Letterstime - Ein Geleitzug: Homeward Bound? Part XXXI
July 7, 1915
---- Room 40
“From Birmingham: ‘Enemy dreadnought force on course
225, speed 12 knots.’ “
There was a bit of murmur at that report, but not
much. Letters had pretty much kept to
that same course and speed for some time now.
Reported variations of a few degrees or knots held little significance
when based on only brief sightings at over 20,000 yards. If anything, the conversations dwelled more
on the constancy than the differences.
The track pointed roughly at Withernsea and no one had yet to divine how
the Kaiserliche Marine had come to develop such a fixation on the place.
“Wait!” The
voice held a bit of a tremor. “Anyone
know, er, where all the members of the, um, ‘family’ are today?”
“The king?!”
The responder was aghast. All
eyes went to one well-tailored form.
“No, certainly not.
Not His Majesty. No Royal was
scheduled into there this day. I am
quite certain on this point.” The royal
family participated almost daily in commemorations and made a significant
number of other formal appearances. The
man speaking had a sound knowledge basis, being himself a member of the “extended”
royal family. The room relaxed somewhat.
“Had they been?
I mean, well, milord, could the Huns have had an old schedule?”
“No. And this
is all quite preposterous!” The two
nations’ monarchs were, after all, both grandchildren of Queen Victoria. (NOTE
1) He did not actually voice that last
bit, but it was written plainly on his aristocratic features.
---- Imperator, speed 22.5 knots, course 150
Once the warships had drawn ahead, the liners had
adjusted their formation and resumed the pace.
Imperator and Vaterland now steamed almost side-by-side, with Imperator
on the western flank and the other liners close behind in their massive
combined wake.
“He comes apace, master,” the cringing servant kept
his eyes on the deck.
Hadi Pasha slitted his eyes at the man. Two had he sent. This one’s demeanor suggested that there was
more to the matter. The other had, of
course, stayed to accompany. A low growl
issued from his throat, sending the servant to his knees and his head to the
deck in a paroxysm of shivers.
“He comes. He
said. I swear it! By the Prophet’s Beard!”
Hadi put his hand to his own chin - the top one, that
is - and considered, scuffing at the offending head as he did so. He was a guest aboard this great vessel. This was a delicate thing, calling for the
presence of his host, the man who owned this vessel, including the rooms and
beds in which he slept, and the tables at which he ate and ate well of salt and
spice. Had his honor been impugned? If one or both of these had ....
A cough drew him to turn ....
“Captain Hadi,” Ballin’s smooth voice preceded the
sound of his steps. “I am delighted to
again be in your company.”
The Great One turned to see the other striding easily
along the deck towards him. The cough
had not been his. Hadi espied the other
servant he’d dispatched, wringing his hands uneasily a half-step behind,
clueless as to his proper station. The
man was an infidel, but the Master was his guest. Anything he’d do would be wrong and the other’s
head already on the polished teak was hardly a soothing sight.
“The pleasure is mine, Herr Ballin,” Hadi began but
signaled a shift to substance after only a few exchanges. “A guest has duty to his host.”
“I apologize for the meanness of my table this
day. My stewards failed to adequately
restock at Boston, but the fault, of course, remains mine and mine alone ....”
“Oh-oh! I
complain not! Herr Ballin, your tables
overflow with delights. Verily, Hatim
Tayy himself would be shamed by your generosity! (NOTE 2)
“It is another matter of which I would speak.”
“Thank you, sir!
Please ....” Ballin reflexively
began to gesture but managed to turn it into a delicate wave of one hand, most
carefully not in the direction of Hadi or anyone present. He had no idea what might constitute an
insult in this situation and was relieved when the vast Ottoman appeared not to
take offense. All he had to do was
manage for just a couple dozen more hours not to be either sunk by the British
or skewered by the Ottomans ....
“You said this was a mighty steed we rode. One that very few vessels could hope to catch
on the open sea.” (NOTE 3)
“Yes, I said that.
And it is true.”
“But when you said those words, you said also ‘on
this side of the Atlantic’ when off the Americas we were.” Hadi rotated his bulk with surprising grace and
threw his eyes astern and back meaningfully.
“Are things then different on this side?”
Ballin gasped when his eyes went to Imperator’s wake
and traced it to the horizon, and a small but quite distinct smudge. His sailor’s eye judged it to be 10 - 15
degrees to the west of the mighty wake of the liners. Given the height of this deck and the absence
of a hull, the ship or ships must still be over 20,000 yards away.
“Dearest Captain!
