The Phantom Flotilla: The most exciting true story from the Royal Navy's history by Peter Shankland

Author:Peter Shankland [Shankland, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Endeavour Media
Published: 2017-08-24T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

As soon as the Baron Jansenn went alongside, Spicer and Eastwood hurried ashore to contact the local authorities and engage a gang of labourers to off-load the boats and entrain them. Eastwood soon returned and conducted the rest of the party to some tents which had been placed at their disposal. Kabalo, sweltering unpleasantly in the midst of a clearing between the river and the dense undergrowth of the forest, seemed to them the most dismal place they had yet seen. It consisted of a few low mud-brick buildings, corrugated iron sheds, a ship repair yard, railway sidings and the inevitable native village. The ground it stood on was flat with coarse weedy vegetation, and it looked as though it would be a marsh when the river rose. Standing apart from the other buildings there was a dreary prison compound. ‘I am told,’ said Mauritzen, ‘that no prisoners escape during the rainy season. They can’t get through the wall of mosquitoes that surrounds it!’ He showed them a large pile of rusty steel plates and girders, each marked with a different number: they were the pieces of the new steamer Baron Dhanis which had been lying there for nearly a year waiting for them to get control of the Lake so that she could be assembled at Lukuga without interference from the Germans.

When the Doctor was about to turn in, an officer whom he didn’t know came into his tent and introduced himself as Lieutenant Hope. He looked sullen and pale, and his unshaven cheeks were very black in the lamplight. He seemed to be ill, but he declared that he was fit and that all he wanted was a supply of quinine. He had been ordered away, he said, on a long journey and he must start at once. The Doctor was puzzled by his appearance and his behaviour, but knowing that he was attached to the expedition he gave him the quinine, and Lieutenant Hope left as abruptly as he had entered.

It wasn’t until three days later, when the Doctor was seated in the train that was speeding across a vast alluvial plain, that he had an opportunity to ask Eastwood about Lieutenant Hope and learnt that Spicer had dismissed him for being constantly drunk and insulting to the Belgians. What seemed to upset Hope most, Eastwood said, was that he had to leave his sword behind because Mollison hadn’t got one.

The naval party was travelling in an uncomfortable coach with wooden compartments and hard leather-covered seats. Mimi and Toutou, each on two open trucks, were at the back of the train. Spicer, taking Mauritzen with him, had gone on ahead to see what mischief Hope had been up to at Lukuga. For the first fifty miles, with a seventy-ton locomotive, they made good progress though they had to stop frequently for firewood. Except at these halts, where there were usually some officials and a small trading store selling ‘Kaffir goods,’ they saw only unspoilt native villages.

Then

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