Chapter 3

RFS Chasseur didn't depart her pier at Atuona until the afternoon. Her port engine was causing trouble, a transfer pipe between the intermediate and low pressure cylinders was leaking steam badly. In any event, Commandant Krusenbourg decided to sail using just his starboard plant.

This limited the torpedo boat's speed to 10 or so knots. It would now take them a good three days for the trip North to Eaio to uplift the American castaway, Hiram Willens.

To compound matters, the Chasseur's radio had also broken down. She didn't pick up the latest signal from Papeete.

1600 kilometres to the Northeast, HMS Sussex did pick up the signal. Captain Debenham was now aware that a German raider was at large somewhere East of the Marquesas. He promptly called a meeting of his officers.

His problem was that this was a vast area of sea with no reliable way of knowing where the German was heading. He suspected that the Sussex would be at sea for some considerable time. He would need to coal, therefore he resolved to head for Tahiti before resuming the search.

The British Admiralty ordered the rest of the Cruiser Squadron to join in the hunt, but they were now heading for the Panama Canal. It will take several days for them to turn back, coal, then sail to support the Sussex.

All merchant vessels were alerted and those in port told to wait and, if possible, sail in convoy providing suitable escorts could be arranged.

There was nothing for it but to wait and see where the Seeteufel would strike next.

The exploits of the raiders earlier in the war, the SMS Emden, SMS Pinguin and the SMS Mowe, for instance, had shown just how difficult it was to catch a single commerce raider with the technology at the time. The Emden had been caught quite by chance, the Pinguin had sunk over thirty ships before returning home in triumph. The disruption to trade and sea communications had been tremendous, quite out of proportion to the actual damage they'd done.

To make matters worse, Count Felix von Luckner's SMS Seeadler appeared in the Central Pacific. Like the Seeteufel, she was a three masted Barquentine-rigged sailing ship with auxiliary Diesels and she began to cut a swathe through allied shipping in the area North of Fiji.

Although the term 'schooner' had once referred to a particular type of simplified sail rigging developed by the Americans in the 1840s, by the 20th century the definition had become much more generalised. Seeteufel and Seeadler were both either referred to as 'schooners, ' 'barquetines' or 'windjammers.'

The barquetine rig was popular for commercial sailing vessels at the end of the era of sail. The barquetine, by strict definition, had three masts. The foremast was rigged with squaresails, the other two by fore-and-aft, triangular sails. They were well-balanced and had good sailing qualities, hence their popularity.

The armaments on the sailing raiders necessitated considerable redesign and strengthening of the hold area. Steel bulkheads were inserted and steel beams replaced the original wood to carry the weight of the guns.

Some armour was fitted around the magazine and shellroom areas, but it was only an inch thick. Hardly enough to keep out any but a rifle-calibre bullet. These vessels could not afford a stand up fight with any enemy warship.

The Pacific is a huge area of sea within which to find a single disguised ship. The Emden, sporting a fourth dummy funnel, had eluded considerable Allied forces in the Indian Ocean, a much smaller area of sea. What chance had the combined fleets of Japan, England, France and America had of bringing the Seeteufel to book? Providing, of course, they could fully deploy that immense force, which, of course, they couldn't.

At last the Seeteufel, as the Swedish SV Viggen, encountered a Dutch freighter bound for Santiago in Chile. Von Seydlitz was able to discharge his prisoners after considerable negotiations with the Dutchman's Captain. The Germans provided him with a signed promisory note for the cost of passage, redeemable at the next Neutral port of call.

Convention dictated that the Dutch Captain did not report the Seeteufel's position to the Allies. Such an act would be considered hostile.

Von Seydlitz had the option of using a 'Lumpensammler.' The word had a somewhat murky derivation but, in German Naval slang, it meant a captured ship used as a supply vessel and prisoner transport. The Seeteufel, being a sailing ship, needed all its hands for shifting canvas and couldn't spare any crew to man a prize.

Robert and Margaret Begg asked to see von Seydlitz. Through Peters the interpreter, they asked that they remain on board on the voyage to Hatutu. The German Captain was adamant, however. Although he had considerable sympathy for their plight, and respect for Robert, who'd tried to stand up for young Schopf against Johnson, he wouldn't budge. The Beggs and their crewman had to go on the Dutchman.

The Seeteufel then set a course for the Marquesas.

There was little to disturb the tranquility of the night on the Northern Maquesan island of Hatutu. Off in the distance was the constant pounding of the Pacific ocean on the island's volcanic sands. Crickets twittered and some nocturnal animal could occasionally be heard; rats, probably, immigrants from passing ships.

