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Dave Darrin After The Mine Layers, a novel by H. Irving Hancock |
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Chapter 19. The Good Work Goes On |
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_ CHAPTER XIX. THE GOOD WORK GOES ON Dave takes a chance. So does Juno. The all-right cargo. Who can the woman be? Dalzell has a fine report. Story of the sub-hold. Mother and daughter no longer mysteries. "The best in a six-month!"
The seaman nearest the revolver glanced quickly at Darrin, as if to inquire whether he should make an attempt to seize her pistol wrist and wrench the weapon away. But Dave ignored the man's glance as he stepped up, eyeing the young woman coolly. "Lower the pistol," he warned, again. "If you tried to use it, it would tell against you hard, before an English court, and these are wartimes, you know." He was now within two feet of the weapon, which was pointed at his head. "I shall kill you if you try to come near me," the young woman insisted desperately. But Dave took another step. She pulled the trigger. There was a bright flash, a loud report. Dave, however, had been watching that trigger finger. As he saw it stiffen he dropped suddenly almost to his knees, the bullet passing over his head and embedding itself in woodwork across the cabin. Darrin sprang up unharmed. His cap had caught a powder burn; that was all. He gripped the woman's wrist in a hand of steel. With his other hand he coolly took the pistol away from her, then dropped her wrist. Bursting into a fit of hysterical weeping the woman drew back, endeavoring to close the cabin door. But Darrin's foot across the sill defeated her purpose. "You are a brute!" she panted, frantically trying to close the door. "At least," he assured her, "I have saved you from a crime that would have cost you your own life. Look out, please, for I am going to throw your door wide open." "You--you coward!" she panted, and struggled to close the door. "Stand back! I am sorry to have to use force, but you compel it." As she refused to give ground Darrin gave the door a push that forced her back, crowding her against a berth. Then he stepped into the little cabin. In a lower berth lay a middle-aged woman whose piercing black eyes snapped as she surveyed the young naval officer. "You are a wretch, to intrude here!" cried the older woman. "One must often do disagreeable things in the line of war duty," Darrin answered, gravely. "For one thing, I must place you both in arrest. Then I shall be obliged to have your cabin searched." "Oh, if I but had a weapon!" cried the older woman. "If you had, and were quick enough," Dave assured her, "you might succeed in killing me, but that would not affect our duty here, for there are other officers at hand. Madam, I perceive that you are fully dressed, so I must ask you to rise and leave this cabin, for a few minutes, at least." "I shall not do it," she snapped. "Then you will oblige me to call my men in, and they will remove you, using no unnecessary violence, you may be sure, yet employing force just the same." "You coward!" The younger woman, too, started in to berate him, but Dave remained calm. "Will you, at least, not leave the room until I have risen?" demanded the older woman. Darrin, who had a notion that the women wanted to conceal or destroy something, nodded his assent, but signed to two of the seamen to enter. Under his instructions they took the door off its hinges, carried it outside and laid it on the floor of the dining cabin. "Now, ladies," Dave called, as he stepped outside, "you will be good enough to come out at once." "We will come at our good convenience!" snapped the older woman. "Wrong again. As I am discharging my duty here, you will necessarily come out at once. I shall not be patient if my instructions are defied." Plainly furious that the door could not be closed, the younger woman assisted the older one to rise from the berth. Then, both expressing their resentment in their glances, the two women came out of the cabin. "Mother and daughter," guessed Dave. "Where will you have us sit, Brute?" demanded the younger woman. "Take any seat in this dining cabin that you please," he replied. "You must sit together, and one of my men will stand before you." Seats having been taken by the women, Darrin, calling one of the sailors to him, entered the little cabin. The only baggage there, beyond a hand satchel, appeared to be a locked steamer trunk under the lower berth. "Take that outside," Dave directed. "It need not be investigated until we reach port." Two dressing sacks and a few toilet articles were all the personal belongings that could be found there, though Darrin did not stop until he and the seaman had inspected pillows, mattresses and all other places that might have concealed papers or other little belongings. Coming outside after some minutes Darrin asked: "Ladies, do you wish to remain in the dining room, or will you go back to your sleeping cabin?" "We will remain here for the present," replied the older woman. "If we wish to return to our own cabin later on we will do so." "Wrong again," Dave informed her. "You must remain in one place. There can be no roaming about. This seaman who is your guard will see that you remain where you are for the present. I cannot permit you to leave this part of the dining room. Ladies, I regret being obliged to be so disagreeable, but I beg to assure you that your rights will be respected, and that you shall come to no harm if you obey instructions." Then he looked into the other three cabins, but found them empty. With that Darrin left the dining room, after detailing another seaman to remain on duty there with the guard over the two women. Darrin's next care was to inspect the holds. Here he found a cargo that appeared to consist of hundreds of cases of dried fish. At random he selected one of the cases, had it carried to the deck, and ordered that it be opened. Its contents proved to be dried fish. "There is something worse than that on board, or the skipper would not have acted so much like a lunatic," Dave