"That ain't fair," he said. "No, sir," Olaf chipped in. "Matter of fact, he reckons he's given up the fags." "This ship's a helicopter," the captain stated, doubtfully. - J.E. Macdonnell: Under Sealed Orders Page 21
And then, because he could no longer contain his pleasure at sight of their tough, lovely faces, he matched their own grins and said:
"Nice to have you aboard. You've got eight barrels now, Bent."
"Yessir," I've taken a gander at her already. She might do all right, that one."
Dutchy nodded. Scowling, he moved on.
In his cabin he was met with a surprise not quite so pleasant. He had taken out the manila envelope, interested to look at his sealed orders and learn the time of sailing, when sounds came from the pantry and a man emerged into the cabin.
"My God,'" Dutchy said startled, looking up. "Samson!"
The giant frowned, then smiled diffidently. "That's right, sir. Samson."
Now Dutchy's scowl was genuine. Smart-aleck talk, from a strange rating, he could not tolerate. It was impertinence. His voice was a warning rasp.
"Who the devil are you? What are you doing here?"
The smile retreated, the frown returned. "Samson, sir. Steward Samson."
"You mean your name is Samson?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good Lord!" Dutchy chuckled. "Stand back a bit. I'm getting a crick in my neck. Where's Hawton?"
"Hawton, sir?"
"My steward."
"I dunno, sir. I'm your steward."
Oh no... "Where've you come from?"
"The Australia, sir. I was commander's steward."
Dutchy heard the words, he recognised their implication, and suddenly he was ashamed.
Hawton had known he was poor, with nothing but his pay to draw on. Hawton had accepted the one good serge suit in his meagre wardrobe, and zealously nursed it, as he did the faded khakis, knowing there was no money to spare for frequent replacements.
That had been all right. Hawton was loyal. Most of all, he was discreet.
But this fellow came from the sartorial splendour of a cruiser's wardroom. Every morning he had laid out the fresh clothes of a commander; an officer no doubt with private family means.
Dutchy looked at him, and his mind saw the crisp starched khaki, and the mind which had overcome its fear when he'd rammed his old ship into a superior Japanese vessel could not overcome its shame.
He told himself that this fellow was a rating; that clothes don't make a man; that he was the captain, and Samson had better do his job, or else. And all he could say was, cautiously:
"You've unpacked my gear?"
"Yessir, it's all stowed away. Some of it'll need ironing again, but at the moment I'm preparing lunch. If there's something you need now..."
Dutchy waved a hand in negation. His eyes were intent on Samson's face. But he saw only alertness and a basic good nature- neither pity nor guarded sneer.
"You're permanent service?" he said.
"No, sir. Reserve."
A smart Rocky, Dutchy thought. He couldn't have been in more than four years yet he'd become a commander's steward. The recognition of Samson's competence gave him no comfort. Smart, he would be used to smartness... in uniforms.
"What were you before the war?"
"A journalist, sir."
Dutchy frowned in surprise. Reserves covered a multitude of occupations, from bellboy to bricklayer, from trammies and wharfies to jackeroos, but he'd never come across a reporter before.
He wanted to say, "What the hell made you a steward?" but that came close to being slightingly personal, and stewards in fact did a good job in action stations. Instead, he said:
"What paper?"
"Adelaide Advertiser, sir. I was a feature writer."
That didn't mean a thing to Dutchy. "How come you landed here? Drafted?"
"No, sir. I requested transfer to a destroyer."
Dutchy's wariness eased a little, but his voice was blunt when he said:
"Why?"
Samson smiled; that, too, Dutchy liked.
"I started in a small ship, sir. She was the Dungowan, a supply-ship operating from Darwin. I was a seaman then, loading-number of an oerlikon. The captain's steward was killed by a Zero in the first raid. We rated only one steward. I was detailed off for the job." A pair of barn-door shoulders shrugged. "Liked the job, sir, and changed branches. But a cruiser... I preferred the small ships, sir. And in a destroyer you..."
His voice trailed. There was a hint of embarrassment in his face. Dutchy finished the sentence.
"You see more action."
"Yessir."
Suddenly, the grey eyes in the weathered face were very shrewd.
"What is a feature writer?" Dutchy said.
"Well, sir, he writes special articles. A sort of enlargement on the news as opposed to the normal reporting. Stories in the magazine section, that sort of thing."
"So that's why you became a steward."
"I beg your pardon, sir?"
"You'd get better stories from a commander, or a captain, than you would from the messdeck. You'd be in on the ground floor. You'd hear things, you'd get the correct background to an action. Eh?"
"Well, sir, I..."
"You're still writing?"
"I turn out a story now and again, sir," Samson said, cautiously.
Dutchy was silent. Worse and worse, he was thinking. His experience of journalists was as meagre as his wardrobe, but he knew they would be trained to observation. Ferrets. This fellow would not only see his uniforms, he would note them. And compare...
