THE ATONEMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15518, 28 January 1914, Page 5

THE ATONEMENT.

) :B y JAMES BLYTH. „» " A Hazardous Wooine," sic.

•i gTORY OF MODERN A ADVENTURE.

COrYRICHT.

CHAPTER Xll—(Continued.) about me and saw that no one 1 tfjK was within hearing. Then I but 1° Frenchman briefly what I had to, Vand seen upon the marsh. hw» w jj| remain hern," I said to him "L° U cnd of my >'»'" ■" ! d0,,,t suppose * nemy will « l-t for 8 " , no time. Th ° t ' ie ' his not oven commenced yet. But Inst bo 0,; guard I shall be away < " J ° l least two days from morrow. You Vwlch things' here. And, oh! my i you will -~!, Mi>» Ruth. If Ire is"» ,lv truth '" tins maß ' of June's, 1 ■■ M 1 am on the other sido of the forth Sea when y..ur message conies I'll . 'to vou as swift as the swiftest hasten to ) l " , , BMOI will bring me ' . are nothing (or l brotherhood, i>- thing for the smuggling jm in comparison with Miss Ruth. As L the threatened iin.vioii, I daresay that i, more in the cloud.-, than anywhere else M keep your eye* open. We cannot •fferd to bo carries."•You are right, a thousand times right, my friend," »aid >'"<"• "And listen; 1 ,m not altogether what you think. I am known to the secret service of my country. We have hoard rumours of thus infamy. We arc voir ''" , " 1-ranee and England will fight together it war comes. You nav trust me even more than you thought. 1. for Mistake Slit.' rrd, pah '. I can stop his flving when 1 rh'.»'se. And. my friend, the fluMard carries one passenger with tut. Should I a>k you to fly with me, you will come' T !,, '! ,i? " ■•Of course, I sai.i

"Good!" ] Our conversation km interrupted by the women, who began to prepare supper. During that meal I did not sit in the seats > (if the mighty- Stafford had not returned,' ' Ruth remained by her brother's hammock. ' I preferred to fit with Fred and Bob, ' Eugene and mv other friends, to eating ' mv meal in solitary state "above the salt . , , : I had no opportunity to speak alone with Ruth before I retired to my hammock, i When I entered the sleeping chamber my darling girl bade her brother and mo good night and surrendered the care of the former to old June. 'Lor said June, as I looked askance at her before preparing to dip into my hammock. "You don't , wan to be afeared of an old woman like nic! But there, bor! I'll go out for ten minutes if that'll suit ye ? Mind you covar up yar nar\ n us head when I come in agin for fear ole June should kiss ye! Hech! Hech! Hech! And mind you doan't take off the spell. Whatever ye do, doan't ye never take that off." The skipper was dozing, or pretending to do so. I had iust a word with June before I slept, and she told me that his injury was much more serious than my trifling wounds, and that it was of vital important that he should not be excited or worried. I tank off to sleep without seeing the chief's eyes open But before I slept I heard a good deal of shouting and —riotous, and probably drunken—from the great hall. I recognised Stafford's voice, and guessed that ho and his party had waited till I had retired and my friends had supped before they reappeared. Now they were conduct , ing themselves in a way that proved that they had little concern for their chief's welfare.. I saw old June look angrily at. the door as Stafford's voice rose higher"and higher, and I saw her go staggering out of the sleeping chamber. Presently she returned with a satanic smile on her face. She looked at me to see if I slept, and caught my eves upon her. She nodded and winked. "I ha' put 'em to sleep," she cackled. "You won't hear 'em much longer." And truly enough within five minutes the shouting and loud voices died away. There were some heavy groans and mows, and then all was silence. My last w»king view that night was the old hag, Iwnt double, her head resting against the lower netting of the chief's hammock, her fjngeip crooking and waving in strange gestures and curves. Then I fell off to sleep. CHAPTER XIII. LEFT roil DEAD. The next day the skipper was no better It wag clear to me that I should have to «t out on the submarine without having been able to communicate to him what I had learnt from the voices upon the marsh. June locked uneasy, and muttered to me that, although she had no doubt that the chief would soon be well, he must not be troubled to-day. As soon as I woke I was made to rise and leave the sleeping chamber, nor was I permitted to enter it again before I left on my way to go aboard the Otter. The day was a dull and unpleasant one for me. Stafford kept Potin at work at the hangar on the hill the whole of the day; Fred and Bob were busy preparing the submarine, and the chief engineer, who was going over his engines, was one of my friends also, so that I was left alone with little companionship. Stafford bore himself in a rude and overbearing manner, but I submitted to it without taking offence. I should bo shut up with this man in the narrow quarters of a submarine for probably forty-eight hours, and it would be an impossible situation if we were to have a quarrel, a greater quarrel, that is, than had already taken place, before we sailed. Stafford made some difficulty as to the composition of the crew to sail with us. But hero Fred and Bob stood firm. They would not go unless the chief engineer went, and his chief assistant, both of whom were partisans of mine. We could not '•ike more than six or seven all told without discomfort—for not only was the Otter mailer than the navy craft, but a great space of her must be reserved for our cargo— that I had the pleasure of knowing my party would be in the majority alward.

