Into Uncharted Seas (Westerly Gales)

by E. C. Williams

“I think we can safely allow half the crew at a time to take a nap – lying down on the deck, at their stations,” he said to Kendall. “But be sure each station has at least one man awake and alert.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” the XO replied. “Good idea, if I may say so, Skipper. The hands are pretty worn down by now.”

  “That includes the galley, too. Tell Cookie to take a nap – order her to, if need be.”

  “Roger that, Skipper.”

  “Now I'm going to duck down to sick bay for a moment, to say a word to the wounded hands.”

  Sam went below to the schooner's little hospital, where he found the MO making the rounds of the hanging cots on which the wounded lay, her interns and SBAs napping on the deck along the bulkheads. He joined her, and spoke briefly with each man who was conscious.

  When they had finished, he said to the Doctor, “Marie, I'm glad to see you giving your mates a break, but you should get some rest yourself. I'm afraid I'm going to create more custom for you come morning.”

  “I'm well-rested, Sam. I just woke up from a nap, to give my people a stand-down.”

  Sam stared intently at her face, drawn and gray in the dim light of the sick bay's battle-lanterns, and suspected she was lying about the nap. But he didn't pursue it.

  “Are the galley rangers bringing your hands coffee and soup?”

  “Yes, Sam. They haven't neglected us.”

  The two stood in silence for a moment, then Sam took his leave by saying firmly, “Be sure you get another nap before dawn, Marie. Things are going to get hot at sunup. I'm afraid.”

  “Aye aye, Commodore.”

  Sam then returned topside and walked slowly back toward the quarterdeck, this time along the port side, completing his circuit of the battle stations, offering a few quiet words of encouragement in passing at each one. He was pleased to see that his order about naps had already been passed, and half the men were curled up in corners out of the way, oblivious to everything, having fallen instantly asleep.

  When he reached the quarterdeck, he found Mr. Robert waiting for him, clipboard in hand. Sam's heart sank. “More bad news, Sparks?”

  Sam saw a flash of teeth in the darkness as the comms officer grinned in reply. “Nossir. I think this's good news.” Sam took the board and ducked into the chartroom, carefully closing the door behind him, to read the message by the dim red light over the chart desk. The light was turned off and on automatically by a switch actuated by the door to keep its faint glow from spilling out on deck.

  The message was from Scorpion, reporting her arrival back in Hell-ville, and ending with “Mission accomplished.”

  Sam felt a small but significant part of his burden of worry fade away. He initialed the message form in the block marked “CO”, returned to the open deck and handed the clipboard back to Robert. “Good news, indeed,” he said. Robert then vanished in the darkness, going forward to share the message with the XO, in accordance with the routine Sam had established.

  Sam paced awhile, and then Ritchie appeared, hands full, from below. “Thought you might want a cuppa and a bite, sir,” he said. “I took the liberty of putting a shot o' rum in your coffee, for medicinal purposes, like.”

  The “bite” was a big cylinder of cold glutinous rice mixed with bits of spiced cabbage and salt fish and wrapped up in pickled seaweed. Sam didn't think he was hungry until he tasted it, found it delicious, and immediately felt ravenous, suddenly realizing that he hadn't eaten in hours. He inhaled it, then sipped gratefully from the mug. Ritchie's coffee was as different from the galley brew as satin from sail-canvas, fragrant, mild, yet rich-tasting. He could detect, too, the complex taste of the fine ten-year-old rum that had been a gift of Nosy Be's governor, and which he thought Ritchie had been saving for company.

  “Thanks, Ritchie,” Sam said. “Very good: I needed that.”

  Refreshed, Sam returned to alternately pacing the deck and staring aft in the direction of the pursuing pirate craft . So the rest of the long, tense night wore on.

  - 6 -

  Earlier that day, the RKS Scorpion approached the island of Nosy Be from the north. All hands were in a buoyant mood, having carried out their mission successfully and returning to the island that was home for many of them – the Kergs who had found wives or girlfriends there, and the seamen who had been recruited on the island.

