"What about it?" asked Sir William.
"A little row of notches—that's all. He adds another from time to time, and I feel sort of sorry for Fritz when he's about."
"Like rats' tails hanging on a stable door," supplemented the First
Lieutenant in explanation.
"I see," said Sir William. "This is going to be interesting." He pitched the stump of his cigar overboard and turned up the collar of his ulster as the spray began to drift past their heads.
"We work together sometimes," said the Submarine Officer, "Gedge and I. Little stunts, you know…. It's part of my job, of course, huntin' Fritzes, but it's more than a job with him: it's a holy mission. That's why I'm a bit frightened of him really." The speaker searched the visitor's face with his guileless blue eyes. "I'm afraid of meeting him one day, unexpectedly, before I can establish our identity!" His quick smile flashed across his sunburnt face and was gone again.
The Submarine was passing under frowning walls of cliff, and the murmur of the surf thundering about the caverns and buttresses of that rock-bound coast almost drowned the throb of the engines beneath their feet. Far out to seaward a formation of Mine-sweeping Sloops crept away to the west. Close inshore, where the gulls circled vociferously, an insignificant trawler with a rusty funnel lay rolling in the swell. A wisp of bunting jerked to the stumpy foremast, and a pair of hand-flags zigzagged above the trawler's wheel-house. The Yeoman of Signals on the Submarine's conning tower stiffened like a statue as he read the message.
"Says, 'Will Sir William Thor-r-ogood come aboar-r-d, sir? If so, he'll send a boat.'" His speech placed him at home in these Northern latitudes.
"Reply, 'Yes. Please send boat.'"
A quarter of an hour later Sir William was climbing out of a tubby dinghy over the trawler's bulwarks. A big bronzed man in a jersey and sea-boots, wearing the monkey-jacket of a Lieutenant of the Reserve and a uniform cap slightly askew, came forward, one enormous hand outstretched in greeting. "Pleased to meet you, sir," he said. "My name's Gedge."
Sir William shook hands and winced.