Chapter III: Part 3

The picket-boat was now steaming in darkness, made more intense by the glare, two miles ahead of her, of "Glaring Gertrude's" huge beam. This light, by a lucky chance that night, never seemed to leave the white salt-heaps on the opposite shore.

"We're right on top of the mines now, sonny. Feeling gay?"

"Ra--ther!" answered the Orphan, the uncomfortable feeling in his stomach entirely forgotten.

"Worth a guinea a minute! My jumping Jimmy, it is!" the Sub kept saying to himself. "Starboard a little! That's the ticket. Keep her as you go. We're nearly past the mines now."

Presently the Orphan could see a dark line to starboard--perhaps a thousand yards away--and knew that this was the low-lying ground which swept along to the right of Yeni Kali fort, the land from which the guns had fired on the trawlers last Saturday.

If only "Glaring Gertrude" would stay where she was and amuse herself counting the salt-heaps all would be well. Once or twice she swept away from them, and the Orphan caught his breath lest she would swing right round on the picket-boat; but every time, just at the critical moment, back she would go to see if the salt-heaps were still there.

The picket-boat throbbed along; hardly any smoke was coming out of her funnel, and only very seldom a spark; old Fletcher might be a humbug, as Jarvis said, but he _could_ stoke.

Then the Sub pointed out, right ahead, the square dark shape of Yeni Kali itself, its upper edge--broken and jagged where shells had crumbled it--silhouetted against "Glaring Gertrude's" beam.

"They're working it from somewhere in the fort itself," he said, speaking very quietly, "and the fort gives us a shadow. Splendid!"

"We've come too far; port your helm and ease her a bit, Orphan. Get that lantern ready--stand by to light it," he told the signalman.

The picket-boat turned in towards the darkness of the land, and moved through the black water with just a little rippling gurgle under her bows, whilst the crew, for'ard, strained their eyes to find the mark-buoy--the mark-buoy which the Turks had shifted.

"We ought to see it--it's white," muttered the Sub impatiently, but their eyes were rather blinded by looking at "Glaring Gertrude", and they could not pick it up.

The Sub kept his eyes shut for a minute, and then looked again.

No result.

The line of shore was very close now, and it was inconceivable that the Turkish look-outs at their guns, all along it, could not see the picket-boat. Round and round, first this way and then that, she steamed, hunting everywhere for that mark-buoy--without success.

To seaward the _Swiftsure_, "Peeping Tom" and his sister were still keeping up their noisy game of "Peep Bo", I spot you!--Bang! No, you don't!

But for that, and the gurgling under the bows, and the soft grating of the engines, there wasn't a sound. Not a sound came from the shore close to them, not even a dog barked.

The Sub grew restless. He knew that the two trawlers and the _Swiftsure's_ picket-boat must already be sweeping through the mine-field and expecting to see the red light to guide them.

He swore at the Turks, cursed himself, and above all he cursed "Glaring Gertrude" and the fort for making the darkness so pitch black round the picket-boat.

He steered out towards the opposite shore until he almost ran into the big search-light's beam, swung her round, and made another "cast", but the blackness away from the glare and in the shadow of the fort was absolutely inky.

No buoy could he find.

He looked at the luminous face of his wrist watch. "It's getting on for eleven," he said bitterly. "The trawlers must have nearly finished."

"There's a light, sir! Look, sir! To seaward!" a man called excitedly.

"Keep quiet, you fool," growled Jarvis, "or you'll wake them Turks."

They all looked back towards the mine-field, and saw a small white light--like a small star twinkling low down on the water--between them and the _Swiftsure_.

"The trawlers have finished--that's the signal," the Sub swore angrily, "and we've not helped them. Go back to the ship, Orphan. Curse it all!"

And then at last the Turks woke up. Flash! Bang! Flash! Bang! Guns began firing one after the other, and the Orphan ducked as he heard shells whistling through the darkness.

He could have kicked himself for ducking, because the shells were not really coming his way, but bursting hundreds of yards beyond the little white light. It was that the Turks had seen, not the picket-boat. She had, however, to pass it on her way back.

"Which side shall I pass the light?" he asked nervously.

"Keep inside; they won't see us, and they won't hit us if they do--I almost wish they would," the Sub growled miserably. "Shove her along!"

As the picket-boat increased speed and approached the light the noise of shells came much nearer. One especially seemed to be very close, and burst in the water not a hundred yards ahead.

"Confound you! Keep your head still; you aren't a jumping marionette," swore the Sub as the Orphan ducked again.

"Sorry!" he stuttered. "I try, but I can't help it."

"Shove her along! Open her out! Let her rip!" roared the Sub. He was more happy now that there was some danger.

The picket-boat dashed through the water. She came abreast the white light, swinging from a pole on a buoy quite unconcernedly.

"That marks the end of the channel they've swept," the Sub bellowed; but the Sub was much too interested in the shells which were humming and shrieking, right over the boat now, some of them bursting as they struck the sea, others falling in with a "flomp". Another moment and the white light was left behind, wriggling excitedly as the wash of the steamboat made the buoy dance. Another hundred yards and they were out of the line of fire.

There was a sudden shout from the bows: "Something ahead, sir!" and out of the darkness came cries and shouts for help. They steered towards them, stopping engines, and found two men in an almost sinking dinghy--a trawler's dinghy--one of them trying to paddle with bits of bottom board.

They hauled them in and left the boat behind.

The men were numbed and half dazed. One, a signalman, had a cut on his head and was bleeding freely.

"285's blown up, sir; we're the only ones left."

