The Gatecrashers: The Nicholas Everard World War II Saga Book 6

by Alexander Fullerton

  It wasn’t easy to accept—despite having recognised the facts and probabilities and having had quite a long time in which to think about them.

  “Ninety-five feet.”

  A full stop on all hope was as difficult to hoist in as the concept of limitless space. The two were similar—you felt there had to be something beyond the full stop … Another peculiar fallibility of the human psyche was that you could see it in black and white and still try to convince yourself it wasn’t true.

  Ninety-eight feet. Gimber said, in a perfectly normal tone, “We’ve had it, haven’t we.” X-12 still trembling, straining to fight the downward drag of her own weight. She’d exhausted her reserves of air and now she was using up all her battery-power. At full grouped up it wouldn’t take long. Seven fifty now. In ten minutes the world would end: at least, they’d be on the fjord’s rock bottom waiting for it to end, with nothing to do but wait. Might say prayers, he thought. Open the last tins of fruit. Pray, or tell dirty jokes, sing hymns …

  There’d been a few narrow squeaks before this. In the Med in Ultra; and in his first ship, the destroyer Hoste—he’d come very close to drowning, that time. You couldn’t go on throwing sixes forever. As this thought appeared in the back of his mind he recognised it as one he’d entertained before, but not of himself, always in thinking about his father and his narrow squeaks.

  “Hundred feet.”

  Gimber’s report brought him back to earth. Or rather, to this limbo. “Limbo” was how it felt, how it was and would be—because this was perdition, no one could ever know the details of X-12’s loss. In that sense one might be dying—about to die—on another planet.

  He’d seen the wheel move.

  Light had flashed on its rim as it jerked to port. It struck him that although she was sinking, and at a steeply stern-down angle, she must still have some forward way on—possibly a significant amount, was travelling forwards at fair speed as well as losing buoyancy and sinking: would as likely as not respond to her helm if he applied some.

  His brain did a double-take on that … and woke up.

  Ship’s head was 054. Course to the shallows on the far side of the channel would be roughly 030 … He grabbed the wheel, flung it round to put on twenty degrees of port rudder. If there were only a few hundred yards to go to get her into those shallows—if you could drive her on to them—up them—and if she’d hold herself together while you did it, while she crashed along the bottom, after first hitting the bottom at some point and surviving that …

  How many “ifs” was that? But she was answering her rudder, swinging to port.

  “Hundred and five …”

  Crash!

  She’d struck stern-first—in seventeen and a half fathoms. She was ploughing on—lurching, staggering, stern scraping over rock.

  “Hundred feet!”

  Lanchberry was clawing his way back up the incline of densely-packed machinery. He’d been knocked down again and he was growling obscenities. Paul had her on a heading of 030: he shouted, with one hand extended for it, “Chart!” A hundred feet was about seventeen fathoms. And the point was, she’d risen, she’d been at a hundred and five, struck rock and bounced, finished at a hundred. Well, not finished, not as long as there was still some juice in the battery: and that might be the next thing, sound of the motor slowing … The wheel was jumping in his one hand: the imminent danger now was to the rudder, which at any minute could be smashed in one of those clanging impacts on rock.

  “Ninety feet!”

  Lanchberry pushed the chart over Paul’s shoulder. Paul told him as she struck again, the whole body of the boat jarring from it but still driving on, “Get Louis here—both of you—”

  All along the coast opposite the island the bottom shelved quite steeply. So if she could be kept moving that way—uphill—as long as the rudder and propeller could stand up to it—which was a toss-up, second by second—and as long as the side-cargo could endure this battering—the cargo and its running fuse, which was another thought altogether … Gimber was close behind him, Lanchberry at his left shoulder: he shouted, having to scream to be heard over the racket as she ground over rock—bow falling slightly as her tail-end crashed against some outcrop and flung upwards— “East side of the channel—I’m steering for the shallows. Dotted part on that coastline—see?”

  “Got it!”

  “When we’re there—if we make it that far—not much water over us. Abandon by DSEA—OK?”

