Westbound, Warbound

by Westbound, Warbound (retail) (epub)

  ‘Sextant angle on her masthead. Having all masthead heights – as we do, they’re all listed – we’ll check by sextant angle until we know well enough what six hundred yards looks like, then put the sextant away and judge it by eye.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘RN ships are better off, they’re used to steaming in close company – flotillas and squadrons, so forth – and they have distance-metres, pocket rangefinders. Maybe we’ll get ’em, one day. You know my watches are eight to twelve a.m. and p.m., I suppose?’

  A nod. ‘I’ll try to make myself useful.’

  ‘Don’t worry. You will.’ Finney was going to stand watches as Andy’s dogsbody, as Gorst and Janner did with Fisher and Halloran. Andy added, ‘And Julia’ll be all right on her own.’ He raised his voice: ‘Long as she’s got a bucket in there.’

  ‘I think you’re hateful!’

  Laughing… But she’d lost her other guardian; Ronnie Dixon had been appropriated by the Caradoc Castle, whose own chief engineer had been landed with appendicitis. Some of the Cheviot’s ratings had also transferred to other short-handed ships: three of the ABs, and the one remaining greaser. But she’d miss old Dixon, he guessed.

  He hadn’t been ashore – except for visiting a naval hospital when they’d taken PollyAnna in this last Tuesday to top up bunkers and fresh-water tanks, embark fifty rounds of 12-pounder ammunition, and for ordnance artificers to fit the two twin Marlins. These had been tried out at sea against floating crates, later in the day, and Fisher’s gun’s crew had engaged a similar target at ranges of between 2,000 and 4,000 yards and not done badly. It had been dark when they’d re-entered the Bedford Basin, groping their way in between the dozens of other steamers tugging at their cables, riding-lights bright above low-lying drifts of fog; a launch had come out to return the artificers to the dockyard, where next morning they’d be going through the same process with some later arrival. Everything at breakneck speed, to get the convoy away on schedule. He’d thought again about spending an evening ashore, but in fact had plenty to keep him busy on board – on top of routine duties, absorbing ‘homework’ on half a dozen different subjects, each section of it starting with Halloran, who’d read and then initial it, passing it to Fisher, Fisher then to Andy, who’d also been working up his knowledge of flag signals, memorising the dozen or more which the Commodore and/or the Escort Commander would be likely to make most often. The groups were all listed, and he was having the lists copied out by Gorst so that the skipper and his watchkeeping officers and the cadets would each have a copy; but as signals were his job he wanted to be able to recognise them at first sight, not have to look them up. The ones likely to be seen most often were ‘Keep better station’, ‘Stay closed up’, ‘Make less smoke’; but also orders for emergency turns or adjustments to the convoy’s speed. Or ‘Enemy in sight bearing…’ followed perhaps by ‘Make smoke’ – drop smoke-floats. General signals would be made by flags, those to individual ships by Aldis lamp. The Commodore had a staff of RN signalmen, and as professional seamen – a damn sight more professional than a lot of those could be, at this stage anyway – one didn’t want to turn in a second-rate performance.

  Among items already mentioned such as smoke-floats, flares, etc., they’d been supplied with red sails for the lifeboats. Reason for this being that a red sail showed up much better, to ships or aircraft searching for survivors, than white ones which in an even slightly disturbed sea were hardly visible at all, from any distance. There was a certain amount of rerigging involved: the bosun had put a couple of ABs on to it on the Wednesday forenoon, and the display of red canvas had caught Julia’s eye; she’d asked Andy, who’d happened to be nearby, ‘Red sails now?’

  His explanation had left her silent, pensive. Back in her memories, he’d guessed. Perhaps of – what was his name – Finney’s fellow: Knox, Charlie Knox, with his head-wound, head in her lap when he’d died. In his imagination Andy could see it – see them, her… He broke into her silence with, ‘Doesn’t mean we’ll be going sailing. In fact you can be ninety-five per cent sure we won’t.’

  He saw her thoughts shift to another tack then. Eyes on his, and that quick, slightly quivery smile…

  ‘Know that song ‘Red Sails in the Sunset’?’

