A moment or two later Coggins, breathless and blasphemous, appeared at the top of the hatch. 'It's no good, sir,' he wailed; 'it's no —— good. I've done me best to tinker up they damned hengines to get 'em to 'eave round, but now the metal's bin and run in the cross'ead, and they won't 'eave round no more.'
'Is there nothing we can do to it?' queried the sub.
'I ain't seen nothin' aboard we can patch 'im up with, sir. Them hengines—them —— hengines—ain't fit to crack nuts, let alone be aboard a ship!'
The sub. bit his lip, for there they were, well out of sight of land, the ship helpless, and nothing in sight. But he had been trained as an engineer himself, and was better at the job than some people imagined.
'I'll come and have a look at it,' he announced. 'We must do something. I can't sail the damned ship home, and there's nobody here to tow us!'
Eventually, after three hours' hard labour, they succeeded in repairing the damage with a piece of sheet-brass filched from somewhere else. It is doubtful if any fully qualified engineer would have passed the repair as either safe or satisfactory; but by the time they had finished, and were black, bad-tempered, and greasy, the engines were persuaded to produce the revolutions for four knots without running very hot. Even four knots was better than drifting aimlessly about the sea with the prospect of being bagged by a submarine or dying of thirst and starvation.
The next thing which refused duty was the boiler itself. It gave out at eight o'clock the same evening, and once more Coggins, looking more like a demon from the nethermost pit than a respectable stoker petty officer of his Majesty's Navy, a rabid teetotaler, a strict chapel-goer, and the father of four children who attended Sunday school regularly, arrived on deck in a state of incoherent vituperation.
'And what's the matter now?' Hargreaves inquired.
'The biler, sir. 'E ain't bin cleaned for eight months, them Germans says. The uptake and toobes is all sooted up, and we carn't get no steam to the hengines no'ow!'
The sub. sighed. 'How long's it going to take to clean it?'