CHAPTER XII
THE RAIDER'S RETURN
SIEGFRIED VON EITELWURMER opened his eyes. His first thoughts werethose of curious wonderment. It seemed remarkable, almostdisappointing, that he found himself still alive.
More, he was still on board the airship, but his surroundings weredifferent. The intense darkness had given place to light--notartificial luminosity of electric agency but the welcome light ofday. His quarters had been changed. During his period ofunconsciousness he had been taken along the narrow cat-walk (perhapsit was well for him that he had no recollection of that perilouspassage along the V-shaped gangway) and had been placed in thecentre gondola.
This move had been made at Ober-leutnant von Loringhoven's orders.During the nerve-racking journey over the sea-frontier of Englandthe Hun commander had given scant thought to the comfort of hisguest, but with immediate prospects of a safe return, he hadrecalled the advisability of giving the Kaiser's emissary thosehonours that his position albeit a despised civil one demanded.
"Are you feeling better now?" enquired von Loringhoven.
The spy sat up and passed a hand over his forehead.
"Where are we now?" he asked, ignoring the ober-leutnant's question.
"In sight of German soil," was the reply. "Yonder can be discernedour incomparable island fortress of Heligoland. No, we do notdescend there, nor at Tondern or Borkum. Unfortunately thatdare-devil of an Englishman has done us some damage, so we go on tothe repairing sheds at Kyritz--they, fortunately, are beyond reachof hostile aircraft. At least, so I hope, but there is no tellingwhat these English seaplanes will do next."
With von Loringhoven's reassurances bringing comfort to his torturedmind the spy's mercurial spirits rose. Yet not without a shudder herecalled his last conscious moment in the horrors of the pitch-blackcramped interior of the after gondola.
"Himmel!" he exclaimed. "That was a nightmare. I little thought tobe alive, and now I am tempted to shout 'Hoch! Hoch!' at the top ofmy voice."
"The bracing upper air," commented the ober-leutnant. "It is superbfor raising one's spirits. Yes, it was an anxious time. I admit it.For the moment I thought that the cursed seaplane was going to hurlherself straight through the envelope. It is a thing that these madEnglishmen would do. I know them."
Von Eitelwurmer nodded in silent accord.
"But," continued the commander, "it was otherwise. Possibly our firedistracted the pilot, or he may have changed his mind at the lastmoment. Yet it was so close that I doubt whether there was anythingto spare between the tip of one of his planes and the underside ofthe rear gondola. To me, looking aft, it seemed the narrowest shavepossible. However, she missed us, and I immediately gave orders forthe motors to be restarted. Heaven be praised, we never saw thatseaplane again."
"And the damage?" enquired von Eitelwurmer.
"Not enough to prevent us continuing the voyage," replied vonLoringhoven. "Two of the after ballonets are perforated too badly tobe patched. A couple of my men succeeded in plugging the holes withthe special preparation we use in such contingencies. You willobserve that this floor inclines considerably in spite of theredistribution of ballast. We are down by the stern. Well, what isit?" he asked curtly as Unter-leutnant Klick entered thecompartment.
"A wireless has just been received, sir," replied Klick, salutinghis superior. "It appears that two of our airships have failed toreturn."
"_Donner wetter!_ Two out of twelve!" exclaimed von Loringhovenfuriously. "This is serious. But it might have been worse," hemuttered in an undertone, as he glanced at the drooping end of thelarge envelope.
The spy went to one of the windows. The air was still sharp but mildin comparison to the piercing cold of the night. Already the sun waswell above the horizon. Two thousand feet or less beneath theairship--for on approaching land the Zeppelin had descendedconsiderably--could be discerned with remarkable clearness the greengrass and red sandstone of the island of Heligoland with a strand ofwhite sand adjoining one face of the cliffs. A short distance beyondwas the flat, semi-artificial island of Sandinsel, with itsbatteries, concealed when viewed from the sea, standingconspicuously against the dunes.
Still further away were the flat, receding shores bordering theestuary of the Elbe, but vainly the spy looked for any signs of thevaunted High Seas Fleet. Even the well protected triangular expanseof water was desolate of shipping, save for a few small craftengaged either in laying additional mines or conveying stores to theisland fortress.
At that height the varying depths of the sea could be noted owing tothe changing colour of the water--not that that fact interested vonEitelwurmer in the slightest. He was a landsman out and out. He wascontent to leave the difficult task of wresting the trident fromBritannia's grasp to others. The matter did not concern him. Hespecialised in the arts and intrigues of espionage.
