Instow didn’t need to look to see if the bow was still there. He knew it was not. The vessel began to nosedive. ‘Abandon ship!’ he bawled unnecessarily into the megaphone which seemed to appear conveniently in his hand. ‘Abandon ship!’
Men were scrambling and slithering across the tipping deck. Some were in the water, their arms raised as if in surrender, crying out for help towards the destroyer. A sailor on fire jumped into the sea making a small cloud of steam. ‘Abandon ship!’ bellowed Instow.
The ship was abandoning them. It was tipping sideways; he could not have stayed on the bridge even if he had decided to do so. Falling to his knees he crawled towards Mancroft who was now lying in a bundle, as if sheltering from the cold, against the bulkhead. He attempted to shake him but there was no life. The blood-smeared face fell to one side. Instow said: ‘Poor lad.’ He realised he was still clutching the megaphone. Lying against the bulkhead, next to the dead Mancroft, he bawled through it again, uselessly: ‘Abandon ship!’
He somehow got down to the tilting deck. It was awash and vacant, the pom-poms swinging playfully. Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath he slid over the side into the chilly sea.
He spat out the salt water but his life jacket kept him afloat. He kicked his legs and splashed his arms. There were other men in the water around him, some moving, some floating and stiffly still. Shouting came from above, abruptly drowned by the noise of the destroyer’s guns, and he saw sailors on the rail. ‘Here! Here!’ Instow called almost politely. They had already seen him. The warship had lost speed and was now lying nearly calm, continuing to fire at the low, droning aircraft. He looked about him from the water, stretching his neck and wondering if the E-boats had gone. Nets were being thrown over the side and he went towards them at an ugly paddle. He arrived at the soaring grey hull and grabbed the net at the same moment as another man. He realised it was his steward, still wearing his white jacket. ‘After you, sir,’ the man spluttered indicating the net.
‘You go, son,’ said Instow. ‘Get the bloody coffee on.’
Sailors were scrambling down the nets to help. The tubby steward was almost dragged from the water. Instow half-climbed behind him. Hands grabbed him and tugged him the rest of the way.
He was safe and in one piece. He had even managed to get to his feet when a young midshipman ran to him and said: ‘We’ll get you fixed, sir. Come with me.’ He put a blanket and a protective arm around Instow and introduced himself: ‘I’m Parsons.’ All around, the guns were flashing, detonations splitting the air. The young man helped him through a hatchway and into a dim cabin.
Instow sat gratefully. ‘I’m soaking this bunk,’ he said to Parsons.
‘That’s all right, sir. Smith wets his bed anyway. I’ll rustle up some coffee.’
‘Put a drop of Scotch in it, will you?’
‘That’s how it’s served.’
He went out and Instow fell back exhausted against the bulkhead. He wondered how many of his crew were safe. Mancroft had been right to be afraid.
The door opened and a rating appeared with a bundle of clothing. ‘Get your togs off, sir. You’ll catch your death. Try and get into some of these.’ Immediately behind him came the midshipman carrying a can of coffee.
He drank the coffee, grateful for the lace of whisky, then used the blanket as a towel and climbed into the rough-and-ready clothes. The midshipman returned and Instow said: ‘How many of my men did you pick up?’
‘I believe it was six, sir.’
‘That’s not enough,’ said Instow.
‘Other vessels may have picked up some more.’
‘I’d like to see my chaps.’
‘I’ll take you.’
The ship was still shuddering, pitching so violently that they needed to hang on. Parsons opened a steel door and Instow walked into a medical room almost the width of the ship. Men were lying on stretchers being treated by doctors and navy nursing orderlies, bowed as if in prayer. The resounding outside noises had a descant in the sobs and groans of the wounded men.
‘Next door, sir,’ said the midshipman. He led him through. In the dull lamplight he saw them, most on stretchers. One man, Sims, was sitting in a chair moaning for his mother. ‘Sir, captain,’ he said as if Instow would do instead. ‘We’re being slaughtered. Where’s the others gone, sir?’
Instow tried to say something to him but it was hopeless. For Sims, for the others and for himself. A Liverpool man, from the engine room, asked if he could please arrange to send a five-shilling postal order to his wife for her birthday. Instow said: ‘As soon as I can get to a post office.’
