At the rail he turned to the Robinsons. "Good luck, madame!" he said to the woman.
"And to you, too, Captain."
He glanced at the small boy. "And you, Alfred," he added, "you don't know how lucky you are to be so young. By the time you are grown, this war will be over. There should be no other in your life."
Alfie started to smile, then thought better of it and stuck out his tongue instead.
"Alfie! It's no matter wot we think, we've still got some manners!" his mother rebuked him.
"Don't blame him, madame," Lauterbach interrupted. "He's only doing what he thinks right." He turned to Captain Robinson. "Here is your new passenger list, Captain, and your certificate of cartel. Under it you will not be molested again. Good luck."
They shook hands, and Lauterbach dropped over the side, sliding down the rope ladder to the waiting boat below. Faces came to the Kabinga's rail, first a few and then many, until her whole midships and upper works were lined. Halfway across to the Emden, Lauterbach waved. A few waves replied, then another, and then a dozen more, until it seemed as if all their former captives were waving and cheering.
When the Kabinga was nearly out of sight, Leutnant von Guerard appeared from the wireless room. "Intercepted message broadcast by the Calcutta lightship, Herr Kapitan!" he said.
Von Mueller accepted the flimsy, read it grimly, then passed it across to von Muecke.
REPORTED BY ITALIAN S/S LOREDANO AN HOUR AGO, GERMAN CRUISER EMDEN HAS SUNK THE BRITISH S/S DIPLOMAT AND KABINGA AND GREEK S/S PONTOPORROS AT LAT. 18:1 N, LONG. 86:24 E. ALL VESSELS ARE WARNED TO BE ON THE LOOKOUT FOR HER IN THE AREA.
Helmuth glared at von Mueller indignantly. "Schweinehund!" he exclaimed. "He swore on his honor—his sacred honor!"
"Are you surprised, Helmuth?" asked von Mueller.
''Yes—but by all rights he should be our ally," von Muecke protested. He referred, of course, to the Italo-German treaty of alliance. "He might at least have had the decency to remain neutral."
"Does it matter so much now, in any case, Helmuth?" Von Mueller shrugged. "Save that the fool's dishonor has actually worked to our advantage?"
"Our advantage?" Von Muecke gaped at him. "Certainly." Von Mueller nodded. "By giving out this information so soon he has given us the best chance we could wish to escape whatever trap the English might try to set for us. Now, while the English are getting ready to cast their nets for us here, we will be on our way elsewhere."
"Jawohl, Herr Kapitan," von Muecke said gravely. "These are dangerous waters. I am afraid our usefulness is ended here."
"Dangerous, yes, Helmuth," said von Mueller. "But as to our usefulness, I have my own ideas."
Von Muecke glanced at him sharply. In his own good time, he knew, the Captain would tell what he had in mind. When he did, the junior knew it would be something audacious—something unanticipated.
But von Mueller himself had really no exact idea of what they should try next by way of attack. There was no doubt in his mind that their best move, if they were to carry out the duty expected of them, lay in the strategy of surprise; they must strike and strike and strike again, as hard and as suddenly and as unpredictably as they could where they were least expected. How or where that might be, he did not yet know for sure, yet instinctively he recognized that it would be a mistake to reveal his thoughts even to his most trusted officers. His plans would not be betrayed, but all hands would be kept more on the qui vive if there were some mystery in his movements. For the time being it might be wise to let them sit and wonder.
In the meantime ship's housekeeping had to be tended to, willy-nilly. Wednesday came up with brilliant weather, and under such conditions, von Mueller decided, it would be folly to postpone further the coaling that was imperative. Accordingly, Fontoporros was summoned forward and made fast and the transfer of the Greek's cargo began. It was slow, hot, dirty work that frayed nerves and tried tempers. In twelve hours, broken only by a brief rest at midday, when the heat became unbearable, they were able to transship only 440 tons. The operation ended two hours short of midnight, when the Pontoporros was cast off and sent, under guard, to a rendezvous at some vague future date off Simalur—a rendezvous which was destined never to be kept. But the Emden had been able to replenish her bunkers and deck stores. She now had coal enough to continue her cruise for a time; coal that at least would burn and maintain a full head of steam, whatever Chief Engineer Ellenbroek and his assistant, Haas, might think of it.
As the Pontoporros bore away southward, the Emden herself bore up in a more easterly direction for the Preparis North Channel and the junction of the Madras—Rangoon and Singapore—Calcutta traffic lanes. Everyone on board had high hopes of flushing out more game along those heavily traveled and as yet untouched routes. But when the dawn came the seas were empty, and not even so much as a smudge appeared on the horizon. Throughout the day they prowled the area, without success.
"Have they all been warned away?" demanded von Muecke in the cool dusk of the evening.
"It's possible," von Mueller admitted, "though we've intercepted no broadcasts to that effect."
"In the morning, then, maybe?" von Muecke said hopefully.
Von Mueller shook his head. "Our greatest value lies incur mobility, Helmuth. It is also our greatest advantage. When we stop too long in any one place, we risk losing them both. As soon as it's dark, we'll run on through the North Channel and then bear southeast to cut across the Singapore—Rangoon line."
Von Muecke's eyes glinted. They might catch nothing; still, the prospect of activity was more to his taste than lying in wait.
The passage of the channel presented no difficulties. The chatter of British warships could be heard on the wireless, but apparently none had thought yet to seal off that passage. They were all too far away even to be considered as potential threats. By dawn the Emden was well clear and into the burnished waters of the Andaman Sea.
143
Through another hot, still, lazy day they steamed slowly, first southeast, and then as they came near the track of Singapore ships, south-southeast. Not until late afternoon, however, did they raise even so much as a smudge on the horizon. Then it was so faint that they could not be sure that it was not simply a wisp of haze. Yet it was a possibility and it bore almost dead ahead. They dashed toward it.
There was a steamer, surely enough, bearing northward for Rangoon. But when they brought her to, she proved to be the Norwegian S/S Dovre.
"Another neutral!" Von Muecke's tone of disgust echoed the general sentiment on board.
But Karl von Mueller was far from dissatisfied. He had already made up his mind as to their next move, and an enemy ship would have encumbered the Emden with another load of prisoners. After requesting several newspapers, he quietly sent the Norwegian on her way.
So long as it remained light, those who were off duty went eagerly to work on the papers. All of them were starved for news, for most of what they had heard since leaving Tsingtao had come to them in the briefest possible radio communiques, and any enlargement was welcome, no matter how highly it might be colored by their adversaries' point of view.
Indeed, they found many of the items highly diverting. There was a measure of fury and bitterness, to be sure, in the endless accounts of German atrocities. How could even the dullest Englishmen, they wondered, believe such palpable lies? Yet it was obvious that the accounts were taken seriously in London. At the same time, however, there was much satisfaction to be derived from the fact that the German armies were advancing everywhere, and that the English themselves seemed to admit that they were powerless to halt them. It was amusing also to read the lurid and grossly exaggerated accounts of their own activities in the Indian Ocean. Any idiot should be able to see that if they had done only one tenth of the nefarious deeds with which they were credited they would have had to have a flying machine for a ship. The vessel had yet to be launched that could appear at so many and such far-flung places in such swift succession.