"But now," continued Kaspar Krauss, taking up the parable, "every strafed English ship has a gun, and one never knows but that a coasting vessel is not a death-trap for us. You remember that fishing-smack off Flamborough?"
Furst shuddered.
"Will I ever forget it?" he answered. "'Tis marvellous that we live to tell the tale. What would I not give for a life ashore with a tankard of Munich beer, a loaf of good bread and cheese? And tobacco—what is tobacco? I have almost forgotten."
"There was some in that Dutch vessel we burnt a week ago," said Krauss.
Furst clenched his fists.
"And where did it go?" he demanded. "That schweinhund our kapitan put it under lock and key. He and the pig-faced von Loringhoven smoke every night when we rise to recharge batteries, but never a cigar or a pipeful comes our way."
"We'll be back again on Friday if all goes well," said the other. "Then we can enjoy ourselves."
"Enjoy ourselves!" echoed Furst contemptuously. "How? I've got a bundle of notes in my belt, but precious little use are they. In the good old days a mark was a mark, but now——"
"Yes, I know," snarled Krauss. "Just before the war I came back from America on the George Washington with eight hundred and fifty marks to my name. I was going to buy a small business in Bremen and settle down to a life ashore. I should have done well. Then came the war. The rascally swindlers told us that if we lent our money to the State it would be repaid with twenty-five per cent. when peace was proclaimed. Just imagine! I handed over my eight hundred marks in silver, fool that I was! Even supposing the government does pay me back a thousand marks, it will be in rotten paper money, and I know that five thousand now will not buy the place I had offered to me for eight hundred and fifty four years ago."
"There will be trouble," agreed Furst. "Do you know that there is a movement amongst the men of the U-boats' crews to hoist the Red Flag?"