by Alan Evans
Smith lifted the glasses to his eyes again. Now he could see the specks that were ships under the smoke. Minutes later he tried again and this time the four funnels of each destroyer were visible. The ships were steaming in line ahead, obviously a screen for a bigger ship they were escorting. So an Austrian patrol in strength, making a sweep and steaming at surprisingly high speed. Harrier’s navigator had estimated at least twenty-five knots, yet the Austrian battleships could not approach that speed.
As if to confound him the report came down from the masthead: ‘Destroyers are screening a battleship! And more smoke to-eastward of her!’
That smoke would be more destroyers, of course, the other side of the screen. But Bennett was voicing Smith’s thoughts: ‘She can’t be a battleship, steaming like that!’
A signalman came running from the wireless office and thrust the flimsy at Bennett. He read it, passed it to Smith. ‘Admiral Winter and his squadron are thirty miles east of us. He orders us to shadow and report.’ He paused, then added, ‘He’ll have his work cut out to catch them.’
Smith said, ‘I’m going to the masthead.’ He climbed the ladder and squeezed in beside the look-out in his cramped circular steel perch that gyrated wildly as Harrier’s mast swept forward and back. He steadied himself and peered through the glasses, finally managed to hold them on that reeling horizon and the ships there. He took one long look, rested his eyes then looked again. He lowered the glasses, grunted noncommittally and climbed down, returned to the bridge.
He said, ‘Salzburg.’
Bennett’s mouth opened. He checked the question before it was uttered but Smith answered it anyway. ‘I’m positive. And there are another three destroyers.’
Bennett stood still for a moment, staring out over the bow at the destroyers that were hull-up now, and close behind them the smoke that marked Salzburg: He said slowly, ‘That — has torn it. We can’t shadow here; she’s two or three knots faster and she’ll just steam away from us. Besides —’ He paused. This was his ship and his decision. Smith was only a passenger. Bennett threw at the signal yeoman, ‘Wireless: “Enemy squadron is Salzburg and the six destroyers. Attacking.”’
Smith thought it was the right decision; on her present course Salzburg intended turning towards. Trieste at the end of her sweep, was too far north to be bound for Pola. There was a chance that Winter’s squadron might intercept her but only a slim one. If Harrier could make a successful attack, score with just one torpedo, she might at least so cripple Salzburg that Winter would be certain of catching her.
If.
Bennett was stooped over the voice-pipe, talking to the torpedo gunner aft. ‘— don’t know which side but most likely we’ll engage to starboard.’ He lifted his head to smile wryly at Smith, ‘May as well be ready, sir.’
Smith returned the grin. ‘That’s right.’
A look-out yelled, ‘Enemy opened fire, sir!’
Smoke wisped away from the three destroyers. Each of them mounted a pair of four-inch guns and they were within range. Bennett ordered, still laconic, ‘Open fire. Leading destroyer.’ Seconds later the four-inch on the fo’c’sle barked and the smoke whipped acrid across the bridge. It caught at Smith’s throat and he coughed, swore under his breath, wiped at watering eyes. Harrier’s ensign cracked on the wind above him. He stared up at it then turned his gaze forward. Water-spouts lifted from the sea ahead, one barely fifty yards away, the rest just beyond in a close group. That was good shooting. Harrier tore through the churned patch of sea, still on a course to intercept the destroyer screen and put her in position for a torpedo shot at Salzburg. The range was closing only slowly because the other ships were steaming almost as fast as Harrier. If Bennett turned directly towards them he would not close the range more quickly; they would simply steam on northwards and leave him to cross their wake.
So the range closed slowly, too slowly. The four-inch banged away as fast as its crew could load and lay it but Harrier was seriously outgunned. The salvos shrieked in, two shells at a time, every few seconds and always creeping closer. Bennett could not take evasive action — swerving would lose him precious distance he could not afford if he wanted a shot at Salzburg — so Harrier steered a course like a ruled line.
