On Land and Sea at the Dardanelles Part 33

Going forward again, he found Roy tucking into an enormous breakfast with every evidence of enjoyment. Williams was acting as host, and listening with interest to Roy's account of their wanderings across the peninsula.

Ken asked for Gill, and heard that he was doing very well, but only fit to lie up for the present.

Roy rose, brushed the crumbs from his lammies and stretched his tall frame.

'Heigh ho, I wish we could get back to our chaps,' he remarked regretfully.

'Well, of all the ungrateful beggars!' said Ken with a laugh. 'Talk of buying a ham and seeing life, you won't see as much in the trenches in a month as you'll see here in a day.'

'Any one can have this steel box for me,' retorted Roy. 'I like to fight where I can see what's coming.'

'Maybe you'll see more'n you want before you're finished with this trip, ye long grouser,' put in Williams. 'This ain't no pleasure picnic, let me tell you. Our old man's hot stuff, he is, and if I knows anything about it, it won't be long before he starts handing out surprise packets to them Turks.'

'Hallo,' he broke off, 'we're for the surface.'

As he spoke, G 2's bow began to rise and the whole long hull took a gentle slope.

'Pretty quick!' exclaimed Ken. 'I thought you had to do a lot of pumping first.'

'Bless you, no,' said Williams with a superior grin. 'Not with these 'ere modern craft. They works with horizontal rudders, sort o' fins along the side. Blime, G 2 can pop up and down mighty nigh as quick as a dab chick.'

'There now,' he continued, as the vessel came back to an even keel. 'She's floating just submerged. I reckon her periscopes is just out o' the water.'

'Could we have a look?' asked Ken eagerly.

'Ay, I dare say. You wait a minute and I'll see.'

He was back in a minute, and beckoned them to come.

There were two periscopes. It was the forward one they were called to.

They saw a circular table from which a tube ran up through the top of the submarine. A man in s.h.i.+rt-sleeves--he was the other c.o.xswain--got up from a stool and motioned Ken to take his seat and look through what seemed like a pair of binoculars.

Ken gave a cry of surprise. Instead of the hot, stuffy interior of the submarine with its pale electrics and maze of machinery, he was gazing at a wide circle of small-crested waves which shone gloriously blue under a brilliant sky. Now and then a white-winged gull swooped across the view, but apart from these, there was no sign of life or of land.

'Here, let's have a squint,' said Roy eagerly, and Ken gave way.

'Why, it's like a living picture show,' declared Roy. 'Gosh, I could sit and watch it all day. But I say, can't other craft spot the periscope in all this suns.h.i.+ne?'

'Not with this bobble on. At least not very easy,' said the observer, as he took his place again.

'Where are we?' asked Roy.

'Somewheres in the Sea o' Marmora,' Williams answered. 'Just in the mouth o' it, so to speak. I expect the old man'll keep pus.h.i.+ng along up the north coast, awaiting for them transports out o' the Bosphorus.'

'And you talk about its being dull, Roy?' said Ken with a laugh.

'Well, perhaps I spoke a bit hastily,' allowed Roy. 'I'll grant I'd like to see us get our own back on some of those Turkish blighters. I haven't forgotten last night yet, I can tell you.'

'You wait till we get our eyes on one, that's all,' said Williams,' and you won't wait much longer.'

But the wait lasted longer than Ken and Roy expected. All that day G2 cruised slowly back and forth between the big island of Marmora, where the marble quarries are, and the high coast of the European mainland, yet nothing rewarded her vigilant watch.

There was nothing to do but sit about and yarn, and more than once Roy told Ken that he wouldn't be a submarine sailor for any amount of 'hard lying' money.

It was about four in the afternoon, and Ken had been taking a quiet nap, for he had a lot of arrears of sleep to make up, when he was roused by a sudden sharp order from Lieutenant Strang.

In an instant the drowsy interior of G2 wakened into sudden life, and Ken, springing to his feet, moved forward to where Williams was standing near the forward periscope.

'What's up?' he asked in a quick undertone.

'Craft in sight. Can't tell what she is yet.'

'A wars.h.i.+p?'

'Transport, most like, but can't say yet. Sit tight. I'll tell ye when I can see her a bit plainer.'

By the deeper hum of the engines, Ken knew that they had quickened their speed. There was a sort of suppressed eagerness about all the twenty-five men who composed the crew of the submarine. Ken longed to have a peep through the camera of the periscope, but knew it was impossible.

'She isn't much,' said Williams at last. 'Just a tramp of twelve or fourteen hundred tons. Still, she may ha' got troops aboard, and if she ain't, it's grub or munitions for them beggars in the peninsula.'

'Are we going to torpedo her?' asked Ken.

'Not likely. We ain't like Germans, as chucks away a thousand pound torpedo on a pore little fis.h.i.+ng smack.'

'But we shan't let her go, surely?'

Williams chuckled. 'Bless your innocence, no! A couple o' sh.e.l.ls from our little popper up topside will settle her hash all right.'

Another order echoed from aft. Strang's voice had a curious hollow sound, like a shout in a tunnel. Ken felt the vessel rising beneath him.

Men sprang up the steel ladder leading to the conning tower. A moment later the hatch flew open with a hollow clang, and the sea air gushed in, freshening delightfully the thick oily atmosphere below.

At the same moment power was switched off the electric engines, and the petrol motor broke into life with an appalling racket. The long, cigar-like vessel trembled under the increased power.

'Can't we go up on deck?' muttered Roy who had joined Ken.

Ken shook his head. He knew that this was impossible, yet all the same it was intolerably irksome to remain below without being able to see or take a hand in what was going on.

More orders, and presently the submarine came to rest, and lay, with hardly a movement, on the surface.

Williams turned and beckoned to Ken, and next moment Ken had his eyes glued to the binoculars. In the circle of sea thrown on the mirror, the first thing he saw was an untidy looking tramp, her rusty plates showing as she rolled slowly to the slight sea.

Aboard her all was wild excitement. Turkish sailors were hurriedly launching boats. Ken almost fancied he could hear the davits squeal as the boats were hastily lowered to the level of the sea. Evidently the men were in a desperate fright, for seldom had Ken seen the slack, leisurely Turks move with such speed.

We ain't hurrying 'em,' said Williams in Ken's ear. 'We've give 'em twenty minutes.' Here, let your chum have a squint.'

Ken made way for Roy, and as he did so there was a shout from aft.