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Studies in Computational Intelligence 838

Stefka Fidanova Editor

Recent Advances
in Computational
Optimization
Results of the Workshop on
“Computational Optimization” and
“Numerical Search and Optimization”
2018
Studies in Computational Intelligence

Volume 838

Series Editor
Janusz Kacprzyk, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
The series “Studies in Computational Intelligence” (SCI) publishes new develop-
ments and advances in the various areas of computational intelligence—quickly and
with a high quality. The intent is to cover the theory, applications, and design
methods of computational intelligence, as embedded in the fields of engineering,
computer science, physics and life sciences, as well as the methodologies behind
them. The series contains monographs, lecture notes and edited volumes in
computational intelligence spanning the areas of neural networks, connectionist
systems, genetic algorithms, evolutionary computation, artificial intelligence,
cellular automata, self-organizing systems, soft computing, fuzzy systems, and
hybrid intelligent systems. Of particular value to both the contributors and the
readership are the short publication timeframe and the world-wide distribution,
which enable both wide and rapid dissemination of research output.
The books of this series are submitted to indexing to Web of Science,
EI-Compendex, DBLP, SCOPUS, Google Scholar and Springerlink.

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/7092

Stefka Fidanova
Editor

Recent Advances
in Computational
Optimization
Results of the Workshop on “Computational
Optimization” and “Numerical Search
and Optimization” 2018

123
Editor
Stefka Fidanova
Parallel Algorithms
Institute of Information and Communication
Technologies, Bulgarian Academy
of Sciences
Sofia, Bulgaria

ISSN 1860-949X ISSN 1860-9503 (electronic)

Studies in Computational Intelligence
ISBN 978-3-030-22722-7 ISBN 978-3-030-22723-4 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22723-4
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part
of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations,
recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission
or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar
methodology now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from
the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this
book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the
authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained
herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard
to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Organization

Workshop on Computational Optimization (WCO 2018) is organized in the

framework of Federated Conference on Computer Science and Information Systems
FedCSIS—2018 and Numerical Search and Optimization part of the Numerical
Methods and Application Conference–2018.

Conference Co-chairs

For WCO
Stefka Fidanova, IICT-BAS (Bulgaria)
Antonio Mucherino, IRISA (Rennes, France)
Daniela Zaharie, West University of Timisoara (Romania)
For NSO
Stefka Fidanova, IICT-BAS (Bulgaria)
Gabriel Luque, University of Malaga (Spain)
Kalin Penev, Southampton Solent University (UK)

Program Committee

Bonates, Tibérius, Universidade Federal do Ceará, Brazil

Breaban, Mihaela, University of Iasi, Romania
Chira, Camelia, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Gonçalves, Douglas, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Brazil
Hosobe, Hiroshi, National Institute of Informatics, Japan
Iiduka, Hideaki, Kyushu Institute of Technology, Japan
Lavor, Carlile, IMECC-UNICAMP, Campinas, Brazil
Marinov, Pencho, Bulgarian Academy of Science, Bulgaria
Micota, Flavia, West University Timisoara, Romania

v
vi Organization

Muscalagiu, Ionel, Politehnica University Timisoara, Romania

Parsopoulos, Konstantinos, University of Patras, Greece
Pintea, Camelia, Tehnical University Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Roeva, Olympia, Institute of Biophysics and Biomedical Engineering, Bulgaria
Siarry, Patrick, Universite Paris XII Val de Marne, France
Stefanov, Stefan, Neofit Rilski University, Bulgaria
Stoean, Ruxandra University of Craiova, Romania
Stoean, Catalin University of Craiova, Romania
Stuetzle, Tomas, Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium
Tamir, Tami, The Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Israel
Zilinskas, Antanas, Vilnius University, Lithuania
Preface

Many real-world problems arising in engineering, economics, medicine, and other

domains can be formulated as optimization tasks. Every day we solve optimization
problems. Optimization occurs in the minimizing time and cost or the maximization
of the profit, quality, and efficiency. Such problems are frequently characterized by
non-convex, non-differentiable, discontinuous, noisy or dynamic objective func-
tions, and constraints which ask for adequate computational methods.
This volume is a result of very vivid and fruitful discussions held during the
Workshop on Computational Optimization and Workshop on Numerical Search
and Optimization. The participants have agreed that the relevance of the conference
topic and quality of the contributions have clearly suggested that a more compre-
hensive collection of extended contributions devoted to the area would be very
welcome and would certainly contribute to a wider exposure and proliferation of the
field and ideas.
The volume includes important real problems like modeling of physical pro-
cesses, wildfire and natural hazards modeling, modeling metal nanostructures,
workforce planning, wireless network topology, parameter settings for controlling
different processes, extracting elements from video clips, and management of cloud
computing environment. Some of them can be solved by applying traditional
numerical methods, but others need huge amount of computational resources.
Therefore for them are more appropriate to develop an algorithm based on some
metaheuristic methods like evolutionary computation, ant colony optimization,
particle swarm optimization, constraint programming, etc.

Sofia, Bulgaria Stefka Fidanova

March 2019 Co-Chair
WCO’2018

vii
Contents

Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times of First Hop

Redundancy Within Video Networks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Paul Bourne, Neville Palmer and Jan Skrabala
Desktop Application Developed by Open Source Tools
for Optimizations in Cases of Natural Hazards
and Field Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Nina Dobrinkova and Stefan Stefanov
Data Optimizations on Kresna Fire (2017) as Inputs for WFA
Simulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Nina Dobrinkova
Solving Sorting of Rolling Stock Problems Utilizing Pseudochain
Structures in Graphs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Jens Dörpinghaus and Rainer Schrader
InterCriteria Analysis of Different Hybrid Ant Colony Optimization
Algorithms for Workforce Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Stefka Fidanova, Olympia Roeva, Gabriel Luque and Marcin Paprzycki
Different InterCriteria Analysis of Variants of ACO algorithm
for Wireless Sensor Network Positioning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Olympia Roeva and Stefka Fidanova
Geometric Versus Arithmetic Difference and H1-Seminorm Versus
L2-Norm in Function Approximation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Stefan M. Filipov, Ivan D. Gospodinov, Atanas V. Atanassov
and Jordanka A. Angelova
Ellipsoidal Estimates of Reachable Sets for Nonlinear Control Systems
with Bilinear Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Tatiana F. Filippova

ix
x Contents

Structural Instability of Gold and Bimetallic Nanowires Using Monte

Carlo Simulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Vladimir Myasnichenko, Nickolay Sdobnyakov, Leoneed Kirilov,
Rossen Mikhov and Stefka Fidanova
Manipulating Two-Dimensional Animations by Dynamical Distance
Geometry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Antonio Mucherino
Index Matrices as a Cost Optimization Tool of Resource Provisioning
in Uncertain Cloud Computing Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Velichka Traneva, Stoyan Tranev and Vassia Atanassova
Three-Dimensional Interval-Valued Intuitionistic Fuzzy Appointment
Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Velichka Traneva, Vassia Atanassova and Stoyan Tranev
Logical Connectives Used in the First Bulgarian School Books
in Mathematics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Velislava Stoykova
An Improved “Walk on Equations” Monte Carlo Algorithm
for Linear Algebraic Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Venelin Todorov, Nikolay Ikonomov, Stoyan Apostolov, Ivan Dimov,
Rayna Georgieva and Yuri Dimitrov
Author Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Developing a Method for Measuring
the Failover Times of First Hop
Redundancy Within Video Networks

Paul Bourne , Neville Palmer and Jan Skrabala

Abstract IP protocols have been used to distribute compressed media over private
and public networks for a number of years. Recently the broadcast sector has started
to adopt IP technologies to transport real time media within and between their facil-
ities during production. However, the high bitrate of uncompressed media and its
sensitivity to latency and timing variations requires careful design of the network in
order to maintain quality of service. Connectionless protocols are commonly used,
which means that packet loss is of particular concern and redundant paths must be
provisioned with mechanisms to switch between them. This project develops and
critically analyses a method for measuring the effectiveness of first hop redundancy
protocols for broadcast video production networks. The aim extends previous work
[1] to recommend particular configurations to optimise networks and to provide a
method that broadcast engineers can use to verify performance. Cisco’s HSRP is
recommended with static routes configured for redundant paths. It is recommended
that the network is tested using a synthetic RTP stream with a low complexity packet
sniffer and NICs with hardware timestamps. Further work is identified including
ways to improve the accuracy of the results and to consider the impact of more
complex networks.

Keywords FHRP · HSRP · GLBP · VRRP · Network redundancy · Gateway

protocol · Failover · Network performance measurement · Video network

P. Bourne (B) · N. Palmer

Solent University, East Park Terrace, Southampton, Hampshire SO14 0YN, UK
e-mail: [email protected]
N. Palmer
e-mail: [email protected]
J. Skrabala
Vostron Ltd, 32B Castle Way, Southampton, Hampshire SO14 2AW, UK
e-mail: [email protected]

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 1

S. Fidanova (ed.), Recent Advances in Computational Optimization,
Studies in Computational Intelligence 838,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22723-4_1
2 P. Bourne et al.