Neither knew anything, except that there had been a great heave under their trawler and they'd found themselves in the water, swum about, found the dinghy, and got into her. One man had started feebly baling her out with his hands, whilst the other had ripped up one of her bottom boards and tried to paddle to the ships.

"She was only a-goin' round in circles and a-drifting inshore," he said.

They hadn't seen any more of the crew, but the Sub stopped engines and halloed into the darkness. No answer coming back, he returned to the _Achates_ at full speed. "Squinting Susan" and "Peeping Tom" had to be passed, but they and the _Swiftsure_ were still busy with their little game, and so no one bothered about them.

Until the Sub brought the news, no one knew of the disaster to trawler No. 285--not even the second trawler, which had already returned. Some of the crew of the _Swiftsure's_ picket-boat had seen a sudden glare on the water---like a flash running along the surface--which they thought was a shell bursting. Nobody had heard any explosion.

In case there were any more survivors, the _Swiftsure's_ picket-boat went back to search the mine-field, and luckily found the skipper of the trawler and two more men drifting about on wreckage. Even they could give no definite account of what happened. One thought he heard a noise; another that he'd seen a flash; they all remembered a great heave under them and finding themselves in the water.

And so, in this sad way, the night's adventure ended; and the picket-boat having been hoisted in, the Orphan, very miserable, undressed and turned in to his hammock.

The Sub was wretched. He had not found the mark-buoy, and had done nothing to help in any way, and he cursed himself for not searching the mine-field area thoroughly, and for leaving the trawler skipper and those two men.

He wished someone would kick him very hard.

Next forenoon the Orphan was busy in his picket-boat collecting the crews of the other trawlers--some men from each--and bringing them aboard the _Achates_. He also had to fetch from the _Aennie Rickmers_ her captain--a positively enormous man--and the flying officers, one of whom was a jovial burly Frenchman with a red beard, very proud of being called "Ginger".

On the quarter-deck, officers and men fell in, bare-headed, whilst the little pale-faced Padre read the burial service for those missing from the blown-up trawler.

Nothing more happened that day, but on the Wednesday the wind rose, and by nightfall was blowing hard--a very black night it was--and at about two o'clock in the morning an explosion occurred under the bows of the _Aennie Rickmers_.

She made signals of distress, and began to sink rapidly by the head. There had been rumours for some days that two Austrian submarines had escaped from the Adriatic; it might be a torpedo from one of them, or perhaps from some Turkish torpedo-boat. Some suggested floating mines; others that an explosion had occurred inside the _Aennie Rickmers_ herself. No one knew exactly what had happened. All that anyone did know, when Captain Macfarlane took the _Achates_ close to her, was that she was sinking; that her "dago" crew of Levantine nondescripts had deserted in all her boats; and that her English officers, the flying officers, their men, and the four wounded from the _Achates_ were left without any means of saving themselves.

A most unpleasant hour-and-a-half followed.

The first the China Doll knew of it was being roughly punched in the ribs and shaken. He woke to hear men passing from hammock to hammock, singing out: "Turn out, sir, turn out; submarines about; all hands on deck, sir!"

He didn't lie long after that. He was down, had pulled on his trousers, found a coat and cap, fumbled in his chest until he found his swimming-collar, and was blowing it up round his neck before he was really awake.

Bubbles, whose hammock was slung next to his, had gone to sleep again. He prodded him feverishly. "Submarines, Bubbles! All hands on deck! Get your swimming-collar!" he squeaked.

"Oh, bother! Curse you!" grunted Bubbles. "You aren't pulling my leg? Oh, hang it!" he grumbled, as he saw all the other snotties tumbling into their clothes, officers coming out of their cabins into the dark, crowded "half-deck", and heard the banging down of armoured hatches. "I do hate this beastly war. Breakfast at seven; then a cold bath at two in the morning. Beastly!"

The China Doll went up on the dark quarter-deck and hunted round for someone to talk to. His teeth were chattering and his knees were trembling--it was so dark and cold.

"What's happened?" he asked, stumbling across Uncle Podger.

"Something blown a hole in the _Aennie Rickmers_, and the Sub's gone across in the cutter to bring back our wounded."

"What did it? Was it a submarine?"

"Don't bother; no one knows. Come and have a look at her."

He took him round to the other side of the turret, into the wind, and out in the pitch-black night they could just make out the darker mass of the hydroplane ship, apparently tipped up by the stern, and a signal-lamp flashing on board her. They heard shrieks coming from her, and the China Doll's heart beat fearfully fast.

Near them, on the quarter-deck, the querulous voice of Dr. O'Neill, the Fleet-Surgeon, was lamenting that he had ever come to sea. "Mother of Moses!" he groaned, as "Glaring Gertrude" turned her light towards the _Achates_ and everybody's face showed up, and the turret and the superstructure, the masts and the funnels, stood out clearly against it. "Mother of Moses, they'll torpedo us next if we wait here much longer! They _must_ see the ship every time that beastly thing passes across us."

As "Glaring Gertrude" swept away, and everybody and everything was left in darkness again, the Fleet-Paymaster's loud, cheery voice bellowed: "Cheer up, old 'C.D.'; if you have to take to the water, you won't find any whisky in it!"

The officers and men standing by tittered, for they well knew that Dr. O'Neill was a rabid teetotaler, and that "C.D." stood for "Converted Drunkard".

"I've never tasted the beastly stuff in my life, and know it you do!" snapped the Doctor furiously.

"Sadly lacking in the sense of humour you are, old C.D. What could be funnier than the whole seven hundred and fifty of us to go drifting ashore, under those salt-heaps, with swimming-collars round our necks?"

