destroyer 'No. 2' to keep touch with the third destroyer if she
attempted to leave harbour within twenty-four hours of my departure.
They both rejoined me on 5th December at full speed, and reported the
arrival of the two destroyers six hours after I had left, and that they
made no immediate preparations for sea. After recoaling 'No. 1' and
'No. 2' from the _Sylvia_ store-ship, a process which occupied seven or
eight hours on account of a strong breeze and a slight sea, I proceeded
at thirteen knots, and reached Singapore without further incident,
anchoring in the outer harbour.
Here I was met by a collier, chartered in Cardiff under sealed orders,
and am at present completing the coaling of my squadron.
I have determined, after the incidents of the dynamite cartridges on the
way out to Gibraltar and again at Malta, to take no more coal from
shore, and have arranged for a collier to meet me at Hong-Kong. Our men
will alone handle the coal, so there shall be no further chance of foul
play.
The man Hopkins is still under close arrest, and I consider that this
course will be more conducive to the safety of the expedition than
handing him over to the civil authorities, with my proofs of his
complicity not yet substantiated. The fact also that he is an American
citizen would open up many legal difficulties, and after the lengthy
diplomatic representations as a result of Parker's opening fire on the
Patagonian, it is advisable to steer clear of these shoals in future.
This morning I received a wire from Colombo informing me that the
Patagonians had not yet left, and that one was still undergoing repairs.
I shall leave to-morrow, and, as the monsoon is fairly strong, I have
dismounted the guns and the search-lights of all three destroyers to
lighten them as far as possible.
The mail is just leaving, and by the time you receive this letter I
shall be slowly punching my way against the monsoon. I hope to be in
Hong-Kong not later than the 22nd.
Both Dr. Fox and I shall be very glad to renew our acquaintance with you
there, and to talk of old times and adventures when we all three were
much younger.
C.H. HELSTON."
Ping Sang was small of stature and plump to a degree. He lay indolently
back in his luxurious, crimson-upholstered chair, resting his podgy feet
on a richly embroidered footstool.
His jolly, oily face was wreathed in smiles, and he blew great clouds of
smoke from between his fat lips as he slowly read this letter, his
little eyes twinkling with humour and with appreciation of his own
well-being and prosperity.
His fat little hands had short stumpy fingers, beautifully manicured and
covered with rings, which glistened and twinkled as he raised a dainty
Venetian glass to his lips. He was dressed in dark claret-coloured silk
robes, with pantaloons of light green, held together with gold knob
buttons and gold braid loops, and was undoubtedly a prosperous gentleman
and a dandy to boot.
On the opposite side of the fire, sitting bolt upright in an attitude of
keen nervous alertness, was Ho Ming himself, a tall, gaunt Manchu, whose
long thin fingers, with their prominent tendons, clenched rather than
grasped the carved arms of his chair. His light-blue silk over-garment
hardly concealed his attenuated figure, and his face was as gaunt as his
body, with thin, tightly drawn lips, deeply recessed eyes, and prominent
hooked nose.
Between them and behind a carved black wood table, supported by black
wood dragons, sat A Tsi, Ho Ming's comprador, almost hidden by the
clouds of tobacco smoke circling round him in the dull light of an
ancient bronze lantern which swung from the ceiling, and contained a
cunningly concealed electric light. He was dressed solemnly in black
silk, relieved only by gilt buttons. It was this man who for the last
ten days had been searching for any traces of the Pirate Syndicate's
intentions, and with several Cantonese sailors selected from his
master's vessels had mixed, both on board their ships and in the opium
dens and lodging-houses ashore, with all the floating population of
Hong-Kong.
"Helston and his ships should be here in a couple of days," said Ping
Sang, speaking in Chinese and handing the letter to the anxious Ho Ming;
"everything is all right so far."
"Now, Tsi, tell us again what you have been able to discover."
"Nothing, sir, beyond what I have already reported. There are two large
junks from Amoy at the Aberdeen Dock, whose crews are strangers to
Hong-Kong. Two days before their arrival an Englishman arrived by a
coasting steamer which had picked him up at Amoy, and he is now staying
at the Victoria Hotel, and one of my men has seen him go on board these
junks. From what I can find out, they have a much larger crew than is
customary."
"It is very unusual for junks to come down here from Amoy," interposed
Ho Ming, glancing keenly from one to the other, and hardly able to
restrain his impatience at Sang's apparent indifference or his
comprador's stolidity. "Those junks are probably full of explosives, and
it would be an easy thing to float them up against any of Helston's
ships in the harbour and blow them up. We must do something--we must!
Why, the ships may be here any time!"
"My dear Ming," smiled Ping Sang, waving a fat deprecating finger and
settling himself more comfortably in his chair, "we must not excite
ourselves--that's the only thing we can do at present. We've not the
faintest reason for suspecting either the Englishman or his junks;
still, we may be able to do some little thing."
"I think it might be wise, just for the sake of curiosity, to burn those
junks."
"But think of the law--English law; we are not in China now. ('Thank
goodness', or the equivalent in Chinese, piously muttered the
comprador). We can't bribe the magistrates here; and think of the risk
and the punishment."
"Well, well," continued Ping Sang soothingly, "we won't do it to-night.
To-morrow I'll try and get a look at this Englishman--I may know him and
he may know me. Have you seen him yourself, Tsi?" he asked. "Is there
anything peculiar about him?"
"No, sir; but the man who saw him go aboard at Aberdeen says he limped
badly," answered A Tsi.
"A limp had he? Well, I rather fancy I shall know him, and I rather
fancy he would know me," drawled Ping Sang, "though I'll take good care
he doesn't recognize me!"
* * * * *
On each side of the entrance to the Victoria Hotel is generally a motley
row of coolies squatting at the edge of the pavement with their mat
trays containing sweetmeats, matches, or sugar-canes for sale among the
rickshaw men who come and go. Among these, next morning, was a fat old
man in a dirty pair of blue trousers, with a dirty blue tunic tied round
his naked shoulders, clamouring for purchasers as he fanned a swarm of
flies off his sugar-canes with his broad mat hat. This was Ping Sang,
and all the while he kept his eyes glued on the hotel entrance. He had
bribed a coolie to give him his place for the day, and there he squatted
in this extremely uncomfortable position. Sportsman as he was, with all
his love of luxury, he never did anything by halves, and there he stayed
on the chance of seeing the lame Englishman, whilst the sweat ran down
his back, and even the morning sun blistered it.
Presently a coolie--and Ping Sang recognized A Tsi--came out of the
hotel and passed without apparently noticing him, but he had the
forefinger of his left hand extended, whilst the other fingers were
doubled up. That meant that the Englishman was not in the hotel. A Tsi
sauntered back again. Two fingers of the other hand were extended this
time. That was sufficient for the old gentleman. The Englishman had
gone to Aberdeen, where the two Amoy junks were anchored. Gladly rising
to his feet, Ping Sang stretched his cramped legs, slung his two baskets
across his shoulders with a bamboo pole, and trotted down the main
street, trying to imitate the usual ambling gait of a street hawker. It
was several miles to Aberdeen, and he slowed down very quickly, dropping
a sugar-cane every now and then to lighten his load, and eventually came
to the outskirts of the town and to the broad road which runs along the
edge of the sea. Finally he squatted down at a sharp bend of this road
in the shade of a big tree, and waited with his baskets in front of him.
He had arranged for A Tsi to follow him, and presently that invaluable
comprador came rapidly along in a tumble-down double rickshaw, still in
his coolie dress and with a big bundle under his arm.
After much haggling with the rickshaw man, who did not appreciate the
extra weight of Ping Sang's fat little person, the old sportsman got up
beside A Tsi, and the coolie drew them along, sweating and grunting.
Half a mile before they arrived at Aberdeen the busy little bay, crowded
with native shipping, came in sight, and A Tsi pointed out to his
companion two very large junks lashed together in the middle of the
harbour.
"These are the two from Amoy. They came in two days ago, and have not
yet discharged any cargo. In fact they don't seem to have any," said A
Tsi. "If you will wait by the landing-place I will go off to the junks
under pretence of selling this bundle of ready-made clothes, and try and
find out more about them."
They stopped the rickshaw some hundred yards from the centre of the
village, paid their grumbling coolie, and then Ping Sang trudged down to
the landing-place with his baskets of sugar-canes, and squatted by the
road-side, in spite of the hostile looks of the vendors already there.
A Tsi followed at some distance, got into a _sampan_, and was sculled
out to the junks.
Ping Sang watched him clambering over the ship's sides; but almost
immediately afterwards he noticed that a scuffle was going on and saw A
Tsi thrown overboard, and, missing his boat underneath, fall with a
splash into the sea, bundle and all. He swam ashore easily and
scrambled up the beach with a very rueful countenance, amidst the
shrieks of laughter of the coolies along the sea-shore, who had gathered
to see the fun.
As he passed Ping Sang he made a previously agreed-upon sign, which
meant that the Englishman was aboard, then he entered an eating-house
across the road.
Hardly had A Tsi disappeared when a rickshaw came rushing up, a Chinaman
jumped out, threw a piece of silver on the ground and ran down to the
water's edge, got into a _sampan_, and urged the boatman to hurry off to
the same two junks. Ping Sang just caught a glimpse of his face and it
seemed familiar, but where he had seen it before he could not think. He
watched him board the junks, and wondered whether he too would meet the
same rough treatment; but he did not reappear--he evidently belonged to
them.
The old gentleman racked his brains, but could not, try as he would,
remember that face.
