by David Black
They all sat, glum. Britain had occupied Iceland a few months ago to stop Jerry putting U-boat bases there, astride the convoy routes, because Jerry on Iceland was the end of Britain’s north Atlantic lifeline.
The Honourable Bertie was first to ask: ‘Um. I know I’m spoiling your soliloquy, dear boy, but what do we do when we get there? If it’s all true?’
‘Obviously, Bertie, we report back.’
They all knew what that meant: breaking radio silence, even though they’d still be in the belly of the beast.
Bertie nodded and smiled his indulgence for an old chum: ‘If there are Jerries there, are we supposed to sink them?’
Sink them in neutral Soviet waters? That was the subtext.
‘We’ve not to get caught,’ was all Trumble said.
All discussion on the matter of orders was over so with a few glances all round, they got down to the serious planning.
Communicating between the two boats without breaking radio silence was first up: manoeuvring signals, alert signals all reduced to shorthand Morse, using Aldis lamps from the bridge, or submerged, by Asdic pulses. Then they set out procedures for everything from firing breeches buoy lines to co-ordinating deck gun and anti-aircraft fire. Finally, there was the rendezvous point to be agreed off the Kola Peninsula, where they would meet before proceeding inshore: thirty-degrees east, seventy-three-degrees north, in the middle of freezing ocean.
There was one other problem: the charts. All they had dated back to the 1820s when John Barrow was second secretary at the Admiralty, and he was using the fleet that had defeated Napoleon to check out shortcuts to China for want of something better to do. The only updating done on them since had been the odd ‘notes to mariners’ from passing tramp steamers engaged in the timber and whale-oil trade out of Murmansk and Archangel. When they got there, there was going to be a lot of ‘proceed with caution’.
‘One last thing,’ said Harry as the Honourable Bertie’s lot prepared to rise. It was all to do with something Shirley had said . . . ‘P . . . umppity tumppity.’
‘You said we weren’t to get caught, sir. If the Russians spot our periscopes or a bit of conning tower . . . we’re just another submarine. They won’t know who to blame. But if they see our numbers . . . they just have to look through last year’s Jane’s and they’ll have us as British. Maybe we should paint the numbers out before we sail.’
They all stared at him, more so Trumble. ‘You can be a sneaky little bastard sometimes, Gilmour,’ he said.
Chapter Nineteen
There was no denying it: it was land. The first good day since they had slipped from Lerwick, they had executed their daily trim dive just before dawn and had surfaced into a clear, cloudless sky; the air still, as if itself frozen, and the waters of the Arctic Ocean rising and falling like a steel-blue lullaby. And there off the starboard bow was land, dancing on a gall of freezing air: snow-capped mountain peaks, eighty miles closer than they should have been.
The Skipper and Grainger were on the bridge. In the control room Harry could feel their consternation tumbling down the conning tower hatch.
The weather they’d endured on the long, long slog north had come at them in varying degrees of awfulness. If the wind abated, fog and mist and rain set in; when the wind rose, so did the sea, and the further north they got, the sea began sticking to The Bucket’s conning tower, and periscope stands, and gun – ice, in other words – and never, ever a sight of the sun or even a star.
They had battered on using dead-reckoning, working out their progress by speed and course, and frantic fingering of the nautical almanacs trying to factor in the effects of tides and currents when known; and falling back on sheer guesswork when it came to calculating by how much the battering wind might be knocking them off a point here, a point there, from their course. Way point by way point, Grainger had done his sums, and according to his dead-reckoning, the coast of Norway, for surely that must be what they were looking at, should have been a hundred miles to starboard. The evidence of their eyes said different, and now the Skipper was worrying what to do about it. The first worry on his mind was being discovered by enemy air patrols, with the coast of Norway demonstrably a mere twenty miles away. He wasn’t apportioning blame yet . . . but the truth was filtering through the boat, and as far as ‘the buckets’ were concerned, it was the navigator’s fault.
