taking his chum aside. "I don't want to crow
over that fellow. It isn't cricket. You might take him to the
_Capella_ and come back for us. You'll have a pretty good load as it
is."

"Two British officers, escaped from an internment camp, on board the
_Hoorn_, sir," reported Vernon, as he delivered his cargo of German
prisoners on board the _Capella_. "They would like to be taken off."

"Carry on, then," replied Captain Syllenger.

As the cutter returned from her second trip to the _Hoorn_, the
_Capella's_ crew awaited with undisguised curiosity the arrival of the
men who had contrived to escape from irksome detention in a neutral
country.

Presently Shrap, who was sitting up on the quarterdeck, gave a bark of
delight.

"Good old Shrap!" said Ross. "He knew me in spite of my rig-out."

"Blow me, if it ain't Mr. Trefusis!" exclaimed one of the men.

The next instant the first of three hearty cheers burst from the
throats of the crew, with whom Ross was a great favourite. The
Dutchmen, too, joined in, to the accompaniment of a prolonged blast
upon the _Hoorn's_ siren as she resumed her interrupted voyage.

"It's like being home again," declared Ross, after Captain Syllenger
and the other officers had congratulated him. "But, I say, can anyone
lend me a decent suit of togs?"

CHAPTER XXIX

Bound for the Baltic

A fortnight had elapsed since the day on which H.M.S. _Capella_ towed
the captured unterseeboot into Harwich harbour. Since then she had
been attached to a base on the East coast of Scotland, her sphere of
usefulness in the English Channel being a thing of the past.

The German blockade had fizzled out like a damp squib. Absolutely
afraid to risk the remaining boats in operations that would certainly
end in their being unceremoniously conveyed to Davy Jones's locker, the
German Admiralty had dispatched them to the Mediterranean, where, under
the Austrian flag, they attempted, at first with a certain degree of
success, to terrorize merchantmen by their "frightfulness".

So the _Capella_ had been ordered to Cromarty Firth, pending the
completion of arrangements for sending a fleet of swift destroyers and
patrol-boats to operate in conjunction with the British submarines in
the Baltic.

Almost the first duty Ross had to undertake upon arrival was to draw
money for the ship's company from the Paymaster's office at Invergordon.

Accompanied by six seamen, wearing their side-arms and car