An hour went by, the bell at the little dockyard rang out, and the
workmen poured out to their dinner, and Ping Sang, after his
unaccustomed exercise, felt very hungry, and longed for his usual
luxurious lunch and Manilla cigar. He even felt annoyed that he, one of
the smartest business men in the Chinese empire, should be such a
failure as a hawker, for no one would buy from him. In desperation,
hunger overcame his disgust, and he munched one of his own sugar-canes,
smiling grimly to himself at the unappetizing meal. Presently the crowd
was scattered by a double coolie rickshaw. The men, in gaudy uniform,
stopped close to him, and shortly afterwards, for he kept his eyes on
the junks all the time, he saw a European in a white helmet climb down
into a boat alongside and come towards the shore.
The _sampan_ rasped against the shore, and the white man stepped out and
slowly limped up the sloping landing-place, scanning the faces of the
men on either side.
Ping Sang's surmise was correct. He was one of the three men--the
Englishman of the "Mysterious Three"--whom he had mentioned in his first
letter to Helston--the most reckless adventurer of the lot.
Ping Sang thought there was little chance of his being recognized, but
took the precaution of pulling his broad hat over his eyes and bending
down over his baskets. It struck him too that his shoulders and back
were not grimed and blackened with the sun, and he was hastily pulling
his dirty tunic over them, when he was prodded heavily in the stomach,
his hat was knocked off, and standing above him was the Englishman,
bursting with laughter.
"Ask this man for his license!" shouted the Englishman, and a big Sikh
policeman did so. Ping Sang had not one--the one thing he had forgotten
in his "make-up"--and he fumbled in his belt to give himself time to
think. Out rolled two of his favourite cigars, wrapped in silver paper
(he had kept them to smoke on the way back after dark), and they were
worth more than a hawker could earn in a month.
He grabbed them hurriedly, but the policeman was too sharp for him, and
hauled him to his feet with an unmerciful twist of his pigtail.
"Robber! thief!" grunted the highly amused crowd, which had now flocked
round them.
Poor old Ping Sang was dumfounded, and though ready for most emergencies
when dressed in his usual clothes, had now not a word to say. In fact,
thoughts and words do not come quickly when your scalp is being nearly
torn off at every move.
The crowd made way as the huge Sikh shoved his way through, and Ping
Sang had perforce to follow, vainly trying to ease the strain on his
pigtail.
The Englishman came with them to the police station and charged him with
stealing the cigars, and before Ping Sang knew what had happened a pair
of handcuffs were snapped on his wrists and he was shut up in a room.
As the door closed behind him he heard the Englishman say to the
sergeant in charge:
"That's a double-dyed villain, sergeant; was a servant of mine once; had
to get rid of him for prigging my things. There's another of them
somewhere about, and if you'll lend me a couple of your men I'll have
him here in no time."
Poor old Ping Sang's heart went to his feet, for if A Tsi too were
caught, no one would know what had become of them. They might be in
jail for a week or more before being identified, and meanwhile Helston's
ships would arrive, and no word of warning could reach them except from
Ho Ming, who, he well knew, was useless in any emergency.
A Tsi, however, had seen the whole incident from an upper window of the
eating-house, where he had had his clothes dried.
The affair was evidently premeditated. Somebody must have given
information as to Ping Sang's presence there, and no doubt remained that
this European with a limp was the Englishman whom Ping Sang, the
previous night, had said he probably knew.
Now the old man was under arrest, and till he could be identified and
released any plan of action would be delayed, and so much time would be
gained by the pirate syndicate.
It was useless his going to the police station and stating that the
dirty old hawker was no other than the wealthiest merchant in China and
the president of the Trading Association, for he himself was a dirty,
disreputable-looking object, and would be probably clapped in jail as an
accomplice.
No; he must get back to Ho Ming as quickly as possible.
He crept down the rickety stairs and was just going out into the street,
when he saw the European with a couple of Sikh policemen coming straight
towards the house, led by some gesticulating men who had seen him go in
there.
It flashed across his mind that whoever had seen Ping Sang had seen them
together, that he was now going to be caught on some trumpery charge,
and he knew well enough that, unless he could escape, their predicament
might not be known for weeks.
He made his way to the back of the house, but the inn-keeper, already
suspicious of him, barred the way, and he fled up the unguarded stairs
again, looking eagerly for some place in which to hide, but the rooms
were as bare as a barn. He then ran to the rear windows to see if he
could jump to the ground; but even if he did so, there was no escape
from the yard behind, for two walls, too high to climb, ran back to the
face of the hill, which here was cut in a perpendicular cliff.
Already he heard the tramp of heavy boots up the stairs, and, in
desperation, was about to jump and chance scaling the walls, when he
suddenly noticed that next to this house was a small temple or
joss-house, and that a grotesque carving at the corner of one of the
projecting eaves stuck out within jumping distance. Once he was on the
roof of the temple he might climb across to some lower buildings behind,
and might possibly find some place to hide himself.
It was his only chance; so without a second thought he kicked off his
shoes, clambered like a monkey to the roof above him, crawled to the
edge, balanced himself unsteadily, and sprang for the gilded dragon
seven or eight feet away from him.
As he sprang he came in view of the street and heard a yell from the
crowd; but it only made him grip more firmly as he fell on the grinning
dragon, the rotten wood creaking and cracking as he drew himself on to
the top of the joss-house.
Moving cautiously along, he jumped to the lower buildings behind, and
saw, to his great joy, that they were built right up against the cliffs,
which were here much less abrupt and might possibly give some foothold.
If he could but climb to the top he would be able to reach Ho Ming
across the mountain; so, clinging to bushes and clumps of grass, pulling
himself up from rock to rock, he painfully made his way upwards.
Looking over his shoulder, he saw one of the Sikh police following him.
The man jumped from the roof of the eating-house to the joss-house; but
the dragon, already cracked, broke under his weight, and he fell into
the court-yard beneath.
This gave A Tsi a momentary start, for they now could only get on to the
roof by climbing the pillars in front of the joss-house, and this was a
difficult thing to do.
The crowd in the street began throwing stones at him and several struck
him, but in desperation he clambered up and up, forcing his bruised toes
into every crevice that would give foothold, now slipping and sending
down a shower of stones, now gaining a yard or two. His hands were
bleeding and numb with pain as he fought his way, till with a gasp of
relief he wriggled and wormed his way to the top, and with a last effort
swung himself over the edge and rolled breathless into some bushes.
Cautiously peering over the edge, he saw several coolies clambering
after him, whilst the Englishman and the Sikhs encouraged their efforts
from below.
Once they reached the top he knew that he would be captured in no time,
for with his naked feet and want of training he could not hope to
distance these sturdy coolies in a chase over the mountain-side.
As he clutched the edge, wondering what best to do, he accidentally
dislodged a stone. It rolled down and made the climbers hesitate.
Instantly seeing his opportunity, he wildly tore at everything he could
loosen and hurled it down on his pursuers. The foremost was hit on the
hand, and slid some feet before he could steady himself. Another had his
eyes filled with earth and sand, and then with great relief A Tsi saw
them all retreat, slipping and sliding to the roof of the joss-house, in
spite of the threats and cajoling of the police.
Then he saw the crowd streaming along the road, and knew his pursuers
would climb up some other way. Getting on his feet, he began painfully
pushing his way up the thickly wooded side of the mountain slopes. He
was now free from immediate danger, but must reach Ho Ming without a
moment's delay. He dare not descend to the main road, because the
police would be certain to be on the watch for him, besides which he
dare not go into the town till after dark, for he was bleeding from many
cuts, and his clothes were in tatters.
It was a terribly long way and terribly hard work to climb the mountain
to the Peak, but he must do it and wait till dark before striking one of
the roads running down to his master's house.
Hour after hour he climbed painfully and slowly, getting his directions
from the sun, and occasionally catching glimpses of the harbour beneath
him.
Presently he came to a large clearing, breasted the slope in front, and
saw the whole panorama of the harbour below him glistening in the sun,
and the dark mountain ranges of the mainland looming behind it. The
tiny boats moving backwards and forwards were the ferry-boats to
Kowloon, and like toy ships lay several English cruisers.
As he stood panting with his exertions, the boom of a gun came up from
below, then another and another at regular intervals. A man-of-war
saluting! He searched the harbour below him, but saw no sign of powder
smoke. Quickly he glanced towards the narrow waters of the Lyemoon Pass,
knowing that through this entrance men-of-war usually arrived, and then
from a little black, moving object on the water he saw a tiny ball of
white smoke shoot out, and presently the report came gently up to him.
Nineteen he counted, then twenty and twenty-one, and understood enough
to know that it was a foreign man-of-war saluting the British flag.
Throwing himself down on the coarse grass, he watched the black speck
moving nearer and nearer, and as it emerged from the dark shadows of the
Lyemoon Pass, he saw that it was followed by five others, the last three
mere dots on the sea.
Gradually the little squadron become more distinct, and he was able to
distinguish two cruisers with masts and military tops leading, a
merchant ship with short, stumpy funnel, and then three destroyers. At
last Helston's squadron had arrived, a day before it was expected, and,
unless he could give warning, the ships would run the greatest danger
before night was over.
Not a moment was to be lost, so painfully he pushed on, crawling round
rocks and shoving his way through the undergrowth till he came to the
outskirts of the villas on top of the Peak. Creeping behind garden
walls and thick hedges, he made his way, without being seen, to the belt
of trees and bushes which ran by the side of the road, among which he
hoped to conceal himself till dusk made it possible for him to descend
to his master's house.
