CHAPTER XIV
The Night of Nights
"Hurrah! They've laid the ship slap alongside the Mole," reportedSeton from his post of observation at the seaward aperture.
"Sure," agreed Smith. "And it's about time we broke bounds and had achip in."
Both men were shouting at the top of their voices, for the noisewithout was deafening. The roar of the heavy guns punctuated by thecrash of the quick-firers, the rattle of machine-guns, the hiss ofescaping steam, the grinding of the _Vindictive's_ hull against themasonry, the cheers and shouts of the storming-parties, and the criesand groans of the wounded, all united in an indescribable babel ofdiscord.
Owing to the relative position of the ship and the prisoners'observation aperture, only a few feet of the _Vindictive's_ sterncould be seen. There was nothing to indicate whether the assault hadbeen successful. But on the Mole side there were soon evidences thatthe British seamen and marines had obtained a footing, and had morethan made good their position.
Grotesquely garbed men were dashing forward in sections, hurlingbombs and using Lewis-guns like fiends possessed. Here and there acornered Hun would put up a fight until laid low by bullet or cutlassthrust. Slowly but surely the British invaders of the Mole wereworking their way along.
"No place for us here," yelled Seton. "Our fellows are bombing everyhole they see. It's useless to attempt to tell them who we are, and Idon't fancy being blown to atoms by our own side. We'll have to taketo the tunnel."
"Right-o!" agreed the pilot.
Together they struggled desperately with the refractory stone, untilby dint of great effort they succeeded in raising it on to the floorof the cell. It was then a matter of comparative ease to enlarge thehole sufficiently to allow them to effect their escape.
They were not a moment too soon. With the sounds of the conflictimmediately outside their cell, the two men dropped through thegaping hole, alighting on the stone floor of the corridor eight ornine feet below.
The tunnel was thick with suffocating fumes. Until the smoke clearedany attempt at escape in the rear of the storming- anddemolition-parties was out of the question. All that could be donewas to work their way along to the seaward end of the corridor, andthere await developments.
"Wish I had a gas-mask," exclaimed Alec chokingly.
"Same here," agreed the pilot. "Here," he added, pointing to a pileof what appeared to be short sticks, "take a few, they'll come inhandy."
The acquired articles were bombs of German manufacture, and hadevidently been placed there as a reserve stock.
"Know how they work?" inquired Smith.
Alec shook his head. He understood the mechanism of the Mills'grenade, but he had never before had an opportunity of handling aGerman bomb.
"Simply pass this thing round your wrist and chuck the thing as hardas you can. The cord is tied to the safety-pin, and the jerk releasesthe pin. Quite easy."
"And easy to blow yourself up," added Seton. "All right, carry on!We'll do our best with the things."
Proceeding cautiously, for they could hear Huns talking in thetunnel, the two men worked their way along the tunnel for nearly ahundred yards. Then they paused abruptly and flattened themselvesagainst the wall.
A few feet farther along, the corridor terminated in a flight ofsteps, seven in number, leading upwards to a fairly spaciouscasemate. From where Alec and his comrade stood the legs of severalGermans could be seen, the rest of their bodies being hidden by thecurvature of the roof of the tunnel. The men were formed up round aquick-firing gun of 15 centimetres, or approximately 4.1 inches--aweapon of great hitting power and rapidity of action.
Evidently they were waiting to train the weapon upon some movingobjective that had not yet entered the arc of fire.
The two officers glanced at each other. Their teeth gleamed in thedull light, as they exchanged grins of delight. They were no longerprisoners of the tyrannical Hun, but strong men armed. Providence haddelivered the enemy into their hands, but it would not be a one-sidedcontest. The surprise of the attack would compensate for theinequality of numbers, and there were the survivors and possiblycrews of guns in another casemate to be reckoned with.
Simultaneously both officers took a step forward, and launched theirdeadly missiles. The two reports sounded as one, outvoicing in theconfined space the din of the conflict without. Amid the rattle ofmetallic splinters could be heard the thud of bodies falling and thestartled squeals of wounded men who find themselves unexpectedly hit.
The rapid crack of an automatic pistol and the splaying of bulletsagainst the stonework gave Seton and his companion warning that theirwork had not been thorough. Through the pall of smoke a Hun--perhapsmore than one--was "letting rip".
Four bombs in quick succession gave the unseen foe his quietus.Silence reigned in the casemate. The roar of battle without wasincreasing in violence.