The crash and the shudder through the ship told them they were hit amidships and smoke poured up and laid out in a long, flat black trail astern of them. Flames roared from the hole in the deck and a damage control party scrambled towards it dragging the hoses. Bennett chewed his lip and dug his hands deep in his pockets, squinted ahead at the destroyers where muzzle-flashes winked and the gun smoke sprouted then trailed on the wind.
Smith wanted to pace the deck, chafed at his enforced inaction yet knew there was nothing he could do. Bennett was doing all that could be done and now he yelled triumphantly as he saw the shell from the four-inch burst in a flash of yellow flame on the leading destroyer. Smith stared beyond her, glasses of his eyes. Salzburg was barely four miles away now and clear in the lenses. The silhouette in the book had come to life and she steamed lean and swift and deadly, a fearsome beauty. Voss would be on her bridge. Salzburg’s turrets were trained round, the guns pointing at Smith. He saw the long, yellow tongues lick out from them, the smoke that balled up and almost hid the great ship for a second.
The crash of the hit and the shudder seemed more distant this time, but immediately Harrier swerved to port and Smith could feel her slowing. Her head came around again as Bennett snapped at the coxswain at the wheel but still her speed fell away. Then the salvo from Salzburg roared in with the sound of a train and plunged into the sea a cable’s length ahead. The water-spouts lifted higher than Harrier’s masthead and hung there for seconds before falling in a jewelled, green-white curtain of spray.
Bennett lifted his head from the engine-room voice-pipe, looked at Smith and said flatly, ‘Chief thinks the port side shaft has gone. Reckons he can give us ten knots.’ He turned to stare out over the bow at the destroyers and Salzburg still racing away towards the north. ‘Yeoman. Wireless: “Hit. My speed ten knots. Enemy in sight four miles —” Wait.’ He stared after the ships.
Smith said, ‘They’re changing course.’ A signal had broken out on Salzburg’s yard, was now hauled down, and the destroyers and Salzburg were turning.
Bennett continued: ‘“Course north-east. Speed twenty-five knots.”’
Smith said, ‘They know Winter’s out there somewhere, so they’re heading for home.’ And cutting the corner to Trieste on that course. Salzburg or one of the destroyers must have picked up the wireless-traffic between Harrier and Winter’s squadron. It was in code but the exchange itself would tell them there was another warship or warships in touch with Harrier. Or the fact that Harrier had attacked rather than shadowed them would tell Voss there was a supporting squadron close at hand. Voss would guess at once the reasoning behind Harrier’s neck-or-nothing, suicidal charge.
Bennett nodded gloomily. The Austrian squadron was slipping away from him. Harrier plugged slowly along after the receding ships but they became small with distance and then were gone over the horizon. For some minutes their smoke still marked them but then that, too, was gone.
Bennett swore bitterly, then told the yeoman, ‘Send: “Lost contact with the enemy. Request permission to resume course for Venice to make repairs.”’
Within minutes they received Winter’s affirmative and his endorsement: ‘Well done.’ Bennett said heavily, ‘Good of him to say that. Well, we tried, anyway.’
They had. Smith thought Bennett had done all he could and had got off lightly. By now Harrier might have been a shattered wreck, shot to pieces, lying on the bottom of the Adriatic. Even as it was the young medical student shipped as doctor had reported three dead and a score of wounded below.
Salzburg had escaped without a scratch. As Harrier’s head turned towards Venice Smith still looked out at the distant horizon where the battle cruiser had disappeared. He had met Salzburg and Voss sooner than he expected and been
dealt with and dismissed. Voss had wasted no time in making his presence felt and this was only a beginning — if he was going to Trieste then it was for a reason, so Smith’s time was short.
*
The battered Harrier came limping into Venice in the dusk, through the low-lying littoral that was no more than wide sand spits enclosing the lagoon on which the city lay, its spires and domes lifting ahead, the tall tower of the Campanile of San Marco standing above them all. Harrier entered by the Porto di Lido, the way into the lagoon, passing between the long arms that stretched out to sea. The torpedo-boat on guard there challenged the Harrier’s lamp blinked in answer. A puttering launch led them to a mooring off a long stretch of quay. The tall tower of San Marco was close now, looming high above them. Only one dim light burned on the quay opposite where Harrier lay. A picket boat stood off until she was moored then closed the ship.
