As it is, owing to the mistaken good-nature of the rival generals, thedate of the fixture was changed, and practically all that a historiancan do is to record the result.
A slight mist had risen as early as four o'clock on Saturday. Bynight-fall the atmosphere was a little dense, but the lamp-posts werestill clearly visible at a distance of some feet, and nobody,accustomed to living in London, would have noticed anything much out ofthe common. It was not till Sunday morning that the fog proper reallybegan.
London awoke on Sunday to find the world blanketed in the densest,yellowest London particular that had been experienced for years. It wasthe sort of day when the City clerk has the exhilarating certainty thatat last he has an excuse for lateness which cannot possibly be receivedwith harsh disbelief. People spent the day indoors and hoped it wouldclear up by tomorrow.
"They can't possibly fight if it's like this," they told each other.
But on the Monday morning the fog was, if possible, denser. It wrappedLondon about as with a garment. People shook their heads.
"They'll have to put it off," they were saying, when of asudden--_Boom!_ And, again, _Boom!_
It was the sound of heavy guns.
The battle had begun!
* * * * *
One does not wish to grumble or make a fuss, but still it does seem alittle hard that a battle of such importance, a battle so outstandingin the history of the world, should have been fought under suchconditions. London at that moment was richer than ever before indescriptive reporters. It was the age of descriptive reporters, ofvivid pen-pictures. In every newspaper office there were men who couldhave hauled up their slacks about that battle in a way that would havemade a Y.M.C.A. lecturer want to get at somebody with a bayonet; menwho could have handed out the adjectives and exclamation-marks till youalmost heard the roar of the guns. And there they were--idle,supine--like careened battleships. They were helpless. Bart Kennedy didstart an article which began, "Fog. Black fog. And the roar of guns.Two nations fighting in the fog," but it never came to anything. It waspromising for a while, but it died of inanition in the middle of thesecond stick.
It was hard.
The lot of the actual war-correspondents was still worse. It wasuseless for them to explain that the fog was too thick to give them achance. "If it's light enough for them to fight," said their editorsremorselessly, "it's light enough for you to watch them." And out theyhad to go.
They had a perfectly miserable time. Edgar Wallace seems to have losthis way almost at once. He was found two days later in an almoststarving condition at Steeple Bumpstead. How he got there nobody knows.He said he had set out to walk to where the noise of the guns seemed tobe, and had gone on walking. Bennett Burleigh, that crafty oldcampaigner, had the sagacity to go by Tube. This brought him toHampstead, the scene, it turned out later, of the fiercest operations,and with any luck he might have had a story to tell. But the lift stuckhalf-way up, owing to a German shell bursting in its neighbourhood, andit was not till the following evening that a search-party heard andrescued him.
The rest--A. G. Hales, Frederick Villiers, Charles Hands, and theothers--met, on a smaller scale, the same fate as Edgar Wallace. Hales,starting for Tottenham, arrived in Croydon, very tired, with a nail inhis boot. Villiers, equally unlucky, fetched up at Richmond. The mostcurious fate of all was reserved for Charles Hands. As far as can begathered, he got on all right till he reached Leicester Square. Therehe lost his bearings, and seems to have walked round and roundShakespeare's statue, under the impression that he was going straightto Tottenham. After a day and a-half of this he sat down to rest, andwas there found, when the fog had cleared, by a passing policeman.
And all the while the unseen guns boomed and thundered, and strange,thin shoutings came faintly through the darkness.
Chapter 10
THE TRIUMPH OF ENGLAND
It was the afternoon of Wednesday, September the Sixteenth. The battlehad been over for twenty-four hours. The fog had thinned to a lightlemon colour. It was raining.
By now the country was in possession of the main facts. Full detailswere not to be expected, though it is to the credit of the newspapersthat, with keen enterprise, they had at once set to work to inventthem, and on the whole had not done badly.
