‘Want a breather, Johnny?’
Sideways glance: then another at the compass. He nodded, made room for Bob to take over the wheel. ‘Bite to eat, anyway. Sandwich. Where’s—’
‘In there.’ Pointing – right-handed, left hand having taken over the wheel, and with his feet straddled against the boat’s plunging motion – at the engine-space hatch… ‘If Zero hasn’t already wolfed it all.’
McNaught did have a slightly wolfish look about him. Crouching in that lair of his, baring his teeth at intruders… He had not only the food-bag in there with him, but also one Enfield .303 rifle and a few clips of ammunition for it, and a box of hand-grenades. Which – touch wood – would be returned to Mr Dewhurst’s stores, unused, in a few days’ time.
* * *
Coming up for 1.30 am… Pope took over the wheel again and cut the revs, reducing to about fifteen knots. It was an earlier reduction of speed than the programme had allowed for, but there were low-lying islands all over the place – on both sides and ahead – and hardly any of them had been shown on the chart. They’d picked up the second island – which was charted – right on schedule, but then almost immediately some others which they hadn’t known existed. Presumably the Russian hydrographer didn’t either. But if one was right in assuming that the patch of salt-washed marsh on the port hand now was the island they all had known about – it was where one should have been, all right – then there’d be an extensive area of very shallow water to the south and west of it, and obviously one had to allow for the uncharted patches to have similar hazards around them.
In which case even fifteen knots was too fast for safety. But at twenty-five there’d still have been half an hour to go; and at this speed they were putting themselves twenty or thirty minutes behind schedule, which was already more time than one could afford to lose.
At least one could use binoculars now – at the lower revs, and with some shelter in here too. There was still a swell, but the gently rolling surface was barely ruffled.
‘Damn it all…’
Johnny was putting his wheel over – again – in order to stay middled between two land-patches. Although there was no way to be certain that the two visible areas of scrubby marshland weren’t connected just below the surface. In which case, any minute now—
This had not, in fact, been the ideal choice of a place to put the Count ashore. And it was too late to rethink – or to pull out and try again farther east, for instance… The Count was on his feet now, between Pope and Bob, all three of them straining their eyes into the dark. Wheel was amidships again, the land on either side seemingly in spitting distance, and nerves tight – waiting for the crash, catastrophe…
The near-end of the patch to starboard looked higher: and sheer, steep-to. Bob was examining it through his glasses, guessing there might be deeper water there – the other side, the side they could have gone when they’d chosen this more westerly route instead. Not that there’d been anything in the choice, one could have spun a coin: with effectively no chart, no information or local knowledge whatsoever… He heard Pope comment, ‘Not quite as frantic as it looked, was it?’ Because they were now through that gap and were still afloat, still moving in more or less the right direction, and with a prospect of open water ahead now.
Bob told him – fairly sure of it now – ‘This is a deeper channel we’ve got into.’
‘Looks like it.’
Dangerous words: a challenge to the Fates, last words before grounding…
Not yet, though. The Fates playing cat-and-mouse. Engine throbbing steadily, the wake by now probably washing those last islands’ fringes, the outspreading bow-wave constantly erasing stars’ shimmering reflections from the smooth, dark surface. A gleam of phosphorescence where the white water curled away… Pope waved an arm: ‘This channel must be the main one – we’d have been in it already if we hadn’t gone the wrong side of that little archipelago – d’you agree?’
‘Yes. So on our way out—’
‘Exactly.’
Shouting to each other, over the engine noise… But that would be their route back out to sea, the way they would have come in if they’d diverged slightly to starboard instead of to port about a quarter of an hour ago. He turned his glasses that way: back over the quarter… Caught his breath – held it, brain numbed by shock for about half a second – then: ‘Johnny – slow down! Slow, Dead slow…’
He’d done it: without knowing why. Engine only mumbling to itself now: water sounds audible under and around the CMB as she slowed. Bob’s arm out pointing astern: ‘Ship at anchor – destroyer. See that dim light – on her fo’c’sl?’
