Part 2

“I’m a sailor. That’s all I can do. I got to live,” Schultz explained. “Maybe I get my chance at that officer, too. Ach, if I do!”

“Well, stick around an’ don’t get looney,” cautioned Tim. “Though for the life o’ me I don’t see how you got aboard this ship. I thought they were pretty careful about lettin’ Germans aboard nowdays.”

“Nobody asked me anything. I just signed up and nobody tells me I can’t,” the German insisted.

“’Tis no wonder the country’s full o’ thim spies,” Tim commented, “lettin’ furriners in that way.

“But whither or no, you’ll walk the mark whilst you’re wit’ me. An’ some time, Schultzie, I’ll tell you about an honest-to-God American that wasn’t afraid of anythin’ that floated. It ’ll do you good, me boy. Did you never hear o’ John Paul Jones?”

“Clang! Clang! Clang!” suddenly crashed the engine room signal from the bridge. Tim held his breath and waited until, “Clang!” sounded the signal for the fourth time. He knew the bridge was calling for “Full speed ahead.”

Grabbing a short iron bar he ran for the narrow steel ladder and reached it ahead of the rest of the crew. Then he turned and, perched on his vantage point four rungs up, faced the panicky group.

“I’ll brain the first man o’ youse that tries to get out o’ this fire-hole!” he screamed, swinging his weapon above their heads. “Get back there an’ shove some steam into thim boilers, y’ quitters! Av the old man didn’t want more steam he wouldn’t be ringin’ for it.”

“Out o’ the way there, you crazy fresh water runt!” warned a burly coal passer, making for the ladder. “They can’t keep us down here to drown like rats.”

With a sickening thud the bar crashed down on the skull of the coal passer and the huge bulk crumpled at the foot of the ladder. “Thud!” came the bar on another head, and two men lay still at the bottom of the ladder.

“I’ll use you all alike!” cried little Tim, the thrill of battle lighting up his smeared face. “Act like Yankee sailors an’ youse won’t have nothin’ to fear from me. Get back to thim furnaces now an’ be min! Schultzie, fire me furnace for me whilst I stay here to crack the next yellow-leg that tries to run away from a fight.”

Tim’s rough methods earned command of the stokehold for him. Perched on his ladder with his weapon ready, he stood guard as the crew returned to work.

“I had to put the fear o’ God into thim,” he mumbled as he surveyed the work of his bar. “I’m hopin’ a little cold water’ll bring thim boys up standin’.”

The men in the stokehold of the Aurora could feel the increased speed of the ship as she surged ahead, and they could feel that she was swinging off sharply to starboard. But the grimy crew had more to fear from the stubby man on the ladder than from the torpedo which they expected momentarily.

Suddenly there was a terrific shock which knocked down most of the stokers. The Aurora rolled down wickedly, but righted herself within a few minutes. It seemed hours before the signal to stop rang out in the engine room. Then came a bedlam of hideous noises from above, a series of explosions following one another in a deafening roar.

“They’re shellin’ us!” cried one of the men.

“Thin we’re safer here,” Tim announced.

“Schultz!” he sang out. “Go on deck an’ find out what it’s all about! Thin come back an’ tell us. Mind you don’t lose your nerve an’ run away. If y’ do, God help you--we’ll all take a crack at you.

“The rest o youse stay here. Maybe th ol’ man’ll be wantin’ some more steam in a minute. Keep her blowin’ off!”

* * * * *

For very good reason, Captain Froebel had decided not to sink the Aurora with an expensive torpedo. He had been away from his base a long time and with so many British and American destroyers now operating, he wanted to save his deadliest weapon for them. Also, the Aurora promised to have things on board which he needed, and his German thrift forbade destroying a prize which promised little difficulty, until he had picked her clean. A bomb properly placed would finish this craft when he was through with her. So he determined to pick her clean without considering that several things might happen.

In the first place, never having had experience with Great Lakes craft, he had no idea that the Aurora was capable of picking up speed rapidly. Neither did he know that this odd ship, built to cut some sharp corners in the ship canals without a tug, was quick as lightning on her helm. It came as a surprise to him, therefore, when the steel hull of his victim slammed into him and carried away the periscope of his almost totally submerged craft.