Broadly, the facts were that the Russian army, outmanoeuvered, had beenpractically annihilated. Of the vast force which had entered Englandwith the other invaders there remained but a handful. These, the GrandDuke Vodkakoff among them, were prisoners in the German lines atTottenham.
The victory had not been gained bloodlessly. Not a fifth of the Germanarmy remained. It is estimated that quite two-thirds of each army musthave perished in that last charge of the Germans up the Hampsteadheights, which ended in the storming of Jack Straw's Castle and thecapture of the Russian general.
* * * * *
Prince Otto of Saxe-Pfennig lay sleeping in his tent at Tottenham. Hewas worn out. In addition to the strain of the battle, there had beenthe heavy work of seeing the interviewers, signing autograph-books,sitting to photographers, writing testimonials for patent medicines,and the thousand and one other tasks, burdensome but unavoidable, ofthe man who is in the public eye. Also he had caught a bad cold duringthe battle. A bottle of ammoniated quinine lay on the table beside himnow as he slept.
* * * * *
As he lay there the flap of the tent was pulled softly aside. Twofigures entered. Each was dressed in a flat-brimmed hat, a colouredhandkerchief, a flannel shirt, football shorts, stockings, brown boots,and a whistle. Each carried a hockey-stick. One, however, worespectacles and a look of quiet command which showed that he was theleader.
They stood looking at the prostrate general for some moments. Then thespectacled leader spoke.
"Scout-Master Wagstaff."
The other saluted.
"Wake him!"
Scout-Master Wagstaff walked to the side of the bed, and shook thesleeper's shoulder. The Prince grunted, and rolled over on to his otherside. The Scout-Master shook him again. He sat up, blinking.
As his eyes fell on the quiet, stern, spectacled figure, he leaped fromthe bed.
"What--what--what," he stammered. "What's the beadig of this?"
He sneezed as he spoke, and, turning to the table, poured out anddrained a bumper of ammoniated quinine.
"I told the sedtry pardicularly not to let adybody id. Who are you?"
The intruder smiled quietly.
"My name is Clarence Chugwater," he said simply.
"Jugwater? Dod't doe you frob Adab. What do you want? If you're forbsub paper, I cad't see you now. Cub to-borrow bordig."
"I am from no paper."
"Thed you're wud of these photographers. I tell you, I cad't see you."
"I am no photographer."
"Thed what are you?"
The other drew himself up.
"I am England," he said with a sublime gesture.
"Igglud! How do you bead you're Igglud? Talk seds."
Clarence silenced him with a frown.
"I say I am England. I am the Chief Scout, and the Scouts are England.Prince Otto, you thought this England of ours lay prone and helpless.You were wrong. The Boy Scouts were watching and waiting. And now theirtime has come. Scout-Master Wagstaff, do your duty."
The Scout-Master moved forward. The Prince, bounding to the bed, thrusthis hand under the pillow. Clarence's voice rang out like a trumpet.
"Cover that man!"
The Prince looked up. Two feet away Scout-Master Wagstaff was standing,catapult in hand, ready to shoot.
"He is never known to miss," said Clarence warningly.
The Prince wavered.
"He has broken more windows than any other boy of his age in SouthLondon."
The Prince sullenly withdrew his hand--empty.
"Well, whad do you wad?" he snarled.
"Resistance is useless," said Clarence. "The moment I have
plotted andplanned for has come. Your troops, worn out with fighting, mere shadowsof themselves, have fallen an easy prey. An hour ago your camp wassilently surrounded by patrols of Boy Scouts, armed with catapults andhockey-sticks. One rush and the battle was over. Your entire army, likeyourself, are prisoners."
"The diggids they are!" said the Prince blankly.
"England, my England!" cried Clarence, his face shining with a holypatriotism. "England, thou art free! Thou hast risen from the ashes ofthe dead self. Let the nations learn from this that it is whenapparently crushed that the Briton is to more than ever be feared."
"Thad's bad grabbar," said the Prince critically.
"It isn't," said Clarence with warmth.
"It _is_, I tell you. Id's a splid idfididive."
Clarence's eyes flashed fire.