The Bucket had not been a happy boat on their long journey to beyond the Arctic Circle. The growing intrusion of Grainger on their everyday lives had hung over all of them. A submarine was too small a space for the effects of such a judgmental ego not to be felt to the furthest reaches. Although in this case, it stopped abruptly at the forward engine room bulkhead. Mr Partridge did not suffer it to come further, and as Mr Partridge reported direct to the Skipper, even Grainger knew better than to try and wander back there, casting his deprecating eye over all he would survey. Forward, the Quartermaster, Tubby Tevis, was ready to kill him. And so was Carey: to rile the Jimmy the way he had was no mean achievement by Grainger. He’d even penetrated the hitherto impervious hide of the Tigger.
Under orders not to waste a minute, they had steamed north on the surface, steering to cross the Arctic Circle at a point five degrees west, before shaping a course direct for the rendezvous point, 600 nautical miles to their north-east on the edge of the Barents Sea, where the north coast of Norway met that of the Soviet Union. It was a course which kept them well away from the coast of occupied Norway and the eyes of any prying Germans. Which was why, on that empty ocean, and while still in company with Trumpeter, the Skipper had been confident enough to arrange a series of gunnery exercises to keep both boats’ gun crews tight.
Immediately after surfacing from their dawn trim dives, each boat would dump its gash, unweighted, and the other would blast away until it had sunk the offending sacks. By the time The Bucket and Trumpeter parted company for the final run in, they were blowing each other’s rubbish to bits after only a couple of rounds, even in the crappiest weather.
The Tigger should have been insufferably jubilant – but wasn’t, for Grainger had been on hand at every shoot to offer advice. Nor had Harry escaped Grainger’s critical attentions; the only difference here was that Harry knew how to deal with him. Navigation was where their paths crossed, and Harry shadowed the new navigator every step of the way.
‘I want to pick up your skills, sir,’ he’d told ‘Tyrone’ in tones just this side of fawning.
Every martinet has a weak point reasoned Harry and it appeared that ‘Tyrone’ was prepared to accept Harry’s attentions as his due. As for Harry: his aim wasn’t to curry favour, but to open up a dialogue with the man and try to work out what made him tick – and in the process, pick up as many navigation tips as he could along the way.
As the Skipper had already pointed out, Harry could be a sneaky little bastard when necessary. Which was why Harry, down in the control room, was just as concerned as Grainger about this yawning error in their position. According to Harry’s dead-reckoning too, they really should have been a hundred miles away from the Norwegian coast.
‘Mr Gilmour to the bridge! And bring your sextant!’ It was the Skipper.
He was obviously seeking a second opinion on where the bloody hell they were! Harry headed for his locker.
By the time Harry was back in the control room, clutching his instrument, it had actually dawned on him what was happening; if he was right, he was going to feel so bloody smug! Grainger, up on the bridge, must have already been shooting the sun, still low on the horizon to the south-east, calling down his readings to Carey, who was checking them against almanac and chronometer. Even if the whole crew were dying for the navigator to fall on his arse, Carey of all people knew that this was no gloating matter. But then Harry didn’t think Grainger had got it wrong. When he got to the bridge he knew it.
It was crowded up there, in the brilliant freezing air, with four instead of two lookouts, summoned upstairs to scour the sea and sky for Jerrie
s, so close to land. Because there it was for all to see and comprehend: a thin, jagged and very solid line along the horizon. Harry could have laughed out loud, but decorum was called for.
‘Sir,’ he said, by way of innocent preamble.
The Skipper, binoculars fixed on the mountains, said nothing.
‘Sir,’ repeated Harry, ‘I don’t think Mr Grainger’s position is actually that far out.’
The Skipper leant back and gestured towards the far peaks, with that arch, sarcastic look of faux incredulity he was so fond of.
‘They’re not really there, sir,’ said Harry.
The Skipper just stared at him but you could see his mind working, calculating whether young Gilmour was experiencing a breakdown or picking precisely the wrong moment to discover his inability to tell the difference between a bad practical joke and grossly insubordinate impertinence.
‘It’s the clear sky, sir . . . the air is really cold. The sea is always that bit warmer, especially in these latitudes, and since the sky cleared last night, it’s just that bit more so. That causes a thin layer of moist air to form between the water and the cold air, and it acts as a lens.’
