The Man from the Clouds Part 23

"Can it be that she has a morbid taste for inebriates?" I wondered. "One has heard of women with curiously diseased fancies. Or perhaps she has simply a pa.s.sion for reforming them. One of those smiles for every sober hour would be a distinct inducement to behave!"

But this was not business and as I walked home I turned my thoughts sternly to that scythe blade.

VIII

H.M.S. _Uruguay_

As I neared my bleak sanatorium I said to myself,

"If only something would happen!"

Week after week spent within those walls or in wandering over this limited s.p.a.ce of muddy roads and sodden fields, with nothing to show for it, was an unexhilarating prospect. Perhaps the recollection of the comfortable house and the pleasant company I had just left accentuated this feeling, and the swift disappearance of our glimpse of crispness and sunshine did nothing to raise the heart. In that low-lying isle one got the most extraordinary views of the weather and could see storms approaching when they were still leagues away, and portents of rain or wind hours ahead of their coming. This evening the frost had vanished, the sun was sinking into a grey-blue bank, little filaments of wind clouds were reaching all over the sky, and a stiff chilly breeze was already blowing in from the sea.

"We are going to have a change," I thought.

And we were indeed going to have a change; and of more than weather.

Those storm clouds were blowing up the something I wanted to happen, though how promptly would I have changed my wish had I but guessed! But Fate had loosed that nor'west gale and there was no stopping the order of things now.

In the night I remember waking once or twice to hear the wind shouting down the chimney, and to feel very snug in bed. When I got up it was still blowing a full gale, and looking out of my window I could just catch a glimpse of the masts and funnels of a large steamer which seemed to be lying under the lee side of the island for shelter. What she was precisely I could not see enough of her to say, nor when we met at breakfast, did the doctor know more about her.

Like many a storm that springs up very suddenly, this one began to subside as fast, and in the course of the morning I set out to have a closer look at the strange ship. Quarter of an hour's walk in that direction told me all I wanted to know about her. In fact I recognised her as no stranger at all but an old acquaintance, H.M.S. _Uruguay_, a great lump of an ex-liner once running to South American ports with a band in the saloon at nights. Now, painted grey, with the white ensign flying over her, and some hundreds of blue jackets and a formidable complement of six inch guns aboard, she was one of those auxiliary cruisers which have been doing so many odd jobs and getting through so much dirty, risky, arduous work during this war.

What had brought her under the lee of Ransay I could but guess; some engine trouble and that gale on top of it most probably, but there she was, and there were the islanders standing at each door gazing at her. I gazed too for a while and then came back to our early dinner.

Going out again in the afternoon, the affable Mr. Hobhouse was pa.s.sing the time of day with a couple of petty officers within five minutes, and as he continued his walk he saw that, whatever was the reason, H.M.S.

_Uruguay_ was not going to leave immediately. The wind had now fallen to a stiff breeze, and as she lay under the shelter of the island, sh.o.r.e leave had evidently been given to a number of the men. First at one farm and then at another he could spy parties of blue jackets buying b.u.t.ter and eggs, poultry and cheeses, everything fresh from the land they could get. It was cheerful to see them again, and yet one uncomfortable thought did cross my mind as I looked at their great grey ship anch.o.r.ed there.

"What a sitting target for a submarine!" I said to myself. "Pray Heaven no submarine turns up here to-day!"

I had gone out to the bare northern headland and was heading home again for tea when I happened to see on the road a small knot of these blue jackets, just parting from a couple of countrymen. This pair turned towards me and in a moment I recognised my acquaintances Peter Scollay junior and Jock. Mr. Hobhouse had visited their house several times by now and was on the most friendly terms with the family.

"Good-day, Peter!" he cried as he pa.s.sed them. "Have you been taking your brother to look at the ship?"

For some reason Peter stared at him in an odd way, and Jock burst into one of his loudest laughs. Peter seemed to mumble something which Mr.

Hobhouse failed to catch, and then when they had pa.s.sed, he could see him laughing too.

To be laughed at without knowing the reason why is always irritating, even to one of Mr. Hobhouse's exceptionally amiable temperament, and it had the effect of suddenly sharpening his critical faculties. A thing struck him that had never happened to strike him before. What was that great strapping Scollay fellow doing at home on a small croft where he was quite superfluous, when his country needed every man? And why did the lout stare and then laugh? Considering what a vigilant eye was watching him behind Mr. Hobhouse's gla.s.ses, it seemed to me unwise as well as rude.

