Murdo's War

by Alan Temperley

  Once the binding wire was removed, the boards came off surprisingly easy. Carefully Henry Smith laid the silver nails and wooden planks to one side. Then he was tumbling wood shavings to the floor as he lifted out a long object, wrapped in brown waxpaper. Moving the men backwards to get better light, he carefully folded back the paper to reveal a gleaming, steel-blue metal arm. Three long diagonal whorls of bronze teeth were set near the head, and at the foot a complex series of cams and two white metal inlays for ball-bearing races. It was beautifully finished and polished to a satin smoothness. A film of fine oil glistened down the shaft as he turned it in his hands.

  ‘Well, it doesn’t mean a thing to me,’ said Hector, passing a rough finger down it. ‘I know a bit about engines, but I’ve seen nothing like this before.’

  ‘It’s a new design,’ Henry Smith said, gently laying the arm back in its crate of shavings. ‘The principles are entirely different.’ He pulled the lever from his pocket again and turned to one of the smaller cases. ‘I think this will be a cooling block, or valves.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ Hector said, shaking his head as the first board splintered slightly, and a nail tinkled to the floor. ‘Don’t bother. I’ve seen all I want.’

  ‘You’re sure?’ Henry Smith looked up, his gold-rimmed spectacles flashing in the lamplight. ‘It’ll only take a minute.’

  Hector looked around the room and through the door to the head of the stairs. The murmur of the men’s voices drifted from below and there was a short, sharp burst of laughter. Someone was playing a happy little tune on a tin flute.

  Henry Smith stood back from the case, ‘It will do, then? You’re satisfied?’

  ‘I think so,’ Hector replied.

  ‘It’s a deal?’

  Hector glanced at Murdo and raised his eyebrows. He smiled ruefully. ‘I suppose so.’

  Delighted, Henry Smith clapped him on the arm and his face lit up with pleasure. Leaving the cases as they were he raised the lantern high to give them light, and they filed out on to the bare landing.

  After the icy chill of the house, the schoolroom was aglow with warmth and light and friendliness. The Norwegians’ eyes turned expectantly towards them as they walked in the door. The smile on Henry Smith’s face told them all they needed to know.

  ‘It is fixed,’ he said jubilantly. ‘We move on. We have our crossing to the mainland.’

  Their eyes turned to the stocky old seaman and the boy who stood behind him.

  ‘I think this calls for a drink.’ Henry Smith reached into his jacket pocket and produced a half bottle of whisky, roughly corked, with the label half picked away. ‘Here, Bjorn, pass over a few mugs.’

  Bjorn and the man named Dag, a small, red-haired, happy fellow, with a silver flute sticking out of his shirt pocket, carried two clusters of mugs across to a basin and came back with them dripping clear drops on to the bare boards of the schoolroom. They laid them on top of the levelled desk and Henry Smith poured a generous tot into each, emptying the bottle. He tossed it into an old fish box full of rubbish, and the men gathered round, reaching for the wet mugs. Only Carl Voss did not join the throng, but crossed to a chair beside his bed roll and took out a knife, trimming his nails and watching them sardonically. Henry Smith regarded him for a moment, and imperceptibly the expression on his face changed. His lips narrowed, his nostrils flared, a shadow passed across his pale eyes. He decided, for the moment at least, to ignore the man. Turning back to the crowd around him, he raised a chipped mug.

  ‘A toast! Calm seas and may our good luck continue.’ The men drank, gasping as the fiery Orkney spirit reached their throats.

  Hector opened his jacket and consulted an ancient pocket watch on which the silver casing had long since faded to brass. ‘It’s – quarter to one. If you want a load taking over tonight, that’s fine with me. We might as well, since we’re here. But I want to get Lobster Boy out of the pool soon. If we don’t we’ll be here for the night.’

  ‘I don’t see why we shouldn’t,’ said Henry Smith.

  He looked questioningly at the tall, thin man named Knut. He was a striking figure with very fair hair and a dark curly beard. His nose was a mere button in the pale Nordic face.

  ‘You can be ready?’

  ‘Any time,’ Knut said. ‘Five minutes to change, that’s all.’

