Danger! and Other Stories - Arthur Conan Doyle (best novels for teenagers TXT) 📗

own little flagship were at sea once more, bound for our original station off the mouth of the Thames.

I had no time to read our papers whilst I was refitting, but I gathered the news after we got under way.  The British occupied all our ports, but otherwise we had not suffered at all, since we have excellent railway communications with Europe.  Prices had altered little, and our industries continued as before.  There was talk of a British invasion, but this I knew to be absolute nonsense, for the British must have learned by this time that it would be sheer murder to send transports full of soldiers to sea in the face of submarines.  When they have a tunnel they can use their fine expeditionary force upon the Continent, but until then it might just as well not exist so far as Europe is concerned.  My own country, therefore, was in good case and had nothing to fear.  Great Britain, however, was already feeling my grip upon her throat.  As in normal times four-fifths of her food is imported, prices were rising by leaps and bounds.  The supplies in the country were beginning to show signs of depletion, while little was coming in to replace it.  The insurances at Lloyd’s had risen to a figure which made the price of the food prohibitive to the mass of the people by the time it had reached the market.  The loaf, which, under ordinary circumstances stood at fivepence, was already at one and twopence.  Beef was three shillings and fourpence a pound, and mutton two shillings and ninepence.  Everything else was in proportion.  The Government had acted with energy and offered a big bounty for corn to be planted at once.  It could only be reaped five months hence, however, and long before then, as the papers pointed out, half the island would be dead from starvation.  Strong appeals had been made to the patriotism of the people, and they were assured that the interference with trade was temporary, and that with a little patience all would be well.  But already there was a marked rise in the death-rate, especially among children, who suffered from want of milk, the cattle being slaughtered for food.  There was serious rioting in the Lanarkshire coalfields and in the Midlands, together with a Socialistic upheaval in the East of London, which had assumed the proportions of a civil war.  Already there were responsible papers which declared that England was in an impossible position, and that an immediate peace was necessary to prevent one of the greatest tragedies in history.  It was my task now to prove to them that they were right.

It was May 2nd when I found myself back at the Maplin Sands to the north of the estuary of the Thames.  The Beta was sent on to the Solent to block it and take the place of the lamented Kappa.  And now I was throttling Britain indeed—London, Southampton, the Bristol Channel, Liverpool, the North Channel, the Glasgow approaches, each was guarded by my boats.  Great liners were, as we learned afterwards, pouring their supplies into Galway and the West of Ireland, where provisions were cheaper than has ever been known.  Tens of thousands were embarking from Britain for Ireland in order to save themselves from starvation.  But you cannot transplant a whole dense population.  The main body of the people, by the middle of May, were actually starving.  At that date wheat was at a hundred, maize and barley at eighty.  Even the most obstinate had begun to see that the situation could not possibly continue.

In the great towns starving crowds clamoured for bread before the municipal offices, and public officials everywhere were attacked and often murdered by frantic mobs, composed largely of desperate women who had seen their infants perish before their eyes.  In the country, roots, bark, and weeds of every sort were used as food.  In London the private mansions of Ministers were guarded by strong pickets of soldiers, while a battalion of Guards was camped permanently round the Houses of Parliament.  The lives of the Prime Minister and of the Foreign Secretary were continually threatened and occasionally attempted.  Yet the Government had entered upon the war with the full assent of every party in the State.  The true culprits were those, be they politicians or journalists, who had not the foresight to understand that unless Britain grew her own supplies, or unless by means of a tunnel she had some way of conveying them into the island, all her mighty expenditure upon her army and her fleet was a mere waste of money so long as her antagonists had a few submarines and men who could use them.  England has often been stupid, but has got off scot-free.  This time she was stupid and had to pay the price.  You can’t expect Luck to be your saviour always.

It would be a mere repetition of what I have already described if I were to recount all our proceedings during that first ten days after I resumed my station.  During my absence the ships had taken heart and had begun to come up again.  In the first day I got four.  After that I had to go farther afield, and again I picked up several in French waters.  Once I had a narrow escape through one of my kingston valves getting some grit into it and refusing to act when I was below the surface.  Our margin of buoyancy just carried us through.  By the end of that week the Channel was clear again, and both Beta and my own boat were down West once more.  There we had encouraging messages from our Bristol consort, who in turn had heard from Delta at Liverpool.  Our task was completely done.  We could not prevent all food from passing into the British Islands, but at least we had raised what did get in to a price which put it far beyond the means of the penniless, workless multitudes.  In vain Government commandeered it all and doled it out as a general feeds the garrison of a fortress.  The task was too great—the responsibility too horrible.  Even the proud and stubborn English could not face it any longer.