1 Introduction

The broadcast industry is currently undergoing a step change as it replaces bespoke

network infrastructures based on the Serial Digital Interface (SDI) with commodity
enterprise equipment using Internet Protocol (IP). Consumers in the UK are supple-
menting traditional broadcast channels with online services; TVB Europe’s recent
outlook report [2] states that viewers prefer streaming services over offline down-
loads and continues that such services are predicted to grow by 9.1% each year over
the next five years. Meyer and Francis [3] suggest that the release of a number of IP
related standards throughout 2017, as well as native IP products, has also increased
broadcasters’ confidence in IP technologies to the point that they are now investing
heavily in IP infrastructures for playout and distribution. Broadcast services provider,
Timeline Television, recently unveiled the first all IP outside broadcast truck [4]. The
result is a desire for IP based infrastructures throughout the broadcast chain from
capture through to delivery.
There are many advantages in terms of cost and flexibility but maintaining Quality
of Service (QoS) for signals that are both time-sensitive and of high bandwidth can
be challenging. Broadcasters are used to fixed bandwidth links and bespoke health
monitoring mechanisms. In contrast network infrastructures have evolved with dif-
ferent requirements and have therefore developed significantly different techniques
and monitoring tools. In recent years there have been significant efforts to help the
sectors to converge, led by organisations such as the Broadcast Bridge and Alliance
for IP Media Solutions [5, 6].
Higher level applications are often used to monitor network services and create
reliable circuits using technologies such as Software Defined Networks (SDN) and
Mulit Protocol Label Switching (MPLS). These tools are usually provided by third-
party vendors based on proprietary intellectual property and produce a high degree
of abstraction [7–9]. There are standard redundancy protocols available that can be
configured to respond to changes in network performance. However, monitoring
QoS in IP networks has proved to be difficult for broadcasters as the metrics built
into enterprise equipment tend to be geared towards the operational requirements
of generic data networks. The levels of abstraction and limited detail available may
leave broadcast engineers wary of the technologies and either less likely to adopt
them or to wildly overprovision the networks. The broadcast industry recognises the
need for network engineers who understand the requirements of media signal flows
and are starting to understand that a detailed understanding of networks is required to
configure effective production LANs [10–12]. A review of current literature provides
limited guidance on the relative performance of redundancy protocols and there are
no procedures for measuring the performance of high availability networks.
This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of existing network redundancy
protocols and their suitability for broadcast video networks with a focus on produc-
tion networks. The project will explore and evaluate methods of monitoring network
performance and recommend a test procedure to allow engineers to verify and opti-
mise their configurations.
Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times … 3

2 Background

IP networks are becoming increasing important throughout the broadcast video work-
flow from production through to distribution. Value can be added to the signal chain
via the flexibility of dynamically routed signals and format agnostic transport proto-
cols. There has been significant uptake of services distributed using IP technologies
such as Over the Top (OTT) and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) [13, 14]. OTT
services such as Netflix and BBC iPlayer are delivered over the public Internet with-
out the need for proprietary devices whereas IPTV services such as Virgin Media
use managed networks. Due to the nature of the networks OTT is usually deliv-
ered using Hyper Text Transport Protocol (HTTP) using the connection-orientated
Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). With the use of a buffer, this provides bene-
fits such as retransmission but at the expense of latency. IPTV or real-time signals
within a production environment are more likely to use Realtime Transport Protocol
(RTP) over the connectionless User Datagram Protocol (UDP). RTP is used by many
media-centric protocols as a transport mechanism to provide sequence numbers and
timestamps with minimal overhead. The information provided within the headers
may be used by high level applications to improve QoS and further feedback is usu-
ally exchanged between participants using the RTP Control Protocol (RTCP) [15].
The small receive buffer and lack of a retransmission mechanism means that RTP
is vulnerable to packet-loss and necessitates a rapid failover mechanism to maintain
resilience using a secondary path.
First Hop Redundancy Protocols (FHRP) provide an essential tool for increas-
ing availability in critical switched IP networks. They provide a mechanism for fast
failover to the next hop from a primary path to a secondary path within a group of
backup routers. The process is faster than waiting for spanning tree or dynamic rout-
ing protocols to converge on a new path due to the limited scope and pre-configuration
of the FHRP. Essentially two or more routers are able to share the default gateway
at OSI layer 3, which provides an alternative route or may even be used for rudi-
mentary load balancing. This does necessitate the use of multilayer switches but can
be implemented at the Access Layer or Distribution Layer [16, 17]. YanHua and
WeiZhe [18] have shown that such protocols are suitable for use within cable tele-
vision IP networks when combined with device redundancy, although they caution
against diminishing returns as the network complexity increases.
Cisco has developed two major proprietary protocols Hot Standby Routing Proto-
col (HSRP) and Gateway Load Balancing Protocol (GLBP). Another common proto-
col is the Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP), which is available as an open
IEFT standard RFC5798. It is similar to HSRP in operation but not compatible [19,
20]. Other equipment vendors also have proprietary protocols; Juniper Networks
has NetScreen Redundancy Protocol (NSRP), Avaya has Routed Split Multi-link
Trunking (R-SMLT) and Extreme Networks has Extreme Standby Routing Protocol
(ESRP) [21–24]. Broadcast installations usually combine best-of-breed equipment
and are generally multivendor environments built on open standards. However Cisco
have a dominant position in the switching and routing market with over 50% of the
4 P. Bourne et al.

worldwide market share in 2016 [25]. As such this investigation will focus on HSRP,
GLBP and VRRP. Common Address Redundancy Protocol (CARP) was considered
but relies on the Berkeley Software Distribution so is not practical on many platforms
[26].
HSRP is configured for an interface using the standby command and allows the
user to configure a virtual gateway for the connected hosts to use. Priorities are
specified such that an active router is allocated with one or more standby routers
sharing the virtual address with the active router as shown by Fig. 1. Packets are
forwarded based on an IP/MAC address pair and standby routers monitor the status
of the active router to promote a backup router in the case of a link failure on the active
path. Tracking objects can be used to monitor interfaces or Service Level Agreement
(SLA) tracking can monitor connectivity beyond the first hop. Either method can
update the router priorities to determine the active path. Different priorities can also
be assigned to different Virtual Local Area Networks (VLAN) to implement basic
load balancing, although this may become unwieldy on large networks [17, 27].
GLBP uses multiple gateways simultaneously, which enables more effective load
balancing and therefore uses all the bandwidth within the topology. Routers within a
GLBP group may be the Active Virtual Gateway (AVG), an Active Virtual Forwarder
(AVF) or the Standby Virtual Gateway (SVG). The AVG assigns virtual MAC address
to the other group members. Up to four AVFs, including the AVG, are able to forward
packets and the SVG is ready to take over from the AVG based on a similar priority
system to HSRP with decrements based on tracking objects. GLBP is implemented
on an interface using the glbp command and load balancing can be achieved within
the group by assigning packets to the MAC addresses of the AVFs via an equal
round-robin, by weighting certain paths or based on the host [17, 28].

Fig. 1 A typical HSRP configuration with the host using a common virtual gateway IP address
Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times … 5

VRRP is very similar to HSRP in that is uses a single virtual gateway that is shared
between a master and one or more backup router. It is implemented on the interface
using the vrrp command and supports object tracking to determine failures. Fewer
IP addresses may be used by VRRP than HSRP as the physical IP address for the
master router may also be used as the virtual IP address [29].
Several articles have been published that outline the configuration options for
HSRP, GLBP and VRRP [20, 30–32]. These discuss how the options affect the
underlying algorithm but there appears to be little guidance on how to optimise the
parameters or how the common protocols compare under similar conditions. Ibrahimi
et al. [32] and Rahman et al. [33] demonstrate a basic method, using continuous
Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) echo requests to show the duration of a
link failure. Pavlik et al. [17] show a more accurate method to determine the interval
between missing and restored replies using timestamps from a packet sniffer. None of
the studies investigate the time taken to restore a link after the primary link recovers.
QoS describes the technical performance of a network, which can usually be
objectively quantified and measured at specific points within the network topology.
Common parameters include latency, jitter and packet loss but bandwidth and packet
reordering are also important within video networks due to the temporal sensitivity
and inter-packet dependencies of media flows [34, 35]. Latency is the time it takes
for packets to reach their destination whereas jitter is the variance in the inter-packet
latency. Latency is often acceptable when there is minimal jitter or packet loss,
although it can be a problematic in live broadcasting when disparate sources are
combined such as when conducting interviews. Packet loss tends to be caused by
excessive latency or jitter that causes buffers to underflow and tends to result in
audio or video frames freezing or degrading. Receive buffers can reduce jitter and
therefore packet loss but at the expense of latency [36]. Bandwidth is of concern
within production facilities due to the high data rates of video at 2.97 Gbps for a
single uncompressed High Definition (HD) stream. Gharai, Perkins and Lehman [37]
have noted that in video networks, packet reordering should be treated on an equal
footing with packet loss and the European Broadcast Union (EBU) recommends that a
receiver should not have to accommodate packets out of order by more than 10 places.
Packet reordering is often caused during redundancy switches. Cisco recommends
that for video networks latency should be less than 300 ms, jitter less than 50 ms and
packet loss of less than 0.5% [38] although production environments may have to
work to stricter limits for control and monitoring with latency as low as 10 ms and
virtually no packet loss [39, 40].

3 Test Method

How to measure the effectiveness of FHRPs is one of the major objectives of the
research and a clear and accessible method should be one of the outputs. Previous
studies of the quality of video over IP have made a distinction between the QoS
provision from the network and the QoS provision from the media application [36,
6 P. Bourne et al.

