Chapter 115 Spies
Chapter 115 Spies
The house was silent, with only a floor clock ticking away.
This was the commander’s office of the naval headquarters in Port Fullan, and unlike the monotonous to the extreme office of a certain Earl, the house was decorated with several potted plants that were known to have been well taken care of at a glance, and there was also an oil painting hanging on the wall, with a round of red sun rising from the vast ocean.
The owner of the office, Admiral Austin, was sitting in a chair behind the desk, resting his eyes.
The Admiral’s brain was certainly not idle at this time, there were too many things for him to consider lately.
First and foremost was the matter of shipbuilding.
A new batch of Slurpee ships was being built in the shipyard’s dockyard in full swing, a batch because this time two of them were being started at the same time.
The new Slups are not, of course, simple copies of the Hope.
On the one hand, Lord Greymane had come up with a new term – “ergonomics” – after experiencing the sea trials himself.
He demanded to improve the comfort of the crew on board (relatively speaking) without affecting the ship’s combat effectiveness, such as the deck furnishings as neat and regular as possible, not so messy as to give people a headache at first sight, improve and simplify the operation of the sails and some other aspects.
In short, it would be best to make the sailors feel at home. Of course, a small ship like the Slupe had little potential for improvement in this area, but the Lords demanded that this design concept be carried over to the larger ships to be built later.
The reasoning behind this is well understood, it is relatively easy to maintain good moods and stamina in a relatively comfortable environment.
“I’m talking about combat effectiveness without compromising combat effectiveness, which is the root of everything.” Earl Greiman concluded as he emphasized.
On the other hand, although the trial voyage of the “Hope” was generally successful, some flaws were still discovered one after another during the frequent training of Quirk and the others.
These flaws and some improvement suggestions from the naval officers and soldiers were fed back to the shipyard at the first time, so that Rubin and Benjamin and others could modify the design and improve it on the new ship in time.
Both of the above aspects created a lot of tests for the craftsmen in the shipyard.
Then there was the problem of piracy.
Not only Count Greiman, but Austin himself suspected that there were scouts of the Mudskipper Gang lurking within or near the Navy, and he had assigned Captain Valk of the Naval Pickets to join forces with Duran, Cecil’s Intelligence Officer stationed at Port Fullan, to look into the matter, and there was no telling when the results would be available.
If there really were scouts, the fact that the Navy was about to take the initiative might have leaked out.
“Doo doo doo doo!” A knock on the door interrupted Austin’s thoughts.
He opened his eyes and shouted, “Come in!”
The door to the room was pushed open and two men walked in, none other than Captain Valk and Intelligence Officer Duran.
Austin gestured for the two men to sit down as he said, “I hope you two have brought me good news.”
The two looked at each other and Duran made an inviting gesture towards Valk.
The picket leader squared his shoulders and said to Austin, “Commander, there is good news and bad news.”
Austin immediately said, “Bad first!”
At least there was good news behind it to console himself.
“The Navy does have spies planted by pirates on their side. “
Ah, that wasn’t so bad, one had thought that was a 10 out of 10 thing before.
“So, what’s the good news?”
“We’ve got a lock on who the spy is.”
Captain Valk handed Austin a sheaf of papers.
Austin hurriedly skimmed through them and said with slight bemusement, “Well, it looks like Lord Gleeman is paying his soldiers a bit too much for them to have the free money to do something like this.”
The scout that the pirates had planted within Port Fullan turned out to be the owner of the only brothel within the town, by the name of Clement.
The means he used to obtain the navy’s information could be imagined.
“Is the evidence conclusive?”
“Very conclusive, we have a man following a contact.”
“How many men in the Navy have been to his store?” “So far we have a total of 48 people confirmed to have been there, including six officers.”
With so many people, Austin’s face grew stiff with annoyance, there must have been quite a few assholes who had been set up in bed.
“Throw everyone out of the army who has been to a brothel!” “Anyone in the army is forbidden to go whoring in the future.”
Austin was just about to yell it out like that, but after thinking about it, he let it go, and ordered, “Line up the people who specifically leaked the information, and do whatever the military rules say.”
Captain Valk responded, “Yes, Commander.”
The Duran intelligence officer on the side said, “Should we just get the city hall to cooperate in sealing off the brothel.”
Austin, however, waved his hand and said, “No, I was worried about not having a chance to catch the Mudskipper, perhaps this is a good opportunity to use this spy to set a trap for the Mudskipper.”
“Anyway, let’s have a nice talk with this Clemente boss first.”
……
Clemente was hanging, tied up, in a hidden room in his brothel.
His gagged mouth whimpered and screamed as hard as he could, but it didn’t do the slightest bit of good, and the people outside the room couldn’t hear him at all.
After all, he had put a lot of effort into soundproofing the room for the convenience of his clients.
One of the men said, “Ungag him, Clement, and if you scream, you’ll get it!”
The towel that gagged Clement was pulled out.
The guy took a few deep greedy breaths before begging for mercy, “Navy lords, I confess, I confess all.”
The man smiled wryly, “Yo, you’re a thief so soon? What are you going to confess?”
“I ……” Clement was speechless all of a sudden.
Today is Clement’s most unlucky day, originally business is doing well, but also came a few groups over the naval officers and soldiers, he moved again to take the opportunity to pry some information of the small mind.
A few naval officers and soldiers individually pack a room, called the girl in it to eat, drink and play, I did not expect them to quarrel inside, things smashed a lot, as the boss of Clement naturally want to go over to see.
The officers and soldiers kicked out the lady who accompanied them to drink, and then let the boss come to give them a judgment.
Who would have thought that these guys would close the door and swarm to restrain him.
Then he became the current appearance.
Clement squeaked, “I …… I …… I confessed that I cheated on my taxes.”
“Slap!” A loud slap slapped the brothel owner in the face fat.
An officer lowered his voice and bellowed, “We don’t care if you steal taxes or not. Say! Are you a spy planted by the pirates in Port Fullan? Keep your voice down and speak to me.”
“Wrongfully accused, how could I have dealings with those vicious bastards.”
Clement tried to weasel his way out of it, but the naval officers and soldiers quickly came up with evidence that made his jaw drop, and with the brightly shining knife comparing to his face, the brothel owner finally admitted that he was in contact with the Mudskippers gang from the pirates.
The officer came over and patted his meaty face as if he was patting a pig that was about to be sent to the slaughterhouse.
He said with a smile on his face, “According to our Commander Austin, you were put on the spot immediately after your admission.”
Clement revealed a strong sense of fear, and he just wanted to open his mouth to beg for mercy, but his mouth was immediately covered tightly.
But he heard the officer continue, “Just listen to me, now there is a chance to live in front of you, I wonder if you can seize it.”
Hearing that he could still live, Clement, who still had his mouth covered, nodded vigorously.
Thank you for the reward from the book club “Fade? The reward of “Calm?
(End of chapter)