The centre of the island is dominated by an extinct volcanic cone dressed in low scrub. In a fertile strip between the beach and where the ground starts to rise, there are palm trees, ferns, some bamboo and other tropical flora. In amongst this cover, Rupert had built their little home.

The breeze off the ocean was warm and humid and brought with it the scent of marine life. It was approaching the time of year when the hot atmosphere could no-longer absorb any more moisture and dumped it in a series of torrential downpours for days on end. The dry creeks of Hatutu became rushing rivers as the volcano shed this deluge to the sea.

Joanna couldn't remember how long she spent with her arms around Rupert. She could remember crying, blubbering like a baby into his bare chest. He held her head gently in his hands, stroked her hair and told her everything was all right.

She didn't know why she was crying. It could be the sudden release of tension, worry over her parents and the situation they now found themselves in. At the same time she felt an acute embarrassment. She wanted Rupert to see her as grown woman, not a child, and here she was moistening his chest.

She tried to apologise, but her voice wouldn't work. Instead, he placed his hand on her cheek and smiled, then cradled her head once more.

Joanna could remember their first kiss. Rupert's lips brushed her hair, then her forehead. It thrilled her. She remembered the erotic dreams she'd had, dreams of their naked bodies together.

That gentle touch snapped her back. She was suddenly aware of his nakedness, the lower half of his body was covered by a shirt. She could tell he wore nothing underneath.

Her stomach knotted and a shiver coursed through her body. A warm feeling began to spread out from between her legs. She shuffled a little closer and pushed her hand down to the small of his back. He flexed his muscles and she felt his skin ripple beneath her fingers.

"Joanna?" he said. He pronounced her name 'Yo-warna, or sometime 'Yo-harna.' It amused her in some strange way. "Joanna," he repeated.

"Mmm?"

"Is not proper."

She looked up at him and shook her head, in agreement or not? He couldn't tell which. Her lips were soft, moist and inviting. He stroked an errant lock back from her face, then kissed her lightly on the mouth.

Joanna watched him wrestle with his conscience. She'd already decided, knew it when she rolled under their flimsy partition. This time there'd be no withdrawal, no more battling against the tide. She reach up and brushed the beginnings of his beard, then advanced for another kiss.

Time appeared to stand still, there was no sound but their laboured breathing. Even the sound of the Pacific rollers seemed to fade. There was just him and her.

Their lips were locked together for a long, long time. She thought he seemed well-practiced at the art of kissing because his mouth melted to hers moving rhymically and insistantly.

Joanna's linen shirt seemed hot and sticky against her skin. She wanted to feel him, flesh to flesh, as she had dreamed. She pulled back from him to lift the garment over her head. Rupert appeared transixed, licking his lips in anticipation. She got tangled as she tried to pull her arms out of the sleeves. Rupert sprang to her aid, as he'd done on innumerable occasions.

His jaw sagged as if he was going to speak. She shook her head, she didn't want him to say anything, not now. Instead, she took his hands and placed them around her, squashing her small breasts into his chest.

They rolled together until Joanna was on her back with Rupert on top. He was kissing her fiercely, her neck, lips, any part of her he could reach. She was taken aback by the intensity of his passion. His mouth reached her breasts and he suckled on each nipple in turn. They burned with arousal, she moaned and stiffened at the sensation.

Joanna felt him then, hard and urgent. His flimsy covering had fallen off during their gentle wrestling. Rupert's bare thighs straddled her's, his rigid penis pressed into her stomach.

She knew the mechanics of sex. No boarding school girl could possibly be ignorant of such things a few weeks short of her 17th birthday. She'd listened to the talk and read the forbidden books; had woken up at night after a vivid dream, hot and sweaty, with a powerful itch between her legs. She'd played with herself with her fingers until she was breathless.

Rupert's penis thrilled and frightened her at the same time. In his powerful male presence she felt helpless, without free will, and with a desperate need to be joined with him physically.

She wasn't quite sure later who took the lead. She remembered his fingers stroking through her bush, seeking her vagina inside her pants. She remembered holding his hard cock and of pulling it between her legs. She remembered clutching his bottom as he pushed his way past the obstruction of her hymen. She remembered the brief pain followed by a flood of desire.

She didn't come, then, there was altogether too many amateurish fumblings and inexperience. It was enough, however, for her to want more, to relive the experience of being taken by someone she loved.

And in love she was, now that the veil of denial had been blown away. They murmured their love to each other as night continued on to morning.

