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The frontier-line is some miles above the ancient city of Thorn. It is strictly guarded by day and night. The patrol-boats are afloat at every hour. Kosmaroff had arranged to arrive at this spot early in the night, before the mists had been dispelled by the coming of the moon. Even he could only guess at their position. Once they dared to approach the shore in order to discover some landmark.
Hearing a submarine approaching beneath the surface, the merchantman may avoid her and the destroyers and patrol-boats may take means to effect her capture. From Lodestone to Leyden Jar The Mysterious "C.M." Spark and Frictional Telegraphs The Electro-magnet Davy and the Relay System.
The transports were of course anchored nearest the shore, with the war-ships outside of them for protection in case of a sudden raid by the Japanese fleet; while outside of all, a mile distant, the seven torpedo-boats steamed constantly to and fro, acting the part of patrol-boats, and keeping a sharp look-out seaward, for the Chinese would have been caught in a trap had the enemy appeared while they were lying at anchor in the roadstead, unable to manoeuvre.
The wrecked air-ship was quickly surrounded by a little fleet of destroyers and patrol-boats, and the crew were brought ashore, prisoners. That same night yet another Zeppelin was hit and damaged in another part of the country. Raids followed in such quick succession as to be almost of nightly occurrence during the favouring moonless nights.
Meanwhile our coast and ports are in danger, for the millions we sink in forts and mines won't carry us far. They're fixed pure passive defence. What you want is boats mosquitoes with stings swarms of them patrol-boats, scout-boats, torpedo-boats; intelligent irregulars manned by local men, with a pretty free hand to play their own game. And what a splendid game to play!
Then two bullets struck the boat simultaneously, one on the stern-post, fired from behind, the other full on the side amidships, where Martin lay concealed. Neither of the two men moved or made a sound. Kosmaroff leaned forward and peered into the fog. The patrol-boats were behind now, and the officers were calling to each other.
"I'll have the river policed and all possible traffic suspended. Any craft that are let through the cordons of police-boats will be made to follow the other side of the river. We'll have nothing off the Marble Quay except the boat-load of sieves and the patrol-boats." He sighed. "I believe," he said, "that that is all except fixing the day and the hour."
When he saw how they ate, and when he remembered that none of the pearl patrol-boats were expected for two months, he sighed. But the crew of the Haliotis lay down in the verandah, and said that they were pensioners of the Governor's bounty. A grey-bearded man, fat and bald-headed, his one garment a green-and-yellow loin-cloth, saw the Haliotis in the harbour, and bellowed for joy.
During the course of the day Wilmshurst heard the salient facts in connection with the raider's career. She was the Hamburg-Amerika intermediate liner Porfurst, who, after being armed and camouflaged, had contrived to escape the cordon of patrol-boats in the North Atlantic. For three months she had followed her piratical occupation, re-provisioning and re-coaling from the vessels she captured.
On one hand lay Africa, on the other the Moorish country, both shrouded in a soft haze and edged with snowy foam. Down below the soldiers of Italy were singing. A merchantman of belligerent nationality, our ship proudly flew its flag again. Indeed, had it failed to do so, the British patrol-boats would long since have known the reason why.
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