WILLIAM LE QUEUX: 15 Dystopian Novels & Espionage Thrillers (Illustrated Edition). William Le Queux
crying for food, and those without savings and with only a few pounds put by looked grimly into the future and at the mystery it presented.
Most of the papers published the continuation of the important story of Mr. Alexander, the Mayor of Maldon, which revealed the extent of the enemy’s operations in Essex and the strong position they occupied.
It ran as below: —
“Of the events of the early hours of the morning I have no very clear recollection. I was bewildered, staggered, dumbfounded by the sights and sounds which beset me. Of what modern war meant I had till then truly but a very faint idea. To witness its horrid realities enacted in this quiet, out-of-the-way spot where I had pitched my tent for so many years, brought them home to me literally, as well as metaphorically. And to think that all this wanton destruction of property and loss of life was directly due to our apathy as a nation! The Germans had been the aggressors without a doubt, but as for us we had gone out of our way to invite attack. We had piled up riches and made no provision to prevent a stronger nation from gathering them. We had seen every other European nation, and even far-distant Japan, arm their whole populations and perfect their preparedness for the eventualities of war, but we had been content to scrape along with an apology for a military system — which was really no system at all — comforting ourselves with the excuse that nothing could possibly evade or compete with our magnificent navy. Such things as fogs, false intelligence, and the interruption of telegraphic and telephonic communication were not taken into account, and were pooh-poohed if any person, not content with living in a fool’s paradise, ventured to draw attention to the possibility of such contingencies.
“So foolhardy had we become in the end, that we were content to see an immense and threatening increase in the German shipbuilding programme without immediately ‘going one better.’ The specious plea that our greater rapidity in construction would always enable us to catch up our rivals in the race was received with acclamation, especially as the argument was adorned with gilt lettering in the shape of promised Admiralty economies.
“As might have been foreseen, Germany attacked us at the psychological moment when her rapidly increasing fleet had driven even our laissez faire politicians to lay down new ships with the laudable idea of keeping our naval pre-eminence by the rapidity of our construction. Our wide-awake enemy, seeing that should these be allowed to attain completion the place he had gained in the race would be lost, allowed them to be half finished and then suddenly attacked us.
“But to return to my personal experiences on this never-to-be-forgotten day. I had run down Cromwell Hill, and seeing the flames of Heybridge, was impelled to get nearer, if possible, to discover more particularly the state of affairs in that direction. But I was reckoning without the Germans. When I got to the bridge over the river at the foot of the hill, the officer in charge there absolutely prevented my crossing. Beyond the soldiers standing or kneeling behind whatever cover was offered by the walls and buildings abutting on the riverside, and a couple of machine guns placed so as to command the bridge and the road beyond, there was nothing much to see. A number of Germans were, however, very busy in the big mill just across the river, but what they were doing I could not make out. As I turned to retrace my steps, the glare of the conflagration grew suddenly more and more intense. A mass of dark figures came running down the brightly-illuminated road towards the bridge, while the rifle fire became louder, nearer, and heavier than ever. Every now and again the air became alive with, as it were, the hiss and buzz of flying insects. The English must have fought their way through Heybridge, and these must be the bullets from their rifles. It was dangerous to stay down there any longer, so I took to my heels. As I ran I heard a thundering explosion behind me, the shock of which nearly threw me to the ground. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that the Germans had blown up the mill at the farther end of the bridge, and were now pushing carts from either side in order to barricade it. The two Maxims, too, began to pump lead with their hammering reports, and the men near them commenced to fall in twos and threes. I made off to the left, and passed into the High Street by the end of St. Peter’s Church, now disused. At the corner I ran against Mr. Clydesdale, the optician, who looks after the library which now occupies the old building. He pointed to the tower, which stood darkly up against the blood-red sky.
“ ‘Look at those infernal Germans!’ he said. ‘They can’t even keep out of that old place. I wish we could have got the books out before they came.’
“I could not see any of our invaders where he was pointing, but presently I became aware of a little winking, blinking light at the very summit of the tower.
“ ‘That’s them,’ said Clydesdale. ‘They’re making signals, I think. My boy says he saw the same thing on Purleigh Church tower last night. I wish it would come down with them, that I do. It’s pretty shaky, anyway.’
“The street was fairly full of people. The Germans, it is true, had ordered that no one should be out of doors between eight in the evening and six in the morning; but just now they appeared to have their hands pretty full elsewhere, and if any of the few soldiers that were about knew of or thought anything of the interdiction, they said nothing. Wat Miller, the postman, came up and touched his cap.
“ ‘Terrible times, sir,’ he said, ‘ain’t they? There was a mort of people killed this afternoon by them shells. There was poor old Missis Reece in the London Road. Bed-ridden, she were, this dozen years. Well, sir, there ain’t so much as the head on her left. A fair mash up she were, poor old lady! Then there was Jones the carpenter’s three kids, as was left behind when their mother took the baby to Mundon with the rest of the women. The house was struck and come down atop of ’em. They got two out, but they were dead, poor souls! and they’re still looking for the other one.’
“The crash of a salvo of heavy guns from the direction of my own house interrupted the tale of horrors.
“ ‘That’ll be the guns in my garden,’ I said.
“ ‘Yes, sir; and they’ve got three monstrous great ones in the opening between the houses just behind the church there,’ said Clydesdale.
“As he spoke the guns in question bellowed out, one after the other.
“ ‘Look — look at the tower!’ cried the postman.
“The light at the top had disappeared, and the lofty edifice was swaying slowly, slowly, over to the left.
“ ‘She’s gone at last!’ exclaimed Clydesdale.
“It was true. Down came the old steeple that had pointed heavenward for so many generations, with a mighty crash and concussion that swallowed up even the noise of the battle, though cannon of all sorts and sizes were now joining in the hellish concert, and shell from the English batteries began to roar over the town. The vibration and shock of the heavy guns had been too much for the old tower, which, for years in a tottery condition, had been patched up so often.
“As soon as the cloud of dust cleared off we all three ran towards the huge pile of débris that filled the little churchyard. Several other people followed. It was very dark down there, in the shadow of the trees and houses, despite the firelight overhead, and we began striking matches as we looked about among the heaps of bricks and beams to see if there were any of the German signal party among them. Why we should have taken the trouble under the circumstances I do not quite know. It was an instinctive movement of humanity on my part, and that of most of the others, I suppose. Miller, the postman, was, however, logical. ‘I ’opes as they’re all dead!’ was what he said.
“I caught sight of an arm in a light blue sleeve protruding from the débris, and took hold of it in a futile attempt to remove some of the bricks and rubbish which I thought were covering the body of its owner. To my horror, it came away in my hand. The body to which it belonged might be buried yards away in the immense heap of ruins. I dropped it with a cry, and fled from the spot.
“Dawn was now breaking. I do not exactly remember where I wandered to after the fall of St. Peter’s Tower, but it must have been between half-past five and six when I found myself on the high ground at the north-western corner of the town, overlooking the golf links, where I had spent so many pleasant hours in that recent past that now seemed so far away. All around