Anchored – as a guardship, possibly – in the channel they’d just agreed they should have come through. The destroyer’s distinctive three-quarter profile – four idiosyncratically spaced funnels – told him she was Scottish-built – Yarrow-built – at about the turn of the century. There’d been four of that class in the Tsar’s Black Sea fleet.
Pope had altered course by about ten degrees to point the CMB’s stern directly at the destroyer, presenting any fo’c’sl sentry or bridge watchkeeper who might happen to be awake and sober with the smallest possible target. But a searchlight might still spring out, spearing them on its beam for the gunners then to do their worst. In which event – Bob guessed, instinctively seeking options – Pope’s best move might be to open the throttle wide – forty knots – and backtrack around the way they’d just come. A second or two was long enough to decide this, and he knew Pope’s thoughts would have been going the same way… Pope remarking now – ordinary conversational tone, not much engine noise to beat – ‘D’you know, I rather think we’ve got away with it?’ Gentling the throttle open, just a little. The point of stopping – slowing right down – had been to reduce wake and bow-wave, but for a few minutes there’d been every possibility of the wake she’d already created getting there and alerting some dopey watchkeeper.
‘What d’you think, Bob?’
‘I think we picked the best side of those islands.’
A grunt… ‘We push on inshore, anyway – d’you agree?’
‘I’m only wondering what she’s guarding… But yes – I do. And we go out the same way we came in.’
‘Like the chap in the Rubaiyat.’ Engine-noise rose as he gave her another knot or two. ‘Should’ve brought my torpedo, shouldn’t I?’
Except this was not what he’d called a ‘Bolshy hunt’. The last thing one wanted was to cause explosions, announce one’s presence; the aim was to creep in and then creep out again, leaving no sign of having been here.
The Count rested a hand on his shoulder. ‘Is it all right?’
‘It’s fine. We were lucky, then.’
What seemed rather less than fine was the prospect of having to repeat this in a week’s time and quite possibly every second night thereafter… But then, on other nights there might well not be any guardship in that channel; also, one would be better off from the navigational point of view – having found a way in, knowing one could get in and out. Even knowing there had to be a minimum of eight feet of water in that channel, since eight feet was the draft of those Russian S-class, Yarrow-built TBDs.
Pope called over to them, ‘We’re running late now. Can’t be helped, can it.’ He gave her a few more revs, though: some slight help… Stooping to the hatchway, enquiring, ‘All right, McNaught?’ and getting in reply a growl of something like ‘Och, aye…’
* * *
Low-lying land – whether islands or protrusions of the mainland was anyone’s guess – was gradually closing in on both sides again. They’d come about two miles from where they’d seen the destroyer, and ahead now – although even with glasses it was hard to make it out – was what looked like a dead-end.
‘Slower, Johnny?’
‘Thinking of the time, as much as anything.’ He cut the revs a bit. ‘For your pal’s sake, I mean.’
He was right, in this. Solovyev did need the two hours of darkn
ess they’d allowed for, in which to cache his skiff and then either lie up for the daylight hours or transfer himself to some location where he’d be less conspicuous than he was going to be on about fifty thousand acres of empty marsh. Whereas for themselves it didn’t matter much; they had the CMB’s flat-out speed of forty knots to make use of, if they needed to make the trip out to Zoroaster in nearer one hour than two. There’d be a moon, admittedly, but they’d be well off the coast before it rose, and at least they’d beat the sunrise.
Meanwhile, the binocular-view of the head of this inlet was becoming clearer.
‘I don’t think it’s a dead-end, Johnny. I think that’s a gap near the left edge. Either for us or the skiff if we drop him off there.’
Pope put his own glasses up. Holding the boat on course with his belly against the wheel: then lowering them again, not having made much of it… ‘See how it looks when we get in there.’
