The conversation now turned on the events of the war, with the result that I found myself in the peculiar position of having to join with one of my deadly enemies in cursing my beloved Germany, which nearly broke my heart. I would have preferred to have knocked the fellow down for some of the ridiculous statements he made. But in view of what I hoped to obtain from him I had to swallow it all and chime in with him. In the meantime my second mate had joined us, accompanied by one of the English petty officers, who carried a huge parcel of the latest papers under his arm. I now went back into the cabin with the petty officer, offered him a whisky, and cast my eye rapidly over the papers. Chance decreed that a paragraph in the second paper I took up caught my eye. It stated that on Wednesday, _i.e._ two days before our arrival, by order of the English officer commanding the Tralee district, several Sinn Fein leaders had been arrested in Fenit on suspicion of being concerned in a conspiracy against the English Government. So this was the answer to the riddle! And the paper stated that an Irish pilot (whose name I have forgotten) had been arrested on a similar charge. There could be no doubt about it. It must have been our pilot, the man for whom we had been waiting so anxiously here. It was no easy task for me to conceal from the petty officer the difficulty I had in following his remarks on all sorts of unimportant subjects. Fortunately, the other two now reappeared, and I was able to switch off. I handed the papers to Düsselmann, holding my thumb on the paragraph in question so that he noticed it at once. At the same moment the English captain clapped me on the back, and said in a reassuring tone, 'Capt'n, you need have no fear of U-boats. I'll keep a look-out for you.' As I did not at once grasp the meaning of these words he added in explanation, 'Your mate told me you were very much afraid of the U-boats and feared that you would never return from this voyage. Of course, I can understand this in the case of a man who is engaged to a girl in Christiania and is to be married in two months' time. But don't worry. So long as you are compelled to remain here for repairs I will lie at the entrance to the bay and take care that no U-boat gets in. And now, in return for that, give me another drink.' Suiting the action to the word, he poured out drinks for himself and the petty officer.