The Fleet-Surgeon stalked away, muttering angrily: "I hate fools."

By this time everything that could be done to make the _Achates_ safe, in case she was attacked, had been done; water-tight doors and hatches were all closed; the Orphan was under the fore-bridge with his 6-pounder guns' crews; Bubbles was on the after-shelter deck with his; look-out men, all round the quarter-deck and fo'c'sle, peered into the darkness; the Sub had gone across to rescue the wounded men and, if need be, bring back everybody from the _Aennie Rickmers_, and all the officers and men who had no jobs to do stood waiting for whatever was going to happen.

To those who realized what might happen, and who thought it more than probable that whatever had fired a torpedo at the hydroplane ship--and by now everybody said it was a torpedo which had blown a hole in her--would come back out of the darkness, wait for that search-light to show up the _Achates_, and then take a pot-shot at her;--to those, that next hour-and-a-half was probably the most trying, and longest, in their lives. The wind blew so fiercely, and the water was so cold and dark, that there was very little chance of anyone being picked up once the _Achates_ did sink, as there was every prospect of her doing--the poor old ship--once a torpedo got home.

Fortunately most people have not vivid imaginations, and to go into the battery during this time no one would have imagined that anything at all out of the way was happening. The men crowded there, just discernible by the blue-stained fighting-lights, walked up and down or stood in knots, smoking, and talking quietly about everything under the sun except what was going on. It was only when that hateful search-light passed along the ship, and one saw that practically all these men had their swimming-collars blown up round their necks, that one realized that they did know what the next few moments might bring them, and that, knowing this, they did not worry about it.

All had been done that could be done; of course, the _Aennie Rickmers_ and their own wounded messmates aboard her could not be left in danger, and old "Yellow Beard", as they called Captain Macfarlane, was on the bridge up there above them.

So why bother?--and they didn't.

Uncle Podger, going up on the boat deck--really to get away from the China Doll, who would worry him with questions--stumbled against someone crawling on his hands and knees. The search-light sweeping round just then, he saw that it was Fletcher. "What are you hunting about there for?" he asked him.

"I can't find the tortoise, sir," the old man said. "I did not want to leave him behind if anything happened."

"He can swim, can't he? You'll be able to hold on to him, and he'll tow you ashore!" Uncle Podger laughed, and tried to help find "Kaiser Bill", waiting for "Glaring Gertrude" to come back again and throw a little light into the corners the "savage" beast most frequented. He left Fletcher still looking for him, and on his way for'ard to pass the time with the Orphan, collided with the Pimple stumbling along from the bridge.

"She's safe--she's only got her fore compartment flooded---the bulkhead's holding. Our wounded are coming across in the cutter. The Captain's sent me to tell the Fleet-Surgeon," and away the Pimple dashed.

A few minutes later the cutter with the wounded splashed alongside. They were hoisted in and taken to the sick-bay. Two of these--Cookey, the chief cook, and the leading stoker--both of whom had had their legs smashed, were very big men indeed; and no one who has not had to do it can imagine the difficulty of handling helpless men of that great size and weight, and lowering them into, or hoisting them out of small boats even in daylight. In darkness it is much more tedious and awkward; yet, abandoned by their crew, and with the ship apparently sinking under them, the first thing the officers of the _Aennie Rickmers_ and the French and English flying officers and men did, after they had been thrown out of their bunks by the force of the explosion, was to get the wounded ready to be lowered over the side, and, directly the _Achates'_ cutter had come alongside, to lower them safely into it. This was an incident of quiet, unostentatious coolness and courage which deserves recording. It is, perhaps, easy to be courageous at 2 p.m.; at 2 a.m. it is a very different matter.

And another thing must be put down. As the first of those two helpless men was being carried for'ard, an officer--the first he met, and it was not the Fleet-Surgeon--took off his own swimming-collar, pushed it into his hands, and disappeared in the dark before he could give it back.

Shortly afterwards the miserable "dago" crew came screaming alongside and begged to be taken on board. They were; and they'll never forget the "feel" of the ammunition boots of the tender-hearted marines who shepherded them that night into a casemate and locked them up inside. Then off went the _Achates_ to get out of the limit of "Glaring Gertrude's" range of vision, and to lose herself in the pitch-black night, where neither torpedo-boat nor submarine could find her.

The Sub had been left behind in the damaged ship, to shore up that fore bulkhead and to keep an eye on it all night. He was as happy as a "fiddler" to be able to make a good job of it and "wash out" the recollection of his bad luck and judgment two nights previously.

The remainder of the Honourable Mess crowded down into the gun-room with the joyous relief of danger past, demanding sardines, onions, and beer. They got them, too, at that unearthly hour of half-past three in the morning, for the purple-faced Barnes and the miserable little messman knew from long experience what would be wanted, and had spent the last half-hour preparing for them. It all went down as "extras", so the messman didn't mind.

The Pimple brought the news that it was a torpedo-boat that had attacked the _Aennie Rickmers_. "A signalman saw her dropping astern directly after the noise--the Navigator says he saw it too," he told them.

"Have an onion, Pimple?" they jeered.

The China Doll, at the first rumour of "sharks and onions", had dashed down from the quarter-deck, entirely forgetting that his swimming-collar was still round his neck; and they made him keep it there--blown up, too--so that he had the very greatest difficulty to swallow his fair share of the food--as for his glass of beer, Rawlinson drank half that--before the Commander sent the sentry to tell the Pink Rat to "'out lights' in the gun-room and stop that confounded noise!"