41]. Studies at the application layer have tended to focus on comparing image qual-
ity by detecting artefacts such as blocking and blurring or calculating Peak Signal
to Noise Ratio (PSNR) using bespoke measurement applications. These are very
dependent on the configuration of the codec and often require reliable side-channels
to make mathematical comparisons with a reference stream. This study will instead
focus on the QoS of the network, which Tao, Apostolopoulos and Guerin [41] state
is largely driven by packet loss, delay and jitter. This may be achieved by generating
and injecting a stream of timestamped packets into a test network to be captured and
analysed at a receiver. Previous studies into FHRPs demonstrate a method to test
availability using a continuous stream of Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)
echo requests to determine the duration of a link failure [32, 33]. Alternatively a
packet sniffer can be used to observe the interval between missing echo relies as
demonstrated by Pavlik et al. [17]. Essentially packet drop and the unavailability
interval provide the same information as the packet drop is a function of the interval
and bitrate.
There are several network simulation packages that may be used to rapidly anal-
yse the behaviour of different configurations. Common simulators include Cisco’s
Packet Tracer, open source application GNS3 and Riverbed Modeler. For these to
produce accurate results, they require detailed implementations of the software and
protocols running on the network devices as well as accurate models of the hardware
performance. The level of difficulty required to accurately reproduce the test envi-
ronment is not necessary where real equipment is available to provide accurate real
time results.
A testbed was created to emulate a typical spine-and-leaf network architecture as
recommended for high available networks. The topology is shown by Fig. 2.
The source had an edge ‘customer’ router, which connected to their Local Area
Net-work (LAN). This had redundant links to an external network via primary and
secondary routers, which were connected to the ‘main’ router at the destination on a
WAN. The switch simplified the configuration of the customer router by removing
the need for two interfaces on the same subnet. The primary link utilised a Gigabit
Ethernet connection whereas the secondary was only Fast Ethernet. Secondary links
are often metered in practice so load balancing was not implemented. To simulate a
link failure, the interface G0/0 was shut down on the primary router with a tracking
object to promote the secondary link based on the line-protocol state. The FHRPs
were configured to decrement the priority of the primary router below that of the
secondary router if the line protocol went down; this causes the secondary router to
pre-empt the primary router and traffic would be rerouted. An alternative method
would be to check the reachability of the loopback interface on the destination net-
work using ICMP requests to decrement the priority upon failure. This would be a
more meaningful detection method within a real network but the non-deterministic
nature of packet generation and propagation may distort the results, which should be
focused on the responsiveness of the redundancy protocol itself.
All routes were statically defined within the routers to prevent the dynamic rout-
ing protocols from interfering with the results. The FHRPs were configured on the
primary and secondary routers with a default static route on the customer router
Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times … 7

Fig. 2 Topology for FHRP experiment

pointing to the virtual IP address. A default and more rapid configuration was tested
for each FHRP using the parameters shown by Table 1. By default HSRP sets the
time between hello messages to 3 s and the hold time to be 10 s. The hold time is the
interval after which the active router is declared to be down once hello messages are
not acknowledged. The hold timer must be greater than the hello timer—usually at
least three—to avoid the active router being declared down between hello messages
[42, 43]. GLBP uses the same system of hello and hold timers with identical default
and minimum values [44]. HSRP and GLBP timers can be set with millisecond gran-
ularity but a shorter timer increases the amount of overhead traffic and can cause the
system to behave erratically as it becomes too sensitive [34]. For the rapid test the
hello timer will be set to 1 s and the hold timer to 3 s; this will allow the effect
of smaller timers to be observed without creating instability. VRRP advertisements
are sent every second by default with a failover delay calculated by three times the
advertisement interval plus the router’s skew time. The skew time is based on the
8 P. Bourne et al.

Table 1 Active variables for FHRP experiment

Hello interval (s) Hold timer (s) Pre-emption delay (s) Priority
(backup/master)
HSRP D 3 10 0 –
HSRP R 1 3 0 –
GLBP D 3 10 30 –
GLBP R 1 3 3 –
VRRP D 1 – 0 100/110
VRRP R 1 – 0 253/254

inverse of the priority. The standard doesn’t include shorter advertisement intervals
but Cisco has implemented this in their IOS down to 20 ms [30, 45]. The priorities
were configured as high as possible for the rapid test to reduce the skew time. It
should be noted that pre-emption delay should normally be configured to allow for
the boot time of the equipment [34]. Each configuration was tested ten times.
Two methods were employed for measuring the interval between the interface
changing state and the FHRP responding. A third method that would track missing
ICMP echo replies was considered and trialed during earlier studies [1]; the results
from this would be more comparable to existing studies but the flow was found to
be too simplistic and imprecise to represent media streams.
Method 1: The packet loss was measured using a test stream and packet sniffer.
This relies on the accuracy of the packet generator as well as the timestamps within
the captured stream. VLC Media Player was used to generate a stream of colour bars
and tone from an MP4 file. netsniff-ng was used to capture traffic for analysis using
Wireshark’s RTP dissector. The interval between missing sequence numbers could
be used to determine the packet loss during failover or restoration. The jitter on the
captured packets was also measured to determine the inter-packet arrival variance
and therefore the precision to which the time interval could be reliably calculated.
Method 2: Timestamped debug messages on the routers were used to report the
interface failure and pre-emption of a new router. NTP was used to synchronise
the internal clocks so that the timestamps from different devices could be compared.
The accuracy of the log timestamps was investigated by sending 1000 PING requests
from the source PC to the primary router with 100 ms interval. The SPAN feature on
the primary router was used to copy packets from the G0/1 interface to a netsniff-ng
packet capture on the SPAN PC. Logging was configured on the primary router to
millisecond accuracy using an Access Control List (ACL) to also log the arrival of
the ICMP echo requests. The timestamps on the packet capture were compared to
the logging timestamps to indicate any discrepancy with the logging process. The
jitter inherent on the network was also measured using the Iperf utility.
Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times … 9

4 Results

Of the 1000 PING requests sent, the maximum deviation from the intended 100 ms
interval was ± 4 ms within the raw Cisco timestamps. The PING utility and source
interface will introduce jitter so the figures were adjusted based on the inter-packet
arrival intervals from the SPAN capture. This reduced the error slightly to +4 ms
and −3 ms. In total 31 packets were logged as having a different arrival time to the
SPAN data with an average absolute deviation of 2 ms. The round trip time reported
by the PING utility ranged from 1 to 2 ms with an average of 1.88 ms.
After running 10 cycles of the jitter measurements, the maximum jitter reported
was 570 µs, the minimum 26 µs and the mean average result was 82 µs with a
standard deviation of just 0.1.
The results from the experiment suggest that Cisco’s logging timestamps have
the potential to be accurate to within +4/−3 ms. The jitter added from the test
equipment was much lower than this, which suggests that the figures are reliable. This
is enough precision to compare FHRP but Accedian [46] suggest that inaccuracies in
timestamps approaching even a tenth of a millisecond are unsuitable for measuring
high performance SLA metrics. One concern is that the load on the router was
extremely low during this experiment as there was no significant traffic being routed
or other events for the router to log. As such this indicates the best accuracy of the
logging timestamp.
The minimum, maximum and mean average time have been presented for the
default and rapid configurations of each redundancy protocol. The failover times
are summarised in Table 2 and the restoration times in Table 3. The average jitter
calculated from the stream captures is included to provide an indication of the system
stability—jitter data has not been presented for the rapid configuration of VRRP as
it was consistently reported to be zero. The mean absolute differences between the
results from the two methods are shown as absolute value and percentages.
The mean failover and restoration delays as well as the mean number of packets
dropped are shown as radar plots for the default and rapid configuration in Fig. 3 and
Fig. 4 respectively. The metrics have been scaled to produce a plot whereby the outer
edge indicates the worst performance and the center indicates ideal performance.
It can be seen from Tables 2 and 3 that the two test methods produce similar results
for VRRP and GLBP but there is significant disparity for HSRP—the captures suggest
that the protocol is 83–88% faster than the logs report. Inspection of the packet
captures verifies that this figure is correct and suggests that the logging process
introduces a delay with this protocol. The results correlate well with the studies
completed by Pavlik et al. [17] although it is interesting to note that all of the protocols
were faster than in their study. This is likely to be due to the different topologies used
and will be particularly affected by the use of static routes in this study. Previous
studies have not analysed the restoration delays, which were also found to be fastest
with HSRP closely followed by VRRP.
The packet loss showed some particularly interesting results. The rapid failover
of HSRP led to the fewest losses whilst GLBP resulted in the most. Surprisingly
10 P. Bourne et al.

Table 2 FHRP failover PCap RTP sequence errors

delays in seconds from packet
capture and cisco logs Min Max Mean Jitter Dropped
HSRP D 0.325 2.576 1.527 0.069 29
HSRP R 0.313 1.026 0.655 0.069 9
VRRP D 3.090 3.937 3.461 0.071 76
VRRP R 2.244 2.874 2.602 – 79
GLBP D 30.705 38.928 33.425 0.069 670
GLBP R 3.913 4.894 4.332 0.071 678
Cisco logs Mean absolute
difference (%)
Min Max Mean
HSRP D 11.188 13.344 12.280 10.753 87.56
HSRP R 0.644 3.856 3.274 2.713 82.87
VRRP D 2.784 3.552 3.206 0.307 9.57
VRRP R 2.192 2.900 2.548 0.581 22.81
GLBP D 30.464 34.984 32.337 1.107 3.42
GLBP R 3.652 4.580 4.047 0.285 7.04

Table 3 FHRP restoration PCap RTP sequence errors

delays in seconds from packet
capture and cisco logs Min Max Mean Jitter Dropped
HSRP D 0.293 2.692 1.484 0.069 0
HSRP R 0.417 1.009 0.725 0.069 0
VRRP D 2.360 3.535 3.132 0.071 574
VRRP R 2.205 2.878 2.508 – 0
GLBP D 31.200 46.519 35.533 0.069 0
GLBP R 2.993 3.358 3.196 0.071 0
Cisco logs Mean absolute
difference (%)
Min Max Mean
HSRP D 0.368 2.660 1.436 0.083 5.77
HSRP R 0.156 0.944 0.633 0.081 12.83
VRRP D 2.840 3.532 3.166 0.168 5.31
VRRP R 2.288 2.924 2.698 0.239 8.88
GLBP D 31.108 46.512 34.654 0.874 2.52
GLBP R 3.100 3.196 3.128 0.103 3.28
Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times … 11

Fig. 3 A comparison of protocol performance with default configurations

Fig. 4 A comparison of protocol performance with rapid configurations

12 P. Bourne et al.

GLBP resulted in slightly more loss with its rapid configuration even though the link
initially came back up more quickly. VRRP consistently dropped a significant number
of packets during restoration when configured with the default parameters—no other
configuration exhibited this behaviour including the rapid configuration of VRRP.
This is highly undesirable as it will result in an additional video glitch in the event
of a failover.

