2004 - Mimi and Toutou Go Forth (19 page)

But they didn’t. Apart from Rosenthal’s absence, everything seemed normal. Below deck the engine clattered, the boiler spluttered and the ash-pans filled as Fundi expertly stoked the furnace. The Iron Cross flapped from the mast in a freshening breeze and amidships the stumpy funnel smoked and roared. From the prow another noise was heard: the bleating of a goat which the crew kept on board. Its official purpose was emergency food, but the tethered animal had become a kind of mascot. As if standing on some rocky mountain outcrop, she held her horned head high and stared unblinking at the clear blue water as the German steamer powered forwards.

‘O Eternal Lord God,’ intoned the man in the skirt, ‘who alone spreadest out the heavens, and rulest the raging of the sea, who hast compassed the waters with bounds until day and night come to an end, be pleased to receive into thy Almighty and most gracious protection the persons of us thy servants, and the fleet in which we serve.’

As much as he was able, Spicer adapted his supercilious drawl to the form of prayer used in the Navy. ‘Preserve us from the dangers of the sea, and from the violence of the enemy; that we may be a safeguard unto our most gracious sovereign King George, and his dominions…’

Boxing Day 1915 happened to fall on a Sunday, so the officers and men were mustered for ‘divine service’, as it was known in the Navy. They stood on the flat sandy space in the middle of the camp which Spicer had designated the quarterdeck. As he spoke with prayer book in hand, the Union Jack fluttered in the breeze off the lake. The air was cool. The northern European is always grateful for this moment of balm before the sun fully rises, although the African labourers on which his comfort generally depends are already hard at work.

The officers—Wainwright and Dudley, Tyrer, Dr Hanschell and Cross—were wearing their strange, pearly-grey Spicer uniforms. They faced the lake with Spicer, their unsheathed cutlasses in the salute position. The ratings, facing in the other direction, wore solar topis and presented their long Marine’s rifles.

‘O come, let us worship and fall down: and kneel before the Lord our Maker, whose Hand doth all the secret springs command of human thought and will,’ said Spicer, as an African boy came running towards them, ‘at whose bidding the winds blow and lift up the waves of the sea. We are thy creatures, O Lord…’

The boy was carrying a piece of paper with a message from Goor, the Belgian naval commander. Spicer glanced at it, then continued reading from his prayer book.

‘…prevent us, in all our doings, with thy most gracious favour, and further us with thy continual help; that in all our works begun, continued, and ended in thee, we may glorify thy holy Name.’

The officers began to stir as they saw the
Kingani
rounding the point behind the lower ranks in front of them. The ratings twisted their heads, trying to see what was going on. Spicer held up his hand as he finished the service.

‘…and finally, by thy mercy obtain everlasting life; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.’

‘Amen,’ the men echoed impatiently.

Spicer watched the German gunboat, his hand still raised in the air. It was a few minutes before he spoke. ‘Chief Petty Officer Waterhouse! You may dismiss the divisions—and man the launches for immediate action!’

The men ran down to the harbour, Spicer walking slowly behind them. Waterhouse and Tait climbed into
Mimi
with Spicer following. Also with them was the big, red-haired seaman from Donegal, whom Spicer had taken a dislike to.

Flynn manned the gun on
Toutou
under Dudley’s command, with Mollison at the wheel. Before letting them launch, Spicer waited for the
Kingani
to come past the camp, so that the motor boats would enter the lake between the German boat and the enemy’s headquarters at Kigoma. Once the
Kingani
had cruised past, the two motor boats sped out into the lake, foam surging up their bows as the 100-horsepower engines thrashed the water.

Eastwood and Dr Hanschell ran up to the cliff above the harbour with the other members of the expedition. Stinghlamber’s Belgians joined them there, as did hundreds of Holo-holo tribesmen—the whole crowd lining the bluff 800 feet above the water.

‘It’ll be all right,’ Eastwood told the doctor as they watched
Mimi
head for
Kingani
’s starboard quarter and
Toutou
speed after her on the port side. ‘I’ve felt all along that the hand of God is over this expedition.’

‘Why shouldn’t it be equally over the Germans?’ snapped back the exasperated atheist.

‘Well, you’ll see,’ said Eastwood, slightly embarrassed. ‘We’ll get home safely, every one of us.’