THE PILOT THREW A BOMB FULL IN THE FACE OF A PRUSSIANUNTER-LEUTNANT]
Keeping a sharp look-out for the approach of Hun reliefs along thecorridor, the two officers waited until the pungent fumes had almostcleared. Then, into the suffocating atmosphere they penetrated.Ascending the short flight of steps they gained the gun emplacement.The weapon, trained to the extreme left, was pointing slightly to theright of the lighthouse, at the extreme end of the Mole extension.Around it lay the bodies of the crew.
A glance through the sighting-slit in the gun-shield gave Alec aclue. Seaward the water was swept by search-lights, the giant beamsdarting between the sullenly rolling clouds of artificial fog.Quick-firing guns were blazing away like fury. Apparently atorpedo-craft attack on the harbour was about to take place.
"Make a job of it while we are about it," shouted Smith, pointing toa passage on their right. "Another quick-firer in there!"
Through the passage dashed the impromptu bombers, encouraged by theirprevious victory. Less than ten yards away was another 15-centimetregun. Apparently its crew were either in ignorance of the knocking-outof the sister-gun, or else they attributed the noise of the bombs tothe explosion of a shell fired from seaward.
In any case the surprise was complete. Two bombs were sufficient tosilence the weapon.
Beyond was yet a third gun. In this instance the task was by no meansso easy, for running along the communication passage came a stalwartnaval gunner--one of a picked crew from the German High Seas Fleet.
It was the two officers' canvas suits--garments so grudginglyaccepted and yet so opportune--that saved them from instantdetection. The Hun, imagining them to be two members of aworking-party, bellowed an incoherent order. In a trice he wascollared in approved Rugby fashion, while a heavy blow behind the earreduced him to a state of insensibility.
The scuffle was witnessed by two or three Germans engaged in bringingup ammunition. Their shouts of alarm roused the rest of the gun'screw.
Before Seton and his companion, having completed their task ofstrafing the Hun gunner, could hurl their bombs, a fusillade ofpistol shots rang out. A bullet grazed Smith's cheek; anotherploughed a furrow through Seton's hair.
The pilot threw a bomb full in the face of a Prussian unter-leutnant.The missile failed to explode, although it floored the German.Another Boche picked up the bomb and hurled it back. Ricochettingagainst the wall it hurtled past Seton's head and clattered on thefloor of the tunnel ten feet in the rear of the British officers.
There was no time to devote to that. If the sinister missile explodedit meant an end to the contest, but fortunately it was what was knownas a "dud".
Almost immediately Alec threw a grenade. It exploded within a coupleof seconds of leaving the Sub's hand. When the smoke cleared away,the gun was deserted, save by the dead and dying. Three Huns who hadescaped the death-dealing missile had promptly leapt through theembrasure into the sea.
"By Jove, we've put a battery out of action," declared Smithbreathlessly. "What luck!"
"Luck, indeed," agreed Alec, pointing to the unexploded bomb. "Ifthat beauty had gone up--but it didn't. What's d
oing now?"
The two men made their way to the embrasure. It was just possible tosqueeze between the steel shield and the granite face of the gunemplacement.
Without, the scene beggared description. Although the 15-centimetreguns were silent, hundreds of smaller quick-firers and machine-gunswere letting rip at what was certainly short range. Search-lightswere swinging to and fro across the harbour, star-shells burstinghigh aloft turned night into day.
From seaward shells were coming in showers knocking splinters fromthe Mole extension on which a Hun battery of six 88-millimetre gunswas rapidly being put out of action.
To the right of the embrasure at which the two British officers hadtaken up their post of observation could be discerned a string ofcanal barges, moored end to end with anti-torpedo nets between, whilethe line of obstruction terminated in a number of net defence buoys,their position hardly visible even in the strong artificial light.
The while, sounds of conflict on the Mole were distinctly audible,although from where Seton and his companion stood it was impossibleto see what was taking place. The crash of bombs and the rattle ofmachine-guns mingled with British cheers and German guttural shouts.Whatever was happening it was apparent that the landing-parties weremaking things particularly hot for Fritz on Zeebrugge Mole.
Even as the two men looked the object of the Huns' shortened firebecame visible, for, steaming at full speed towards the Mole-head,were the first of the British block-ships _Thetis_, _Intrepid_, and_Iphigenia_.
Once more it was a case of the onlookers seeing most of the game. Atthe risk of being knocked out by a British shell--for the position ofthe now silent 15-centimetre guns was known to the attacking forces,although the actual bore of the guns was supposed to be but 10.5centimetres--Seton and his companion stood enthralled at thespectacle of supreme valour.