5 Conclusions

The initial tests logging ICMP echo requests suggested that timestamps could be
accurate to within ± 4 ms and that the jitter from low-level packet generation tools
would have minimal influence on the results. However, the disparity between the logs
and packet captures show that the timestamps from logs cannot be relied upon for
more complex protocols—this could be due to the interface between the protocol and
the logging procedure or due to the priority that is assigned to logging the protocol. It
is recommended that it is more accurate to capture an RTP stream to test the failover
delay.
Originally packEth was going to be used to generate an RTP stream. The thread-
ing used to generate the traffic is reported to be stable to microsecond resolution
[47] and Srivastava et al. [48, 49] found the tool to be more suitable than alter-
natives for testing high capacity links. However this tool doesn’t produce RTCP
messages, which caused the routers to drop the RTP stream. Instead VLC Media
Player was used, which had to encode real video frames rather than generating a
synthetic stream. The captures showed a throughput of approximately 20–30 pack-
ets per second, which didn’t give much resolution and the delta between consecutive
packets varied from approximately 0.04 to 250 ms, which is quite bursty. The resolu-
tion could be improved by increasing the data-rate at the source but the burstiness is
likely to be harder to solve. The jitter in the network was fairly consistent throughout
the experiment at around 70 ms. A video network would be expected to have jitter
below 30 ms to maintain QoS [50]. The high figure is likely to be due to using a
software application to generate the RTP stream. The worst case jitter originating
from the source and capture NICs themselves was measured to be just 0.57 ms. A
tool is needed to synthetically generate RTP streams with RTCP messaging so that
a high throughput can be generated with low jitter. This could be an extension to
packEth or a separate utility.
The results themselves suggest that HSRP is the most effective protocol and that
the rapid configuration improves its performance. This protocol is Cisco proprietary
so VRRP would have to be used within a multivendor environment with the config-
uration customised to avoid the packet loss observed using the default parameters.
This work could be extended by reducing the configured timers further to find the
limits of the protocol. As broadcasters are likely to use larger systems with best of
breed equipment, the effects of multiple standby devices and mixed-vendor equip-
ment should also be investigated.
Developing a Method for Measuring the Failover Times … 13

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Desktop Application Developed by Open
Source Tools for Optimizations in Cases
of Natural Hazards and Field Response

Nina Dobrinkova and Stefan Stefanov

Abstract In our paper we present a decision support desktop application that can
provide the opportunity for faster response of firefighting and volunteer groups in
cases of wildland fires or flood events. It is developed with free and open source
software. The application is desktop based and is meant for operational room support.
The desktop application has two modules. The first one is about wildland fires. The
second is about flood events. The main goal is visualization of POI’s (Points Of
Interest) as logistic centers for water supplies and different tools needed on the field
working teams. List of the tools is included in the POIs information. The application
goal is to be calibrated on the field. The wildland fires module will be tested in
municipalities of Zlatograd, Madan and Nedelino during the duration of eOutland
project. The flood events module will be tested in Geghi reservoir, Armenia during
the duration of ALTER project.

Keywords Open source software · Decision support application · QGIS

1 Introduction

The idea of the application is to visualize vulnerable objects and POI’s. It can be used
in operational room for support of firefighting and volunteer groups for field response
in cases of wildland fires or flood events. The POI’s are water supply locations and
logistic centres that contain different firefighting tools for field work.
The application has two modules: Wildfire module [1] and flood module [2] for
each of them we have different testing zones. The test zone about wildfire module is

N. Dobrinkova (B) · S. Stefanov

Institute of Information and Communication Technologies-Bulgarian Academy
of Sciences Acad., Georgi Bonchev bl. 2, 1113 Sofia, Bulgaria
e-mail: [email protected]
N. Dobrinkova · S. Stefanov
Center for National Security and Defense Research - Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia,
Bulgaria
e-mail: [email protected]
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 17
S. Fidanova (ed.), Recent Advances in Computational Optimization,
Studies in Computational Intelligence 838,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22723-4_2
18 N. Dobrinkova and S. Stefanov

located on the territory of Zlatograd, Madan and Nedelino municipalities. The test
zone about flood module is located in the Akhtala and Teghut areas of Lori Marz
along the Shamlugh river. Including the Vorotan Cascade and its associated dams in
the Syunik region, Kapan and Voghji river basin of Syunik area. Flood module [2] is
visualizing the flood dangerous zones and the possibilities how the wave can propa-
gate with time. Also the software give as option visualization of important buildings
and infrastructure. The testing area is the Geghi reservoir located in Syunik, the
southernmost province of Armenia. The needed geodatabases (infrastructure, build-
ings, administrative units, water objects, monitoring sites location, etc.) is provided
from the American University of Armenia and Institute of Geological Sciences.

2 Main Features of the Desktop APP

The desktop application is fully developed with open source software [3]. The free
sources of data and the open source software solutions that we are using for devel-
oping our desktop application give us a lot of opportunities and possibilities to build
application that can be used in the operational rooms in support of volunteer and
firefighter teams in cases of wildland fires and flood events. Our decision support
application will have two modules: wildfire module and flood module [2].
The wildfire module [1] is mainly focused on the ability for providing better deci-
sion support to the groups when they are on the field. It has ability to visualize logistic
centres and what equipment is located there. The base layer can be switched between
different styles which depends on the needs of the users. Module can visualize the
distance between two or more points on the map. The fire danger zones of previous
fires can be also visualized. In the application is included quick link to the weather
forecast maps. Zoom in, zoom out and printing options are available for the users.
The tool has geolocation which is based on the network location (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1 Wildland fires module—main panel

Desktop Application Developed by Open Source Tools … 19

Main features of the Wildland fires module:

– POI’s feature: visualize the location of objects like water supplies and logistic
centres and provide additional information about them as what kind of equipment
is included inside;
– Base layers feature: gives the opportunity for base layer change, by inclusion of
different map types as street map, earth view map, relief map etc. Users can chose
the map style which fits best on their needs;
– Layer switch—give the opportunity of easy switching between predefined layers
if is needed specific information;
– Measures feature: can measure the distance between different objects and may be
used for field support;
– Weather forecast maps feature: this service is based on geolacation and visualize
different data and maps about weather like: temperature, wind speed and direction
etc.;
– Zoom feature: can be used for more detailed information for the objects;
– Print feature: can make digital maps printed on paper if this is necessary;
– Geolocation feature: based on network location, this feature visualizes the location
of the device which is using the application;
– Selection feature: allows users to select part of the map for better performance;
– Extra layers import feature: users can import custom layers into the application if
they need to visualise something more specific;
– Image export feature: can export map as an image file (Figs. 2 and 3).

The flood module [2] is focused to visualise how the high waves can spread in case
of flood event. The module is showing the most vulnerable buildings in cases of flood
hazard. This buildings type is: schools, kindergarten etc. It delivers information about
the nearest and most threatened buildings. The tool purpose is to deliver geo data data
to the groups on the field in fast and convenient format. This data can support them
for better response and decision taking. This module is connected with The Alliance
for Disaster Risk Reduction project with acronym: ALTER. The project focuses on
establishment of public-private partnerships to understand and address flood risks
that may stem from water and mining dam failures. Know-how, technologies and
experience from the European Union are transferred to Armenia. The testing zones
are the Akhtala and Teghut areas of Lori Marz along the Shamlugh river, the Vorotan

Fig. 2 Wildland fires module—base layers, measure and selection

20 N. Dobrinkova and S. Stefanov

Fig. 3 Wildland fires module—custom layer upload

Fig. 4 Flood events module—main panel

Cascade and its associated dams in the Syunik region, and the Kapan and Voghji
river basin of Syunik region (Fig. 4).
Main features of the flood events module:

– POI’s feature: visualize the location of objects like water supplies and logistic
centres and provide additional information about them. Special equipment which
may be needed for the teams on the field;
– Base layers feature: give the opportunity for easy switch between any selected
base layer such as street map, earth view map, relief map etc. Any user can chose
the map style which fits the best on his/her needs;
– Layer switch—gives the opportunity of easy change between the predefined layers
if it is needed specific information;
– Measures feature: can measure the distance between different objects on the field;
Exploring the Variety of Random
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changing from blue to silver and silver to blue with the passing of
every cloud.
Southend is a pretty spot at any time, but after a month spent on
a sick bed in a stuffy London side-street, the view from the pier-hill
seemed to me exceptionally beautiful.
As I stood there drinking my fill of the sweet, strong, brackish air,
and basking in the sunshine, I was conscious of being scrutinised
quietly but very keenly by a man who was lounging near the Royal
Hotel.
There was nothing in his appearance or dress—white flannel
trousers and shirt, cricketing blazer and straw hat—to distinguish
him from the hundreds of holiday makers in like attire who are to be
seen in and about Southend during the season, but I recognised him
at once, and with some alarm, as one of the cleverest officers of the
detective force, and one, moreover, who had been specially told off
to effect the capture of Mullen.
In detective stories, as in pantomimes—no doubt for the same
reason—the policeman is too often held up to scorn and ridicule as
an incompetent bungler who is more dangerous to the hearts of
susceptible servant girls than to law-breakers, and more given to
deeds of prowess in connection with the contents of the pantry than
in protecting the lives or properties of her Majesty’s subjects. The
hero of the detective story is very often a brilliant amateur, of whom
the police are secretly jealous, notwithstanding the fact that
whenever they have a difficult case they come, hat in hand, to seek
his assistance. This, after a little light banter for the benefit of the
Boswell who is to chronicle his marvellous doings—and in the course
of which, by-the-bye, the fact that the police are about to arrest the
wrong man is not unfrequently elicited—he condescends to give, the
understanding between him and them being that he shall do the
work and they take the credit.
Why the amateur detective should be the victim of a modesty
which is not always characteristic of the amateur in other
professions does not transpire, but the arrangement is extremely
convenient to the policeman and to the author, the latter probably
adopting it lest inquisitive readers should ask why, if there are such
brilliant amateur detectives as authors would have us to believe, we
never hear of them in real life.
Now I should be the last man in the world to cheapen the work of
my fellow-craftsmen. I hold that there is no more unmistakable mark
of a mean mind than is evinced in the desire to extol oneself at the
expense of others, but none the less I must enter my protest against
what I cannot but consider an unwarrantable imputation upon a very
deserving body of men.
Detectives and policemen, taken as a whole, are by no means the
bunglers and boobies that they are made out to be in the
pantomimes and in the pages of detective stories. I do not say that
they are all born geniuses in the detection of crime, for genius is no
commoner among detectives than it is among bakers, bankers,
clergymen, novelists, barristers, or cooks. But what I do say is that
the rank and file of them are painstaking and intelligent men, who
do their duty to the public conscientiously and efficiently; and to dub
them all duffers, because now and then a detective is caught
napping, is as unjust as to pronounce all clergymen fools because a
silly sermon is sometimes preached from a pulpit.
I had managed to get ahead of the police in the investigation I
was conducting, not because of the shining abilities with which I was
endowed, for as the reader knows I had bungled matters sadly on
more than one occasion, but because Fate had thrown a clue in my
way at the start. But I have never underrated the acuteness and
astuteness of the representatives of the Criminal Department from
New Scotland Yard, and it did not greatly surprise me to find, when I
commenced operations again at Southend, that though the little
brown cutter was still lying off the same spot, she was being closely
watched by men whom I knew to be detectives.
Whether they had discovered the relationship between Mullen and
the owner of the “Odd Trick,” and in following up the clue had traced
the boat to Southend, or whether they were in possession of
information unknown to me which led them to believe the fugitive
had been hiding in the neighbourhood, I could not say; but that they
were there to effect the capture of Mullen, should he return to the
cutter, I made no doubt.
Mullen, however, was apparently too wary a bird to come back to
the nest until he had satisfied himself that no net had been spread
there to catch him, for that he had got wind of what was going on at
Southend seemed probable from the fact that he never put in an
appearance there again. Nor would it have profited me personally if
he had, for in that case I could scarcely hope to forestall the police
in the matter of his arrest.
Under the circumstances it would be mere waste of time to stay in
Southend, and the question I had now to ask myself was, “Where,
then, is he likely to be?”
As crime begets crime, so question begets question, and “Where,
then, is he likely to be?” had scarcely come to the birth before it was
itself in travail with, “Why not on the ‘Cuban Queen’?”
 CHAPTER XXVII
I PLAY A GAME OF “BLUFF” WITH HUGHES

