Chapter VII: Part 7

The _Goethe_ shuddered, and heeled over until her decks were almost awash. There was a sudden roar as she turned on her side. Then with a plunge she went to the bottom.

This was the end of the great battle, and the British light cruisers and destroyers devoted themselves to the work of picking up survivors.

They were thus occupied when a huge airship and a number of aeroplanes came out from Heligoland. Avoiding the battleships and cruisers, which might have turned their guns upon them, the aircraft made for the destroyers and attacked them by dropping bombs into their midst. The work of rescue could not be continued under such an attack, and the destroyers scattered, each with its party of rescued Germans.

None of the British ships had been damaged beyond repair, and the number of casualties was very small. An officer and fourteen men had been killed, and three officers and about thirty men were wounded. Greater speed, greater weight and range of guns, and better marksmanship had told in favour of the British.

The Germans, indeed, had received a very sound and thorough whipping in punishment for their attempt to rush over to England and bombard undefended towns. But more than all they received a proof of Great Britain's invincible power upon the seas.

It was not until many days afterwards that Max Hilliger again met his uncle in one of the corridors of the German naval headquarters in Wilhelmshaven.

"Well, my dear Max," began the admiral, "and what is now your opinion of your friends the English? We gave them a pretty run for their money, eh?"

Max nodded, not being quite sure of his uncle's humour.

"And they appear to have caught you, _mein Herr_," he responded. "Our ships have not such speed as theirs. That is a grave disadvantage."

Admiral von Hilliger shrugged his shoulders.

"In future we shall use oil fuel," he said. "The necessary alteration in our machinery will be quite easy."

"Then there is their superiority in guns, sir," ventured Max. "Their guns not only throw a heavier shell than ours, but they are also of much longer range. I am told that the _Goethe_ was smashed almost to pieces before she could so much as touch one of the British Dreadnoughts."

"That fault can be remedied," declared the admiral. "Already we are having larger guns made. And, remember, we are having many new ships built. They will have guns such as the English have never dreamt of."

"And in the meantime," said Max, "I suppose our great fleet will lie idle in the Kiel Canal?"

"In the meantime," rejoined the admiral, "we have our Zeppelins and our submarines. Make no mistake, my dear Max, Great Britain's attempt to blockade our ports will not affect us in the least. We, on the contrary, can starve Great Britain. We shall throw a ring of submarines all round their wretched islands, so that no single ship can enter or leave their seaports."

Max smiled.

"They will be equal with us, even then," he boldly declared. "With submarines you cannot hope to hold command of the seas. Besides, to prey upon merchant shipping--neutral ships as well as British--is not war, it is rank piracy."

Admiral von Hilliger laughed.

"Piracy?" he repeated. "In that case, you shall yourself be one of our pirate chiefs. You shall fly the Jolly Roger. But I do not care what you call yourself so long as you make yourself a terror of the seas. It is what His Majesty the Kaiser wishes you to be. He wishes you to sink their hateful Dreadnoughts, their troopships, their fishing boats, their cargo steamers, and even their passenger liners, wherever they can be found."

Max looked up into his uncle's puffy blue eyes.

"Their passenger liners?" he repeated in amazement. "Do you say that such is the Kaiser's wish? But that would be murder!"

"Hush! my dear Max," cried the admiral. "We must not call it by so unpleasant a name as that. The whole thing is very different if we call it simply submarine warfare."

"And suppose I refuse?" demanded Max.

Again Admiral von Hilliger shrugged his shoulders.

"Then you will be arrested for mutiny," he declared coldly. "And the penalty for mutiny is death. Do you understand? The penalty is an ignominious death."

Max was silent for some moments. At last he said:

"I prefer to suffer the penalty."

But already the admiral had turned away, not hearing the words.

*CHAPTER XXXI.*

*SUBMARINES AT WORK.*

"Glad to see as you're able to get about again, sir."

Constable Challis, patrolling the esplanade, had come to a halt beside an invalid's bath-chair in which old Mr. Croucher sat, gripping an unopened newspaper in his thin, white fingers. The bath-chair had been drawn up against the rail so that the invalid might have an uninterrupted view of the sea. Not far from it a boy in Sea Scout's uniform stood watching a company of Territorials busily digging trenches on the lower level of the denes.

"It must be quite a couple of months since you was out here last," continued the policeman.

"It is just two months and three days," returned Mr. Croucher, leaning back with a weary sigh. "It was on the morning after the first Zeppelin raid, you remember. Yes, I am much better; but this last attack has been quite the worst I have known--rheumatism, Challis, rheumatism. I should hardly have come out even on a fine morning like this, only that Seth Newruck, here, kindly offered to wheel my bath-chair, my man having enlisted."

He paused as if exhausted by so long a speech.

"I see changes, Challis," he resumed. "Many changes. Most of the villas are tenantless. People are at last realising the danger of an invasion. Even Mrs. Daplin-Gennery has taken flight. Where has she gone, Challis?"

"Buxton, sir," the constable answered.

"Ah, well inland! The enemy will not reach so far as that until England is conquered."

"Which isn't at all likely," added Challis.

"I don't feel so sure about that," retorted Mr. Croucher. "Everything seems to point to the probability that the Germans will land sooner or later. Look at what the War Office are doing here! Look at that long line of trenches and the breastworks. Look at all these soldiers!"

