The Mystery Ship: A Story of the 'Q' Ships During the Great War

COLD, grey dawn was stealing over the North Sea. Hull down to the east'ard, her cage-mast just showing above the horizon, lay the Hoorn Reefs Lightship. Off the tail of the bank...

"It's like this," explained the R.A.F. officer. "I've three days' leave. Why I've been granted it is a mystery, as one doesn't get much in the R.A.F. without asking for it. Howe...

FOR the second time within forty-eight hours Karl von Preussen tramped the deserted road leading to Nedderburn Junction railway station. On the previous occasion he called himse...

Cedric Wakefield was a burly, pleasant-faced youth of twenty-four, upon whose broad shoulders rested the weight of responsibility of M.L. 1071, her crew and equipment. In those...

It was ten and a half hours after the light-cruiser squadron had left Auldhaig. At thirty knots the light cruisers were approaching the rendezvous mentioned in their sealed orde...

"I don't know so much about that," demurred Morpeth. "I'll use it as a lever to prize a secret out of this von Preugfeld. We'll have him up here and give him the shock of his li...

"Hardly," replied the Postal Censor's assistant. "One receives so many cables and telegrams for dispatch in the course of the day. I'll find out the name of the clerk on duty at...

It was a few days after Karl von Preussen's hasty and almost panic-stricken exodus from Edinburgh. Entwistle, Secret Service agent, with a highly respectable record, had been ca...

"WHAT a ghastly welcome!" soliloquised Leutnant Karl von Preussen, as he approached the "prohibited area" of Auldhaig. For the present his assumed name was Captain George Fennel...

WITH Captain Cumberleigh's valedictory words ringing in his ears, Pyecroft began his preparations to avoid capture. While his comrades were hurriedly lowering the _Pipsqueak's_...

THE next day dawned bright and clear. Hardly a ripple disturbed the placid surface of the Flow, although beyond the harbour the flood tide was boiling and seething through the P...

"WHAT'S for dinner at the mess to-night?" inquired Blenkinson. "Wonder if the management has got rid of our box for 'The Maid of the Mountains'? If not, will he try and make us...

Lunch was over at Auldhaig Air Station. Most of the officers had drifted in twos and threes into the ante-room to seize the opportunity of enjoying a smoke before falling in on...

"He's taking the vessel back to Ostend," announced Krauss. "It's madness. To say nothing of the danger of mines, it's putting our heads into a noose. With Wilhelmshaven and Heli...

"It won't be for the want of trying," rejoined the R.N. R. man grimly; then bending till his lips nearly touched the mouth of the voice tube, he shouted, "Stand by, below there,...

He knew perfectly well. The sight of a slender pole inclined slightly from the perpendicular and throwing out a double feather of spray as it cleft the water told him that it wa...

"And the sooner the better," added Jock McIntosh. "It was a close thing to say who would be fed up first--Fritz or us. Fritz did win that, but by a short length."

"IT seems as if Old Man Morpeth's keen on taking all the Auldhaig crush for a joyride," said Meredith, as he shook hands with Cumberleigh and was introduced by the latter to the...

"KNOW anything about motor bikes?" inquired Morpeth, helping himself to a liberal chunk of margarine and pushing the earthenware jar across to his companion. "After you with the...

A BLINDING flash and a deafening roar, followed by a sickening lurch of the little patrol boat as the lightly built hull reeled to the recoil, announced that the action had comm...

"DONNERWETTER! I am utterly sick of this business, Kaspar," whispered Seaman Furst. "It is the life of a dog, or worse. If this war is not over by the beginning of the winter th...

IT was close on eight o'clock on a clear October evening that Kenneth Meredith, promoted to Lieutenant-Commander R.N.V.R., and having the distinctive letters D.S.C. tacked on to...

George--otherwise Kenneth Meredith, sub-lieutenant R.N.V.R. and second-in-command of H.M. Motor Launch 1071--deliberately blotted five lines of his weekly epistle to the fond on...

Ober-leutnant Hans von Preugfeld, commanding officer of U 247, was typically Prussian in his thoroughness. Carefully he examined the sand adhering to the "arming" of the lead li...

"THE fog is thicker than ever," grumbled the ober-leutnant as he emerged from below. "It is so far fortunate for your landing, von Preussen, but give me a clear night. Then ther...

IT was a formidable trap. Already there was less than seven miles between the jaws of these rapidly closing pincers as the two divisions of hostile torpedo-craft steamed towards...

"From Officer Commanding No. Umpteen Group to Air Ministry. I have to report that the following officers are reported missing, believed drowned:--Captain R. G. Cumberleigh, Lieu...

THROUGHOUT the winter and the following spring Kenneth Meredith still carried on at Scapa. Wakefield, too, was temporarily retained, but otherwise the band of R.N.V.R. officers...

THE "old hooker" was plugging along at a steady twelve knots. At frequent intervals copious quantities of spray would be flung inboard as her bows plunged into the long swell. R...

The men obeyed with a will. Almost in its own length the "tin" dinghy spun round and darted towards the pall of misty vapour. It was a dog's chance, and the men realised it, but...

IT was late on the following day when Meredith and his companions, together with close on six hundred naval ratings and a corresponding quantity of kit and baggage, found themse...

After being second-in-command of a crack M.L., McIntosh felt no violent enthusiasm over his job--to take the two cumbersome craft to a strange port eighty odd miles along the co...

"IT'S time those scallywags of ours put in an appearance, Sparrowhawk," remarked Colonel Greyhouse of the Auldhaig Air Station. "They reported from Leith two days ago. We're sho...

"CONFOUND it!" ejaculated Cumberleigh, ruefully contemplating a small amount of silver in his palm. "Bang goes another Bradbury. At this rate I'll be on the rocks before many da...

THE Admiral's secretary at Auldhaig stood at the Commander-in-Chief's elbow. It was close on lunch-time, and the Admiral had still a bulky though fast diminishing pile of docume...