Then they crept noisily to their hammocks in the half-deck, and, marvellous to relate, slept like tops.

This finally concluded the operations off Smyrna--they were only intended temporarily to divert the Turks' attention--and a few days later the _Swiftsure_ and _Triumph_, with the trawlers, were recalled to the Dardanelles, and the _Achates_ ordered to Port Said to repair her small damages, leaving "Peeping Tom" and "Squinting Susan" to play "I spy you" by themselves, and "Glaring Gertrude" to go on counting her salt-heaps on the opposite shore or not, just as she pleased.

*CHAPTER VII*

*Off to the Dardanelles*

The _Achates_ arrived at Port Said on the 18th March and made fast, head and stern, to the Senior Naval Officer's buoys, off Navy House.

It was on this date that the combined French and British fleet made the attack on The Narrows--the attack which ended so disastrously with the loss of the _Ocean_, _Irresistible_, and _Bouvet_, and the crippling of the _Inflexible_ and _Gaulois_.

A very bad day it was, only relieved by some daring acts of bravery, of which none so roused the admiration of the whole fleet as the courage displayed by those destroyers which went alongside the mortally wounded _Ocean_ and _Irresistible_, and removed their crews under a concentrated fire from many heavy guns.

It was magnificent.

But the _Achates_ lay comfortably at Port Said all that tragic day, making preparations for repairing the damage caused by the Smyrna shells, and talking by wireless to her chummy ship the _Bacchante_, anchored off Suez, at the other end of the Canal.

Barely six weeks ago the Turks had made their feeble attack on the Suez Canal, and of course the first thing that the Honourable Mess decided to do was to visit Kantara and Tussum, where the fighting had taken place. The Lamp-post had an elder brother on the staff at Ismailia, the Pimple had a long-lost cousin in an Indian regiment at Kantara, and by dint of much worrying of these two unfortunate young soldiers, everyone had the opportunity of visiting these places and picking up a few bullets.

Anyhow, they had a very joyous three weeks, only slightly damped by the almost entire disappearance of the damage done by the Smyrna shells; but a few holes remained in one funnel, and they looked forward intensely to showing these to their chums in the _Bacchante_. Eventually that ship came back through the Canal, the _Achates_ followed her outside, and both of them steamed away to join the Eastern Mediterranean Squadron at its base at Mudros, the harbour in the island of Lemnos, sixty miles or so from the end of the Gallipoli Peninsula and the commencement of the Dardanelles. At last they were to take a hand in "The Great Adventure".

At two o'clock in the afternoon of the 12th April they both slipped through the "gate" in the submarine net, and anchored in that great land-locked harbour.

It was extraordinarily impressive to see the enormous assemblage of ships there--both French and British ships of every kind--battleships, cruisers, destroyers, submarines, huge transports, store ships, colliers, auxiliaries of all sorts, two white-painted hospital ships, trawlers, and tugs.

At the top of the harbour lay the little white town of Mudros, with its white twin-towered Greek church, and its row of spidery windmills on the ridge behind it; though the Honourable Mess had not much time to gaze open-mouthed at all these things, and to grin with pleasure when the _Bacchante_ anchored in the wrong place and was obliged to shift billet; because a collier came alongside almost immediately, and down they had to go, get into "coaling rig", and, for the rest of that bright sunny afternoon, "coal ship".

Everybody knew that the next attack on the Dardanelles would be a combined naval and military operation, and as transport after transport came steaming into Mudros harbour, the enthusiasm and excitement increased.

Also the Honourable Mess dined their pals of the _Bacchante_, and proudly showed them the few traces still remaining of the damage done to the ship at Smyrna. This was a beautiful occasion, because it washed out all memory of the incident of the "sea-gulls"--not one of them mentioned it--and also because the _Bacchante_ snotties introduced a delightful new form of "drag" hunt round the "half-deck", the "drag" being a piece of decomposed cheese (which they brought with them) and some Tabasco sauce and Chile vinegar dropped discreetly at intervals. As a special privilege, the "War Baby" was invited to the "meet", and the "Youngest Thing in Marine Subalterns" joyfully left the exalted atmosphere of the ward-room, unbuttoned the trouser-straps under the soles of his boots--the straps which kept his trousers and their broad scarlet stripes so beautifully straight--and prepared for the fray.

Blindfolded, and on hands and knees, these young gentlemen enjoyed a famous "run"; and though the Padre did object to the "drag" being placed on the pillow in his cabin bunk, even that did not seriously diminish their enjoyment. As a matter of fact, it slightly added to it.

Exactly what part the Navy would take in the approaching "landing" on the Gallipoli Peninsula no one exactly knew; but when the news came that men were being told off for "beach parties", and then when the Pink Rat, Bubbles, and the Lamp-post were ordered to be prepared to land with them and provide themselves with some sort of khaki uniform, excitement rose to fever pitch.

Within half an hour the Pink Rat appeared in the mess in proper soldiers' kit--beautifully fitting--which, he explained, "he'd brought out with him in case of accident".

"If you went to Heaven you'd turn up at the gate, and sign your name in old Peter's book with a pair of wings on and a mouth-organ!" the Sub snorted when he saw him; and Uncle Podger suggested that "he probably had a tail, with a sting on it, and a brand-new shovel, stowed away somewhere on board, lest, "in case of accident", he found himself in the other place."

The whole Honourable Mess concerned themselves with the fitting out of Bubbles and the Lamp-post. Proper khaki was unobtainable--at that time--so they dyed their white uniform in Condy's fluid, and as it shrunk in the process, and the resulting colour was a dirty yellow, streaked with brown, the effect was not good.

