The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [1061]
'What are there seven of round here?' I called back to Davies once (thinking of A to G). 'Sorry,' I added, for no answer came.
'I see a star,' was my next word, after a long interval. 'Now it's gone. There it is again! Right aft!'
'That's Borkum light,' said Davies, presently; 'the fog's lifting.' A keen wind from the west struck our faces, and as swiftly as it had come the fog rolled away from us, in one mighty mass, stripping clean and pure the starry dome of heaven, still bright with the western after-glow, and beginning to redden in the east to the rising moon. Norderney light was flashing ahead, and Davies could take his tired eyes from the pool of light.
'Damn!' was all he uttered in the way of gratitude for this mercy, and I felt very much the same; for in a fog Davies in a dinghy was a match for a steamer; in a clear he lost his handicap.
It was a quarter to seven. 'An hour'll do it, if we buck up,' he pronounced, after taking a rough bearing with the two lights. He pointed out a star to me, which we were to keep exactly astern, and again I applied to their labour my aching back and smarting palms.
'What did you say about seven of something?' said Davies.
'What are there seven of hereabouts?'
'Islands, of course,' said Davies. 'Is that the clue?'
'Maybe.'
Then followed the most singular of all our confabulations. Two memories are better than one, and the sooner I carved the cipher into his memory as well as mine the better record we should have. So, with rigid economy of breath, I snapped out all my story, and answered his breathless questions. It saved me from being mesmerized by the star, and both of us from the consciousness of over-fatigue.
'Spying at Chatham, the blackguard?' he hissed.
'What do you make of it?' I asked.
'Nothing about battleships, mines, forts?' he said.
'No.'
'Nothing about the Ems, Emden, Wilhelmshaven?'
'No.'
'Nothing about transports?'
'No.'
'I believe--I was right--after all--something to do--with the channels--behind islands.'
And so that outworn creed took a new lease of life; though for my part the words that clashed with it were those that had sunk the deepest.
'Esens,' I protested; 'that town behind Bensersiel.'
'Wassertiefe, Lotsen, Schleppboote,' spluttered Davies.
'Kilometre--Eisenbahn,' from me, and so on.
I should earn the just execration of the reader if I continued to report such a dialogue. Suffice to say that we realized very soon that the substance of the plot was still a riddle. On the other hand, there was fresh scent, abundance of it; and the question was already taking shape--were we to follow it up or revert to last night's decision and strike with what weapons we had? It was a pressing question, too, the last of many--was there to be no end to the emergencies of this crowded day?--pressing for reasons I could not define, while convinced that we must be ready with an answer by supper-time to-night.
Meantime, we were nearing Norderney; the See-Gat was crossed, and with the last of the flood tide fair beneath us, and the red light on the west pier burning ahead, we began insensibly to relax our efforts. But I dared not rest, for I was at that point of exhaustion when mechanical movement was my only hope.
'Light astern,' I said, thickly. 'Two--white and red.'
'Steamer,' said Davies; 'going south though.'
'Three now.'
A neat triangle of gems--topaz, ruby, and emerald--hung steady behind us.
'Turned east,' said Davies. 'Buck up--steamer from Juist. No, by Jove! too small. What is it?'
On we laboured, while the gems waxed in brilliancy as the steamer overhauled us.
'Easy,' said Davies, 'I seem to know those