  As they neared the green coastline, Lieutenant Dave Schofield was intrigued by the sight of a small white dot, floating nearly motionless over the northern shore, very near the town of Andilana. At first he thought it might be a cloud – an oddly low, anomalous cloud, to be sure – but a closer look through his telescope dispelled that notion. He could see then that it was shaped like an upside-down raindrop, with a dark dot underneath at the end of the tapering part. Since the dhow had to swing wide to the westward to avoid the inshore sandbars, Dave got no closer look during the passage down the western shore, although it remained in sight, intriguing and mysterious.

  When the Scorpion reached the point where she would have to make a left turn to the east to head toward Hell-ville harbor, beginning what would have been a slow and tedious beat into the variable light breezes, now mostly from the east in the lee of the island, she was met by the little Hell-ville harbor tug, which bustled up and asked for a towline to be passed. Dave had not radioed ahead for a tow, but he was grateful nonetheless. With the tug's assistance, they would be at anchor in the harbor hours before the dhow could have worked her way to windward. The dhow rig was not very well suited to frequent tacking, nor to close-winded sailing.

  Scorpion passed the tug a line and dropped her sail. Tug and tow then proceeded eastward at a stately five knots, and within the hour Scorpion had picked up her mooring in what had become known as “Navy Anchorage” in Hell-ville harbor, half a cable away from Joan of Arc. Dave immediately noticed the absence of the Albatros, and wondered if she had sortied in response to his message about the two enemy dhows off Mafia Island.

  As the tug was throwing off the Scorpion's towline, and before she could get away, Dave grabbed his megaphone and shouted to her, “Thanks for the ride, Skipper. Come aboard for a drink?”

  That was an invitation no mariner ever refused except under the most stringent demands of duty. Apparently the tug master's duty didn't demand too much of him at the moment, for he waved his assent and brought the tug smartly alongside, where a couple of Scorpion's hands were already rigging the pilot ladder.

  The tug master came up the ladder and over the bulwarks with an agility that suggested he was much younger than the average skipper. But as Dave shook his hand, he saw that Captain Silvano, as he introduced himself, was in fact well into middle age. Like so many of the Nosy Be islanders, he was a golden-skinned meti.

  “Chief, leave that to Cameron and come join Cap'n Silvano and me for a drink in my cabin,” Dave called to Landry, who was overseeing the securing of the Scorpion's rig for harbor and making sure all portable gear with any resale value was securely locked away. Although Nosy Be had little serious crime, the harbor area was plagued by petty theft, mostly the work of poorly-supervised adolescent boys, either fatherless or with dads absent at sea, whose mothers found them too much to cope with. They would swim or paddle out to anchored vessels on homemade rafts, shinny up the anchor cable, and make away with whatever was loose and could be sold to a shady ship's chandler. The prudent mariner removed all temptation from their reach.

  “Best offer I've had all day, Skipper!” Landry shouted in return, and with one parting order to the Boatswain came aft to join Dave and Captain Landry.

  “Best! Rum, and three mugs,” Dave called to his seaman-steward as they went below to his tiny cabin/mess/chartroom. “And tell Boats we can splice the mainbrace once everything's secured for harbor.” This last provoked cheers from all the hands within hearing.

  Once settled at Dave's table, he proposed a toast to the Domoina (for this was the name of the tug), to which Silvano responded with a toast to the Scorpion.

&n
bsp; These formalities out of the way, Dave said, “Cap'n, where's the Albatros?”

  “Dunno, Cap'n. A few days ago, she took most of the hands from the Joan, and all the shoreside yard workers, and worked twenty-four hours or more straight getting ready for sea. She also took the Joan's guns and ammo. Then she got underway in the wee hours without a pilot and using her motor sloop to tow – hardly anybody noticed she was gone 'til the mornin'.”

  Schofield exchanged glances with Landry, then said as casually as possible, “Training exercise, I reckon.” But it was clear that the Albatros was off chasing the two pirate dhows Scorpion had reported.

  Silvano seemed satisfied with this explanation. He only said, “Guess so,” and took another sip of his rum.

  Dave then topped up their mugs, and said, “Captain, please tell us what the hell that thing is that's hanging in midair over the northern coast – we've been eaten up with curiosity ever since we sighted it.”

  Silvano laughed. “That's what the soldier-boys call the 'A-Whiz,” he replied.

  “'A-Whiz'?”