•Stafford was sulky when we made our ivay through the passage as soon as dusk fell on the evening of the day following "i.v return to headquarters. I saw him take Pot'u asido and give him certain directions, and I saw Potin's eyes seek mine, and knew that if those directions *t* i inimical to my interests or to Jiuth's they stood no chance of being carried out. But I had no opportunity •'"self of a word aside with Potin. Just before we left the great hall Ruth came '•-I and .'look hands with me, allowing me 1,1 hold her dear fingers just so very little longer" limn etiquette demanded'. ''' Jtlfl nodded and winked, but evidently "usiderod that she had told me all that "is necessary. In the circumstances I was not sorry to leave the somewhat Iflcn.rpy atmosphere of the great hall, and '" find my way to mv good friends, Fred ■no Bob. It, wan exciting, too, to realise that for the first tune in my life I was •J.I it to vent, ire in a submarine at sea. l ii<' short passage between my capture arid ''"»■ Winging to in Hi« hoathouso had not "'''" .i practical experience of submarine r ' lv '''- Now we were, ho far as I could bound, if not for trie other side «'' the North Sea, at anv rate half across. •™d I could not doubt "that much of the '".vage would have to be made submerged. I had my Webley and Keott .320 auto- "'" in m . v hip | MM -kit. and my magic bag *u»nended round mv neck on an eel skin- '" .V I was armed against all manner of evil!

I'fKcnpli,,,,, „1 :uliiiiarine travel have '<* become n> common that it would only '" ledums to narrate the passage to the ," , '*'' ''"' down the river and nearly " the railway bridge over Brevdon on ™ Waie, for Mir look-outs on the hill ''ported thai there was neither trading "amy •„,,• j., llht ~, be (eared. Then we «*nk. and. with Fred at the helm, went '■'}' carefully, fully submerged, periscope »nd all. down the winding harbour till we r ''" out past. (Jorleston Pier Heads. 1 was amazed to see that Fred steered with°"t any iig nt l,nn projected ahead. It otild, I suppose, have been dangerous to jurn on t |„. (~„;,, projectors w j,|, which w Htu-r w,.« furnished, and might, nnv, almost i-ertflinty would, have drawn attention to our passage below, for the light

must have been seen moving down the outlet of the rivers had any loitering riverside hand or fisherman chanced to look into the water as wo passed. But for any man to follow the winding turnings, and remember the ever varying depths us Fred did was an extraordinary tour de force. When we were at sea, and had run, submerged, through the Corton Gat, Bob took the helm as wo rose our dome to the surface, and Fred sat down beside me.

Stafford had seated himself in a corner of the saloon, in company of his three friends .who had come aboard with him. He scowled at mo once or twice, but otherwise did not appear to concern himself with my doings. He and his companions ware smoking and drinking, and the gush of fresh air as our dome rose immediately wo came to the surface was intensely sweet.

I expressed my admiration for Fred's feat of helinsmanship. "Ye see, Master Jack," he said, "ten years ago it wouldn't ha' been possible. But thoy ha' dredged and dredged to got deep water for the largo timber craft till you can get thirty feet up to Reedhiun Ferry on the top o' tlio tide, and this here little craft hain't more than twenty feet from dome to keel son, if so much. As for tho reaches, I know 'em by heart." It was a beautiful calm evening at sea. Wo went slowly along, our dome open, our railed-in deck just awash, and I chose to spend an hour or two in the sweet sea air, with Fred and one of his mates to talk to. Bob remained at the wheel, and I could not but think how fortunate it was for me that the only really skilful mariners and engineers belonged to what I think I am justified in calling "tho honest party." But for that Stafford might have pressed a majority of his men aboard, and then we should have been J more or less at their mercy if it came to a hand-to-hand turn up, though unless | the majority against us were fully two to I one I believed I and my friends could have I given a good account of ourselves. Now, j however, it did not seem as if wo had anything to fear. 1 did not believe that the possible suspicions of the revenuo people I had got near the truth. Interference from! them was tho last thing in my mind- I 1 gave myself up to the enjoyment of that trip in the Norh Sea. 1 had sailed the,' sea time and time again. But here on 1 the railed-in deck of the submarine I was j almost at sea level and there was some- 1 thing quite new in watching the waves I rock and ripple from their level. We j passed a few dandies and steam drifters I out for the spring herring or "razor backs,"" saw the smoke of four or five collier tramps, the lights of a couple of Scotch passenger steamers, but did nci have to sink once till Fred spotted the signal of our Dutch galliot which had put out with our contraband saccharine. It would not be safe to return to Reedham till the following night and throughout the day we lay in mid North Sea, rarely troubling to shift our position or to sink, simply letting the Otter drift with the tide, and amusing ourselves with yarning, eating, and drinking—for the submarine was splendidly found in stores, both solid and smoking and watching the beautiful changes of the sea. I remember that Fred made for a "knoll" or sand bank, and we fished for a few hours, and caught some flat fish, but* none of any size. About three in the afternoon we began to move slowly homewards, one of my friends seated or standing on the dome, and giving warning if we seemed likely to approach too near any craft which could by any chance suspect us. In nine cases out of ten we might pass within ten yards of a steamer. The coasters- would think we were a government ship. It wa s only when a torpedo boat destroyer or a scout, or even an- " other submarine, appeared, that we sank and made ourselves invisible, even to our very periscope. We entered Gorieston Pier Heads about midnight, and went slowly up to Breydon without any adventure or mishap. A little past the half-mile point, when above the bridge, Stafford aeked Fred if there was any objection to rising. .'This rubber-tasting air always upsets me, he said. "I 'should like to get to the surface and open the dome as soon as possible." -. ;