Slowing again. The land on each side wasn’t high but its edges were vertical – more or less – suggestive of deepish water. Not that the CMB needed much to float in, but other ships did – destroyers, for instance, an immediate concern being whether there might be more where that other came from – around the next corner, for instance. Alert, with a searchlight ready, and – well, twelve-pounders, those Yarrow ships had… He was swivelling slowly, glasses up, as the entrance to a transverse channel opened up to starboard. It meant the land they’d had on their right hand was yet another island: but the northern side of that channel – and all the land abeam to starboard now – might well be mainland.
Pope had ignored that junction: he’d seen it and evidently decided to hold straight on. Reducing revs again just slightly, a notch or two on the throttle.
Solovyev asked – from close on Bob’s right – ‘Are we near the place where I leave you?’
‘Can’t be far now. At least, I hope—’ He’d checked – mouth still open… Then, recovering: ‘Hey, Johnny!’
‘Lights in there!’
They’d both seen it – shouted at each other simultaneously…
Some kind of – anchorage – base – camp… Pope had pushed his throttle shut. There were three lights in a line, two others off to the left. In a place – the head of an inlet in an area of empty marshland – where you wouldn’t expect there to be any electricity supply – or any need for it either… And – Bob caught his breath – visible now against the background of starry sky – thin funnels, stubby masts. And a crane: he had it in his glasses, the head of it in slanting silhouette close to that pair of lights. He knew – well, guessed, but it had clicked suddenly, fitted into a slot in recent memory – what this must be, or be connected with… Hearing Pope at his elbow – having cut the power he’d declutched but she was still running on and he couldn’t leave the wheel – ‘Tell McNaught I may want flat-out revs at the drop of a hat, will you?’
He passed the message. Remembering the flotilla navigator, Snaith, had mentioned that the Bolsheviks were preparing a deployment eastward against Guriev, and shipping their heavy equipment in barges in tow of tugs. So here was the loading base, the military depot: those were the masts of tugs and there’d be barges in there too, beyond doubt… The engine’s throb was down to nothing, barely more audible than the gurgle of sea around the CMB’s timbers, its swirl and suck around her bow and under her stern as she continued to run on, still with steerage-way on her, Pope holding her on course for the centre of that gap between low banks of vegetation. It was all he could do – short of running her into one of those banks.
‘I know what this is, Johnny. No need to look closer – if we can get where there’s room to turn her—’
The bow struck some object. The CMB lurched, her forepart lifting as she jarred to a dead stop. A crash from inside the engine-space might have been McNaught falling off his stool: in the cockpit they’d all been holding on – Pope to the wheel, the other two to the coaming below the windscreen. There’d been a grating noise from for’ard, lasting about two seconds; it had stopped now and the stern was swinging, continuing under the impetus of her forward motion while the bow was held and slowly pivoting. The impact – thinking back on it in the immediate aftermath, needing to understand what had happened – had been solid but also – well, cushioned. Like a train hitting buffers, almost: not like grounding, or—
‘Cable – chain cable. Boom across the bloody entrance. Damn.’
Bob moved: ‘I’ll get up for’ard with a boathook. Or over the side, if necessary. Where’s—’
That same grating noise again. The rasp of chain against – under – the CMB’s bow. Then a sideways lurch: and silence. Swinging, she’d slid off it. Touch wood… But you could feel the difference – that she was floating properly now, that rigidity gone out of her.
‘How amazing…’ Pope spoke detachedly, as if it was happening to someone else… He leant over the side, looking for’ard. Then over to the other side, crossing behind Bob and the Count. Straightening up, then… ‘Boathook’s a good idea, Bob. If you can get up on her nose and push us off a bit. Sooner be well clear before I use the screw – what?’
It would have been easy if one could have just backed off, but this craft couldn’t be put astern. In point of fact, if she could have been they wouldn’t have hit the cable in the first place, he’d have taken the way off her as soon as they’d seen those lights.