"Most unsatisfactory!" said Uncle Podger, when they first tried it on and he saw the Lamp-post's ankles and wrists sticking out far beyond the ends of trousers and sleeves, and Bubbles hardly able to breathe in his. "Most unsatisfactory! It will be an insult to the Honourable Mess if either of you are found 'corpsed'."

"You mustn't tell them you belong to the _Achates_ when they come to bury you," the others shouted. "You must promise that!"

"You're perfect scarecrows," roared the Sub when he saw them--"a pair of confounded convicts!"

Everybody laughed at them and devoutly envied them--and they laughed at each other.

Rawlinson, who prided himself on being a really great poet, burst out with:

"Two little convicts going out to fight,
One had his clothes too short, the other much too tight!"

There was a roar of laughter as the Honourable Mess lifted up their voices, chanting this, and dancing round the quaint pair, whilst Rawlinson, exhausted with the production of this exquisite couplet, retired to a corner to think out something which would rhyme with khaki.

The Lamp-post, grimacing, and trying to twist himself so that he could get a back view, didn't know or care what he looked like, but said he felt "like a prize idiot".

"How nice to feel natural for once, Lampy!" that insubordinate officer, the China Doll, squeaked.

This was simply asking for trouble. The two convicts chased him round the table, just missing him as he dashed out into the half-deck. Piercing shrieks for help followed, and the others rushed out to rescue him.

A glorious scrap followed.

"At any rate," said the Sub, when they'd come back again to repair damages, and the Hun had apologized for tearing the Pink Rat's coat-collar, "you'll both frighten the old Turks. That's one comfort."

There were so many things to keep up the excitement during those days of preparation. The transports, with their cheering loads of British, Australians, New Zealanders, French, and Algerian troops; the quaint old battleships from home, the dear old "mine bursters", with their clumsy, projecting spars and tackle, over the bow, for booming off mines; the balloon ship practising its funny, yellow gas-bag at the outer anchorage, and the enemy aeroplanes and their bombs. These last were, at first, a source of immense delight to the Honourable Mess, but eventually they became a little sorry for them--they flew so high and dropped their bombs so very unsuccessfully.

"How very disappointing!" said the Lamp-post one day. "Just fancy having brought along those bombs, to drop 'em harmlessly, and then have to fly back, all that way, without having done any damage."

He was quite serious about it, and, as a matter of fact, one could not but feel sorry for the poor chap, up there in his Taube, who, having expended all his four bombs uselessly, found he had to fly back some sixty miles to wind'ard, before he could go and "turn in" and try to forget about it.

Then, one day, they heard that their old friend the torpedo-boat, down at Smyrna, had come out to sea and fired three torpedoes at a crowded transport without hitting her; and by nightfall came the news that she had been chased, driven ashore, and destroyed by gun-fire. That was very good "business".

Next came the order that steel plates were to be built round the steering-wheels of the steam pinnace and the picket-boat, to protect the midshipmen and coxswains from rifle-fire. Almost at the same time the Orphan and the Hun (who was in charge of the steam pinnace) had been ordered to provide themselves with khaki, and told that their boats would be required to tow the soldiers to the beaches, on the day of the grand attack.

It was a great moment for both of them; and what a mess they made of their hands and clothes with Condy's fluid, and what prize burglars they looked when at last they showed themselves arrayed for war!

Every ship had to supply one or more steamboats, and each ship devised its own rifle protection. The _Achates'_ boats had a steel plate about five feet high bolted to the deck, in front of their steering-wheels, with a narrow, horizontal slit just below the upper edge, so that when those behind it stooped down under cover they could steer through this. The ends of the plates curved back a couple of feet, so as to give side protection.

Some ships built regular steel boxes with "all round" protection, others carried the side plates so far aft that they protected men standing in the stern-sheets; and the snotties in the boats with the least protection made great fun of those who had more. Probably, among the hundred thousand men in that harbour, during the days prior to the landing, the twenty or thirty snotties in charge of these steamboats were the most supremely happy of all.

The Hun and the Orphan went away, several times, and practised towing the transports' boats. Each steamboat had to tow four of these, one behind the other. On one day the 1st Lancashire Fusiliers came on board the _Achates_, and practised climbing down into the boats, down specially constructed wooden ladders, and were then towed ashore in twenty-four packed boats, each four being towed by a steamboat, and all six steamboats steaming in line abreast.

On another day all the snotties and men "told off" to land as beach parties, or as crews of boats, were fallen in on the quarter-deck, and Dr. Crayshaw Gordon, mounting the after capstan, gave them a few words of advice and instruction in case any of them were hit.

"Don't frighten them, Doc," the Commander had hinted previously--and he didn't. He had such a funny way of "putting" things that he had the men laughing in no time.

He explained how the little first-aid dressing should be used, tearing open the cover, showing them the pads to go next the wounds, the pieces of waterproof to cover the pads, and the bandage to wrap round all. He held up the safety-pin which is in every packet--held it so that all could see--and finished up with: "You men will probably come under heavy fire; some of you will get bullets through you; but if any of you come back wounded _without_ your safety-pins, there will be the devil's own row." He had such a quaint, nervous, amusing way of talking, and was so kind-hearted and so popular with the men, that they grinned and guffawed with amusement.

Of those men who stood there that afternoon, fifteen were killed on the day of landing, and some twenty-five or thirty wounded.

"Thank God, they have no imagination," Dr. Gordon told the Commander, "and can't realize what is in front of them!"

"They simply don't bother to think about it, Doc."