"Yes, sir," nodded the constable, "we're beginnin' to look quite military, aren't we?"

"Military? I call it desperately warlike," declared the invalid. "Those trenches are not being so carefully dug merely to give training to the Territorials. They are being made for military use. Such elaborate defences would be a waste of time and material if there were not grave danger. It is clear that the authorities expect them to land just here."

Constable Challis leant his folded arms on the rail.

"You may take it from me, sir," he said, reassuringly, "that it's only a reasonable precaution. The same sort of defence work is going on at other places--at Buremouth and Eastwold."

But Mr. Croucher shook his head obstinately.

"Not to the same extent, Challis," he insisted. "I am told that there are twenty thousand soldiers assembled within easy reach of Haddisport. That is not simple precaution. It is preparation--preparation for an armed resistance. And look at these stockades and redoubts, or whatever they call them--battlements--fortifications! Look at the loopholes for heavy guns, and the sandbags! I suppose the guns themselves are lying ready somewhere close at hand, with the shells to fire them with."

"Yes, sir," Challis nodded. "They are all handy in the grounds of Sunnydene. Tons of 'em."

"Dear me, dear me!" said Mr. Croucher in consternation.

Seth Newruck had turned the bath-chair so that its occupant could have a fuller view of the embrasures and their connecting palisades of corrugated iron. "It isn't so very long ago, sir," Seth reminded him mischievously, "since you argued that there ought to be heavy guns stationed all along the East Coast. And now that they are putting up a few fortifications, you take alarm."

"Alarm?" repeated Mr. Croucher. "But isn't it enough to cause alarm? Why, it's just as good as an advertisement of the fact that the enemy's transports and cruisers may be expected any day, any hour!"

"What amuses me," added Constable Challis, "is that all those packin' cases which they have filled with sea sand, makin' them like blocks of granite, are really fish boxes belongin' to the Germans themselves. Before the war they were the property of a firm of German fish curers. You can read the name of 'Hilliger and Co.' on every one of 'em!"

"Hilliger? Ah!" cried Mr. Croucher, "That man Hilliger, I am convinced, has been working towards this war for years past. He ought never to have been allowed to carry on his business in Haddisport. It was only a blind--a blind to cover his underhand work of spying and intrigue. Where is he now, Challis--do you know?"

"Over in his own country, I suppose," answered the constable. "But here's young Mark Redisham comin' along. He knows a lot more about these things than I do."

Mark Redisham had paused to look out upon the sea at a patrol trawler in which he appeared to be greatly interested. When he came nearer and saw Seth Newruck and the two men he saluted and again paused.

"The enemy seem to have been pretty close," he observed, speaking especially to his fellow scout.

"Yes," returned Seth. "It looks as if there were a submarine somewhere near."

"And it has been doing some damage," rejoined Mark.

"Eh? What's that?" interrogated Mr. Croucher. "A German submarine? Where? How do you know?"

Mark explained, indicating the trawler.

"Well, sir," he said. "She's flying the signal to say so. That red flag with the ball beneath it means that there's a submarine in the neighbourhood. But as well as that, she has more men in her than her own crew. I expect she has rescued them from some ship that the submarine has torpedoed."

"Dear me!" exclaimed Mr. Croucher. "We shall have no ships left soon if this sort of thing goes on much longer! Can't the navy put a stop to it? Even the enemy's battleships are doing less harm than their submarines. It's simply terrible!"

"Between ourselves," remarked Constable Challis, "it's nothing but silly spite and disappointment that makes them sink our ships. They can't touch our cruisers now, so they sneak about sendin' our merchant vessels to the bottom. Yesterday I came upon some boys tryin' to get at a bird's nest. When they saw they couldn't manage it, they began to throw stones at it. That's the way the Germans do. Silly spite; that's all."

Mark Redisham went down the town, keeping step with a battalion of Territorials marching behind their band. When he arrived at the harbour the trawler which he had watched from the cliff was coming in. She had picked up sixteen men drifting in open boats. Their ship, the _Priscilla_, a cargo steamer bound for one of the northern ports, had been sunk by an enemy submarine.

Early in the morning the _Priscilla_ had been going under easy steam when a submarine had come to the surface a little distance away on the starboard side, hoisting the German flag and signalling to the steamer to stop.

Instead of obeying, the English captain put on full speed and steered a zig-zag course with such skill that the submarine soon dropped astern, unable to keep pace with him or to aim at him with her torpedoes or even her deck guns.

The captain was congratulating himself and his engineer on their lucky escape when suddenly a second submarine popped up right in front of his vessel's bows. This time he was obliged to stop his engines, for he saw a gun rise from its chamber on the submarine's deck. Two officers stood on the platform of the conning-tower.

One of them called out in perfect English, asking where the steamer was bound for, what was her cargo, and where was the British fleet?

"I'm sorry to cause inconvenience," the German added, "but you must remember this is war. I shall have to sink you. I will give you ten minutes to get clear of the steamer. Get as many of your belongings together as you can and take to your boats."

While the crew were hastily putting their clothing and personal possessions into their kit bags, and launching the two boats, the captain was ordered to produce his ship's papers. He observed as the submarine drew alongside that both officers wore the Iron Cross, and that one of them was hardly more than a boy.

"You can take some food and water with you," said the younger, "and if you steer north-west you will probably come upon some fishing boats that may help you."