‘What are you talking about, Mr Gilmour?’ said the Skipper.
‘It’s a mirage, sir,’ said Harry. ‘I’ve seen it before, yachting, in the early spring or late autumn when the air is cold and the sea warmer. The moist air acts as a lens. I’ve seen the MacBrayne’s steamer low-flying on its way to Tobermory, and Ailsa Craig lifted out of the Firth of Clyde when we weren’t even up to Toward Point and its peak shouldn’t have been above the horizon. Those mountains are probably a good hundred miles away, but the way the light is being refracted through the moist air it looks as if they’re just on the horizon. They’re not.’
The silence was broken from down below. Carey, who’d heard none of the exchange, called up: ‘Mr Grainger’s figures put us within two miles, east-south-east of his original estimated position, sir!’
After 600 nautical miles of cloud and fog and gale and unknown currents with never a sight of sun or star, Grainger had brought them to a point that was actually nearer a mile and a half of their aiming point. Everyone paused to consider the seamanship involved, and to reconsider Grainger. Up until now they hadn’t much liked what they saw.
On passage, with the routine of the boat fixed, and a standing order to avoid contact with the enemy at all cost, there had been a little more time to spare over meals round the wardroom table for the officers to get to know their new colleague; and submarines being the cramped, hugger-mugger steel tubes that they were, the crew to eavesdrop. But Grainger had given nothing away, and naval etiquette forbade the Skipper from forcing him. They had only learned one thing: when Grainger had been asked where he got his DSC, he merely replied: ‘Narvik.’
Harry hadn’t known that the dark-blue ribbon on Grainger’s chest with its broad, vertical white stripe was a Distinguished Service Cross, but he knew they didn’t grow on trees. Or that the man had been in the same waters as he had, probably just a fjord away, exhibiting the ‘conspicuous gallantry’ the ribbon demanded while Harry had been standing around watching his men ‘have a fag’.
Harry decided he was going to get to know Grainger better. But the little he’d found out had filled him with dismay.
Living cheek by jowl on a submarine meant you got to know your fellow crewmen very well indeed, but when it came to what made them tick – that was another matter. Some blokes, you got to know everything about, down to the name of their sister’s pet goldfish. Others, rank being obvious, all you got was a name, and sometimes a vague geographic point of origin.
The Skipper wasn’t a great one for small talk. They knew he came from Hampshire, where his family were in timber. He was a second son who saw no incentive in going into the family business. There were always girls involved and he was a very good cricketer, liked his beer and was undefeated uckers champion of the boat. Also, you didn’t talk to him for long before discovering he was a very witty man – sometimes viciously so – and that there was a steel not to be trifled with.
There wasn’t much to know about Sub-Lieutenant Milner, aka the Tigger, beyond an enthusiasm that was itself beyond parody. His family ‘had land’ in Herefordshire and he had followed numerous brothers to a very respectable prep school before ending up in Dartmouth. He seemed to only vaguely know about his sisters, who were indeterminate in number and collectively referred to as ‘les girls’. He liked Rita Hayworth and explosive ordnance, not necessarily in that order, and was cognitively incapable of imagining any existence for himself other than that of a Royal Navy officer.
It was with Malcolm Carey that Harry built up a serious friendship. The tall, angular, impossibly exotic Carey. An intelligent, well-read man, with a precision of speech and movement that bespoke a certain unashamed vanity, which ‘Jack’ allowed him on account of the fact that he took the care and maintenance of his crew very seriously indeed. He was ‘old Melbourne’, privately educated and from a family with ‘strong interests’ in finance down under; who had wanted to see the world but still wanted the respect, and maybe just a tiny bit of envy, from his contemporaries and elders. Oh, and it has to be mentioned . . . if nothing else, Carey certainly looked the part. And of course, he was married to the beautiful Fenella. He and Harry talked about many things, but after the novelty of Carey’s exotic background was exhausted, most of the time they talked about books.