  “Yes – that's their short name for 'Aerial Early Warning System' – A – E – W - S. A-Whiz. An even shorter name would be 'balloon', but that's apparently not military enough for 'em.”

  “You mean like a kid's balloon? A toy?”

  “Yeah, but thousands of times bigger. It's got a little basket thing slung underneath, and it's tethered to the ground at a spot near Andilana. A poor militia lad is stuck up there all day with a telescope, a phone, a bottle of water, and a handful of cold rice. And I guess he has another bottle to pee in. If it was me, I'd piss over the side and try to sprinkle the sergeant who picked me for that duty. Anyway, the idea is, from way up there he'll see Caliphate raiders long before they'd be in sight from down on the ground.

  ”In fact, that's how I knew to meet you off Point Mahatsinjo, and give you a tow into Andavakotakona Bay – .the militia boys at the AEWS station passed the word about you hours ago. It's mighty handy for reporting the arrivals of vessels that don't have radio – gives me and the pilots plenty of notice. So even though we haven't had a raid since the one you Navy lads intercepted off Andilana – for which we're awfully grateful – we know we'll get plenty of warning of the next one. So long as it happens in daylight and fair weather, o'course.”

  He paused for a reflective pull at his drink. “I think the militia regiment is anxious to prove its worth, too – all the heavy liftin' being done by the Kerg Navy so far, and hoggin' all the glory, like.”

  “Well, the militia may get its chance pretty soon,” Dave said. Silvano gave him a sharp look and said, “Why? Something in the works involving the Regiment?”

  Dave realized that he had gone too far, and tried for a casual, dismissive tone. “Oh, no – not that I know of. Just speculating.”

  “'Cause I got a boy and two nephews in the militia,” Silvano said, still gazing shrewdly at Dave, to the latter's dismay.

  “All I know is that the pirates have the capability to mount another raid on Nosy Be. And if they can do it, I'm guessing they might do it. That's what I meant,” Dave said firmly, hoping that was misleading enough. “And that's classified info, Captain Silvano, so I'd be grateful if you'd keep it to yourself.”

  “Oh, aye, Cap'n. Mum's the word.” But Dave knew that by tomorrow at the latest the word would be all over the island that the Navy confidently expected another pirate raid very shortly. Well, that would have a good effect on alertness, and would also misdirect public speculation from what Dave guessed were the Commodore's real intentions.

  Captain Silvano consulted his pocket watch – a big mariner – and drained his mug. “Well, duty calls – got a schooner to get underway shortly. Many thanks for that welcome drop o' rum, Cap'n.”

  “Any time, Skipper – thanks again for the tow.”

  Dave saw Silvano on deck to the pilot ladder, where the tug master debarked with the same youthful agility he displayed on boarding, ordered the line cast off, and got the tug underway briskly. Dave responded to Silvano's good-bye wave, then turned to gaze reflectively at the small white dot hanging in midair to the north. Chief Landry came up to his elbow, and Dave said musingly, as if to himself, “I wonder if we could make that thing work on shipboard, at sea?”

  “I dunno, Skipper,” Landry replied dubiously. “Only on a calm day, for sure. And how would we keep the tether from fouling the rigging?”

  “I believe I'll ask the militia CO if I can go up to the AEWS site.”

  But before Dave could do that, he had to report aboard the Joan, whose captain was now the SOPA, the “senior officer present afloat”, in naval jargon, and was thus, in Sam's absence, commander of Kerguelenian navy vessels – all two of them, now – and personnel, in Hell-ville. Indeed, the hoist “Sierra Oscar” flew from Joan's foremast, signifying this status, and the signal “SCORPION REPORT ABOARD SOPA” was already flying from her signal halyards.

  Dave ordered the dory launched and manned, and hurried below to shift out of his at-sea slops into more decent clothing – his civilian shore-going rig. He reflected as he did so that it was past time that naval officers had a uniform, now that the seamen were so smartly turned out in an outfit that they had, in effect, designed themselves. Although “designed” was too strong a word for a get-up that had gradually evolved by a consensus of the petty officers.