Fortune, however, favoured him, for who should he see wobbling down as
fast as his fat little legs could carry him but that merry little tailor
Hong Sing, with a great bundle of clothes under his arm. He knew him
well, and called him by name as he came near. The little man gave a
frightened look round, and would have made off had not A Tsi seized him
by the arm and pulled him into the bushes.
When Hong Sing had calmed down he hurriedly explained matters.
Luckily the little man was returning from trying on some clothes for a
customer, and had in his bundle enough clothes to rig A Tsi as a
respectable-looking butler. He had no shoes, but Hong Sing knew where
he could borrow a pair from a house close by, and within half an hour A
Tsi was walking boldly down the road with his escort.
As they neared Ho Ming's residence A Tsi stayed behind, whilst Hong Sing
went on to reconnoitre; but all was safe, and at last the faithful
comprador had finished the first part of his task.
Ho Ming had already returned from his office, but it was very difficult
to make him act energetically. Like most Chinamen, he had the utmost
fear of the law and those who administered it. He was more polite and
obsequious to a police sergeant than to the wealthiest merchant in the
colony, and it was a long time before A Tsi could persuade him to take
immediate steps for the release of Ping Sang. He had not even heard of
the arrival of the squadron, and walked rapidly up and down the room
bemoaning the absence of Ping Sang and his own helplessness. "What can
I do? What can I do?" was all he could say.
"You go at once to the Chief of Police and bail out Mr. Ping Sang; they
will do it for you. Get them to telegraph to Aberdeen to send him up to
head-quarters with an escort. Write a letter to Captain Helston before
you go, and I'll take it aboard and warn him of his danger."
"Yes, yes; we ought to do that," faltered Ho Ming, already trembling at
the prospect of interviewing the Chief of Police, and sat down to write
a letter, whilst A Tsi went away to change his butler's clothes for some
of his master's.
With the letter in his pocket, A Tsi hired a chair with four sturdy
coolies, and was soon carried down to Murray Pier, off which the little
squadron was now at anchor, and, taking a _sampan_, pulled alongside the
_Laird_.
*CHAPTER IX*
*Captain Helston Wounded*
Ping Sang Kidnapped--Cummins gives Advice--A Narrow
Escape--Helston's Fears--A Futile Search--An Exchange of
Prisoners
_The Narrative is continued by Dr. Fox_
We arrived at Hong-Kong on the afternoon of December 22, after an
uneventful voyage from Singapore, and received permission to moor at
Admiralty buoys.
Helston expected Ping Sang to come aboard immediately, and was rather
upset that he did not appear. He is still very nervous and irritable,
and the chilly evening made him complain again of his rheumatism, though
he certainly seems much improved in health and spirits since he shook
off the Patagonian destroyers, and has, so far, brought his ships in
safety.
He and I were smoking in his after-cabin, and making up our minds as to
whether we would wait any longer for Ping Sang or go ashore, dine at the
Club, and afterwards try and find the old gentleman, when Pritchard, the
officer of the watch, brought down a letter.
Helston hastily tore it open. I saw at once that it contained bad news,
but he handed it to me without saying a word, and rang for the
quarter-master to bring down the messenger.
The letter was from a Mr. Ho Ming, of whom we had never heard.
"DEAR CAPTAIN HELSTON,
"I do not know what to say. My comprador brings you this, and you may
trust him. His name is A Tsi. He knows all. You are in the greatest
danger. Mr. Ping Sang has been thrown into prison this afternoon, and
there is a fearful conspiracy to sink your ships. In great haste and
distress,
"Yours respectfully,
"HO MING."
Hardly had I read it before the bearer of the letter was shown in--an
honest-looking Chinaman, not marked by small-pox. He appeared
exhausted, was much scratched about the face and hands, and I saw that a
patch of blood had soaked through the right sleeve of his silk coat.
He told his story in a very direct, straightforward manner, and would
not be disturbed in the telling of it, although Helston kept constantly
asking him unnecessary questions, wanting to know the end of the yarn
before he had barely started. I admired him for his pertinacity--though
I generally detest Chinamen--and for his pluck, because he was evidently
almost on the point of collapsing. In fact his legs nearly gave way
under him several times, and at last I pushed a chair forward and made
him sit down.
Helston seemed somewhat relieved when the story had been told, for, as a
matter of fact, there was little enough evidence of immediate danger,
and the thought of Ping Sang the sybarite shut up in jail as a common
thief was somewhat amusing.
Hardly had he finished, though, before Pritchard came down from the
quarter-deck followed by a native who was one of the tallest I have ever
seen, and as thin as a lath. He was in an extremely excited condition,
flopped down on a chair, said his name was Ho Ming, and began wringing
his hands.
"Mr. Ping Sang has disappeared," he broke out; "gone, no one knows
where. I go see Chief of Police and tell him who Ping Sang is. He
perfectly satisfied if I will stand bail. Telephones to Aberdeen police
station to have him sent up. They reply, 'The master of the man
arrested this afternoon withdrew the charge and has taken him away'.
What shall we do? What shall we do?"
He was in a state of most intense alarm, pitiful to see, even in a
Chinaman.
"Phew!" ejaculated Helston, "that makes it more serious. Did they know
where he had gone?"
"I no wait," whined Ho Ming. "I come to you quickly."
There was silence for some seconds whilst Helston and I looked at each
other, for if Ping Sang had actually been kidnapped by this scoundrel of
an Englishman, it was a most disastrous event for our expedition,
because he was the head and brains of the Trading Association, and it
was through him, and by means of his enormous credit throughout China,
that the heavy expenses of the squadron had to be met.
Without him it was almost impossible to move, as I well knew that the
funds with which Helston had in the first instance been supplied were
well-nigh exhausted.
"See what Cummins has to say about it!" we both suggested, breaking the
silence.
Cummins was the Commander of the _Laird_, and, even in the few months
the ship had been in commission, had become the one man relied upon in
every emergency either for advice or action. Short of stature, with a
little thin body and very sloping shoulders, his head looked too big for
his body and his long thin nose too big for his head. It was only when
he talked, which he seldom did, that his dreamy grey eyes commenced to
light up, and then they had the most humorous twinkle in the world. He
was a great mathematician, had been a torpedo lieutenant, and was taken
for a dreamy philosopher till you saw those twinkling eyes change to
eyes of steel, and his somewhat effeminate, irresolute lips harden.
This was only when he had a big job to undertake or a weighty decision
to make.
He sauntered in, dressed as usual, without regard to appearance, in an
old ill-fitting monkey jacket, the pockets of which had been roughly
stitched at the sides, for he always had his hands in them and wore them
out rapidly. He was chewing his usual wooden toothpick, biting off
little pieces, which he carefully put in his left-hand pocket, whilst he
carried a store of new ones in the right-hand one.
When he did speak he always commenced with a silly little chuckle which
was distinctly irritating--to me at any rate.
He seemed vaguely amused at the presence of the two Chinese, and at the
details of the crisis which Helston recounted to him.
"What do you advise?" asked Helston, biting his words, as he always does
when excited. "Whatever we do we must do quickly."
"Heugh! heugh! heugh!" chuckled Cummins, selecting a fresh toothpick
from his pocket, "I should give that cove some brandy first of all,"
pointing to A Tsi, who was looking pretty ill, and he smiled blandly at
us, wandered off to a corner of the cabin where Helston kept his cigars,
and lighted one, whilst a servant brought the drink and turned on the
electric light, for by this time it had become dark.
Every now and then he gave vent to an irritating chuckle, as if
immensely amused at the whole story, whilst Helston watched him with
ill-concealed impatience, knowing that it was useless to hurry him.
Then suddenly turning round, he gave his advice:
"Communicate with the police, sir, and have Ping Sang traced. Get
search warrants issued, and search every junk leaving Hong-Kong
to-night. This Englishman has got a long start, but there is no breeze
to speak of, and if he tries to get him away to the mainland, we might
catch him if you sent the destroyers out at once. That man--the one
with the brandy--would possibly recognize the junk. Send him with
Parker ('No. 3'); he's the smartest of the three, and will probably get
away first. I will go up and make the necessary signals, and have their
searchlights sent over from the _Sylvia_. They may be able to get away
in an hour."
Without waiting for Helston's "All right, Cummins, you carry on," he
sauntered up on deck, and we heard him singing out for the signalman;
and then, putting his head down the skylight, he chuckled; "Heugh!
heugh! heugh! You need have no fear for your Chinese friend, sir; they
won't hurt a hair of his head. They'll want to exchange him for that
rascal Hopkins."
"Bless my soul, I never thought of that!" exclaimed Helston, much
relieved; "I never thought of that!"
The Skipper's galley being called away, he and I went ashore, taking Ho
Ming with us.
We landed at Murray Pier, and had to push through a crowd of curious
Chinamen.
Helston clutched my arm and whispered excitedly: "There are some of
those brutes who shadowed me in London. Get out of this quickly, old
chap!" I thought he was probably mistaken, and put it down to his
nervousness, but when we got into rickshaws and were driven rapidly up
the street, I could swear that several detached themselves from the
crowd and followed us in the dark shadows of the trees on either side.
However, there was no trace of them when we reached the main road.
By a stroke of luck we found the Chief of Police at Headquarters, and he
telephoned to Aberdeen for more information.
Ping Sang had been discharged two hours ago, and was taken aboard the
Amoy junks, one of which was just then sailing.
He listened impatiently whilst the Chief of Police spoke through the
telephone.
