Part 38 (1/2)

'That's the naner, I've heard; runs a salvage concern, too, Juist way'

'Well, he won't get any of hed, and soon after took my leave, and inquired from a passer-by the road to Dornum

'Follow the railway,' I was told

With a ind in my face from the south-west, fleecy clouds and a half-moon overhead, I set out, not for Bensersiel but for Benser Tief, which I knew must cross the road to Dornum somewhere A mile or so of cobbled causeway flanked with ditches and s, and running cheek by joith the railway track; then a bridge, and below me the 'Tief'; which was, in fact, a small canal A rutty track left the road, and sloped down to it one side; a rough siding left the railway, and sloped down to it on the other

I lit a pipe and sat on the parapet for a little No one was stirring, so with great circuan to reconnoitre the left bank to the north The siding entered a fenced enclosure by a locked gate--a gate I could have easily cliain and look across The enclosure was a saunt heaps of coal glittering in the side, and a deserted office building I skulked along a sandy towpath in solitude Fens and field were round me, as the map had said; s and osier-beds; the di unfettered over a plain; once or twice the flutter and quack of a startled wild-duck

Presently I came to a farmhouse, dark and silent; opposite it, in the canal, a couple of ees I climbed into one of these, and sounded with my stick on the off-side--barely three feet; and the torpedo-boat melted out of my speculations The streaes to pass with coht I saw, and a fewin side-cuts linked by culverts to the canal, but nothing noteworthy; and mindful that I had to explore the Wittmund side of the railway too, I turned back, already a trifle da under the road and railway, I again followed the tow-path, which, after half aand another fenced enclosure; a timber-yard by the look of it This tiain, and cli back, but its occupants evidently slept) I was in a timber-yard, by the stacks of wood and the stea more than a timber-yard, for as I warily advanced under the shadow of the trees at the edge of the clearing I caely reminded me of Memmert, and below it, nearer the canal, loomed a dark skeleton framework, which proved to be a half-built vessel on stocks Close by was a sie A paved slipway led to the water here, and the canal broadened to a siding or back-water in which lay seven or eightand went on, walking, I should think, three miles by the side of the canal, till the question of bed and ulterior plans broughtlittle to my information I had encountered a brick-field, but soon after that there was increasing proof that the canal was as yet little used for traffic It grew narrower, and there were ns of recent labour for its i excavated, evidently to abridge an impossible bend The path had beco inblue line on the o farther, and retracedto concoct a story which would satisfy an irritable Esens inn-keeper that it was a respectable wayfarer, and not a tramp or a lunatic, who knocked him up at half-past one or thereabouts

But a much more practical resource occurred to , free and accessible, lay there ready to hand I boarded one of the ees in the backwater, and surveyed ht It was of a sihter, strictly, in the sense that it had no means of self-propulsion, and no separate quarters for a crew, the whole interior of the hull being free for cargo At both bow and stern there were ten feet or so of deck, garnished with bitts and bollards The rest was an open well, flanked by ays of substantial breadth; the whole of stout construction and, for a hun, with a marked forward sheer, and, as I had observed in the specimen on the stocks, easy lines at the stern In short, it was apparent, even to an ignorant landsned not ht be, for, though the few miles of sea she had to cross in order to reach the islands were both shallow and sheltered, I knew from experience what a vicious surf they could be whipped into by a sudden gale It must not be supposed that I dwelt on this s of iination still drooped nervelessly at hterit -place Under the stern-deck was stored a massive roll of tarpaulin, a corner of which ood pillow It was a descent froht; but a spy, I reflected philosophically, cannot expect a feather bed two nights running, and this one was at any rate airier and roomier than the coffin-like bunk of the 'Dulcibella', and not so very ly ensconced, I studied theon me in the last half-hour that this canal was only one of several; that in concentrating otten that there were other villages ending in siel, also furnished on the chart with corkscrew streams; and, moreover, that Bohme's statistics of depth and distance had been ories, A to G The very first es The suffix _siel_ repeated itself all round the coast-line Five ersiel, and farther on Carolinensiel Four miles as Dornuenriedersiel That was six on the north coast of the peninsula alone On the west coast, facing the Eood way south of Norden But on the east, facing the Jade, there were no less than eight, at very close intervals A roup; they had nothing to do with Esens, nor had they any i roup of six on the north coast, whose outlook was the chain of islands, and whose inland centre, almost exactly, was Esens I still wanted one tohypothesis added the solitary Greetsiel At all seven villages streams debouched, as at Bensersiel From all seven points of issue dotted lines weretowards the islands And on the mainland behind the whole sevenfold system ran the loop of railway But there were manifold minor points of difference No stream boasted so deep and decisive a blue lintel as did Benser Tief; none penetrated so far into the Hinterland They varied in length and sinuosity Two, those belonging to Hilgenriedersiel and Greetsiel, appeared not to reach the railway at all On the other hand, Carolinensiel, opposite wangeroog Island, had a branch line all to itself

