Bartimeus

“ Somewhere beneath the surface, still affixed to the submerged stern, was the Destroyer's main anti-submarine armament—her depth-charges. One had been in the tray, ready set for instant release by the jerk of a lever, when the collision occurred.
"If the stern breaks off, that depth-charge'll sink with it, and explode when it gets down to forty feet."
"That's right, sir," said the Gunner, with melancholy calm.
"And the explosion'll rip this bulkhead out of her, and down the fore part will go. Half a ship's better'n none, Mr. Hasthorpe." ”

“ The children's faces were eyeing their elders as if uncertain how to take this unexpected turn of events.
"They don't really eat men, do they?" said the awed voice of Cornelius James.
"You don't honestly think——" began Miss Mayne, her colour once more supplanting her smile. "Oh, couldn't you tell them—run out and say I—we——"
Graeme hastened after the visitors with belated promptings of conscience and the laws of hospitality, but before he reached the hall the splutter of gravel and the hum of the engine told the listeners in the dining-room he was too late. ”

“ With unrelaxed caution, however, the submarine continued to approach slowly from astern, and it was on this precise bearing that none of the schooner's guns would bear. The leaden minutes dragged by like an eternity. The Commanding Officer of the Prize several times left his place of observation and crawled on hands and knees from man to man, steadying them and impressing on them the necessity for keeping out of sight. One of the port foremost gun's crew, a lad of eighteen, twitched uncontrollably with excitement like a galvanised frog as he sprawled face-downwards. ”

“ Out of the wreaths of fog and tobacco-smoke forward drifted presently the strains of an accordion——
"It's a long, long way to Tipperary...." The voices of the men, singing under their breath as they worked, blended restfully with the throb of the engines and the swish of water past the ship's side. A little breeze sprang up, tearing rifts here and there in the surrounding fog; a few pale gleams of sunlight filtered through, and on the fore-bridge of the Cruiser the Yeoman of Signals raised his glass and steadied it against the topmost rail. ”

“ Every gun and howitzer on board opened fire with a roar that shook the ship from bridge to keel. The machine-guns in the top broke into a hysterical chatter, and all along the Mole bursts of flame belched forth. The shrapnel was spattering about the upperworks like hailstones, and as I got the bows round, heading for the Mole, I felt the ship check and shudder as a heavy shell struck her. ”

“ Then, at daybreak, chequered forts ahead: cranes and sheerlegs rising out of the mist about the dockyard, distant spires catching the first of the sun. Home!
The Light Cruiser came slowly up harbour in tow of her attendant tugs, like a victor being escorted to his dressing-room by seconds. On all sides syrens hooted vociferously, ships in harbour manned and cheered, and all about the old weather-beaten brick houses by the water's edge was the flutter of flags and handkerchiefs: the welcoming cries of women came faintly across the stream. ”

“ A dazzling star shell lit the scene like day, and I saw Milsom stoop and vault a clear drop of six feet, turn and catch a burly Marine in his arms, and rush forward to help secure the grappling anchor. They had got another brow out by now, and men were pouring over it with scaling ladders. The din surpassed all description. The almost ceaseless roar of guns, the grinding and crash of the brows, the sob of the waves as they broke against the pier, flinging the spray high, and ever and anon the explosion of shrapnel overhead spattering their deadly hail broadcast. ”

“ The ship was blundering along at a good seven knots, swerving blindly from side to side like a wounded bull, and leaving on the troubled surface of the water a fiery, serpentine trail of burning oil. The hissing crackle of the flames and roar of the wind, the constant eruption of vast columns of sparks that belched hundreds of feet into the air and floated to leeward, made the doomed ship a terrifying and almost demoniac spectacle.
"Can't be a soul alive on board," said the First Lieutenant. "Just as well—ugly customer to tackle." ”