The crew had rowed a short distance away from their steamer when they saw a couple of German sailors go on board of her with what looked like explosive bombs. A few minutes afterwards they returned empty-handed, the submarine backed away. There was a loud explosion on board the _Priscilla_ and she rapidly sank.

The submarine then went off at high speed, and as she did so a couple of dummy funnels were raised on her deck, false bulwarks at bow and stern were rigged up, and with a pair of masts and with smoke curling from the funnels she had all the appearance of a heavily laden steamer.

"You didn't happen to notice her number, did you, captain?" Arnold Bilverstone inquired, when the master of the _Priscilla_ was narrating his experience to the officers in the naval base at Haddisport.

"Well, it was painted over," the captain explained, "and an eye was painted in its stead. But under the paint I could make out the raised figures U50."

"Then the younger of those two officers was Max Hilliger," decided Mark Redisham; and Mr. Bilverstone agreed.

Later on that same day, or rather in the evening, Mark Redisham was again at the naval base. Just at about dusk a wireless message was received, intimating that two enemy submarines were in the neighbourhood.

The air was calm and clear and the sea smooth. Half a dozen of the most powerful telescopes and marine glasses were engaged by as many expert watchers in sweeping the sea, while at the end of the pier a naval gun was charged and a crew of experienced marksmen were at the breech ready to train it on the instant if the Germans' periscopes should be sighted.

Mark Redisham was the first to discover a ripple on the water some three miles away, but it was one of the officers who determined that the ripple was caused by the movement of a half-submerged submarine. It was apparently making towards Alderwick Roads, where half a dozen patrol trawlers lay at anchor.

The light was gradually fading, but the moving target was still visible. The gun was laid. For months back, at intervals, it had been brought into practice upon a mark less easily seen than the one upon which it was pointed at this moment, and the gunner who now controlled its aim had never been known to fail.

The lever was pressed. The shell shrieked forth. Then there was a terrific explosion which shook the windows of the town as the submarine was struck and sent to its doom.

An electric launch was sent out to pick up possible survivors, but all that could be seen was a slimy film of oil on the water's surface.

From the pier as the boat went out, the periscopes of the second submarine were sighted, but before the gun could be trained it had disappeared.

*CHAPTER XXXII.*

*U50'S WORST CRIME.*

"This second submarine was the U50.

"It's that naval gun on Haddisport pier that I warned you of," said Max Hilliger, as the vessel submerged and her electric motors were turned on. "We ought not to have come in so close. I believe those mine-sweepers in the Roads must have discovered us. Most of them are fitted with wireless masts. No, it's no use trying to rescue our friends. They couldn't have escaped after an explosion like that. We had better remain submerged and get away from the coast as quickly as we can."

Lieutenant Koerner was inconsolable over the loss of the other submarine. They had been working in partnership for several days past, sinking fishing boats more especially and using explosive bombs rather than wasting expensive torpedoes.

This use of bombs had necessitated the stopping of their intended victims. Having stopped and boarded them, there had always come the difficulty of dealing with their crews.

If you send a torpedo into an enemy ship from a discreet distance there is no question of sparing life. A submarine could not in any case encumber herself with prisoners. But when you have to speak to the vessel's skipper and have been polite to him, the matter is different. Even a German commander can hardly refuse to give him and his ship's company a chance of saving their lives.

Max Hilliger was greatly in favour of using bombs. He did not advance any serious scruples against the destruction of property; but he had been educated in England, he still retained a sense of honour and fairness, and he drew the line at taking the lives of innocent and unoffending seamen.

This was the rock upon which he and Lieutenant Hermann Koerner split. Koerner was not burdened with any of his subordinate's English ideas of humanity. He hated the English, and everything British. Like most Germans, he had persuaded himself that the war had been begun entirely by Great Britain; that Germany had never wanted to go to war. He resolutely closed his mind to the fact that his country had for many years been preparing for war, and seeking for a cause to pick a quarrel with Great Britain so that, being fully prepared, she might fall upon her and smash her.

Above all, he hated Great Britain because of her supremacy upon the seas. She had put a stop to German commerce and held Germany's great navy in a firm grip; therefore he considered that it was his highest patriotic duty to go about stealthily in his submarine destroying British shipping regardless of whether the ships he sank were armed for defence or were peaceful, unoffending fishing smacks.

He would have preferred it if all the vessels which came within reach of his torpedoes were ships of war; so that by sinking them he might lessen the overpowering strength of the British Navy.

But he had discovered long ago that the British naval officers and seamen were even more clever in protecting themselves from sudden attack than the Germans were in taking them by surprise.

Many times the U50 had been taken with other German submarines and torpedo boats to lie concealed in the narrow seas in the hope of being able to sink some of our transports carrying troops and munitions across to France; but they had always been frustrated or outwitted.

Lieutenant Koerner found that it was much more easy to lurk submerged in the tideways of commerce and to attack undefended merchant ships or fishing boats. Had not Max Hilliger sometimes opposed him, he would never have allowed a crew to escape. Max, however, held to one unvarying argument.

"What we are ordered to do," he declared, "is to help to overcome the enemy by starvation--preventing their ships from carrying food and other merchandise into their seaports. And if we sink the ships and their cargoes there is no further advantage to be gained by taking also the lives of their crews. Give their men at least a chance to escape in their boats."

