CHAPTER XX—TOO LATE AGAIN
If the Seacove boys, George Belding and the radio force, found an interest aside from the general object of the Colodia’s cruise, the bulk of the crew were not so fortunate. Their keen outlook for the German raider the Sea Pigeon, began to be dulled as the tropical days dragged by.
The destroyer was running down a westerly course near enough to the equatorial regions to cause every one to feel the languor that usually affects the northern-born in southern climes. The boys lolled around the decks, and found drill and stations hard tasks indeed.
Everybody said: “Is it hot enough for you?” And with the permission of the executive officer more than half the crew slept on deck instead of below in their hammocks.
During a part of the afternoon watch the engines of the destroyer were stopped, a life-raft was lowered on the shady side of the ship, and the boys in squads were allowed to bathe, the quartermaster’s boat with two sharpshooters in it, lying off a few yards on the watch for sharks.
The Colodia had an objective point, however, toward which she was heading without much loss of time. Hour after hour she steamed at racing speed and through an ocean that seemed to be utterly deserted by other craft.
In those wartimes the lanes of steam shipping, and sailing craft as well, had been changed. Ships sometimes sailed far off their usual course to reach in safety a port, the track to which was watched by the German underseas boats. The Colodia would ordinarily have passed half a hundred ships on this course which she followed toward the American shores.
Cruising the seas, whether for pleasure, profit, or on war bent, is a very different thing nowadays from formerly. Practically this change has been brought about by a young Italian who had a vision.
No longer does a ship go blindly on her course, unable to learn who may be her neighbor, deaf to what the world ashore is doing as long as she remains out of port.
The wireless telegraph has made this change. The radio furnishes all the gossip of sea and land. Even in wartime the news out of the air puts those at sea in touch with their fellowmen.
All day long, and through the night as well, the radio force on the Colodia might listen to the chatter of the operators on land and sea. Unnecessary conversation between operators is frowned upon; but who is going to “listen in” on a couple of thousand miles of wireless and report private conversations between working radio men?
On the Colodia a man was at the instrument practically every minute, day or night. Commercial messages, weather warnings, code sendings of three or four Governments, the heavy soundwaves from Nauem, the German naval headquarters, flashes from ship to ship—all this grist passed through the wireless mill of the destroyer.
All the time, too, they were seeking news of the Sea Pigeon, the German raider, which the Colodia had been sent out particularly to find. Of course, the finish of the submarine One Thousand and One had been reported to the naval base, and an emphatic, “Well done!” had been returned. But the sinking of the submarine, after all, was not the main issue.
As the destroyer had combed the sea for her prey, so she combed the air by her wireless for news of the raider. And when the news came it was as unexpected as it was welcome. The men were offering wagers that the destroyer would end in seeing New York again rather than sighting the Sea Pigeon, when just after the wheel and lookout were relieved at four bells of the morning watch, the radio began to show much activity.
Messengers passed, running to and fro from the station to the officers’ quarters. There was not usually much radio work at this hour, and the watch on deck began to take notice.
George Belding slid around to the radio room and showed a questioning countenance to Sparks who was himself on duty.
“What’s doing, sir?” he asked the radio chief.
“Well, we haven’t picked up your particular S O S; but there is trouble somewhere dead ahead.”
“I can feel that the engines are increasing speed, sir,” Belding said. “Does it mean that we may have a scrap with a sure-enough Hun?”
“The message sounds like it,” admitted the radio man softly. “There’ll be trouble, I reckon. You’ll hear all about it, soon enough.”
Commander Lang himself appeared on the bridge, and this was a surprisingly early hour for him. Other officers gathered, and there began a somewhat excited conference. The boatswain’s mates failed to pipe the clothes lines triced up. Half an hour earlier than usual the hammocks were ordered stowed. Ikey Rosenmeyer, who loved to sleep till the last minute, was tumbled out unceremoniously and had to stow his hammock in his shirt!
The hammock stowers likewise stopped down the hammock cloths early, and the whole crew had their mess gear served out long before the galley was ready to pipe breakfast. During the meal hour word was passed to shift into uniform instead of work clothes.
“It’s extra drill, I bet,” declared one of the boys pessimistically. “More work for the wicked.”
“There is something doing, sure enough,” Phil Morgan declared. “I think we shall be piped to stations before long.”
He had not seen George Belding then. When the latter reported what he had heard at the radio room Whistler was more than ever confident that there was something of importance about to take place. It was some time, however, before the real fact went abroad among the members of the crew.