Bennett said gloomily, ‘Welcoming committee.’
Smith forced himself out of his brooding and managed an encouraging grin. ‘Cheer up. I agree with Winter. I think you did your whole duty and if I’m called to make a report that’s what I’ll say.’
Bennett smiled in return. ‘Thank you, sir.’ He went aft to meet the party from the boat but Smith stayed on the bridge. The city showed no lights and the lagoon was a flat, smooth black in the night but he noticed a staging to one side of the channel and on it rested, lowered for the night, a huge spherical balloon. That would be part of the city’s defences against aircraft attacks. Venice was well within range of the Austrian Air Forces bases.
A messenger came to him on the bridge. ‘Cap’n’s respects, sir’— that was Bennett — ‘but there’s a Cap’n Devereux asking for you, sir. Liaison officer here, sir. He came aboard with the dockyard man.’
Smith dropped down the ladder from the bridge and walked aft past one of the ragged shell-holes in the deck. The timber patch clapped on it by the carpenter had been moved away and a tubby little man was investigating the damage, torch in one hand, notebook in the other. He would be the agent from the dockyard.
Captain Devereux strolled on the quarter-deck of Harrier where a small police light glowed. He was tall, his uniform immaculate, the four gold rings on his sleeve and the gold on his cap gleaming brightly in the light. His shoes were highly polished and he carried a walking-stick that showed the glint of more gold on its handle. He halted to lean on this and said briskly, ‘Ah, Smith. You had a little trouble I see. However, as soon as I got Bennett’s signal I set about making arrangements. Harrier should be in the dockyard some time tomorrow and on her way back to Braddock in Alexandria in a day or two.’
Another officer, a big man, stood back in the shadows. Smith could not see his face or his rank but there was something foreign about his cap and uniform. Italian? Devereux did not mention him. Smith said, ‘Any news from the squadron, sir’?’
‘One signal from Winter saying they were engaging the enemy but nothing since. Let us hope that no news is good news. We need some. There are rumours of unrest among the Austrians.’ Smith had heard them. The Austro-Hungarian empire was a mixture of races and the Slavs were calling for independence. But Devereux went on, ‘They’re only rumours — the Austrians seem to be fighting as well as ever. The Italians have been beaten in a battle at Caporetto in the mountains to the north and are falling back. Venice itself has suffered a number of air raids and they’ve done some damage. Hopefully the weather will soon curtail that activity.’
Now Devereux’s voice took on a tone of emphasis. ‘With regard to the Italians, Smith, everything is arranged with them through me. I am the liaison officer, the senior British officer here — and liaison is my responsibility. Without boasting I can say I speak the language well. I have an officer at Naval Headquarters in the dockyard and over these last two years I’ve built up excellent relations with them. These must not be damaged by people barging in. Understood?’
‘Yes, sir.’ If those were the rules, then Smith was bound by them.
‘Good.’ Devereux relaxed slightly. ‘I know about your orders, the secrecy and so forth. Winter told me what he wanted. I acted on his order’— Devereux managed to suggest he disapproved of them, which sounded a warning note to Smith — ‘and persuaded the Italians to co-operate. Some things I’d rather leave to Winter to explain, but for now I can say you’ve been lent a small flotilla of MAS boats and no questions asked. All the Italians have been told is that the boats are wanted for an experimental mission. They are under your command unless or until the demands of the service necessitate their recall.’
MAS were motor-torpedo-boats and Smith thought that to be lent them for some unknown and experimental mission was generous. Devereux must have been very persuasive. Or possibly the Italians had great faith in Winter...
Devereux went on, ‘I’ve brought along the senior captain to meet you, Lieutenant Pietro Zacco.’ He lowered his voice: ‘He seems a surly type but I’m told he knows a little English. God knows how little. However —’ Devereux turned and called, ‘Tenente!’
The big man moved forward and Devereux performed the introductions: ‘Tenente Pietro Zacco — Commander David Smith.’