"Has she left the harbour?" ... "Well, can't you follow her?" ... "How
about the steam-boat?" ...
"She is already out of the harbour," he said, turning to us and hooking
up the telephone-receiver, "and their steam-boat is under repairs and
they cannot stop her. I'll send one of our patrol boats from here to
cut her off."
"My destroyers must be ready by this time," interposed Helston, "and if
you will make out search warrants, I'll catch her before she can get
across to the mainland."
"The warrants would take some time," answered the official, "and I
should have to see the Governor. The patrol boat shall get away
immediately."
But for once Helston made up his mind. "Warrants or no warrants, I'll
search every junk under way to-night," he said, and strode impatiently
out of the room.
"I don't care what you do, outside the harbour limits," said the Chief
of Police to me as I followed Helston; "and it's a very dark night, and
no one will be any the wiser."
Ho Ming coming with us, we went down to the Victoria Hotel, and after
some difficulty--for all we knew of the Englishman was that he walked
with a limp--found that he had not returned in time for dinner, as was
his custom.
Coming back from the hotel, I several times thought I could hear the
pattering of soft feet behind me, though I could see no one. To reach
Murray Pier, however, we had to go round the cricket ground, and as we
passed along the front of it I saw two shadowy figures dart across to
the trees which bordered the road at the side, and it struck me
immediately that, if they meant any mischief, they might head us off
there.
With a sudden inspiration, I sang out to Helston, who was ahead of me,
"Race you to the pier for a dollar, old chap!" and called to my coolie,
"Fi tee, fi tee! You beatee him fellow lickshaw, half dollah can do."
This was enough for the sporting coolies, and they raced like mad things
round the corner and down the dark road.
It was lucky we were going so fast, because as we came abreast the one
electric light in the road, two pistol shots rang out from the shadows
under the trees and then a third. One splintered through the woodwork
of Helston's rickshaw, and both our rickshaw coolies, with a yell of
fright, dropped their handles, and fled for their lives. Helston tumbled
head-foremost into the road at the sudden stop, though I was just able
to save myself, and turning, saw a Chinaman within two yards of me
levelling a pistol straight at Helston. I struck at him with my heavy
malacca stick, and caught him on the wrist just as he fired again, the
pistol rolling into the mud.
[Illustration: I STRUCK AT HIM WITH MY HEAVY MALACCA STICK]
I grabbed at it, and the Chinaman fled into the shadows.
Helston scrambled to his feet, and we both jumped behind trees, the
policeman on duty at the pier rushing towards us with his revolver in
his hand and blowing his whistle lustily.
Ho Ming, whose rickshaw man had dropped him twenty yards behind, crawled
out from behind another tree, and soon we had quite an army of policemen
running up from different directions, one of them dragging my own
wretched coolie after him into the electric light.
Then came some of our boat's crew with boat's stretchers in their hands,
and just as they reached us Helston suddenly fell in a heap on the road.
They carried Helston down to the pier, and there he regained
consciousness and struggled to his feet. I saw his left arm was broken.
I supported him down to the boat, got him safely aboard, and ripped his
clothes off to examine him. "Beastly ashamed of myself, old chap," he
kept saying, "but they've got me in the chest too."
The bone was smashed five inches above the elbow. The flattened bullet
had then torn a deep groove through his chest muscles, and he had lost a
great quantity of blood. His wrist and forearm were also paralysed, so
it was a pretty bad job, and took me and my surgeon, young Richardson,
an hour and a half before we had him ship-shape again.
We ought to have given him chloroform and tried to sew up the damaged
nerve, but he would not hear of it, because he was anxious to get the
destroyers away and look after a hundred details, when once Cummins had
reported their departure; and all the time we were busy with him,
putting on splints and sewing up the wound in his chest, messengers and
signalmen kept coming and going incessantly. He feared that one or
other of the junks would drift down alongside and blow up, and worked
himself into a tremendous pitch of excitement when the _Strong Arm_
delayed reporting "all water-tight doors closed". Then he thought it
would be advisable for the steam-boats of the two ships to patrol round
and round till daylight, and it took a long time to get steam up in
them, all of which excited him still more.
Of course I knew that Cummins would "carry on" without him perfectly
well, and I am certain he knew that too, and the knowledge only made him
the more determined to superintend everything personally.
Finally he wanted to go aboard the _Strong Arm_ to see for himself that
she was prepared for any emergency; but that was too much for me, and he
eventually was satisfied with sending for her captain, Hunter, to report
personally.
I made him eat some dinner--he had had nothing since lunch-time--and
urged him to take a sleeping-draught. Not a bit of it. He was going to
stay on deck till sunrise. "I'm no baby, old chap; it's all right, now
you've fixed it up;" and he had a chair placed on the quarter-deck and
sat there. However, I put half a grain of opium in his cup of coffee,
and what with that and with the strain of the last few hours, he was
soon sound asleep, and we moved him, chair and all, into the navigator's
cabin, much to the relief of everyone, and especially of Cummins.
Personally I did not believe in the blowing-up theory, nor did I feel
any intense interest either in old Ping Sang's fate or in the effects
his disappearance would have on the expedition. As a matter of fact, I
was pretty well bored with the whole affair, and would have "chucked it"
willingly, but for my chum Helston. I turned in and slept soundly, as,
thank Heaven! I generally do.
As I conjectured, nothing happened during the night, and at daybreak the
destroyers had not returned.
Helston had slept fairly well, but, what with the pain in his arm and
chest, a bad headache from the effects of the opium, and the
disappointment of not recovering Ping Sang, was almost unbearable.
He had a great number of official calls to pay on shore, and was also
very anxious to "carry on" aboard his ships, but I had at last to come
definitely to an understanding with him and tell him very plainly--and
he knew that I meant it--that I would not remain in the ship any longer
unless he went on the sick list and did exactly what he was told to do.
If he continued to play the fool, I swore that I would invalid myself
home, and--perhaps most powerful argument of all, though I do believe he
would not have had me desert him for anything--I assured him that if he
persisted in refusing to act on my advice his health would most
certainly break down, he would be obliged to give up the command, and
then what hope would he ever have of winning that fickle little jade
Milly.
Eventually we got him to bed--I was horrified to see how thin he had
become--and I gave him another sleeping-draught, darkened his cabin,
roped off the quarter-deck to prevent any trampling of feet over his
head, and presently he went to sleep again, sleeping soundly till the
afternoon.
He looked much less haggard when he woke, but I kept him in bed.
"How long are you going to keep me here, old chap?" he asked piteously.
"Two days more at the very least," I told him.
The destroyers had returned that afternoon without having been
successful in their search.
During the next few days the police searched, without result, every junk
in the harbour and every place where the Englishman could have concealed
himself or Ping Sang. The second Amoy junk was found to contain no
suspicious cargo, but, for all that, it was carefully watched, to give
early warning lest she should attempt any treachery, because Cummins was
still doubtful about her, and did not relax any precautions during those
long nights.
Christmas-day went by, and Helston was able to walk round the gaudily
decorated mess-decks, headed by our amateur band playing those atrocious
tunes, "The Roast Beef of Old England" and "For he's a jolly good
fellow", and everyone gorged as usual at lunch and slept like boa
constrictors afterwards in their cabins.
I suppose I am too old for sea life, because Christmas so-called
festivities on board ship bore me to distraction. At night the
midshipmen had what they called a sing-song in the gun-room, to which
the _Strong Arm's_ gun-room had been invited. They made the most
disgusting noise--it makes me angry to think of it even now--and had the
confounded impudence to ask me down, as they all wanted to drink my
health.
The yarn had got about that but for me Helston would have been killed.
Perfect rot! but there it was; and the Sub and senior midshipman came to
my cabin after I had turned in and pressed me to go down, even for five
minutes.
I was reading a favourite chapter of Carlyle's _Sartor Resartus_--what a
biting cynic that man was!--and hate being disturbed, so told them to go
to Jericho, and wished I had the power to send them there, the whole bag
of tricks.
No news of Ping Sang had arrived, and though Helston naturally worried
himself, Cummins was still convinced that, as he had been kidnapped
solely to be exchanged for Hopkins, we should shortly hear of him.
And so it turned out, for a letter came one morning, apparently written
by the lame Englishman and posted from Macao, the Portuguese town at the
mouth of the West river.
He signed himself Chas. R. Hamilton, and suggested an exchange of
prisoners. I quote an extract from his letter as showing his unbounded
impudence and his evident knowledge that we were bound hand and foot
whilst Ping Sang was in his power.
"... In conducting war against the Chinese Government at Peking (war he
called it, not piracy!) we little imagined that we should have the
honour of meeting ships manned by my own countrymen.... Ping Sang, you
may be glad to hear, is in robust health, but is anxious to return to
you, as, I understand, your further proceedings are practically
dependent upon his financial assistance.
"As he is of such great importance, I am naturally loth to part with
him; but unfortunately I hear you have on board your ship an old friend
of mine, Reginald Hopkins, and if you could deprive yourself of his
society we might, in short, exchange our two unwilling guests ...
"In arranging the details of such exchange I must first ask you to give
me your word of honour that you will not attempt any treachery during
the transfer, nor endeavour, once the exchange has been made, to follow
or interfere with Hopkins.
"I suggest that you send a destroyer to Macao with your reply. On her
arrival a man giving my name will board her and receive the letter. If
favourable, I will then write you again, and only regret that my
distance from Macao will cause much delay.
"Failing a reply I shall, of course, retain possession of Ping Sang...."
