by John Harris
They struggled ahead, the engine pounding, the ship shuddering with the vibration so that a pencil on the chart table danced along its surface until it fell over the edge to the deck. They were barely moving now and the gunboat was drawing closer. Staring at it, Willie felt his heart sinking.
‘Sweet suffering J,’ he said softly.
There was a long silence as they watched the approaching gunboat, then Edward, who had been staring in the opposite direction, spoke again. ‘Perhaps we won’t need Him Father,’ he said. ‘We have friends.’
Following his gesturing hand with his eyes, Willie saw a destroyer appearing through the mist and racing to place itself between the Lady Roberts and the gunboat. At its masthead was the White Ensign.
‘Done it,’ he said.
At that moment, the Lady Roberts slowly and inexorably came to a stop. They were aground.
The clang of the telegraph came as Yeh ordered the engine astern. Stirred yellow mud bubbled up round the ship as the telegraph clanged again and the wheel was swung to probe for deeper water. Once again they felt the soft jar as they touched bottom, and, as they tried to struggle forward, there was a flash and a puff of smoke from the gunboat. The shell exploded ahead of them, but it was off target, and the British destroyer, swinging round in a great arc, leaning with the turn, fired a shot in return. It was considerably closer to the Nationalist ship than the Nationalist’s shot had been to the Lady Roberts and they saw the gunboat’s silhouette begin to grow shorter.
‘She’s turning away,’ Edward said.
As the gunboat swung, showing her stern, the Lady Roberts gave a great shudder, seemed to shake herself, then slithered across the mud into deeper water.
‘I think, Father,’ Edward said, ‘that, thanks to the Royal Navy, you’ve probably made it.’
As he spoke, Yeh grinned and it occurred to Willie that he’d never seen him smile before.
‘All you have to do now, Father,’ Edward pointed out, ‘is get to Hong Kong, where you can sort out your affairs, play piano at the party, and head for Australia.’
They were well beyond the mouth of the river now and in open waters opposite Chusan Island. Ahead of them at the other end of a towing hawser the destroyer laboured under their weight. They had used up their bunker fuel and all the galley coal they had acquired – plus the excess they had taken on – but a collier, alerted by radio, was on its way north to refuel them. They would have to do the bunkering themselves with their own derricks, but at least they could consider themselves safe.
Willie was still too full of emotion to speak. Out there, ahead of him, were the seas where he had made his life. The Yellow Sea. The East China Sea, where he’d fought off pirates. The South China Sea, where he had almost lost his life in an aircraft dinghy. The Sea of Japan, which he’d crossed half-dead from typhus on his return from Vladivostok in 1919. The Java Sea where by a hair’s breadth they had missed the Japanese fleet as it had massacred the last small ship survivors from Singapore. The Timor, the Arafura, the Coral Sea, and down to Sydney, where they were now bound.
He drew a deep breath. He could still smell China, that strong mixture of odours that pervaded all its cities, villages, paddy fields and roads. He hadn’t noticed it for years and had thought he’d smelled it so often it had disappeared from his consciousness. But tonight it was stronger than he’d ever noticed it – probably, he thought, because he knew he would never smell it again.
He’d seen some changes: the Empress Tzu-Hsi. Yuan ShiK’Ai. The warlords, every wicked one of them. The Kuomintang. And now the Communists. Surely they had come at last to the end of the road. There had been a war in China ever since he’d arrived there, but at last China was in charge of China again. There could surely be no more permutations of power and he could only wish them well.
And he’d lived through it all! He’d seen the old mediaeval superstition-riddled, barbaric China fade away; seen girls abandon the flat, pressed hairstyle for disastrously dyed permanent waves; seen them marry foreigners; seen them discard the tortured lily feet, satin trousers and cork-soled slippers, and adopt the cheongsam, three-inch heels and nylons, and then abandon them again for the Communists’ stark boiler suits and caps; seen them elbow the foreigners off the dance floors; seen them crooning into microphones to American jazz until political dogma had killed it all dead.
It was over. After fifty years, he was finished in China. He had finally dragged up the last of his roots and those of his family and their dependants and planted them elsewhere. He had a new life to look forward to now. Not for all that long, he supposed, because he’d already lived more of his life than he still had left to live. But he wasn’t afraid. He’d had a ball.