§

The
Kingani
’s goat was still bleating away happily at the prow, the breeze off the lake ruffling its coarse hair. Leutnant Junge examined the coast for signs of a slipway down which the
Bula Matari
, as the Africans called the Belgians, might launch the
Baron Dhanis
. The day was bright, the view clear; surely this time he would be able to bring back to Commander Zimmer the information he required.

It would be no recompense for the tragic loss of Rosenthal, however. Hearing a roaring noise over the chugging of his own engine, Junge casually turned—and saw, to his horror, two motor boats bouncing over the waves towards him. From their bows the white ensign fluttered impudently. Junge lifted his field glasses. He could see white men on board and a substantial gun.

Panicking, he shouted down into the engine-room, ‘
Die Englander sind hier!
‘ The English are here!

Seeing that the two launches would rapidly overtake him, Junge ordered that the
Kingani
’s speed be increased.

He also turned sharply to port and told one of the petty officers to man the ship’s gun, cursing the fact that it could only fire forwards.

Down in the engine-room, Junge’s Chief Engineer and his Artificers were working hard to get steam up. Fundi was reaching into the furnace with tins of oil—pouring it on to the flames. Suddenly they heard a blast and felt the ship jolt backwards.

It was the recoil from their own gun. Junge had fired on
Mimi;
but his constant circling northward movement meant she was soon astern of him. He ordered the petty officer to transfer his fire to the other boat. Penne, Junge’s navigator, and Petty Officer Schwarz, who had brought up rifles from the hold, began firing at
Mimi
as she surged towards them. At six pounds,
Kingani
’s gun could fire further than hers, which carried only three-pound shells, but the nearer she got, the more danger there was. Junge told the men to crouch behind
Kingani
’s circular iron gunshield.

§

The range was closing. Standing behind
Mimi
’s gun, Spicer could clearly see the German captain through his binoculars. The man, who was wearing a white uniform and a peaked cap, seemed to be very agitated indeed. Spicer clenched his jaw in satisfaction, gripping his long cigarette holder between his teeth. At that moment, a shell from the
Kinganihit
the water beside them, sousing him with cold spray. There was a lurch as Tait, who was at the wheel, pulled the boat away from the shell-flash.
Mimi
pitched and yawed in the choppy water. Bullets from the German rifles flew past Spicer and the red-haired seaman.

‘Sit down!’ shouted Tait above the roar of the engines.

‘No thank you, sir,’ replied the Donegal man in his deep brogue. ‘I can see better standing up.’

Spicer started shouting at Waterhouse, who was manning the gun. He was trying to spot for him, trying to give him the ranges—but Waterhouse couldn’t understand a word, because of the cigarette holder in Spicer’s mouth and the noise from the engines. He fired, knowing he had missed the moment the boom of the shell sounded in the breech; the muzzle wasn’t steady, pointing wildly up and down with the movement of the boat.

Up on the cliff, the doctor and Eastwood watched the shells falling around
Toutou
, which was also careering wildly. The Holo-holo were murmuring in astonishment. Then another shell boomed out and suddenly flames were licking the deck of the
Kingani
.

§

Down in the engine-room, the German Chief Engineer knew at once it was a fatal hit. Running up on deck he was confronted by a dreadful sight. Junge and his two petty officers had been blown to pieces: the high-explosive shell had come right through the iron gun-shield supposed to protect them. There was blood everywhere. Leutnant Junge’s leg had been ripped off at the hip and his body was leaning awkwardly against the remains of the gunshield. Penne and Schwarz were less mangled, but clearly dead. The ship’s mascot bleated pitifully in the ruins. As the Engineer took in the gruesome scene, his nostrils filled with the acrid smell of explosive. Another shell whistled over and went straight through the engine-room skylight. This time there was no explosion; he realised that the shell, coming down on its parabola, must have passed right through the side of the boat.

There was a splash and he saw Fundi slip into the water and swim away. The two motor-launches were bearing down on the
Kingani
now, still firing. Water was coming in through a shell-hole in the port bunker. Flames licked the wooden deck. There was nothing to do but surrender. He began to haul down the large Iron Cross flag from the mast. He must have thrown it into the water or the flames, because it was never captured.