  ‘Hardly help but know it!’

  ‘Danced to it a few times?’

  ‘Of late, done very little dancing. As it happens. You do much?’

  ‘Not much, no. But in Newcastle they have weekend thrashes at what’s called the Assembly Rooms. So – now and then… Well, when my cousins are home especially –’

  ‘Your uncle’s sons. Both second mates, you said.’

  ‘Garry and Dick – yes. But ‘Red Sails’ – I was trying to remember the words –’

  He managed a line or two, and she joined in with him for the next verse. Laughing… She had a sweet voice, he thought. Nodding, brown eyes on his: ‘You thought I might be having a fit of the horrors, didn’t you? Lifeboats, etcetera.’

  ‘It’d hardly be surprising…’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ A quick head-shake. ‘I’m not letting it last for ever. Down in the dumps occasionally maybe – even bad dreams, but –’

  ‘I don’t know whether you’re more attractive in profile or full-face. Either way you’re – really something, Julia. Shouldn’t be saying this, I know – no intention of – you know, what they call taking advantage of you in any way, but –’

  ‘You wouldn’t be. Don’t worry, Andy, I’m not walking wounded – I dare say I was, but –’

  ‘What you are, Julia, is bloody marvellous.’

  * * *

  Dusk. Convoy formed – more or less – with the AMC – drab-looking former passenger liner of about 17,000 tons with two tall funnels and several 6-inch gun mountings, and flying the White Ensign – in the lead of column five, 1,000 yards on the commodore’s starboard beam. Commodore having hoisted flag K and numerals one-zero, meaning ‘Speed ten knots’: all ships in convoy flying that now, as well as their positions in convoy, such as PollyAnna’s four-three. Commodore setting the pace, the AMC keeping station on him – on the Empire Quest flying the Commodore’s flag, a blue St George’s Cross, its blueness fading in the dying light. That front rank – as much as one could see of it beyond others in the darkening mass and from this angle of sight – still looked ragged. Basic problem in station-keeping being the ships’ widely differing characteristics: half speed ahead in the MV Empire Quest, for instance, not by any means matching half ahead in the SS PollyAnna. Or even between more similar types of ship – PollyAnna and other single-screw tramps of between 6,000 and 6,500 tons gross register, 9,000 or 10,000 tons deadweight, say. Differing size and pitch of screw, depth of screw beneath the surface, hull shape, sail-like wind-catching upperworks, for instance. You’d settle down to it, acquire the skills and judgement as time went by – and revise it later when you hit foul weather – but for now it was makey-learn, pretty well hit or miss. Preferably, miss. With the light going, sound-signals were being used – predominantly one short blast meaning I am directing my course to starboard, two for I am directing my course to port, three for My engines are going full speed astern – which with so many ships in company could be overdone, lead more to confusion than to safety, when several gave tongue simultaneously. Speed adjustments, meanwhile, could only be made by whistling down the tube to the engine room and requesting, ‘Up two’ or ‘Down four’, meaning two, four or however many revolutions more or less per minute. There was no rev-counter in the bridge, and the number of revs per minute didn’t need to be memorised; the decision had only to be whether to speed up a little or slow down. For larger changes one had the telegraph on which to ring down for dead slow, slow, half or full ahead – or astern – or in really drastic situations double full ahead – give her all there is. But if when you ordered ‘Up four’ and at the same time your next-ahead realised he was getting too close to his next-ahead and came down four, you could find yourself having to put your helm ov
er to avoid running up his backside, then maybe steaming abeam of him for a while; and getting out of that embarrassing situation could be tricky – especially if your own next-astern had meanwhile seen fit to close up to where you had been.

