Part 8

"The Turks still hold it," the Navigator said. "Our chaps are preparing to rush it when the ships have finished their bit of work."

"How are they going on down in the _River Clyde_?" he asked.

"Badly; they've been terribly cut up; haven't landed a man since nine this morning; something went wrong when they tried to get the lighters in position under her bows. Look through your glass! You see those chaps there under the little bank on top of the beach, this side of her; those are all who are left of some six or seven hundred who tried to get ashore early this morning. They can't budge; they have been there all the time. And those are their dead, those brownish lumps scattered along the beach. Those two transports' boats, stranded under Cape Helles, drifted there. Every man aboard them was killed before they got near the shore. They've been drifting about all the morning, and fetched up on the rocks. Look at that splash jumping up close to the _River Clyde_--that's another 8-inch shell from the Asiatic shore. They hit her three times before she took the ground, but have missed her ever since. Ah! There goes a salvo from the _Prince George_--she's looking after the Asiatic guns--that'll quiet 'em."

"Any news from the Australians, sir?" the Orphan asked, feeling horribly miserable.

"They and the New Zealanders have done grandly," the Fleet-Paymaster answered cheerily. "Pushed inland a devil of a way. They'll be across the Peninsula in no time--with luck."

No news had come from the French on the Asiatic side. "They seem to be doing all right," the Navigator said; "but it's precious difficult to make out what's happening there."

Some men came through the battery door carrying a stretcher with a man on it, his face covered with a cloth. They bore it right aft on the quarter-deck, lifted back a tarpaulin, which the Orphan then noticed for the first time, laid the body on the deck, drew the tarpaulin over it, and went for'ard.

"That's the seventeenth," the Navigator told him; "most of them soldiers."

Dr. O'Neill, capless and haggard, came up the after hatchway. "By the powers that be, but the General has a bad leg!" he said as he hurried past them on his way to the sick-bay.

"That's the General you brought off this morning," the Fleet-Paymaster explained.

The Sub and the China Doll came up from below, the China Doll just wakened by the heavy firing.

"That R.H.A. chap promised to send you off your rifle, China Doll; he called out to us just before he landed," the Orphan said; but the Assistant Clerk shook his head sorrowfully. "No, he's dead; he died as they brought him on board; he and that chum of his are both there," and he pointed to the tarpaulin.

"Someone told me," said the Sub, "that the R.H.A. chap got ashore all right, fixed up his signal things, and sent off one or two messages before he was knocked over. He was more lucky than a good many of those there; they never got out of the boats."

"Why did the Captain want you?" asked the Orphan.

The Sub took him aside, his eyes very bright. "He'd forgotten why he sent for me, but then wanted to know if we'd had orders to go after those crippled boats that time. I told him that we hadn't, but that I couldn't stand by and do nothing. I thought he was angry; he said that if the steamboats had been disabled it would have meant a serious delay. I told him we'd only had a bullet through the funnel and a bit chipped out of the gunwale. He looked me up and down, tugged at his beard, and I saw that he was smiling. So that's all right, my jumping Orphan!"

"Did he know that the Hun went in too?"

"I told him."

"What did he say?"

"Oh, you know that funny, slow way he has of talking when he's trying to be humorous. He just tugged his beard and said: 'I thought I noticed that young officer's boat'. Gosh! what a morning it's been!"

The picket-boat's steering gear having been reported repaired, the Orphan was sent away again, and kept busy until nightfall, backwards and forwards between "W" beach and the ships. Once he took Captain Macfarlane on board the _Queen Elisabeth_, now anchored off the _River Clyde_, and waited for him whilst the big ship fired salvoes of 6-inch shell into Sedd-el-Bahr village and the earthwork on Hill 141 above it. Another time he went alongside the sappers' pontoons, and Bubbles dashed down to speak to him. "My dear chap, it's a great game; we're having a ripping time!" he gurgled and snorted, looking a terrible brigand in his clothes--already very dirty. "Oh, that's nothing!" he laughed, as he saw the Orphan smile. "We lay in the old Turks' trenches for two blessed hours this morning. It was a great time. If you get a chance, bring us in some butter and some sausages--and, my hat! old chap, I'm dry--dry as a lime-kiln, and my water-bottle's been empty for the last three hours."