On the 23rd April the first move began. Transports crammed with cheering troops, cruisers, and battleships slipped out through the "gate" in the net. The _Achates_ spent the night at sea, and anchored off Tenedos Island next morning. Here were gathered the men-of-war, transports, fleet sweepers, and trawlers told off for the landings at the end of the Peninsula. It was a dull, grey-looking day, and a fresh breeze rising in the morning made the sea choppy, and must have caused intense anxiety to those in command, because the great landing was to take place next morning, and unless the sea was absolutely smooth, boat-work would be much more difficult.

That afternoon the Sub was ordered to go in the Orphan's picket-boat as "second in command" of the six steamboats which were to tow the battalion ashore. He was dumb with delight, and the Orphan almost as pleased.

In the afternoon the breeze did die down, and the Turks sent an aeroplane to see what was going on. It dropped a few bombs from a great height into the water between the ships, and flew back again.

Later on, the _River Clyde_ came along and anchored close to the _Achates_. Poor old _River Clyde_! She was to make her last voyage that night, with 2000 troops on board, to run herself aground under the mediaeval castle of Sedd-el-Bahr early next morning, and make her name famous in the annals of the British Navy and Army for many ages.

Large square openings had been cut in her side, and under these ran plank gangways, meeting at the bows, where a hinged platform was all ready to be lowered into the hopper and the lighters which were to fill the gap between her stem and the shore.

Her soldiers were intended to pour out of these openings, along the planks, down into the hopper and lighters, and so ashore.

At dusk the 1st Battalion Lancashire Fusiliers came on board--old soldiers all of them. Very silently and quietly they "fell in" on the quarter-deck and in the batteries, unslung their packs, laid their rifles alongside them, and were dismissed.

This was the moment for which the bluejackets were waiting. They had a great feast prepared on the mess deck, and hustled them down to it.

Five of the subalterns were grabbed by the Honourable Mess and brought down to the gun-room; the remaining officers were entertained in the ward-room.

"Thank God!" roared the Sub, "I'm coming in with you chaps to-morrow, or I couldn't face you. Buy up the place--beat the China Doll--break the blooming furniture--chuck your gear on the deck outside. Bless you, we'll give you a better dinner than you had in that old transport of yours. And there's my cabin for two of you--the bunk for one, and a shake-down for another. Barnes! Barnes! Bring round the sherry, and tell 'em to hurry up with the dinner."

Every delicacy the gun-room store possessed appeared on the table. The soldiers swore it was the best dinner they'd had since they left England; and the Honourable Mess spun them yarns about Smyrna--by order of the Sub, who had forbidden them to mention the morrow.

Dinner over, Uncle Podger took charge or the five subalterns, and piloted them into the crowded ward-room, where a "sing-song" had already been started. The Sub, the Pink Rat, Bubbles, the Lamp-post, the Orphan, and the Hun changed quietly into their war gear. The Sub, the Orphan, and the Hun climbed down into the two steamboats, went across and made fast to the trawler which was to tow them and their eight transport boats (empty) across to the Peninsula during the night. The other three snotties, laden with leather gear, water-bottles, field-glasses, revolvers, ammunition-pouches, haversacks with food for twenty-four hours, and blankets rolled up in their straps, were taken across to the _Newmarket_--fleet sweeper--along with all the men of the beach parties.

The sing-song in the ward-room was in full swing as the last crowded boat pushed off, and up through the open ward-room skylights came the rousing, roaring chorus of "John Peel", following them in the darkness until they were almost alongside the _Newmarket_. Many of those who sang it were singing it for the last time.

At ten o'clock the _Achates_ weighed anchor.

The sing-song went on until nearly eleven, but breakfast had been ordered at a quarter to four, so older heads suggested sleep. The "Lancashire" officers were stowed away in cabins, beds were made up for them on the deck; the ward-room cushions and arm-chairs all helped, and the men of the battalion lay down on the upper deck, with their heads on their packs.

At 3.15 everyone turned out, and half an hour later breakfast was ready for the soldiers--eggs and a good helping of bacon, bread and jam and butter to fill up corners, and as much coffee, tea, or cocoa as they wanted to wash it down.

This was all the _Achates_ could do for them, and, little though it was, everyone felt happy that each officer and man of that grand battalion started on The Great Adventure with a good breakfast under his belt.

The little Padre, whose gentle soul had been in anguish all that night, was not the only one who wished that their mothers and wives could know this.

At half-past four the _Achates_ stopped engines; the Lancashire Fusiliers "fell in", and out of the darkness covering an absolute calm, almost unruffled sea, came the six steamboats and the twenty-four transports' boats, each with its crew of five bluejackets.

Into these the soldiers filed, down the long ladders, and in twenty minutes the last boats had been filled and towed away.

There are no words which will properly and soberly describe the admiration felt by the officers and men of the _Achates_ for that battalion. When the last boat had shoved off, and the transports' boats and their six steamboats had taken up their stations in line abreast and began to move slowly away, Captain Macfarlane turned to the Commander and said gravely: "I've seen, Commander, a good deal of war on shore, but I have never seen anything which has stirred me so greatly as the quietness and discipline of those fellows--as the majesty of their bearing."

He went up on the bridge, and the _Achates'_ engines rumbled slowly ahead.

It was now a quarter to five on Sunday morning, the 25th April, the greyest of shadowy dawns--the formless clouds were grey--a darker streak of grey, where grey sea and sky met, was the Gallipoli Peninsula; and three grey patches, darker still, were the _Swiftsure_, _Cornwallis_, and _Albion_, close inshore, waiting for the moment to commence bombarding.