Sometimes when the vessel attacked was of little importance, and especially if she happened to be a neutral, Koerner yielded and gave the crew time to abandon their doomed ship. But if the vessel were fitted with wireless masts, if she appeared to be armed, or if she offered any resistance, he showed no mercy, but came within gun range and opened fire upon her. It was only the very large ships against which he fired a torpedo. It is of one such exploit that I am now going to tell you.

Leaving the neighbourhood of Haddisport, the U50 crossed the North Sea and made her secret way down the Dutch coast to Flanders. Avoiding the British mine-field and keeping carefully out of the way of the British naval patrols, she was taken into the German submarine harbour at Zeebrugge, where she remained for some days, having her instruments cleaned and tested, her torpedo chambers replenished, and taking in stores for a long voyage.

Lieutenant Koerner behaved rather mysteriously towards Max Hilliger during this time. He had many consultations with staff officers and with the commanders of other submarines, and refused to inform Max what was in the wind. All that he would admit was the fact that they were going out under sealed orders, which were not to be opened until they should reach a point somewhere to the westward of Land's End.

The point indicated on their chart was in the midst of the Scilly Islands. Here, on a certain very dark night, the U50 lay motionless in a calm channel, with only the upper part of her conning-tower above the surface, hardly distinguishable from the surrounding rocks. Hermann Koerner was on watch with a pair of powerful binoculars.

"You appear to be expecting something," remarked Max Hilliger from below. "There can be no enemy ships in a dangerous corner like this."

"It is for that reason that I am watching," returned Koerner. "Since there can be no enemy near, it is safe for us to enter into communication with our friends."

"Spies, I suppose," conjectured Max, peering upward through the darkness.

"Ah!" exclaimed Koerner. "At last; I was searching in the wrong direction."

He drew an electric torch from his pocket and began to flash it. It was a wan, green light, which could not have been seen from a great distance. Koerner returned the torch to his pocket, closed the trap door of the conning-tower, and descended into the cabin, humming the air of a German folk-song.

"Well?" said Max.

"It is all right," nodded Koerner. "You can enjoy a good sleep, my friend. You will need it; because for some days and nights to come it is probable we shall both require to have very good eyesight."

Max turned into his bunk, but did not at once fall asleep. The intense silence and darkness kept him wakeful. He would much rather have been listening to the busy humming of the electric engines. At about midnight he turned on his pillow and spoke.

"Hermann!" he called.

There was no answer. He lay listening, and from one of the distant compartments there came to him the faint tap-tapping sound of the wireless instrument. It was too faint for him to hear distinctly enough to follow the message; and just as he was beginning to catch a word here and there, it stopped, and there was a long interval of silence, during which he fell asleep, not to be awakened again until late on the following morning. The petrol engines were at work, a dim gleam of daylight came in through the thick glass of an uncovered skylight. A servant was busy laying breakfast on the little table in the middle of the cabin.

"We are under weigh, then?" cried Max, speaking to the man in German.

"_Ja, mein Herr_. Since eight o'clock."

Max glanced up at the tell-tale compass above the table, and saw that the course was due west.

"It is the direction of America, _mein Herr_," said the servant, following his glance.

Max dressed and went out on deck. The dummy funnels and the false bulwarks were raised. There was a ragged red ensign flying from the mast. No land was in sight, and the sea was clear of shipping; but in the wake he presently discovered the swiftly moving periscopes of two other submarines. Lieutenant Koerner was on deck, but there were seamen about, and Max suppressed his desire to go up to him and question him.

When they were alone together at breakfast, however, he leant across the table and said:

"Is there any particular reason why I should not know something of our destination, Herr Koerner? I see that there are two others of our undersea boats in our company. Our purpose, whatever it is, must therefore be of importance."

"If it succeeds," returned Koerner, breaking the top of an egg, "it will be the biggest, most important thing we have ever done, or are ever likely to do. It will send a thrill of astonishment over the whole world. It will prove that the Kaiser's brave submarines are more powerful weapons than any dreadnought that ever was built."

"You amaze me," said Max. "I do not understand. I cannot guess. We are making a course westward, leaving England behind. We appear to be going out into the Atlantic Ocean. It is not there that we shall find any British battleships."

Lieutenant Koerner laughed.

"Let us hope not," he rejoined. "No, my dear friend. Believe me, it is not battleships that we seek."

"What then?" cried Max, nervously clutching at the edge of the table. "You do not mean--you cannot mean--that it is your intention to try to sink an Atlantic liner!"

"Well guessed!" laughed Koerner. "We shall torpedo her--a great liner--the greatest liner--the _Ruritania_."

Max Hilliger leapt from his chair.

"What?" he cried. "Impossible! You cannot be serious."

"I was never more serious in my life," Koerner assured him. "I tell you we are going to lie in her track--we and our two companion submarines. We shall station ourselves at three different points, one of which she must surely pass. And then, when she comes in sight, we shall creep nearer, unseen, unsuspected, and wait until she draws within range, when we shall take careful aim, making no mistake; and send our torpedoes into her. You see, it is war, my dear child; it is war."

Max Hilliger had turned suddenly pale; his eyes were staring wildly, his hands trembled.

"War?" he repeated. "Do you call it an act of war to sink a great steamship like that--a ship carrying no protective armour, no defensive guns, a ship crowded with innocent passengers, not all English, many of them Americans no doubt, probably scores of women and children. War? War? That is not war, Hermann Koerner. It would have no excuse, no justification. It would be crime, I tell you--a horrible, fiendish crime. It would be murder."

