Westbound, Warbound

by Westbound, Warbound (retail) (epub)

  ‘Didn’t like it when you picked him up on the ‘prost’, did he?’

  ‘No, he didn’t. Interesting slip-up, though, wouldn’t you agree – suggests he has German or Germans on his mind? I should have said – Cluny also told me not to say anything in Caetano’s hearing that I wouldn’t want Germans hearing. Why I didn’t say anything about the bloody music. Should have, maybe – if anyone was going to tell the bastards to cut the volume, Port Captain would, wouldn’t he. We’ll see tomorrow what Cluny has to tell us, anyway.’

  ‘What he has to tell you, Andy. I’ll have to take your duty for you, won’t I. We might swap, Monday for Tuesday?’

  ‘Yes. Christ, yes.’ They were passing the Volcao. She’d fallen silent now, and there was no sign of life at the gangway head. ‘Hadn’t thought. But if that’s OK with you –’

  ‘Prospect doesn’t disturb me in the least. Doubt if I’d want to land either night.’

  ‘And Halloran has the duty Wednesday. Works out nicely. Next point, though – think we should tell the Old Man there’s something going on?’

  ‘Tell him what’s going on?’

  ‘After I see Cluny again, then.’

  ‘But before that, maybe. Hang on a mo.’ Pausing in their approach to the PollyAnna’s gangway. ‘Your theory about Glauchau maybe having linkage to the Spee. Dates and so on – may be just coincidence; on the other hand it does seem to add up – begins to seem more likely than unlikely, even. I was thinking about it when we were in Manolo’s –’

  ‘I’d have sworn you were too busy trying to see down that blond hag’s dress. In fact –’

  ‘I’m talking seriously, Andy.’

  ‘– could have been why she scarpered when she did.’

  ‘What I’m saying is it might be as well to let the Old Man know about it.’

  ‘Then you, as second mate –’

  ‘Your brainwave, Andy, you tell him.’

  * * *

  He woke with the tall, dark girl in his mind – the one with the long hair and lovely shoulders. Lovely everything. Kicking himself that he hadn’t asked Frank Cluny who she was or what the form might be, whether for instance that little commander had any kind of lien on her – as husband, for instance, or established lover. She hadn’t looked or acted as if she thought he had.

  Get it out of Cluny this evening. He’d surely know. Those two might well have been in Manolo’s, coming from there when he’d run into them. Nodding to himself, thinking that if he did get to see her again it might rate as their second meeting, he could act as if they already knew each other.

  Loading started not at eight but before half-past, which for a place like this wasn’t bad. There was a steam-powered elevator that lifted ore from the railway trucks into the main body of the chute, and an outlet trunking trained out over the hold – aftermost hold, number five – with a semi-flexible tubular spout made of jointed steel that hung down into the ship’s guts and convulsed when the ore was crashing through it. The speed of loading was governed by the rate at which a gang of eight or ten dock labourers could shovel the ore from the trucks on to the elevator: the racket was tremendous. Halloran had the bosun and half a dozen hands standing by, and when the flow was stopped, as it periodically was, getting down inside and trimming – levelling, squaring the stuff away between prerigged fore-and-aft partitions of heavy timber that split it up, would prevent the whole immense weight of it shifting in one mass, which in foul weather with the rolling of the ship it would otherwise be inclined to do, and which would be extremely dangerous.

  As a wartime cargo, ore was dangerous enough in any case – or would be in U-boat waters, which they had to reckon on being in at some later stage. The Old Man had pointed this out when they’d been loading manganese ore in Calcutta, Andy remembered: Old Man having had experience of Atlantic convoys in the ’14–’18 war, and given them a talk about precautions they’d be taking when the grimmer times arrived. Having lifeboats permanently turned-out in their davits, for instance, ready for speedy lowering; he’d spelt this out to Andy, Fisher and the cadets, some of the engineers and the wireless officers too, Halloran also present, although feigning prior knowledge – didn’t need telling, knew it all, as first mate having a master’s ticket after all, only nodding agreement as the skipper explained, ‘Such a weight of it, see, that when she’s right down to her marks there’s most of all the holds still empty. Each ton deadweight fills no more ’n fifteen to twenty cubic feet, that’s the nub of it. So, punch a hole in her then – as a torpedo does, that being the nature of the beast – sea bursts in, fills that big empty space in, say, two and a half seconds, down she goes like a stone. I’ve known of a ship near enough PollyAnna’s size taking fifty seconds – fifty seconds – from being hit to going under.’

