Count Luckner, the Sea Devil

by Lowell Thomas; Graf von Felix Luckner

We got hold of the half-caste who had been so inquisitive. The white man we had seen on horseback was with him. Something, indeed, was afoot. We talked casually with them and then suggested drinking. They were interested, and became enthusiastic when we produced our half gallon of rum. In the half-breed's hut we staged a drinking bout, which lasted half through the night. Nothing like rum to make men friendly and conversational. The half-breed got so conversational that he blurted out,

"Why, you're all right. But at first we thought you were Germans. We could get fifty pounds if you were Germans."

Now, as an American sailor would say, you've got to "hand it" to the English. They know how to spend money when it is useful. We Germans are usually more niggardly, or "careful" some might call it. We will try to save a mark and then lose thousands. Having received the wireless warning from the resident at Aitutaki of mysterious armed Germans in the South Seas, the authorities in the Fijis had passed word among the natives to be on the lookout for us, and had offered a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar reward to anyone who turned in definite information about a party of Germans posing as neutrals.

It was clear enough that the half-breed and the white man had been plotting to hand us over to the authorities, but how far they had gone we did not know. We didn't find out that night. It was not until later that we learned the white man's horseback ride had been to give a warning about us to the captain of a cutter in the harbour, and that the cutter had at once shoved off to carry the message to the officials on one of the larger islands a day's sail away. Not knowing this, we used a good deal of persuasion to put the idea firmly into the heads of the two men that we could not possibly be Germans. It may have been our eloquence, or, more likely, the genial influence of the rum, but, at any rate, they seemed to lose all of their suspicions and became convinced that we were the truest Norwegians from Scandinavia. Kircheiss and I, somewhat the worse from our session at detective work, slept at the Englishman's house.

The four others were offered quarters ashore for the night, but two of my boys remained in the boat as a precaution. It was well they did, too. During the night, native swimmers went out to her and cut the anchor rope. They were put up to it by a Malay police officer who was suspicious of us. Not knowing any or my men would remain on board her, since she was only an open lifeboat, he planned to search her. So he sent his swimmers out to pull her ashore and beach her. The wind was inshore. The anchor rope cut, the boat drifted in. Our two men were asleep, and only awakened when keel jarred against bottom. Dark figures were around in the water, trying to pull the boat on the beach. Our men, pistol in hand, drove them away and then pushed out into open water.

On the following day, we made our final costly error. The ships in the harbour weighed anchor and raised sail. We picked the one that seemed the newest and arranged with the skipper to take us along with him to Suva, on the main island Viti Levu. Of course, our plan was simply to sail a few miles out to sea with him and then take the ship ourselves after donning our uniforms and getting out all of our weapons. A sudden squall blew up and forced the vessels back to port. We returned with her. And now we should have taken her while she lay at anchor. The people ashore would have seen what was going on, but we could have held up the island and then put to sea, storm or no storm. That was our first impulse. We should have followed it. Always trust your first impulse—at any rate, if you go into the pirate business. It is the boldest and best. Instead, we chose a more cautious course. Prudence ceases to be a virtue when you are on an adventure like ours. We had been bold enough heretofore, and I have no satisfactory explanation for our caution now. It may have been that we were not quite ourselves. Our voyage down from the Societies and the Cooks to Fiji, with those days of hunger, thirst, and scurvy, had sapped our strength and vitality. Perhaps, although we felt quite well, we had not yet got back our full vigour of body and mind. Perhaps we were low on red corpuscles. At any rate, we resolved to wait until the following day and capture our ship when it had got out to sea. While we waited, another vessel arrived.

She was a beauty, too, and would have delighted any seaman's eye as she came sailing into the harbour. She had just arrived, we were told, from Suva. She ran regularly among the islands, carrying merchandise to the traders. She was a handsome three-masted schooner with auxiliary motor power, new, clean, and trim, just the kind of ship we wanted.

"By Joe," I said to my boys, "there's our ship."

We immediately dismissed all idea of the old windjammer we had intended to capture, and devoted ourselves to this new beauty. A council of war was held, after which Kircheiss went to the captain of the vessel, which now had docked, and told him that we were Norwegians who, while making a cruise in a lifeboat, had missed our ship, which was taking coal from Australia to Suva. Could we not take passage with him to Suva instead of on the other slower old craft, so that we could get back to our own ship? We would pay regular rates for the passage.

"All right," replied the captain, a jovial, unsuspecting fellow. "Come aboard at eight o'clock this evening. We sail in the morning."