Lieutenant Koerner looked up at him with his egg-spoon poised.

"Calm yourself, my friend," he urged. "Call it what you will, that has nothing to do with you or with me. It is our part to do our duty by obeying our orders. And we have orders to sink this _Ruritania_. We shall obey."

Max shrugged his shoulders and sat down again, but not to eat.

"Oh, well!" he said presently. "After all, I need not distress myself perhaps. Her owners, her captain, her passengers have been warned. We shall not even see her. She will steam by another way, and even then be escorted by British cruisers. Otherwise--if I thought there was the merest chance of your doing this horrible thing--I should ask you to put me ashore on the nearest land, or I should pray that we ourselves should be sent to the bottom of the sea."

All the rest of that day and through the next night, while the U50 went on her way to take up her appointed position on the steamship route, Max Hilliger thought and brooded, wondering by what possible means he could avert the contemplated crime, even by the sacrifice of his own life.

He wondered if he could open some valve so that the submarine should never again rise to the surface; if he could secretly smash or disable some important piece of mechanism, or jam the torpedo tubes. But all the time he knew that if he should attempt such a thing there still remained the other two submarines, either of which might succeed where Hermann Koerner had failed.

At length the appointed position was reached. The commander occupied himself in making calculations of time and distance. Again and again he examined his instruments and controls, again and again he went through a rehearsal of every act and movement which would be put into practice when, if at all, the fatal moment arrived. Had Max Hilliger tried to disable any of the mechanism he could not have succeeded, so carefully was everything watched, so constantly was he himself kept under observation.

He contrived as often as he could to be in the conning-tower; but Koerner and the quarter-master were usually at the periscopes, and Max could only watch the two men, hoping, always hoping, that they would discover no sign of the expected liner. By their hardly suppressed excitement he knew that should she be keeping to her usual course and time, she was already due.

Suddenly Lieutenant Koerner ordered "diving stations." The tanks were filled--the vessel was submerged, and she sped through the dark depths at the fullest speed of her electric motors for about a quarter of an hour, when she again rose. Telegraph signals were rung. The torpedo tubes were charged.

"Is it the _Ruritania_?" Max panted. He saw that the moment had come.

"Yes. Quick! Get down into the torpedo chamber."

Instead of obeying the command, Max Hilliger snatched his loaded automatic pistol from his belt and leapt like a maddened animal at the commander.

"Stop!" he shouted. "Stop! Touch that lever and I will shoot you!" He flung himself forward, but a blow from the quarter-master's fist struck him in the face and he wheeled round, lost his balance, and fell. The pistol dropped from his grasp. His brain reeled, yet half consciously he heard the command given: "Fire!" He felt the vessel give a jump as the torpedo left its tube. From somewhere far away he heard a deep, dull explosion. Then, as a second torpedo was discharged, he came to his fuller senses.

"It is done!" cried Lieutenant Koerner with an exultant laugh as he drew back from his periscope.

Max Hilliger had risen to his knees. He had seized his fallen pistol and now he levelled the weapon at the commander.

"God forgive me," he murmured. "But it is less than you deserve."

And with that he pressed the trigger, firing point blank at a spot beside the Iron Cross on his companion's breast.

Hermann Koerner flung up his arms, tumbled backward, and lay upon the grating very still.

Dropping his weapon, Max stepped over him and made his way to the periscope. Trembling from head to foot, he yet controlled himself sufficiently to bend over the instrument to adjust its disturbed focus. Reflected in the mirror he saw the image of an immense Atlantic liner with four red funnels, and many decks crowded with people. Her whole vast fabric was heeling over. She seemed to have been struck by the torpedo somewhere amidships.

"How awful!" he exclaimed.

He turned to look once again at the commander lying dead at his feet.

"God forgive me," he repeated. "But it is less than you deserve."

*CHAPTER XXXIII.*

*MAX RENOUNCES THE FATHERLAND.*

Max Hilliger was now alone in the submarine's conning-tower and in charge of its controls. He was shaking violently as he began to realise the horror of what he had done.

He had deliberately fired a bullet into the heart of his superior officer, who had also been his companion and his friend. It was a terrible thing to have done; yet he believed that the act was justified. He only regretted that he had not committed it sooner, before Hermann Koerner had had time to give the fatal command for the discharging of the torpedo.

Had he done so, had he fired his shot at the right instant, how many hundreds of precious lives he might have saved! He would have had no haunting regrets in taking one man's life, if by taking it he had been able to prevent a far greater crime.

What he had seen in the mirror of the periscope was far more awful than the sight of Hermann Koerner's dead body. That the great liner was doomed he could have no possible doubt. He had heard the explosion as the torpedo struck its intended mark. He had seen the immense vessel heeling over, the passengers thronging her decks and scrambling for the boats.

There were no other ships in sight to rush to the rescue. He, Max Hilliger, himself, could do nothing to help. Even if the U50 had been capable of picking up survivors, he was well aware that, in spite of their peril, there was not a soul in that sinking leviathan who would accept help from a German submarine.