“Why not on the ‘Cuban Queen’ indeed?” I repeated, as I called to

mind the fact that it was there Mullen had lain secure when the hue
and cry were at their height. It was only when the hue and cry had
somewhat subsided that he had ventured forth to commence his
devilry afresh; and what was more likely, now that the hue and cry
had been raised once more, than that he should have crept back to
his former hiding-place?
The next afternoon I was in the little cottage at Canvey again, and
should have been there sooner but for the fact that I wished first to
satisfy myself that my movements were not being watched by the
police.
I did not intend on this occasion to waste time in trying to find out
whether Hughes had any one on board with him or not, especially as
I was now without Quickly’s assistance. This was a case in which it
seemed to me safer to achieve my purpose by a bold stroke than to
adopt the more cautious course of beating about the bush. The
thing to do would be to engage Hughes in conversation, and when
he was off his guard to charge him suddenly with sheltering a
fugitive from justice on board the “Cuban Queen.” The cleverest
rogue is apt to betray himself when a surprise is thus sprung upon
him, and such a clumsy rascal as Hughes should not be difficult to
deal with. I did not doubt that he would deny the impeachment with
much bluster and more bad language, but by keeping a keen eye
upon his face when playing my game of “bluff” I hoped to be able to
come to some definite conclusion in regard to the theory I had
formed concerning Mullen’s whereabouts.
 But I had yet to catch the hare which I felt so competent to cook,
and of the two tasks the former promised to be the more difficult.
Hughes, as the reader already knows, did not often leave the hulk,
and as it was quite out of the question that I should seek him there,
some plan for making it necessary for him to come ashore must be
devised. After much brain-cudgelling I hit upon an idea which I
immediately proceeded to carry out. The oil which was burned in
Hughes’ cabin was taken out to him every Monday and Thursday by
the attendant whose duty it was to fetch and carry for the caretakers
of the hulks. I knew that it was so as the man had to pass my door
on his way to the boat, and I had seen the tin can in his hand
repeatedly. As a matter of fact, I was at that moment reminded of
the matter, for the day was Thursday, and the man in question was
just going by my gate, carrying the can in one hand and a small sack
of potatoes in the other. If I did not avail myself of this opportunity I
should have to wait until the following Monday before taking action,
so I at once opened the door and hailed him.
“I want you to do a little commission for me,” I said. “You’ll be
going down to the village some time to-day, I know. Could you leave
a letter to Mr. Hayes at the vicarage?”
“Yes, sir,” he said civilly; “with pleasure.”
“That’s right. Put that sack and the can down and come into the
other room while I scribble the letter. I daresay I can find you a
glass of grog in there and a cut of cold beef if you feel like having a
mouthful.”
“Thank you, sir,” he said, unburdening himself of his load and
following me into the inner room. I had not finished my own
breakfast very long, and a small joint was still on the table.
“Pull up and help yourself,” I said, producing knife and fork.
“What’ll you have to drink? I’ve got some old rum. How’ll that suit
you?”
“Capital, sir,” he replied.
 “All right. It’s in the other room, I think. I’ll be back in a moment.
You make a start, meanwhile, on the cold beef.”
No sooner was I in the other room with the closed door between
us than I whipped out the cork from the paraffin can, and seizing a
siphon of soda-water that stood upon the table—it was the only
liquid handy—I slipped the spout into the mouth of the can and
pressed the tap.
“If this isn’t pouring oil on the troubled waters it’s at least pouring
troubled waters on the oil,” I said to myself, when half a tumbler of
soda had hissed into the can. “There’ll be some rosy language about
when Hughes goes to light his lamp after filling it up with this stuff,
for he’ll never get it to light, much less to burn. And if he doesn’t
make the discovery too early the man who looks after his
requirements will be gone, and Master Hughes will have to sit in the
dark and go to bed with his supper uncooked, or come into Canvey
and get some more oil. He may, of course, get filling up his cooking
stove in the daytime, and find the oil won’t burn, or he may have
enough left in it to carry him through. But anyhow, if the thing
doesn’t work out as I hope, there will be no harm done, for at the
worst they can only suppose that some water has accidentally got
into the can.”
The thing did work out as I had hoped, however, for as night was
beginning to close in I saw Hughes unlashing the dinghy as if to
come ashore, and judging from the sounds which broke the evening
stillness I had reason to believe that he was at his old habit of
swearing aloud to himself. This is a habit which is more soothing to
the swearer than to an enforced listener, especially when the
swearer is rowing a heavy boat against the tide, and jerks out a
fresh and aggressively emphasised oath with each expulsion of
breath. On this occasion the hopes which were expressed about the
soul, eyes, limbs, and internal organs of every one who had been
connected with the offending oil, beginning with the individual who
“struck” it, and finishing off with the shopkeeper who sold it, and the
man who brought it to the hulks, were distinctly uncharitable.
 Nor did Hughes confine himself to human beings, for the
unfortunate can in which the oil had been carried and the various
matches which had been struck in his unavailing efforts to light the
lamp were with strict impartiality similarly banned.
“Oil!” he growled as he ran the boat ashore. “I’ll oil ’im and the
man wot sold it too!” (More hopes in regard to the soul, eyes, limbs,
and internal organs of the offender.) “A pretty fine fool ’e made o’
me, standin’ there burnin’ my fingers and a box of matches trying to
find out what was wrong. Oil! Call that splutterin’ stuff oil! Why, I
might as well ’ave tried to set fire to the river.”
Still swearing, he made fast the dinghy and proceeded, can in
hand, in the direction of the village.
After a time I started to follow, and overtook him just as he was
passing my cottage.
“Good-night,” I called out over my shoulder in passing, as is the
custom in the country.
He replied by bidding me go to a place which, though it may likely
enough have been his ultimate destination, I sincerely hope may
never be mine nor the reader’s.
“I’m sure I know that dulcet voice,” I said, stopping and wheeling
round. “It must be, it is, the genial Hughes. How are you, my worthy
fellow?”
The worthy fellow intimated that his health was not noticeably
affected for the better by the sight of me.
“Oh, don’t say that,” I said. “You were most hospitable to me in
the matter of drinks when I had the pleasure of spending a very
delightful hour in your company on board the ‘Cuban Queen’ one
evening. Pray let me return the compliment. This is my cottage, and
I’ve got some excellent whisky aboard. Won’t you come in and have
a glass?”
This was a temptation not to be withstood, and he replied a little
more civilly that he “didn’t mind,” and even unbent so far as to
answer Yes or No to one or two casual remarks I made.
When he rose to go, some spirit of mischief prompted me to ask
him what he had in the oilcan, and this, apparently recalling his
grievance, put him in the worst of tempers again, for he snatched at
it, savagely blurting out,—
“What the dickens ’as that got to do with you?”
“Keep a civil tongue in your head, you scoundrel!” I said sharply,
taking a step towards him. “Answer me like that again, and I’ll give
you a lesson you won’t forget!”
“You, yer bloomin’ monkey!” he snarled, spitting on the ground in
front of me as an outward and visible sign of his contempt. “You
give me a lesson! And where should I be, do yer think?”
I looked him full in the face and shot my bolt.
“You would be in prison, my good fellow, for harbouring a
murderer, disguised as a woman, and you’d be charged with being
an accessory after the fact.”
He stepped back, paling visibly under his bronze complexion, and
answered, for once, without an oath.
“’E ain’t a murderer. ’E’s a private soldier wot struck ’is superior
officer for comin’ between ’im and ’is wife, and then deserted. I see
it myself in the paper ’e showed me, and I’d ’a done the same if I’d
bin in ’is place. And so ’ud you, Mister.”
“Ho, ho! my friend,” I said to myself. “I was a ‘monkey’ a moment
ago—now I’m a ‘Mister.’ So you are funking it already, are you?”
And then, aloud,—
“Do you think any jury will believe that you thought a private
soldier could afford to pay you what that man’s paying? Now, look
here! I’ve got the whip hand of you, but I don’t wish you any harm,
personally. If you’ll do exactly as I tell you, and play me fair, I’ll pay
you the sum that yonder man’s paying you, and you sha’n’t get into
any trouble if I can help it.”
 “Wot d’ yer want me to do?” he asked.
“Answer me one question first. Supposing I were to arrange to
take your place on the ‘Cuban Queen’ for a couple of days. In that
case the man who waits on the hulks would have to be squared to
keep his mouth shut. Could that be done?”
“P’raps. ’E ain’t the inspector. ’E’s paid to wait on us, so as we
don’t ’ave to leave the ’ulks. ’Tain’t ’is business to look after what we
do. P’raps ’e might if it wos worth ’is while.”
“Very well. I’ll give you the money to-night to square him, and
some on account for yourself as well. And now another question.
Where does your wife live?”
“Mill Lane, Chelmsford.”
“That’s all right. When you get back to the ‘Cuban Queen’ you’ll
get a telegram from Chelmsford to say she’s dying, and that you
must go to her. You must show that to the man you’ve got aboard.
What do you call him by-the-bye?”
“Winton.”
“Well, you must show the telegram to Winton, and tell him you
intend applying for leave, and that he must go somewhere else in
the meantime. He won’t want to leave the only safe hiding-place
he’s got, and he’ll try and persuade you not to go, and will perhaps
offer you a big money bribe to stay. You must persist in going; but
after a time you must say that you have a brother at Southend who
could come and take your place while you are away, and that you
are sure he’d keep his mouth shut if he were well paid. Winton will
have to consent if you persist. Then you’ll send a telegram to me, as
if I were your brother, asking me to come over to see you; and when
I come you’ll show me the telegram and ask me to take charge of
the hulk while you go away to see your wife. I shall come at night,
so as not to be seen, and shall pretend to agree, and then you can
go ashore and put up at my cottage here until I signal you to return.
Do as I tell you, and play me fair, and I’ll give you fifty pounds for
yourself when it’s all over. What do you say?”
 “Can’t be done,” he answered sullenly.
“Why not?”
“’Cos it can’t.”
“Very well. Good-night, then. I’m going straight from this house to
the coastguard station, and shall send two armed men out to the
hulk to arrest the murderer you’ve been harbouring, and two more
to arrest you—you can’t get far away in the meantime—for
harbouring him and for being an accessory after the fact. I suppose
you know what the punishment for that is? And when you come out
you’ll be a ruined man. The hulk-owners will discharge you without a
character for gross violation of rules.”
He looked murder, and had he been less of a coward might have
attempted as well as looked it. Then something seemed to occur to
him, and he stood staring absently at me while turning the matter
over in his bovine brain. I guessed the upshot of his meditations to
be somewhat as follows: “This man, whoever he is, has me in his
power and can ruin me. I wish he were out of the way, but I don’t
mean risking my own neck for him. If I let him go on the hulk
Winton is more than likely to suspect he’s a spy. In that case he’s
just the sort of man to knock the meddling fool on the head, and the
job I want done would get done without my putting my neck in a
noose.”
Anyhow, he looked at me curiously for a minute, and then said, in
a more conciliatory tone,—
“What are you going to do to Winton?”
“Arrest him by-and-bye. If I can I’ll keep your name out of it. If I
can’t, and you lose your crib, I’ll make it up to you in some way. But
let me tell you one thing: you’d better play me fair, or it will be the
worse for you. The ‘Cuban Queen’ is being watched night and day,
and if you tell Winton of your meeting with me, and he tries to
escape or you try to give us the slip yourself, you’ll be instantly
arrested, and it will go hard with you then. Play me fair and I’ll play
you fair, and no harm need come to you at all in the matter. Once
more, will you come to my terms? If not, I’m off to the coastguard
station. There’s only one policeman in Canvey, and I shall want two
or three men—armed men—for Winton, and the same for you. I
mean business, I can tell you. Come, is it Yes or No?”
“Yes,” he answered, with a horrible oath. And then we sat down to
arrange the details of our little conspiracy.
 CHAPTER XXVIII
I BOARD THE “CUBAN QUEEN” FOR THE
SECOND TIME

