The Radio Gunner

by Alexander Forbes

Nor was his time all spent in this laboratory: his duties took him aboard nearly every ship in the flotilla, where he scrutinized the condition of the apparatus, questioned the operators, stimulated their interest, and set them thinking as they had never thought before. Most of the destroyer skippers noticed an increase in efficiency in the handling of communications by the men under them, and some patted themselves lustily on the back for it. It was not long after his arrival that he had made the round of the radio-compass stations on shore, not only in the Azores, but also at Madeira and the Canaries. On these excursions he tested and calibrated each station with a destroyer circling at a distance of two or three miles, sending signals; and he spared no pains to satisfy himself that the operators had a thorough understanding of their duties, and knew full well that on their vigilance rested large issues.

But after his first general survey of the flotilla as regards its efficiency in communications, Evans found time for further research which this survey had suggested to him; and he was never so happy as when thus engaged. Sometimes, as a result of an idea either in the realm of electrical theory or of tactical expediency, the need of intensive development of new or modified apparatus would appear; then an engineering research, which in peace-time would require months, was completed in five or six days. Evans in his dungarees would work day and night with his skilled assistants, often risking death among wires charged with a thousand volts or more. No time was spent writing detailed protocols of experiments. Results were carried in his head with only occasional notes scribbled on scraps of paper or on the walls of the test shop. The radio chief who assisted him became fired with his enthusiasm and worked ungrudgingly for long hours which would ordinarily make most petty officers grumble loud and long.

In the warrant officers’ mess Evans was more often the listener than the speaker. When occasion offered, he would draw out the older men on the specialties in which they were expert, and often would guide the conversation into a discussion of coördination, in which each man was stumped to show how his particular duty fitted into the organization of the navy as a whole, and thereby was led to see his own function in a new light, thus acquiring an increased sense of his responsibility. There was one old boatswain named Jenks nearly sixty years of age, a veteran of both the Spanish and the German wars, a relic of the old type of seaman that is all too scarce. Evans delighted in leading him to open his rich storehouse of experience, and in drawing from him his old-time navy lore. Jenks in his turn found Evans sympathetic, and talked with him as he did with few other men, revealing a shrewdness and wisdom which had often stood him and the navy in good stead.

To the mess as a whole Evans remained something of an enigma. They saw him in his room manipulating a slide-rule and jotting down figures on a scrap of paper, softly humming a tune to himself the while. Few of them had ever seen a slide-rule, and from his frequent use of it they inferred that he had had more schooling than most of them; but in general they found him rather uncommunicative as to his past history.

For exercise and relaxation Evans frequently went ashore and took a walk among the hills. On his first shore liberty the sense of foreign picturesqueness came over him more than ever as he approached the antique landing in the center of the town, where at the water’s edge was an array of architecture so different from anything in the Anglo-Saxon world. On shore he found himself in a strange world indeed. Strange sights, sounds, and smells greeted him everywhere; barefooted men were leading donkeys laden with goods about the narrow, dirty streets. And after flooding his senses with a riot of impressions of an alien world, it was with a distinct sense of homecoming that he returned to his quarters aboard the mother-ship of the flotilla.

He had not been at Punta Delgada long before he discovered a spot easy of access, walled off from the town, in which, among the most restful and soothing surroundings, he could give himself over to relaxation or thought. This was the ancient Borge garden, created by one of the Portuguese nobles who flourished on these islands in the far-off days of their feudal prosperity. Now neglected, overgrown with weeds, this antiquated paradise reflects its former glory with a stronger appeal than if it were kept up with a lavish hand, much as the ivy-covered ruins of England tell their story all the better for their ruined state.

In the Borge garden there are trees of the strangest, most fantastic character—trees with pudgy leaves, trees with shapes one would never believe could really exist. Here and there are deep grottoes with giant tree-ferns growing from their depths; zigzag stony paths lead down into them or through tunnels or over bridges artfully contrived to conceal as far as possible their artificial nature. Fascinating glimpses into the depths of tropical greenery are thus given emphasis by their skillful setting. Surmounting the rest of the garden high up on the slope is an ancient watch-tower commanding a view of the sea. Crumbling steps overgrown with weeds lead up the side to its summit. Beside it stands a majestic and venerable tree, a conifer of the cedar or cypress group, which must have stood there for centuries casting its deep shade on the old watch-tower. Framed under its great lichen-covered branches, the wide expanse of the blue ocean makes the fairest of pictures—one on which the eye can rest and never tire.

Evans made friends with the old barefoot gardener who opened the great gate in the garden wall, and by signs and gestures allayed his suspicions till the old man admitted him cheerfully whenever he knocked.

Here, when his brain was taxed and overwrought, he would seek the quiet of the garden and give himself over to rest or meditation. Sometimes he would wander through the depths of the great fern grottoes, but oftener he would climb to the top of the watch-tower and sit gazing off over the blue expanse of sea, as perhaps the lookout had done in other wars of a bygone age. Many a problem in the borderland of science and strategy which harassed him in the turmoil of life aboard ship yielded a solution to his mind unfettered and free as it was when he sat on the watch-tower.

The Borge garden was inhabited by numerous small birds that sang melodiously among the trees and shrubs, and so doing enhanced immeasurably the charm of the place. Evans was no ornithologist, but he was a lover of all wild life, and especially of birds. He took with him to the garden liberal stores of crumbs which he scattered on the ground about him. Little by little the more venturesome of his feathered friends grew accustomed to his presence, and would light on the ground beside him, till finally one or two actually came and ate from his hand. He would talk and whistle to them, and in course of time, whenever they heard his voice, they would fly to the old tree by the watch-tower and there await the social feast which he never failed to bring. He in turn found a deal of cheer in the companionship of his bird friends. And so it was that when disheartened or exasperated with inertia and officiousness, the snarls of red-tape in which supply clerks entangled much-needed gear, or the stupidity and indifference of radio operators whom he tried to instruct, he found in the little birds of the garden a solace that made life more livable, and more than once helped him over the hard places.