CHAPTER XV
A PRISONER OF WAR
As soon as the Norwegian tramp and her escort were on the way to a German port the torpedo-boat resumed her station at the head of the starboard line.
The British seamen had been sent below as soon as they were transhipped, but Tressidar was told to go aft and await examination.
"You say your ship engaged one of our cruisers?" asked the lieutenant-commander of the torpedo-boat. "What was the result?"
"Your cruiser ran away," replied Tressidar pointedly.
"And then what happened?"
"The 'Heracles' stood in pursuit. An action was taking place. We were left adrift in the cutter."
"And the end of the action?"
"I cannot tell. Both ships were lost in the mist."
"Was the English cruiser torpedoed?"
"That I cannot say," replied the sub.
"It was possible. Were there any signs of one of our incomparable submarines about?"
"We saw one several hours later."
"Then it is certain that your 'Heracles' was sunk," declared the German joyously. Already he had decided to report that a party of English Seamen, the sole survivors of a torpedoed cruiser, had been rescued by a division of the High Seas Fleet. He could imagine the intense enthusiasm in Berlin at the news.
He plied Tressidar with questions to elicit the information as to the exact position where the engagement started, but beyond the vague statement that it was somewhere in the North Sea, the sub. refrained from giving further details.
"The fellow is obstinate," remarked the unter-leutnant to his superior. "Why not lock him up in the fo'c'sle with his men?"
"He is an officer, von Möber," said the lieutenant-commander. "He is entitled to a certain amount of consideration."
"If I had my way I'd make it hot for this Pig of an Englishman, officer or no officer," declared von Möber.
"You are over-zealous," said his superior. "These Englishmen treat our men who fall into their hands in a proper manner."
"Because they fear reprisals," added the unter-leutnant. "Once they began to ill-treat the crew of one of our lost submarines, but we soon frightened them into better manners. That shows how the English fear the German arms."
The young German firmly believed what he said. Like hundreds of his fellow-countrymen, he regarded the considerate treatment of Huns held as prisoners in England as a sign of weakness, while, on the other hand, severity towards British captives was looked upon as a testimony to the certainty of success to the German arms. Leniency to prisoners and to interned Germans in England, instead of raising a spark of gratitude in the minds of the kultured Huns, was accepted as a token of moral weakness on the part of the strafed Englishmen.
German submarines could—and did—torpedo unarmed merchant ships without warning; Zeppelins sailed by night over undefended British towns and villages, raining death and destruction upon them. In both cases these gallant exploits were hailed with wild enthusiasm by the German nation. Yet the humane British, refraining from reprisals of a similar nature, were looked upon by the Huns as a nation afraid to retaliate, so that in the day of reckoning they would be able to make better terms with the All-Highest War-Lord. And this theory, fostered by "inspired" newspapers, was held practically by entire Germany.
The lieutenant-commander of the torpedo-boat was an exception. Practically born and bred a sailor, his outlook was wider than that of the majority of German naval officers, who are first and foremost soldiers, and sailors by the will of their Emperor.
"While Herr Tressidar remains on board he will be treated with proper respect, von Möber," he said firmly, then turning to his prisoner he added, "I do not ask you for your parole, but let me warn you that a sentry will be posted outside the door, and that any attempt on your part to escape will certainly be discovered and with it your privileges will be withdrawn."
"Thank you," replied Tressidar. "I understand."
He turned and followed a petty officer who had been told off to show him to his place of detention. Just as he reached the small oval hatchway leading below, two heavy explosions in quick succession almost burst the drums of his ears.
So terrific were the detonations that the sub., was for the moment unable to detect their source. It seemed as if the deafening noise came from immediately overhead and from all sides of the torpedo-boat. The frail craft shook like a terrified animal under the rending of the air.
Then, to his unbounded delight, Tressidar saw the leading light cruiser was heeling badly to starboard, her upper works hidden in clouds of smoke mingled with spray.