The Boxers. The massacre at Shantung. His heart gave a little jump as he thought of Abigail and the women in his life. Four of them. Emmeline – treacherous, spiteful, vengeful, voracious, hating Emmeline, who had died in a Japanese concentration camp. Dear Ab. Old Honest Eyes, whose loyalty and good sense had made him what he was, who had trusted him when he sometimes didn’t deserve to be trusted. Port Arthur and his introduction to the faithful Lady Roberts. Yangpo, Vladivostok and Nadya, who’d taken the place of Abigail, his wife now, good, decent, beautiful Nadya. He wasn’t sure he deserved the love he’d received. Especially when he thought guiltily of poor lost Sue-Lynn Sim, who had disappeared into the darkness of God alone knew what future, and left him saddened at the memory of her.
America. Japan. Australia. India. Indo-China. The East Indies, now no longer Dutch. He’d covered a lot of ground, risked his life here and there, made a lot of money, and come a long way from the offices of Wainwright and Halliday in the City of London. He came back to the present with a shiver. It was all lost life, lost love, lost youth, disappeared downwind years ago, all dead and done with. It had been tender at times and terrifying at others, not only when he’d been shot at, or almost died but also when funds had run out and he’d thought he was going bust. But he’d made it and could leave something for his children to build on.
He remembered how Abigail had once quoted Ecclesiastes to him soon after they’d first met, and he recalled the words now. For everything there was a season, a time for every purpose under the heaven. A time to be born. A time to die. A time to kill and a time to heal. A time to weep and a time for laughter. A time for war and a time for peace.
A time also to slow down. A time to stay at home. A time to let his children take over. If they didn’t manage it, it was their fault and not of his doing. If Sarth’s weren’t Cunard, Cathay-American, the Glen Line, P & O or any of the big outfits, at least their ships had come to be respected. They kept to their timetables and their promises and delivered their goods. And – he smiled – though she was hardly the flagship, the old Lady Roberts was still incredibly ploughing on. He patted the rail, looking about him at the old ship as her battered hull wallowed through the waves.
A thought occurred to him and he called to Yeh. ‘John, let’s have a red at the masthead. For the first time, and probably the last time, a Sarth ship’s carrying mails.’
As Yeh waved acknowledgement, Willie became aware of Edward alongside him and turned, in sentimental mood.
‘This ship,’ he said quietly, ‘has been involved in more incidents than the Royal Navy ever dreamed of.’
Edward laughed. ‘What’ll you do with her now, Father? Sell her at last?’
Willie gave him a startled look and he tried to explain. ‘Dammit, she’s donkey’s years old! She’s full of cockroaches and rats and doesn’t manage more than eight knots with the wind and tide up her backside. You must be running her at a loss.’
‘I am,’ Willie agreed. ‘But the Lady Roberts goes on until she finally gives up the ghost. And then I think I’ll have her mounted in concrete and set up on the front lawn as a monument to British shipbuilders and to what she’s done – and might still do – for Willie Sarth.’
Edward laughed again. ‘Surely to God, Father,’ he said, ‘you’ve finish
ed now. You’re not young any more.’
Willie nodded his agreement. ‘I’m old, son,’ he admitted. ‘Damned old.’
‘Then haven’t you finished?’
Willie smiled. On the foredeck his other son, Thomas, was standing with his family. Nearby were George Kee and Da Braga with their families. He had brought the whole lot out, he thought, pleased with himself. He’d repaid loyalty with safety. There was nothing more to do except go home to his wife. Yet he had the feeling that even now it wasn’t finished.
He looked at Edward and smiled. ‘You never know,’ he said. ‘I might live to be a hundred and that would give me time to do a lot more.’
Synopses of John Harris Titles
Published by House of Stratus
Army of Shadows
It is the winter of 1944. France is under the iron fist of the Nazis. But liberation is just around the corner and a crew from a Lancaster bomber is part of the fight for Freedom. As they fly towards their European target, a Messerschmitt blazes through the sky in a fiery attack and of the nine-man crew aboard the bomber, only two men survive to parachute into Occupied France. They join an ever-growing army of shadows (the men and women of the French Resistance), to play a lethal game of cat and mouse.
