After sunset the elements favoured those of us on board who had certainly endeavoured to help ourselves. A rain-squall dropped from above, mists rolled up from the surface of the ocean which had hitherto been so calm and tranquil, and soon it became rough and unpleasant. Womenfolk who had been sick beyond belief through fear and shell-shock now became genuinely sea-sick. Perhaps it was a counter-irritant ordained for the best.
As soon as firing ceased and the enemy had disappeared from view, I sneaked away alone to a coal-bunker, where I carefully buried deep under the black nuggets a small packet of precious documents which would undoubtedly have proved of absorbing interest to the Hun. I thought this would probably be the last place anyone would be likely to look for anything of the kind, even if a boarding had become actual.
On returning to my friend, I much amused that gentleman by reason of a rather argumentative dispute I was drawn into with a Reverend raft captain regarding the salvage of certain fishing gear which I suggested would be the best help to kill the monotony whilst drifting and waiting to be picked up; assuming naturally that we were shortly to be sunk by the submarine.
But by degrees twilight gave place to gloaming. Sturdily the engines throbbed and the vessel pushed steadily ahead; whilst every eye that could, searched the sea around for any sign of periscopes.
What a relief it was to all when the faint outline of land gradually showed up far ahead! Greater still some hours afterwards when a bay was entered and the vessel reached safe anchorage. This, however, was far from the destination we had had in view, and however beautiful the scenery might be said to be, my companion and myself had no desire to linger there for an indefinite period.
How we fared eventually; how the soul of one of our small coterie collected on a rock-bound island, a General recently returned from Gallipoli, passed over the Great Beyond in a storm; how ships that passed and repassed were attacked by submarines and sunk or escaped; how wreckage, empty lifeboats galore and dead bodies daily piled up in the alcoves and on the rare sand-patches of the shore; how a wireless, with plant and adjacent buildings, was blown sky-high; how we were all burnt out of house and home, and other passing episodes of that short but adventurous trip, do not concern the subject-heading of this narrative. They remain another story.