The Orphan had some water in the boat and gave it to him. The next time he went back to the ship he got a barricoe filled and took it inshore; but there was too much of a crush for him to go alongside, so the Lamp-post waded in up to his waist and fetched it. "We've almost run out of it; all our people gave their water to the wounded, and there are any amount more coming down now. We've just heard that the Worcesters have rushed Hill 138, and they and the Lancashires are going to try and take Hill 141. Yes, there they come," and he pointed up the gully, down which many stretchers were being carried. He shouted to a couple of the beach party, and seizing the barricoe of water, they ran it up the beach towards a little tent under the rocks to the left, with a Red Cross flag flying near it, and crowds of men in every attitude of weariness gathered round it. These were all wounded men.

At this time, about a quarter to five, there was a period of comparative quiet. The Worcesters had cleared the Turks out of Hill 138, so that "W" beach was practically free from rifle-fire; and now they and the Lancashire Fusiliers were forming up to attack the earthwork on Hill 141. This dominated both Hill 138 and "V" beach, where the _River Clyde_ lay, so that, until it was captured, it was impossible to join hands with the remnants of the Dublins on "V" beach. A very brave attempt was made about half-past five to take this earthwork; but the two gallant regiments were almost exhausted after their hard day's fighting under a hot sun, and they met more wire entanglements, so thickly laid, and commanded by such a heavy fire, that they were unable to advance farther. At nightfall the Turks still held Hill 141, and separated the troops who had landed on "W" beach from those who had landed on "V" beach.

These poor chaps had suffered terribly all day, and still remained crouched under the low cliff or bank there, unable to move.

During the fighting for this last hill, the Orphan towed in two horse-boats with two field-guns and their limbers. They were covered up with tarpaulins, and he was not certain whether they were English 18-pounders or French 75's. At any rate, the beach parties soon got hold of them with hook-ropes and drag-ropes, hauled them ashore, and "man-handled" them up the gully. The Orphan knew, in a general sort of way, that things were not "going" as well as had been hoped, but he was kept so busy, and was so fatigued, that by sunset he could hardly keep his eyes open. Several times he had to hand over the wheel to Jarvis; but at last, after having spent nearly an hour hunting in the dark for an important transport which had anchored in the wrong place, he found himself at nine o'clock back again alongside the _Achates_.

The Sub, on watch, told him that he would not be wanted for some time. "Go and get something to eat, and a rest," he said; "you've had a pretty hard day of it."

He stumbled down into the gun-room, where he found the Hun fast asleep with his head on the table. Barnes brought him a glass of beer, and he swallowed it in one draught. "Give me a biscuit--anything--I'm too sleepy to eat."

But Barnes had some sandwiches ready. "Plenty of mustard on 'em--made 'em myself--mustard'll ginger you up. Just you lie down on the cushions, and I'll stick the plate alongside you."

The Pimple found him, and wanted to tell him the latest news. The Orphan told him to "chuck it". The China Doll came in and would have asked him questions, but the Orphan pretended to be asleep, so he tiptoed out again like a mouse. Uncle Podger strolled in, smoking his pipe, and began to play patience. He watched him shuffling and dealing the cards, and then fell asleep.

He woke. The corporal of the gangway was shaking him.

"The Commander wants you, sir."

He dragged himself up. The gun-room was empty. The alarum-clock on the notice-board showed a quarter to eleven, and he went up to the dark quarter-deck, where he found the Commander and reported himself.

"Oh! there you are, are you? I've been sending all over the ship for you. The 'wounded' launch is going down to the _River Clyde_; I've no one else to send with her; Rawlinson has gone away in a cutter and I can't trust anyone else; the steam pinnace will tow you down, and the doctors are going with you. I've sent four hands into the launch already, and she's at the starboard boom; drop her astern and alongside the port gangway. Hurry up!"

Still half asleep, the Orphan found this big pulling boat (fitted to transport wounded, she had been), dropped into her, and five minutes later brought her alongside.

The Hun, in the pinnace, came along out of the dark, bumped into her, and got her painter made fast to the towing-cleat. "They're having a jolly lively time down at the _River Clyde_!" the Hun called across.