With its periscope gone there was nothing left for the U-X-8 but to come to the surface and fight it out. Even in this situation the underwater boat had all the advantage over the Aurora, which was sailing without a gun crew. Repairs to the damaged periscope could be made quickly, once the prize was disposed of. Captain Froebel hurriedly mounted his light deck gun and fairly deluged the decks of the Aurora with shell fire as a matter of chastisement.

“Take your crew off in the boats!” he shouted to Captain McGraw of the Aurora, in very good English, after the first shower of shells. “I’m going to shell your ship immediately again. Heave to and get your boats off if you want to save your men! I’ll give you ten minutes.”

Captain McGraw, who had seen four of his men go down under the fire of the pirate, was well aware that further resistance was useless. The Aurora was not built for battle and a well-placed shell might end her career at any time. He sounded the order for the boats and the crew lost little time getting overside.

Deep down in the stokehold, Tim Donahue and his surly crew failed to get the order to abandon ship. When Schultz clambered down the ladder with his report, he whispered to the little man on guard so that the men might not know the truth. No doubt he feared they might blame him for not shouting down the order from the deck. Without doubt the sight of the German craft had frightened him and driven all desire to leave the ship from him, because of his fear that he might be taken aboard the submarine.

“Gott!” he whispered excitedly. “It’s a big submarine and we knocked her periscope off. She is laying to and our crew’s gone over the side, already. We’re all alone on the ship.”

“The divil we are!” little Tim cried.

“Ja!” Schultz whispered. “They are coming aboard from the submarine. I saw them launching a collapsible.”

“Let thim come,” challenged Tim, grasping his steel bar tighter. “Av these yellow legs’ll stick we have a chance yet. If not thin we’ll all go together. Are you game, Schultzie?”

“Ja!” declared Schultz. “Maybe I get a chance at an officer, anyway.”

Tim Donahue looked down into the smeary faces of the men in the stokehold. There were eight of them and they were looking up at him curiously.

“Youse guys have one chanst in a thousand o’ gettin’ out o’ this alive,” he told them. “There’s a submarine ’longside an’ there’s a Heinie crew comin’ aboard. They’ve got our gang up there buffaloed. Will youse stick?”

“Sure we’ll stick!” they answered him.

“All o’ youse?”

“Sure--what’s the game?”

“Thin hunt yourselves some good handy pieces o’ pipe an’ be sure it’s heavy enough,” Tim directed. “Mind ye do as I say or it’ll be all off wit’ youse. There’s a choice for you bein’ kilt by the Germans ’r me. Get out o’ sight in the bunkers an’ stay there quiet till ye hear me signal which will be Schultzie, here, talkin’ Dutch. The Heinies think they’ve got the hull crew corraled. Schultzie, me lad, you’re a godsend this day. Come up the ladder wit’ me now, and keep out o’ sight when you get on deck.”

The long steel ladder led up to a hatchway in the forward end of the deck house, which was connected with the after cabin galley and mess room. A door directly in front of the companionway to the stokehold led directly out on deck. As the two stokers reached the top of the ladder, they heard the men from the submarine coming over the rail to the deck just outside. Hurriedly Tim and Schultz sought a hiding place on either side of the door, each grasping a short bar, their only weapons.

* * * * *

Schultz listened intently to the conversation of the boarding crew.

“Cleared out like rats from a sinking ship,” he heard the officer in charge sneer in German. “Yankees! Bah! They won’t fight like men. We will clean her out and then blow her up. First I will go through these deck houses to see what the swine have left for us.”

Schultz stiffened in eagerness. He started to move forward, but Tim grasped him by the arm.

“Keep your shirt on, Schultzie,” cautioned the temporary commander of the Aurora. “Wait for him to get well inside.”

“Gott!” Schultz hissed. “How can I wait! So bad I want just one good crack at his head.”

