Dalziel said suddenly, ‘Rain’s eased a bit, but it’s too late to be much use. With this low visibility it will be quite dark before long.’ He frowned. ‘Call Hornby and tell him to check the radar unit again.’
Standish passed his order and crossed to the opposite side to watch the yellow-toothed banks of breakers as they surged towards the ship’s quarter. Driven hundreds of miles, he thought, with nothing between them and the great expanse of the Gulf but Terrapin’s fragile hull.
Perhaps the vessel for which they were now searching had already reached safety, or had even been driven ashore as a total wreck. He found that he was hoping it was still there somewhere ahead of the labouring frigate. Just so they could catch them. So he could see the faces of the sort of men who could butcher without mercy in the name of brotherhood.
Minutes dragged into another hour, with the motion making their minds and bodies bruised as the ship heeled and plunged, corkscrewed and staggered, like a thing gone mad.
Wills reached the wheelhouse gasping. ‘Coffee, sir.’ He was soaked and his hair was plastered across his eyes. He said, ‘I put somethin’ good in it.’
Standish took a mug and tasted it. There was more rum than coffee, he thought. But it was what they needed at this moment.
Irvine had spent most of the time by the radar repeater, his faced lined with strain. He reported for the hundredth time, ‘Nothing yet, sir.’
Dalziel said, ‘Better go round the ship, Number One. Make sure everything’s secure.’ He smiled, ‘Cheer them up, eh?’
Standish dragged on his oilskin. He was glad to leave, if only to be doing something.
Little groups of men were huddled everywhere. Burch and his signalmen, their coats making them look like wet seals on a rock. Lower down, Harris, the chief bosun’s mate, a heavy knife hanging from his waist on a lanyard as he watched the whaler jerking in its davits as one sea after another swept along the deck from end to end. Motts was about too, clinging to a lifeline while he guided his working party along the treacherous deck, gauging the time between moves, watching the sea and cursing with the rest of them.
Caley was right aft, his thickset body bent almost double as he crawled around the depth-charge mortars accompanied by two of his ratings. He saw Standish and yelled, ‘One of the Carley floats has gone! God knows when or where, but it’s bloody missing now!’
Standish hooked his arm around a wire stay and felt the receding water dragging greedily at his legs and feet. ‘If we can keep ahead of this front we should be all right.’ He saw Caley nod doubtfully. ‘After we’ve found that boat we can keep on going until it blows itself out. We’ve the rest of the Gulf if need be.’
Caley wiped his streaming face. ‘We gotta find the bloody boat first!’
Down below decks it was quieter but no less menacing. The cabin flat seemed unnatural and deserted, with some of the doors sliding and squeaking as if being moved by invisible fingers. And all the time the sea thundered along the hull and drove hissing overhead in a never-ending onslaught.
It was not quite deserted. In one cabin he saw Pigott jammed in a corner of his bunk while he pencilled notes in a long ledger, his glasses slipping to the end of his nose as he tried to keep upright.
In the sickbay the Australian engineer was still doped or asleep, his body held in the swaying cot by two traps, while Mackie, the leading medical assistant, slept almost as deeply in Rideout’s swivel chair, his mouth wide open while he snored obliviously in his dreams.
Standish found the two women in the wardroom. They were sitting in two chairs which someone had lashed against a steam-pipe.
He said, ‘I just came to tell you we’re still making good speed.’ Now that he was here he did not know what to say. They were both looking at him, and when he glanced down he saw that his legs and shoes were still caked with filth from the burned village.
The girl said quietly, ‘It was good of you to come. Down here you feel cut off. Helpless.’ She gripped the chair as the deck canted steeply, the hull quivering to another great wave. ‘But it must be worse for you.’
Standish removed his cap and shook it on the carpet. ‘Like the ship. Battered but unbowed.’ He smiled. ‘She has seen worse. They built ships to last in those days.’
Mrs. Penrath asked, ‘Will you find this boat?’ She was watching him gravely. ‘And if so, what then?’
Standish listened to the shafts, the shuddering jerk of screws as the stern lifted above the quarter sea.
‘Keep it in sight until the weather eases, I expect.’ It was odd, he had hardly thought about it up to now. ‘We can always radio the Malaysian patrols, or the Thai army too for that matter.’