Behind the _Achates_, like a shoal of minnows, followed the steamboats and their twenty-four transports' boats; behind them were fleet sweepers, and looming indistinctly in the distance, as wide as the eye could pierce, came transports and store-ships in great numbers, the _River Clyde_ among them.

On board the _Achates_ the fo'c'sle and after shelter deck were crowded with officers and men anxiously gazing ahead.

"You know that R.H.A. officer," the China Doll kept on telling anyone who would listen to him--"that cheery chap who's going in with them to make signals. He promised to send me off a Turk's rifle. Wasn't that decent of him?"

On the bridge Captain Macfarlane, tugging nervously at his pointed beard, and standing next to the Commander, muttered to himself: "Thank God! they had a good breakfast."

"Every one of them, sir," the Commander jerked out, in the most matter-of-fact way.

"There's nothing like having your stomach full to keep up your pluck, Commander. It makes all the difference."

"I expect it does, sir. The books say so, at any rate."

"I know it does," the Captain said, thinking of what he had been through himself, and turning to speak to the Navigator, busy taking bearings.

The thudding of heavy guns broke the stillness, and splashes of flames lighted up the greyness of the daybreak.

"Hullo! they've started!" said the Commander. "They're three minutes late by my watch. I expect the blessed thing is losing again. I'm hanged if I know what's wrong with it."

The Great Adventure[#] had commenced.

[#] The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps had already effected a landing beyond Gaba Tepe, 15 miles to the north-east.

*CHAPTER VIII*

*The Landing on Gallipoli*

For half an hour there was one constant rumbling of guns fired by the _Swiftsure_, _Cornwallis_, _Albion_, _Prince George_, _Lord Nelson_, and _Agamemnon_; and shells from the first two of these, bursting in scores on the last half-mile of the Peninsula, hid it almost continuously under a cloud of lyddite smoke.

The six picket-boats steamed in steadily towards this smoke cloud with the Lancashire Fusiliers behind them, not advancing very rapidly because the current, flowing out of the Dardanelles, was against them, and the transports' boats were so heavily laden.

The crews of these boats had already tossed their oars--four in each boat--in readiness to pull in to the land when the steamboats should cast them off.

The Orphan steered his picket-boat--the fifth boat from the left--with one hand; in the other he held a half-eaten sandwich. Jarvis stood one side of him, the Sub the other, all three behind the bullet-proof protecting shield. Jarvis had slept a little through the night; the other two had not.

"Practise stooping and steering through the slit," the Sub ordered. "If you keep standing up and looking over the top, you'll get a bullet in your head when the time comes."

"But there can't possibly be anyone left alive there," the Orphan protested, as he watched the shells bursting.

"Just wait! You'll soon find out!" the Sub answered grimly, and noticing that the picket-boat was forging ahead of the line, sung out to the stoker petty officer to "ease her". This man was looking out of the engine-room hatch, just in front of the bullet-proof screen, and popped his head down to give another twist to the steam-valve. Old Fletcher, peering out of the stokehold hatch, farther for'ard, thought he, too, had been told to do so, and also bobbed his head down.

"Has the tortoise come along with us this time?" the Sub asked. The Orphan did not know; but Jarvis snorted: "Yes, 'Kaiser Bill's' 'ere all right; the old 'umbug!"--though whether he meant the tortoise was a humbug, or the old stoker, he didn't say.

The picket-boat fell back into line, and the Hun, standing behind his bullet-proof screen in the pinnace on the right, waved cheerfully across to the Orphan.

It was now clear daylight--about a quarter-past five.

The battleships still pounded the end of the Peninsula, and the six steamboats drew ahead of the _Achates_, which had now stopped engines. Behind them followed the trawlers, and the _Newmarket_, fleet sweeper, with the Pink Rat, Bubbles, the Lamp-post, and their beach parties, and behind her--far behind--came many transports.

"There's the _River Clyde_," called the Orphan, pointing away over the starboard quarter to where she was coming along, very slowly, towing the hopper and lighters which were presently to bridge the gap between her bows and the shore. After her, and with difficulty keeping pace with her, more ships' steamboats towed half a battalion of the Dublin Fusiliers.

"That's Cape Tekke--that high end bit, and that's Cape Helles--the higher cliff to the right, with the white lighthouse 'affair' on top," the Sub explained. "We've to land in between them. There's a bay there--'W' beach--underneath that smoke."

The sun itself had not yet been visible, but now it shot up from behind a distant ridge, humped like the back of a huge pig, and blazed straight in their faces.

"Old Achi Baba," said the Sub, shielding his eyes. "If they get as far as that to-night, they'll be able to look down on the Narrows and on the forts there."

"The Navigator told the Pimple that the soldiers expect to have dinner at Achi Baba," the Orphan said. "I jolly well hope they will. Isn't this sun beastly? I can't see where I'm going."

"Well, don't get too far ahead, and don't look into it," the Sub growled. "This isn't a race; ease down and give the pinnace a chance."

They were now about a thousand yards off the smoke cloud which concealed "W" beach, and the incessant crash of high-explosive shells bursting there, and on the high ground above it, made the most infernal din. At this point the two left-hand steamboats diverged from the other four and steamed towards the rocks under the actual end of the Peninsula; the Sub, with the remainder, maintained the original course. But "W" beach, and the scooped-out gully which led upwards to the high ground, and the cliffs at each side of it were hidden in dense clouds of lyddite smoke and by a thick morning haze which lay on the water. Unfortunately the sun, shining over Achi Baba, shone full on this smoke and mist, and lighted it up to such a dazzling extent that from the boats one could see nothing whatever of the shore, and judging distances was impossible.