The Orphan, turning his sleepy head in that direction, listened, and heard a good deal of rifle-firing, and occasionally the spluttering of a maxim.

"Right into it," he thought, and forgot his tiredness.

Dr. O'Neill and Dr. Gordon scrambled down the ship's side into the launch; the big chief sick-berth steward came down after them. Bags of dressings were passed down; and Dr. O'Neill cursed irritably when a bag, fumbled owing to the darkness, slipped through the hands of the people on the gangway above, fell into the boat, and only just missed falling overboard.

The Commander called down to the Doctor: "Keep the steam pinnace if you want her." The Sub roared out orders to the Hun, and he started his engines and towed the launch away from the ship's dark side.

Six bells struck on board her--it was just eleven o'clock.

*CHAPTER IX*

*The "River Clyde"*

The night was not very dark, a pale moon--past the quarter--appeared occasionally between slowly drifting clouds, and the sea was still quite smooth. The Peninsula showed as a dark wall rising gradually from Cape Tekke to the high cliffs at Cape Helles, beyond and under which the _River Clyde_ lay.

The Orphan--wide awake now--steered the big clumsy launch, and listened to the two weary doctors talking of their day's work and the job in front of them. Dr. O'Neill, the Fleet-Surgeon, had a grievance--he generally had. This time it was with the Padre and the Fleet-Paymaster. They had tried to make out a list of the men killed and wounded--the men who had been brought on board the _Achates_--but the sights and sounds in that crowded sick-bay, with the for'ard turret-gun firing directly over it, every two or three minutes, had been too much for them. Their stomachs would not "stick it".

"The only job they have, and they can't do it," he growled. "It took me another two hours getting in all the names and the official numbers on their identity disks."

"It was pretty beastly in there, P.M.O., and they've never seen anything like it," Dr. Gordon said soothingly. "They did their best; the Padre fainted outside, and the Fleet-Paymaster was sick."

"Never seen anything like it before! Nonsense! Nor have I! Did you get them all safely to the hospital ship?"

Dr. Gordon told him that he had only just returned from doing so. "The whole thing's silly, confoundedly silly, and this is the stupidest of all--this trip of ours," the Fleet-Surgeon snapped.

"It's not much of a joy ride, is it? You must be awfully tired," Dr. Gordon said in his nervous, self-disparaging manner, as if he too had not been hard at work the whole day.

Silence followed for some time, until the steam pinnace, swerving suddenly to port to pass two trawlers, indistinct in the darkness, jerked the launch after her and waked the Fleet-Surgeon. "Why the devil can't that young imp in the pinnace steer properly?"

The noise of furious rifle-firing coming from Sedd-el-Bahr stopped him for a moment, but then he went on again with his dismal groan. "A nice little job at this time of night. Running straight into it we are."

As the boats had altered course so much to port, they presently found themselves close under the high cliffs, and whilst being towed along in front of them, the moon, peeping out for a few moments, made them conspicuous.

Dr. O'Neill had just asked angrily: "Why the devil they wanted to go in so close! Didn't they know the Turks still held the end of them!" when ping! went a bullet over the stern of the boat and plunked into the water.

Another came, and another.

"Keep down, under cover!" growled Dr. O'Neill, more savagely than ever, and he and Dr. Gordon, the chief sick-berth steward and the four men of the crew, sat themselves down in the bottom of the boat. The Orphan, sitting exposed in the stern-sheets, wished he was ten sizes smaller.

They were close to the _River Clyde_ now; its dark shape loomed just ahead of them, and the noise of firing crackled fiercely, tiny spurts of flame from hundreds of rifles lighting up the water's edge.

They ran under the starboard quarter and gained shelter; the launch scraped against a rough wooden ladder and stopped; the doctors scrambled up it, followed by the chief sick-berth steward; their surgical dressings and lantern were handed up to them, and they disappeared through the dark gangway port in the ship's side--one of those ports which had been cut to allow her troops to pour out quickly. The Orphan and his crew in the launch, and the Hun in his steam pinnace, were left to themselves.

