His own idea had been to use a Very pistol from a range of a few yards, but Talbot had panted that it would be best to shove off and then do the job with tracer. When this was done—a burst of tracer from the port-side Vickers—the explosion was accompanied by a sheet of flame that would have incinerated anything within fifty feet of it.
‘Was a bit hectic…’
In the bridge still, with Stack. Harper at the wheel.
The reason for pushing on ahead of Monkey and Furneaux was to get the wounded back as soon as possible. In some cases an hour or two might make the difference between life and death. In Newhaven there’d be ambulances and doctors on the quayside: by the time Furneaux’s 560 was alongside, this lot would be in hospital and the ambulances back again waiting for his.
Stack said—something he’d said before, only in different words—‘Hell of a price to pay, Ben.’
‘I know. Fucking awful…’
He was going to have to start talking about the other thing soon: if he was going to at all. He thought he’d have to. There might never be a better chance: alone with him, and Stack seemingly in a confiding mood. Saying now—in further reference to the dead and wounded, the high price of the battle won—‘Could be asked—you or I might ask it, even—was finishing-off the Heilbronne worth the candle? She wasn’t getting out into the Atlantic, was she, once John Heddingly’d scored. Not without major repairs—dry-docking, for a start?’
‘There’d be a dry dock in Cherbourg, surely.’
‘Yeah, but—’
‘Orders were to sink her, anyway.’
‘That’s true… Ours not to reason why, uh?’
‘She could have been mended quick enough. If those bastards decide this or that’s a rush job, bloody do it—they don’t mess about, crack their bloody whips and it happens. And from Cherbourg, then—’
‘You’re right, of course.’
From Cherbourg, repaired possibly within days, she could have slipped out at any time they chose, with nothing anywhere near enough to stop her. Then the U-boat war would have been given a leg-up—maybe in some area even a major boost: could have provided the straw to break the donkey’s back. The price did have to be accepted.
But he was a thoughtful man, old Bob. Concerned, utterly decent. Didn’t look like it—to people who didn’t know him he looked like a bruiser—but he felt things. In this other business, in fact, he was the only truly decent character in the whole line-up and, incidentally, the one who was going to be hurt, no matter what.
So tell him. Get it over with.
Part of the dilemma was your own cowardice. So commit yourself.
‘Bob—’
‘Hang on. Something I want to put to you, while we’re on our own.’ Ben had been going to say, ‘When there’s a chance of a really private word’—and Stack was now looking round at the dark bulk of Harper behind the wheel: raising his voice to add ‘—to all intents and purposes, that is, on our own.’
Tm not hearing nothing, sir.’ Shifting his feet, swaying against the direction of each heavy roll. The wind was still rising. ‘Cloth ears is what I got, sir.’
‘I’ll take your word for it, Harper.’ Back to nearer-to-normal tone: only high and loud enough to beat the engines’ noise, sea and weather noise… ‘Ben—so happens, cloth ears come into this, in a way. I want to tell you that as a navigator here, you’re wasted. A kid sub-lieutenant straight out of King Alfred, given a few weeks’ sea-time—’
‘My own thoughts exactly. In the 15th Flotilla it was different. Never realized how different.’
‘Point is, I don’t consider your bloody ear’s all that important. Seriously, Ben. You had plenty of experience as a Number One—in fact you wouldn’t ’ve been far off getting your own boat then—OK, in a short boat, but what the hell, you’ve done quite a time in these, now… D’you get on all right with the quack at Aggressive, by the way?’
The doctor, at the Newhaven base. Name of Morrison. Dan Morrison. Ben glimpsed a certain ray of light but instantly decided not to believe in it. Cowardice again: fear of jumping too soon, hoping for too much… Lowering his glasses though—about half-way—and staring at the hunched, goon-suited shape with its own proboscis-like binocular extension slowly sweeping the wilderness of sea ahead.
‘Yeah. I’d say so. Nice fellow.’