"I don't want any of your beastly cheek," he said. "Scout-MasterWagstaff, remove your prisoner."
"All the sabe," said the Prince, "id _is_ a splid idfididive."
Clarence pointed silently to the door.
"And you doe id is," persisted the Prince. "And id's spoiled your bigsbeech. Id--"
"Come on, can't you," interrupted Scout-Master Wagstaff.
"I _ab_ cubbing, aren't I? I was odly saying--"
"I'll give you such a whack over the shin with this hockey-stick in aminute!" said the Scout-Master warningly. "Come _on_!"
The Prince went.
Chapter 11
CLARENCE--THE LAST PHASE
The brilliantly-lighted auditorium of the Palace Theatre.
Everywhere a murmur and stir. The orchestra is playing a selection. Inthe stalls fair women and brave men converse in excited whispers. Onecatches sentences here and there.
"Quite a boy, I believe!"
"How perfectly sweet!"
"'Pon honour, Lady Gussie, I couldn't say. Bertie Bertison, of theBachelors', says a feller told him it was a clear thousand."
"Do you hear that? Mr. Bertison says that this boy is getting athousand a week."
"Why, that's more than either of those horrid generals got."
"It's a lot of money, isn't it?"
"Of course, he did save the country, didn't he?"
"You may depend they wouldn't give it him if he wasn't worth it."
"Met him last night at the Duchess's hop. Seems a decent little chap.No side and that, if you know what I mean. Hullo, there's his number!"
The orchestra stops. The number 7 is displayed. A burst of applause,swelling into a roar as the curtain rises.
A stout man in crinkled evening-dress walks on to the stage.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he says, "I 'ave the 'onour to-night tointroduce to you one whose name is, as the saying goes, a nouse'oldword. It is thanks to 'im, to this 'ero whom I 'ave the 'onour tointroduce to you to-night, that our beloved England no longer writhesbeneath the ruthless 'eel of the alien oppressor. It was this 'ero'sgenius--and, I may say--er--I may say genius--that, unaided, 'it uponthe only way for removing the cruel conqueror from our beloved 'earthsand 'omes. It was this 'ero who, 'aving first allowed the invaders toclaw each other to 'ash (if I may be permitted the expression) afterthe well-known precedent of the Kilkenny cats, thereupon firmly andwithout flinching, stepped bravely in with his fellow-'eros--need I sayI allude to our gallant Boy Scouts?--and dexterously gave what-for inno uncertain manner to the few survivors who remained."
Here the orator bowed, and took advantage of the applause to replenishhis stock of breath. When his face had begun to lose the purple tinge,he raised his hand.
"I 'ave only to add," he resumed, "that this 'ero is engagedexclusively by the management of the Palace Theatre of Varieties, at afigure previously undreamed of in the annals of the music-hall stage.He is in receipt of the magnificent weekly salary of no less than onethousand one 'undred and fifty pounds a week."
Thunderous applause.
"I 'ave little more to add. This 'ero will first perform a few of thosephysical exercises which have made our Boy Scouts what they are, suchas deep breathing, twisting the right leg firmly round the neck, andhopping on one foot across the stage. He will then give an exhibitionof the various calls and cries of the Boy Scouts--all, as you doubtlessknow, skilful imitations of real living animals. In this connection I'ave to assure you that he 'as nothing whatsoever in 'is mouth, as it'as been sometimes suggested. In conclusion he will deliver a shortaddress on the subject of 'is great exploits. Ladies and gentlemen, Ihave finished, and it only now remains for me to retire, 'aving dulyannounced to you England's Darling Son, the Country's 'Ero, theNation's Proudest Possession--Clarence Chugwater."
A moment's breathless suspense, a crash from the orchestra, and theaudience are standing on their seats, cheering, shouting, stamping.
A small sturdy, spectacled figure is on the stage.
It is Clarence, the Boy of Destiny.
The Swoop! or, How Clarence Saved England: A Tale of the Great Invasion Page 6