“Shall we destroy that, too?” inquired one of my lieutenants, pointing to the little schooner.
“Certainly,” was my answer. “It has sailed on its last voyage. Detail a man at once to be ready with the explosive cartridges.”
With our machine guns and fire-arms ready for action, we landed at a little dock on the beach, without meeting with resistance of any kind, and, falling into step, we promptly proceeded to the wireless station. The destruction of the little white sail-boat was deferred for the time being, as I wished first of all to find out how affairs on shore would develop.
We quickly found the telegraph building and the wireless station, took possession of both of them, and so prevented any attempt to send signals. Then I got hold of one of the Englishmen who were swarming about us, and ordered him to summon the director of the station, who soon made his appearance,—a very agreeable and portly gentleman.
“I have orders to destroy the wireless and telegraph station, and I advise you to make no resistance. It will be to your own interest, moreover, to hand over the keys of the several houses at once, as that will relieve me of the necessity of forcing the doors. All fire-arms in your possession are to be delivered immediately. All Europeans on the island are to assemble in the square in front of the telegraph building.”
The director seemed to accept the situation very calmly. He assured me that he had not the least intention of resisting, and then produced a huge bunch of keys from out his pocket, pointed out the houses in which there was electric apparatus of which we had as yet not taken possession, and finished with the remark: “And now, please accept my congratulations.”
“Congratulations! Well, what for?” I asked with some surprise.
“The Iron Cross has been conferred on you. We learned of it from the Reuter telegram that has just been sent on.”
We now set to work to tear down the wireless tower. The men in charge of the torpedoes quickly set them in place. The stays that supported the tower were demolished first, and then the tower itself was brought down and chopped into kindling wood. In the telegraph rooms the Morse machines were still ticking busily. What the messages were we could not decipher, for they were all in secret code. But we chuckled with both amusement and satisfaction as we pictured to ourselves the astonishment of the senders, who were waiting in vain for a reply to their messages, for, from the vigorous action of the apparatus, we concluded that some information was eagerly desired. But this, to our regret, it was not in our power to furnish.
Our next duty was quite to the taste of my vigorous boys in blue. A couple of heavy axes were soon found, and, in a few minutes, Morse apparatus, ink bottles, table legs, cable ends, and the like were flying about the room. “Do the work thoroughly!” had been our orders. Every nook and corner were searched for reserve apparatus and other like matter, and everything that bore any semblance of usefulness in a wireless station was soon destroyed. Unfortunately this fate was shared by a seismometer that had been set up on the island. In their zeal my men had mistaken it for a lately invented addition to the telegraph service.