“ Screens clattered down along the length of the ship's side, and a broadside of yellow flame leaped out over their heads. The submarine was suddenly plastered by bursting shell and half hidden by leaping waterspouts, as she slowly listed over to her side, with oil spouting from the rents in her hull. Her crew scrambled wildly out of the conning tower and waved their hands above their heads in token of surrender. Fire instantly ceased on board the British man-of-war, when unexpectedly the crippled enemy, her stern submerged, shot ahead and made off at high speed. ”

“ All the world loves a lover, grateful to this ebullition of nature for reminder and promise alike. To the sailor, however, there is no fairer sight than a ship with 600 feet of white bunting floating astern. It may not be his ship, but it reminds him that his turn will come.
A semaphore waved a parting message from a brother Captain: a cryptic jest that wrinkled the corners of the recipient's eyes; a great man stepped out on to the spacious grandeur of his quarter-deck, and raised his cap with a dignified, half-affectionate gesture of farewell.... ”

“ According to the arrangements we had made beforehand, the demolition party retired first, while the Marines covered the retreat, and no sooner had the first reluctant figures begun to struggle back across the shattered brows than the enemy concentrated every gun he could bring to bear upon the crowded scaling ladders and the gangways.
Fountains of flame and sparks flew skywards, through which the forms of men came stumbling, each living figure that reached our deck, it seemed to me, the embodiment of a miracle. ”

“ She herself spoke little, but, when she did, displayed a love of the beautiful and no small knowledge of many of the arts that beautified the interior of the mansion. The little party had reached the portrait gallery, and at Georgina's request Mouldy Jakes furnished them with thumb-nail sketches of the life histories of the originals. He talked in a dryly humorous fashion that held the children alternately entranced and convulsed with laughter, warming to his self-imposed task as Miss Mayne caught the infectious mirth and echoed the children's gurgles with her own clear sweet laugh. ”

“ So off they set and awakened the echoes of the shallow caves with their voices, explored the pools left by the tide; built with the aid of pieces of driftwood a sand castle that had cockle shells for windows and a tiny green crab as keeper of the gateway, and through all the absorption of this light nonsense Graeme was conscious of Claire Mayne, whether she spoke or was silent, in view or out of sight, as a man is aware of the sunlight and the wind on his cheek. ”

“ Withal was the consciousness that a single movement on board, so much as a finger raised above screen or coaming, would betray their true character and bring the game of bluff to a swift and tragic conclusion. The periscope of the submarine had broken surface a quarter of an hour after the torpedo struck, about 400 yards distant on the port beam. It turned after a while and steered towards the ship, but the Captain and Signalman, prone at each end of the bridge, with their eyes glued to the observation slits, alone were aware of their quarry's movements. ”

“ Inboard, however, the alarm rang along the mess-decks and saloons, and men crawled into hen-coops and deck-houses to man the hidden guns. A few minutes later the submarine broke surface half a mile astern of the ship, and fired a shot across her bows. Whereupon the supposed collier stopped her engines, and lay rolling in the trough of the seas with steam pouring from her exhausts, while the crew, who had rehearsed this moment to a perfection never yet realised on the boards of legitimate drama, rushed to and fro with every semblance of panic. ”

“ He heard the breast-bone crunch as the steel went home to the muzzle of the rifle. The German fell sideways, twisting the weapon out of Tani's grip with his weight. Then Tani saw a bearded officer, the haft of a broken sword dangling from a leather thong at his wrist, struggling to reload his revolver.
As a mongoose jumps for a snake the Japanese leapt at the German's throat. They fell together in the bottom of the trench, and for a moment they fought with their hands, in the welter of mud and water, trampled on by other combatants, breathing in short, savage gasps. ”

“ For five weary months they endured the winter gales of the Atlantic, wallowing to and fro along the trade routes, outwardly a scallywag tramp, but behind her untidy bulwarks observing, with certain necessary modifications, the discipline and customs of his Majesty's Navy. With paint-pot and sail-cloth they improved the ship's disguise from time to time, and wiled away the heart-breaking monotony of the days by inventing fresh devices to conceal their character. ”