  The only lights being shown were stern lights – white, half-strength and visible over an arc of only 135 degrees, or 67½ degrees on each quarter. Which was fine, as long as there was no confusion as to which ship’s stern light this one or that might be – if, for instance, your next-ahead found it necessary to haul out of line. The Soissons wasn’t doing at all badly, though. And to starboard the St Benedict – a tramp smaller than PollyAnna – was holding her own. All of them pitching more than rolling. Steering to pass clear to the north of Sable Island – on a course of 080 degrees, which meant plugging just about directly into wind and sea. Wind of the lacerating, streaming-eyes variety, and in the frequent sleet showers binocular-plastering: you wiped the front lenses, got maybe half a minute’s clearer vision before they plastered up again. Staying in the shelter of the wheelhouse was no answer, as its windows fogged-up and plastered-up. It had already been pitch-dark when Andy had taken over the watch from Halloran, and for this first hour or so he’d found it hard-going – aware from the first minute that it simply wasn’t possible to keep a truly efficient lookout, and of the hazards implicit in that. OK, so that was how it was, what you had to cope with. The Old Man was up there with him – had been there through most of Halloran’s watch too though, wasn’t present only on account of his third mate’s comparative lack of experience – and Finney, whose main value lay in maintaining contact with the bridge-wing lookouts and in contributing to the (naked-eye) all-round looking-out, as well as later being sent down to the galley to bring up pannikins of tea. The Old Man standing hunched mostly in a fore corner of the wheelhouse, although when the sleet did obscure its windows he usually moved outside. There were windows you could open but usually going outside was better. However blinding (as well as freezing) it was, you could usually see a length or more ahead out there, as long as you wiped the binocs often enough. Skipper’d be out there on the starboard side mostly, Andy port side – less distant from the voicepipe – and the only conversation they’d exchanged in an hour had been Andy commenting – having heard the Old Man cursing to himself – ‘Moonrise near ten should improve things, sir,’ and an answering growl of, ‘Hell it will…’

  He was right, too. The overcast was heavier and more solidly continuous than Andy had realised. Just after ten he thought he saw moon-flush on the beam for about half a minute, then it vanished. Sleet driving hard – and more motion on the ship, he thought; by that stage must have whistled for increases and reductions in revs forty or fifty times, he guessed. And had not had to say a word to the helmsman about his steering. When at about ten-thirty AB Timms reported that he’d been relieved at the helm – helmsmen were standing two-hour watches, and changed over at the half-hour – he was glad to acknowledge with, ‘Couldn’t’ve done better, Timms.’ Having held her for two hours within about 2 degrees either side of 080 – despite her having wind and sea smack on the bow – and at the same time kept a wary eye on the Frenchman’s stern light, ready to sing out if it began going noticeably astray. Anyone who saw that as easy, Andy thought, should try it.

  * * *

  It was livening up when he handed over to Fisher at midnight, and gale-force by the time he was up for morning stars; turning out and getting himself up there despite the sound and feel of it because one had often found it wasn’t as hopeless as you’d guessed it would be. It was, though: not a chance of any kind of sight, only blacker-than-black storm clouds racing from the east, howl of the wind, morass of tumbling sea. No less cold, but no sleet or snow either, which was something. In the slow leaking-away of darkness, the Soissons was plunging along ahead of PollyAnna at about the right distance, a mound of white-streaming foam with black protuberances – stem or stern alternatively, masts and the midships superstructure leaning hard this way and that – the St Benedict too – never less than half-buried in it – slightly abaft PollyAnna’s beam to starboard, tanker British Stream abeam to port, maybe a cable’s length closer than she should have been, while astern, the Eileen Harper, an engines-aft grain carrier out of London and more recently from the Plate, seemingly pretty well in station, her bow-on appearance in this sea-state not unlike a broad-beamed submarine’s. PollyAnna’s own forepart lifting to the oncoming, white-plumed ridges like – he thought, imaginatively – a short stretch of macadam: that length and breadth and blackness rising as each ridge came racing – the biggest for some time lifting her now – up, up – then faltering, listing away to port, slamming down into a boil of ocean piling all round, bursting across the foc’sl-head and flooding aft, feet-deep over the hatch-covers. Stern rising then, forepart burying itself, multi-ton loads of North Atlantic exploding against this central island’s lower levels – where the skipper had wisely retired an hour ago, would now have his head down on the cot which he’d have somehow jammed or lashed in place, while on the other side of the thin dividing bulkhead Julia would no doubt be braced between it and her bunk’s leeboard.