‘He’ll pass you A1 if I ask him nicely and you swear your hearing doesn’t cause you any problems. We’ll need clearance at higher levels too, but—I pull some weight—and it’s my flotilla, damn it…’
‘You wouldn’t believe how fine-tuned my ear is at this moment.’
‘Fact is, Ben—it’s bullshit. What’s wrong with a skipper making use of other men’s sharp ears? Use lookouts’ eyes, don’t we?’
‘A skipper… If I could believe this—’
‘You can believe I’ll try. OK, so it’s a long shot… Maybe a refresher spell as a first lieutenant ’d be a good first move. If we could get that far. But you have the experience, and I’d say the talent.’
‘Jesus Christ…’
‘No guarantees, Ben. Let’s have that clear.’
‘Of course—’
‘Well, I’ll work on it.’
It wouldn’t have been easy to have followed that with Oh, by the way, d’you know your wife’s a tart?
He’d offered to take over the watch, give Stack an hour or two below, but he hadn’t wanted it.
‘I don’t sleep all that much. Specially at sea.’
He went down, lit a cigarette, checked the position, called up suggesting an adjustment of two degrees to port, then went below and for’ard to see whether Barclay needed help or a breath of air.
Carter was in the galley, braced against the boat’s gyrations while slicing bread for sandwiches.
‘Spam again, sir. Tea or kye for you?’
‘Kye’d be fine. You fit now, Carter?’
‘Reckon I’ll live, sir.’
Earlier, he’d had his head in a bucket.
Command, for Pete’s sake!
So darned improbable it would be better not to think of it as much more than a daydream—born of Stack’s good heart as well as his natural Aussie disinclination to be bound by unnecessary rules and regulations. Odds-on, it wouldn’t come to anything…
And what the hell—you were at sea, not stuck ashore behind some desk, as you might have been. Count your blessings.
Barclay, asleep at the wardroom table, was woken by Ben’s entry. He looked better too. Not exactly blooming, but less like one of his own patients. Buckets were still in evidence, but had at least been emptied. The wounded—Newbolt and the snotty, and PO Motor Mechanic Talbot—the rest were next door—were either sleeping or unconscious. Heavily doped, of course. Barclay lurched out into the galley flat with him, and thence into the forward messdeck, where Charlie Sewell was dozing with his head on his folded arms. He didn’t wake, but Michelson the Oerlikon gunner did, and came out into the flat. He’d stayed to help after taking part in the embarkation and helping to carry some of the wounded down here. A square-built man, red-headed, middle twenties. The patients were all quiet, he said. The one in most discomfort was Newbolt’s radar operator, an AB named Pickering, who had facial damage and might have lost his eyes. Barclay had padded and bandaged not only his face but also both his hands, wrapping them almost to the size of footballs so that he wouldn’t easily be able to pull the coverings off his eyes—which in pain, fright and darkness might have been a natural thing, especially when emerging into semi-consciousness.
Nightmare. Remembering Stack’s sadness: thinking, here’s the price.
Barclay muttered, ‘Just all blood. You can’t tell.’ He added, ‘Thank God for morphine.’
‘And roll on Newhaven.’
‘Yeah, crikey…’
‘Reckon the snotty ’ll make it?’
‘Christ knows. Tell you one thing, I’d never make a doctor… Grateful for your help though, by the way.’
Two and a half hour
s to go, yet; possibly even three. It was about four-thirty. Ben offered Michelson a cigarette.
‘Thanks, sir. Finished all mine.’
‘Sandwiches and kye coming up, mind you. Carter’s doing it now. Think the cox’n ’d like a shake?’
‘I’d let ’im be, sir. Bear with a sore ’ead, otherwise.’ He suggested to Barclay, ‘If you want a break, sir—it’s all quiet, an’ I could shake him if I had to.’
‘I’ll take you up on that.’ Barclay nodded. ‘Any problems, shake him and come and find me. Wheelhouse or bridge—OK?’
