"Well, I'm a good judge of men, and we must take people as we find them. Chief-officer Fritz Schweitzer is a perfect spy and a first-class officer of submarines. Awash or under the surface, he knows no fear. But a little, able-bodied seaman, six weeks ago at Kiel, gave him a thrashing in a Bierhalle till he wept. One thing we must remember to-morrow—everything must be said in German. I like to talk English, as you know. It pleases me to be taken for a sedentary city gentleman, it's my little vanity, von Vedal, but, for safety's sake, to-morrow night, when She comes ..."
"Quite so. Have you finished your cigar? Then let us go up on deck and see what the night is like."
There was a slight grating sound and an almost imperceptible swish as the gun-punt swung away from the side of the Hulk, swept round the miniature headland and raced for the mouth of the Miel Creek.
[1] See Frontispiece.
CHAPTER VI
HOW JOHN CAREY FOUGHT WITH THE GERMAN GIANT IN THE SALOON, AND "MR. JONES" MET UNEXPECTED THINGS IN THE NIGHT
It was five o'clock, low tide in the marsh creeks, and snow was falling lightly.
At high tide, the Doctor's Hulk rose considerably above the bank of Thirty Main Creek. It was three yards from the solid mud of the salting, and when the bridge was dropped one went up an incline to reach the deck.