I remember well how the news came to me.  I was lying at the time off Selsey Bill when I saw a small war-vessel coming down Channel.  It had never been my policy to attack any vessel coming down.  My torpedoes and even my shells were too precious for that.  I could not help being attracted, however, by the movements of this ship, which came slowly zigzagging in my direction.

“Looking for me,” thought I.  “What on earth does the foolish thing hope to do if she could find me?”

I was lying awash at the time and got ready to go below in case she should come for me.  But at that moment—she was about half a mile away—she turned her quarter, and there to my amazement was the red flag with the blue circle, our own beloved flag, flying from her peak.  For a moment I thought that this was some clever dodge of the enemy to tempt me within range.  I snatched up my glasses and called on Vornal.  Then we both recognized the vessel.  It was the Juno, the only one left intact of our own cruisers.  What could she be doing flying the flag in the enemy’s waters?  Then I understood it, and turning to Vornal, we threw ourselves into each other’s arms.  It could only mean an armistice—or peace!

And it was peace.  We learned the glad news when we had risen alongside the Juno, and the ringing cheers which greeted us had at last died away.  Our orders were to report ourselves at once at Blankenberg.  Then she passed on down Channel to collect the others.  We returned to port upon the surface, steaming through the whole British fleet as we passed up the North Sea.  The crews clustered thick along the sides of the vessels to watch us.  I can see now their sullen, angry faces.  Many shook their fists and cursed us as we went by.  It was not that we had damaged them—I will do them the justice to say that the English, as the old Boer War has proved, bear no resentment against a brave enemy—but that they thought us cowardly to attack merchant ships and avoid the warships.  It is like the Arabs who think that a flank attack is a mean, unmanly device.  War is not a big game, my English friends.  It is a desperate business to gain the upper hand, and one must use one’s brain in order to find the weak spot of one’s enemy.  It is not fair to blame me if I have found yours.  It was my duty.  Perhaps those officers and sailors who scowled at the little Iota that May morning have by this time done me justice when the first bitterness of undeserved defeat was passed.

Let others describe my entrance into Blankenberg; the mad enthusiasm of the crowds, and the magnificent public reception of each successive boat as it arrived.  Surely the men deserved the grant made them by the State which has enabled each of them to be independent for life.  As a feat of endurance, that long residence in such a state of mental tension in cramped quarters, breathing an unnatural atmosphere, will long remain as a record.  The country may well be proud of such sailors.

The terms of peace were not made onerous, for we were in no condition to make Great Britain our permanent enemy.  We knew well that we had won the war by circumstances which would never be allowed to occur again, and that in a few years the Island Power would be as strong as ever—stronger, perhaps—for the lesson that she had learned.  It would be madness to provoke such an antagonist.  A mutual salute of flags was arranged, the Colonial boundary was adjusted by arbitration, and we claimed no indemnity beyond an undertaking on the part of Britain that she would pay any damages which an International Court might award to France or to the United States for injury received through the operations of our submarines.  So ended the war!

Of course, England will not be caught napping in such a fashion again!  Her foolish blindness is partly explained by her delusion that her enemy would not torpedo merchant vessels.  Common sense should have told her that her enemy will play the game that suits them best—that they will not inquire what they may do, but they will do it first and talk about it afterwards.  The opinion of the whole world now is that if a blockade were proclaimed one may do what one can with those who try to break it, and that it was as reasonable to prevent food from reaching England in war time as it is for a besieger to prevent the victualling of a beleaguered fortress.

I cannot end this account better than by quoting the first few paragraphs of a leader in the Times, which appeared shortly after the declaration of peace.  It may be taken to epitomize the saner public opinion of England upon the meaning and lessons of the episode.

“In all this miserable business,” said the writer, “which has cost us the loss of a considerable portion of our merchant fleet and more than fifty thousand civilian lives, there is just one consolation to be found.  It lies in the fact that our temporary conqueror is a Power which is not strong enough to reap the fruits of her