CHAPTER XX

FISHING

With the morning light the men were set to consolidate the position. Frank's barricade was strengthened; the gully was parapeted and wired; everything possible was done to improve the defensive capacity of the natural trench which marked the summit of the Australian advance, and which its occupants were to hold for a month without being able to push farther.

On the day after the fight, Frank was sent down to the beach by the major to report himself to the colonel, who at once employed him in his proper duties of interpreting for the Turkish prisoners.

"You'd rather be doing something else, I dare say, after that brilliant little defence of yours," said the colonel; "but interpreters are scarce, and you can't be spared."

During the next few days Frank learnt by degrees many details of the wonderful feat accomplished by the allied army. In the first place he discovered that the landing-place of the Australians, a little north of Gaba Tepe, was almost immediately below his old haunt on Sari Bair, and the guns he had heard firing above during that unforgettable day were evidently the battery which he had seen hauled up the hill. He heard too how at Beach Y, to the south, the King's Own Scottish Borderers and part of the Naval Division had gained the top of the cliffs with ease, covered by the guns of three cruisers in the bay; and how, still farther southward, the Royal Fusiliers, landing from the _Implacable_, had made good their footing without a single casualty. On the broader sands at Beach W the Lancashire Fusiliers had at first failed against the wire entanglements almost at the water's edge, and the innumerable snipers and machine guns concealed in the hollow between the cliffs. At Beach V, the Dublin Fusiliers, almost annihilated as they attempted to force three lines of wire and a labyrinth of trenches, had taken cover under a high sandbank that stretched along the shore, where they were joined by such of the Munster Fusiliers and the Hampshires as survived the terrible fire which burst on them when they rowed in from the collier in whose side a door had been cut for their exit. At Beach S the South Wales Borderers had scaled the cliffs without much difficulty; and the French had successfully effected their diversion on the opposite shore of the channel at Kum Kale.

These were the doings of the memorable Sunday. On Monday the Australians, supported by the guns of the fleet, withstood a violent counter-attack that lasted two hours, and finally drove off the Turks at the point of the bayonet. Elsewhere along the shore, except at Beach Y, which had been abandoned, the invaders held their own, and during the following days the work of consolidation made rapid progress. The sappers threw out piers on which stores and ammunition were unloaded from lighters under incessant shrapnel fire. Engineers cut roads up the cliffs to facilitate the transport and the passage of the ambulance parties that were continually going up and down. The wounded were conveyed to the ships as rapidly as possible. Day and night the work went on, amid the deafening roar of big guns and the unceasing rain of bullets.

During the month of May little further progress was made. The way was blocked by the hill of Achi Baba, crowned by a strong redoubt, and seamed with trenches extending on all sides in terraces one above another. Against these strong fortifications no general advance was possible.

Meanwhile German submarines had commenced their activity in the Dardanelles and the AEgean Sea. They failed to interfere with the supplies for the army, but they torpedoed three large warships, the _Goliath_, the _Triumph_, and the _Majestic_, and put a temporary check on the close co-operation of the fleet. Their successes were in some measure balanced by the feats of British submarines, which ran the blockade of mines, penetrated as far as Constantinople, and sent several Turkish transports to the bottom.

One evening, just after the _Majestic_ had been sunk, Frank was smoking an after-dinner cigarette with his colonel outside the mess-tent. The conversation turning on submarines, Frank mentioned the incident of the broken case on the quay at Panderma, when he had noticed the periscope of a submarine disclosed by the breach. He did not dwell upon it, and the colonel only remarked that the activity of the German submarines had evidently been long premeditated.

Two mornings later, Frank was summoned to the colonel, with whom he found a naval captain.

"Good morning, Forester," said the colonel. "I have been telling my friend Captain Roberts some of your queer experiences before you settled down as a humdrum interpreter. He is rather interested."

"I am indeed," said the captain. "After what you have gone through, interpreting must be dull work--duller than mine, for it's not very exciting to fire at long range without much chance of getting one back."

"It's not very exhilarating, certainly," replied Frank. "The prisoners haven't much to tell. They don't like their German officers, and haven't an idea what they are fighting for. Fighting is their job, and _Kismet_ covers it all.... You haven't been hit from Sari Bair, then?"

"No, though their shells drop pretty close sometimes. Our sea-planes haven't managed to locate that battery. I understand you didn't actually see the guns emplaced."

"No, after I toppled one over I made off. You see, things were getting pretty hot just then."

"Naturally. Well, you seem to have been able to take good care of yourself in very ticklish situations; but perhaps after all your present work is a relief after so much excitement. A man can have his fill of adventures, I suppose."

"I confess things weren't altogether pleasant, sometimes, though they had their bright side."

Frank smiled at his recollections of the major of artillery whose clothes he had commandeered, and of the boastful Abdi gurgling in the sea. At the same time, struck by a peculiar intentness in the captain's manner, he asked himself, "What is he driving at, I wonder?"

"Yes, of course there are two sides to everything," the captain went on. "Sometimes the bright side is eclipsed by the dark--according to the state of one's liver, perhaps. Your liver doesn't trouble you much, I fancy."

Frank looked at the broad, jolly face smiling enigmatically at him.

"Is there anything you wish me to do?" he asked bluntly but respectfully.

The two elder officers exchanged a glance.

"Well, since you put it like that--yes, there is," said the captain. "But it's a matter entirely for yourself. If you feel any hesitation, we shan't think any less of you if you don't entertain the idea. I may as well say at once it's a dangerous job, not at all in the ordinary risk of warfare; but the colonel had told me of your work on the cliff yonder, and for a mere interpreter, you know, you appear rather to relish risks that are not quite ordinary."

"You don't think much of risks when you've got anything going," said Frank. "Anyhow, if I can be of use--what's the nature of the job?"

"It's just as I expected," interposed the colonel, rising. "I'll leave you two to talk it over. Come and tell me what you arrange, Forester. You'll find me somewhere in the neighbourhood."

Next morning Frank's absence evoked enquiries among the junior officers. The colonel was appealed to.

"Forester? Oh, he's off for a few days on special service."

"Interpreting, sir?" asked one.

"He'll have opportunities of airing his Turkish," said the colonel.

His manner discouraged further questioning. The others saw that he meant to say no more. One of them, however, presently asked whether Forester was likely to be away long.

"I can't say." He tugged his moustache reflectively. "Our little job here is not exactly a soft one, but I wouldn't be in Forester's boots just now for a peerage."