We had a council of war after dinner that night, that is, Cummins and
Helston had, for I myself only sat near the fire and smoked, and refused
to give any advice even when they asked me.
I am paid to come this fool's jaunt as a doctor, and I'll see them
hanged first before I interfere with their job. I certainly would not
let them meddle with mine. If they did follow any advice I happened to
give and it was unsuccessful, I should never hear the last of it, or, if
it by chance were successful, they would pat each other on the back and
pretend and believe too that it was their plan all along; so it was much
better to smoke my pipe and keep my own ideas to myself.
Eventually they decided to arrange the exchange, although Cummins seemed
personally averse to such a proceeding, thinking it much beneath our
dignity to treat with such a man.
*CHAPTER X*
*Destroyer "No. 1" Meets her Fate*
To Release Ping Sang--Trapped--"No. 1" Disabled--A Gallant
Deed--Sinking--Poor "No. 1" Disappears
_Mr. Glover's Narrative is now continued_
The three days after Captain Helston had been shot (his coxswain told me
he probably would have been killed but for Dr. Fox) were most exciting.
Then things calmed down and became rather monotonous. We were not
allowed ashore after sunset, however. Captain Helston did not want
anything to happen to us midshipmen, and that was a nuisance, for we
missed any amount of fun--dances and things.
Our gun-room people played the _Strong Arm's_ gun-room at Socker in the
Happy Valley, and knocked "the hide and hair" off them; and this was
some consolation, for they had been rather uppish. We also had a picnic
in the sailing pinnace to Deep Bay, which was jolly good fun, although
we all got wet through coming back, and that ass Dumpling dropped the
bread into the water whilst he was wading ashore with it.
I had been sent back to the _Laird_ from "No. 3", and Tommy Foote
(Toddles) from "No. 1", and on New Year's eve we were having a bit of a
jamberee in the gun-room--we had asked for half an hour's extra
lights--when Jeffreys, our Sub-Lieutenant, was sent for by the
Commander.
We thought it was because of the row we were making, but he came back
and told Tommy to get his things ready and stand by to go aboard "No. 1"
at daybreak.
"No. 1" went off in the morning, but was back again in time for
seven-bell tea. Tommy hadn't much to tell. They'd run over to Macao,
and Mr. Pattison, the Skipper, had given a letter to a Chinaman who had
come alongside as soon as they anchored.
That was all, and nothing more happened for seven or eight days, whilst
we had to grind at school, mathematics and torpedo theoretical rot and
other things.
But then there were more rumours, and one day we heard that all
Hopkins's gear was being packed--you remember him, the Yankee secretary
who had been under arrest ever since leaving Colombo--we often wondered
why.
Tommy Foote was sent again to "No. 1", and when next morning Mr.
Pattison came aboard for final orders, he was evidently to take Hopkins
with him.
You bet your life I was dead keen to go with Tommy and see the fun, for
there was evidently something in the wind; so I asked Mr. Pattison to
take me too. You see I had rather a pull over him, for he was very
sweet on my cousin Milly; so he asked the Commander and off I went.
We steamed out through the West Channel, and Tommy and I thought we were
bound to Macao again, but we were wrong, and it turned out that our
destination was a small island about sixty miles away, at least I should
think it was that distance, for we were doing about fifteen knots, and
it took us four hours before we ran into a narrow little harbour between
high cliffs, anchoring some ten cables from shore.
There wasn't a sign of a living thing, and we waited and waited, whilst
Mr. Pattison kept on looking at his watch. He told us then that we were
going to exchange Hopkins for the old Chinese gentleman who had been
kidnapped.
"Why! is Hopkins one of the pirates?" we both asked, somewhat
disappointedly, for he was hardly our idea of a pirate, and we rather
liked him, he was so amusing.
"I only knew it myself this morning," Mr. Pattison told us.
Well, presently a _sampan_ came wriggling out from behind a small
headland, and when it arrived alongside there was a fat little man
sitting in it gorgeously dressed.
I didn't tell you that we had brought a man named A Tsi with us; but
this man recognized him immediately as Ping Sang. The fat old chap
climbed nimbly over the side and shook hands all round, so pleased was
he to be safe again.
Hopkins was brought on deck, and apparently he and Ping Sang knew each
other, though they only glared like two cats, and he climbed down into
the _sampan_, Mr. Pattison taking no notice of him whatever.
However, Tommy and I stepped forward and shook him by the hand. I don't
quite know why, but expect it was because we wanted to say that we had
shaken hands with a real pirate. He seemed quite pleased.
His bags and boxes were so numerous that the _sampan_ had to make two
trips, and this delayed us nearly an hour, Mr. Pattison fuming with
impatience, and steam blowing off from the escape pipes.
Directly the _sampan_ had shoved off with its last load, we weighed and
secured the anchor and were off back to Hong-Kong.
We thought our work was over for the day, but were mightily mistaken,
for as we came to the mouth of the harbour, there, to our dismay,
steaming gently towards us, were the three Patagonian destroyers, and
behind them a cruiser painted dark green from mast-head to water-line,
very much like the _Strong Arm_, only not so big. And they were, all of
them, between us and Hong-Kong.
I never felt so scared in my life. Tommy went as white as a sheet, and
even Mr. Pattison turned a bit yellow.
He swore terribly and cursed them for treacherous hounds--it was just
about the neatest trap you ever saw in your life--and ordered the helm
hard a-port.
Round we went, clear of the harbour mouth, and heading south as if we
were going to run away; but if the people in the Patagonians thought we
were going to do so they were jolly well mistaken; it was only to get up
full speed and clear to quarters, which we did in a brace of shakes, the
men as keen as mustard.
Tommy had to go down on deck and take charge of the two for'ard
6-pounders, but Mr. Pattison ordered me to stay on the bridge with him.
The helm was put hard a-starb'd, we swung round like a top, and headed
straight for them.
The destroyers seemed at first to be making straight for us too, but
almost immediately turned off to starboard and ran into the little
harbour we had just left. The signalman sang out, as they showed their
sides to us, that they had no guns aboard, so that explained their
flight.
We were now rushing down on the cruiser, going at quite twenty knots,
and wondered whether she would open fire. We were not long left in
doubt, for we were not more than eight hundred yards from her when we
saw two little spurts of flame from under her bows, and then more from
her fore-top, and the little shells whistled past and burst in the sea
behind us.
I know I ducked my head, and rather thought Mr. Pattison did so too.
Then we began firing from the 12-pounder on the bridge and from Tommy's
6-pounders as fast as we could, and what with the noise of the guns
going off so close to me and the whistling of the enemy's shells, I felt
quite dazed, and it was no use to bob or duck, because the air seemed
full of them.
Mr. Pattison startled me to life again by sending me aft with a message
to the Sub. As I ran down the ladder two holes suddenly appeared in the
after funnel, and a cloud of smoke burst out with a roar close to the
after steering-shield. I must confess I stopped running, absolutely in a
funk, and my legs would hardly hold me up. It was only for a second,
though, and I ran aft just as hard as I could. The shelter screen was
all bent and twisted, and in front of it were two of the after 6-pounder
gun's crew lying on their faces, and blood was oozing from under them
and running along the deck. I just managed to give the message to the
Sub, who was bending over them, and then I was horribly sick.
I don't remember how I got back to the bridge, but just as I did so--and
now we were not a hundred yards from the cruiser--a shell burst on the
fo'c'stle close to the port anchor, and pieces came tearing through the
canvas screen round the bridge with a horrid shrieking noise. Looking
down I saw that one of the securing chains had been smashed, and that
the anchor was now half over the side, hanging by one small chain.
Mr. Pattison saw it too, and tumbled down to the fo'c'stle, shouting to
me, "Keep her as she is, and run along her starboard side as close as
you can go."
I knew what he was going to do. If that last securing chain carried
away, the anchor would go overboard, and even if the cable held at the
stopper and did not run out, we might swerve right across the cruiser's
bows and be cut in half.
We were right up to her now, and through her bow-gun ports I could see
the men round the small quick-firers, but the mere fact of having a job
to do prevented me from feeling frightened. Another second and we were
alongside her fo'c'stle, not twenty feet away, and their small guns
fired point-blank at us as we rushed past her side. I remember dimly
noticing Mr. Pattison lying on his stomach on the fo'c'stle lashing the
anchor for dear life. My ears were ringing and painful, my head seemed
to be splitting, but I had enough common sense left to see that the
stern of the cruiser seemed to be swinging into us.
She must have put her helm over, and meant to crush us as her stern
swung round.
I yelled to the quarter-master at the wheel to "hard a-starboard", for
she would be into us before we could clear her. I could just see his
face as he stood on the steering platform below, and he heard me, but
shook his head grimly and put the helm over to port. Our bows were
already flying past her quarter-deck, and I saw at once that he was
right and I was wrong, for our stern immediately began to swerve
outwards.
It was a terrible moment, for she was swinging into us faster than we
were swinging away from her.
She must strike us and I thought all was over, and gripped hold of the
bridge rails, waiting for the bump.
Another second--there was a crash! We heeled right over to port till I
saw the lee gunwale a-wash, and, oh horrors! the two men lying on the
deck aft slipped overboard with shrieks of agony and fear. I saw our
stern crumple like tissue-paper. We grated along, separated, righted
ourselves, and were flying away.
Mr. Pattison jumped up to the bridge, yelling to "'midships the helm",
but it would not move, and was jammed hard over.
All the men aft had been knocked off their feet, and I saw them
scrambling up again as Mr. Pattison rushed aft, and all crowded round
the crumpled stern.