The dockyard agent came bustling aft then and engaged Devereux in rapid conversation. Smith held out his hand to Zacco who gripped it and said, ‘Signore.’ He was about thirty years old and clean-shaven, but for a thick black moustache. That looked odd to Smith after the all or nothing, full beard or completely clean-shaven rule of the Royal Navy. It was a strong face, impassive in the light, dark eyes watchful. Devereux had said Zacco was surly but maybe the Italian had been given reason Smith would have to find out later.
He groped for words but did not find a single one of Italian except. ‘Tenente.’
An uneasy pause, then Devereux returned: ‘Smith! I have to go back to the dockyard with this chap. I’ll send a boat and an interpreter along in the morning about ten to take you over to the Giudecca, that’s where the MAS lie. And as Harrier’s going to the dockyard you’d better have your kit packed. We’ll have to find you some quarters.’ He strolled to the side of his waiting boat. He had a strutting walk, head back and looking down his nose.
Smith went with him. ‘I’d like to start before then, sir.’ Devereux smiled. ‘Don’t be in such a hurry. Salzburg isn’t going to fly away!’
Smith realised that Devereux did not take seriously either the threat from Salzburg or Smith’s orders. He said, ‘She won’t lie idle, either, sir.’
Devereux’s smile became a frown. ‘That’s as may be but my interpreter doesn’t report for duty till ten and that’s when I’ll send a boat to take you to the Giudecca.’
He turned away and went to his boat.
Smith decided he did not like Devereux nor the way things were going. The liaison officer might be carrying out his orders but it was clear that he personally had no faith in Smith’s secret mission.
He returned to Pietro Zacco, the big lieutenant waiting by the light. But the watch keeping officer and his quartermaster also stood there so Smith moved on to the rail, beckoned to Zacco to follow him, stood staring out at the dark city, the long stretch of quay. Smith pointed to it. ‘This place?’
‘Riva degli Schiavoni, signore.’
‘Are you regular navy?’
‘No, signore. Merchant ships. Reserve. Most MAS officers are reserve.’
‘What is the Giudecca?’
Zacco turned to point across the lagoon. ‘Big mooring. Six hundred metres.’
‘Do many MAS boats lie there?’
‘Yes, signore. All. Many.’
Smith thought, many curious eyes too, and gossip, in a crowded mooring. That was inevitable but — he leaned forward over the rail. A dark-haired girl had walked along the quay and halted under the small light there. She wore a cape but the hood of it was thrown back and Smith saw her face in the light, turned towards the ship.
Zacco said, ‘Ecco — La Contessa. That is what we call her, but she is an English lady, Signorina
Helen Blair. She is also called Angel of Mercy. She is much loved, much respected lady.’
Smith was certain she was lovely. He could barely make out her features across the gap of black water but he was certain of that and sorry when she walked on, out of the
light and into the darkness, lost in it. Only the tap of her heels came back to him and then even that was gone.
He stirred, tried to pick up the thread of the conversation. ‘If the Giudecca is crowded I would like a more secluded place.’ He explained, ‘A place with few people.’
Zacco said slowly, ‘There are many places out in the marshes. But here — there is only San Elena. It is an island. The dockyard is close. It is only two kilometres from here.’ He pointed towards the sea. ‘Near the Porto di Lido. Only the church is there — and il Professore Eccentrico.’
Smith glanced at him, startled. ‘That — what?’
Zacco smiled apologetically. ‘The Mad Professor. He is an officer who works in a shed there. He sings all the time. Everyone says he is a little — you know?’ He tapped his forehead.
Mad? Smith was curious, but he said, ‘San Elena sounds good. I will meet the MAS boats there tomorrow morning. Thank you, Tenente. Good night.’
‘Good night, signore.’ The big man left, impassive still, crossed the deck and climbed down to the boat that waited for him. He was reserved, certainly, but hardly surly. Evidently Devereux’s ‘excellent relations’ with the Italians had somehow left out Lieutenant Pietro Zacco.
Smith went to his bunk and lay awake, restless, seeing again the lean, wicked beauty of Salzburg and the flickering flame of her guns.
He could not count on Devereux; had to see Winter as soon as possible.