Samson misread his silence as an invitation to continue.
"All my stuff is factual, sir, no fiction."
Too late to get rid of him, Dutchy argued with himself. Truman had given him his sealed orders, therefore they would be sailing shortly. And sending him ashore wouldn't be fair. A man's berth can't depend on the state of a captain's clothes. Damn the clothes! Journalist or the King of England, he wasn't going to worry him!
"This Silent Service stuff is all very well, sir," Samson was saying, "but it doesn't do much good for recruiting. There are plenty of war correspondents but you don't find them sailing with the Navy. The Army, sure, and now and again a reporter flies on a bomber raid over Berlin, but our lot's in a backwater as far as publicity's concerned. I try to do something about that." Suddenly, relief was strong in Dutchy.
"I agree," he said, smiling easily. "But unfortunately there's a regulation preventing serving personnel from writing for the press."
"That's so, sir-but it's all right if the stories are submitted to the censorship liaison officer in Navy Office. After, of course," Samson said a shade quickly, "being vetted by the ship's commanding-officer."
"Exactly," Dutchy nodded, hiding his satisfaction. "Everything you write goes through me."
"Yes, sir, I understand that."
"Bad luck, Samson."
"Pardon, sir?"
"Oh, you can write your head off as far as I'm concerned. But for the women's papers, about sailors peeling spuds and how they do their dhobying. Domestic events, you might call it."
Samson was frowning. "I don't quite understand, sir. In the cruiser..."
"Understand this," Dutchy said, not harshly. "You won't be writing a word about our mission. Not till after the war."
Samson's frown altered to an expression of eagerness.
"A secret mission, sir?"
"What's for lunch?" Dutchy said.
"Ah... I thought a salad, sir. There's a nice leg ham..."
"Fine. Get on with it."
"Aye aye, sir."
"Coffee," Dutchy said.
"Coffee, sir."
"I mean coffee all the time. As far as I'm concerned kai is sludge. Got that? Never cocoa, always coffee. And every time I come down from the bridge, especially at night. You'll find," Dutchy said poker-faced, "plenty of action for yourself in a destroyer."
Samson grinned. A pleasant-enough face, Dutchy thought.
Hard, with something open about it. Or was that expression just an occupational acquirement? Cultivated to make the victims talk? Never mind. The big bastard could think all he liked about his clothes, but for damn sure he'd never write anything about them, not while he was aboard here!
"Pity about that story, sir," Samson said.
"Lunch," Dutchy growled. "And Samson?"
"Sir?"
"Hawton was a very quiet chap. He hardly opened his mouth. We got on well together."
"I get the message, sir. Though it's a pity."
"What is?"
"I could make you famous. If they're any good, newspapers syndicate their special articles all over Australia."
Sharp and sudden, a wary irritation filled Dutchy. Samson was a steward now; and there was nothing more pesty than the Reserve who brought the imagined superiority of his peacetime occupation into the simple, uncomplicated disciplines of the Service.
Yet there was a deprecatory smile on Samson's face, as though he might be joking against himself. But Dutchy had neither the time nor inclination for analysis of his steward. Nor did he intend explaining his own motives. "Get on with your work," he growled.
"Yessir."
Samson walked quickly into the pantry. Dutchy sat down at a small steel desk bolted to the deck, laid on it the manila envelope and forgot him.
Inside the larger envelope was a smaller one, sealed, and a single sheet of paper. The sealed envelope was marked, "To be opened on clearing the Heads." Dutchy placed it in a drawer of the desk, turned the key and put it in his pocket. He unfolded the sheet of paper. "Being in all respects ready for sea..." the orders began conventionally, and ran on for two terse lines.
Dutchy put the paper in his short's pocket-things had a habit of falling out of unbuttoned shirt pockets-and climbed up to the compass platform. He found the engine-room phone in its expected place, on the windbreak ahead of the binnacle. He pulled the receiver from the clip and whirled the handle.
Jackal's phones, like most modern ships', were sound-powered. This was a solid advantage if the electricity supply were cut off. Down in the engine-room another phone howled. Knowing the call from the bridge, Baxter took up the receiver himself.
"Engineer."
"Captain, Chief."
"Yessir."
"Those damn moving blades of yours on the turbines... I want them ready to move at six in the morning."
CHAPTER THREE
To a man who had been in destroyers most of his Service life- and who had handled the stripped-down Utmost, the fastest ship in the R.A.N.-the removal of Jackal from her berth presented little difficulty.
Dutchy went ahead on a spring, swung her stern out, got the spring in and put his engines half-astern. She slipped away easy and smooth. Over towards Pinchgut he stopped her, swung her with counter-revolving screws with barely forward movement on, and then aimed her sharp nose to clear Bradley's Head. At thirteen knots Jackal knifed through the early-morning sparkle under a clear pale sky. Even in the air's coolness there was a promise of heat.
