After that I kept a guard pacing the length of the narrow craft. We worked upon
the engine all that day and night and half the following day. Most of the time
we drifted idly upon the surface, but toward noon we sighted smoke due west,
and having found that only enemies inhabited the world for us, I ordered that
the other engine be started so that we could move out of the path of the
oncoming steamer. The moment the engine started to turn, however, there was a
grinding sound of tortured steel, and when it had been stopped, we found that
some one had placed a cold-chisel in one of the gears.
It was another two days before we were ready to limp along, half repaired. The
night before the repairs were completed, the sentry came to my room and awoke
me. He was rather an intelligent fellow of the English middle class, in whom I
had much confidence.
“Well, Wilson,” I asked. “What’s the matter now?”
He raised his finger to his lips and came closer to me. “I think I’ve found out
who’s doin’ the mischief,” he whispered, and nodded his head toward the girl’s
room. “I seen her sneakin’ from the crew’s room just now,” he went on. “She’d
been in gassin’ wit’ the boche commander. Benson seen her in there las’ night,
too, but he never said nothin’ till I goes on watch tonight. Benson’s sorter
slow in the head, an’ he never puts two an’ two together till some one else has
made four out of it.”
If the man had come in and struck me suddenly in the face, I could have been no
more surprised.
“Say nothing of this to anyone,” I ordered. “Keep your eyes and ears open and
report every suspicious thing you see or hear.”
The man saluted and left me; but for an hour or more I tossed, restless, upon
my hard bunk in an agony of jealousy and fear. Finally I fell into a troubled
sleep. It was daylight when I awoke. We were steaming along slowly upon the
surface, my orders having been to proceed at half speed until we could take an
observation and determine our position. The sky had been overcast all the
previous day and all night; but as I stepped into the centrale that morning I
was delighted to see that the sun was again shining. The spirits of the men
seemed improved; everything seemed propitious. I forgot at once the cruel
misgivings of the past night as I set to work to take my observations.
What a blow awaited me! The sextant and chronometer had both been broken beyond
repair, and they had been broken just this very night. They had been broken
upon the night that Lys had been seen talking with von Schoenvorts. I think
that it was this last thought which hurt me the worst. I could look the other
disaster in the face with equanimity; but the bald fact that Lys might be a
traitor appalled me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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