  ‘Knut will be coming with us as guard,’ Henry Smith explained. Hector nodded.

  ‘Good. Well, then; if you’ll all get ready, we can start taking some of the cases down to the shore.’ The Englishman smiled wryly. ‘At least it will be easier than carrying them up.’ He began buttoning his heavy coat and turned up the fur collar.

  Those Norwegians who had not finished their drinks tossed them back and crossed to their bed-rolls and rucksacks. In a couple of minutes they were ready. At the far end of the room Knut had pulled off his sweater and was carefully unfolding a set of neat black clothes. Murdo saw the glint of gold. It looked to him like a uniform.

  Ten minutes later they were on their way. Murdo shifted the heavy box on his shoulder so that the sharp edge did not come against the bone. Before and behind him a line of men, shouldering and clasping similar boxes, stumbled across the rough heathery ground towards the cliff top. Murdo was not at all sure he would be able to manage his case down the steps when they came to them. He imagined clutching the wobbly rail for balance; felt it lurch out under his weight. He thought of the sickening drop to the rocks – at the very least his priceless case falling to destruction in an avalanche of stone, box-wood and twisted metal; or landing in the sea with a splash, and sinking.

  In the outcome, no-one suffered any mishap, and a few minutes later they all stood safely on the little concrete jetty by the pool. Dag was the last man down. He laid his case on top of the others and wiped a trembling hand across his forehead.

  ‘Dear God,’ he said, and sat on one of the boxes with his head in his hand. Then he shrugged his shoulders to loosen the shirt that was sticking to him with sweat.

  Murdo did the same, and ran a dry tongue around his lips. There were not enough boxes yet to make a load, they would have to go back for more. He closed his eyes for a moment at the thought, but said nothing.

  A hand fell on his shoulder and he looked up to see Bjorn smiling down at him. He raised his eyebrows and smiled back.

  ‘Right.’ Hector took charge. ‘Let’s not waste too much time. You leave the cases there. Murdo and I will load them into the boat.’ Raggedly the Norwegians crossed the rocks and began to climb the shadowy path once more. Henry Smith looked briefly and pointedly at the man called Arne, then turned away towards the steps with the others. Murdo was surprised, he would not have expected him to negotiate the steep path a second time when it was unnecessary. Already many things were puzzling him about Mr Smith.

  They passed from sight. Arne alone remained by the pool. He was slightly built and so fair as to be almost an albino, with cropped hair and red rims to his eyes.

  Hector addressed him. ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘Murdo and I can manage. You give the others a hand.’

  ‘No, I’ll stay and help you,’ Arne said. He slid one of the crates nearer to the edge of the jetty.

  ‘As you like,’ Hector said.

  Murdo pulled the boat from her mooring and tied her up alongside. It was the work of only a few minutes to pass the cases across and stack them neatly on the bottom boards.

  Arne was not disposed to talk. When they had finished he sat on a corner of the jetty and smoked a cigarette, sheltered from the wind by a projecting rock and looking over the moonlit sea.

  The men were soon back, and after four of the Norwegians had made a third trip the boat was full. Murdo spread a tarpaulin over the boxes and lashed it in place.

  Hector checked his boat’s level in the water. ‘She’ll do fine at that today. Not much freeboard, but the sea’s calm enough.’ He looked up at Henry Smith. ‘Murdo and I will take her through the passage and pick you up at the other jetty. It�
��s going to be a bit of a squeeze.’

  ‘I’ll come with you, if it’s all the same,’ Henry Smith said. Hector shrugged. ‘Come if you want,’ he said. ‘Do you expect us to go off and leave you?’

  ‘You could.’ Henry Smith stepped neatly aboard and seated himself amidships. He looked up at the men on the jetty.

  ‘Knut,’ he said.

  The Norwegian who was going to act as guard at the cave stepped forward. He had removed a long parka, and now it was revealed that he had changed into the uniform of a British naval sub-lieutenant. A white scarf hung about his neck and he carried a navy-blue duffle coat over one arm. With his dark beard and erect, easy bearing, he looked every inch the young officer.

