Sailors on the Inward Sea

by Lawrence Thornton

  “We don’t have answers, Malone. We just know how to ask interesting questions. That’s part of the paradox of our line of work. We want, personally, to know everything. But our success depends on staying clear of the explicit, letting the reader make up his mind where he is going based on the evidence.”

  “You still see better than the rest of us,” I asserted.

  “Sometimes. And when we do there’s a cost.”

  “In what respect?”

  “Self-knowledge. Things you’d rather not know that come as a consequence of probing the hearts of others. Ford knew that better than any of my friends.”

  ON THE MORNING train to Lowestoft and the hearing, Conrad felt as if he were on his way to witness an execution. The same orderly met him at the station. This time the young man was sober and uncommunicative, the only words they exchanged on the drive about the weather. As they passed the sentry at the entrance, Conrad could see the whole installation, the grass plots between buildings a deep lush green, the Union Jack flying from the flagpole crisp and brilliant under a cloudless sky, though neither the light nor the intense colors could dispel the grimness that touched every corner of the base, as if it were covered with a film of fine soot. Even his room, in the same building where he had been put up a week earlier, looked dour.

  The hearing was scheduled for one o’clock. Jessie had packed a lunch of bread and mild cheese and he ate standing at the window, glad he could avoid the heavy food in the mess. He had finished the tea in the thermos when there was a knock at the door, a lieutenant who said he would escort him to the hearing room. Neither Conrad nor the officer spoke on the way, walking side by side on the gravel paths, going down a line of barracks and across a parade field to another set of buildings where the lieutenant held out his hand, guiding Conrad into a door and down a long corridor where their footsteps echoed and on through a second door into an airy, well-lighted room that resembled the parlor of a fine country house. There were leather sofas, wing chairs, photographs of ships on the walls, one taken on the deck of a three-master whose bow was submerged in swirling white water, men in storm gear working a winch, a fine heroic scene. At the far end a large fireplace whose mantel was stained by smoke stood invitingly. Having expected something more like a bare courtroom, Conrad’s tension eased. He regarded the arrangements for the hearing, two trestle tables pushed together end to end and half a dozen chairs facing another table with three chairs, larger and more ornate. Behind the table where the board would sit, three large windows framed the dock.

  He could see five or six ships at the docks through those windows. At first he did not recognize the Brigadier because the scaffold that rose from the dock all the way to the rail at the top of her bow blurred her distinct outline. A brazier attended by several men smoked on the dock, cooking rivets that a man grasped with tongs, tossing them up to another on the scaffold who caught them in a pail, each rivet glowing on its journey through the air. A crane lifted a large steel plate from its bed of wooden pallets, the replacement for the section stove in by the Valkerie turning slowly on the end of the cable and catching the sun like a jewel. At the base of the scaffold, deep within the mass of crosshatched timbers, burned the sharp blue light of a welder’s torch.

  The point of blue light stayed in his vision as he turned away, his attention drawn to footsteps in the corridor, a staccato rhythm that peaked just before the Brigadier’s officers entered the room and then went silent on the thick blue carpet. Wearing a dress uniform with decorations, his hat pinioned between his left arm and his side, blond hair combed back, Fox-Bourne came in first, a privilege accorded by his rank but also indicating, Conrad thought, his intention to confront the proceedings head-on. He walked straight to the tables, acknowledging Conrad with a nod and glance that revealed neither anxiety nor regret nor remorse, a look blank as a statue’s that told Conrad he had judged himself and found no fault greater than the harshness that goes hand in hand with revenge. Conrad saw no trace of defensiveness, victimization, or any of the lesser vices we employ to comfort ourselves and justify our actions. He believed that Fox-Bourne thought he had acted according to the dictates of a twice-broken heart that trumped the legalisms he was there to hear. In a strange way, that selflessness saved him from Conrad’s utter contempt. In his own mind, Fox-Bourne had simply been the medium through which justice was fulfilled.