  Lanchberry shouted, “Still take a bloody hour! More—she’ll flood slower!”

  He shook his head. “Through the wet-and-dry. Get sets on, breathing from them, hold on tight and I’ll knock the clips off, let the door blast open …”

  “Christ Almighty!”

  He yelled at Gimber, “Depth now?”

  He’d craned round to see the gauge. Clinging to overhead pipes. Sixty feet … Ten fathoms. You could see that patch on the chart. A hundred yards to travel—if she got that far before breaking apart. Steeper incline here. She felt and sounded like a tin can being used as a football, noise and motion both stunning, really frightening: she’d split clean open any moment … “Get the sets out, Jazz!” He heard Gimber’s scream of “Fifty feet!” There was a period of savage, penetrating grinding from the stern, the length of her keel touched again, lifted, bounced in a crash and an upward spasm that felt as if the keel had fallen off, to leave (his imagination saw it) her belly unprotected, to be opened on the next bounce like a can ripped by the knife … He told himself, teeth gritted, that she’d make it. Her bow had swung up again as if she was trying to push her snout up out of water. For which he wouldn’t have blamed her … Another crashing impact aft rang her like a gong: she rose, came down again stern-first and—this time—crumpled.

  He heard steel ripping, somewhere underneath. Lanchberry let himself go sliding and bouncing to the engine-room bulkhead, slowing his progress by grabbing at fittings as gravity took him aft. He slammed the hatch on the crawl-hole to the engine space, and forced the clips over. Gimber shouted, “Thirty-three feet!”

  She was still driving on …

  But the rudder had gone. The wheel was stuck, immoveable. She could be turned, deflected into deeper water. He thought, Stop her, then … He was turning his head to pass the order: Gimber shouted, “Twenty-eight feet!” And simultaneously he heard the screw go. A noise like throwing a lump of metal into a meat-grinder, and a violent trembling right through her frames. It lasted about five seconds, by which time the propeller could have no blades left on it: the main motor raced, its hum rising to a howl which cut off as Gimber broke the field-switch.

  X-12 sliding on over rock: slowing, but still sliding, sounding like a heap of scrap-iron under tow.

  She’d stopped. Still with bow-up angle on her, and a list to starboard instead of port. Time: seven fifty-six.

  “Depth?”

  The swirl and lap of sea were the only external sounds. But there was water-noise inside her too, internal flooding. Gimber told him, “Twentyone feet.”

  “Check the side-cargo’s still there.”

  Lanchberry did so. Panting … He turned back, nodding. “Bastard …”

  But Paul wanted it to be still there. He’d only questioned it because of the list being to starboard instead of to port now—but that would be caused by the incline of the rock shelf she was resting on. He wanted it there, and to have it blow at eight twenty-five, so it would destroy the boat and all her contents, including equipment that was on the secret list. The orders had been to abandon in deep water, if at all, or otherwise to smash up that gear before leaving, and there wasn’t time for such attention to detail now.

  “DSEA sets on, boys. Quick as you can. Chuck mine over, Jazz.”

  The crunch would come with the opening of the W and D door. Even at this depth, opening up to outside pressure at one blast would be like getting yourselves run over by a truck. But if you could survive it—by hanging on like grim life itself and—essentially—prevent
ing your oxygen mask from being knocked off—then you’d only have to crawl into the W and D and climb out through its open hatch, float to the surface.

  With the mainland shore only yards away. He talked to the others about it while they were strapping-on their DSEA sets.

  “When I see we’re all ready, I’ll knock the clips off. See you lads up top. Good luck.”

  “Same to you, skipper.” Lanchberry said, “Done a bloody good job, I’d say.”

  “Seven-pound hammer, Jazz. For the clips.”

  Gimber began, “Paul …”

  “Talk later, Louis. Let’s get cracking.”

  Lanchberry produced the hammer. Seven fifty-eight. Twenty-seven minutes left on the clock on the port side-cargo, and possibly as little as two minutes on others.