They got sandwiches from Carter, and went up into the plot. Carter went on through, into the bridge with Stack’s, Harper’s and others’ rations. Ben commented, ‘Good bloke, that Michelson’, and Barclay glanced at him almost angrily: ‘They’re all good blokes. They’re the best, the cream, every bloody one of ’em.’ It was about the longest and certainly the most fervent statement Ben had ever heard him make.
The kye was excellent, and the sandwiches weren’t bad. Nowadays it seemed always to be either spam or corned beef, whereas in the Dartmouth flotilla it had been mostly ham. More pigs in the West Country, perhaps.
‘Not getting your head down, Ben?’
‘Not yet, anyway.’
‘Lucky you had your crash in the afternoon.’
‘Less luck than bloody exhaustion.’ Sipping the red-hot kye. ‘And foresight.’
‘Good party, was it?’
‘Terrific.’
Tell Rosie, he thought. Imagining it: this evening, say about seven o’clock—or later, if she was working late—tell her—well, first, I love you, and then Listen, I’ve been told there’s a chance I’ll be getting a command. Well—it’s only a very, very small chance… But darling, listen to this now—
‘You were dropping off.’
‘I was?’
Barclay nodded, drained his mug then pushed the rest of a sandwich into his mouth. ‘I’ll leave you to it. Ought to get your head down, Ben. I had a long kip down there. Might spell the skipper for an hour or so now.’
‘He doesn’t want it. I offered.’
‘May have changed his mind. I’ll ask him, anyway.’
‘OK.’
Thinking about Rosie again. The cigarette-stub was burning his fingers. He pressed it out, and lit a new one.
Rosie, listen—that’s not all. The conveyance I knock around in is due for an overhaul. So I may get a few days off in which case—well, mid-week wouldn’t be so good, would it, I mean your flatmate being around, but—
Buckinghamshire, maybe. Meet her family. If she could steal a few days.
‘Snoozing, Ben?’
Stack: down from the bridge. Ben began to move, to surrender the folding seat to him, but he didn’t want it.
‘Been sitting all night.’ He leant against the bulkhead—for stability. His blue-black beard looked more like five days’ growth than a single night’s. ‘I’ll take a smoke from you, though—save me a trip below.’
‘Of course. Everyone smokes mine. Here…’
‘Want to talk to you, Ben. Couldn’t up there, with our friend cloth-ears, bless his heart—’
‘But we did talk. Tell you, it’s left me groggy. Can’t begin to say how grateful—’
‘Not that. Something else. Very—personal.’ His stormlighter flared, went out: he swore, tried again. It needed shielding, in the draught from the mattress-covered shell-damage in that corner. Letting the smoke trickle out now, from the first inhalation: eyes shut for a moment, revelling in it… Then: ‘When we spoke last evening, Ben—after the first briefing? Yeah, well. I didn’t tell you the truth. There’d hardly have been time, anyway, but—other reasons too. Such as—for instance—well, who does like admitting failure?’
‘Failure?’ Ben frowned. ‘What kind of—’
‘If you want it in one word—marital. Joan and I are finished. When we talked then I at least implied to you that—well, I couldn’t face telling you, that’s all.’
‘Christ Almighty…’
‘I’m a dull bastard to live with—that’s the long and short of it. I suppose when we married it didn’t show—you know, the excitement, eye of the beholder, all that—and I still am nuts about her, in a way—’
‘Well, for God’s sake—’
‘Excuse me, sir—more kye, or—’
‘No thank you, Carter.’
Ben glanced at him, shook his head. Thinking—about Stack and Joan, this revelation—No need to tell him. He’s telling me…
Carter had gone on down.