Following the explosions came a dead silence of nearly a minute, then the remaining ships of the German flotilla opened a rapid fire, the shells hurtling towards a dozen different targets that existed solely in the heated imaginations of the gun-layers. So erratic was the firing that more than once the German ships were in danger of being hit by the projectiles discharged from the guns of their consorts. For full five minutes pandemonium reigned.
Meanwhile the stricken cruiser was still heeling. Already her upper deck on the starboard side was flush with the water. Men were clustering aft or else crowding into the boats that had survived the explosion and were capable of being lowered.
It was a British submarine which had scored a couple of direct hits. In spite of the presence of a double screen of torpedo-boats, notwithstanding the prying eyes of the Zeppelins cruising over the fleet, a plucky lieutenant-commander of one of the "E" class had been able to obtain a periscopic sight of the German flagship. Here was a chance too good to be missed. He immediately gave orders for two torpedoes to be fired. Either was sufficient to strike a mortal blow, for the first struck the target abreast of the foremost gun-turret; the second found its mark fifteen feet for'ard of the stern-post.
Without waiting to observe the result of the explosion, the submarine dived. To turn and speed away from her prey would be courting destruction, for her movements would be distinctly visible to the observers in the Zeppelins, and the torpedo-boats, directed by wireless from the airships, would be rushing to and fro across the submerged path of the British submarine and tear her to pieces with explosive grapnels. So her lieutenant-commander steered her so that she would pass underneath the German flotilla, and then, by compass course, kept in the track that the hostile vessels had previously held. Here the water, disturbed by the propellers of the flotilla, was thick and muddy, and, forming an efficient screen for the Zeppelins, enabled the British submarine to get clean away.
Long before the Teuton flagship had plunged to the bottom and the furious cannonade had died away, the "E Something" was a dozen miles from the scene of her exploit.
The disaster had temporarily unnerved the Germans. Once again, in spite of their cautious cruise in neutral waters, one of the ships had been sent to the bottom. And the irony of the situation lay in the fact that had the ships not altered course to head off the "Freya" beyond the three-mile limit, the opportunity for the British submarine to "bag" a Hun might not have occurred.
Steering a zig-zag course and sheltering between the far-flung lines of torpedo-boats, the remaining German cruisers ran frantically for the Kattegat and thence to the security of Kiel Harbour, while the torpedo-boat in which Tressidar and the luckless cutter's crew found themselves prisoners parted company and steamed rapidly in the direction of the island of Sylt.
It was not long before Sub-lieutenant Tressidar found that his ideas of hospitality differed considerably from the German lieutenant-commander's notions on the subject, for when the tumult on board had begun to subside—and not before—was the young officer sent below.
The "cabin" was little better than a metal compartment below the waterline and immediately underneath the officers' cabins. Although officially designated a torpedo-boat, the craft was almost equal in size to the largest British destroyer, her draught being not less than eleven feet. Built on the "cellular" principal, with double bottoms and numerous transverse and lateral watertight bulk-heads, this type of vessel was considered by the naval architects of the Fatherland to be practically unsinkable, although already several of this particular torpedo-boat's sister ships had failed to come up to expectations when cruel fate brought them within range of British quick-firers.
Save for a solitary electric lamp of low candle-power the sub.'s place of confinement was unlighted. Ventilation, too, was of the most meagre description, for the only air admitted was the already close atmosphere of 'tween decks that filtered in though a small "louvre" over the locked door. Without a sentry had been posted, but the key, instead of being entrusted to him, was kept in the lieutenant-commander's cabin. Thus, in the event of the vessel being sunk, it was fairly reasonable to assume that all chances of the prisoner being rescued depended upon the whim of the commanding officer and the alacrity of the German sentry, even if time permitted for him to risk his life for the sake of an "English swine."
Left to his own devices, Tressidar lost no time in taking minute stock of his surroundings. With the exception of a low bench, the place was devoid of furniture. The inner skin of the hull plating had been newly coated with red lead, and smelt abominably. In addition, some of the seams, working under the strain of the powerful engines, were "weeping" copiously, until the floor was flooded to a depth of two inches.