  ‘We’ll pick you up at the far jetty,’ Henry Smith said.

  Hector looked coldly at the uniform. Distaste welled up in him.

  ‘Does he have to wear that?’ he said.

  ‘I think it’s a good idea,’ Henry Smith answered. ‘Just in case someone strays down to the cave.’

  ‘I told you, nobody will.’

  ‘You can’t be that sure.’

  ‘What if it’s the police?’

  ‘He has documents,’ Henry Smith replied smoothly.

  ‘Where did you get that uniform?’ Hector said to the young Norwegian.

  Knut shook his head.

  ‘What does it matter where he got it?’ Henry Smith broke in impatiently. ‘He stole it! The captain who brought them over had a spare one! It doesn’t matter! I told you, everything’s arranged – it’s all been worked out.’

  Again there was silence. Two of the men on the jetty shifted their feet against the cold.

  ‘Well, I don’t like it,’ Hector said.

  Murdo pulled a hard end of rope straight. ‘What boat was it,’ he asked, ‘you came over on?’ The question had been in his mind all evening.

  Henry Smith smiled and shook his head. ‘Sorry,’ he said. Murdo looked down again and toyed with the end of rope.

  ‘Well, if he’s coming anyway, he might as well get in now,’ Hector said at last. ‘Four’s the same as three. Maybe keep us a bit lower in the water when we go through.’

  Knut, who had listened in silence, swung his rucksack and bed-roll to Murdo and climbed into the boat.

  ‘Move for’ard a bit,’ Hector said. ‘We’ll have to use the oars.’ The two passengers shifted towards Murdo in the bows.

  ‘All right, then,’ Hector said. ‘Let’s away. Throw down the ropes will you.’

  In a moment they were gliding through the channel, crouching as the ragged roof slipped past their heads. A little way along the bow struck a particularly low fang of rock and the boat jarred to a halt with a little splintering crack, which swung them sideways so that the stern struck as well.

  Hector handed Knut a box of matches. ‘Here, give us a bit of light.’

  It was eerie in the dim orange light of the match; the black water slurping on the barnacled rocks, the jutting roof so close above the gunwale of the boat.

  Two minutes later they were chugging beneath the towering crags that curved like pincers about the narrow entrance of the bay. The shadowy group of men on the rocks waved as they drew past. Then Hector pushed the throttle wide and the engine note picked up. The little boat surged forward, heading once more for the open sea.

  The journey back seemed shorter than the trip out. Soon Island Roan had sunk to a dark shadow against the glittering sea behind them. They seemed perpetually to be heading into the darkness. The wind had shifted slightly and now blew straight into their faces from the north-east, from the snowfields of northern Europe. It was witheringly cold. With the added weight of cargo the boat swung less. Unaccustomed to such a load, Murdo felt her driving through the waves rather than riding lightly above them, as she had done on the way out. But the Lobster Boy made good speed, and almost before he was ready for it Strathy Point was looming up ahead, the blinded lighthouse squat above the cliffs. Well clear of the sucking rocks he rounded it to starboard. Twenty minutes later the thin white line of the beach was rising to meet them.

  The flooding tide was nearly to the stacks. They landed the boxes on the upper beach, and while Hector took his boat round to the anchorage, Murdo and the two men carried them up to the cave. The sand was very trampled, a broad path from the sea’s edge to the cliff, but already in the backwash of the waves their tracks were obliterated. Long before morning the night tide would have washed the beach smooth again. It occurred to Murdo that even when they were making two trips a night and arriving home shortly before dawn, this would still be the case. He remarked on it to Mr Smith.

  ‘Yes, we are very lucky with the tides,’ he said. ‘I confess that was something we –’ he bit the word back ‘– that I did not take properly into account. We have the guard – but still, it could have been important.’

  Within half an hour of landing, the boxes were neatly stacked away on the ledge. Knut spread a sheet of heavy waterproof canvas by the tumble of boulders at the inner end of the chamber, and laid out his bed-roll.

  ‘Seven o’clock tomorrow, then,’ Henry Smith said to him. Knut pulled on his cigarette and nodded, accompanying them to the mouth of the cave.