A maxim rattled--fired somewhere from the _River Clyde_ herself; and when it stopped, Dr. O'Neill's harsh voice could be heard asking: "Where the wounded were; what he could be expected to do in that damnable darkness! and calling for a match to light the lantern." A head peeped out from the gangway port, and a voice called down: "That's not a very 'ealthy spot, mate. The trawlers, what comed for the wounded, were sniped something 'orrid down there. They 'ad to shove off out of it."

"We've come for the wounded," the Orphan sang out.

"Well, you bally well won't get 'em. All that are left are hup on the hupper deck, and can't be got down whilst this 'ere shooting's going on--they're quite all right up there--be'ind the bulwarks they are."

From inside the ship came shouts of: "Put out that light! Curse you! We don't want any light here!" Evidently Dr. O'Neill had managed to light it, and was looking round for wounded.

"They'll begin sniping again--they starts directly they sees a light--better keep down in those boats. Off they go--I'm 'opping it!" sang out the man above.

Ping! Ping! Ping! Three twinkles from somewhere to the right--a bullet hit the water, another clanged against the pinnace's steel wheel-screen, another hit the side of the ship just under the ladder, slid down and fell into the water.

The Hun, from behind his shield, sang out to the Orphan to know if he was enjoying himself. The shouts from inside grew louder; then there was silence. Evidently the lamp had been extinguished.

The voice from the gangway called down: "'Ave they stopped? Hany one got a souvenir in 'im?"

"Where are they firing from?" asked the Orphan.

"That old castle sticks hout in the sea, this 'ere side," called back the voice, "and them there snipers 'ave been doin' themselves something proud."

The Orphan strained his eyes and could just distinguish, about two hundred yards away--ahead of the _River Clyde_--the battlemented outline of the castle walls and, farther to the right, a much more indistinct and blurred mass sticking out into the sea. This was actually the sea walls of Sedd-el-Bahr castle, jutting out on a reef.

No more shots came from there, and there was quietness everywhere for a few minutes. He began to feel sleepy, but then one or two solitary rifles rang out on the cliff side of the ship, five or six followed, thirty or forty seemed to chip in, and, almost before he knew it, a perfect pandemonium of rifle-fire burst out, making a ruddy glow against which the stern of the ship and the masts stood out quite plainly. Presently maxims started on shore, whether English or Turkish he could not know; and then, up above, from the foc's'le of the ship herself, several maxims added their voices to the din. The snipers from the sea walls did not take part in this "show". It died down after a while; a few crashes of musketry, then a few scattered shots apparently answering each other, and silence--silence which seemed absolutely extraordinary--as if it was something tangible.

What had happened, the Orphan had not the faintest idea. He could only stay where he was, and hope that Dr. O'Neill would decide something shortly.

Presently he heard the Doctor's voice in the darkness: "Steam pinnace! Steam pinnace!" and the Hun calling back "Aye, aye, sir!" "Go back to the ship and ask the Commander to send for me half an hour after the next attack ceases."

"Right, sir!" and jeering at his pal, the Hun, shoved off and disappeared back to the _Achates_, drawing a solitary twinkle from the sea wall of the castle and a solitary bullet which hit the ship's side, above the Orphan's head.

In a few minutes a voice called down: "You've got to make fast and come along inside 'ere--you and your crew," so he clambered up the wooden steps with his four men. Very willingly he did this, for he was anxious to be able to say that he had been aboard the _River Clyde_, and he felt lonely and very exposed, waiting alongside.

Inside her was absolutely pitch dark; a man who bumped against him could not be seen. The Orphan heard Dr. O'Neill's voice, and elbowed his way towards him, stumbling across something which he knew was a stretcher, but evidently not waking the man asleep on it.

"Sit down, and keep out of the gangway," Dr. O'Neill snapped, "unless you want a bullet in you. There's nothing any of us can do. There they go again, curse them!" as more rifle-firing started, just as it had done before--one or two shots, then more, then apparently a whole line blazing away as if they had millions of rounds of ammunition to spare. This time he heard hundreds of bullets pattering against the opposite side of the ship, and the glare showed him another gangway port opposite the one by which he had just entered.

