CHAPTER XIX
OFF HELIGOLAND
THE Gyandotte steamed out of Queenstown one October twilight in company with four destroyers and headed southeast, a departure from the usual proceeding that excited comment and conjecture from one end of the ship to the other. The bulletin was eagerly searched, but the Old Man had nothing to say as yet as regarded destination or duty. It was not until morning and the Gyandotte, still in company with the destroyers, was seen to be off the southern coast of Cornwall that the unprecedented was known to have happened. So far the Gyandotte had never dipped her nose into the waters of the English Channel. Few of the American patrol boats had, either, for their sphere of activity was principally to the south and west. Naturally the rumor that they were to rendezvous with the British Grand Fleet somewhere in the North Sea for an attack in force on a German naval base became current, mainly because that was the thing that every man's heart longed for. All that day they steamed slowly through treacherous waters, waters far more populous than those they had been frequenting. Mine layers and sweepers, sea-planes, torpedo boats, cargo boats, destroyers, chasers—they saw them all. They passed within sight of Plymouth and the Isle of Wight, with Portsmouth hiding around the corner of it, and finally Eastbourne, and by that time the coast of France was clear to the eastward, and a Channel steamer plowed past them quite as though war was a thing of the past. The cliffs of Dover loomed up toward evening, and it was then that Nelson saw mine sweepers actually at work for the first time. Directed by a saucy little patrol yacht, the two blunt-nosed trawlers steamed westward on parallel courses, a long cable connecting them. Although Nelson watched eagerly as long as they were within sight they apparently found no mines. They were still at it when distance and twilight hid them from view. Some time that night the Gyandotte emerged into the North Sea, for the next morning she was rolling merrily out of sight of land and the quartet of destroyers were rolling even more merrily ahead and astern, stretched out for nearly a mile. Nelson thrilled at the thought that somewhere to the east of them was Heligoland and the entrance to the Kiel Canal and the German navy lying behind its network of mines in the land-locked harbors. Heligoland was a word to conjure with, and Nelson peered into a typical North Sea mist as though he meant to penetrate to the distant rock by sheer force of will.
"I bet you it makes England sick," remarked Garey, when Nelson mentioned the German naval base. "She swapped that rock for something, I forgot what, and I guess she wishes now she'd kept it, all right. Gee, it's a cinch for Germany! They say she spent fifty million dollars on it, making fortifications and so on. I'll bet Gibraltar hasn't a thing on Heligoland nowadays. Hundreds of eleven-inch guns they've got there, they say. A lot of good it would be for a fleet to try to shell that! And a fine chance it would have of getting around it. Yah, that man Salisbury played the goat, all right, when he engineered that deal! Wouldn't you think the English would have been afraid to give up an outpost like that?"
"Yes, but suppose England still owned it," objected Nelson. "Could she have held it today? It's almost within gun range of the shore, isn't it?"
"About forty miles, I guess. Sure, she could have held it. All she had to do was fortify it just as Germany has done"
"But maybe Germany would have objected to another power fortifying a place so close."
"Suppose she did object? What could she have done about it?"
"Why, I don't know. Appeal to the Hague"
"Hah! You make me laugh," jeered Garey. "If England had kept that rock in the sea this war would be over."
"Really? Why?"
"Because Heligoland commands the mouth of the Kiel Canal and all the harbors along the coast in that corner where Germany has her ships hiding! Cuxhaven, Wilhelmshaven and Friedrichskoog, and the mouth of the Elbe that leads to Hamburg; and the Weser, too. Why, Germany couldn't have found a place on the Atlantic coast that the English couldn't have shelled her out of! As it is now Heligoland gives her a fine anchorage for warships, a base for submarines and airships and Zeppelins and destroyers and a signal outpost. They've got searchlights on Heligoland, they say, that'll pick up a dory twenty miles away! Talk about your soft snaps! Germany's got the softest ever. She ought to include Lord Salisbury in her prayers every night: 'God bless Lord Salisbury for letting us have Heligoland!'"
"I'd love to see it," mused Nelson.
"Well, you aren't likely to, I guess. If the Gyandotte started in toward that old rock I'd hand in my papers and fall overboard! None of those eleven-inch shells brushing my cap off, thank you! Nothing doing! Nothing at all!"
"Where do you suppose we're going?" asked Nelson.
"Norway, probably, but don't ask me what for. Won't anything happen, anyway. Nothing ever does on this old skate. All we do is act the nice old gentleman with the umbrella helping the young ladies off the street car and escorting them to the sidewalk. We don't even get splashed with mud."
"But," laughed Nelson, "if you want action why are you against having a peek at Heligoland?"
"Sure, I want action, but I'm not asking for sudden death, believe me, Troy! What I'd like would be a crack at a couple of light cruisers of about our own size. Or three, for good measure. But butting your head against a hundred eleven-inch guns isn't giving yourself a fair show. It's plain suicide."
"Didn't the British ship Arethusa do it?"
"When was that?"
"The first year of the war, I think."
"Oh, that! Take it from me, Troy, the Arethusa didn't go near enough that little rock to be seen. That was off the North Frisians, if I remember, and the British ships were careful to pick out a fine misty day. The Arethusa did well, though. I'm not saying she wasn't a plucky one. As I figure that little ruction, this fellow Beatty—wasn't he the chap that time?—had his big ships waiting outside in case the Germans showed fight. The Arethusa went in close to draw 'em out. She did it, too, for a couple of German cruisers met her and smeared her considerable. Then she backed out and had tea and fixed things up and went back to it. And they say—and I guess it's right—that she 'strafed' the two Fritzes before she called it a day. Sank one and set the other afire. There were other ships mixed up in that row: the Lion, the Queen Mary, the Invincible, I think it was, and some more. And I dare say there were destroyers barking around, too. And German subs, maybe, I guess it was a pretty scrap, all right, only it was so foggy and dark no one could see who they were fighting. The British did for three German cruisers and some destroyers, and she took hundreds of prisoners; old Admiral von Turpentine's son among them. But I never heard how many ships the British lost, except from Berlin, and you can't believe what Berlin says. But I'm betting the Johnnie Bulls didn't get very close to old Mr. Heligoland!"
