Part 10 (2/2)
”'Aren't you goin' to 'ave a go at 'em?' says the mate.
”'You can 'ave all the go at 'em you please,' I says, 'after we leave the s.h.i.+p. Besides you there's 19 men and 4 Eurasians in this crew, and some of 'em will maybe like to see 'ome again--I know I do!'
”We get into the boats, myself takin' along what was left of a second case of Scotch, and good old pre-war Scotch it was, not the gory infant's food they serve these days that a man 'as to take a tumblerful of to know 'e's 'aving a drink at all. I also took along three sofy cus.h.i.+ons, hand-worked by the missus, with pink doves and cupids and the like--rare lookin' they was. 'A man might's well be comfortable,' I says.
”I 'ad a cook. 'If comfort's the word,' says the cook, 'I might's well take along the wife's canary,' and 'e takes it along in a cage in one 'and, and a bag of clothes in the other. 'E's in the boat when 'e thinks to go back for a package of seed 'e'd left for the canary on the shelf in the galley. 'Hurry up with your bird-seed,' I says, and as I do a sh.e.l.l comes along and explodes inside of 'er old frame somewheres, and the cook says maybe 'e'll be gettin' along without the seed--the canary not being what you'd call a 'eavy eater, anyway.
”The mate 'ad a cameraw, and when we're clear of the s.h.i.+p he would stand up and set the cameraw on the shoulders of a Eurasian fireman, and take shots of the s.h.i.+p between sh.e.l.ls.
”In good time one last sh.e.l.l 'its 'er, and down she goes. The U-boat moves off, and we see no more of 'er.
”It's a fine day and a lovely pink sunset, and there's a beautiful mild sirocco blowing off the African sh.o.r.e to make the 'ot night pleasant as we approach it in the boats. A man could 'ardly arsk to be torpedoed under more pleasant conditions, I say, and we continue to row toward the sh.o.r.e in 'igh 'opes. It's maybe two in the mornin' when we see the side-lights of a s.h.i.+p. She's bound east--a steamer--and we know she's a Britisher, because we're the only chaps carried lights in war zones at that time. Carryin' lights at night o' course made us grand marks for the U-boats, but there was no 'elp for it. A board o' trade regulation, that was, and no gettin' away from what the board o' trade says. We had our choice of carryin' lights and losin' our s.h.i.+ps, or not carryin'
lights and losin' our jobs. So we lost our s.h.i.+ps. After a year and a 'alf of war some bright chap in the board said that maybe it would be a good idea to change the regulation about carrying lights, and they did.
And about time, we said.
”Some of the crew were for 'ailing the s.h.i.+p in the night. ''Ail 'ell!' I says. 'D'y' think I want to be took into that rotten 'ole of a Port Said, or maybe Alexandria, and that end of the Mediterranean fair lousy with U-boats. Besides, we'll get 'ome quicker this way,' I says, and allows her to pa.s.s on. In the mornin' we run onto the beach, and 'ardly there when a crowd of Ayrabs come gallopin' down on 'orseback to us.
'We'll be killed now,' says the mate, and talks under his breath of stubborn captains, who wouldn't 'ail a friendly s.h.i.+p's light in the dark, but the only killing the Ayrabs do is two young goats for breakfast. And they make coffee that was coffee, and we had a lovely meal on the sand. And by and by they steered us along the sh.o.r.e to where was a French destroyer, which takes us over to Gibraltar, and from Gib we pa.s.sed on through Spain and France to Havre. Three weeks that took, and I never 'ad such a three weeks in all my life. 'Eroes, ragin'
'eroes--that's wot we were!
”At Havre the French authorities took the mate's pictures out of the cameraw, and they never did give 'em back. Except for that, it was a fine pleasure, that land cruise 'ome.
”Lucky? Oh, aye, you may well say it. Three times in one week I 'ad me 'ot barth and my lovely sleep in me brahss bed--it's not to be looked for with ordinary luck, you know.”
One day the destroyer to which I was a.s.signed put to sea. There were other destroyers, and we were to take a fleet of merchantmen from the naval base to such and such a lat.i.tude and longitude, and there turn them loose. My friend's s.h.i.+p was of the convoy.
We made such and such a lat.i.tude and longitude, and there we turned them loose, signalling the position to them and waiting for acknowledgment.
They acknowledged the signal. We then hoisted the three pennants which everywhere at sea means: Pleasant voyage! They answered with the three pennants which everywhere spells: Thank you. And no sooner done than away they belted, each for himself, and let the U-boats get the hindmost.
The hindmost here was the rusty old cargo boat of my friend. I could see her for miles after the others were hull down; and long after I could see her I could picture him--walking his lonely bridge and his s.h.i.+p plugging away at her 7 or maybe 7-1/2 knots across the lonely ocean.
Three times torpedoed and taking it all as part of his work! Some day they may get him and he not come back; and when they do the world will hear little about him. Hero? He a hero? Why a sh.o.r.e-going flunky had him bluffed for smoking a surrept.i.tious cigarette in high quarters! 'Ero?
Not 'im. Why 'e don't even wear a uniform.
So there they are, the wheezing old cargo boats and their officers and crew. British, French, Italian, American, but mostly British.
No heroes, but the Lord help their people if they hadn't stayed on the job.
FLOTILLA HUMOR--AT SEA
We were a group of American destroyers convoying twenty home-bound British steamers. There was one s.h.i.+p, a _P. & O._ liner, a great specimen of camouflaging.
She was the only s.h.i.+p in the convoy that was camouflaged, and she rode in stately style two lengths out in front of the others. All of which made her a prominent object. Our officers felt like telling her to dress back; but she had a British commodore aboard, and for an American two or three striper to try to advise a British commodore--well, it isn't done.
All day long she rode out in front of the column, and all day long our fellows kept saying things about her.
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