She nodded. ‘We are going as far north as that then?’
‘Maybe.’ He thought suddenly of the Cornwallis. Strange they should be driving towards the same area where she had been. He glanced quickly at the girl and wondered if she was thinking that, too.
He said, ‘You’ll be safe enough.’
He looked around the shabby wardroom and recalled the smart elegance of Sarah Dalziel’s hotel suite. It seemed like a million years ago. The stark contrast filled him with pity for the girl who was watching him so intently. It was terrible enough for her with what had happened and the uncertainty which lay ahead, without all this.
‘I must go now.’ He thought of the sea and the strained atmosphere in the wheelhouse. ‘Wills will be here if you want anything.’ He looked at the girl. ‘Anything at all.’
He left the wardroom and lurched back along the swaying passageway between the cabins. Something made him turn and he saw the girl standing behind him, her slim figure outlined against the open door.
‘Yes?’
She came towards him, feeling her way along the safety rail, but with her eyes on his face.
‘I wanted to see you. To explain …’ She faltered and dropped her eyes.
‘I understand.’ He reached out and took her wrist. It was very slender and quite cool. ‘Try to shut it out. It’ll take time, but …’
She shook her head, the black hair falling forward across her face. ‘Not that. I didn’t want to let you go on thinking I was ungrateful. I’ll never forget what you did for us. For me.’ She lifted her head and he saw the desperation in her eyes. ‘I heard some of the others speaking of your trouble. What you’ve been through. I didn’t know. Didn’t stop to think.’ She stared down at her hand in his. ‘I’m so sorry.’
He replied, ‘It’s over. Forget that, too.’ He waited as the ship dipped heavily into a trough. It seemed an age before the water stopped cascading across the deck above their heads. And all the while he was conscious only of her. Of her nearness. Of his need for her. He said, ‘When this is over …’ He paused. ‘If you ever find you can’t cope, I’d like you to write to me. Will you do it?’
She reached out and touched his coat, watching the salt water dripping across her wrist. ‘I promise.’
Wills burst from the wardroom and shouted, ‘Sir!’ He seemed to sense what was happening and added more quietly, ‘Captain wants you up top double quick, sir. The radar has made a contact.’
Standish looked at the girl. ‘Damn.’ Then he added, ‘Tell them I’m coming up.’ As Wills dashed away he said, ‘It’s hard to be alone in a ship.’
As he ran towards the companionway he retained a clear picture of her face. He had seen her smile for the first time.
Dalziel turned to the wheelhouse door as he pulled himself inside. ‘Well, what did I tell you, eh?’ His eyes were blazing with excitement. ‘A firm contact at red four-five. Range ten miles or thereabouts.’ He followed Standish to the radar repeater. ‘Not much of an echo, but I’m grateful they found it at all in this weather.’
On the small screen it was certainly difficult to make out anything but a mad mixture of flickering lights.
Dalziel said, ‘I’ve been up to the radar cabinet. Better picture there, I can tell you.’ He frowned, ‘Smaller than I expected. Probably a launch.’
>
He looked at Irvine. ‘Tell the engine room I want maximum revolutions. Emergency full speed.’
Corbin appeared in the wheelhouse and Dalziel said dryly, ‘A fine entrance, Cox’n. Right, take the wheel now, please.’
The speaker crackled above the door. It was Wishart’s voice which followed. ‘The other vessel has altered course, sir. Now steering approximately zero-five-zero.’
Dalziel muttered, ‘Impossible. That’s away from the land, for God’s sake. They’ll run smack across the path of the storm if they maintain that course.’ More sharply he added, ‘Keep checking.’ But he was unable to stay still. ‘Go up, Number One. Have a look yourself.’
The radar cabinet was streaming with condensation, and the faces of the operators gleamed in the big scopes like wax masks. Wishart was there, Hornby too, and they turned to watch as Standish peered over the shoulders of Vine, the senior radar operator.
‘What do you make of it?’