  On the other hand, Chambers, Higgins, and Scorsby looked miserable. Conrad believed they were as sickened by what had happened as he was, a belief they confirmed later when they testified, and there was the added weight of the repercussions from speaking against their captain. But they had no choice if they wanted to live with themselves. The dilemma was clearly on the helmsman’s mind when he came in, flanked by two solicitors. When they were all standing behind the chairs at the long table the tension in the room was electric, as if they were gathered around a mast that had just that moment been struck by lightning, the air hissing and full of the smell of burning. From the corridor came the sound of more footsteps. Admiral Worthy preceded two senior officers, followed at a respectful distance by their aides-de-camp. Thin and tall, well over six feet, the admiral moved quickly to the table, where he put down a thick bundle of papers and regarded the men before him from beneath bushy eyebrows.

  “Please be seated,” he said.

  Conrad took the chair at the far left. Chambers, Higgins, Scorsby, the helmsman, and one of the laywers sat down in that order, followed by Fox-Bourne and his advocate. Nodding left and right, Admiral Worthy introduced Commanders Wilson and Austen, distinguished-looking chaps in their own right, though there was no question that the authority of the board rested with Worthy. After looking over a few sheets of paper he had withdrawn from a folder, he cleared his throat and leaned forward, explaining that the inquiry had been called to investigate the ramming of the German U-boat Die Valkerie by the Brigadier to determine if there had been any fault in the conduct of the rescue operation mounted after the submarine went down.

  “I am a patient man,” he said, “a man who believes in facts, not opinions. Keep that in mind during your testimonies. What happened, where, when. Captain Fox-Bourne, I know this is distressing. Please bear with us. Perhaps you could give the board your view of the events.”

  In a calm, measured voice, Fox-Bourne described the weather that morning as if he were reading from a climatological chart, including wind directions and speeds, the anticipated height of the swells, the parameters of the fog north, south, and east of Lowestoft. He said that under such conditions he would normally have delayed putting out until the fog had begun to lift, but with convoys of merchant ships due in the area within the next few days he was obliged to clear the lanes of mines. Worthy nodded, listening with his head slightly cocked as Fox-Bourne said that he had proceeded at “slow ahead,” posting one of his most reliable junior officers, Whelan, as lookout. The fog had lifted only moments before they sighted the U-boat, too late to avoid striking her. And it was a matter of minutes after the ships had drifted apart that a German officer shot Whelan in cold blood. That was when he had ordered his men to open fire.

  Fox-Bourne’s solicitor asked to address the board. He believed it was important to point out that Captain Fox-Bourne had done his duty under the most trying personal circumstances, circumstances that might well have incapacitated other men. Only three months before the incident his son, Edward, had died when the merchant vessel he sailed on was sunk by a torpedo. A handful of men who survived by clinging to debris later testified that the submarine, which had surfaced, offered no assistance to the men in the water. The loss of Edward was compounded by Whelan’s death. Fox-Bourne had established a warm personal relationship with the ensign much like that which obtains between fathers and sons.

  The solicitor’s insertion was a masterful stroke, perfectly timed and executed and obviously intended to manipulate the board’s emotions by introducing the claims of grief. If the hearing had been a chess match, the solicitor would have won a
major piece, perhaps the game, by gaining the board’s sympathy before the atrocity had even been mentioned. It was an altogether brilliant ploy, guaranteed to color the admiral’s opinions and even alter them, especially in light of the submarine’s sailing away from the survivors of Edward’s ship. It had seemed risky at first to suggest that Fox-Bourne was under such stress that his judgment was compromised, but that too was part of the strategy. The lawyer went on, saying that he had mentioned the issue to give the board a sense of the captain’s state of mind during the incident and to make clear that he had overcome his personal loss and was thinking only of the safety of his men when he ordered the Brigadier away from the site, which was littered with debris.

  “I understand,” said Worthy, “but the question we are here to address concerns the consequences of retreating whilst men were in the water. Perhaps Captain Fox-Bourne will give his recollections.”