  Lanchberry was the first to be breathing from his mask. He settled himself against the after bulkhead and raised a thumb towards Paul. Gimber joined him at that end. Paul fixed his own mask over his mouth and nose and opened the distributor valve; the bag inflated, and he was breathing oxygen. They’d all been through the drill a dozen times in the practice tank at Blockhouse; that tank was a hundred feet deep, but you started in a chamber at the bottom of it that was flooded gradually—rather like the flooding-up of the W and D—not just suddenly flung open … He braced himself with his back against the bulkhead beside the W and D door—on the side away from the hinge, so the door would open away from him. There was a small space here in which it had been suggested a half-size chart-table might be fitted, and it gave him room in which to press himself back into the corner. He put his left hand up to his face, grasping the mask by its snout where the flexible pipe joined it from the bag. He glanced at the others, saw they were doing the same, and they both signalled “Ready.” He raised the hammer.

  One clip off.

  They could be put on or taken off from either side of the door. Normally you’d do it by hand, but with such sea-pressure in the chamber, forcing the door against the clips, you needed some power to shift them. Only one clip held the door now. He took another quick look at Gimber and Lanchberry—saw they were ready, watching him, like Mickey Mouses in their masks. He aimed the hammer, swung it down.

  The blast flattened him against the bulkhead. He couldn’t breathe in or out: he was dizzy, reeling—down on his knees in a roaring, leaping torrent. Struggling up … Left hand still pressing the mask to his face. Then the noise was stopping, and his main impression was of the incredible viciousness of the cold: it was like ice hardening around him. There was a numbness already growing through his arms and legs, but as the roar of inflooding sea quietened he was thinking, That wasn’t so bad …

  As long as one didn’t freeze.

  He thought afterwards that he might have been unconscious for a few seconds. But he was breathing normally by this time and searching for the others, in darkness relieved by a diffuse radiance entering the viewing ports. He’d expected the control-room lights to stay on, even under water, but they must have shorted out. He half walked, half swam towards the after end of the compartment where they’d been when he’d last seen them. It would be eight by now, he guessed, and shut his mind to it, to the possibility of a new, huge eruption hitting them at any moment. There was only one that he knew for sure was coming, and he had twenty minutes to get away from it.

  A hand closed on his arm.

  He moved his other hand to the arm of whichever of them this was. Then felt the face and head. Sharp stubble surrounded the mask, not Gimber’s beard which in water would be like seaweed. A stubbly scalp, too. Identification positive—Jazz Lanchberry. He was pulling at Paul’s arm, trying to lead him. Paul allowed it, went that way, and had his hand placed on the body of Louis Gimber. It was limp and there was no mask on the face. Paul made himself breathe lightly and regularly—through the mouth: there was a clip on his nose to hold the nostrils shut—as per the Blockhouse drill book. There was no point in putting Gimber’s mask on for him: he was unconscious, his mouth and windpipe would already be full of water, the only way to save his life would be to get him out and give him artificial respiration as soon as possible. If he could be got out. Recollections of old nightmares had to be held at bay: the feeling of tight enclosure, the hoarse, frighteningly loud sound of your own breathing rasping in the mask, the sensation of being trapped in the bubbling laughter of drowned men. He had a grasp on Gimber, sharing him with Lanchberry, both of them moving awkwardly for’ard with the burden between them. It was likely to be difficult getting him through the crawl-hole into the W and D: one of them would have to be in there with him, and there wasn’t space for two. It had to be done, though. Old Louis, to be returned to Jane, if only so she could cheat him for the rest of their natural lives. The mind wandered, vaguely recognising the miraculous fact of being alive and the distinct possibility of suddenly becoming dead. Lanchberry slid into the crawl-hole like a sea-snake entering its cave, then lugged Gimber in after him, with Paul helping from outside, or trying to. They managed that part of it all right, but now Jazz would have either to push the body up through the hatch above him, or get up through it and reach down to pull it up behind him. Limp bodies were extremely difficult things to handle in such circumstances and in very confined spaces. Limbs tended to catch on hatch-rims and in other places, and there’d be a danger of getting him stuck in it. Such things had been known to happen in DSEA escapes, or attempted DSEA escapes. Very much on their side in this one, of course, was the extremely shallow water.