"Not a dog's chance of seeing what is going on," soliloquised the sub., as he threw himself upon the bench and drew his feet clear of the miniature lake. "I wonder what the game is? I hope, for my sake, and the sake of my men, that this hooker won't be torpedoed or mined while we are on board."
Tressidar was in a bad temper. The fact that he had been made a prisoner through the indefensible and high-handed action of the Huns riled him considerably. If he had had the ill-luck to be captured in fair fight he would, doubtless, have accepted the situation without demur, but to be literally kidnapped without the chance of a blow in self-defence was galling in the extreme.
Several hours passed. Save for a visit from a particularly surly seaman who brought the sub. a very sorry meal, Tressidar was left severely alone, to ruminate over his bad luck.
At length the slowing down of the torpedo-boat's engines told him that she was nearing port, for hitherto she had been racing at top speed and steering a zig-zag course. After twenty minutes, during which the engine-room telegraph bell clanged as many times, the vessel came to a standstill.
Then followed another tedious wait. Apparently the Huns were in no hurry to land their prisoner. But, since there is an end to all things, Tressidar in due course found himself being escorted on deck, preceded and followed by armed seamen.
It was still daylight. The torpedo-boat was berthed, in company with more than twenty others, in a spacious basin. Surrounding the enclosed water was a broad quay, flanked with two-storeyed buildings. The entrance to the basin was, remarkably, on the eastern side or remote from the open sea. Evidently the approach was by a tortuous, intricate channel that skirted the southernmost extremity of the island.
To the westward the outlook was bounded by a range of sand-dunes of varying altitudes. In some places they were about 50 feet in height; in others the grass-grown hummocks slightly exceeded double that dimension. A short distance to the north-west was a lighthouse, a round yellow tower perched upon a tall red cliff, that formed a striking contrast to the white sand-dunes on either side.
In almost every depression between the chain of dunes were heavy gun batteries, while on a broad level road running parallel to the sea and about two hundred yards from the summits of the sand-hills were numerous armoured motor-cars armed with quick-firers of widely differing calibres.
"Ah, I know where I am now," thought Tressidar as he recognised the lighthouse—not from actual acquaintanceship but from an intimate knowledge of the British "North Sea Pilot." "That's Rothe Kliff lighthouse, so they have landed me at Sylt. Next to Heligoland, they couldn't have chosen a stronger place to hold me prisoner. I wonder if they are going to keep me in some wretched prison camp in the centre of the German Empire."
He looked in vain for the cutter's crew. The men had been landed and marched off almost as the torpedo-boat was berthed, and were now on their way to embark in a small steamer for Hamburg.
The exhibition of captured British seamen in that paralysed commercial port was a stroke of diplomacy on the part of the German authorities. It gave colour to the official lie that a portion of the dauntless High Seas Fleet had boldly made a demonstration in force off the Firth of Forth The English had plucked up sufficient courage to leave their fortified harbours and give battle. It was a feeble attempt, and the British fleet broke off the engagement before the Germans could force a decisive action. As it was, a British battleship had been sunk with all hands. A large armoured cruiser had been sent to the bottom, a portion of the crew being rescued by the humane Germans. While engaged in this work of mercy the German cruiser had been torpedoed by a submarine. This was the fairy-tale that was quickly spread--broadcast from Hamburg to Königsberg and from the shores of the Baltic to the Swiss frontier.
Escorted by a file of marines, Tressidar was marched along the quay through throngs of curious and ill-disposed sightseers, of whom nine out of ten were in uniforms. At the end of the quay the escort turned down a narrow lane and finally came to a halt outside a low stone building, almost on the outskirts of the little town. The house stood in its own grounds, which were enclosed by a tall iron fence topped by a complex array of barbed wire. At the gate were two sentries. Two more stood in the portico of the house, while others were much in evidence as they marched to and fro on the raised platforms commanding an uninterrupted view of the grounds.
Inside the fence and separated from it by a distance of twenty feet was another barbed wire entanglement, while in the intervening space were several large and ferocious-looking mastiffs.
This was Sub-lieutenant Tressidar's first introduction to the naval prison of the fortress of Sylt.