"It's blocked up with boards, and you can see the light between them," someone sitting next him said; "and those blighted Turks can see a light inside here, through them, too."

This burst of firing died away very rapidly; and as he sat there, jammed among a lot of soldiers, his eyes gradually became accustomed to the darkness, and he made out that he was close to a big hatch leading down into absolute blackness--the hold probably--and that above him was another hatchway, with a coaming round it, the edges of which stood out quite clearly against the clouds. A broad wooden ladder--the foot of it quite close to him--led up to this and, as he knew it must, to the upper deck, where the remaining wounded lay. The gangway port through which he had come, showed as a lighter patch than the ship's side, and anybody moving across it could be just distinguished; but people did not move across it more than they could help, because a lot of bullets had already come through it from the sea wall. Under this, his launch lay--at the foot of the ladder he had just climbed up. Dr. Gordon kept on talking, evidently trying to pacify Dr. O'Neill, and a man near him kept rattling something--a ship's lantern it sounded like--so he guessed that the chief sick-berth steward sat quite near. People conversed all round him, in a drowsy sort of way, as if to prevent themselves being nervous or of going to sleep; farther away, hundreds of people seemed to be snoring. A soldier leant against his back; he knew it was a soldier because a bayonet kept pressing against his thigh; someone slid down across his legs, snoring loudly; he pulled up his knees, and the man went on snoring peacefully; out from a distant corner came the sound of a man in pain, in his sleep.

Some men were sitting at the foot of the ladder, and, because he heard Dr. O'Neill talking to them, he guessed that they were officers. He was evidently suggesting the possibility of getting down the wounded now that the firing had died away, but they kept on saying: "They'll start off again in a minute! It can't be done." Every now and then came the noise of heavy boots trampling hurriedly across the deck above; a figure would appear over the coaming, silhouetted against the clouds for a moment, and then someone would come hastily clattering down the ladder as if he were glad to get away from there. The whistle of an occasional bullet over that hatch explained this.

Another burst of firing broke out, swelled to a perfect fury of noise, and then subsided just as the others had done.

During a comparatively quiet interval which followed, several men scrambled down the ladders. They called out: "Worcesters to go ashore at once!" and then went back again, screwing themselves over the coaming and disappearing along the deck. The group of officers stirred themselves and stood up wearily--a tired, lackadaisical voice kept repeating "Sergeant-Major! Sergeant-Major!" then seemed to wake properly, and yelled it out.

Men began to stir. '"Ere, wake up, Major! You're wanted," came out of the dark; the sound of a man waking irritably from his sleep, scrambling to his feet, a long yawn, and then a sharp, decisive "Yes, sir! Sergeant-Major, sir!"

"Fall in, the Worcesters! Worcesters! The Worcesters have to go ashore," the officer shouted.

"Fall in, Worcesters! Fall in, Worcesters! Fall in! Fall in round the ladder!" Men all round took up the cry, waking those asleep. Men cursed and yawned, and yawned and cursed again.

"Who are you a-shaking of? I ain't a ruddy Worcester," growled someone. The darkness was full of bustle and noise as the Worcesters dragged themselves to their feet and groped round for their packs and rifles. Rifles clattered to the deck; men jostled, cursing, against each other, and the Sergeant-Major's voice kept calling out: "Come along, lads! We've got to go ashore! Hurry up, Worcesters! This way, Worcesters! Fall in near the ladder!"

Men began humping on their packs. The Orphan--by this time on his feet, to keep out of the way--had a rifle shoved into his hands. "'Old on to it, mate, while I shoves my blooming pack on." He helped the man whilst he secured the webbing-straps. Then a plaintive voice came out of the dark: "I cawn't find me pack! Where's me pack?"

There was a titter of amusement as the Sergeant-Major yelled for the men to help him find it.

"'Ere it is, you blighted idiot!" someone shouted. "You was a-sittin' on it."

"'Elp me on! 'Elp me on!" the idiot pleaded.

"You'll 'ave to 'ave a lady's maid, that's what you'll 'ave to 'ave. We cawn't go waiting for you, Bill 'Awkins," bawled the Sergeant-Major; and to judge by the silly cries of Bill Hawkins, they were strapping him up too tightly.