  Gorst had murmured, ‘Got to be darned nippy!’

  ‘Damn right, lad. If you’re going to have any chance at all. But I’ll tell you all another thing, while on that subject. Any ship I command, officers see their men into the boats before they get into ’em…’

  * * *

  Andy sought out the Old Man in mid-forenoon, asked if he could have a word, and gave him his Glauchau theory.

  The noise of the loading was excruciating; even up here in the day cabin with its door and scuttles shut you had to shout to be heard. There’d been a blissful fifteen-minute break, but the chute was back in action now: the ore-dust cloud had taken that long to settle, was now again poisoning the air you breathed. The rest of the hands were being employed chipping and scraping – preliminary to red-leading and then repainting – and out on deck you couldn’t even hear that cacophony.

  Or breathe. Or hear the Glauchau’s brass band, either.

  Skipper gazing at him, blue eyes blinking slowly.

  ‘May be codswallop, sir, but the dates coinciding as they do – and the fact she’s still doing damn-all, just lying there… I thought, no harm mentioning it.’

  ‘No harm at all.’ Blink, blink. ‘No harm at all, Holt.’

  ‘But there’s something else, sir. Funny set-up ashore here.’

  He told him about Manolo’s, and what Cluny had said; about Caetano, the so-called acting port captain, allegedly pro-German and in front of whom Cluny hadn’t wanted to talk, had therefore asked Andy to go back tonight. ‘I said I would if it’s something that really matters, and he said, ‘It’ll matter to you, all right!’

  ‘To do with the Glauchau, you think.’

  ‘Seemed so, sir. And definitely with Caetano. I got the feeling that in his hearing I’d better not show interest in the Glauchau. As it happened, second mate and I’d been discussing her – that theory about the Spee – and then Cluny warned me not long after we got there, ‘Don’t say anything you wouldn’t want the Germans to hear about’.’

  ‘Cluny being a South African barman, you say.’

  ‘Decent sort of fellow, sir. Rolling stone, all that – has been – but I’d say he’s straight enough.’

  ‘You’ll go back and get whatever it is he’s offering, then.’

  ‘Was planning to, sir.’

  ‘Let me know how it goes. I’m glad you told me. Anyone besides you and Fisher know about it?’

  ‘No, sir. Thought until we knew what we were talking about –’

  ‘Wise man, Holt. Wise man. Be a full-blown man Wednesday – eh?’

  * * *

  There was no mail – none was delivered on board, anyway. News on the wireless was that last night after the Graf Spee had blown herself up, the cruisers Ajax, Achilles and Cumberland had steamed up the Plate estuary, passed close to the still-burning and smoking wreck – she’d settled on a mud-bank and remained clearly visible – and entered Montevideo, to the vociferous delight of many thousands of spectators. Commodore Harwood had been promoted to rear-admiral overnight, and the captains of Ajax, Achilles and Exeter had received decorations. Cumberland was the replacement for the badly damaged Exeter, Harwood had whistled her up from Port Stanley on the 13th. There was
no mention of Renown or Ark Royal; Spee would have faced only those three cruisers. Now her remains were lying with oily black smoke still drifting from her while Uruguayan and Argentinian fishermen were doing good business ferrying tourists out to snap her with their Kodaks. Langsdorff and his crew were said to have been landed in Buenos Aires – from those tugs, presumably.

  Halloran asked Andy, over supper in the saloon, ‘Shore-going again, Holt? Found yourself a woman – that it?’

  ‘Not exactly found. Ran into, sort of. Got an idea where I might run into her again.’

  ‘And that’ll be it, eh? Gets an eyeful of our third mate and bingo, she’s in the sack?’

  Derisive… Andy looked back at him – at the blue-black jaw, eyes like fat, black currants in a bun, nose like a trodden-on potato. He shrugged. ‘Never know your luck.’

  ‘Oh, I know mine!’

