On the afternoon of November 23, two teenage boys hurried into the third-grade classroom of Torshavn Public School, a young male teacher wearing round-rimmed glasses was lecturing. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

The male teacher took out his pocket watch from his vest pocket and glanced at it, then said tepidly: "Mr. Rasmussen and Mr. Frisch, can you explain the reason why you are 30 minutes late for this class, or let me guess first...... Today's lunch was too bad, so you decided to try your luck at the beach and see if you could catch a trout for a delicious pot of soup, but you didn't have the luck, so you delayed it? ”

"Mr. Peterson, you only guessed the beginning." The taller boy grinned excitedly, "We saw warships at Hegareka Cliff, the British warships, there were dozens of them, and we watched them line up into the strait, and they must go to the other side of the strait." ”

"There's a white plane in the sky." The other boy added in a childish voice.

The male teacher frowned slightly, raised his right hand and pushed his glasses: "Mr. Rasmussen, Mr. Frisch, you swear to God, this is not a story that you made up because you missed class time?" ”

The two boys replied in unison, "Yes, I swear." ”

The male governess hesitated slightly, then raised his voice one degree: "Gentlemen, would you like to go and see how magnificent it is for a whole British fleet to sail in formation?" ”

In Europe at this time, male and female students were usually taught in separate classes, and there were only boys in this room, and they replied excitedly, "Yes!" ”

The male teacher snapped his fingers: "Then you guys are really lucky!" The Royal Fleet can only be seen sailing past in formation during important celebrations, and the best vantage point belongs to the King of England, who is now treated like a King from the Cliff of Hegareka. Am I right, Rasmussen and Mr. Frisch? ”

The two students, who were not reprimanded for being late, replied in a loud voice: "Yes, Mr. Peterson, that is definitely a king's pleasure!" ”

The classroom was boiling with the boys eager to try, and it wasn't until the male teacher put his index finger to his mouth and made a silent gesture that they barely managed to calm down in their excitement.

"Our principal, we don't want to see a whole class absent from this afternoon's class, so we have to sneak out quietly, and we can get a bike for a bike and the rest of us go on foot, and we meet at Hegareka Cliff, understand?"

The boys collectively suppressed their voices and replied, "Understood! ”

The male teacher nodded in satisfaction and motioned for the students to leave the classroom. The little ones quickly and quietly grabbed their school bags and slipped out, and the male teacher stopped the two late students, and when the others were almost gone, he took the bicycles and let them sit on them one after the other, and rode them to their destination.

Hegareka Cliff is located on a sea cliff east of Tórshavn, which has an excellent view of the East Island across the Channel and the island of Boroy to the east of the East Island.

Along the way, the male teacher asked the two boys a lot of questions in a normal tone, and they knew everything, but with the children's insight and understanding, the description of the truth must be biased. In a short time, the three of them were the first to reach the cliff of Hegareka, where several cars were already parked, and a dozen men and two women were looking out to sea. Sensing that someone was coming, several men cast wary glances in unison. Tórshafen is not a very large seaport, and the residents who have lived here for a long time have an impression of each other. Seeing the two children on the male teacher's bicycle, and the children who came on foot one after another, the men quickly reined in the menacing eyes that made the hairs stand on end.

The male teacher beckoned the boys not to approach the dangerous position on the edge of the cliff while quietly peering into the sea. The strait between Strammer Island and East Island is the narrowest and longest waterway in the Faroe Islands, nearly 15 nautical miles long, and more than a dozen ships can be seen sailing north in the strait, all of them painted with lead-gray exterior paint, and the chimneys spew billowing black smoke, which can seem to be about thirteen or fourteen knots from a distance, but none of them have the typical silhouette of a dreadnought or battleship.

Don't......

With doubts in his heart, the male teacher looked in the direction of Boroi Island, because the sea was cloudy and the light was dim, the sight of the sea was not in the best clarity, in a very laborious situation, he vaguely saw that there were some shadows of ships in the bay that entered the waterway between East Island and Boroy Island, without binoculars, he could not distinguish the type and number of ships, but nevertheless, he still felt that this was a very important piece of information, and it was necessary to pass it out at the first time, after all, the landing of the German fleet escort force in Ireland was already known to the world, The British fleet would not have come to the Faroe Islands for no reason, and their greatest and most urgent goal was to defeat the German navy.