The two men crouched breathlessly in the shadow as they heard footsteps coming nearer and nearer along the steel deck. The interior of the deck house had become quite dark in the dusky, grayish light which hung over the sea. The officer’s flashlight blazed ahead of him as he stepped through the doorway.

There was a sudden muffled thud, a stifled groan, a faint scraping sound. Then silence.

“You got him good, Schultzie, me by,” Tim whispered. “I’ll drag him out o’ sight whilst you’re callin’ in a couple more o’ thim. Git thim two at a time, if you can. There’s time enough and we’ve got to give the lads below a chanst at thim, y’know.”

“Two men follow me!” Schultz commanded in German, his hand before his mouth to muffle his voice. More footsteps sounded on the deck and the stokers waited for the figures to darken the doorway. There were two more slight thuds and then perfect silence.

“Goin’ fine, Schultzie by,” whispered Tim. “Just like the ol’ Third Ward picnic at home. Get their guns and heave thim guys out o’ the way where they won’t be disturbin’ us. How many more in the boat?”

“There were six in the boat with the officer,” Schultz answered.

“Four left thin,” commented Tim. “We’ll feed thim to the byes. Fetch thim all in, Schultzie.”

“All of you follow me below decks, this way!” Schultz directed in the same guttural, muffled voice. “The companionway is here.”

A moment later four more figures passed through the doorway and groped ahead into the darkness unmolested. They found the companionway and following the red glow from a partly opened furnace door, they began to descend the long ladder, directed by Schultz from above.

When they had neared the bottom the flash played upon them from above, but thinking their commander had remained behind their suspicions were not aroused. Under the light, however, the waiting stokers, crouching to spring, watched them come.

When the last man had stepped to the steel plates, Tim bade them strike. There was a rush and good American curses came up, mingled with cries of surprise and groans. Then silence settled down.

“Got thim all, lads?” Tim called from above.

“Sure t’ing,” came the answer. “Send some more.”

“Get their guns!” Tim ordered. “We may need thim. This thing’s only half over.”

Schultz was bending over the prostrate officer, who had been dragged out of the way.

“Gott!” he cried. “He is der captain. He lives, but not for long, I think. It was my chance and I fixed him good.”

“It ain’t hardly human to shuffle thim off that way, Schultzie,” Tim said regretfully. “You must o’ hit him too hard. But if you done it, it’s too late to kick now. It ain’t our way, though. Get on his cap and jacket. We need a Dutch captain at this stage o’ the show.”

“But he was--” began Schultz, trembling with emotion.

“Oh, the divil take care o’ him! Never mind who he was. I hope he was the Kaiser. Anyway, he’ll never tell on you.”

* * * * *

Standing at the rail of the Aurora, coached by Tim Donahue, Schultz with his adornments of an officer of the German navy, called out in his best High German to the man on the conning tower of the submersible, just visible in the dusk.

“Bring eight men aboard at once!” he ordered in a disguised voice. “This craft’s full of plunder that we need. There’s not a Yankee sailor left on board.”

The two men at the rail of the Aurora watched the small boat leave the submarine before they hurried back to their station just inside of the deck house.

“Below there!” Donahue called down into the stokehold. “Here’s eight more comin’ aboard! Don’t open up anythin’ until you get me signal! Kin you handle thim or shall I come below meself?”

“We’re waitin’ for ’em,” came the answer. “Send ’em along.”

“There’s the byes,” said Tim, with a note of pride.

Within fifteen minutes the second boatload from the U-X-8 were lured into the stokehold. Then came some more thuds and groans and a few curses, and another battle was over.

“All clear below for the next lot!” came a voice from below.

“There’ll be no more murther done on this ship this night, you bloodthirsty divils,” answered Donahue with a chuckle.

“Get on their caps an’ blouses and we’ll all go over an’ have a look at the submarine. There can’t be more’n half a dozen left on her. Get all the guns you can find on thim fellers down there, and you’d best make thim all fast so they won’t wake up an’ start somethin’ whilst we’re away.”

The firehold crew was not long in getting up the ladder to the deck, rigged out in a motley array of German sea clothing, and grinning with the thought of the easy victory over the enemy, who had descended innocently to meet them.