In a moment I pa.s.sed the blue jackets, who were distributing some purchases among their party before they set out for their ship, and I saw a possible excuse for Peter's amus.e.m.e.nt, though it seemed a poor one. The men were carrying a couple of baskets of eggs, two or three large cheeses, a parcel which probably contained b.u.t.ter, and one or two poultry. Presumably the pair had been selling them some of this a.s.sortment, and perhaps my suggestion that they had been merely sight-seeing struck them as humorous. It argued a poor sense of humour; still, there was one possibility.

Once more the amiable Mr. Hobhouse showed his friendly spirit by addressing a few kindly words to the good fellows (that was what he called them, as being the phrase most suited to his foolish appearance), and in his artless way he was able to gather that he had been correct in supposing that Peter and Jock had been amongst their purveyors.

Unfortunately he had not the foresight to enquire particularly which of the articles those two had purveyed. But I wonder very much whether any possible reader of this account, given what I knew up to this point, can honestly say that he would have put that question?

Well, I got home and sat down to high tea with Dr. Rendall, and of course he began to talk of the _Uruguay's_ visit. Even if nothing else had happened afterwards, such an event would have given Ransay food for several days' conversation.

"We are probably eating our last eggs and our last b.u.t.ter for the next week to come," he said with a laugh. "These sailors have cleared the island out, from all I can hear. They've even been to this house and got what they could, and I believe they practically cleaned out my cousin's farm."

"Really?" said Mr. Hobhouse. "Really indeed? Ha, ha! Do you know I found even the Scollays selling them things."

"Oh, I expect every one has been making hay while the sun shines," said he.

He had had one of his moody attacks so lately as the day before, but he had quite recovered his good humour by now, and in fact was in an extra jovial mood that evening. We sat up till about half-past ten, and then went up to our bedrooms.

I had reached the stage of pyjamas and was just opening my window for the night when the dreadful thing happened. Suddenly the whole island seemed to be illuminated. I turned my eyes instinctively to the place where the _Uruguay_ lay, and there high into the heavens mounted a blinding pillar of flame. The wind was still blowing pretty fresh away from me and towards the ship, but even against it the roar that followed shook every window and door in the house. The pillar of flame vanished the next instant, but high in the air fire-b.a.l.l.s seemed to linger for some minutes. And then the pillar of smoke rose up. It rose and rose, swift and gigantic, growing all the while greater and more terrible in girth, till at last when it was some hundreds of feet high it slowly stretched out at the top until it looked like some huge evil tree seen in a nightmare.

And there I stood at the window and stared. And there on the spot where H.M.S. _Uruguay_ with her crew of hundreds and all her complement of officers (largely R.N.R. and R.N.V.R. men like myself) had lain, stood that gigantic pillar of smoke. Then all at once I realised that everything living in that ship and most of her inanimate self was represented now only by that foul column.

I heard the doctor's door open and his voice say: "Mr. Hobhouse!

Hobhouse!"

I had presence of mind to clap my gla.s.ses hurriedly on my nose, before I rushed into the pa.s.sage.

"What has happened? Is that the ship gone, do you think?" he asked in a low voice.

I noticed that he seemed a man with a good control over his feelings. I had mine, too, pretty well in hand, but to play the absurd Thomas Hobhouse at such a moment was more than I cared to do. I preferred to show a little of what I felt and get away from him on that excuse. So I stammered something, and then we looked at one another for a moment, and I hurriedly went back to my room.

IX

BOLTON ON THE TEACK

"Only one survivor."

The doctor looked into my room about eight o'clock next morning to give me this brief bulletin. At breakfast he told me he had been out most of the night, but there had only been that single case for him. A boat from the island had picked a solitary living seaman out of the sc.u.m of oil, blackened by it like a negro and without a st.i.tch of clothing. Some of the dead had been found, but not in a condition to be discussed, and of course many fragments of debris. And now a number of patrol boats were on the scene, he had handed over his patient to a naval doctor, and that was all the news of the tragedy up till eight o'clock.

I knew that John Whiteclett would certainly be in one of the patrol boats, and I spent the morning in looking out for him. Thus by an apparent accident when the Commander did land about noon he very soon walked into Mr. Hobhouse. My cousin's face was grave and set, and there being no witnesses, neither of us luckily had to act.

"Well, Jack?" I said.

"Did you see it happen?" he demanded.

"I happened to be at my window."

"Tell me what you saw," said he.

I told him and he nodded at intervals.

"Just what a couple of other witnesses have told me," he said.

"Submarines?" I asked.

He shook his head.

"The odds against a torpedo sending a ship straight up like that are enormous. And one would have heard two explosions--which n.o.body did.