“But when you had satisfied yourself that there was a man in hiding
on the ‘Cuban Queen,’” says the reader, “and when you had every
reason for suspecting that man to be Mullen, why not at once arrest
him? Why go to work like Tom Sawyer in ‘Huckleberry Finn,’ who,
when he wished to rescue Jim the nigger from the woodshed, must
needs make a seven days’ job of it, and dig the poor wretch out,
when it would have been an easy matter to abstract the key and let
him out through the door?”
Why? Well, for several reasons, one of which is that the story
would then have been shorter and perhaps less interesting. Another
is that, though it is true I had good cause to suppose the man in
hiding to be James Mullen, I had no actual proof of his identity.
The reader must remember that I had seen him but twice in my
life. The first time was in the train, going down to Southend, when
my only cause for suspecting him to be Mullen was a fancied
likeness to the published portrait. The second was on the day of the
explosion at the Post Office, and on that occasion he had been
cleverly disguised, and we had not come to close quarters until after
dark, when the difficulty of identification is greatly increased.
Were I, as matters then stood, to give information to the police, I
could only claim to be the means of accomplishing his arrest,
whereas, if I could once obtain satisfactory proof of his identity my
chain of evidence would be complete, and now that I had spent so
much time, thought and money on the enterprise, I preferred to
carry it through myself rather than hand it over to some one else at
the last moment.
 By taking Hughes’ place upon the “Cuban Queen” I hoped to
obtain the necessary evidence, and once such evidence was in my
possession, I should lose no time in effecting an arrest.
The morning after my interview with Hughes I took train to
Chelmsford, and thence despatched the pretended telegram from his
wife. When I got back to Southend, the telegram which Hughes was
to send to his supposed brother was waiting for me at the address
we had arranged between us. Lest the police should be tampering
with letters and telegrams, I had arranged that Hughes’ message
should contain nothing more than a request that Bill Hughes would
come over to see his brother Jim at Canvey.
To Canvey I accordingly went, calling first at my cottage, where I
arrayed myself in a well-worn suit of waterman’s clothes, which I
had kept there all along lest I should at any time have to assume a
disguise. My next procedure was to shave off the beard which I had
been wearing on the night of the explosion at the Post Office. The
fact that the night had been very dark was against Mullen’s knowing
me again, for though the bursting of the bomb had lit up the whole
neighbourhood, the street in which our encounter had taken place
was entirely in shadow, owing to the height of the buildings on
either side.
That it was quite possible he would recognise me, if only by my
voice, I fully realised, and I knew perfectly well that every moment I
spent in his company my life would be in my own hands; but I
flattered myself that I was more than a match for him in a fair fight,
and in regard to foul play,—well, forewarned is forearmed, and I was
not unprepared.
I waited until it was dark before starting for the hulk. Hughes
came on deck in reply to my hail, and proved a better actor than
might have been expected. After he had inquired gruffly, “Is that
you, Bill?” and I had responded, “Bill it is, Jim,” and had been bidden
come aboard, he went on—in response to my question of “Wot’s
up?”—to speak his part in the little play which we had rehearsed
together. He informed me he had had a telegram to say that his wife
was ill, and that he wished to go to her, but did not like applying for
relief because he had a cove on board, disguised as a woman (this
in a lowered voice, according to instruction), who had got into a
scrape and wanted to lie low awhile.
My supposed brother then went on to ask me if I would take
charge of the hulk in his absence, assuring me that the cove was “a
good un to pay,” and that the job would be worth a five-pound note
if I promised to keep my mouth shut.
To all this Mullen was no doubt listening, so I replied—
emphasising my remark with the expectoration and expletives which
might be looked for from a seafaring man—that I was ready to take
over the job and keep my own counsel. That point being
satisfactorily settled, I was invited to step below and make the
acquaintance of the gentleman in the cabin.
 CHAPTER XXIX
I TRY A FALL WITH JAMES MULLEN