"One did," remarked Nelson. "The Liberty."
"Did, eh? Liberty? Sounds like one of ours. I don't remember her."
"Well, she was only a little destroyer, Garey. But she waltzed straight in under those guns and tried to torpedo the big ships lying in the harbor. And she kept on until she had only one round of ammunition left and one torpedo in her tubes. Then she turned tail and beat it back. She lost her commander and three of her crew, but she lived to tell the story in spite of all the eleven-inch shells they plumped down on her; enough, I guess, to sink her twice over if they'd hit her!"
"What do you know about that?" asked Garey. "Say, she was some little kid, what? Well, you've got to hand it to the British for pluck. I always say that. And, say, that Liberty ship was well named, wasn't she? I wouldn't wonder if she was an American destroyer they'd borrowed from us, or something. Anyway, I'll bet more than half the 'gobs' were Irish!"
There's always a nasty, choppy sea running in that stretch of water hemmed in by the British Isles and the coasts of Germany and Denmark. Shallow and treacherous and generally vile, it is abhorred by sailors the world over, and those on the Gyandotte could find nothing good to say of it. All that day the mist held and hid everything a mile or so distant, and the lookouts never kept their eyes peeled any more thoroughly than they did while the line of ships steamed on toward the north. It was an area well infested with German submarines, while it was no unusual thing for a pack of destroyers to dart out from one of the protected bases on the chance of picking off a lone prey. But, save that the sharp, short waves kept the decks wet and made everyone uncomfortable—life on the destroyers must have been miserable indeed, Nelson thought—no incident pleasant or unpleasant broke the monotony. Forty-six hours after passing Dover the American ships reached the Skager Rack and dropped anchors off Christiansand, where, during a long, black night, they rolled and tumbled miserably. Nelson always recalled that night as one of the most unpleasant of his life, for they had suddenly penetrated into Winter weather and few of the men had as yet received their heavy clothing. Even below deck it was cold, and in the hammocks sleep was a chill nightmare. Pitch and toss and freeze was the program that night, and not a man aboard but longed for daylight. Ferris, for once supplied with something to be thoroughly pessimistic about, fairly outdid himself!
The next morning, which dawned bright and frostily clear, the ships sought calmer quarters and in the afternoon liberty was granted and the little city was over-run with Jackies. The attitude of the inhabitants puzzled Nelson. They appeared friendly, or, certainly, not unfriendly, but kept oddly aloof and were uncommunicative to a degree. The men on all ships had been specially and strictly cautioned as to behavior, and as a result the Christiansand folks had nothing to complain of on that score. Ferris remarked gloomily that they were "a frosty lot," and reckoned they never got quite thawed out after the long Winters.
Towards five o'clock word went around that warships were coming up from southward, and there was much activity along the harbor front. A Norwegian gunboat of a very ancient vintage rolled out to sea, apparently, as one of the Gyandotte's crew said, "to give 'em the once over." Evidently the gunboat was satisfied. Or else she thought discretion the better part of valor. In either case, she was soon hiking back to the protection of the fort, looking immensely relieved. It was nearly six o'clock before the newcomers revealed themselves beyond question as British destroyers. They slap-banged cheerfully through the channel and came about and slid to anchorage amidst the American ships with a dash that brought cheers of admiration as well as welcome from the latter. The British "gobs" cheered back and for several minutes the staid old harbor was extremely noisy and ribald. Signal flags fluttered, boatswain's pipes peep-peeped, bugles called, and winches rattled and hummed. And along the shore the mild-eyed and annoyingly self-contained citizens looked on curiously. Perhaps they suspected an Allied attack. If they did their demeanor was a model of coolness.
On the Gyandotte the side boys lined up, the boatswain trilled merrily and the Old Man and the luff went over the side into a gig and were pulled away to the British flagship, a three-stacked destroyer with great high bows and a veritable bulwark of depth charges lined amidship. Nelson wondered hard what it all meant, and his heart thumped like a hammer several times when he realized the possibilities. The combined forces included a light cruiser and ten destroyers, enough thought Nelson hopefully to provide some lively times if the enemy was sighted. He climbed into his hammock at midnight, however, with curiosity still unappeased, and the next day was quite uneventful. One might have thought that the American and British ships had made an appointment at Christiansand merely to enjoy an uninterrupted palaver. The northern sunlight made gay with fluttering bunting, small boats crossed from ship to ship and the harbor had a most holiday appearance. On shore, Limie "gobs" and American tars fraternized and swapped yarns and rode on the tram cars or in carriages and saw the sights very happily. Not until late in the day was the disappointing truth made known. Then from eastward, probably out of Christiania, lumbered fourteen Norwegian cargo boats, each well down in the water and each fairly shrieking its nationality in great white letters along its hull. And this was what the Gyandotte and all the destroyers. had come hundreds of miles for! To escort a lot of freighters across the North Sea! It was fairly disgusting!
The cargo boats, which ranged from big to little, passed on down the Rack, exchanging signals with the flagship, and went out of sight in the early darkness, and for awhile Nelson hoped against hope. But presently the bugle called, winches clattered all over the harbor and the fleet followed. Nelson could have wept. The fine adventure had come to nothing in the end but the old, old story: convoying! Ferris summed it up in one bitter word: "Stung!"