Steadying himself, he took Lieutenant Koerner's place and gave the command for the U50 to dive. Below in the engine-room they seemed not to have heard the sharp report of his automatic pistol, or, if they had heard it, they probably attributed the sound to some ordinary and innocent cause. But at length the quarter-master, who had been occupied in the torpedo chamber, climbed up the communication hatch to inquire into the result of the attempt upon the great liner.

"What luck, Herr Koerner?" he cried excitedly. "We have struck her--yes?" He crawled into the conning-tower and at the top of the ladder stumbled over the body of the dead commander. "_Ach!_" he ejaculated in consternation. "What is this? What is this?"

The submarine was going down at a sharp angle, propelled by her electric motors. Max Hilliger remained at his post to give the signal when she should be deep enough, and to control the steering gear.

By the light from an electric bulb the quartermaster saw the commander's body lying grimly motionless at his feet. At first he believed it was Max Hilliger, but he was quickly undeceived. Hilliger was still at work among the instruments and switches where a few minutes earlier Hermann Koerner had been. And now Hermann Koerner lay dead!

"There has been an accident?" the quartermaster questioned in agitation. "How did it happen, Herr Hilliger?"

Max Hilliger rang the telegraph indicator to the engine-room, he adjusted the rudders, and turned round to answer nervously and in a trembling voice:

"No. It was not an accident. I have killed him. I need not tell you why. You know. You heard me warn him that if he touched that lever I would shoot him. You had better send up one of the other officers to take command and make me your prisoner. I will suffer the punishment for what I have done."

The quarter-master glanced swiftly at the dead officer and then back again at Hilliger. "You killed him!" he cried in amazement. "You!"

He was staring at the Iron Cross on the midshipman's breast. Max was conscious of the fixed gaze, and his hand went up to the decoration. He gripped it in his fingers, and tearing it off, threw the medal contemptuously from him.

"But he was your friend," continued the quartermaster. "He was your superior officer. He was doing his duty to the Fatherland. He was obeying his orders!"

"He was not bound to obey an order to take the lives of hundreds of innocent people--peaceful, unarmed travellers," Max objected warmly.

"But you did not prevent him," rejoined the quarter-master. "The torpedo was discharged. I, myself, discharged it."

"Yes, unfortunately it was discharged." Max nodded gravely. "It was discharged, and it struck the target at which it was aimed. Even at this moment that great ship is sinking and her passengers and crew are struggling to save themselves."

"That is good," said the quarter-master with a chuckle of satisfaction. "It is a blow from which our English enemies will not soon recover. The whole world will now know that our enterprising submarines are more powerful than all Great Britain's boasted battleships." He returned to the engine-room and told his expectant companions that the mighty Atlantic liner had been sent to the bottom. They cheered noisily and started singing, and their singing and cheering only ceased when they learned that their commander was dead.

Many of them deserted their stations to make a rush at Max Hilliger. They called him an assassin, a traitor. They declared that he was at heart a contemptible Englishman, and that he ought never to have been allowed to enter the Kaiser's navy.

But while they clamoured for his life they realised that in their present situation they could not well do without him. There was only one other of their officers capable of assuming the command and navigating them home--a sub-lieutenant named Adolf von Wiebe. It was necessary, therefore, that Max Hilliger should continue to act as an officer, taking watch and watch about with Lieutenant von Wiebe, until they should join the main fleet beyond Heligoland, and hand him over for punishment.

"In the meantime," said Lieutenant von Wiebe, "you will consider yourself under arrest."

"Naturally," returned Max. "And you need not suppose that I wish to escape the penalty for what I have done. I told Hermann Koerner that if he fired that torpedo I would shoot him. Instead of warning him I ought to have shot him as soon as I knew that the liner had come in sight. It was he who was the murderer, not I."

"He did his duty," argued Wiebe. "He obeyed his instructions. It was to sink that liner that we came out here into the open sea. The whole thing was planned and arranged weeks ago. The owners of the ship were warned. The passengers were told before they left America that they would sail in that steamer at their own risk. The captain could have escaped us if he had taken a different course. Why did not the British Navy protect her by sending a cruiser convoy with her?"

"Because," Max reported, "the British Navy trusted that Germany had still a little honour and humanity left, and that no German submarine commander would be so brutal and cowardly as to fire a torpedo into an unarmed passenger steamer, carrying neutral Americans and women and little children. But that is where Great Britain and all other civilised nations have made the mistake. They have given Germany more credit than she deserved. She has no honour and no humanity, but only deceit and falsehood and cruelty."

"Be careful what you are saying," cautioned Lieutenant von Wiebe. "Remember that we are at war, and that our whole existence as a nation depends upon our conquest of Great Britain."

"War?" rejoined Max. "But war has its laws as well as peace. We Germans have broken those laws. Our enemies--Russia, France, and Great Britain--are playing the game fairly and honestly; but we are not. You know this as well as I do, only you shut your eyes to it all. From the very start, when we invaded Belgium, we've been worse than savages, robbing and murdering peaceful citizens, destroying their beautiful cathedrals, wrecking their homes. We've gone out of our way to bombard unfortified towns; we've hit below the belt. When we couldn't break through our enemies' lines, we have forced them back by using poison gas; when we've been too cowardly to engage their battleships in open fight we have sunk their merchant vessels and helpless fishing boats. And now there is this greatest crime of all--the sinking of the _Ruritania_. I tell you, Adolf, I am sick of it all, and I hope, as I firmly believe, that Germany will be beaten."