“We’ll take the two boats,” Tim directed, as the group gathered about the rail. “Schultzie an’ me and two min ’ll git off in the first boat an’ the rest o’ youse follow in the second. Stand off until you get three flashes from me light. Thin come along wit’ ever’thin’ y’ got!”

“Mind y’ keep your mouths shut, an’ let Schultzie do the talkin’,” he admonished. “He’s got the lingo, and don’t any o’ youse be tryin’ out your Milwaukee German.”

Silently the smeary, grimy expedition put off from the ship, and the leading boat boldly approached the submarine. It was now quite dark, and the men in the boats were reasonably safe for the time being. A look-out was posted on the deck of the submarine and Schultz hailed him in German.

“The rest of the men are following shortly,” the bogus captain assured the guard.

There was no challenge, and the four men silently climbed aboard, keeping their weapons handy. Schultz and Tim walked toward the look-out.

“Pigs,” grumbled Schultz. “They have all run off like cowards.”

At the same minute the look-out’s knees doubled under him suddenly and he sank limply to the deck without a groan. Immediately Tim’s light flashed across the water, and the second boat came alongside.

“Follow us below an’ keep thim guns handy!” he whispered as they scrambled across the slippery deck. “We’ll have a fight on our hands now, I’m thinkin’.”

There were six men below, but only two of them were in sight when the unexpected guests arrived among them. When the other four rushed into the compartment they were looking into the muzzles of ten guns. Their two mates were but silent heaps.

“You’re lucky y’ were in the other compartment,” commented Tim, grinning at one of the captured officers. “Behave yourselves now and you’ll be likely to see home some time av there’s anythin’ left o’ your damned country whin the Yanks get through wit’ it.”

“Swine! Yankee swine!” raved the officer.

“So you thought ’twas easy we’d be, me laddie buck,” Tim tantalized. “An’ did you never hear o’ the ol’ Bonum Richard an’ a feller named John Paul Jones? An’ better min than you’ll ever be, he had to fight an’ lick, me son.”

“You will pay! You will pay, yet,” cried the angry captive in fair English. “When the day comes the German navy will come out and then good-by to your puny fleet, your transports, and your whole verdammt’ country.”

“Fools!” rumbled Schultz. “You know nothing of the wonderful America. She is the best country in the world. You will never whip us!”

* * * * *

The survivors were shackled and tumbled into convenient berths while the boarding crew went gunning in search of any who might have escaped the first assault. Tim found a line which was made fast to the bow of the submarine. Leaving two men aboard, he ordered the rest of the crew back to the Aurora.

“Schultzie,” he said, “wit’ your experience in the German navy you’d ought to be able t’ navigate a ship. Can you steer? She’s steam gear and can be handled from the bridge.”

“I have served both ends of the ship in the navy,” Schultz assured him. “But I’m not a good navigator.”

“Well, do your best, me lad. So long as you don’t fetch us up in the German navy yard, it’ll be all right,” Tim comforted him. “Wit’ me life spent in the fire hole I’d ought to be able t’ run the engine room. Maybe I can find an oiler in the crowd to be me first assistant. We’ll run her along easylike until daylight, an’ maybe we’ll pick up the boats wit’ the skipper an’ the rest o’ the crew.”

The sun rose to reveal a strange spectacle on the high seas. Lumbering along, with an odd fishlike creature dragging at the stern, the Aurora came into the reddish-yellow light of the dawn like a figure being developed on a photograph plate. At her stern fluttered the Stars and Stripes and on a tiny jury staff above her strange tow a similar emblem floated.

Far off on the horizon a smoke cloud appeared suddenly, growing larger and larger, as Schultz watched it from the bridge through the ship’s glasses. Then he telephoned to the engine-room, and Tim Donahue, acting chief engineer, shut off steam and climbed to the bridge. The news spread below decks, and the stokers deserted their furnaces without orders and clambered up to the main deck, many of them still wearing the uniform of their enemy’s navy.