We were now steaming in a circle, and our broadside was exposed to the
cruiser, which commenced firing very rapidly again.
Then I saw the men aft jump clear of the rudder chain, the rudder swung
amidships, and, thank God! we darted away; but something must have
happened to the engines, for we were not going nearly so fast.
This has taken a long time to write, but probably did not last fifty
seconds. It seemed a lifetime.
Directly we were clear Mr. Pattison came for'ard and took charge.
They had unshackled the steering chain, he told me, and the rudder had
swung amidships. The starboard propeller had been smashed in the
collision, and, with only the port screw working and the helm almost
useless, we struggled along in a very erratic manner, our bows now going
round to starboard and now falling off to port.
Shells were shrieking all round us, but going wild, probably because we
were swerving so much from side to side.
To avoid exposing the men, Mr. Pattison ordered all those on deck to
take shelter under the fo'c'stle, leaving only himself on the bridge and
the quarter-master at the wheel.
I was sent with the necessary orders, and for the first time noticed
Ping Sang and A Tsi standing on deck near the for'ard torpedo-tube quite
unconcerned; but I hustled them for'ard, and everybody, even the Sub,
Tommy, and I, had to crowd down below, and did not see what happened
during the next five minutes, though they were evidently making better
shooting, for we heard several small explosions where shells must have
struck.
All at once there was a muffled roar and the hissing noise of escaping
steam.
We three jumped on deck and saw a great hole in the deck near the base
of the foremost funnel, and clouds of steam and smoke pouring from it.
We opened the manhole cover to the for'ard boiler compartment, more
steam and smoke came swishing out, and in the middle of it crawled out a
stoker, with his face and arms terribly scalded. He just managed to
pull himself out, and, yelling with pain, would have thrown himself
overboard, had not the Sub caught him and hurled him to the deck, where
he lay writhing and shrieking.
Tommy and I peered through the manhole to see if anyone else was alive,
but the Sub shoved us aside, and, with a heaving-line lashed round him,
and holding an old oilskin in front of his face, crawled down. His name
was Harrington--I must tell you it, because this was the pluckiest thing
Tommy and I ever saw.
We took charge of the heaving-line, and he half-stumbled or was
half-lowered down into the steam.
When he got down the ladder and put his feet into the water we could
hear swishing about, he gave a great cry of pain--it must have been
nearly boiling--but he did not hesitate, and we could dimly see him
groping about on the bottom plates, and could also see that the water
was rapidly rising, and was quickly over his knees.
He called out in a squeaky voice for another rope, and lashed it to
something, which we two and some men who came to help hoisted up.
It was another of the stokers, but such a sight as I shall never forget.
He was quite dead, and half the flesh was torn from one shoulder and
from one side of the face.
As we hauled him on deck his skin seemed to come away with his clothes
wherever we touched him.
Oh, it was a most fearful sight!
Tommy and I were roughly pushed away by an old petty officer, and the
body was covered with a tarpaulin.
We could not keep our eyes off that heap, and should have fainted in
another second had not Harrington himself appeared out of the manhole
with his face just like beef and bleeding, and his hands like turkeys'
claws.
He fell down on the deck, and as I knelt down he said in a hoarse
whisper; "My feet, my feet! For God's sake undo my boots!"
We unlaced them, and oh, the terrible pain it was to him to take them
off! and though we cut his socks with a knife, the skin all came off
with them. He had fainted by that time.
Then I heard Mr. Pattison's voice, and Tommy rushed aft and brought some
brandy and a pillow, and we propped his head up and poured a little
brandy down his throat, though it was difficult to do it, because his
tongue was so swollen.
They covered him with a blanket, but he was a huge man, and his two raw
feet stuck out at the end. I shall never forget them.
All this terrible time I had noticed nothing else, but now, looking over
the side, I saw that the destroyer was only going very slowly, and that
there was a big hole at the water-line, where that last shell had come
aboard, and water was pouring in.
No shells seemed to be coming our way now, and looking towards the
island I saw the cruiser steaming away from us without firing, and,
hurrah! hurrah! two great splashes of water leapt up, one after the
other, close to her stern, and boom! boom! came the reports of heavy
guns from the north.
"Hurrah! hurrah!" shouted Tommy, "there's the _Strong Arm_."
You can imagine what a relief it was and what we felt.
We yelled and shouted like mad things, and even Harrington had strength
enough to raise his head and wave his arm, though he could not make as
much noise as a mouse.
It was indeed the _Strong Arm_ firing her foremost guns, and making a
great bow wave as she steamed towards us.
"Out collision mat!" shouted Mr. Pattison, and the order was yelled down
the fo'c'stle and everyone came rushing out, got a line round the
destroyer's bottom, made it fast to the collision mat, and hauled it
over the great rent in the side.
It took three or four minutes to do this, and by that time the deck
seemed quite close to the water, and the stern seemed even lower. The
_Strong Arm_ was now drawing up rapidly.
Then I was sent with a couple of men to screw down the hatch covers
leading to Mr. Pattison's cabin and the ward-room, and by the time we
had done it the deck was a-wash.
The starboard engine had stopped by now, and we lay wallowing with a
horrid log-like jerky motion whilst the men tried to get a tarpaulin
over the hole in the stern, but did not seem to do any good.
The boats were next got into the water. They were full of holes, but by
stuffing their jumpers into the shot holes in the whaler and by bailing
hard, they just managed to keep her afloat. The collapsable Berthon
boats were quite useless, being pierced in half a dozen places, and the
dinghy was smashed to smithereens.
There was only the whaler for fifty men. This meant that most of us
would have to take our chance of hanging on to an oar or wooden grating
till the _Strong Arm_ could pick us up.
By the time we had lowered Mr. Harrington (the Sub) and the scalded
stokers into the whaler our stern was quite under the water, and we were
heeling over to starboard, till fittings, not secured to the deck, began
sliding down, and the sea came over the foot of our deck stanchions. We
could actually feel poor old "No. 1" sinking under us--a horrid
sensation.
"Scramble on deck, boys! All up from below!" was shouted down the
engine-room and stokehold hatches, and everybody began taking off their
boots and jumpers.
This gave me a very creepy feeling.
Steam was roaring out of the escape-pipe, and we all anxiously looked
first at Mr. Pattison, expecting him to give the order to jump, and then
towards the _Strong Arm_, wishing she would come along faster.
Mr. Pattison was hanging on to the bridge rails--the bridge had a
tremendous slant--to keep himself upright, and the signalman hoisted a
signal that we were sinking.
The _Strong Arm_ came rushing up, firing fast from her bow guns, and for
one horrid second I thought she would not see our signal in the
excitement of chasing the cruiser.
Tommy and I were hanging on to the torpedo-tube aft with our feet in
water, and I heard him gasp, with a very white face, "She's going on";
but a moment later we saw her boats' crews clambering over the nettings
into their boats, and raised a mighty cheer of relief as she slowed down
abreast of us. Her boats were lowered with a run and a splash, and came
pulling over to us as hard as men could pull, and as they arrived
alongside our men were ordered to scramble on board them.
We had a row as to who should jump first, for Tommy said that he
_belonged_ to the destroyer and I was only a passenger, so that he ought
to be the last to leave; but I said that as I was senior to him--I was
two places above him passing out of the _Britannia_--it was my duty to
see him get into the boat first.
We had to cling to the torpedo-tube to argue it out, for the deck was
now so steep we couldn't stand on it.
"Get into the boats you young idiots!" shouted Mr. Pattison. "Why are
you keeping the boats waiting, you lop-eared sons of Ham?"
So we settled the matter by both jumping at the same time. I was jolly
glad that I did not let him have his own way.
Just as we had all shoved off, Mr. Pattison being the test to leave, we
heard a cracking noise--a bulk-head must have given way--"No. 1" almost
righted herself--her bows came out of water and pointed higher and
higher, till they were almost upright. There she stayed while you could
have counted fifteen or sixteen, and then slowly slipped down out of
sight.
There was just a little swish as the sea rushed in to cover her, two of
her capstan bars came shooting out of the water, and poor old "No. 1"
had disappeared. I felt rather snuffy, and I knew Tommy did too. We soon
were aboard the _Strong Arm_, and down in the gun-room they all crowded
round and asked questions. It was not till then that I discovered that
my cap was missing, and found too that my hair was all matted together
with blood.
Tommy searched and found a cut about an inch long, and felt rather
annoyed, I think, that he himself hadn't anything to show.
You can imagine I felt jolly proud to have been wounded, though it did
rather take the gilt off the ginger-bread not to have known it at the
time. It was probably a piece of the shell that smashed the
anchor-securing chain.
It must have delayed the _Strong Arm_ nearly an hour, to stop her
engines alongside "No. 1" and to get all of us aboard, and by that time
the pirate cruiser was only a cloud of black smoke on the horizon, with
the three little destroyers which had again come out of the bay steaming
after her at full speed.
*CHAPTER XI*
*The Action off Sin Ling*
The Action Commences--Casualties
_The Report submitted by Commander Richard Hunter, R.N.,
Captain of the "Strong Arm"._
The report of the proceedings which Commander Richard Hunter, R.N., the
Captain of the _Strong Arm_, subsequently submitted to Captain Helston,
is so terse and yet so graphic, that it is inserted here.
* * * * *
"H.I.M.S. _Strong Arm_,
"Hong-Kong, 9th Jan.