The boathook was stowed – like every other bit of loose gear on board, it seemed – in the engine-space. McNaught passed it out, and Bob went for’ard with it.
The timber roof of the engine-space, from the cockpit to the horizontal fore hatch, was flat, but the rest of the boat’s sides and upperworks were curved – turtle-decked, was the term for it – with one protruding strake low down for toe-hold and a higher one to hold on by. He crabbed up towards the bow, concentrating on just getting there, anyway preferring not to see whatever reaction might be developing in or around that camp, depot, whatever this place was that they’d literally blundered into. If an alarm had been raised – could be the raison d’être of that cable, to set one off – the only hope was to get out of here before the Bolsheviks had rubbed the sleep out of their eyes…
Straddling the saddle-like stern then, with the bullring close in front of him as a convenient handhold, he leant over, peering into the dark, still water. At first he couldn’t see the cable – or much else – but then about twenty feet towards one bank – and less than that distance towards the other – he spotted it, a ruler-straight black line with the tidal movement lapping around it where it emerged. Here in the middle it was under water: but right against the boat’s forefoot, presumably…
Groping for it, with the boathook’s ironclad working end. Contact… Working blind still, but getting the hook jammed into a link of cable so it would hold when he put some weight against it. As now… But achieving nothing – until after about a minute’s perseverance he realized that the CMB’s forepart was at last beginning to respond, swing away…
He shifted his grip: applied all his weight…
Pope’s voice, then – after a few more minutes – ‘Bravo, Bob. We can get at it here now. Hold her as she is, can you?’
He had a second boathook, presumably. Or he’d use one of the skiff’s oars. Bob waited: holding the bow about three feet clear of the chain, everything more or less static for the moment, and no sounds or visible stirrings from the direction of the lights. Probably no one awake. One had heard that they drank a lot. But he knew why they had that destroyer anchored where she was – in the main channel, doubtless the tugs’ entrance to and exit from this place. She’d be there either on defensive watch or as escort to barge convoys in daylight. This was first-class intelligence to take back to Baku, anyway; an extra dividend from Operation Nightingale.
Which was now well behind schedule.
‘Ready, Bob? Together now – heave…’
She barely responded at all, to start with, but then the gap between her and the chain began to widen.
<
br /> ‘Right. Hang on now…’
The engine’s throb deepened and quickened. With a single screw you got a kick to starboard when you first put it ahead; Pope would have his wheel hard a-starboard, and that kick might be advantageous, insurance against swinging her stern into the cable as he turned her away from it.
Back in the cockpit: pushing the boathook inside. ‘Here…’
‘Nice work, Bob.’
‘Damn lucky, weren’t we?’
They could so easily have got stuck there. If that chain had got itself involved with the propeller, for instance. Then what – hand-grenades at first light, Pope’s Last Stand?
‘Bob.’ Motoring back the way they’d come, Pope pointed out over the port bow. ‘I’d say our best bet is this eastward channel. Put your Count ashore somewhere there, and possibly get out that way ourselves – if we’re really lucky?’
‘Let’s put him on his way first, uh?’
‘Absolutely.’ The side-channel’s mouth was opening to them now. Pope began to ease his wheel over. ‘Here we go…’
Bob put a hand on the Count’s shoulder: his leather coat was slippery-wet from spray or sea-dew. ‘Sorry, Nick. Won’t be long now, anyway. I’d guess this must be the eastern edge of the delta – so where we’re heading now is pretty sure to be mainland – wouldn’t you say?’
‘Please God.’
‘It must be, though. That’s a military stores or loading depot, where we’ve just been. So there has to be a road to it – d’you see? Wouldn’t have crossed water – needing a bridge, or—’
‘Mainland in any case. Yes…’ Nodding – in the darkness lessened by a vague radiance from the engine-space. He’d added a cloth cap to his attire: must have had it in a pocket… ‘You’re right, Bob. That’s – capital…’
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