  He was well aware of the German sailors, Fox-Bourne said, particularly aware given what had happened to his son’s comrades, but as commander of the Brigadier he was responsible for the safety of his men and Mr. Conrad. In his opinion the danger of running afoul of debris or mines that may have come out of the submarine as she broke up outweighed that faced by the survivors, many of whom wore life vests or clung to flotsam. Nevertheless, the moment he believed his ship was no longer at risk, he rang the telegraph to “neutral” and then, briefly, to “slow ahead,” closing the distance between the ship and the survivors as much as he dared.

  A wave of sympathy had surged up in Conrad’s heart while the lawyer spoke of Edward and Whelan. Their loss was magnified by the setting in the hearing room, especially the pictures of old ships and lost sailors to whose names theirs were added, swelling the long honor roll of the dead. But as soon as Fox-Bourne recommenced his testimony, Conrad’s emotions drained away. He had entered that room with no idea what to expect from the man, how far he was prepared to go in admitting his culpability or denying it. Now, sentence by sentence, word by word, he was learning. The story Fox-Bourne told was plausible, seemingly in accord with the facts, an apparently straightforward account that distorted everything that had happened between Scorsby’s request to lower the lifeboats and their appearance an hour later with the six glistening Germans, sickening him as it no doubt had the others, a calculated lie honed in consultation with the solicitor that ran beside the truth, invisible as air.

  Worthy thanked Fox-Bourne when he finished, adding that the board appreciated his candor. He then interrogated the junior officers beginning with Chambers, concentrating on the weather, the time that had passed between the Valkerie’s sinking and the Brigadier’s retreat, the distance Chambers estimated she had traveled away from the site, how far back toward it after Captain Fox-Bourne ordered a change of course. When he finished with Chambers he went on to Higgins and Scorsby, posing the same questions but interrupting them frequently for clarification, clearly disturbed by the divergence between their views and Fox-Bourne’s, bearing down on them about the nature and extent of debris—none of them reported seeing any; almost everything they said was at variance with Fox-Bourne’s testimony and sometimes flatly contradicted it. It was agonizing for them, the tension evident in every word, and while Conrad could see them out of the corner of his eye he did not look at them, gazing straight ahead at the board and sometimes behind them at the Brigadier, where the welders’ torches sparked with blue explosions, the scaffolding like a veil put up by Fox-Bourne that his officers were slowly dismantling, the admiral looking more dour by the minute as the evidence mounted.

  When Conrad’s turn came, Worthy addressed him as captain, saying that it was his understanding that Conrad was aboard as an emissary of Admiral Northcliffe to inspect procedures on the ship and make recommendations.

  “Yes,” Conrad answered. “That was my assignment.”

  “And this assignment came about as a result of your experience as a sailor or as a writer about the sea?”

  “As a sailor,” Conrad told him, choosing to ignore the sarcasm. “The admiral believed that fresh eyes might lead to improvements.”

  “Ah. Well, then, it is my understanding that you were present on the bridge at the time of the collision and later when Captain Fox-Bourne ordered ‘slow reverse.’ Would you mind giving up your opinion of the conditions, particularly the question of debris and the necessity of retreating?”

  For the first time during the hearing Conrad turned his head to the side and looked down the length of the table to Fox-Bourne. What he saw was more complex than he expected, the trace of the lie but also the utter conviction that Fox-Bourne had been right, his expression close to what Conrad had imagined it might be when he had seen him standing on the bow of the ship that morning a week earlier, satisfied, glad for the fog that had served up the Valkerie so he could take his revenge. That was what mattered, the lie put forth to save his career important but secondary.

  Conrad told the board that he had thought of nothing else since the incident, that he had vetted his opinion a dozen times at least over the past week, thought of it alone and discussed it with his wife, playing devil’s advocate to his position, looking at the events the way he imagined they had been perceived by Fox-Bourne and his officers in the hope that he might see something that would change his opinion. Yet the more he had considered the events, the more convinced he had become that the retreat was unnecessary. Even if there had been debris from the U-boat, the danger it posed to the Brigadier was insufficient to have cost those men their lives. He presented his view technically, carefully describing the distances as he remembered them, the conditions of the sea, the fog, the manner in which the U-boat sank, aware of the effect his testimony was having on the board, glad that it was not his word alone that would finish Fox-Bourne, that they all shared the responsibility for the judgment that was coming.