Von Loringhoven was cast in a different mould. Although his presentenergies were centred upon the air service he was at heart a seaman.He, too, was examining the expanse of sea, but with the skill of apractised navigator.
"Look!" he exclaimed, pointing to a small, indistinct object fromwhich emanated two ever-diverging lines of ruffled water. "Do youknow what that is? Here, take these binoculars and look. Now,perhaps, you see what I mean?"
The spy brought the glasses to bear.
"A fish, I suppose," he remarked.
"A fish of sorts," added the ober-leutnant. "One's sense ofproportion is deceived at this height. It is an unterseeboot. I donot fancy it is ours, otherwise why should she keep submerged whenclose to our territorial water?"
He lifted the receiver of the telephone.
"Wireless cabin. Report to the commandant of Heligoland that thereis a submarine in the south channel. Ask if it is one of ourunterseebooten."
In a few minutes came the reply.
"No German submarine operating sub merged off the fortress. Can youattack?"
"No, I cannot," declared von Loringhoven bluntly, directing hisremarks to his companion. "She's a British submarine. Those fellowsnose their way everywhere. She, evidently, is inside the outerminefield. And they want me, crippled as this airship is, to attack.It is unreasonable; besides, the wind is increasing in strength andwe have yet to make a landing."
So, giving by wireless the bearings of the daring submarine, vonLoringhoven "carried on" in the knowledge that the dangers of thisflight were by no means over. Already the wind was blowing with avelocity of thirty miles an hour--a rate that would make landing adifficult matter--and, what is more, its strength was hourlyincreasing.
At ten in the morning the Zeppelin came in sight of the sheds atKyritz, a town in the province of Brandenburg and roughly sixtymiles north-west of Berlin. This was the base for airships that hadsustained damage likely to take a considerable time to repair. TheGerman authorities, profiting by the lessons of the British airraids on Friedrichshaven and other Zeppelin stations within range ofaeroplanes operating either from the sea or from the hostilefrontiers, had taken the precaution to remove the repair depots wellinland. In such places as Borkum there were Zeppelins in commissionready for making flights to the British Isles, but at the firstintimation of a raid upon the airship sheds the mammoth gas-bagswould fly inland until the danger was past. In the case of aZeppelin undergoing extensive repairs such a course would beimpossible; hence the establishment of the base at Kyritz.
Turning head to wind the crippled Zeppelin descended slowly andcautiously towards a field surrounding the three large sheds. Thesheds themselves were marvels of scientific ingenuity. For one thingthey were easily collapsible. By means of mechanical appliances theroof could be parted lengthways and each section allowed to foldagainst the walls. The walls could then be lowered until the wholestructure lay flat on the ground. The fabric, composed of steelsheeting on girders of the same material, was covered with stuccothat strongly resembled the surrounding ground. Viewed from a heightthere would be great difficulty in distinguishing between thecollapsible sheds and the adjoining land. The buildi
ngs, of course,could only be lowered when not tenanted by airships, but such wasthe deliberate thoroughness of the Huns that they had to provide forthis contingency in the possible yet improbable event of a Britishaircraft raid.
Another feature of the sheds was the fact that each was built upon agigantic turn-table, so as to enable the openings to turn away fromthe prevailing wind and thus facilitate landing operations; while bya system of disc signals the commander of the returning Zeppelin wasinformed of the direction and strength of the breeze.
Yet, in spite of these precautions, the landing operations werefraught with danger, especially in the present case.
As the crippled airship approached the shed, ropes were lowered frombow and stern. These were seized by swarms of trained air-mechanics,and as gently as possible the huge envelope was brought upon an evenkeel. All the while the propellers kept revolving in order to enableher to counteract the force of the head wind.
Then other ropes were lowered from the 'midship portion of theZeppelin while simultaneously gas was exhausted from some of theballonets to neutralise her buoyancy.
All that seemingly remained was to shut off the motors and drag themammoth into its lair.
Suddenly a strong gust of wind, eddying past the shed, struck thebow of the Zeppelin. The men holding the bow ropes were thrown in astruggling heap of humanity upon the grass. In an instant the wholeof the for'ard portion of the Zeppelin reared itself in the air. Thealuminium longitudinal girders were not proof against the unequalstrain, and with incredible rapidity the frail fabric buckled.
