Guy Thorne - The Secret Service Submarine - A Story of the Present War

The afternoon, as I have said, was dark and lowering, and as I changed at Heacham for the local train, a bitter wind, which cut like a knife, swept over the vast flats, straight from Heligoland, the Kiel Canal, and the tossing wastes of the North Sea.

We crawled along slowly, stopping at half a dozen stations, until, with a groan, the train drew up in the God-forsaken little terminus of Blankington-on-Sea. The sea was two miles away over the mud flats, and Blankington consisted of an enormous church, five maltsters' yards, a few fly-blown shops, and seventeen public-houses, where the townspeople and labourers on the weekly market day defied the marsh fogs with ardent spirits.

Wordingham, the husband of the woman who kept the Morstone Inn, was waiting with his dog-cart. I hoisted in my kit-bag and jumped up beside him and we started off. It was pitch dark, and we had five miles to go along a level road.

On the right were huge fields of barley stubble, all in the great shoot of the Earl of Blankington, whose yearly head of "birds," as partridges are called in Norfolk, to say nothing of pheasants, was second only to that of Sandringham itself, not so very far away. To the left were a few more fields where some plovers wailed mysteriously, "it's dark and late," or "it's late and dark," and beyond, the vast creeks and saltings towards the ocean. Even as we got out of the little town, I heard the great boom of a double ten-bore far away. Well, I could at least go back to my wild-fowling, and Wordingham told me that the geese were working backwards and forwards in skeins of at least a hundred, right over the Morstone miels.

We bowled along through the night, and I turned up the collar of my thick ulster, for it was bitterly cold.

"Well," I said, "any news, Wordingham?"

Wordingham was a big, strong, nut-brown, silent man, who took time before he spoke. At last he did so, but without replying to my question.

"My missus," he said slowly, "has got the parlour behind the bar ready for your brother, sir. It is a snug, ship-shape little place, and we will do our best to make him comfortable. And if you and I can't show the Captain a bit of sport, well, there's no one in this part of the country who can."

"Good," I said. "My brother has still got a month to get thoroughly fit before he goes back to join the North Sea Squadron. I want him to have as much shooting as possible."

Wordingham nodded and flicked up his horse. He was a well-known wild-fowler in East Norfolk and, if report spoke true, a very skilful poacher too. The marshes were free to everyone, right up to where the sea came on rare spring tides. Wordingham had an excellent mahogany punt, with a long, black-powder gun, and he would often get as many as thirty brace of duck at a single shot after hours of cautious water-stalking.

But, apart from the wild birds of the saltings, Morstone was in the very heart of one of the most famous shoots in England. The villagers were poachers to a man, and it was well known that fast motor cars often made sudden appearances at night, whereby the poulterers of Leadenhall Market were greatly enriched next morning. Many and many were the "old things" that found their way into the capacious side-pockets of my friend – "old thing" being the local name for hare, a word which is never spoken aloud in a Norfolk village by those who find it "their delight of a moonlight night," &c. &c.

I thought none the worse of Sam Wordingham for that. I had no big shoot and no expensive machinery of game-keepers and night-watchers to keep up. I, myself, was a bit of an Ishmael, to say nothing of a lover of sport.

"I am sure we can do my brother very well," I said. "It is a fine fowling year with all this cold, and there are a lot of worthy fowl about, as many as I have ever seen. But has there been no news in the village since I left?"

"You will be surprised to hear as the Doctor himself dropped in to the private bar yesterday evening."

"Doctor Upjelly?"

Sam nodded. "It was about nine o'clock. Mr. Pugmire was settin' by the fire, not to say boozed, but as is usual about nine o'clock. 'Muzzy' is how I put it. Thinks I, 'Here's the Doctor come after Mr. Pugmire,' though I never knew such a thing in all these years before, and everyone knows Mr. Pugmire's little failings, the Doctor included."

"Was it that?"

"No, it weren't," and Sam turned his big, brown face toward me.

I knew Sam. Many and many a midnight had we spent together waiting for flighting time. I forbore in anticipation.

"'E sets himself down and 'e calls for a bottle of strong, old ale – fowlers' tipple. 'E nods quite pleasant to Mr. Pugmire, what was looking at him like a cat looks when you catch it stealin' cream. 'Pugmire,' says he, 'you will join me in a little refreshment?' But the old gentleman, he was too scairt, and 'e mumbles something and shuffles off 'ome – and I'll lay that's the first time Mr. Pugmire has been 'ome partly sober this year. Then the Doctor, he makes 'imself very pleasant, 'e does. My missus comes in and he begins asking about – what do you think 'e arst about, sir?"

"I haven't an idea."

"About the Captain, about your brother."

I was startled. I hadn't told the Doctor that my brother was coming to stay in the village – it was no business of his, and we had few confidences on any subject. Lockhart knew and, of course, Doris and her sister, but they were not likely to have said anything.

"What did he want to know?" I asked.

"Where he was sleeping, and if we were going to make the gentleman comfortable, and if he had a taste for shooting, had I heard? Regular lot of questions!"

"Well, it's very kind of the Doctor to take an interest in my brother," I replied.

"Very, sir," Wordingham answered dryly. "Mr. Jones, he came down last night at ten o'clock, came down from London in his motor car, 'e did. He's at the school now, or leastways, with this tide and the moon getting up in an hour or so, he will be out on the marshes with the Doctor. I heard tell that they was to be out all night. Bill Jack Pearson, from the school, 'e told me."

Again there was silence, while I thought over this little bit of information, for anything is news in such a stagnant hole as Morstone. Mr. Jones was a friend of the Doctor's who often came to see him. He was a short, sturdy, red-faced man with bright blue eyes and a very reserved manner. We always understood that he was in business in the city, and well-to-do. Like the Doctor, he had a passion for wild-fowling, or that, at any rate, was supposed to be the reason for his visits, though Doris had more than once hinted to me that she thought Marjorie, her younger sister, was a bit of an attraction too.

"Ever been out with Mr. Jones, sir?" Wordingham asked.

"Not I. Why, I've only been out with the Doctor once in all the time I've been at Morstone. He seems to prefer to be alone."

"Aye, he's a solitary man, is the Doctor. On that time you went out with him, did you get anything, sir?"

"I got a couple of brent geese, but the Doctor was not in form at all and missed his one chance when they came over."

"Now, would you be surprised, sir, if I was to tell you that the Doctor is one of the worst shots in the parish?"

"I should be very surprised indeed. Why? He gets awfully good bags night after night – whenever he goes out, in fact."

"You know Jim Long up at Cockthorpe?" – he was mentioning a famous professional wild-fowler who lived by supplying the markets with duck and taking out sportsmen from London over the difficult and intricate marshes at night.

"Of course I do. Been out with him lots of times."

"Well, sir, don't say as I told you, don't mention it to Jim and don't mention it to a living soul, but I found out only last month, accidental like, that Jim's been supplying the Doctor with teal and widgeon and grey geese and plover and what not for goodness knows 'ow long. 'E leaves a nice little bag in the Doctor's old hulk in Thirty Main Creek, and the Doctor finds 'em there and brings 'em home. And, what's more, Mr. Jones, 'e can't shoot for nuts, neither. I've see'd 'im firing off their guns, to get 'em dirty, from the deck of the hulk!"