"SIR,
"I have the honour to report that, in accordance with your signal
received at 8.30 A.M. on 8th Jan., I immediately raised steam in fifteen
boilers. One hour later I was able to slip from the buoy, and proceeded
southwards to the rendezvous indicated in your orders.
"By 10 A.M. I was making fourteen knots, and at 11 nearly nineteen,
which speed was gradually increased to twenty as the remainder of my
boilers raised steam.
"At 12.35 P.M. the island then being in sight, the mast-head look-out
sighted a cruiser and three destroyers steaming towards it from the
west, and almost immediately afterwards sighted destroyer 'No. 1'
leaving the island.
"The cruiser was apparently heading to cut off 'No. 1', whilst the three
destroyers disappeared under the land.
"We then saw 'No. 1' head straight for the cruiser, which thereupon
opened a vigorous fire from her small guns. 'No. 1' disappeared behind
her and apparently fouled her stern, for she came away steaming but
slowly and steering in a very erratic manner.
"She was now under a very severe fire, and a considerable explosion
occurred nearly amidships at 12.45.
"Being now 10,000 yards from the cruiser, I opened fire on her from my
foremost guns, and in a couple of minutes caused her to cease firing on
the crippled destroyer and steam off to the southward. At this range I
did not hit her.
"I followed at my utmost speed, and was rapidly closing, but as 'No. 1'
signalled that she was unable to keep afloat I stopped alongside her and
removed her crew. I regret to report that she sank immediately
afterwards.
"I also regret that five men of her crew are missing, including two
wounded men who fell overboard, and that ten are injured--Sub-lieutenant
Harrington, suffering from severe burns and scalds, Midshipman Glover,
slightly wounded, and one man badly burnt (since dead).
"Having re-hoisted my boats, I renewed the pursuit, and at 2 was
overhauling her fast. Meanwhile the three destroyers had scattered and
I disregarded them.
"At 3.25 we made our distance 6000 yards by range-finder, and I again
opened fire from my forecastle 6-inch and the two foremost upper deck
6-inch.
"The enemy replied vigorously from two or three guns and continued her
flight.
"Though we made one or two hits at this range, it was not till we had
drawn up to within 4000 yards that our shooting became good, and at
4.32--the island of Sin Ling being five miles to leeward--she caught
fire astern, steered wildly, and exposed her broadside.
"We now hit her time after time, and her fire became slow and very
inaccurate.
"At 4.56 she hauled down her flag (the Chinese imperial colours, with a
black instead of a red dragon and ball) and ceased firing.
"I too ceased firing and lay to about 2000 yards distant, unwilling to
go within torpedo range. I then ordered my First Lieutenant (C. W.
Smith) to board her, and gave him sixty men to form a prize crew and
navigate her to Hong-Kong.
"When my boats were half-way across she suddenly opened fire on them,
gathered way, and steamed towards me with the evident intention of
ramming, an evolution which I managed to avoid by going full steam
astern.
"She also discharged a torpedo whilst passing, which struck me on the
port bow, and, though failing to explode, stove in one plate. Some
water entered through rivet holes.
"At the same time she opened a very rapid and sustained fire, which
caused many casualties on the open deck, where the men had crowded to
see her.
"Thereupon I renewed the action, and quickly cleared her upper works and
subdued her fire, my 6-inch shells doing very evident destruction.
"She was repeatedly hulled, flames burst out in several places, and at
5.15 made for Sin Ling at full speed, beaching herself in a sinking
condition at 5.42.
"Daylight was now failing.
"I took the _Strong Arm_ as far inshore as I dared, after picking up my
boats' crews (they had been fired upon in the most wanton manner), and
shelled her at point-blank range. In ten minutes I had the satisfaction
of seeing a large explosion aft; a great gap was made in her side, she
heeled to port till the water reached the base of her funnels, and half
her deck was submerged. She was evidently too badly damaged to be
floated.
"This being done, I returned to Hong-Kong and moored to my buoy at 9.25
P.M.
"Very little damage has been sustained by this ship, and it can be
repaired without assistance from the shore.
"I regret, however, to report the following casualties:--
"Killed: One petty officer and five men.
"Wounded: Three officers, two petty officers, and thirty-five men.
"I have the honour to be, &c.,
"RICHARD HUNTER, Commander R.N.,
"Captain of H.I.M.S. _Strong Arm_."
*CHAPTER XII*
*A Council of War*
The "Strong Arm" Returns--Boarding the "_Hai Yen_"--Jenkins--The
Council of War--Ping Sang's Chart--Cummins has a Plan--Ping Sang
Remembers
Captain Helston, with his left arm bandaged to his side, and one empty
sleeve of his monkey jacket flapping in the wind, was on deck to see
"No. 1" slip from her buoy and start on her fatal voyage. No sooner had
her dark hull disappeared in the morning mist than he began to regret
having sent her. A fit of his old irresolution returned, and he would
have recalled her had she been within signalling distance.
He sent for Cummins--a grotesque-looking object in the early morning,
unshaven and wearing a pair of huge sea-boots.
"You know, Cummins," he began, "I have a feeling that something will
happen to her. There is no knowing but that she will poke her nose into
some trouble. What induced me to trust to their word of honour I don't
know, and it may simply be a trap to recapture Hopkins."
"Ha! ha! ha!" chuckled Cummins, chewing his toothpick, "it's too late
now, sir; we can't communicate with her."
"Well, don't you think it might be advisable to get up steam and follow
her."
"Can't manage it, sir. They are refitting the starboard low-pressure
piston-ring, and it won't be ready for another twenty-four hours. You
might send the _Strong Arm_, though. I was always averse to trusting
that Englishman's word."
Helston, to tell the truth, was somewhat nettled at Cummins's influence
on board and his somewhat arbitrary manner, and the implied "I told you
so" irritated him to a degree. So, saying sharply, "Very well, we'll
let her go alone," went down to his breakfast.
But ten minutes later he again changed his mind, and made a signal which
resulted in the _Strong Arm's_ rapid departure.
He expected both ships back by four o'clock at the latest, and as the
hours went by and there was no sign of either, he became extremely
nervous and restless, pacing up and down his after-cabin all that
afternoon. At dinner he scarcely touched anything, and was just on the
point of going out himself aboard "No. 2" or "No. 3", when the signal
midshipman reported that the _Strong Arm_ was entering the harbour and
making her number.
He ran up on deck to see for himself, and quickly a signal blinked
across from the _Strong Arm's_ mast-head lamp that she had driven a
strange cruiser ashore, and rescued the crew of "No. 1", which had been
sunk.
The news rushed like wildfire round the ship, and officers and men
crowded on deck to see her slowly creeping to her buoy and signalling
for medical assistance.
Helston went aboard her immediately, and Dr. Fox and the other doctors
of the squadron worked all night with the wounded, many of whom had to
be sent to the Naval Hospital next morning, including Harrington, whose
condition was very grave.
Helston obtained a rapid report of the day's happenings from Hunter, and
congratulated Ping Sang on his escape.
The identity of the strange cruiser was unknown, and even Ping Sang, who
had more information than anyone else as to the resources of the
pirates, had been unable to recognize her. However, it was a great
achievement to have destroyed so powerful a vessel at the cost of one
destroyer, though the loss of life was much to be regretted.
"You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs, I believe," was Ping
Sang's comment, as he calmly puffed his cigar on the sacred
quarter-deck.
The loss of life evidently did not worry him in the slightest degree.
Helston was most severe with Pattison, for, though praising his
intrepidity and personal behaviour, he censured him strongly for his
manoeuvring of "No. 1".
"What induced you to run straight at her instead of taking to your heels
and escaping, I cannot think, and to leave the bridge in charge of a
midshipman at the most critical moment seems to me to show a great want
of judgment. You had no torpedoes on board, and it was impossible for
you to damage her."
Except for the fact that his action delayed the cruiser, and ultimately
led to her destruction, Helston would have sent him home forthwith.
This was not his hasty judgment, for he made no remarks at the time, but
was given two days later when all the circumstances had been
investigated more closely. In fact Harrington, the Sub, who had been so
badly injured in his attempt to rescue people from the stokehold, was
the only one belonging to "No. 1" who came in for any praise, and he was
too ill in hospital to appreciate it.
This opinion was general throughout the squadron, and poor Pattison, who
was sent to the _Sylvia_ for duty, more or less in disgrace, felt it
very keenly.
"I did the first thing that came into my head," he said, "and it wasn't
till we were right on top of her that I remembered we had no torpedoes
on board."
The morning after the return of the _Strong Arm_, this ship, with
Helston aboard, and the two remaining destroyers in company, steamed to
Sin Ling Island.
The strange cruiser was found still lying on the rocks--a
melancholy-looking object. Her after magazine had evidently blown up,
and she was a total wreck aft of her main-mast--a mass of warped and
twisted plates and deck beams.
On her twisted stern was her name _Hai Yen_ in Chinese characters, the
gilt scorched by fire; but this name did not identify her, and her
origin and history were still a mystery.
No complaint could be made of the _Strong Arm's_ captains of guns, for
their shooting had been marvellously effective, and her upper works were
riddled with shell holes. Two guns had been dismounted, and her funnels
were pierced in a hundred places.
Helston and Hunter had come to the conclusion that she had been
escorting the three destroyers from the south, chiefly from the certain
fact that they had neither guns nor torpedo-tubes aboard when first seen
by "No. 1". These spare tubes and guns might still be aboard the _Hai
Yen_. So a thorough search was made through the whole ship, and, though
none of these things were found, it was discovered that the ship had
been pretty thoroughly stripped of everything movable, and that the
upper deck was covered with coal-dust. The coal must have been brought
up after the action, because in places it covered great smears of blood,
and the only inference was that the three destroyers had coaled from her
bunkers during the night, removed all her remaining portable
stores--even her small quick-firers had disappeared--and also taken her
crew aboard them.