"Jump!" shouted von Loringhoven, his voice barely audible above theexcited yells of the men and the rending of metal.
Setting the example the commander dropped from the cat-walk,followed by Unter-leutnant Klick and most of the crew. A few,imprisoned in the foremost gondola, were crushed under the ruins ofthe girders.
For a moment the spy hesitated to follow the example of hiscompanions in peril. Taking his courage in his hands, he loweredhimself over the latticed sides of the gangway. There he hung untilhalf stupefied by the fumes of the escaping hydrogen; then, relaxinghis hold he dropped, landing in a most undignified manner upon theequally ruffled von Loringhoven as he crawled from under thewreckage.
In five minutes nothing remained of the raider but a mass of gauntand twisted girders from which fluttered the remains of the envelopein the grip of the now howling wind.
Two hours later, Siegfried von Eitelwurmer found himself in thepresence of the Director of Aeronautical Intelligence in theofficial quarters of the Air Department--a pretentious building inthe Wilhelmstrasse at Berlin.
With him were Ober-leutnant von Loringhoven and half a dozencommanders of the Zeppelin Squadron that had just carried out theraid over the British Isles. The task of reporting upon the raid wasabout to commence. Already the British communique had been received,and it was now considered advisable to issue a statement for thebenefit of the German people.
The only person not present was Otto von Lohr, the commander of theair squadron, and until he put in an appearance the business couldnot be started.
A telephone bell rang. A uniformed secretary took up the receiver.
"Yes, Herr Schneider, he is here," he replied. "I will inform him ofyour request."
Replacing the instrument the secretary crossed the room andaddressed the spy.
"Herr Kapitan-leutnant Schneider wishes to see you, Herr vonEitelwurmer," he announced obsequiously.
"Very good," replied the spy. "Inform me when the conferencebegins."
Kapitan-leutnant Schneider, the German Naval Censor-in-Chief, was abald-headed, loose-lipped man of past middle age. He looked, andwas, a typical Prussian, subserviently polite to his superiors andpointedly arrogant to those who were not. Von Eitelwurmer belongedto the former category, for although not of the military caste, heenjoyed the confidence of the Emperor. That in itself was sufficientto cause Kapitan-leutnant Schneider to squirm like an eel. It washis way of showing his pleasure at his visitor's presence.
"I wish to ask you, von Eitelwurmer," he remarked after thepreliminary courtesies were exchanged, "concerning the effect of ourreports--my work, you understand--upon the English people. You,living as an Englishman, ought to be in a position to inform me."
"My private opinion, or my official one?" enquired the spy bluntly.
The Censor shut one eye solemnly.
"Your private opinion," he said.
"The German communiques seem to be a source of amusement to theEnglish," began von Eitelwurmer in the same bold tone, for not beingunder the kapitan-leutnant's jurisdiction and having an oldgrievance against him he could afford to "rub it in." "In fact, thecensorship in both countries is one of the chief weapons of theirantagonists. In England bad news that we already know of issuppressed, and consequently all sorts of disquieting rumours getaround. The same holds good in the Fatherland. It is like sittingupon the safety valve of a boiler: sooner or later----"
"Yes, yes," interrupted Schneider. "But as far as we Germans areconcerned it matters little. If the people grow restive, if theirhunger--and hunger amongst the lower classes is acute--goads them toattempted violence the danger ends there. Unlike the English we haveorganised the nation. Every man, woman and child realises his or herduty is to obey, otherwise we might see the business of Louvainenacted upon German soil."
"The English are of a different temperament," remarked the spy."Reverses do not seem to damp their spirits. They have a firm faiththat in spite of blunders everything will come out right for them atthe finish. It is the fatalism based upon centuries of history. Whytheir government does not take them into its confidence puzzles me."
The Censor shrugged his shoulders.
"I do not believe in governments of that description," he said."Give me our all powerful machinery--the War Council. No governmentyet won a war, but many a government has lost one. Now tell me----"
A discreet tap upon the door interrupted the official's words.
"Enter!" he bellowed.
A messenger crept stealthily into the room. By his manner it seemedevident that he expected to have a book hurled at his head. It wasone of the kapitan-leutnant's usual _plaisanteries_, but on thisoccasion von Eitelwurmer acted as a moral shield.
The Censor took the proffered paper, read it and burst into a roarof laughter.
