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Updated: June 15, 2025
He surveyed the heather-crowned islets surrounding them on all sides, the lonely haunts of cormorants and black-backed gulls. "I'm all for houris and sirens and whatnots " The foresail swung across and knocked him into the bottom of the boat. "You frail Ulysses!" exclaimed Thorogood, as they set sail on the new course. "You aren't to be trusted in these populous parts.
The Battle-cruisers are somewhere beyond them again, with their Light Cruisers and Destroyers about thirty miles to the southward. The hands are at dinner and all is peace. She's keeping station quite well now." The speaker moved to the range-finder again and peered into it at the next ahead. "Right to a yard, James." Thorogood nodded. "Thank you: I hope I'll succeed in keeping her there.
It's very rough and blowing like blue blazes, so I don't suppose there are many lame ducks left afloat poor devils.... With any luck we ought to get in to-morrow morning, though." The sleeping figure with the outstretched arms suddenly raised his head and blinked at Thorogood. "Where's the elusive Hun?" he demanded. "'Opped it," was the reply. "Otherwise vamoosed "
Some were playing cards in places sheltered from the wind and spray; near the blacksmith's forge a man was stooping patiently over a small black object: Thorogood raised his glasses for a moment and recognised the ship's cat, reluctantly undergoing instruction in jumping through the man's hands.
The drifter rounded an outlying promontory of one of the islands, and Thorogood raised his hand. "There you are," he said, "there's our little lot!" He indicated with a nod the Battle-fleet of Britain. "And very nice too," said the India-rubber Man, staring in the direction of the other's gaze. "Puts me in mind, as they say, of a picture I saw once. 'National Insurance, I think it was called."
It concerned the photograph of a mutual lady acquaintance, and has no place in this narrative. Thorogood moved to the rail and looked down at the familiar forecastle and teeming upper-deck, thirty feet below. Seen thus from above, the grey, sloping shields of the turrets, each with its great twin guns, looked like gigantic mythical tortoises with two heads and disproportionately long necks.
At seven minutes past three in the afternoon, Cecily Thorogood, that very self-possessed and prettily-clad young woman, was seated in a deck-chair on the saloon-deck of a 6,000-ton liner; an American magazine was open in front of her, under cover of which she was exploring the contents of a box of chocolates with the practised eye of the expert, in quest of a particular species which contained crystallised ginger and found favour in her sight.
The pen may describe, but it cannot convey a just idea of the thrilling cheers that greeted the rescued woman as she was received at the bottom of the escape, or the shouts of applause and congratulation that greeted Harry Thorogood as he emerged from the same, burnt, bleeding, scraped, scarred, and blackened, but not seriously injured, and with a pleasant smile upon his dirty face.
So James, between mouthfuls, gave a brief résumé of the night's adventure, while Sir William Thorogood, Professor of Chemistry and Adviser to the Admiralty on Submarine Explosives, stood and shivered on the hearthrug. "And it just shows," concluded his nephew, "what a three-hours' swim in the North Sea does for a chap's morals." He eyed his Uncle Bill solemnly.
"You're all for fighting, I see," chimed in soft-eyed Molly; "I wonder what little Jim would like to be, if he was awake." "I know what battles I would like to see him fighting," said Mrs Thorogood. "Why," exclaimed the blacksmith in surprise, "I thought you hated fighting of all kinds?" "No, not all kinds. I should like to see little Jim fighting the battle of the Prince of Peace."
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