Some one dressed like a woman was standing by the stove whistling
softly to himself while paring his nails with a pearl-handled knife.
“My brother Bill, sir,” said Hughes gruffly, and I thought rather
nervously, indicating me with the peaked cloth cap which he carried,
rolled scrollwise, in his hand.
I followed suit with a bow, or rather a duck, and a polite “Good-
evening, sir,” but Mullen continued his nail-pairing and whistling
without deigning to look up.
For about a quarter of a minute I stood there feeling, and perhaps
looking, rather foolish. Then Hughes said again, and this time rather
louder, “My brother, sir.”
“There, there, my good fellow, that will do! I haven’t become
deaf! I hear you,” Mullen answered, without raising his head.
He spoke very much in the manner affected by some curates.
Each syllable was carefully pronounced and fell as cleanly cut as if it
had been new pennies which his lips were coining. The aspirates,
the “hear” and “there’s,” he discharged at us as if his mouth had
been a tiny popgun, and he roared at us gently as any sucking dove
with the cooing sound in such words as “do.”
But for all his nicety of speech he had too much of what is
commonly called “side” in his manner to delude any one into the
idea that he was a gentleman.
There is in the bearing of your true aristocrat towards strangers a
certain suave and urbane hauteur—as of one who expects and, if
need be, will exact the courtesy he is accustomed to accord—which
the man of no breeding thinks can be imitated by the assumption of
“side.”
Without his “side” he might conceivably have passed for a
gentleman. As it is, he as surely betrays himself for what he is, as
the man who, by manifesting that over-anxiety to please—which he
mistakes for the easy courtesy of well-bred intercourse—betrays his
under-breeding.
Neither Hughes nor I made any reply to what Mullen had said—
nor did the latter seem to expect us to do so, for he looked critically
at his little finger, felt the nail with the tip of his thumb, put the
finger to his teeth, nibbled at it for an instant, and then began
scraping the nail edge very gingerly.
Chafed at his insolence as I was, I could not help noticing that his
hands were small, white, and beautifully shaped, with the long taper
fingers of the artist, and pink carefully-trimmed nails.
When he had quite finished, he closed the knife deliberately and
put it on a little shelf by the bunk, then darting a sudden sideways
glance at me, he inquired sharply, almost viciously, “Well, sir, and
what have you to say for yourself?”
It was the first time he had looked at me since I had entered the
cabin, and as I met his eye it seemed to me that he started
perceptibly, and that I saw a sudden dilatation of the pupil which
gave a look of consternation if not of fear to his face. The next
moment he turned from me and flashed at Hughes a look of such
malignity that I fully expected to see the look succeeded by a blow—
a look which, if I read it aright, was the portent of a terrible
vengeance to the man who had played him false.
I am almost ashamed to write what followed. Not for the first time
in my life—not for the first time in this enterprise—I acted as only
one could act who was possessed by some spirit of mischief for his
own undoing. Even to myself the impulse which comes over me at
times to play the fool—to say or do at the critical moment the one
word or thing which ought to be left unsaid or undone, is altogether
unaccountable.
This uncertainty of character, this tendency to lose my head and to
bring tumbling about my ears, by the utterance of a word, the entire
edifice which I have perhaps spent laborious months in building up,
has been my stumbling-block through life, and must inevitably stand
in the way of my ever becoming a good detective. But a good
detective I have, as the reader knows, never claimed to be. Were it
so, I should undoubtedly suppress the incident I am about to relate,
for it tells very much against myself without in any way
strengthening the probability of my story.
When the man in hiding on the “Cuban Queen” lifted his head and
looked me in the face, I knew at once that I was in the presence, if
not of James Mullen, at all events of the person with whom I had
travelled to Southend on the occasion when he had objected so
forcibly to the striking of a fusee. The bright prominent eyes,
beautiful as a woman’s, the delicately clear complexion, the straw-
coloured hair, the aquiline nose with the strange upward arching of
the nostrils, the curious knitting of the brows over the eyes, the full
lips that spoke of voluptuousness unscrupulous and cruel, the firm,
finely-moulded chin—all these there was no mistaking, in spite of his
woman’s dress. As I looked at him the scene in the stuffy smoking
carriage on the Southend railway came back to me, and when in his
quick, incisive way he asked, “Well, sir, and what have you to say for
yourself?” I stammered foolishly for a moment, and then, prompted
by what spirit of perversity and mischief I know not, answered him
by another question, which under the circumstances must have
sounded like intentional insolence.
“You’re the man wot couldn’t stand the smell of fusees?”
Had horns suddenly sprouted out on each side of my head he
could not have looked at me with more absolute amazement and
dismay. For a very few seconds he stared wide-eyed with wonder,
and then a look of comprehension and cunning crept into his eyes.
They narrowed cat-like and cruel, the muscles about the cheeks
tightened, the lips parted, showing the clenched teeth, I heard his
breath coming and going like that of a winded runner, and the next
second his face flamed out with a look of such devilish ferocity and
uncontrollable fury as I pray God I may never see on face of man
again.
With a howl of hatred more horrible than that of any tiger—for no
wild beast is half so hellish in its cruelty as your human tiger—he
sprang at me, beating at my face, now with closed fist, now open-
handed and with clutching, tearing nails, kicking with his feet, biting
and snapping at my hands and throat like a dog, and screaming like
a very madman.
To this day it consoles me not a little for the lapse of self-
possession which I had just before manifested to think that I never
lost presence of mind during this onslaught. When he came at me,
my one thought was to see that he made use of no weapons. His
wild-cat clawing and scratching it was no difficult matter for any one
with a quick eye and cool head to ward off; but when I saw him clap
his hand to his hip, where, had he been wearing male clothing, a
pistol or knife might well have lain, the eye I kept upon him was, I
promise you, a keen one.
Finding no pocket at his hips reminded him no doubt of his
woman’s dress, for his hand slipped down to the side of his skirt,
where it floundered about as helplessly as a fish out of water.
A woman’s pocket is, to the degenerate male mind, a fearful and
wonderful piece of mechanism. The intention of the designer was
apparently to offer special inducements to pickpockets, and so to
construct the opening that the contents should either fall out
altogether and be lost, or should be swallowed up by dark and
mysterious depths into which no male hand dare venture to
penetrate. The only way to get at anything which happens to be
wanted seems to be to haul the entire pocket to the surface, very
much as a fishing-net is hauled from the depths of the sea, and to
turn it inside out in search of the missing article.
 On the occasion in question, Mullen was in too much of a hurry to
adopt this course, and, but for the seriousness of the situation, I
could have smiled, as I held him at arm’s length, to see him diving
and fumbling among those unplumbed depths. When at last he rose,
so to speak, gasping, to the surface, his hand was clutching a pistol-
barrel, but the butt had in some way caught the lining of the dress,
and in order to extricate it he had to turn the entire pocket inside
out. In doing so, a folded paper fell, unseen by him, to the floor, and
this I determined at all costs to secure.
Before he could raise his arm to use the pistol, I laid a hand of
iron upon his. As I gripped the fingers which were grasping the butt
they scrunched sickeningly and relaxed their hold of the pistol, which
I wrenched away and tossed upon the bunk. Then I closed with him
that we might try a fall together. Twisting my heel behind his ankle I
jerked him backwards and had him off his legs in a jiffy. We fell to
the floor—he under and I above—with a crash, and as we did so my
hand closed over the paper, to secure which I had thrown him.
Crumpling it up in a ball I made as if to rise to a sitting posture,
and in doing so managed to slip it into a side pocket. The next
moment I found myself pulled over on my back by Hughes, who
asked excitedly if we were both mad that we thus courted inquiry by
fighting like a couple of wild cats. If the sound of scuffling or firing
were heard to come from the hulk an alarm would, he said, be
raised, the coastguardsmen would row out to discover the cause,
and everything would be lost, as Mullen and I would be called upon
to give an account of ourselves, and he (Hughes) would forfeit his
post.
Mullen was evidently of the same opinion, for though he was livid
to the lips, and was trembling with hate and rage until his teeth
chinked in his head like a carelessly-carried tray of china, he gave no
sign of wishing to continue the contest.
Nor was I inclined to shut my eyes to the wisdom of Hughes’
counsel, for I was already conscious of the fact that by taunting
Mullen and provoking him to blows I was doing my best to spoil my
own game. There was all the difference in the world between his
presence on board the hulk being discovered by the police as a
result of a brawl, and his being arrested on information given by me
and supported by proof of his identity.
Mullen was the first to speak. He was now no doubt convinced
that he had not acted with his customary discretion, for he had even
stronger reasons than I to wish to avoid a visit from the police. So
long as it was a question of brains he might hope to hold his own,
but let him once fall into their hands and they would hold him by the
brute force of number, whereas in me he was pitted against a single
foe whom it might not be difficult to outwit.
“I beg your pardon for what happened just now,” he said, “but
before we go any further tell me where and when I have seen you
before.”
“I saw you in the Southend train once. You ’ad a row with a bloke
wot stunk the carriage out with a fusee,” I answered, doing my best
to sustain the rôle I had assumed.
“Ah!” he said, looking very much relieved and with a wonderfully
pleasant smile, “that explains everything. To tell the honest truth,
my good man, I knew I had seen you before, the moment I set eyes
on you, and the fact is I thought you were a detective who has been
hunting me down for a long time, and who has played me one or
two tricks too dirty and too cowardly even for a detective to play,
and for which one day I mean to be even with him.”
He was smiling still, but the smile seemed to have shifted from his
eyes to his teeth, and the effect had ceased to be pleasant. He
swung himself round and away from me, and, with hands clasped
behind him and bent head, commenced pacing backward and
forward—evidently deep in thought—in the scanty space the cabin
afforded.
Five minutes went by in silence, and then he began to mutter to
himself in a low voice, turning his head from side to side every now
and then in a quick, nervous, birdlike way, his eyes never still a
moment, but pouncing restlessly first on one object and then on
another.
“What’s come to me,” he said to himself, and there was a look on
his face which I have never seen except on the face of a madman—
as, indeed, I am now fully persuaded he was. “What’s come to me
that I of all men in the world should so forget myself as to behave—
and before two louts—like a drunken, screeching, hysterical
Jezebel?”
He stopped his restless pacing for a moment, and it seemed to me
that the man was writhing under his self-contempt, as if every word
had been a lash cutting ribbons of flesh from his bare back. Once
more he fell to walking to and fro and holding converse with himself.
“Is the end coming, that I can break down like this?” he asked.
“No, no, it’s this being hunted down day and night, until I get to
start at my own shadow, that has made me nervous and
overwrought.
“Nervous! Overwrought! My God! who wouldn’t be so who has led
the life I’ve led these last six months—hearing in the daytime the
step of the officer who has come to arrest me in every sound, and
lying wide-eyed and awake the whole night through rather than trust
myself to the sleep which brings always the same hideous dream,
from which I awake screaming and with the cold sweat running off
me like water!”
It was a magnificent piece of acting, if acting it were, and there
was a pathetic break in his voice at the last which, had he not been
what he was, would have made me pity him.
But James Mullen, alias Captain Shannon, was scarcely an object
for pity, as I was soon reminded, for as he looked up my eye met
his, and he read there, I suppose, something of what was passing
through my mind. To such a man’s vanity the mere thought of being
considered a possible object for pity is unendurable. It implies a
consciousness of superiority on the part of the pitier which is
resented more fiercely than an insult or a wrong. For one moment I
thought that he was about to attack me again—not this time with
tooth and nail, after the manner of a wild cat or a hysterical woman,
but with a heavy three-legged stool which was lying upon the bunk,
tossed there, I suppose, by Hughes to be out of the way while he
was clearing up.
Mullen turned the edge of a glance toward it without taking his
eyes from mine, and I saw his hand flutter up hesitatingly for a
moment like a startled bird, and then drop dead to his side, and I
knew that he was thinking how dearly, if he dared, he would love to
beat the stool again and again against my face until he had bashed
every feature out of recognition. But on this occasion he managed to
keep his self-control, and contented himself by asking me, with
savage irritability, what I was waiting for, and what I saw strange in
him that I stood staring in that way.
I replied that I was only waiting to know whether he had anything
else to say to me or my brother before the latter left the hulk.
He did not answer except to snap out, “You can go,” to Hughes,
but when, after a surly “Good night both,” that worthy had taken his
departure, Mullen turned to me again.
“Now listen. I’m a dangerous man to trifle with, and a desperate
one, and there are not many things I’d stick at to be level with the
man who played me false. But I can be a good friend to those who
play me fair, as well as a relentless enemy. Act squarely by me while
you are here, and keep your mouth shut when you leave, and you’ll
never have cause to regret it. But if you play tricks here, or blab
when you’re gone, you’ll do the worst day’s work for yourself you
ever did in your life. Do you understand?”
He waited for a reply, so I nodded and said, “Fair do is fair do,
guv’nor. That’s all right.”
“Very well,” he continued; “now we understand each other, and no
more need be said about it. I shall sleep in the hold as I’ve done
before, for if any one came out to the hulk for any reason it wouldn’t
do for them to see me. You’ll take your nap here as your brother did.
So I bid you good-night.”
“Good-night, sir,” I answered civilly, holding the door open for him.
“Now I’ll have a look at the paper that fell out of your pocket in
the tussle, my friend,” I added, as soon as he was out of hearing.
“I’ve got all the night before me; for I don’t intend to take the nap of
which you were speaking until I’ve got you safe in custody—
otherwise it might be a nap to which there would come no waking.”
 CHAPTER XXX
MORE DEVILRY