Vine fiddled with his knobs and switches and said bluntly, ‘This set should have been scrapped years ago, sir. With the new model you can find a fly on a whale’s back.’ He shrugged. ‘I thought I knew, but now I’m not sure.’ He stiffened, and Standish saw a small blip momentarily clear and bright on the flickering scope. ‘Launch, I thought, or something small like that. Quite fast.’ He sighed as the screen faded in a blur of back echoes. ‘Lost it again.’
Dalziel’s voice crackled over the intercom. ‘Well, say something!’
Standish replied, ‘Appears to be heading zero-five-zero, sir.’ He waited, seeing the others watching his face. ‘It’s the only living thing as far as I can see.’
‘Come down here, Number One.’
Dalziel greeted him in the wheelhouse with, ‘Must be that bloody radar again. And I thought …’ He saw Standish’s expression and asked quickly, ‘What is it?’
‘No small boat would head out to sea in this. Not even a maniac would do it.’ He saw the disappointment returning to Dalziel’s dark eyes. ‘But I was thinking, sir …’
‘For God’s sake spit it out!’
‘What if it’s not a launch at all?’ Standish turned his back on the others. ‘Just suppose it’s a submarine’s conning tower.’
Dalziel stared at him for several seconds. Then he said softly, ‘Mother of God. You’ve hit it. The size and the speed.’ He waved towards the salt-dashed screens. ‘The waters round here are too shallow to dive in comfort.’
Standish nodded gravely. ‘She’s making for deep water right now.’ He thought suddenly of the Malay trooper’s indecision. A partly submerged submarine would baffle a native policeman under such circumstances. And Kuala Papan was one of those rare and deep inlets. Deep enough for a ship like the Sibuyan. Or a submarine.
The red telephone buzzed and Irvine said, ‘The Chief wants to reduce speed at once, sir.’ He looked from one to the other, his body pitching back and forth as the ship rolled under him. ‘The starboard shaft is bothering him, sir. He wants to do an inspection.’
Dalziel crossed to the telephone and snatched it from his hand. ‘Chief? This is the captain.’ His eyes were fixed and unblinking as he listened briefly before snapping, ‘Then you don’t know anything’s really wrong, do you?’ Another pause and then he shouted, ‘I don’t give a bloody damn about your instincts, do you hear? There’s an enemy submarine on the surface and I intend to get it.’ Another pause, with only Corbin too intent on wheel and compass to listen. Then Dalziel said very calmly, ‘If you had seen that village, Chief, you might think differently. However, you will remain at full revolutions until I say otherwise.’ He dropped the telephone and looked hard at Standish. ‘No war on indeed. Just where the hell has he been all these years?’
He turned towards Irvine. ‘Give me a course to intercept, Pilot, and move yourself.’ To the wheelhouse at large he added, ‘No angler is considered anything but a liar until he produces the fish. Well, I’ll give them a catch that even the blindest politician can get his teeth into!’
Standish waited until Dalziel had returned to the forepart of the wheelhouse and then said, ‘I could have been wrong, sir.’
‘We’ll worry about that later.’ Dalziel eyed him evenly. ‘But I think not. You may know damn-all about women, but by God you do understand submarines.’
Irvine called, ‘New course is zero-two-zero, sir.’
Dalziel nodded. ‘Warn the ship before we turn. It may get a bit unsteady from now on.’ He smiled. ‘Picket duty, eh? Carry stores, will we? By God, we’ll see about that.’
Irvine said, ‘Ready, sir.’ He sounded hoarse.
Dalziel linked his arm through a stanchion. ‘So be it then.’
13 Aftermath
OUTSIDE THE WHEELHOUSE the sky was almost completely dark, with only the careering wave crests to mark any sort of division between sea and cloud. Standish clung to his position by the starboard clearview screen and watched as once more the forecastle disappeared under a thundering cascade of water, and felt the deck sliding away beneath him, the screen misting over in a distorted mirage of grey and white. He could also feel the bruise on his hip where the pressure of unyielding steel had grated against him as time after time the ship had slid almost beam on into a steep trough, only to emerge shaking and corkscrewing for the next onslaught.
He had lost all sense of time, and the whole meaning of existence seemed to have shrunk to within the wheelhouse and the efforts of Dalziel and Corbin to keep the ship under control.
The men around him were mostly just shadows, with an occasional face picked out by the compass light or the gleam of the radar repeater.