Match after match waxed and waned as I puzzled over the mystic seven

In the end I puzzled myself to sleep, with the one fixed idea that to-morrow, oncanals, if such they were My dreahty chain of redoubts andthe sand-dunes of desolate islets; built, coral-like, by infinitely slow and secret labour; fed by lethal cargoes borne in lighters and in charge of stealthy mutes who, one and all, bore the likeness of Griht (the weathersoood e I halted and fell into torments of indecision There was so much to do and so little time to do it in

The whole probleain doubled and redoubled--seven blue lines on land, seven dotted lines on the sea, seven islands in the offing Once I was near deciding to put ; but thatthe rendezvous, and I was loth to do that

At any rate, I wanted breakfast badly; and the best way to get it, and at the saround, was to walk to Dornum Then I should find a blue line called the _Neues Tief_ leading to Dornumersiel, on the coast That explored, I could pass on to Nesse, where there was another blue line to Nessmersiel All this was on the way to Norden, and I should have the railway constantly atThe last train ( Norden at 715 pe Station at 75

A brisk walk of six ry, to Dornuether all the time, and about half-way had been joined on the left by a third companion in the shape of a puny stream which I knew fro and doubling like an eel, choked with sedges and reeds, it had no pretensions to being navigable At length it looped away into the fens out of sight, only to reappear again close to Dornu where the railway crossed it, but at the town itself, which it skirted on the east, a towpath began, and a piled wharf had been recently constructed Going on to this was a red-brick building with the look of a warehouse, roofless as yet, and orke of my appetite

If I had been wise I should have been content with a snack bought at a counter, but a thirst for hot coffee and clues induced me to repeat the experiment of Esens and seek a primitive beer-house I was less lucky on this occasion The house I chose was obscure enough, but its proprietor was no si rascal with shi+fty eyes and a debauched complexion, who showed a most unwelcome curiosity in his customer As a last fatality, he wore a peaked cap like my own, and turned out to be an ex-sailor I should have fled at the sight of him had I had the chance, but I was attended to first by a slatternly girl who, I am sure, called him up to view me To explain my muddy boots and trousers I said I had walked frole of iroove, I placedto Dornumersiel (which is opposite Baltru a bow at a venture, I dared not assue, and spoke of the visit as alliot from there to Baltrum; but he knew, or pretended to know, Baltrurew the more nervous in that I saw from the first that he took me to be of better condition than most merchant seah in pleading haste to pull out froold watch with the chain and seals attached He told me there was no hurry, that I shouldstrong waters on ave e in his career a dock-side cried seamen, and as often as not are ex-seamen themselves, versed in the weaknesses of the tribe He was now keeping his hand in withto the very class he was used to victiold watch, and, doubtless, a full purse Nothing more ridiculously inopportune could have befallen erous; for his class are as cosift for language and as unerring a scent for nationality Sure enough, the fellow recognized edEncumbered with the mythical sister, of course I stuck tothat I had picked up the accent, and also gave hilish At the saht him an impertinent nuisance, paid my score and walked out--quit of hi me the way to Dornu that he was in liquor, in spite of the early hour, I dared not risk a quarrelsoht at any moment elicit inshop in the hope of giving him the slip--a disastrous resource, which was ladly draw a veil over our scandalous progress through peaceable Dornum, of the terrors I experienced when he introduced lish friend, and of the abasement I felt, too, as, linked arm in arm, we trod the three miles of road coastwards It was his lish; a fortunate whim, as it turned out, because I knew no fo'c'sle Gerathered fro With these I exte of oaths and blasphees Of course he knew every port in the world, but happily was none too critical, owing to repeated _schnappsen_