"Ich liebe Dich," he told her as he sleepily roused her in the morning. He grinned stupidly at her and she laughingly batted him away.

"Ja, also!" she told him in German as she emerged for breakfast.

Commandant Krusenbourg guided the limping RFS Chasseur into the only decent landing place on the remote island of Eiao. There was one single pier jutting out into the open roadstead where the fortnightly island steamer tied up. Like its near neighbour Hatutu, it's a volcanic island, part of the chain caused by the Pacific tectonic plate's ripping-up of the ocean floor.

A native village clung precariously to the coastal strip. The Marquesans lived by fishing the fecund waters in their dugout canoes.

There were two or three European-style houses in the village, adapted to the sweaty tropical climate. One doubled as a Church and Native School run by the Society of Jesus. Two Jesuit Brothers laboured there against the loose sexual morality of the Polynesians. Another house belonged to the French Resident, a semi-official position that allowed him to raise the tricoleur every morning as proof of France's possession of the islands. He also owned the only Marconi radio set on the island.

Hiram Willens, crewman on the American yacht MV Senator, had been expecting the patrol ship for days. He'd escaped the Seeteufel to raise the alarm, only to find doubt and downright disbelief. 'C'est impossible, ' he came to loathe that phrase.

Jean Jacque Krusenbourg was also a doubter, but he was also bored. The islands of French Polynesia must have seemed like an ideal posting for the Navy man, like ascending to paradise without having to die. But, the Commandant was a man of action and saw the war passing him by. He was jealous of the Royal Navy, of the Harwich Destroyer flotillas, the Grand Fleet and the Cruiser Squadrons that sometimes called at Tahiti.

Hiram's crazy story of German pirates intrigued him. Unlikely as it was that a German raider was lurking off the Marquesas, Krusenbourg had an instant vision of glory, of even sinking the Seeteufel with the Chasseur's two puny 3 pounder guns. In any case, it would do no harm to check the island, to see if the story stacked up. The Germans must have left behind evidence, bootprints, rubbish or signs of keeled boats having been drawn up on the pristine sands.

He agreed with Hiram that the island of Hatutu deserved closer examination.

Admiral Michelet had little with which to contribute to the search for the German raider. There was a scattering of old patrol vessels throughout the islands, a flotilla of four destroyers based at Papeete and his two old cruisers. However, the Linois was terminally ill with lack-of-spare-parts and old age and the Dupetit-Trouars would require several weeks of intense effort to get her ready for sea.

He doubted he had sufficient coal reserves for extended operations and his destroyers had limited range. Nevertheless, he ordered the Dupetit to be prepared and provisioned. His shells were unreliable, after so long in storage in the tropics, so he ordered fresh supplies from France. Naturally, his guns used a different calibre shell to the British so he couldn't even borrow some. A pity, he thought, for one broadside of the Dupetit's eight 230mm guns would have rendered the Seeteufel to matchwood.

Meanwhile, he had to try and get all commercial shipping in the region out of harm's way.

The creeks of Hatutu were beginning to dry up. The rock pool, a short distance inland, was now barely deep enough to submerge Rupert and Joanna's legs. Another week or two on the island and it will become a serious issue.

As their eighth day on the island drew to a close, Joanna felt her past life recede steadily into the background. Time had little meaning outside of the seasons. To endure the isolation she had to let go.

She and Rupert had had a fight, as much of a fight as it was possible to have with the reticent German. She'd decided to go for a swim in the sea to break-up the endless sameness of life on the island. He'd told her she shouldn't, that the coral will lacerate her feet and the currents too dangerous off shore. To her ears, his imperfect English made the advice sound like a command and she'd snapped.

She wasn't going to be treated like a child, he was not the boss, he was too protective and possessive and he didn't know everything. She spat the words out to Rupert who looked utterly confused.

She knew he was right, as he was in practically everything, but that just made her feel worse. She'd stormed off, knowing he would be going utterly frantic with worry. She could only walk as far as the rookery, however, before the steep cliffs prevented further progress. There, she sat looking out at the monotony of the ocean while she waited for Rupert to follow, as she knew he would.

Eventually he appeared, walking with a stick after some marine creature had taken a bite of his foot. It was proof, she thought, that he wasn't bulletproof.

"You all right?" he asked, softly. She knew he'd say that, in exactly that tone of voice. She nodded and he sat down beside her.

"How's your foot?" she asked. "Y'know, you should be careful of infection in this climate."

"Ja, I know. I find some medicinal herb."