Dave Darrin on Mediterranean Service Part 38

"Ready!" Darrin ordered.

There was a sharp bark from the throat of the one-pounder. Smash! A cheer went up from the watching seamen. The shot hit the mark. But the two men with Runkle were cleaning and loading for still another shot at the conning tower.

"Any more, sir?" inquired Runkle, with a grin, after firing and landing a second shot in the submarine's superstructure.

"Not unless ordered," Darrin answered, crisply. "If that fellow dives now he'll go below and stay there for good."

Instead of diving, however, the top of the submarine's conning tower was seen to rise higher and higher above the water.

"She's rising, but she's lost her steerage way, sir," announced the corporal of marines.

"The helmsman was undoubtedly killed by the first or second shot,"

suggested Dave. "It looks as if the survivors mean to surrender, but we'll watch out for tricks."

He gave the order for slow speed ahead, soon reducing it to mere headway.

"Marines prepare to board," ordered the ensign, as the launch came up close to the now unmanageable submarine, whose deck showed a bit more than awash.

It called for fine work on the part of the quartermaster to set his launch alongside without crushing it.

Gauging closely with his eye, Ensign Darrin called out:

"Ready to board! Board!"

Making the first leap himself, Dave landed on both feet on the slippery deck of the undersea boat, the marines following eagerly and quickly.

"Lay off and wait!" Dave called back to the quartermaster. Then he stepped closer to the conning tower, through which two holes had been drilled by the two registering one-pound sh.e.l.ls.

"Open up, you fellows down there!" Dave called, briskly. "And don't attempt any tricks."

Inside he heard shuffling movements, but there was no evidence of intent to obey his order. So he called again, but this time spoke in French, believing that order might be more easily understood by those inside the submarine.

"Don't shoot! I'll come up and open," answered a voice in broken French, strongly tinged with Maltese accent.

After a few moments the hatch was raised. Then, one after another, eight or ten of Darrin's crew went below.

"No more men below," ordered Dave, who then followed his men in.

It was a miserable spectacle that met his eyes. A heavy body lay face downward in a pool of blood on the steel deck.

"Who was this?" demanded Dave of the other four men who crouched to one side in fear and trembling.

"Gortchky," answered one of the quartette sullenly.

There could be little danger of mistaking the dead man. Though no feature of the face had been preserved, every line in that odious body stood out clearly in Dave Darrin's mind. It was, indeed, all that was left of Emil Gortchky. Mr. Green Hat would never again steal the secrets of nor plot trouble between nations!

"An able man, even if a wicked one," said Dave slowly, uncovering in the presence of Death.

The body of Emil Gortchky was allowed to remain where it lay. The other four men of the submarine crew, one of whom was proved later to be an expert submarine commander and a deserter from the Swedish navy, were taken up to the platform deck, and thence transferred to the launch, where they were put beside Mender, Dalny, the badly-scared Filipino, and the other prisoners removed from the yacht.

In the meantime, Dan Dalzell had ranged up alongside, followed by Sutton of His Majesty's Navy. Both of these young officers went aboard the submarine and below deck for a look.

Rocket signals had informed those on anxious watch in Grand Harbor of the capture of the submarine. Congratulations had been signaled back.

Just as the dawn broke, watchers in the waters near Valetta saw Dave Darrin's launch enter the harbor, the submarine limping along in tow.

Early as the hour was, a band was lined up on the quarter deck of the "Albion." When Darrin's boat was within six cable-lengths, the band broke out exultingly into the strains of "See the Conquering Hero Comes!"

Probably no naval officer so young as Dave Darrin had ever been so signally honored by a foreign naval commander as was Dave Darrin then.

The submarine was anch.o.r.ed on a spot indicated by the port authorities of Valetta. Then Dave Darrin shaped his course for the "Hudson."

From hundreds of men, lined up on the decks of the flagship, rose l.u.s.ty cheers.

"Bully boy, Darrin!" shouted a group of officers from the quarter-deck.

"Ensign Darrin," cried Admiral Timworth, striding forth from his quarters and grasping the young ensign by the hand. "I offer you my heartiest congratulations! For reward you shall have anything within my power to grant."

"Sir, I know what I want most at present," Ensign Darrin replied, gravely.

"What?" asked the Admiral, quickly.

"A nap, a bath, clean clothing and a breakfast, sir."

"But later on, Mr. Darrin?"

"At Port Said, sir, I shall ask Captain Allen to grant me, if it does not interfere with duty, three days ash.o.r.e to meet my wife, whom I expect to find there when the fleet arrives."

For, as readers of the Boys of the Army Series are aware, Dave and his High School sweetheart, Belle Meade, were wedded immediately at the end of some border troubles in which Dave and d.i.c.k Prescott were involved on the Mexican border.

Despite, or perhaps on account of, the stirring experiences through which he had pa.s.sed, Darrin was asleep five minutes after his head touched the pillow.

Danny Grin, who had been in only at the finish, lay awake for an hour before slumber visited him.

All that was left of Emil Gortchky was dropped into an unmarked, unhonored grave at Malta. Mender, Dalny and the Filipino were condemned by a British court-martial to be shot, a sentence that was soon after carried out.

As for the master and crew of the yacht, they persisted to the end in strenuously denying any guilty knowledge of the real intentions of the plotters. They escaped the death sentence, but, as their conduct was none the less of a guilty nature, the master of the yacht received a sentence of twenty years in prison, while his subordinate officers and the members of the crew were imprisoned for ten years each.

On information supplied to the Italian government Countess Ripoli was arrested. She was not an Italian woman, but had married an Italian n.o.bleman who had died, after which she had turned to spy work. She was locked up and held for trial at Rome, but died of a fever before the day of her trial arrived.

The minor spies and the thugs employed by Gortchky and Dalny, unless they have since fallen into trouble with their own local police, have, of course, gone unpunished.

George Cushing, the secret service agent, is now on duty in the Panama Ca.n.a.l Zone.

M. le Comte de Surigny was a happy man when Dave visited him ash.o.r.e on the day following the capture of the submarine. Surigny is now in Paris, the valued friend of a noted advocate, in whose offices he is studying law. An inheritance of comfortable proportions has since come to the Count, but he has determined upon a career of hard work. He is a strong, fine character in these days, and is proving, to the full, the manhood that Dave Darrin awakened in him.

The fleet remained a week at Port Said, Egypt. Dave had three happy days ash.o.r.e with Mrs. Belle Darrin, and Danny Grin was often to be found in their company.