  The cold was painful, like heavy ice squeezing, gripping, and you couldn’t afford to be delayed for very long. Paul adjusted his distributor valve to give himself a better supply of oxygen, and after what seemed like about ten minutes but was more likely sixty seconds he put his head through the hole and saw Lanchberry’s legs disappearing upwards. He could see it because of the surface light showing through the open hatch, a light that was temporarily eclipsed as Lanchberry’s body filled the hatch on its way through. Paul was in the W and D by then, crouching, keeping his mask out of the way of Lanchberry’s feet, looking up and waiting for the exit to be clear. Then he climbed up into the hatchway. As Bomber Brazier had done only about an hour ago, an hour like half a lifetime.

  Thinking of Brazier: and that if a side-cargo went up now, when all three of them were in the sea …

  Please God, ten minutes more?

  Having got this far, he was sharply conscious of the urge to live. It had never really left him, but he’d had to subdue it when there’d seemed to be no hope. He was out of the hatch, holding to X-12’s casing to stop himself floating straight up. Breathing loudly, and bubbles streaming from each exhalation. But Lanchberry had gone on up with Gimber, and there was no reason to make himself wait. He let go, arched his body in the approved DSEA training tank position, but didn’t bother with the apron in only about twenty feet of water.

  Daylight exploded in his face. And the sight of a mountainside with snow on it. Treading water, he wrenched the mask off and gasped cold air into his lungs. Some salt water came in with it, and he was choking for a while. Lanchberry was supporting Gimber. The sea lapped a fringe of rocks that lined the shore, very much as he’d expected. In not much more than a minute, the two of them sharing Gimber’s weight again, they were among the rocks and wading. They were floundering towards the shore itself, with only a few yards to cover—but then an almost vertical rock climb, which wouldn’t be too easy, with Gimber—when Lanchberry stopped.

  “Bloody hell …”

  Gimber’s head lolled on a broken neck. It must have happened inside the boat when the rush of water hit them. They’d brought a corpse out with them.

  “Leave him here.”

  The body would be better hidden here than it could be up on the shore. It would be a disadvantage to have it found too soon. He didn’t quite know why, but in fact he realised later that his thoughts must already have been turning towards escape as distinct from surrender to the Germans. This was crazy, of course—since they were bo
th frozen, wet, exhausted, half-drowned and hadn’t been able to bring any of the overland-escape gear with them.

  Lanchberry let Gimber’s body down into the shallow water, where it would be contained by the surrounding rocks until some Norwegian fisherman, or German soldier, came across it. Except that when the side-cargo exploded …

  “What’s the time?”

  Lanchberry had an expensive, waterproof wristwatch of which he was extremely proud. He glanced at it now. “Eight-ten.” He shook his head. “I don’t believe it. I thought—”

  “Hey! Hey!”

  On the rock edge above them—a boy. Kid of about twelve, in rough, warm-looking clothes and a woollen cap on his head. Blunt, freckled features and an expression of excitement.

  “English?”

  Paul nodded, shivering. “Yes.”

  Lanchberry muttered, “Well, fuck me!”

  “Kom!” The boy beckoned. Looking around—across the water, and back at the coast road behind him. There were cottages in sight, Paul found when he got up there, and he remembered the chart had shown some settlements along this coast. The boy had a sack with him, in which he stowed their DSEA sets when they shed them. He seemed to be quite sure of what he was doing. Paul hoping it wouldn’t turn out to have been all on the kid’s own initiative, that there’d be some adults around as well. In any case this was the best bet, the only chance of warmth and perhaps a hideout. The boy slung the sack over his shoulder; he’d beckoned again, and he was leading them towards the road when from somewhere in the south and some miles away the explosion of a side-cargo came like a clap of thunder: then, right on its heels, two more, overlapping—a triple-barrelled eruption that went on echoing for half a minute from snow-clad mountainsides. The boy laughed, and shouted back over his shoulder, “Tirpitz! Boom-boom-boom!” he beckoned again and broke into a trot.