And that was the wardroom of HMS Trebuchet, until Lieutenant Grainger RN joined. And what did they learn of him? Suffice to say it was some time before they even knew that the Christian name on his papers was Christopher. But that wasn’t what he called himself, apparently. For that snippet of knowledge they’d had to wait for Harry’s inveigling.
‘Kit,’ he’d told Harry eventually. ‘I answer to Kit.’
Their conversations came in spurts and starts after that. Sudden, spontaneous bursts of chat, always initiated by Grainger, and all singularly failing to inspire any confidence in a bright future together for Kit and ‘the buckets’.
‘The only point to being in the navy is to command,’ he’d told Harry. It was obviously a belated reply to Harry’s question of weeks ago about why he’d joined the trade.
In subsequent chats it dribbled out. He’d been on destroyers, usually a berth where responsibility came quickly to young officers. Not quickly enough however for Grainger. His reward for reckless bravery hadn’t been a quick bump to Jimmy aboard a sistership, just a pat on the back, a bit of ribbon and a ‘carry on, Mr Grainger!’
‘It was either light forces. You know, MTBs, motor gunboats . . . or submarines,’ he’d told Harry. ‘But vroom-vrooming around in plywood bath toys in the Channel isn’t proper navy, is it?’
It was a rhetorical question.
‘So here I am.’
Harry didn’t know exactly what that told him about his new shipmate, but none of it gave him a warm feeling. Navigator on The Bucket was apparently just another rung on Mr Grainger’s rise to command.
But by getting them to here, there was a definite change in the air around Grainger. Not that Harry had any time to properly gauge it. They had just another few hours to the rendezvous point with Trumpeter, and since they would be coming up on it in daylight, close in to Russian territorial waters – and by default, the German-occupied Norwegian border – they would be making the approach submerged.
‘The buckets’ went to work, preparing the boat for action, getting her ready to meet the enemy in whatever shape or form he might come over the horizon. And in the activity Harry noticed something happening among the crew that the short, familiar war patrols had so far not made happen. Up here, so far from home, from support or help, too far for a damaged boat to limp home, on a specific mission, not some opportunistic jaunt to see how many strips of white cloth they could add to their Jolly Roger, they began to change. All these vibrant characters aboard were disappearing before his eyes: their diversity, their personal difference
s, draining away; their individuality being packed and stowed. He didn’t understand what was happening at first, that this was what happened when men long-trained to become part of a machine, finally do so; because this time, more than any other time, their lives depended on it.
The Skipper had the Tigger and Carey pinned down in the wardroom, idly humiliating them at uckers to pass the time. A pot of steaming coffee sat on the table as a treat, with an opened can of condensed milk on the side. The Skipper was la-la-ing absently to himself as he danced across the board with his quarter-inch nut for a playing piece. The other two looked on, Tigger tight-lipped with irritation and Carey affecting boredom. That was when the subdued shuffling and bumping forward erupted into a full-blown clatter and clang of metal on metal, accompanied by yells and curses, and even a whistle’s shrill scream.
The Skipper arched back and leaned into the passageway.
‘Good grief, what the bloody hell is going on there?’ He turned to the watch messenger in the control room. ‘Get forward and find out who’s breaking my boat!’
The messenger, a junior rate in overalls and no cap, shot past with a hurried, ‘Aye aye, sir!’
Still leaning into the passage, the Skipper heard Harry’s voice rise above what was left of the hubbub.
‘I do not care if it goes all the way up your arse next time,’ he heard Harry annunciate in his slow, fierce, I’m a grown-up dealing with a child voice. ‘We will keep doing this until we get it right. It’s called training. Because if you don’t get it right, we’ll all be dead and it won’t matter where the rifle’s gone, or how far. Do you understand?’
The sounds of bodies and stuff rearranging themselves ensued.
The Skipper was readdressing his game when the junior rate came back down the passageway, stifling a grin.
‘Report,’ said the Skipper.
‘It’s Mr Gilmour, sir,’ said the young sailor. ‘He’s got his landing party drilling fer getting out the forward hatch wi’ their Lee Enfields and the dinghy, sir. G’tting’ in a bit o’ a fankle, sir.’