  He was rowed the short distance to the Joan, and was met at the top of the pilot ladder by Mike Christie, who he assumed was still acting CO of the schooner and thus SOPA. But, after they had greeted one another effusively – they were old friends and shipmates – Mike said, “Commodore Ennis wants to see you in his cabin right away, Dave – he's eager to hear all about your mission.”

  Dave raised his eyebrows at that. “Commodore Ennis?”

  “Well, yes. The instant you arrived, he was in command of two naval vessels, and thus became entitled to that courtesy address.”

  “Right. Of course. It just sounded strange to hear the title in connection with anyone but Sam Bowditch.”

  “It seems to sound strange to Captain – Commodore – Ennis, too. In fact, I'm pretty sure he hates it; it makes him uncomfortable, like, to share a handle with Commodore Bowditch. But since he's been our arbiter of naval customs and courtesies from the start, and he came up with the term, I guess he feels he can't object.”

  “So he's off the binnacle list now?”

  “Yes – he took himself off it and returned to duty, over Doc Cheah's objections. Once the Commodore had recovered from the first shock of the news about his wife and baby, he seemed determined to get back to work as soon as possible, which is probably for the best from the point of view of his état d'esprit. Doc's got an SBA following him around everywhere, in case he collapses, which irritates the Commodore no end. But Doc insisted on that much, and threatened to radio Doctor Girard to intervene with Commodore Bowditch to order him to stay in his rack if he didn't compromise to at least that extent. Which apparently Cheah has the right to do, as ship's MO, in accordance with the medical regs Doctor Girard herself wrote when she became senior medical officer.”

  “Verdomme!” Dave exclaimed. “I'll bet that provoked a lot of Chinese from Bill Ennis!” For Ennis never swore in the patois, nor in French or English. Instead he relieved his feelings, when sufficiently provoked, in the pungent Hokkien he had learned from his grandfather. Even seamen who didn't understand a word of it knew they'd better jump to it and not answer back when the Captain reached that state of ignition. And Cheah, for one, judging by his surname, probably understood all too painfully well the names his CO was calling him.

  “And now, may I lead you to the lion's den, Dave? Because I warn you: the Commodore's not in the best of tempers these days.”

  “Well, maybe my report will cheer him up some,” Dave said. “So lead on, shipmate.”

  Dave was shocked by Ennis's appearance. The Captain of the Joan sat upright behind his desk, his expression solemn, his face gray and drawn. He s
eemed to have lost at least ten kilos of weight. His empty left sleeve was pinned up neatly, a lump underneath the fabric showing that the stump was still heavily bandaged.

  In a corner, standing stock-still, was a young and frightened sick-berth assistant, appearing to be trying his hardest to look like a piece of furniture.

  “Good afternoon, Dave,” Commodore Ennis said with distant civility. “Take a pew. Mike, perhaps you could drag a chair in from my mess...? Thanks.”

  “If I may say so, sir, you're looking remarkably well considering the seriousness of your wound.”

  “Well, yes, but it takes work. I take a turn around the deck every day, walking a measured mile – a sea mile, Dave! – and I clean my plate at every meal. I'm recovering my strength in leaps and bounds … leaps and bounds.”

  “It's working, Commodore – you're almost your old self again.” But looking into Ennis's ashen face, Dave wondered if this could possibly be true – if Commodore Ennis wasn't being overly optimistic. If he wasn't in fact driving himself so hard he was headed for a relapse. He glanced surreptitiously at Mike, who returned a warning look that told him quite clearly to drop this topic.

  He was saved from the effort of finding a graceful way of changing the subject when the Commodore did it for him. “Well, Dave, I'm on fire to hear about your mission. I'm sure Sam – Commodore Bowditch – will share your written report with me after he's read it, but I'd like to hear the unpolished version from you.”

  “Aye aye, Commodore. Well, our passage north to Zanzibar was fairly uneventful...”Dave began, and went on to give Ennis a full and circumstantial report of his intelligence-gathering cruise to Zanzibar and Mafia Island. Ennis followed the account with close attention, occasionally interrupting with questions. He was especially interested in their Mafia Island volunteer.

  When Dave finished, Ennis asked, “Have you reported completion of your mission to Commodore Bowditch?”

  “We're trying to now, Commodore, as ordered, but our rig isn't very high-powered, and our comms PO hasn't been able to raise the Albatros yet.”