There was no fastening to the door of my cabin, but on passing my

hand over the place where a fastening might have been expected, a
flake of soft substance caught in my finger-nail and dropped to the
floor. This, when I picked it up, proved to be a pellet of bread
kneaded to the consistency of putty or dough. Taking the swing
lamp from its bracket I examined the door more closely and saw that
there had once been a fastening of some sort. A closer examination
convinced me that the person who had removed the fastening had
been to the pains of plugging the empty screw-holes with kneaded
bread, after which he had apparently rubbed dirt-smeared fingers
over the place where the fastening had been, in order to hide the
marks left by removal.
When I picked out the bread-plugs—which had only recently been
put in, as they were still damp—I saw that the screw-holes were
clean inside, although there were tiny rings of dirt on the outside
where the roughened edges had brushed against the fingers and
collected whatever it was which had been smeared upon them.
Very softly I opened the door and looked at the other side, where,
as I expected, I found a bolt. A moment’s examination satisfied me
that it was the very bolt which had been on the inside, and that it
had only recently been placed where it was.
“There is some devilry in this,” I said to myself. “Even if the bolt
had not been recently changed I should strongly object to be
anywhere where Mullen could fasten me in if he had a mind to. I
shall have to take out these screws one by one with my penknife
and make each hole so large that the screws don’t bite. Then I’ll
replace them, and the whole concern will look as it was before; but
if Mullen should fasten me in, one good kick will fetch the bolt off
and let me out.”
The job was tedious and lengthy, for I had to work in silence and
with a penknife in place of a screw-driver. But I got through it at
last, and having barricaded the door from the inside as best I could,
I pulled out the paper which had fallen from Mullen’s pocket.
A glance was sufficient to satisfy me that my find was no less than
the latter part of another manifesto, printed like previous
manifestoes in rude capitals, and bearing the well-known signature—
“By Order,
“CAPTAIN SHANNON.”
It was evidently an attempt to stir up, for his own ends and
purposes, the disloyalty of the discontented Irish, and by professing
to champion their cause, to enlist their sympathy and co-operation in
the war which was being waged against England. Here is the
document itself:—

“If England have annexed Ireland because she is

smaller and lies near, then might France with equal justice
annex England, for Ireland lies no nearer to England than
England to France.
“Ireland is no mere pendant to England, like Anglesea
or the Isle of Wight; she is a separate and different
country, scarcely smaller in size, complete in herself, and
peopled by a nation of different creed, different
temperament, and different race.
“The Celt shall not be ruled by the Teuton, nor the
Teuton by the Celt.
“God gave Ireland her independence when he cut her
off from England and separated the two countries by
dividing seas.
“And they whom God has set asunder let no man join.
 “But you have joined us to yourself in the union of
bondage and oppression, and when we cry out under our
bondage—a bondage which, were the cases reversed,
England would be as little ready to tolerate as Ireland—
how do you meet our righteous demands?
“By trying to humour us as a woman seeks to humour a
troublesome child to whom she tosses a toy. By sending
us what you dare not insult the Scotch by sending to
Scotland—a sawdust figure, of which you hold the strings,
who is to play at being king and holding court to please
us. But we—ah God! was ever so unreasonable a people?
—we do not simper and dance to the fiddling of this
dummy king who is not even of our own choosing, for we
are ungracious enough to remember that we have in our
midst men of older lineage and nobler blood than he.
“And then you cast about in your mind for some other
means by which you can make us loyal under subjection.
And when there is born to that ‘Queen of Ireland’ whom
Ireland never sees—though she can journey far afield to
southern France or Italy—another princeling, for whom
royal provision must be made out of the pockets of the
people, who can scarce find their own children in bread,
you say, ‘Go to, here is our opportunity; we will make
Ireland loyal for ever by giving this princeling Patrick as
one of his many names and by dubbing him Duke of
Connaught.’
“But Ireland, graceless, thankless, stubborn Ireland, is
not one whit more loyal after receiving this royal boon, for
she knows that you rule over her by the coward’s right—
the right of the strong to oppress and make subject the
weak.
“You call her your sister while you seek to make her
your slave, even as you call Irishmen your brothers while
 you have sought to make their very name a reproach and
a fitting subject for your sorry jests.
“You hold Ireland in the thrall of cruel oppression—for
cowardice is always cruel—not because of any sisterly
feeling for her or love for her people, whom you hate and
who hate you with an undying hate, but because you are
afraid to let her go free.
“But that which you fear shall assuredly come to pass,
and Ireland, which might and would have been your friend
and ally were she free, is but waiting till you are involved
in war to prove herself your deadliest and bitterest enemy
and the friend and ally of every country which calls itself
your foe.
“By order.
“Captain Shannon.”

No more convincing proof that the fugitive in hiding on the “Cuban

Queen” was Captain Shannon could be wished for than this
document, and the only question I had to consider was how best to
accomplish his arrest.
I decided that the safest plan would be to signal Hughes to return.
He could see the hulk from the top window of my cottage, and I had
arranged with him that a red jersey (the men in charge of the hulks
wear red jerseys not unlike those affected by the Salvationists) slung
over the ship’s side was to be taken as meaning, “Come back as
soon as it is dark, and say that your wife is better.”
His return would, of course, render my presence on the hulk
unnecessary, and there would be nothing further for me to do but to
receive whatever payment Mullen proposed to give me, wish him
and my supposed brother good-bye and come ashore. Thence I
should make straight for the coastguard station and inform the
officer in charge that the notorious Captain Shannon was at that
moment in hiding on the “Cuban Queen” disguised as a woman. The
rest would be easy, for I had hit upon a plan by which, providing
that I could count upon the necessary assistance at the proper
moment, the fugitive could be secured without difficulty or danger,
and I saw no reason why the newspaper placards of the morning
after Hughes’s return should not bear the startling announcement,
“Arrest of Captain Shannon.”
 CHAPTER XXXI
THE ARREST OF CAPTAIN SHANNON

Six o’clock next morning saw the red jersey, which was to recall
Hughes, slung over the ship’s side, and the preconcerted reply
signalled from the upper window of the cottage.
From then until nightfall I had to possess my soul in patience, and
never in my life has time hung so heavily on my hands as on that
eventful day.
Mullen, who had been up since daybreak, was watching the
shipping with the liveliest interest. By standing on the steps of the
cockpit he could, without being seen himself, get a distant view of
every vessel that passed up or down the great waterway of the
Thames.
He was inclined to be friendly, even talkative, and only once was
there a recurrence of the irritability he had manifested on the
previous evening. It happened in this wise.
Some fishing lines were in the cabin, and being badly in want of
something to make the time pass, I baited them with shreds of raw
herring, and threw them over the ship’s side. I got a “bite” directly,
but, on hauling up, found it came from a crab about as big as a five-
shilling piece, whom I tenderly detached from the inhospitable hook
and restored to his native element. I rebaited, sent the lead whizzing
overboard, and again brought up a crab.
“Come to look for the other one, I suppose,” I said to myself. “His
wife, perhaps. I’ll treat her kindly,” and crab number two rejoined its
dear ones.
Again I rebaited, again there was a bite, and again a crab clawing
wildly at the air appeared at the end of the line.
 “H’m—a sister this time, or perhaps a daughter. Back she goes,
however,” and crab number three popped safely overboard, only to
be succeeded by crab number four.
“These are Scotch crabs, I should think,” I grumbled, “they’re so
clannish;” but him too I sent on his way rejoicing. Then a fifth
appeared on the scene.
“Oh, hang it all!” I growled. “I shall never get any fish if the crabs
eat up my bait as fast as I put it on. I hoped that last was an
orphan, but it seems as if I had struck another family gathering.”
Crab number six added insult to injury by refusing to let go the
bait, though I turned him over on his back and shook him till he
rattled.
“Oh, I can’t stand this,” I said, raising a menacing heel. But more
humane feeling prevailed, and once more I stooped to assist the
pertinacious crustacean to his native deep. A nip from his foreclaws
was all I got for my pains.
“Very well,” I said, “if you will have it, you will.”
Down came the heel, there was a sickening scrunch, and what
had been a crab was a noisome mess.
Then I heard an exclamation of disgust behind me, and, looking
guiltily round, saw that Mullen, who had hitherto been too absorbed
in watching the shipping to interest himself in my fishing, had heard
the scrunch of the crab’s shell under my heel, and had turned to
ascertain the cause.
“You brute!” he said. “Why couldn’t you throw the wretched thing
back into the water?”
“It ain’t none of your business,” I answered sulkily.
“It is my business, and every decent person’s business. The thing
never did you any harm. Besides, look at the ghastly mess you’ve
made.”
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