Literally into the jaws of Death came the _Thetis_, majestically,unswerving, and as steadily as if about to pick up moorings atSpithead. With her quick-firers replying to the storm of Germanshrapnel she held on, rounded the Mole-head, and passed within acable's length of the battery in which Seton and Smith stood.
Then, with a slight alteration of helm she steered straight for thebarge farthest from the Mole. Down went the barge; on swept the_Thetis_. Between the net defence she went, tearing buoys and netsfrom their anchors and sinkers. Hampered by these obstructions, forapparently the nets fouled her propellers, the _Thetis_ slowed downand grounded diagonally across the entrance to the canal and about ahundred yards from the pier-heads.
Even as she settled, for she had been purposely sunk in the fairway,the _Intrepid_ came into view. In her case she was late in roundingthe Mole-head, a circumstance that was subsequently explained by thefact that her surplus watch of stokers, determined not to miss thescrap, had refused to be taken off by the M.-L.'s. Consequently the_Intrepid_ went into Zeebrugge Harbour with a complement of 87officers and men instead of 54, and that meant that if possible 33extra men had to be rescued by the little M.-L.'s.
Steering for the gap in the net defences made by the _Thetis_ andjudging her position by the latter vessel, hard aground, the secondparticipator in the marine Balaclava entered the Harbour.
Although receiving a heavy gruelling the _Intrepid_, worthy of hername, held resolutely to her course, until she grounded heavily inthe centre of the entrance to the canal. Her mission accomplished shewas sunk by orders of her gallant skipper, and thus thousands of tonsof hard cement were firmly embedded in the mud and sandy bottom ofthe canal. And now, to make doubly sure of the bottling-up process,the _Iphigenia_ approached under a heavy fire. She, too, was carryingfar more than her required complement of men, the supernumeraries,resolutely determined not to be out of the grim business, havingdodged the motor-launches told off to remove them before the shipmade for the harbour.
From their point of observation Seton and Smith watched themajestically-moving _Iphigenia_. Frequently hidden by driving cloudsof artificial fog, pounded by guns of all calibres, with herupper-works shot through and through, the third block-ship held on.
Suddenly two shells hit the ship on the starboard side. Following theblast and smoke of the exploding missiles a dense cloud of steampoured from her vitals, enveloping the whole of the forepart inblinding vapour.
"Steam-pipe severed," decided Alec. "Now, what will she do? She'smissing the entrance, by Jove!"
Fortunately, at that juncture the smoke cleared sufficiently to allowthe temporarily blinded navigation-party to realize their mistake.With her partly-disabled engines going at full speed astern, the_Iphigenia_ drove between a large dredger and a lighter, sinking thelatter like a stone. Then, driving the rammed barge ahead with heronly starboard engine working, she literally pushed the huge,unwieldy craft into the canal.
It was tricky navigation, difficult even in times of peace, tomanoeuvre a craft like the _Iphigenia_ in a narrow waterway. Hamperedby smoke, pounded at by guns, and blinded by search-lights andstar-shells, her commander's task appeared to be super-human. Yetmarvels were accomplished that night, and _Iphigenia's_ handling wasone of them. Ably manoeuvred, she narrowly missed colliding with thesunken _Intrepid_, then coolly and deliberately she was grounded onthe east side of the canal, thus making doubly sure that the hornets'nest was sealed.
And now, their work completed, the storming- and demolition-partiesfrom the _Vindictive_, _Iris_, and _Daffodil_ were being withdrawn.
"Time for us to be making tracks, old man," shouted Alec to his chum."Our fellows are clearing off the Mole. It's our chance to slip offwith them, without being plugged by an over-excitable marine or blownsky high by a British bomb."
"Yes, the show's over," rejoined the R.A.F. officer, as the pairbegan to retrace their footsteps. "Jolly fine stunt--eh, what?"
Past the silent gun emplacements with the wiped-out crews, the twoofficers hastened, and descending the short flight of steps, gainedthe communication passage that ran practically the whole length ofthe Mole.
For quite two hundred yards they fought their way through pungentvapours, hoping to find an exit and thus mingle with thestorming-party as the men withdrew to their ships.
Suddenly they found themselves confronted by a mass of blackenedrubble, the stones still warm to the touch. A hasty examinationshowed that a heavy charge of gun-cotton had blown in the tunnel,completely cutting off the escape of Alec and his companion.
"Properly dished!" exclaimed Smith disgustedly. "We're trapped!"
"Tails up!" exhorted his companion. "I know of a way. Game for aswim?"
"Right-o!" replied the R.A.F. officer. "Lead on, old son! It's thenight of nights, isn't it?"
The Thick of the Fray at Zeebrugge, April 1918 Page 14