As they went out again Parsons said: ‘If you’re feeling up to it, the captain said perhaps you’d like to go up to the bridge.’
‘Yes,’ said Instow. ‘Thanks. I ought to try and see what’s going on. I’ve lost my tin lid.’ He glanced about him as if he expected to find it.
Parsons said: ‘We’ll pick up one on the way.’
He handed a helmet to Instow as they reached the hatch to the deck. There was a dent in the crown. Instow fixed it on his head and followed the young man out. The ship was being flung about in all directions, its guns silent only for moments. He choked in the acrid smoke. Two planes came in low and droning, passing quite slowly, indolently across the bow. He could see the German crosses. ‘Where’s our planes?’ he called to the midshipman.
‘Up there somewhere, sir. They’ve been doing all right. Downed plenty of Jerries. This is a lot quieter than it was.’
He led the way up to the bridge. Two blanketed men were lying on one side of it, neither moving. ‘Get these casualties moved,’ ordered a tall officer with a long face. His steel helmet seemed jokily small. He saw Instow: ‘Ah, jolly good, welcome aboard. Glad you could come. I’m Jock Wilson. I’m Scots.’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Instow. ‘I understand.’
They shook hands. ‘How many of your crew got away with it?’
‘Six at the moment. There may be others.’
‘It’s an absolute bastard. We’ve been lucky. Connaught over there has three fires.’
Instow could hardly see the neighbouring warship for smoke. ‘How is it going?’
‘Going? Well, it’s going. We’ve just about won this round. The merchant ships, minus a couple, are still on course. Soon they’ll be out of reach of the Stukas, anyway. Their E-boats have been swines, but it seems like they’re pulling out. They’ve lost one or perhaps two.’
He was casting around through heavy binoculars. On the windward side the smoke had cleared. ‘Take a wee peep,’ he said handing them to Instow. ‘To port.’
Instow did so. He was astonished. The French coastline, five miles away, was picked out easily by the powerful glasses. He could see lines of watchers. ‘Christ,’ he said. ‘Grandstand seats.’
‘It’s the same the other way,’ said Wilson. ‘Dover looks like Saturday night at the Glasgow Empire. On the roofs. The British, the Huns and the Frogs have all come out to see the fight.’ He paused then said: ‘Aye, like a Roman holiday.’
Even in a battle there are peaceful places; at times one of them is in the sky. Hendry had decided to take the Spitfire up to seven thousand feet. From there, he calculated, he could see the extent of the fight and pick out where he should join it.
At seven thousand there were some unruffled clouds, big and yellow, so slow and lumbering in the light air that they almost seemed to be resting. He had the sensation of being utterly alone, flying in a nicely decorated dream. There were wide breaks, lakes of blue, and flying the plane into the spaces he could look down on the Channel battle, scattered over the reflecting sea, moving slowly as the convoy of merchant ships pushed on bravely to the west. There was smoke, thick in places, but at that height, no noise. He could see two ships on fire, one of them a warship, and the wakes of others feathered the sea as they tried to avoid the E-boats which he could clearly follow by their white tracks. Aircraft moved over the fretwork of ships but, at that height, he coul
d not distinguish between friend and foe. At the edge of the scene one was peeling away with a tail of smoke, thin as a pencil line, behind it. Then the uncertainty was settled for him. He flew into an enveloping custard-coloured cloud and a few moments later emerged into open sky to see in front and a little below a chugging German bomber, a Dornier, sneaking its way back towards the French coast. No fighter escort was in sight. Hendry could scarcely believe it. He eased the Spitfire to port as if he needed to be even more sure, and saw the crosses black on the flanks of the fuselage.
Then the Dornier saw him. He could almost see it tremble and he closed in to cruise alongside it. He moved ahead, turned to port, and went back. He was so close he could see the frightened faces and the rear gunner frantically turning his cumbersome guns towards him.
Hendry curved the plane away. He still could not credit it. It seemed almost unsporting, like assaulting a doddery old man. Then he pictured Lewis barely an hour before, carried streaming blood from the very cockpit of the fighter he was flying. ‘Sorry, chaps,’ he muttered into his mask. ‘I’ve got something for you.’