No man, not even privately on that bridge, commented on the clean getaway. Dutchy's handling of her was something like an experienced driver getting from one car into another of an identical make. And Baxter, the deep-down extension of his judgement, ensured there were no kangaroo starts. Shaking a little, Jackal drew abeam of her grey length Sydney's old foremast and altered to port.
Towards her came one of the earliest Manly ferries of that fine morning. No crowds lined the rails. Faces were barely lifted from newspapers as quietly she slipped past the hundreds of city-bound workers. She was leaving for possibly hideous danger, and they were heading for safety, from safety, but they were used to seeing warships go to sea. I wonder, Matheson mused as he gazed at the incurious passengers, if they even give a thought to their safety, and the reasons for it? As though he were inside his mind Dutchy grinned and said:
"How'd you like that, Bertie? Nine to five, weekends off..."
"I'd like to give it a try," Matheson growled. "For five years or so..."
"And miss all the excitement?" Dutchy jibed. He was in pleasant mood, another ship under him, his old team with him. "Nothing but cricket matches and surfing and beer parties all weekend."
"Horrible," Matheson grinned.
Uninterested in these idle polemics the navigating-officer said:
"Coming on the bearing, sir." He waited, crouched over the bearing sight on the gyro compass.
"On!"
"Starb'd twenty," Dutchy said.
His eyes were on a couple of small boats eight-hundred yards off the port bow but he was feeling her swing: she was answering the rudder with the neat fussless economy of a destroyer, and he felt satisfied. She was a good ship anyway, considering her birthplace, and Truman would have seen that her refit was thorough. And Baxter was down there.
Dutchy took the wheel off her and gave Verril the course to sail her through the Heads. Then he leaned forward to a phone.
"Captain, Chief. All well?"
Through the wire he could hear dull mechanical noises, and above them, high and thin, the whine of those "moving blades." But Baxter did not mention blades or guide vanes or kinetic energy-you never got a joke from him when he was in his engine-room with the ship in confined waters.
"All well, sir," he said.
"Very good."
Dutchy replaced the phone and looked at the massive loom of North Head, that part he could see shadowed from the level rays of the young sun. As with the two boats he was thinking more than looking-thinking that a hundred and seventy men were waiting for his next order.
But not yet would they learn whether their destiny was south or north. Jackal would run on for twenty miles straight out into the east before turning invisible from curious eyes. There was small danger here, but you did it when sailing from more dangerous ports and so even here the routine was the same, for in the Navy the drill is repeated over and over until it becomes automatic, and is performed without thinking. This is necessary because things happen quickly, whether it's towering a seaboat in a rough sea or engaging a 400knot fighter, when there is no time to think.
So Dutchy let her run for an hour, and then he ordered casually, seeing an unusually large number of men on the upper deck:
"Port twenty." And as she came round to the northward, toward nastiness, and they knew what already they had guessed, he said to the navigator:
"Course for Hervey Bay, please."
And then Matheson said, wonderingly:
"Good Lord. What's that?" He and Dutchy were standing at the edge of the bridge as he spoke. Dutchy followed the direction of his gaze and looked down. He gave a small smile.
"Samson," he said, "my new steward."
"That's his name?" Matheson wondered, watching the figure turn from the rails and disappear in the direction of the captain's cabin.
"Or Hercules, take your pick. But watch him Bertie."
"Oh?" Matheson flicked a glance at him, half-enquiring, half-wary.
"Used to be a journalist," Dutchy grinned. "Don't do anything heroic or you'll find your name in all the papers. Any worthwhile articles," he said casually, "are syndicated throughout Australia. Special features, that is."
"You're well up on the subject," Matheson said suspiciously. "He's been buttering you up already?"
"Let's say he's just interested in first-class material," Dutchy said.
"Gawd," said Matheson. His grin tightened into a frown. "Don't you go doing anything childish, like tackling a battleship, just because you've got your own special correspondent on board!"
"A man does what he's ordered to do," Dutchy said loftily.
Matheson's look was shrewd. "Which is?"
"You heard. To sail this vessel to Hervey Bay."
"And...?"
"There to work-up its crew-including the first-lieutenant. And for the moment that's all you need to know. And in five minutes time you can clear lower-deck."
"Aye aye, sir," said Mat
heson, thwarted.
They mustered down near the tubes. There was not much spare room and they were packed tight, the old faces and the new. Verril reported to Matheson. The first-lieutenant roared and three hundred feet came together. It cannot be claimed that there was a sharp and unanimous crack, as heard at Sandhurst or Alder-shot; there was a scraping sort of shuffle and Jackal's ship's company, at their idea of attention, was reported to the captain.
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