The radio had indeed brought news at last of the raider. She was supposed to be lurking near a point not more than two hours’ run ahead of the Colodia. A report from a cattleship had been caught, stating that she was chased just at daybreak by a steamship that was heavily armed with deck guns, and that she surely would have been overtaken by the enemy had fog not shut down and given the cattle boat a chance to zig-zag away on a new course.
The description of the attacking vessel fitted that of the raider, Sea Pigeon. Commander Lang and his officers believed that there was a chance of meeting the German—of approaching her, indeed, unheralded.
There was a good deal of fog about; but overhead the sky was clear and there was the promise of a hot day before noon. Having the approximate latitude and longitude of the cattleship when she sighted the raider, Commander Lang believed the Colodia had a good chance of overtaking the German ship while she was lingering about on the watch for her prey.
The fog was growing thinner, but had by no means entirely disappeared even in the vicinity of the destroyer, when her wireless began to chatter. Sparks sent a messenger on the run to the bridge. This incident visibly increased the excitement of both officers and crew. Word was passed in whispers from the petty officers stationed near the bridge that the call was another S O S.
A second message followed almost immediately. The Colodia’s engines were speeded up. The crew was piped to quarters. The gun crews made ready their initial charges. Everything about the decks was properly stopped down and the destroyer was quickly put into battle trim.
Message after message came from the radio room. Belding came breathlessly to Whistler and Al Torrance with the announcement that it was a sugar ship being attacked, and surely by the raider. Soon the distant reports of guns could be heard.
“If the Susanne can only hold the Heinies off till we get there,” said Belding, who had learned the name of the sugar-laden ship, “we will show them something.”
“We will show them if the German raider isn’t too fast for us,” responded Al. “They say this Sea Pigeon is mighty fast and a pretty nifty boat into the bargain.”
“The old Colodia will show her,” said Whistler with confidence. “Just give us a chance!”
The destroyer plowed on through both sea and fog, while the rumble of the guns grew in magnitude. Whether much damage was being done or not, a good many shots were exchanged by the combatants. It might have been a veritable naval engagement.
The fog swirled about the bows of the Colodia, and the lookouts strained their eyes to catch the first glimpse of the fighting ships. As the fog was thinning from above, the watchers in the tops had the best chance of first sighting the sugar ship and the raider that had attacked her.
A wireless transmitted news of the fight as it progressed. The Germans had not yet succeeded in putting the merchant ship’s radio out of commission. In response, the destroyer had assured the Susanne of her own approach.
“Hold on! We are coming!” the Colodia’s radio had sent forth.
“Enemy half mile off. Steaming two knots to our one,” came the response from the sugar ship.
“Fight it out! We are coming!” repeated Sparks from the destroyer.
“Shell has burst abaft the afterhouse companion. Two of after gun crew killed. Volunteers take their places. We have put a shell through enemy’s upperworks.”
“Great! Keep it up!” chattered the Colodia’s radio.
“Another shell has reached us aft. Women and children sent forward to forecastle.”
The final sentence, read aloud by an officer from the bridge, excited the crew of the Colodia to the utmost.
The American seamen were spurred to fighting pitch now. Their only desire was to get at the raider and her crew.
“It’s a running fight between her and the Susanne,” Morgan said to Al Torrance. “Otherwise the German shells might have reached the sugar ship’s engines before this.”
“Think of them shelling that merchant ship that has women passengers aboard!” groaned Al. “What can those Germans be thinking of? What will happen to them after this war is over?”
“They all believe they are going to win,” Belding said gloomily. “That is what is the matter. And if they should, the whole world will be treated just as ruthlessly as the Germans please.”
“Don’t talk that way! Don’t talk that way!” shouted Al. “I won’t listen to such a possibility! They can’t win this war, and that’s all there is to it!”
“Quiet, there,” admonished the voice of an officer, and the boys subsided to whispered comments, one to the other.
Again and again the wireless chattered the cry for help. The guns thundered ahead. Suddenly there arose a rosy light in the sky, spreading through the fog in a wide wave of color.
“She’s blown up!” was the general and hopeless ejaculation from the crew of the destroyer.
“Her engines went that time, sure enough—and her boilers, too,” groaned Ensign MacMasters, who chanced to stand near the gun crew to which Whistler and Al belonged and where Belding was stationed in reserve. “She’s helpless now. If we don’t get there soon——”
There were no more radio messages. The calls to the Susanne were not answered. The melting fog soon gave the lookouts a clearer view ahead.
“Steamship tops and rigging in sight, sir!” was the cry to the bridge. Then, a minute later: “She’s on fire, sir, and sinking by the stern.”
“Ah!” muttered Ensign MacMasters. “We are too late again!”