  The cars were thick with frost. With the palms of his hands Murdo melted a small patch on Hector’s windscreen and rubbed it dry with a rag. Henry Smith watched him, resting an arm on the roof of the car.

  ‘Well, that’s the first load,’ he said cheerfully to Hector. ‘I thought it went off very well.’

  ‘Aye, it went all right,’ Hector said.

  Henry Smith reached into his inside pocket and pulled out a wallet. He counted out some notes and passed them across. Hector counted them for himself and pushed them into his back pocket.

  ‘Thank you very much.’

  ‘And the same to come again when the job’s finished.’

  ‘Aye.’ Hector climbed into the driving seat.

  ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, then. At the cave – seven o’clock.’

  The car was hard to start. After eight or ten shots with the button, Hector reached back for the starting handle on the back seat. A few vigorous cranks and the engine sprang into life, shuddering violently.

  Stormy Seas

  THE FINE WEATHER CONTINUED. The following night – it was Friday – they made two trips, and the night after they made two more. The Norwegians had the cases ready by the jetty at the entrance to the bay. As they were loaded the Lobster Boy rose and fell beneath the cliffs, sheltered from the Atlantic swell. They kept to schedule, four and a half hours for the round trip, with a break of thirty minutes between midnight and one for a mug of hot soup prepared by Knut. The moon set shortly before they arrived home. It was six o’clock in the morning.

  On the fourth night, however, Hector had refused to go out. There was heated argument. As they prepared to cast off for the last run home in the early hours of Sunday morning, the old man resolutely shook his head. Henry Smith’s face was dark, he was unused to being thwarted. The men on the jetty leaned forward, but Hector was quite impervious to their pleas.

  ‘No, it’s no good going on. We’ve been out three nights running, and it’s the Sabbath. That’s it till Monday. I never went to sea on the Sabbath all my life – he sniffed ‘– well, not very often; and the sea’s been good to me. I’m not starting now. No – no! It can blow a hurricane on Monday if it likes, but I’m still not coming out. Besides –’ even in the lamplight he could see the tiredness on Murdo’s face ‘– the boy needs a night in his bed. We all do.’

  There was unconscious prophecy in his words, for on Monday the weather, which had been so fair, changed. The barometer fell. The wind moved around into the east and soft grey clouds began to roll up out of that quarter. All day the frost did not yield. Dry, icy reeds clattered as the wind swept, strengthening, over the moorland bogs. The ice-fringed lochs, which had rippled and glinted in the winter sunshine, now turned steel-grey, ruffled and blown into small waves like minature seas. The hi
lls, where the dead bracken had glowed russet in the sunshine, turned their fires off and hunched forbidding shoulders against the clouds. Shepherds ranged the hills with dogs, bringing in stragglers to join their flocks in the fields, where they could be watched and fed when the snow came. The sheep huddled for warmth in the lee of stone dykes and under peat banks. Men and women came indoors gladly, rubbing their hands and shivering, to the fires.

  But the sea held its legacy of fine weather, and on Monday night Hector, Murdo and Henry Smith were able to make the two trips. The sea was beginning to rise, however, and the boat sheered and fell in the troughs of the waves as she chugged across the miles of open water between Strathy Point and the island.

  It was on the last run home that the snow began to fall, blind flakes that struck softly on their faces like a hundred tiny paws, pattering over cheeks and lips and eyes, icy and tickling. The shore disappeared. Hector made his way to the for’ard locker and produced the lantern. When it was lit he set it in a bracket by the compass, adjusted a rough shade, and took the tiller from Murdo. Murdo, in Hector’s place on the side bench, shook his arm and the settling snow fell in a flurry to the bottom boards. It was not lying there yet because of the dried salt spray. But by and by the salt was washed clear and the snow began to settle and gather in corners and crevices. On top of the boxes it lay from the start, and soon a half inch layer covered the tarpaulin.

  By the time Hector swung to starboard around Strathy Point, the whole boat, with its occupants, was mantled in white.

  Knut had set a guiding lantern on the beach, hidden from the village by a wall of damp sand. As the boat ran in they saw the spark of light in the swirling darkness. It was dead ahead.