told himself. Next inspecting the engine room and stoke hole he found these departments in order, though the fires under the boilers would soon need attention. Going above, Dave called the stokers and engineers out from among the prisoners, told them that he intended to send them to their posts, and asked them if they would pledge themselves to obey all orders and bridge signals, and not attempt any treachery. This promise was quickly given. "I hope you will all keep your word," Dave added, firmly, "for, if any of you attempts treachery, he will be shot down where he stands. I shall post guards." He posted two of his men in the engine-room, and four in the stoke-hole. "Be vigilant, and don't stand any nonsense," he ordered. Returning to deck he gave his final orders to Ensign Peters, who had come on board and relieved the boatswain's mate. "We are going to take this ship through to our base port," he informed the ensign. "You will command, and will use the petty officers as you need them. I shall require but three of the launch crew to take me back to the 'Grigsby.' You have sufficient force here, Mr. Peters, but we shall stand by and so be ready to give any assistance you may need. Keep yourself informed as to the comfort and conduct of the women prisoners in the dining cabin, and do not permit them to be annoyed by your men. They must have no chance, though, to destroy or conceal any papers they may have on their persons." With that Darrin went over the side. The launch took him back to his own craft. Overhead the "blimp" moved slowly about. While her commander was sure he could reach England safely he preferred to remain in company that could rescue his crew and himself if it became necessary. "Who can the women be?" Lieutenant Fernald wondered, when he had heard Dave's account of the visit to the steamship. "I don't know. But their conduct, like the skipper's, is the main cause of their predicament. Had they behaved naturally I would have guessed them to be passengers from a neutral port to England. All I can say is that, though they speak English well, I am sure that they are not Englishwomen." "The younger woman is a beauty, you say?" "Yes, and her mother, if the older woman be such, is not at all unprepossessing." The two ships and their aerial companion were now headed toward Darrin's base port, traveling at a good rate of speed. It was well along in the evening when they passed the "Reed." In code Dalzell exultantly reported that an unusually large number of mines had been swept and removed from the water, and that two submarines had been located on the middle shoal and destroyed. "Good work!" Dave wirelessed back. Late that night, the "blimp" still leading the way, the destroyer and her prize entered the base port. As soon as they had come to anchor Darrin communicated with the British flag-ship. Officials promptly went aboard the steamer to attend to the removal to a prison on shore of the officers and crew of the steamship, and of the women passengers as well. Immediately after that the ship was subjected to a systematic search by seamen and longshoremen acting under the direction of British naval officers. A name-plate, ready to fit to the front of the wheel-house, was found. The craft proved to be the "Louisa," well known in a certain British port at which she had been accustomed to call with cargoes of dried fish. The fish now on board was taken off rapidly into lighters. And then it was that, in a sub-hold under the cargo deck, a more significant cargo was found. From that sub-hold were removed nearly six hundred floating mines of the commonest German pattern. All had been packed with extreme care, and all were ready for transferring to German submarine mine-layers at sea. It was after two in the morning when Captain Allaire, an officer of the British military intelligence department, came on board the "Grigsby," requesting that her commander be called. Dave received Captain Allaire in the chart-room. Allaire had come to seek information as to the speech and conduct of the two women at the time of their arrest. Dave answered these questions carefully, then added: "I shall be glad, indeed, if I brought in women prisoners of real importance along with the other prisoners." "There are very few pairs whom we would rather have in our prisons," answered Captain Allaire. "The older woman is the notorious Sophia Weiner; the younger is her daughter, Anna Weiner. They use various other names, though. Every intelligence and secret service officer in Great Britain knows of their exploits, and is ever on the lookout for them." "Then I am astonished that they should have embarked on a steamship bound for England," Dave returned. "They must have faced certain arrest on landing." "I don't believe they intended coming to England," Allaire answered. "Probably they were on their way to Spain. It may have been that no German submarine was leaving for the Spanish coast just at the time, and it was imperative that they reach Spain early. So, I take it, they journeyed to the neutral country and embarked on the 'Louisa,' knowing that the skipper could transfer them to a submarine bound for Spain. We are amazed at this fellow, Hadkor, skipper of the 'Louisa.' We had believed him to be all right, and he had ready access to our ports with his cargoes. But his ship has been found to be fitted with all facilities for transferring mines at sea, and also with an anti-aircraft gun and a stock of rifles and ammunition. The work must have been excellently paid for by the Germans, for the crew were assuredly in the secret, and ready even to fight, and they surely had to be paid for their risks." "Then it was a very important catch that the 'blimp' ran us into." "One of the best in a six-month," replied Captain Allaire. "And yet that skipper fellow and his crew must be lunatics, for their conduct lays them liable to being hanged as pirates." When the "Grigsby" put out to sea before daylight Dave Darrin lay asleep. He slept extremely well, too, in the consciousness of a day's duties well done. _ |
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