I entreat you! How long has it
been there?” His lookouts must have
allowed themselves to become careless, sweeping only the more forward arcs,
lulled by their great speed and hampered by their even greater plume.
“An ... hour ago did first I see it ...” Hadi turned his head towards the prostrate
cutthroat and scowled. The man had his
forehead full to the teak but shuddered as though he could feel the gaze.
Ballin licked his lips nervously but waited. The Ottoman’s silence was clearly only a
pause.
“These worthless ones waited an hour - perhaps
longer! - ...”
The one with his head on the deck groveled anew at a
fresh scuff from The Master.
“... before they thought to tell me.”
Ballin’s eyes threatened to glaze at the sight of the
tiny thread of smoke, a serpent rendered no less menacing by its distance.
“It grows, but slowly,” Hadi concluded.
“The British no longer have any great ships of war
that can pace Imperator, let alone catch her,” Ballin stated carefully,
resisting the urge to bolt for the bridge.
“Their fleetest ones are also their smallest. Any such as they would have drawn close
enough to better see us and be seen in their turn in these two hours. No, this must be one or more of their vessels
that are middle in size. Yes, ‘cruiser’
vessels. Did not Admiral Hanzik destroy
four such at New York?” (NOTE 4)
That was true, thought Hadi, with a shallow dip of
his great head. Still, one of them had
fired upon his own person! Indeed, one
of his own men had become a casualty, though Hadi could not just then recall
the man’s name. (NOTE 5)
“I beg you excuse me so that I can go inform the
Admiral!”
Hadi nodded graciously and grandly, willing just this
time to overlook that it was to Ballin’s back, as the ship’s master had eased
away but a pair of steps before turning for the bridge at a pace hardly in
keeping with the bravado of formal decorum.
---- Room 40
“Sir, new sighting report. From E-4: 'Sighted two German armoured
cruisers and one light cruiser with flotilla.’ “
“E-4?” The
voice was that of one of the two most senior officers formally on watch, though
the rooms had become crowded by men far higher in various hierarchies.
“Going up on the map now, sir.”
“E-4 has tentatively identified one of the armoured
cruisers as the Prinz Heinrich.”
“Ah, there they are,” the same senior officer
observed. “What’s that? Twenty-five miles off the Jutland cape?” Actually, he could see it quite well; his
remarks were more for the benefit of others who did not enjoy his vantage. His fear was that they would otherwise press
forward as had happened at the height of the “Withernsea” episode.
“Very well,” the other senior watch officer
acknowledged. “This appears to be some
sort of sweep of the routes to Oslo and the Baltic outfall.”
“That’s a lot of force for a merchant traffic sweep,”
Commander Jan remarked.
“Agreed,” Sartore replied. “Could this be the same force that hit the
picket line north of there?”
“It could be,” Jan opined. “There were several encounters. The ones further out were reported as
battlecruisers, but weren’t the reports on the one closest to the Scandinavian
coast more ... fragmentary?”
“Yes, that’s it!
It was as though they’d been surprised and it was the wireless operator,
and not from her commanding officer.”
“I think that report just said heavy caliber
shells. Perhaps it WAS one or more
armoured cruisers. Still, the first
reports out of Lowestoft had been armoured cruisers.” (NOTE 5)
“That’s so,” Sartore acknowledged. “Thank you, I’d quite forgotten that.” It’d been just four days ago, but it somehow
seemed like months.
“The Prinz Heinrich?
Is that confirmed? What’s she
doing out there? Isn’t she part of the
Huns’ Order of Battle back up in the Baltic?”
“Correct, m’lord.”
“Yes, well, I’d expect her to be more likely reported
in the Gulf of Finland than all the way out at the gates to the North Sea. Get that confirmed, if you can...
“Yes, m’lord.”
“... and pass it along to our Russian friends. We’ve been getting quite a spot of pressure
to provide them more assistance - as if we had warships brimming out of our
bloody vest pockets!”
---- Graudenz, course 345, speed 22 knots
“Contact, bearing 320. Smoke plume ... second contact! Two plumes, sir. Second plume bearing 315.”
Kapitan Niemczyk looked down those bearings
warily. His was the furthest west
half-flotilla of Admiral Necki’s First Scouting, with the admiral and
Derfflinger and Seydlitz just below the horizon to the southeast. His lookouts could sometimes just catch sight
of their plumes. He had expected a
Hanzik Force sighting a few hours ago and to the east. Either they had misjudged the rendezvous -
quite possible - or they were Britishers.
Perhaps a patrol of some sort. If
they turned out really to be Bitishers, matters would become considerably more
complicated.
“Left rudder.
Come to course 320. Signals
Officer, for Derfflinger ....”