China Seas
In this action-packed adventure, Willie Sarth becomes a survivor. Forced to fight pirates on the East China Seas, wrestle for his life on the South China Seas and cross the Sea of Japan ravaged by typhus, Sarth is determined to come out alive. Dealing with human tragedy, war and revolution, Harris presents a novel which packs an awesome punch.
The Claws of Mercy
In Sierra Leone, a remote bush community crackles with racial tensions. Few white people live amongst the natives of Freetown and Authority seems distant. Everyday life in Freetown revolves around an opencast iron mine, and the man in charge dictates peace and prosperity for everyone. But, for the white population, his leadership is a matter of life or death where every decision is like being snatched by the claws of mercy.
Corporal Cotton’s Little War
Storming through Europe, the Nazis are sure to conquer Greece but for one man, Michael Anthony Cotton, a heroic marine who smuggles weapons of war and money to the Greek Resistance. Born Mihale Andoni Cotonou, Cotton gets mixed up in a lethal mission involving guns and high-speed chases. John Harris produces an unforgettable champion, persuasive and striking with a touch of mastery in this action-packed thriller set against the dazzle of the Aegean.
The Cross of Lazzaro
The Cross of Lazzaro is a gripping story filled with mystery and fraught with personal battles. This tense, unusual novel begins with the seemingly divine reappearance of a wooden cross once belonging to a sixth-century bishop. The vision emerges from the depths of an Italian lake, and a menacing local antagonism is subsequently stirred. But what can the cross mean?
Flawed Banner
John Harris’ spine-tingling adventure inhabits the shadowy world of cunning and espionage. As the Nazi hordes of Germany overrun France, devouring the free world with fascist fervour, a young intelligence officer, James Woodyatt, is shipped across the Channel to find a First World War hero…an old man who may have been a spy…who may be in possession of Nazi secrets.
The Fox From His Lair
A brilliant German agent lies in wait for the Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied France. While the Allies prepare a vast armed camp, no one is aware of the enemy within, and when a sudden, deadly E-boat attacks, the Fox strikes, stealing secret invasion plans in the ensuing panic. What follows is a deadly pursuit as the Fox tries to get the plans to Germany in time, hotly pursued by two officers with orders to stop him at all costs.
A Funny Place to Hold a War
Ginger Donnelly is on the trail of Nazi saboteurs in Sierra Leone. Whilst taking a midnight paddle with a willing woman in a canoe cajoled from a local fisherman, Donnelly sees an enormous seaplane thunder across the sky only to crash in a ball of brilliant flame. It seems like an accident…at least until a second plane explodes in a blistering shower along the same flight path.
Getaway
An Italian fisherman and his wife, Rosa, live in Sydney. Hard times are ahead. Their mortgaged boat may be lost and with it, their livelihood. But Rosa has a plan to reach the coast of America from the islands of the Pacific, sailing on a beleaguered little houseboat. The plan seems almost perfect, especially when Willie appears and has his own reasons for taking a long holiday to the land of opportunity.
Harkaway’s Sixth Column
An explosive action-packed war drama: four British soldiers are cut off behind enemy lines in British Somaliland and when they decide to utilise a secret arms dump in the Bur Yi hills and fight a rearguard action, an unlikely alliance is sought between two local warring tribes. What follows is an amazing mission led by the brilliant, elusive Harkaway, whose heart is stolen by a missionary when she becomes mixed up in the unorthodox band of warriors.
A Kind of Courage
At the heart of this story of courage and might, is Major Billy Pentecost, commander of a remote desert outpost near Hahdhdhah, deep among the bleak hills of Khalit. His orders are to prepare to move out along with a handful of British soldiers. Impatient tribesmen gather outside the fort, eager to reclaim the land of their blood and commanded by Abd el Aziz el Beidawi, a feared Arab warrior lord. A friendship forms between the two very different commanders but when Pentecost’s orders are reversed, a nightmarish tragedy ensues.