Adolf von Wiebe forced himself to laugh.

"You are hoping for the impossible," he said. "Germany can never be beaten. Do you think that we have been preparing for this war all these years only to be defeated in the end? Why, this very sinking of the liner--one of the biggest ships that ever sailed the seas--is a proof of our power. As for Great Britain--she is not worth talking about. You, who have lived in England, should know better than to imagine that she could have a ghost of a chance against so mighty an empire as ours! Sooner than you suppose, Great Britain will have ceased to exist."

"It is because I have lived in England that I am so sure that she will be victorious," persisted Max. "And if I could escape----"

"Escape? Escape from a submarine? Oh, no, I shall see to it that you don't escape, my fine fellow! You are as safe here as if you were imprisoned in a fortress. And since you cannot escape, there is no need to put you in irons. I will allow you to continue with your duties, and, notwithstanding your silly prejudices and scruples, I shall trust you not to put any obstacles in our way when it is a question of sinking a few more ships. We still have some torpedoes left, and I intend to use them."

"We shall need more petrol," Max told him sullenly.

"That will be forthcoming," returned Lieutenant von Wiebe. "A supply ship will meet us."

"Where?" Max asked.

"Never mind where. It is perhaps as well that you should be kept in ignorance of the situation."

Max could only very vaguely guess at the course which the U50 was now taking. He was not allowed to handle the charts or to know more than the general direction as indicated by the compass, which usually pointed northward.

As previously arranged, the submarine's two consorts separated from her when the _Ruritania_ had been dealt with. Their instructions were that they were to proceed across the Bay of Biscay and through the Straits of Gibraltar into the Mediterranean to attack British and French warships operating in the Dardanelles; but the U50 had not been fitted for so long a voyage.

As much as possible she was kept submerged, or with only her periscopes above the surface. No ships were chased or attacked. It seemed to Max that it was the purpose of Lieutenant von Wiebe to get as far away as possible from the scene of the foundering of the _Ruritania_, and to avoid all accidents which might bring him under suspicion of having been concerned in that disaster.

Once, when the submarine was passing abreast of a wild, rocky coast, Max was at the periscope. In the mirror he saw reflected the grey shape of a small British cruiser lying at anchor within easy torpedo range.

In ordinary circumstances he would have rejoiced at the opportunity of doing damage to an enemy ship; he would instantly have commanded the crew to their firing stations and manoeuvred to take aim.

But now he told himself that, as he was practically a condemned prisoner, a mutineer who had disavowed his loyalty to Germany, it was no longer a part of his duty even to report the fact that the cruiser was within striking distance. So he kept silent, and the U50 proceeded on her secret way, and Max Hilliger was never suspected of his duplicity.

On the following morning he heard the chief engineer announcing to the commander that they were becoming perilously short of petrol. Lieutenant von Wiebe showed no concern.

"Within two hours," he said, "we shall be in touch with the supply ship. We will creep into one of these bays and get into communication with our wireless."

And in the stated time the Marconi aerials were at work.

*CHAPTER XXXIV.*

*THE SUPPLY SHIP.*

The British cruiser which Max Hilliger had seen through the periscope of the U50 was H.M.S. _Dauntless_. She had been on coast patrol duty for some days in northern waters, watching for neutral ships and boarding them to examine their papers and inquire into the nature of their cargoes.

Most of them had given a satisfactory account of themselves, and had been allowed to pass on to their intended destinations. But one of them, an old green-painted barque flying the Swedish flag, had at once aroused suspicion by the fact that she was fitted with wireless aerials.

A shot was fired across her bow, and she shortened sail. Captain Damant sent a boat aboard of her in charge of a second lieutenant, who was accompanied by Midshipman Rodney Redisham.

Rodney Redisham read the name _Olaf Triggvason_ on the vessel's side, but he did not take any great interest in her while he waited for the lieutenant's return into the boat. The examination seemed to take an unusually long time, and he wondered if anything contraband had been discovered.

Presently the lieutenant appeared in the open gangway, and began to signal back by semaphore to the _Dauntless_. Rodney understood the message that was sent. It was that a quantity of naphtha and benzine had been discovered in the barque's cargo; that the captain was a German, and that his secret purpose was to supply a German submarine, which he confessed that he expected.

An answer came back from the cruiser:

"Stay where you are, and we will come alongside."

The _Dauntless_ steamed slowly up, and the German captain was taken on board of her as a prisoner, to be interrogated by Captain Damant. Shortly afterwards the whole of the crew were taken off and sent below into the seamen's quarters.

The proceedings were quite unusual, and Rodney Redisham did not understand them. Enlightenment came to him, however, when, instead of the barque's own crew, the same number of British seamen dressed up in the foreigners' clothes were put on board the _Olaf_. He himself was ordered to exchange his midshipman's uniform for canvas breeches and an engineer's jumper. Two lieutenants were similarly disguised, and put in command of the barque.

Rodney began to experience the excitement of a prospective adventure. The excitement was increased when three machine guns were transferred from the _Dauntless_ to the decks of the _Olaf Triggvason_.

When all was ready the cruiser steamed away and the barque's sails were braced. Her German captain, under pressure, had given the bearings of the spot near which he had been instructed to lie in wait for the submarine, and for this spot the course was set.

It was in a secluded bay between two barren headlands, far away from any habitation. Outside this bay the vessel tacked to and fro and back and forth; but there was no sign of any submarine.