"Wait a moment, Herr von Eitelwurmer," he said when his mirth hadsubsided. "The conference won't start for some time. There's afellow wanting an audience--an author, curse him! I'll let the pressand their parasites depending upon it know that there is acensorship. This fellow wrote a book: _With von Scheer off Jutland_he called it. Since we must do something to justify our existence Ismashed it. The fellow had no influence, so what matters? And now, Isuppose, he's kicking. Send him in, you thick-headed numbskull; sendhim in."
The author of the banned book entered the room. He was of shortstature, being barely five feet two in height, inclined tocorpulence, and very white-faced. His heavy, bristling, up-turnedmoustache contrasted incongruously with his small beady eyes thatpeered through a large pair of spectacles of enormous magnifyingpowers.
For quite two minutes Kapitan-leutnant Schneider hurled a torrent ofabuse at the head of his caller, punctuating every sentence withfurious oaths. Yet, somewhat to the Censor's surprise, the littleman showed no signs of quailing under the onslaught.
"Might I ask what there is in the book to which you take exception?"he asked.
"The whole of it," thundered the despot.
"Could not certain portions be revised?"
"No; I object to it in its entirety."
"Then, since the story is based upon Admiral von Scheer's report youobject to the official dispatch?"
For a moment the Press Censor was taken aback. It never entered intohis head that this meek and mild man could or would put a poser likethis.
"No; I won't say that," replied Schneider. "But either you are aperverter of the truth or you know too much. The work has had thehigh
est Admiralty consideration, and, as you ought to know,censorship has only one object in view, namely, the public interest.If you are ordered to say that black is white you must say it. Youhaven't, and you must abide by the consequences."
"One moment," interposed the still unruffled man. "Can you give meone solitary instance of what you object to in the book?"
The kapitan-leutnant puckered his shaggy eyebrows.
"No, I cannot," he replied, with considerable mildness. "I haveforgotten all about it."
"And that is what you term the highest Admiralty consideration,"added the author cuttingly. "Very good; I will not trouble youfurther at present, except to show you this: a commendation from noless a personage than Admiral von Tirpitz."
"Himmel!" gasped the astonished official. "Why did you not tell methis before?"
"Because I had not the chance," replied the caller gathering up hispapers. "Good afternoon."
"You are perhaps sorry I waited?" remarked von Eitelwurmer, when thetwo were again alone.
Schneider frowned.
"If the fool had only made out that we had won a great victory allwould have been well," he replied. "The Press and itssatellites----"
"The Conference has started, Herr von Eitelwurmer," announced thesecretary. "I could not inform you before as the Kapitan-leutnantwas engaged."
The spy returned to the council-room. Seated at a long table werethe Zeppelin commanders. As each made his report the statement wastaken down by an official shorthand writer, while the aviators weresubjected to a stiff examination by the Director of Intelligence.
Some were most emphatic in their statements. They knew exactly wherethey had been; others were not so sure, but believed that they hadbeen to such and such a town; others, somewhat indiscreetly buthonestly, confessed that they had lost their bearings. All wereagreed, however, that the Yorkshire towns of Brigborough andBroadbeck had been missed by the raiding aircraft.
"It seems pretty certain that the geography of the Englishauthorities is at fault," commented the Director. "They report thatour Zeppelins visited a North Midland county--that referred to yourpart of the business, von Loringhoven; I always thought thatLancashire was one of the six northern counties of England: let ushope that some day it will be one of a German dependency. However,we'll issue a report that our airships bombed Brigborough andBroadbeck. Then these English will think that you do not know whereyou have been, and that is exactly what we want them to think. Now,von Papen, draw up a suitable report for home consumption. In thesestrenuous times we must satisfy the public demands. It will keep thecommon people quiet for a time, and, if they _do_ find out, theremay then be something good to detract their attention."
The spy smiled grimly. He recalled a saying quoted by a Germanofficer to his captor: "We Germans can never be gentlemen--youEnglish will always be fools." The first part held good, but as forthe second, his residence in Great Britain had taught him thatbehind the apathy of the British nation there was Something--aSomething that, when aroused, would form more than a match for thecunning and brutality of his fellow countrymen. Reluctantly he hadto admit that.
"Why do you smile?" asked the Director, fixing von Eitelwurmer withhis eye.
"I was thinking," replied the spy. "Thinking of how I can get backto England. My good work there is not yet completed."
"Those twenty thousand marks, hein?" enquired the president, and therest of the assembly laughed uproariously at the director's jest.
Billy Barcroft, R.N.A.S.: A Story of the Great War Page 12