Live Free or Die
Charles Walter Scully, cut off from his unit and running on empty, is trapped. It’s 1944 and though the Allied invasion of France has finally begun, for Scully the war isn’t going well. That is, until he meets a French boy trying to get home to Paris. What begins is a hair-raising journey into the heart of France, an involvement with the French Liberation Front and one of the most monumental events of the war. Harris vividly portrays wartime France in a panorama of scenes that enthral the reader.
The Lonely Voyage
The Lonely Voyage is John Harris’ first novel - a graphic, moving tale of the sea. It charts the story of one boy, Jess Ferigo, who winds up on a charge of poaching along with Pat Fee and Old Boxer, the men who sail with him on his journey into manhood. As Jess leaves his boyhood behind, bitter years are followed by the Second World War, where Old Boxer and Jess make a poignant rescue on the sand dunes of Dunkirk. Finally, Jess Ferigo’s lonely voyage is over.
The Mercenaries
Ira Penaluna, First World War pilot, sees his airline go bankrupt in Africa and grabs at the chance to instruct pilots in China. But Ira hasn’t reckoned on the beat-up, burnt-out wrecks he is expected to teach his students in, or on the fact that his pupils speak no English. Though aided and abetted by an enthusiastic assistant, an irresponsible Fagan and his brooding American girlfriend Ellie, Ira finds himself playing a deadly game, becoming embroiled in China’s civil war. The four are forced to flee but the only way out is in a struggling pile of junk flown precariously towards safety. Will they make it?
North Strike
It is 1939. The Royal Navy urgently needs information about German raiders. There is only one place to get it…the port of Narvik and only one man capable – Magnusson. A story of the daring, outrageous exploits of a spy rescuing British prisoners from the Altmark and swept up in to the German battle for Norway.
The Old Trade of Killing
Harris’ exciting adventure is set against the backdrop of the Western Desert and scene of the Eighth Army battles. The men who fought together in the Second World War return twenty years later in search of treasure. But twenty years can change a man. Young ideals have been replaced by greed. Comradeship has vanished along with innocence. And treachery and murder make for a breathtaking read.
Picture of Defeat
It is 1943 and Naples has been looted by the Allies and Axis powers alike, its priceless art treasures coveted by some of the most corrupt criminal minds in Europe. But under the orders of Field
Security, Tom Pugh must save the paintings of Detto Banti, no matter what the cost. In this tantalising read, one man stands against a tide of wilful destruction and greed, trying to save a past for the people of Naples’ future.
The Quick Boat Men
Edward Dante Bourdillon is a man whose fate is linked to the oceans. His parents perished on the waves and, brought up by his uncle who owns a boatyard, Edward leads a life in love with the sea. That is, until he sinks his uncle’s yacht. Soon our hero is bound for Cape Town on an old tramp steamer. From earthquakes to shipwreck, it seems his fortune is turning sour until forgiveness and World War One looms on the horizon.
Ride Out the Storm
The Allies, faced with a shameful defeat, are trapped between the onslaught of the mighty German army and the tumult of the ocean waves. Those that do not die face capture and surrender to the Nazis. But only nine days later more than a quarter of a million men have been rescued and placed safely on the shores of England, saved by an amazing assorted flotilla of barges, tugs, rowing boats and dinghies. This is the incredible story of a mass exodus across the Channel. John Harris tells the miraculous story of Dunkirk.
Right of Reply
Struggle, scandal and mutiny run riot in Right of Reply, set in the 1970s in a whirlwind of a political crisis. An invasion is planned by a convoy of British troop ships sighted off the coast of West Africa. A Khanzian base is at stake. The British claim sovereignty but sedition is in the air. Can the British government turn back before it’s too late? John Harris leaves us on tenterhooks.
Road to the Coast
It’s South America and a fugitive Englishman is caught in a military revolt against a tyrant. Harry Ash is a wanted man, fleeing the police and revolutionaries. After being bombed, he meets a beautiful woman, Grace Rodrigo, and steals a car to take her with him before realising they have a stow-away who could very well endanger their entire escape plan. John Harris pulls off a triumph of an action-packed narrative full of the kind of tension that will have you on the edge of your seat.