  “I see,” Worthy said when he had finished. “Is there anything you wish to add?”

  “I believe that Captain Fox-Bourne could not help himself. In my opinion, he was blinded by his need for revenge. What he did was unconscionable but I understand why it happened. Any of you who are fathers will too.”

  Conrad said what he had to say, what he believed and knew to be true with the knowledge that he was helping to end Fox-Bourne’s career, perhaps something even worse. It was not clear what the board was empowered to do in the way of punishment, though he was certain they could recommend dismissal from the service. On the other hand, if it was within their jurisdiction to send the case to a military trial, Fox-Bourne could end up in prison.

  “He deserved it,” Conrad told me all those years later as we sat on the Nellie. “I understood what drove him to put his hand on the telegraph lever and send the ship away, that it was more likely than not that he believed the Valkerie had torpedoed Edward’s ship, and it made no difference. It made no difference that he couldn’t help himself or that anyone in the room, under the same circumstances, would also have been sorely tempted to let those Germans drown. I include myself, Malone. As I told you, had I been in Fox-Bourne’s shoes I’m almost certain that I would have gone at least as far as to take hold of the lever, all my hatred, all my need for revenge concentrated in my hand, in the feel of the cold steel, the anticipation of the chimes ringing. If there had been only one or two men in the water . . . What would have stopped me and the others was the numbers. All those men in exchange for my son did not add up.”

  He shook his head back and forth and looked down at his hands. Then he leaned forward, as if he wanted to make sure I missed nothing he was about to say. The officers were conferring in whispers, Austen half covering his mouth with his hand while Conrad and the others waited in acute discomfort for whatever the panjandrums would say. He gazed at the Brigadier, then shifted sideways in his chair, the length of the room coming in view. Throw out the leather furniture, add a few dozen turbaned, dark-skinned men, punkahs moving humid air, and it could have been the Eastern port where Jim had listened to another board inquiring
into the circumstances of another collision at sea, one that could well have been even more catastrophic than what happened with the Valkerie, the magistrate excoriating Jim, pronouncing judgment on him before the poor man opened his mouth, doing so in the name of the craft, canceling his certificate because they had to in order to maintain the way they thought about themselves and their profession. He was musing on that terrible scene, comparing the situation with Fox-Bourne’s, which was close enough so you couldn’t fit a piece of paper between it and Jim’s, when Admiral Worthy announced that he and his colleagues would consider the charges in private. As they rose and went out the door, Conrad was convinced that they were off to measure a rope. He could practically see it, he said, down to the tiny filaments standing up along it like hairs on a dog’s back.

  I didn’t see the rope quite so vividly, but the scaffolding surrounding the Brigadier suddenly took on a distinct resemblance to that of a gallows. “By God,” I thought, “Fox-Bourne deserves to swing.” How could anyone deny it? Then I remembered the root cause, Edward’s death, the echo of it in Whelan’s death, the German captain shooting as if he were taking target practice, and the picture turned hazy around the edges. I’d like to know how you see it, Ford. I’d like nothing better right now than for you to clear your throat and say, “It seems to me . . .” This fraught moment is, after all, not so different from situations you have dealt with in your books.

  OUTSIDE, CHAMBERS, Higgins, and Scorsby gathered round a bench where the helmsman was sitting while Fox-Bourne crossed the grassy area in front of them, walking briskly toward a path that ran between two buildings, where he disappeared. The men were shaken and so was Conrad, who wanted to be alone and decided to wander down to the docks. The new plate still hung from the crane’s cable. Several men were gingerly guiding it into place while another was giving hand signals to the crane operator, the plate going lower an inch or so at a time until its holes were exactly opposite the bolts protruding from the Brigadier’s hull. There was a pause in the work, then another signal and the plate made a hollow sound as it slid into place. While it was still echoing, in the hull two workmen spun huge nuts onto the bolt ends.