  Old Man snoring, he guessed; Julia most likely awake. Like bracing herself against being flung around in a tin drum, sick and maybe scared. She’d be all right if she remained horizontal, poor kid. In a couple of days, or three or four, when this lot had blown itself out. Or even if it hadn’t. If the predictions had been right it wouldn’t – not that soon. She’d be OK, though. She had the sea in her blood in any case – as she’d probably agree, something to live up to. Her father, William Carr, skipper of his own trawler working out of Blyth in Northumberland, had drowned in 1923 when she’d been four – trawler lost with all hands in hurricane conditions somewhere off Alesund. Her uncle Harry, then – recently master of the Cheviot Hills – thirty-five years at sea mostly in tramp steamers, and both his sons now second mates.

  Her uncle George in New Zealand to whom she’d been on a visit – last chance, they’d all agreed, before the balloon went up, and it had gone up a few months too soon – had given up the sea when he’d still been young, emigrated to New Zealand in 1922, married a Scots girl and become a farmer. And her grandfather, who’d spent his early years at sea as AB and ship’s carpenter but then set up a boat-building business at Gateshead, which when he’d died in 1921 had been sold very well and the proceeds divided between his children, buying William his trawler, starting George off in New Zealand, providing Harry with the security which in those hard times when he was working his way up through third, second and first mate to Master Mariner he’d needed as allegedly he’d used to say ‘for ballast’, and – later, after Julia’s father’s drowning – allowing her mother to go into partnership with a friend in a dress-making business in Newcastle. (Which had been reasonably successful but was now facing the rationing of clothes and materials, apparently. They’d learn how to cope, or try to, but at present saw it as a looming state of emergency.)

  Andy had had all that from Mark Finney. Finney was no relation or connection of the Carrs, had only happened to have had indentures bought for him a year ago in Messrs A & J Hills of Tynemouth, and to have hit it off pretty well with Julia when they’d met on board the Cheviot Hills. Then in the long, long hours first in the lifeboat and afterwards in the Glauchau’s ’tween-decks, needing other things in their heads than what was actually happening around them, they’d learnt just about everything there was to learn about each other. He’d even enjoyed talking about her, to Andy, who’d come to realise that he – Finney – was entirely smitten with her. Which was all right, he’d concluded, Mark being just seventeen, and Julia having had her twenty-first this last October. She thought of Mark, Andy had decided earlier, when Dixon had been around, as she might of a younger brother.

  * * *

  At 0800 – second day out, 20th – in greyish early light the Commodore hauled down his K.10 hoist and ran up in its place K.8, a two-knot reduction in the nominal speed of adv
ance to make it easier for the convoy to reform. There were gaps from which ships had strayed or straggled, and this would give them a chance to regain station. Wind and sea might have eased a little, might even be nearer force seven than eight now. This anyway was Andy’s impression while taking over from Halloran, who’d already whistled down for the cut in revs; it had been Janner apparently, now on his way below, who’d seen that signal drop from the Empire Quest’s port yardarm and the other go whipping up in its place. Another impression though was that this section around PollyAnna had become the convoy’s nucleus – PollyAnna herself about the right distance astern of the Frenchman, the four tankers bunched more or less where they’d been last evening, the St Benedict admittedly nearer the Anna’s quarter than her beam – but she’d put that right now, easily enough – and the Eileen Harper if anything rather too close astern. So no great problems here, although the rest of it was a shambles, the port-side columns being in particularly bad order, columns seven, eight and nine for instance seeming to have no leaders.

  Halloran’s comment, with the glasses at his eyes, was, ‘Amateur night all round. Dunno where they found the buggers.’

  ‘Commodore’s flashing.’

  Aldis lamp – flashing As, calling-up one of the ships in that port-column mess. Halloran watching the dots and dashes for a moment – the addressee evidently being slow in answering – then handing Andy the glasses. ‘Course still oh-eight-oh, revs for eight knots. Shouldn’t think we’ve been making-good more than eight all night.’ Looking all around, and at PollyAnna’s own plunging forepart, ‘Eased a fraction in the last hour – eh?’