‘Bob, I’m damn sorry. Don’t know what else to say, I—’
‘What it comes down to is I’m—a son of the soil, you might say. No ladies’ man. Not good at polite conversation, all that. Lousy dancer, too—that’s a major failing… And—well, this is what I think about.’ A gesture of one hand, indicating the ship, these surroundings… ‘Dare say talk about too. Not the sort of conversation a girl enjoys. I can understand that. But you have to live it—don’t you? It’s not a part-time job, I mean…’
Expelling smoke: and inhaling another lungful immediately. Shaking his head… ‘That’s about it. Can’t invite you to bring your sheila down—nowhere to bring her, we’re giving up the house. That’s to say, I am—it belongs to one of her relations. And now you know… You’re really stuck on this one, Ben—that right?’
‘Hard and fast.’
‘Mutual?’
‘Seems to be.’
‘You had a big thing going with Joan, didn’t you?’
‘With—Joan…’ Looking at that blaze of blue eyes, narrowed through drifting smoke: wondering what the hell… He nodded. ‘In those days—yeah. Had a lot of fun. Before you hove in sight, of course.’
‘Of course… Look—it’s OK, Ben, water under the bridge.’ Another shake of the head… ‘Hangs on in a man’s mind, though—which is partly why I didn’t bring myself to be straight with you last evening. Truth is—going back a bit—when you wrote from Dartmouth—see, it was all beginning to fall apart then, I was trying to keep it together and I thought having you join us here might be about the last thing I needed.’
‘You’re telling me you had some notion I’d—I and Joan—’
‘It’s all right, Ben. How I felt, this was. Simply for the record—clearing the air—’
‘I’ll make this clear here and now. There’d be no circumstances, ever, under which I’d bloody dream of—’
‘OK. OK. I accept that. I’m telling you the whole thing, that’s all. You and I hadn’t been in touch for—what, two years, and—’
‘How come you still did it for me—got me up here, I mean?’
‘Because—Ben, in my philosophy, if there’s a challenge you’re safer meeting it head-on. Otherwise you could spend your whole life running and ducking—couldn’t you?’
‘But you truly thought I’d—’
‘Or she might. Old flames rekindled?’
‘I can’t believe—’
‘Let’s be frank about it. I don’t hold it against you that you and she used to—run around together. Before my time—none of my business. And Joan’s line was always that you were just good friends. Want to know how I caught on to the truth of it?’
‘Which truth?’
‘Ben, that is not being frank.’
‘All right. How?’
‘With hindsight, mind you. Not at the time, only retrospectively. It was the way she—distanced herself from you. She visited you once in hospital for the sole reason I nagged her into it. Right after you got clobbered, that was, you still weren’t clear was it Christmas or fucking Easter. She used that as an excuse to stay away… And then they moved you down to Haslar, and we were busy—me at sea and then getting to be an SO, plus the fuss of getting married, her family walking all over me, Joan resigning from that upper-crust outfit to join MTC—so as to get paid, that was—but she didn’t even send you postcards, or enquire whether you were alive, dead, crippled… Wasn’t natural, her wr
iting you out of her life like that. If the two of you had been just friends, you’d ’ve gone on being friends. Wouldn’t you?’
‘I would.’
‘There you are, then.’
‘Some sort of case proved, you reckon?’
‘To my mind. Not that it concerns us in the least, now. I wanted you to know I know—that’s all. So you and I don’t have to—sort of tiptoe around each other, henceforth. OK?’
There was a pause. Ben said—needing something to say—‘Amongst my souvenirs of those times—hospital, etcetera—I still have a front-page news-splash about your wedding. Some East Anglian paper, Monkey sent it to me at Haslar. Your photo and Joan’s—gladrags, medals—remember the headline?’
‘Sort of.’ Stack looked embarrassed. ‘There were a lot of ’em, though.’
‘Aussie Gunboat Hero Weds Sister of Belted Earl?’
‘Yeah. Christ.’ Stubbing out his cigarette. Other hand on the deckhead, steadying himself against the roll. ‘Should’ve known better, shouldn’t he? My God he should.’ A shrug. ‘Maybe she should’ve too… Ben—change of subject now. Tell me about your girl.’
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