The boats were now drawing very near their destination, and the Sub had all the responsibility on his shoulders of judging the moment when to slip them. A blast from his steam-whistle was to be the signal for all to be cast off, and Jarvis picked up the whistle lanyard and only waited the order to tug it. Plunky Bill, in the bows, kept a sharp look-out for'ard, and every now and then dipped the boat-hook in the water to find its depth.

The Sub, his face set and anxious, seized a megaphone and shouted: "Out oars!"

The transports' boats' crews immediately dropped their tossed oars into the rowlocks, and the soldiers in these boats turned round to have a look where they were going. They had, until then, been sitting stolidly in the boats with only their packs and the backs of their caps visible, and this sudden swinging round of heads as the oars dropped, and the almost simultaneous appearance of five hundred faces, made an unforgettable sight. Nothing could be seen through the dazzling smoke and mist.

"It's twenty to six," the Sub jerked out, looking at his wrist watch. "We're a few minutes late. We ought to be right there now."

Not a shot had been fired from shore, and the ship's shells were still bursting--very close the explosions seemed to be. "They must be able to see us," the Orphan whispered, nervously peering through the steering slit.

Then there was a yell from Plunky Bill: "Stakes right ahead, sir! Only four foot of water, sir!" Others took up the cry--the crew of the Hun's steam pinnace had seen them and were shouting and pointing.

The Sub looked under the bows and saw them himself.

"We're there!" he roared. "Pull, Jarvis; one long blast! Let go aft! Full speed astern! Hard a-starboard!"

The steam spluttered out for a moment--the Orphan thought the whistle would never clear itself--then it shrieked--the echo came back from the shore almost immediately, proving how close they must be--splash went the tow-rope into the water--the other steamboats slipped their tow-ropes--the stern of the picket-boat swerved to port and trembled as the screw went full speed astern, and the oars of the transports' boats splashed madly in the water.

Not a rifle-shot came from the shore.

As the picket-boat gathered stern-way, the crowded transports' boats splashed past on either side; their coxswains, perched in the sterns, yelling: "Go it: give way! Pull hard! Shove your backs into it!"

"Good luck to you all!" the picket-boat's crew shouted.

The soldiers turned round with grim, set faces, their hands on the gunwales gripping very tightly, ready for the moment when they would have to jump out. The leading boat wavered; she had come up against the stakes and the barbed-wire netting stretched between them. These checked her for a moment, but her weight carried her through, and she almost disappeared in the very thick and dazzling haze. The other boats dashed after her.

In the bows of one--with his machine-gun--was a very cheery subaltern who had dined in the gun-room the night before, and also his equally cheery chum the subaltern of Royal Horse Artillery--the brigade signaller. The latter, as he passed, called out: "Tell your China Doll I won't forget his rifle." "Good luck!" shouted the Sub, "I'll tell the little beggar."

"Turn her round! Take her out to the trawlers!" he roared to the Orphan. Round the picket-boat swung, and just as she commenced to steam out there was a shout of "The first one's beached herself, sir! The soldiers are scrambling out, sir!" And then from behind the haze and smoke clouds, from both sides and above, there burst out the most terrific rattle of maxims, and rifles and the bark of something heavier than either.[#]

[#] One-inch Nordenfeldts.

The picket-boat steamed out at full speed, whilst stray bullets hit the water near her and others pinged overhead. The Orphan and the Sub looked back. They could only see indistinctly through the haze with the sun on it; they could not see what was happening, but neither of them--down inside them--could imagine that any men in those crowded boats could pass through that fire and live. The Orphan held his breath and gripped the steering-wheel. His heart seemed to stop beating: the Sub's face was set, and he had bitten his lip. "They're getting it in the neck--my God, they are!" Jarvis said, as the awful rattling and banging went on without a moment's pause.

The steamboats reached the trawlers, a thousand yards or more from that glare of mist and smoke which hid "W" beach and its tragedy, and there they waited until, suddenly, first one and then another, then half a dozen--a dozen transports' boats, some with three oars working, others with only two, one with only one, scarcely any had all four, came into view, emerging from the mist, and bullet splashes leapt up in hundreds around and among them.

For one horrible second they thought that the boats had been beaten off, but then they saw that they had no soldiers in them, and knew that, at any rate, the soldiers had managed to land; the haze still made it impossible to see what had happened to them.

Breathlessly the crews of the steamboats, clustering round the two trawlers, watched these boats struggling off. The boat with only one oar working, and no coxswain, was turning circles, but drifting slowly out with the current. The man himself was evidently sitting on the bottom boards, because only his hands appeared above the gunwales, and he kept changing the oar from side to side.

Another boat near this one had two oars working, and they watched the coxswain in the stern crouching down and trying with his free hand to make these two keep time.

Just picture to yourself a stream with a tin floating some ten yards from the bank, and half a dozen boys, with their caps full of stones, throwing stones at it as fast as they can. Picture to yourself that tin with the splashes round it, and you will be able to realize something of what the Sub and the Orphan saw; only, instead of one tin, there were sixteen crippled boats--some of them already half filled with dead and wounded--and the bullet splashes leapt six feet and more out of the water.

Then imagine that, instead of a tin, it was a struggling cat the boys were trying to drown with their stones, and that you were making up your mind to slip off your clothes, swim in, and rescue it, knowing that the boys on the banks would throw stones faster than ever, and bigger ones too, which would really hurt.

Well, at this moment the Sub decided to steam into the hail of bullets and rescue those boats.

He roared out: "We can't sit here doing nothing. Go in and help them!"