The male teacher, known to the students as Mr. Petersen, whose real name was Lotta Müller, was a professional German spy who had been hiding in Tórshavn for five years. Since 1871, the united Germany has grown stronger and stronger, and the country's ambitions have expanded with the growth of economic, industrial, and military power. To the east, the Berlin-Baghdad railway infiltrated the Ottoman Turkish Empire, plundering colonies in East Asia and the South Pacific with its ocean-going fleet; To the south, military and diplomatic means went hand in hand, and in just over twenty years, they acquired vast colonies twice the size of the mainland, and began to extract resources from these colonies; To the west, it won the sympathy and support of South American countries through immigration, trade, military cooperation, and so on...... The only thing to gain was to the north, because the north was barren Scandinavia and the cold Arctic Sea, and apart from the relatively rich mineral and fishery resources, there was nothing very interesting to the Germans, even the Faroe Islands, which had a very special geographical location during the war, did not attract the attention of the German intelligence services. Thus, since 1900, there had never been more than ten German spies stationed in the Faroe Islands, and at least twenty or thirty British intelligence agents had been working for the British at the same time.

In 1911, when relations between Britain and Germany were at their most tense, the inherent superiority of Britain's overseas intelligence network was unmistakable. That year, Müller lost seven of his associates, and the German spies who had been lurking in the Faroe Islands either disappeared for no apparent reason or died mysteriously, and the successive losses made the German intelligence services almost abandon the Faroe Islands. After 1912, there were at most three German spies stationed here, and at least only Müller, and their espionage activities were confined to a purely military scope, to put it bluntly, to observe the actions of the British Navy in the Faroe Islands with their eyes—foreign visits, normal supplies, joint exercises, and so on.

Müller, who was the longest-lived German spy in the Faroe Islands because of his polite appearance and status as an elementary school teacher, was cautious and avoided making himself appear too isolated, and he hung his house full of sketches and often gave free portraits to his neighbors, so he had a good reason to ride his bicycle around. In contrast, the British Navy paid more attention to the Faroe Islands and the surrounding waters than the German Navy, and British ships of various guises were often seen here, and several major islands had British-funded weather stations or radio facilities, and the British Navy probably had more detailed geographical and hydrographic information than the Danish government archives had.

After the twenty or so students had arrived, Müller deliberately shouted to them: "Gentlemen, what you see now is the British Royal Navy, which has a long history, and they are respected because they have the best seamen in the world, and to do this, it is necessary to learn every basic subject in school, especially mathematics." Alright, that's almost all for today's outdoor activities, let's go back! ”

It was nearly two kilometers from the school, and the children who arrived had barely seen the ships at sea, but no one complained about Müller's orders. But just as he was about to ride away, a man in a black jacket walked up to him and seemingly casually put his hand on the handlebar.

"Hey, Mr. Peterson, remember me?"

"Are you...... Mr. Frisch, Mr. Frisch at the Mayflower Tavern, your whiskey there tastes very pure. Nice to see you here! Mueller grinned and reached out to shake his hand.

The stout man said with a non-smirk, "Mr. Peterson's outdoor teaching is very interesting, but what makes me curious is, how do you know that these ships are British warships?" ”

Mueller pretended to be surprised: "Ah! Isn't it? ”

Hearing his teacher's rhetorical tone, the boys around him looked at them curiously.

"At such a distance, I can't see what flags are hanging on their flagpoles, and there is a clear difference in appearance between British warships, German warships, and French warships?" The man in the black jacket asked maliciously.

"Have you forgotten?" Muller replied slyly, "Just in April of this year, a British warship visited Tórse, and many of the British sailors visited your tavern, and you were there that night—a blonde British officer spoke of the difference between the navies, the British battleships were painted lead gray, symbolizing the fury of the sea, and the German battleships were painted field gray, the same color as the German soldiers' uniforms, and the French warships were painted in the same color as the British navy, but they liked to paint black waterproof paint below the waterline. I don't think there's anything wrong with a British officer's words, so when the students asked me, I explained it to them. ”

"Oh yes?" The man in the black jacket pursed his lips, and when he saw that the teenage children around him were staring at him, he had to take a step back. The two men who were standing on the edge of the cliff just now had quietly come to the side, and if anything happened, they could block Muller's way in the first place, but now they could only watch Muller leave with the boys.

(End of chapter)