  Fisher gazing po-faced into his scrambled eggs. Halloran throwing his fork down and telling Andy, ‘Place for girls here is the Casa Colorada. If you was after a birthday treat, for instance…’

  9

  The tall girl wasn’t here. On his way through to the bar he told himself by way of encouragement, ‘Not here yet.’ In any case, no reason she should have been – girls didn’t live in bars. On a Saturday night he might have stood an odds-on chance, but this was bloody Monday: she’d as likely as not be at home, washing her smalls or all that long hair. Glancing round again, seeing no familiar faces – except Manolo’s. Guitar music again: they had a radiogram at the back with an automatic record-changer, Cluny had told him – you could put eight records on it at each reload. Cluny must be at the back somewhere now. Doing that or – whatever…

  Manolo, pouring drinks, smiled and called, ‘Welcome back, senhor!’, and Andy asked him – casual tone, as if it didn’t matter – ‘No Franco?’

  Slow shake of the head, while keeping his eyes on what he was doing; Andy’s eye taken then by the little waitress with the hour-glass figure who’d rubbed herself against him last night. She gave him one of her smiles as she wiggled by with a tray of glasses. If it hadn’t been for the existence of that other one, might well have gone for her. Certainly no lack of encouragement – if encouragement had been needed, which as yet it never had been. And one wasn’t thirty yet: nine years and two days to go…

  Manolo, having collected cash – dinheiro, one of a few words Andy had learnt last night – from those customers, was sliding this way: ‘Tonight senhor, no – no Franco. To my regret. Wanna beer?’

  A reminder that what you were certain you could count on often didn’t happen: another of Andy’s father’s dicta. Not easy to take this philosophically, though: Cluny had undertaken to be here. And having told the story to the Old Man, who’d taken it seriously… ‘Beer, please. But Franco –’

  ‘Has gone Belo Horizonte – two hundred, two-fifty kilometres. Take his wife to her mother. Father is mine manager – some accident, gone hospital, old woman on this telephone scream blue murder.’ He’d pointed at it – telephone on the wall behind the bar. ‘Blue murder, that how you say it?’ Smiling, putting the beer glass and half-empty bottle on the bar in front of him, Andy delving for dinheiro – the equivalent of about a shilling, which at home would have got you two pints.

  ‘When d’you expect him back?’

  ‘Tomorrow.’ Hand raised, fingers crossed. Pale, soft-looking hand. ‘If is possible.’

  ‘This time tomorrow, I suppose.’

  ‘Si. But maybe – maybe – Wednesday? Excuse me…’

  The place wasn’t crowded, but he was being kept busy, single-handed. Spotting some new arrival now, waving over people’s heads with one hand while dispensing cachaça with the other: ‘Oi, Mario!’

  Mendoza: limping this way. In uniform, removing his cap and tucking it under his left arm; look of surprise as he spotted Andy. ‘My young frien’ from the PollyAnna!’ Tapping his forehead for memory: ‘I say to you come Manolo’s, uh?’

  ‘Came last night, Captain.’ Shaking hands and reminding him, ‘Holt, third mate. Buy you a beer, sir?’

  One ‘sir’ would last out the next few minutes. The little guy was about twice his age, and master’s rank. Too old one might think to be sliding an arm round the even littler waitress – Manuela, her name was, and she could easily have been his daughter – and asking her if she’d missed him; she was saying yes in Portuguese, and he kissed her, nodded now to Andy: ‘Beer, yes, very nice…’

  One beer would be his lot too, Andy thought, signalling the order to Manolo. Neither Cluny nor the tall girl being here, and anyway needing to save a few cruzeiros for his birthday. Cluny’s absence hit him again then: if he didn’t get back before Wednesday, and the Glauchau was to shove off between now and then, taking her secret with her…? The Old Man would get a signal off to the RN in that case, surely – deep-laden Hun motor vessel, possibly acting as support-ship to a raider: in any case a Hun, eligible for attention – whether or not port regulations or the Hague Convention permitted the use of W/T in a neutral harbour – wouldn’t he? Andy thought of asking Mendoza about this, but decided it might be better not to: it was skipper’s business – most certainly not any third mate’s – and the Old Man most likely knew all about it; meanwhile, best neither to be informed of prohibitions if they existed nor to mention that any such notion might be in the wind.

  If it was. Josh Thornhill wasn’t a man to go off the deep end or do anything in a rush.