“ His First Lieutenant continued to stare across the grey sea to the north-west. Day was dawning, and the spray, flung from the reeling bows of the Destroyer, was like a frozen whip-lash on their faces. "Yes, that's them," he said, in a grimly ungrammatical undertone. To the naked eye nothing was visible above the ragged skyline, but every man on the bridge was standing gazing intently in the same direction, as if the wind carried with it the scent of the quarry they sought. ”

“ The afternoon shadows crept higher up the wooded slopes; the air got cooler as I progressed, and when I emerged from the gorge a chilly wind sprang up. The sun dipped out of sight and the broad valley took on a more sombre tint. Here for the first time I encountered the pines, and in place of the red rock of the gorge, sad-coloured limestone appeared between the foliage. Then it was I realised that the wine-red earth and rock had all the while been reminding me of my own Devon, and felt suddenly homesick. ”

“ The Commander jerked the telegraphs and surveyed his rolling deck. "Cease fire!" he bawled, satisfied himself that the battered whaler was still seaworthy, and gave the order, "Away lifeboat's crew!"
They lowered her, manned by men still breathless with the exultant flush of battle, some with hasty bandages about them, and to and fro they plied amid that tumbling sea and the unmanned foe calling for dear life at their rough hands. The Destroyer turned to make a lee, and along her rail the ship's company gathered, with heaving-lines and lifebuoys. ”

“ Then came a drop of 30 feet on to the Mole itself, and once they passed over into this abyss both storming and demolition parties were lost to view. They took ladders for the purposes of this descent, and the sight of those reeling brows a-swarm with men, laden as they were with these ladders, flamethrowers, machine-guns, bombs, cutlasses, and demolition implements, will always haunt me. They dropped like flies, to lie where they fell, dangling across the narrow gangways or clinging piteously for a moment ere they let go and slipped into oblivion. ”

“ From the altitude of the bridge, the submerged whale-back hull was plainly visible to the figure crouched behind the bridge-screens, and the temptation to yield to the impulse of the moment, to open fire and end the suspense, shook even his iron nerves. A lucky shot might pierce the lead-grey shadow that moved 15 feet beneath the surface; but water plays strange tricks with projectiles, deflecting them at unexpected ricochets, at angles no man can foretell; moreover, the submarine was in diving trim. ”

“ They ranged abeam, giving the blazing derelict a wide berth, and even at that distance felt their cheeks scorch. Men lined the Destroyer's lee rail, watching in shocked silence. To the seaman the fairest of all sights is a ship upon the sea; a ship wrecked upon a lee shore or even plunging beneath the surface with racing propellers is a sad, though not unnatural sight, prompting the heart of every sailor to the rescue, whatever the risk. But a ship on fire, even though abandoned, is repellent, horrible beyond the power of description. ”

“ How they got across that harbour, lit like day by searchlights, whipped into a sheet of foam by shrapnel and machine-gun fire, only God and their Captains know. We saw Jimmy Thorogood in the Dauntless go crashing through the flimsy anti-submarine defences, and I believe we gave him a crazy, cracked cheer. They were plastering him with gas shell, and he was on fire aft and blazing like a hay-rick. But he held on and made the entrance to the Canal, and was lost to view behind some sheds. Daring came next, and Determination, trailing in the rear and almost hidden by waterspouts of falling shell. ”

“ The submarine lay motionless as a dead whale, while the avenging broadside shattered the hull, and the grizzled pensioner inside a hen-coop scientifically raked her deck with a Maxim to prevent her gun from being manned. She finally sank with her conning-tower open and the crew pouring shrieking out of the hatchway. ”

“ The railway terminus at Tokyo was gay with bunting and thronged by a great crowd of people. A brass band somewhere out of sight broke into crashing martial music. "Banzai!" roared the khaki-clad figures in the closely packed carriages, and in response the women and children waved little hand-flags that bore the national emblem on a white ground.
Japan had declared war on Germany, and the occasion was the departure of a Reserve Division which was shortly to operate against the German fortress of Tsingtau. The windows of the carriages were blocked by grim, fighting faces: men from the North. ”