Nevertheless, it was a deplorable _contrete my time, for the road took a different direction to the Neues Tief, so that I had not even the advantage of inspecting the canal and only met with it e reached the sea Here it split into twointo two littleits cluster of houses I ht for the _Gasthaus_ at Dornumersiel, primed my companion well, and asked him to hile I saw about a boat in the harbour; but, needless to say, I never rejoined him I just took a cursory look at the left-hand harbour, saw a lighter locking through (for the tide was high), and then walked as fast as s would carrythe sea ards in the teeth of a smart shower of rain, full of deep apprehensions as to the stir and gossip ht cause if h to discover it As soon as I deemed it safe, I dropped on to the sand and ran till I could run no more Then I sat on my bundle with my back to the dyke in partial shelter fro the sea recede from the flats and dwindle into slenderover the islands till those pale shapes were lost inacross towards Langeoog behind a tug and a wisp of sht! That waswith reports of an Englishain the railway and slink into that train to Norden Now directly I began to resign hts on the rendezvous, a new doubt assailedhad seemed more certain yesterday than that Norden was the scene of the rendezvous, but that was before the seven _siels_ had come into pro As I wondered why, it suddenly occurred to h farther inland than Norden, were equally 'coast stations', in the sense that they were in touch with harbours (of a sort) on the coast Norden had its tidal creek, but Esens and Dornum had their 'tiefs' or canals Fool that I had been to put such a narrow and literal construction on the phrase 'the tide serves!'

Which was it more likely that my conspirators would visit--Norden, whose intrusion into our theories was purely hypothetical, or one of these _siels_ to whose sevenfold systenificance?

There was only one answer; and it filled e Norden

Which to make for? Out came the time-table and map, and with them hope The case was not so bad after all; it derave uncertainties and risks

Norden was still the objective, but mainly as a railway junction, only reht, the possible stations were reduced to five--Norden, Hage, Dornule line Trains froible, because there were none that could be called night trains, the latest being the one I had thisme to Norden, where it arrived at 715 Of trains from west to east there was only one that need be considered, the sa Norden at 743 and reaching Esens at 850, and Wittmund at 913 This train, as the reader ith me in it knoas in correspondence with another from Emden and the south, and also, I now found, with services from Hanover, Bremen, and Berlin He will also remember that I had to wait three-quarters of an hour at Norden, from 7 to 743

The platform at Norden Junction, therefore, between 715, when I should arrive at it _from_ the east, and 743 when Bohme and his unknown friend should leave it _for_ the east; there, and in that half-hour, wastwo at least of the conspirators I hted If I could not find them at all I should be thrown back on the rejected view that Norden itself was the rendezvous, and should wait there till 1046

In the meantime it was all very well to resolve on inaction till dusk; but after an hour's rest, damp clothes and feet, and the absence of pursuers, tees as long as it was light, I cut across country south-ards--a dismal and laborious journey, with oozy fens and knee-deep drains to course, with circuits to be s behind dykes and s What little I learnt was in harles the line of the Harke Tief, the strea at Nessmersiel It, too, was in the nature of a canal, but only in embryo at the point I touched it, south of Nesse Works on a deviation were in progress, and in a short digression down streaenriedersiel, the fourth of the seven, I had no tie Station, very tired, wet, and footsore, after covering nearly twenty hter

From here to Norden it was a run in the train of tenso the ue vanished when the train drew up at the station, and the an to run their course Having donned a bulky muffler and turned up the collar of my pea-jacket, I crossed over i-office, and at once sighted--von Bruning--yes, von Bruning in ure, pleasant features, and neat brown beard He was just leaving the , gathering up a ticket and some coins I joined a _queue_ of three or four persons aiting their turn, flattened myself between the heard what station he had booked for, I took a fourth-class ticket to Wittmund, which covered all chances

Then, with ht the darkest corner of the ill-lit co-room where, by the tiresome custom in Germany, would-be travellers are penned till their train is ready Von Bruning I perceived sitting in another corner, with his hat over his eyes and a cigar between his lips A boy broughtit, I watched People passed in and out, but nobody spoke to the sailor in mufti When a quarter of an hour elapsed, a platfore, Dornuers jostled out to the platfor their tickets I was slow overiar smoke curled into my face I looked over his shoulder at the ticket he showed, ht a muttered double sibilant from the official who checked it; ran over the stations in my head, and pounced on _Esens_ That was as much I wanted to know for the present; so I ht of ed, to look out of the