Strung along the rail they watched the strange ship racing toward them from the colorful horizon. A cheer went up from the deck of the Aurora when a long, lean destroyer came roaring up ’longside. The cheer grew louder when the smoke from the destroyer’s funnels blew aside, revealing the Stars and Stripes flying straight out in the wind.

When an officer and his crew of gobs came aboard of the Aurora, they gazed suspiciously at the motley group of men in German uniforms, keeping their weapons handy for instant use.

“Sure, sir, they’ve just borrowed thim rigs,” Tim Donahue explained with a grin. “The guys that owned them costumes won’t need ’em for awhile, so there’s no hard feelin’s at all.”

“Who is in command of this ship?” the officer asked, with a tone of authority.

“You may have your chice, sir,” Tim replied. “I’m actin’ chief engineer, and Schultzie there, wit’ a Dutch name an’ a Yankee heart, he’s been skipper all night. The rest o’ the crew flew the ship, wint over the side whin the tin fish we’ve taken in tow started poppin’ shells at us.

“Sure, I don’t blame thim for skiddooin’. I’d ’a’ done the same had I the chanst. I’m hopin’ they’re all safe, ’specially Mr. McLaren an’ the rest o’ the engineers. They were good fellers.”

“The boats were picked up during the night by a British destroyer, and the men taken to Liverpool,” the officer informed him. “We were instructed by wireless of the presence of this submarine, but we didn’t expect to find this ship afloat. She’s a lake ship, eh?”

“She is that, an’ the best afloat, sir,” Tim declared.

“I thought I knew her. I was born at Cleveland,” said the officer.

“God bless you, son,” cried Tim.

“Give me your report, please,” the officer directed.

With his Irish love for the dramatic playing at its full sweep, Tim Donahue told his story in detail, encouraged now and then by the grins of the sailors from the destroyer.

“We’re ready to turn over the ship to you, sir,” he concluded. “An’ it’s thankful I am, sir, that I’m puttin’ her into the hands of a Great Lakes man.”

“Your job was well done, I’ll say,” the officer smiled, with more enthusiasm, perhaps, than is proper for an officer to display. “You will all be rewarded for this by the government. Now you will proceed to Liverpool, with your ship under convoy.”

“Sure, sir,” Tim bowed. “We’ll go anywhere wit’ the Aurora, av you’ll give us a navigatin’ officer an’ an engineer. It’s in the fire hole I’m needed, sir, where good min count.”

“They will come aboard presently,” the officer informed him. “Now, where is the crew of the submarine?”

“Here and there, sir,” Tim responded. “Some in the coal bunkers, some in the deck house an’ a few mad ones aboard the submarine. We’ve had little time to arrange thim for inspection, sir.”

“Say!” blurted the officer, with sailor-to-sailor frankness. “Will you tell me, please, how you got away with this thing? You’ve told me how the boys stood by you, but what about yourself in this mess?”

“It was like this, sir,” said Tim, solemnly. “Y’ see ’twas the first trip for me an’ the ol’ Aurora on salt water an’ I had to stick by her. We’ve been together ever since the day she come out o’ Ecorse yards, sir.

“Whin I thought o’ thim divils riflin’ her an’ thin stickin’ a bomb into her and sinkin’ her out here alone in strange waters so far from home, it made me blood boil, it did. I said to myself, we’d not give up without a scrap, an’ av the worst came, sir, we’d go under together--me an’ this ol’ girl that’s made a home for me for ten years.”

Tim paused to look proudly over the steel decks of the ship. His eyes glistened a little as he turned back to the officer, a grin wrinkling his smeared face.

“Did y’ never hear o’ the Bonum Richard an’ ol’ Paul Jones, sir?”

“All that happened a long time ago. What’s it got to do with this?” the officer asked.

“I’m thinkin’ he must ’a’ felt about the same about the ol’ Bonum as I did whin thim pirates began abusin’ the Aurora, sir.”

“Well, he had nothin’ on you, old timer,” the officer declared with more enthusiasm than a naval officer is expected to betray.

[Transcriber’s note: This story appeared in the March 9, 1929 issue of _Argosy All Story Weekly_ magazine.]