Throughout the trip Stafford had behaved himself in a manner void of all active offence. He had even once or twice appeared to endeavour to make himself agreeable. But I noticed that he was never far from the little squad of men who belonged to his party, and that when he forgot himself his eyes darted out sidelong looks at me of extreme vlciousness and animus.

I shall never know if what happened on, Breydon was due to any treachery of Stafford's or>not. On the whole, Ido not think that he had anything to do with it. Had the attack been successful it would have destroyed the greater ambition which he had—that to be won by the help of the Germans. But it may be that he expected to escape and to rid himself at one stroke both of suspicious revenue officers and of me and some of my friends.

We were running with our railed-in deck flush with the water on the top of a strong flood. There was about an hour or an hour and a half's tide to run, and we spun fast with very little assistance from our screw. Indeed, the engineer only kept enough power going to give us steering way. But thetre was a hiss at our bows. Unless our cigar-shaped craft moved swiftly through the water she soon lost the prompt obedience to her helm which is so essential in a vessel of her kind, and when making her way in a narrow channel dredged deep between fathomless mud banks.

We were nearly abreast of Mr. Arthur | Patterson's houseboat on Banham's rond when, from out of the darkness of the night, a rowing boat, lustily pulled, sheered out close ahead of us. "Launch ahoy!" cried a rugged, manly voice. "Heave to in the King s name !" So there was something in the skipper's notion that smuggling was suspected, was my immediate thought. 1 heard Fred curse under his breath, and shout down the speaking-tube running down the dome into the belly of the craft, and at the same moment I heard steps racing up the gangway ladder to the deck. The submarine kept on her way, but did not eink. "Heave to!" roared the voice again. "Catch on to 'em, Bill." A boathook shot its "crome" end from the rowing-boat and caught on to the railing round our deck. "My God !" I heard the voice say, "It's a submarine. Give the word, you fools !" cried the stranger's voice.

So, I thought, the navy have some password known to the revenue. I bad never suspected that. In the meantime the Otter surged ahead, her pace increasing ewiftly, and the rowing boat swung round to tow side by side with us. Stafford was now on deck beside me, and two of his intimates.

" Sheer off. you lubbers," he yelled. "What the devil do you mean by interfering with us?" "Heave to, I tell yon again," roared the voice, and I could: now see a man in the costume of a naval lieutenant in the stern of the boat. This made three men altogether in her.

"You be !" cried Stafford. "Here." he said, "corno aboard us at your peril'" "Board 'em, my men," cried the officer. "Make fast first. '

The rowing boat was hitched to our rail in a second, and the three men came leaping aboard us, only to be met with Stafford's pistol in their faces. before 1 could interfere, he had fired once, twice, and two of the men had fallen on our decks. He had levelled bis weapon at, the officer when I flung myself upon him. 1 had never bargained for wholesale murHer of our preventive or naval men. "Stop it!" I shouted. "Stop it, I tell you'" "You fool '" cried Stafford, struggling with me. "Didn't, you hear them. They know it's a submarine. There's only one way out." He pulled the trigger of his automatic again, but I wrenched his arm at the moment, and the nickel bullet flew wide. I saw myself surrounded by Stafford friend*. Fred 'was hovering round me, uneasy, uncertain what to do. Hob came rushing up, having, I supposed, even in that fruclion of a second, handed the helm to someone else. " you!" cried Stafford. "Come, my men, li* must go '."

, As he spoke ho struck at my head with the butt of his pistol. I was unprepared ,for the blow, and it caught me full on the, forehead, luckily for me just escaping my temple, but knocking me senseless. I did not feel the hands that seized me and cast me overboard. But dimly, in after days, I remembered the sensation of flying through the air, and, I always say, and believe, though I am assured that it is impossible, I heard a shout of protest from two voices, and the plunge of two bodies after me.

This was all I remember of that night; all I was to know of the passing of events for some weeks. My last recollection was a fairly definite one of being knocked senseless, and of being hove overboard into the swiftly-flowing tide. I sank into the sleep of death. I told myself, in my last second of consciousness, that it was all over with me. I was a dead man. God help my Ruth, and God proserve my country!

(To be continued Saturday next.)