'I onterstan',' said Schmidt, fidgeting nervously.
'Remove the prisoner and let him carry on with his work,' the officer ordered. 'If he offers any further violence shoot him at once.' He winked. Billings grinned understandingly, and the hapless German was led away in a cold and clammy perspiration. They had no further trouble with him.
Hargreaves was no fool, and, being fully aware that idleness only breeds discontent and bickering, took very good care to keep his prisoners busy. They were not treated with undue severity, and received exactly the same food as their captors; but they experienced for the first time the rigours of British naval discipline. All day long they were kept hard at work in scrubbing and scraping the Anna to a state of hitherto undreamt-of cleanliness; while at night all of them—except the cook and the man on watch in the engine and boiler room, who perforce had to be allowed a certain amount of liberty, but were kept under constant supervision—slept in the stuffy little forecastle, with an armed sentry standing guard at the door.
Nothing on earth would induce the bluejackets to poke their noses inside the place, much less to inhabit it. They preferred to snatch what sleep they could under the stars; for though—thanks to the energy instilled into the unwilling Germans—the forecastle had been scrubbed far cleaner than it had ever been before, its cleanliness was merely superficial, and it was still well infested with 'hanimals,' as Billings called them.
'Them bugs is pisenous German bugs,' he had remarked, wrinkling his nose in disgust. 'Maybe them 'Uns is used ter 'em. I ain't, an' I'll watch it I don't go ter sleep in a place wi' wild hinsects a-suckin' o' me blood. It ain't fit an' proper, an' I sleeps on deck.'
Incidentally, it was the cook who gave Hargreaves one of the finest frights of his life. At midnight on the night they had come on board, the sub., leaving Billings in charge as officer of the watch, with orders to steer west and to call him at once if anything happened, retired to rest in a small compartment under the wheelhouse which had evidently been used as a charthouse, cabin, and storeroom all rolled into one. It was innocent of insects other than cockroaches, and had a cushioned locker at one side; while the rest of the space was filled with nets, cordage, canvas, paint, oil, and a quantity of food. Dependent from hooks in the ceiling were several dried fish, two bloated sausages, and a large raw ham. The place was stuffy and odorous; but Hargreaves was tired, and so, swathed in a blanket, he soon settled off to sleep on the locker with the door wide open.
Towards two in the morning some slight sound caused him to wake up with a start, and on opening his eyes his blood nearly froze in his veins. There, in the door, clearly silhouetted against the flood of moonlight beyond, was the dark figure of a man peering into the room in an attitude of rapt, listening attention. He was the German cook, from the shape of his bullet-head, and in one hand he held a murderous-looking knife with a long and glittering blade. He could only be there for one purpose, and his knife could only be intended for Hargreaves's throat.
The sub.'s first impulse was to shout for help, for an armed sentry should have been on the deck outside. Then he scouted the idea as impracticable, for the man would be upon him the instant he raised his voice, so he lay still, hardly daring to breathe. Then, with a feeling of great relief, he suddenly remembered the loaded automatic pistol under his pillow. He withdrew it softly, cocked the hammer without making a sound, and then, with the weapon poised, his finger on the trigger, and his nerves tingling, made up his mind to fire on the first sign of aggression.
The cook, treading stealthily, entered the room and looked round to the right and left. He next came towards the locker on which the sub. lay, and seemed to be examining the ceiling intently. Then he raised his knife for the blow.
The muzzle of the pistol went up and followed his every movement, but an instant later the sub. dropped the weapon with a chuckle of amusement…. The German was busily cutting a couple of inches off a particularly succulent sausage hanging from its hook.