To make certain that the crew were not still on the island, Helston
landed two hundred men and thoroughly explored it. It was but a small
rocky outcrop from the Chinese coast, not a mile long, but by the time
this had been done daylight was beginning to fail. No traces of the
crew were discovered.
During this time the midshipmen had been allowed to inspect the ship,
and, needless to say, returned with much spoil. One of them had an
undamaged chronometer, another actually brought off the steering-wheel
from the conning tower, two of them lowered the ship's bell into their
cutter, whilst a daring youngster swarmed up to the foremast-head and
secured her gilt weather-vane.
They were all vastly pleased with themselves and their trophies.
Everybody being aboard again, the _Strong Arm_ steered to the north,
and, on passing the island where "No. 1" had exchanged Hopkins for Ping
Sang, sent the two destroyers inshore to reconnoitre; but though they
entered the little bay where "No. 1" had been so neatly trapped, and
explored the whole of the coast with their searchlights, no sign of any
ship or junk could be found.
The three ships then returned to Hong-Kong, Helston taking Ping Sang
back to the _Laird_ with him.
Ping Sang and Dr. Fox dined that night with Helston, and that merry old
Chinese gentleman, vastly pleased to be sitting once again in front of a
good dinner, was amusing in the extreme.
He made even the surly Doctor smile at his adventures, and very droll
were the descriptions of himself sweating along the main road to
Aberdeen loaded down with sugar-canes ("Beastly stuff! I can't think
why they eat it. Never knew what it was to earn a living of ten cents a
day"); of being hauled along by his pigtail through a malodorous crowd
of his countrymen to the police station ("Never knew I hated them
before, till they began kicking me in the back"); of his struggles and
protestations when the Englishman withdrew the charge and took him back
to the junk; of his voyage to the island, shut down below in the
stinking hold ("They didn't go across that night, but hid round a corner
till the next"), and of his imprisonment on the island, where he was a
guest of the same Englishman ("That man is a precious scoundrel, I tell
you, and his food was worse; but he did give me some decent clothes,
I'll say that for him").
The only one without a smile on his face was Jenkins, Helston's marine
servant, who had persisted in accompanying his master; but this was due,
as Dr. Fox well knew, to the fact that he had been ashore that
afternoon, and was now assuming an air of extreme sobriety only to be
accounted for by a too liberal consumption of beer.
He was an extraordinary man, this old soldier. He never went ashore
without coming off half-drunk, and, as Helston often said, "he's always
most drunk when he's most sober", and it was only by his preternatural
solemness, or by noticing that he occasionally carried the dishes round
the table at the double, that one knew that he had been making a brute
of himself ashore.
Time after time Helston had dismissed him and sent him for'ard to rejoin
the Marine Detachment, but always, next morning, he was stealthily
creeping about Helston's cabin, folding up and brushing his clothes, and
waking him at exactly the same time with "Six bells just gone, sir", and
"'Ere's your cup of tea".
He had once managed to get rid of him by giving him "five days' cells",
but before he had finished this punishment Helston's hair required
cutting. No one could do this so well, so he was brought aft to do it,
and, the job being satisfactorily concluded, Helston gave him one of his
cigars, and twenty minutes to smoke it, before he was locked up again.
On the sixth morning it was "Six bells, sir, just gone, sir, and 'ere's
your cup of tea", and he was now as much a permanent institution as the
ship's bell or the ship's cat.
Ping Sang had gained much interesting but no valuable information from
the Englishman.
"Hamilton is his name. I knew him well several years ago, before he
disappeared, and he was always up to some devilment or other. If he
could not manage to work for his living, he could certainly live by his
wits.
"He gave me a very interesting account of his whole scheme. He,
Hopkins, and the German, Schmidt--the 'Mysterious Three' of
Tientsin--had put in fifty thousand dollars apiece, and many wealthy
Chinese had subscribed very large sums in what he called 'our venture'.
'We've done pretty well. We have quite a respectable little fleet, and
have captured thirty million dollars' worth of ships and cargoes, to say
nothing of the ransoms some of our prisoners have paid for their
freedom. We have friends throughout the country, and our prisoners know
that if they talk too much when they get back, they will get their
throats cut one fine night. We have had to do it to several
already--just as a warning.'
"I asked him if he did not fear capture.
"'Capture!' he laughed, highly amused. 'You will never see any of us
again, unless you happen to come as paying guests. Hopkins made a fool
of himself, but he won't be caught napping again, and ten times your
little fleet could not get into our island.'
"I asked him what became of all the crews of the many ships he had
captured. Had he hanged them?
"'Hang them? Rather not!' he told me. 'One or two of the first few,
perhaps, but ever since, directly they see what a fine life we are
having there, they volunteer to join us, and make splendid recruits.'"
"Did you discover how he was going to get back to his precious island?"
asked Helston.
"No, I did not. I asked him several times, and kept my eyes and ears
open, but not a thing could I discover. He had nothing there except the
junk, as far as I could see, and they gave me complete liberty to go
about the island as much as I liked."
"How did you spend your time?" asked Dr. Fox.
"Playing cards with him, like a fool," said Ping Sang, wreathed in
smiles; "and I lost nearly ten thousand dollars, and have promised to
send them ashore directly we reach his island. He is going to send a
junk for them as soon as we get there, and he had the cheek, too, to ask
me to bring up all the things he had left behind him in the Victoria
Hotel.
"Oh yes, I promised," laughed Ping Sang; "he amused me so, I couldn't
help promising him."
Dinner being over, Hunter and the Captain of the _Sylvia_, Commander
Bannerman, came across in their galleys, and they and Cummins of the
_Laird_ joined a council of war, to determine the future plan of
operations.
It was a curiously impressive little scene in Captain Helston's
fore-cabin that night--the polished table littered with documents and
lighted by the hanging crimson-shaded electric lamps; the grey clouds of
tobacco smoke eddying among the steel deck-beams overhead and curling
through the after 12-pounder gun-ports; the glitter of the polished
brass-work of the gun-mountings, one on each side of the cabin--a grim
reminder of war; and the serious, eager faces of Helston and his three
Commanders as they bent over the various papers and argued their plans
and proposals.
The last time they had all met together round that table they had drunk
success to the squadron, and gaily hoped that the pirates would give
them a chance of "doing something".
Now they had done something--one of their three destroyers was at the
bottom, and five of her men had gone down with her; nine of the _Strong
Arm's_ men were dead (three had died of their wounds), and thirty or
more were wounded--and though they had destroyed a cruiser, still she
had not previously entered into their calculations, and her appearance
on the scene rudely interfered with their plans and expectations of only
meeting old, half-repaired Chinese men-of-war. There might be more like
her, acquired secretly, and with the memory of those nine bodies waiting
to be buried in the quiet cemetery in the Happy Valley next morning, and
the unknown strength of the enemy they were now going to meet, the
council took their places round Helston's table with a certain
solemnity.
Captain Helston himself, gaunt and thin, sat at the head, his long, thin
face haggard in the electric light, his right hand nervously fidgeting
with some papers in front of him, and his left arm still bandaged to his
side, his empty sleeve sewn across his chest.
At the other end of the table sat Hunter of the _Strong Arm_, a man with
a great red face and great red hands, a clumsy-looking giant, more
grieved at the loss of his men than elated at the destruction of the
pirate cruiser. A typical bluff, good-hearted sailor was he, not devoid
of brains, but seldom troubling to use them. To see him in a football
"scrum", and to hear his lusty roars of encouragement to his side, did
one good, and one knew immediately what kind of man he was.
Use his brains! Why? God had given him a great body which never knew
fatigue, a mind which never knew fear, and he was one of the
"range-up-alongside-and-blow-
the-beggar-out-of-water-and-if-he-won't-sink-ram-him" school of naval
officer.
Antiquated in his ideas he may have been, but he was possessed, as are
most men like him, of an enormous personal magnetism, and every man Jack
of his crew would follow him to the death.
On Helston's right sat Ping Sang, bubbling over with humorous details of
his escapade, red in the face, his eyes twinkling with appreciation of
his good dinner. As he was beautifully dressed in his favourite colour
of dark claret silk, and had a gold-knobbed skull-cap of the same colour
on his head, his gay attire contrasted strangely with the more sober
mess jackets of the others.
As usual, he was smoking a cigar, and had in front of him a big despatch
box, from which he drew rolls of papers, spreading them in front of him
with a due sense of their importance.
No one who had seen him on board "No. 1" the day before, standing calmly
near the after funnel under a heavy fire, could help but praise his
contempt for danger; but his first remark when he was taken off in the
_Strong Arm's_ boat and saw the destroyer slide under the sea was,
"There goes four hundred thousand dollars", and when it was discovered
that she had carried three men down with her, in addition to the two who
had been knocked overboard, all he said was, "Men very cheap; plenty
more to take their places".
It was very evident that everything was precious to him except the lives
of the people whom he was paying to risk their lives for the protection
of his vast trade. Already Helston and the others had lost some of
their first admiration for the good-natured, plucky little man, and
could not feel in sympathy with a nature so completely indifferent to
death and suffering. Still, he was not a European, and allowance had to
be made for the stoicism and callousness of the Celestial.
Next to him sat Cummins, an odd little figure, his tie up
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