At the end of the first day the senior lieutenant shook his head and declared his belief that the German captain had deceived them. He anchored, knowing that no submarine would expect to find the ship in darkness. But at dawn he again set sail, and cruised within a radius of about a dozen miles. Returning towards the headlands at noon he was about to tack out again when his Marconi operator called him below. Some ship was trying to open communications.

The lieutenant went to the instrument-room, and a message came to him in international code asking the name of his ship. He purposely delayed his answer until the question had been repeated several times, then, giving the name of the ship, he added a guarded question in German.

There was no response for a long time; but he waited patiently, and at length a series of searching questions came to him as though they were from a British warship, demanding to know his exact position and destination and the nature of his cargo.

He knew perfectly well that there was no British warship, excepting the _Dauntless_, within twenty miles of him, but he answered with all the cunning which would enable his questioner to understand that the way was clear. Already he was convinced that he was speaking with the commander of a German submarine, and at length came the message:

"All right. I am the U50. I am short of oil. Stay where you are, and I will come alongside you within an hour."

That hour gave the lieutenant ample time in which to prepare a surprise for his expected visitor, to keep his men out of sight beside their concealed guns, and to place the ship in such a position that the guns would cover the submarine when it should rise to the surface and come alongside. He kept the Swedish flag flying, but had a British ensign ready to take its place at the appropriate moment.

Rodney Redisham, leaning lazily over the rail at the break of the poop, was the first to discover the movement of the submarine's periscope along the sea's ruffled surface. It was approaching on the starboard side. He reported to the lieutenant, and the helm was put over, so that the barque fell off the wind and lay with her sails swaying empty. The side gangway was opened. Then the submarine, drawing nearer, rose to the surface until her whole length was visible from stem to stern.

Lieutenant von Wiebe and the quarter-master stepped out on the conning-tower platform, and a gang of seamen emerged from the forward hatchway to be ready to take in the new supply of oil.

As they drew closer, steering to come alongside, Wiebe shouted a greeting to the _Olaf Triggvason_, and a couple of English sailors, looking very like Germans, climbing up the main shrouds, waved their arms and cried aloud:

"Hoch! Hoch!"

Slowing down, the submarine drifted nearer, until only a few yards of clear, green water separated her from the barque. More of her crew clambered out upon her long, narrow deck, with Max Hilliger in their midst.

Max had discarded his naval uniform. He was barefooted and bareheaded, and wore only a pair of greasy serge trousers and a grey flannel shirt.

Suddenly the Swedish flag was hauled down from the barque's mizzen, and the British ensign was run up in its place. From the opening of the gangway the shining barrel of a machine-gun was thrust out, two machine-guns appeared between gaps in the poop rail, and along the starboard bulwarks half a dozen British bluejackets levelled their rifles at the German commander and his men. The senior lieutenant, no longer disguised, but in the honourable uniform of a British officer, stood forward at the gangway.

"You will surrender, or I shall sink you," he commanded calmly, as if he were merely giving instructions as to how the submarine should come closer alongside.

Adolf von Wiebe shrank back like an animal at bay, and glanced agitatedly from side to side for a means of escape. But there was none. He could not submerge; he could not take flight. It was useless to think of fighting, and the three quick-firing guns, as well as half a dozen rifles, were levelled menacingly at his ship and his men and himself. It is clear that he had no alternative but to yield.

He shrugged his shoulders in abject despair.

"_Ja wohl_," he responded, with a forced laugh. "You 'ave shove me in ver' difficult corner, _mein Herr_. It is no good. Ze game is hup. I surrender. I mek ze salute."

Drawing his bare feet together and standing very upright, he raised his hand to his cap in formal German fashion, and his crew, one and all, followed his example.

"And now, vot next, if you please?" he asked.

"You will bring your crew on board here," he was told. "Within an hour a British cruiser will be with us to take possession of your submarine."

Ropes were thrown across, and when a gang plank was in place the thirty German prisoners marched disconsolately on board the barque.

The last in the file was Max Hilliger. As he passed by Rodney Redisham he gave a start of recognition.

"Hullo!" he cried, lifting his hand to his forehead. "I'm glad to see an English face again--one that I know. You have outwitted us this time very cleverly, but quite honestly. The English are always honest. They always play the game." And, lowering his voice, he added, "I wish I could say the same of the Germans."

"But you oughtn't to be disloyal to your own people," said Redisham.

"I can't help it," returned Max, standing in front of the midshipman. "I've been mistaken in them all along, and I've had enough of them. You see, I went to school in England, and that has made a heap of difference."

"Yes, and you became a Sea Scout," nodded Redisham, slowly putting out his hand.

Max Hilliger looked down at it, and shook his head.

"That's just like you," he said, "offering to shake hands with a beaten enemy. You're very good, but I can't do it. I am not worthy to take the hand of an English gentleman. My own isn't clean enough."

He was remembering what had happened in the conning-tower of the submarine. He was remembering how he had taken part in many an act of piracy against British ships, and his heart was heavy with remorse. He turned away, and walked aft. Rodney Redisham watched him, and wondered if his apparent humility were genuine.

Max Hilliger made his way to the poop, climbed the companion ladder, and continued his way to the taffrail. For a moment it seemed to Redisham that he was about to fling himself overboard, and so escape the payment as a prisoner of war.