  Mendoza had seized his arm, wanted to move to a table that had just been vacated by some Frenchmen. Andy paid for the beer, then followed him to where Manuela was clearing away glasses and cheroot ends. She was wearing a provocatively musky scent, he noticed. Mendoza commenting – having seen him enjoying a close look at her – ‘Girls very nice, eh?’

  ‘One in particular – saw her last night, not in here, outside, but she might have been in here – tall, long dark hair, really beautiful –’

  ‘You speak with her?’

  ‘No. She was with a commander or lieutenant-commander. Man about your size – could have been her husband, but –’

  ‘Capitao de Fregato is commander.’ Three fingers on his shoulder indicating the rank stripes on shoulder-boards. ‘Capitao de Corveta is more junior commander, or is also Capitao Tenente’ – two stripes – ‘how you say it – lieutenant-commander?’

  ‘The middle one, I’d guess. Junior commander. Man about your height.’

  ‘Da Sousa. Captain of minelayer Cabedelo.’ Wave of a hand roughly in the direction of Sao Joao; the minelayer was berthed just this side of it, of course. Mendoza smiling: ‘She not his wife. Wife live Rio de Janeiro. This one name Arabella. Ah, yes, beautiful, I loving her. Many, many loving her.’

  ‘Well – I’m not surprised…’

  ‘You like meet Arabella?’

  ‘Ah – yeah, some time. But –’

  ‘Tell Tonio. He fix.’

  ‘Just like that? Well… But listen –’

  ‘You like drink cachaça?’

  ‘In a minute maybe. But –’

  ‘Better now. Soon maybe get –’ hand movements meaning the place might get full suddenly. ‘Manuela!’

  She brought them the cachaças. Mendoza had been saying that he’d piloted the French ore ship in this evening, berthed her on the south side of the river, a berth still under construction, Cais Atalaia. ‘Not so good. Railway line completed OK but for loading use ship’s gear and the – what you say –’

  ‘Buckets?’

  ‘Buckets.’ Indicating the size of them – huge, nothing like buckets in any conventional sense. Nodding. ‘Slow, eh? Not like where is PollyAnna. You going good, eh?’

  In fact they’d finished number five hold’s first instalment and had moved the ship in mid-afternoon to make a start on four. Holds weren’t to be filled completely one by one; numbers five, four, three and two would be filled to about one-third of their eventual content, then number one half-filled; two, three and four then filled to capacity, and a
fter that numbers five and one topped-up – so as to finish with the right trim and draft but without imposing undue stresses at earlier stages. And at this rate – with luck, including no breakdown of machinery – it looked as if loading might be completed some time on Saturday. Mendoza was pleased to hear this: Saturday, then, he’d be piloting her out. An afternoon job, he guessed; subject of course to tides, which was the crucial factor. Tomorrow, for instance, he’d be taking out the Volcao, but if she wasn’t ready to sail by about midday she’d have to wait until the tide turned at 1900.

  ‘Where’s she bound?’

  ‘Cayenne. French Guiana.’

  ‘And what about the German?’

  ‘Huh?’

  He hadn’t meant to ask anything about the Glauchau – to mention her at all. But the question had tumbled out more or less naturally – this ship arriving, that one sailing… Anyway, he’d asked it now, and it seemed to have brought Mendoza up short; Andy adding – in for a penny, in for a pound – ‘Still waiting for engine spares, is she?’

  Brown eyes on his and as alert as they’d ever been. A shrug, then: ‘I guess must be. But how I know?’

  ‘Only thought you might. You bring ’em in and take ’em out. And frankly, that awful damn music –’

  ‘I think is from Berlin. March music – Third Reich marching – yes? I don’t like, you don’t like – uh?’

  ‘Could do without it, sure.’ He picked up his glass. ‘Anyway, here’s how.’ High-proof cane spirit: and memories of the old Burntisland, whose junior engineer had brought a few bottles on board in Rio to celebrate his birthday, and Cadet Holt then aged seventeen had found himself still pie-eyed next day, which fortunately had been a Sunday.

  Didn’t like the smell of it much. Rum, of course, although colourless, but by no means of the finest. ‘Cheers, Captain.’ Grimacing then: ‘Ugh…’ Mendoza began telling him, leaning closer after throwing a quick glance around, ‘We have ask him – Glauchau captain – please to switch out. Off, to switch. This is before departure of Capitao da Tovar.’