At irregular intervals Vine’s voice came over the intercom. The other vessel was still there. Mocking their efforts to outpace and overhaul it.
Dalziel snapped, ‘How is it now?’
Vine again, tired and hoarse from strain. ‘Echo bears red oh-oh-five. Range oh-eight-oh.’ A pause and somebody coughed in the background. ‘Course appears to have shifted slightly. Now zero-six-zero degrees.’
Dalziel turned and stared at Standish. ‘He’ll cross our bows. He must be doing sixteen knots at least!’
Standish watched the forecastle lifting again, the steel shining dully against the cascading seas beyond as the old ship struggled upright towards another roller.
‘Must be a submarine, sir. No small surface craft could keep such a steady course under these conditions.’ He added slowly, ‘She’ll dive soon if I’m any judge. According to the chart the bottom starts to fall away to thirty-five fathoms directly across his present course. He’ll be in a comfortable position in half an hour.’
Dalziel struggled up the sloping deck and gripped his arm. ‘We can still head him off.’ He swung round and shouted, ‘Alter course five degrees to starboard!’ He paused and waited until the last wave had crashed against the bridge superstructure. ‘More speed. Tell the engine room I must have more speed.’
Standish picked up the handset, his eyes on Corbin as the coxswain’s tall figure rose and then leaned over at almost thirty degrees.
But it was not Quarrie’s voice this time. It was Petty Officer Barrett, the man who had handled the outboard motors so expertly.
‘The Chief’s right aft, sir!’
Above his voice and the roar of spray and rain Standish heard the pulsating beat of machinery, the whir of fans as the Terrapin’s engines turned the ship’s afterpart into one vibrating mass of metal.
Standish said, ‘The captain wants everything you can give him.’
‘We’ve been doing that for hours, sir.’
‘I know. But do what you can.’ He replaced the handset and almost fell as the deck swooped and then staggered from under him.
He heard Corbin shouting, ‘She’s paying off, sir! Zero-two-zero; zero-one-five; zero-one-zero!’ He was clinging to the spokes, his face shining with sweat in the compass light.
Dalziel had one arm around a telegraph, his head craned towards the gyro. ‘Half astern starboard engine!’ He used b
oth arms to hold on as the deck leaned over still further and men fell headlong across the wheelhouse in a confused, shouting tangle.
‘Starboard engine half astern, sir.’
It seemed suddenly quiet beyond the steel sides of the wheelhouse, and Standish realized with sick horror that the ship was lying in the confines of a steep trough, being pushed along and over by the force of one great, towering roller. Fascinated he watched the roller’s crest start to crumple, heard Irvine gasp behind him as with the force of an avalanche the great mass of water crashed down on the ship’s exposed side.
Corbin yelled, ‘I can’t hold her, sir! She won’t answer!’
‘Put the starboard engine to full astern! Emergency!’ Dalziel’s voice seemed unnaturally loud in the imprisoned stillness of the trough.
The hull shook savagely as the screws fought against sea and rudder to bring the stem round.
A seaman sobbed, ‘She’s goin’! Oh Jesus, she’s goin’ right under!’
No one answered, but as one more great wave battered against the listing hull Corbin croaked, ‘She’s coming, sir!’ The gyro ticked round. ‘Zero-one-five. zero-two-zero.’
‘Get ready.’ Dalziel laid his hand on that of the mesmerized seaman at the telegraph. ‘Now. Full ahead starboard!’
As the bows slewed sluggishly above the creaming wall of water the noise and violence came back as savagely as ever.
Dalziel said, ‘Steer zero-three-zero.’ He waited as Corbin brought her round. ‘That’ll give better steerage way for a bit.’
Irvine called thickly, ‘The rain’s stopped!’
Nobody seemed to care. But Standish saw Dalziel’s quick jerk of the head before he turned his attention back to the compass. He remembered what Dalziel had said in the past. It is when the rain stops you have to watch out. In the path of the storm. The words drummed into his mind like a voice in a nightmare.
Irvine clawed his way round the wheelhouse and whispered into his ear, ‘The bottom has dropped out of the glass. We’re heading almost straight to the storm centre, for God’s sake!’
The Greatest Enemy Page 23