Part 14 (1/2)

The captain-they called his in the job He was a Frisian and a first-class deep-water seaman, but, since he knew the Rhine delta, and because the German mercantile marine was laid on the ice till the end of war, they had turned him on to this show He was bored by the business, and didn't understand it very well The river charts puzzled hi for hundreds of e You could see that he would have been far h the shoals of the Eainst a northeaster in the shallow Baltic He had six barges in tow, but the heavy flood of the Danubeslow There were twoto draw rations That was a funny business, for we never lay to if we could help it There was a dinghy belonging to each barge, and the e's dinghy, and so forth Six e nearest us and carry off supplies for the rest The men were mostly Frisians, slow-spoken, sandy-haired lads, very like the breed you strike on the Essex coast

It was the fact that Schenk was really a deep-water sailor, and so a novice to the job, that ood fellow and quite willing to take a hint, so before I had been twenty-four hours on board he was tellingmy best to cheer hiht was New Year's Eve

I knew that that night was a season of gaiety in Scotland, but Scotland wasn't in it with the Fatherland Even Schenk, though he was in charge of valuable stores and was voyaging against time, was quite clear that the men must have permission for some kind of beano Just before darkness we came abreast a fair-sized tohose naht The arrangee, and the other get four hours' leave ashore Then he would return and relieve his friend, who should proceed to do the sa I foresaw that there would be some fun when the first batch returned, but I did not dare to protest I was desperately anxious to get past the Austrian frontier, for I had a half-notion we ht be searched there, but Schenk took his Sylvesterabend business so seriously that I would have risked a row if I had tried to argue

The upshot hat I expected We got the first batch aboard about led in at all hours nextI stuck to the boat for obvious reasons, but next day it becao ashore with the captain to try and round up the stragglers We got them all in but two, and I am inclined to think these two had never meant to come back If I had a soft job like a river-boat I shouldn't be inclined to run away in the middle of Germany with the certainty that my best fate would be to be scooped up for the trenches, but your Frisian has no ination than a haddock The absentees were both watches, and I fancy the ot on their nerves

The captain was in a raging tein with He would have started a press-gang, but there was no superfluity of randfathers As I was helping to run the trip I was pretty annoyed also, and I sluiced down the drunkards with icy Danube water, using all the worst language I knew in Dutch and Gerh the river-side streets I re overhead, and wished I could get a shot at them I told one felloas the reat Elish

'God in Heaven!' said the captain, 'we can delay no longer We must make shi+ft the best we can I can spare one ine-roo back rather short in the hen I espied a figure sitting on a bench beside the booking-office on the pier It was a sliure, in an old suit of khaki: so lost the se peacefully, looking out upon the river and the boats and us noisy felloiththere and looking like nothing on earth I couldn't have been nition He aiting for his cue

I spoke rapidly in Sesutu, for I was afraid the captain ht know Dutch

'Where have you come from?' I asked

'They shut me up in tronk,' said Peter, 'and I ran away I am tired, Cornelis, and want to continue the journey by boat'

'Remember you have worked for me in Africa,' I said 'You are just home from Damaraland You are a German who has lived thirty years away from home You can tend a furnace and have worked in mines'

Then I spoke to the captain

'Here is a felloho used to be in hty luck we've struck hio bail he's a good worker He says he'll coine-room'

'Stand up,' said the Captain

Peter stood up, light and sliirth and weight

'He'll do,' said Schenk, and the nextthe strayed revellers the rough side of his tongue As it chanced, I couldn't keep Peter with es, and I had time for no more than five words with hiue and live up to his reputation as a half-wit That accursed Sylvesterabend had played havoc with the whole outfit, and the captain and I eary ht

In one way it turned out well That afternoon we passed the frontier and I never knew it till I saw a ures on a schedule, and brought us a eneral air of absorption in duty, I ure He took down the naiven as it appeared on the shi+p's roll-Anton Blue, Herr Brandt,' said the captain, 'to be scrutinized by a policeive orders, I doubt not, to ed o unrecognized often by ure in the captain's eyes He liked the way I kept the er-driver for nothing

Late on that Sunday night we passed through a great city which the captain told me was Vienna It seehtly lit as a circus After that, ere in big plains and the air grew perishi+ng cold Peter had come aboard once for his rations, but usually he left it to his partner, for he was lying very low But one -I think it was the 5th of January, e had passed Buda and were reat sodden flats just sprinkled with snow-the captain took it into his head to get hty type-written list, Iwith the hindmost There was a fine old stock of deadly weapons-h shells to blow up the Gallipoli peninsula All kinds of shell were there, frorenades and trench-s preparing for our own fellows, and I wondered whether I would not be doingexplosion Happily I had the common sense to remember my job and my duty and to stick to it

Peter was in the middle of the convoy, and I found hi allowed to smoke His companion was an ox-eyed lad, whom I ordered to the look-out while Peter and I went over the lists

'Cornelis, my old friend,' he said, 'there are some pretty toys here With a spanner and a couple of clear hours I could make these maxims about as deadly as bicycles What do you say to a try?'

'I've considered that,' I said, 'but it won't do We're on a bigger business than wrecking ot here'

He smiled with that extraordinary Sunday-school docility of his