Seeing that one of the British boats was still heading directly for him at great speed, the Engineer pulled out his handkerchief and waved it vigorously. He could see a man in the front of the boat with a cigarette holder in his mouth and—wearing a skirt?

The boat, its engines still at full throttle, rammed into the side of the
Kingani
. The Engineer watched in astonishment as the man in the skirt fell over, then got up again at once, laughing.

The other launch came alongside and an English officer climbed aboard and took the Engineer prisoner. The officer, who announced that his name was Flynn, blanched at the sight of all the blood and pieces of scorched flesh. He eyed the goat curiously, which was still bleating away. Another
Engldnder
ran up the white ensign where the Iron Cross had flown.

The vessel which had rammed them had already turned back to shore, her bows damaged from the collision. The
Kingani
followed, under the command of the squeamish Flynn, who avoided looking at Junge’s body and the blood-spattered deck. The Engineer saw the man in the skirt step on to the beach, surrounded by a crowd of Africans shouting and clapping. Guns from the Belgian shore battery fired in triumph and he felt sick to the pit of his stomach. As one of the
Engldnders
pointed a rifle at him, another brought the
Kingani
into shore.

Leutnant Junge’s corpse rocked with the motion of the water, his torn hip fused to the blackened gunshield. The Engineer steadied himself as the
Kingani
ran aground with a heavy list to starboard. Junge’s body made a sickening lurch from its pivot and seconds later the man called Flynn fainted.

§

Once it was known that a German vessel had been captured, more Holo-holo nocked from the inland villages to join those thronging the paths from the bluff. As Magee writes: ‘They came bounding down from the trees and the hilltops, giving vent to loud whoops of delight and gesticulating wildly, simply falling over each other in their hurry to reach the beach in order to pay their homage to the new Great White Chief, our commander. There they assembled in thousands, arrayed in their brightest pigments and gaudiest loincloths, a jigging, jogging, frenzied mass…’

Dr Hanschell also descended the cliff with Eastwood and Magee. Collecting his medical bag from his tent, in case there were wounded who needed treating, he went to the beach. The crippled
Kingani
was being pulled in as far as she would come and the doctor spied a goat standing with its hooves in the shallows, casting a quizzical eye on all the commotion. The German prisoners were marched away by Belgian
askaris
. Meanwhile, the Holo-holo men threw themselves on the ground in front of Spicer, trickling sand into their hair in what was clearly a sign of homage. The women crowded round him, tugging at his skirt and epaulettes. They simply wanted his gaze to fall upon them, says Magee, ‘regarding this as a fetish which would protect them from evil spirits’.

But in Shankland’s account, Spicer does not seem like a man enjoying the fruits of victory: ‘The Doctor went across and congratulated him: he stood there dazed and unsmiling, and only moved his lips silently as if trying to say thank you. Then he turned to examine the damage to
Mimz
’s bows…Perhaps, the Doctor thought, he couldn’t yet adjust himself to the fact that after years of romancing he really had distinguished himself at last.’

Leaving Spicer to the congratulations of the Belgian officers—expressed, says Magee, ‘in the usual demonstrative Continental fashion of embracing and kissing’—Dr Hanschell climbed aboard the
Kingani
. Walking across the deck, he noticed that his boots were covered in blood. It soon became obvious there was nothing he could do for Junge, Schwarz and Penne. He went to sit on the quay with Flynn, who was still recovering from his fainting fit. The petty officer was dangling his boots in the water to clean off the blood and the doctor followed suit. Neither of them spoke for a while. All that could be heard was the jubilant hubbub of the crowds overlaid with the salutations of some
askari
buglers and drummers, who were sounding a fanfare in Spicer’s honour. Some members of the band were hardly more than children.

T
he same bugles sounded that evening at the funeral of the dead Germans. Their bodies had been wrapped head to toe in white canvas and, stretched out on wooden trestles near a mound of fresh red earth, they resembled ancient mummies.

Between Stinghlamber and Goor stood Spicer, his hat under one arm and his khaki skirt revealing bare knees above brown puttees. Behind them stood the Asian deckhands from the
Kingani
wearing their loincloths; Rupia in his fez; Marapandi, Eastwood’s servant; and Tom, who now affected a skirt like his master. Nearby was a shaken-looking trio of German prisoners.