From the rear and from below he attacked. So far he had not shot down an enemy plane. He had a share in one which another squadron claimed. This would be all alone, undisputed, his first.
From under the belly of the bomber he rose like a fish and fired a brief burst from his eight wing-edge guns. He banked away and came back from the other direction. He could feel his face harden. His target was attempting clumsy escape, yawing awkwardly, haplessly trying to keep out of his way. Bigger, straggling clouds gave it some sanctuary but it had to emerge sometime and he was waiting. Then again it managed to vanish. It went head on into a great bank of cream cumulus leaving him like a thwarted dog.
He banked the plane one way and then the other, turned in a loop and a circle, cursing his luck and theirs. Then he saw it, a mile distant and still plodding through the sky. ‘This time,’ he promised to himself. ‘This time you’ve had it, old boy.’
From the tail and a little above he attacked. The first burst of the guns in the Spitfire’s wings went straight at the gunner trapped in the turret. Hendry saw him fall forward over his guns; the first time he had seen a man die. Smoke began streaming from the rear of the Dornier and small polite puffs of flame. He lay off for a few moments. His chest felt tight. The Germans were trying to get out of the cockpit, with such clumsiness that he involuntarily wished he could help them. Two men jumped and he saw the parachutes open below. But no more.
As though to end any speculation the bomber was abruptly riven with an explosion that seemed to stagger along its whole length. Flames came from its carcass and it dropped from the sky, helpless, disintegrating, finished – another figure on that day’s scoreboard.
Suddenly Hendry was consumed with exhilaration. ‘Whoopee!’ he shouted like a schoolboy. ‘Got him, Mum! I got him!’
He calmed himself and sent his report to base in what he hoped was a subdued, matter-of-fact tone. ‘Downed a Dornier,’ he said into his mouthpiece. ‘Confirmed. Crashed in flames. Some crew ejected.’
A crackling voice came back: ‘Good show, son. Go and find some more.’
Excitedly he began to throw the plane around in the sky. Another aircraft came towards him at such a rate they almost collided, a Messerschmitt 109. That was trouble.
But he never saw the fighter again. He dropped down below the fluffy clouds and saw the ships still savagely in the battle. Three were now burning, one still firing its guns. There were skeins of smoke and the water was patterned with wild lacy wake. He tried to sort out friend from foe. There were aircraft dashing all over the sky. Who was who?
Then he saw two Stukas falling towards one of the merchant vessels. It was like a separate scene, a cameo at the side of a stage. He watched one hurtling down towards the ship, unload its bombs, and then climb its slow, arthritic climb. That was the time to get them. The high second Stuka bent over as if it were at the top of a fairground ride and fell towards the ship. The vessel seemed to be covered with spray and smoke but kept moving.
Belatedly Hendry recognised the moment. He pushed the Spitfire to port and then came in on the struggling Stuka’s rising flank. ‘Got you now!’ he exclaimed. ‘You . . .’ The word would not come and he merely said: ‘Rotter.’ He fired as he came in but he never knew whether he had scored because as he pulled out of the manoeuvre his plane struck the cable of the ship’s barrage balloon which he had failed to observe. It took the wing-tip clean off. ‘God help me,’ he said quietly. Suddenly he wanted someone to be there with him. Even his mother. He was frightened and alone.
That afternoon the sirens howled and Dover’s children were imprudently sent home from school, running below the anti-aircraft fire to their homes. Three German bombers flew swiftly low along the whole length of the town, east to west, and dropped bombs which demolished a row of houses and an off-licence.
Streaming through the streets the children shouted with juvenile excitement when the shadows of the bombers flitted across them. People were tumbling back into rooms from their window perches. The chambermaids at the Marine Hotel tipped like skittles into the upper corridor.
People ran shouting from their houses and pulled the children to shelter. The town’s anti-aircraft guns were firing madly and ineffectually for the bombers were too low. The pavements were scattered with lethal shrapnel.
The entire row of houses and the off-licence were demolished by a single stick of bombs. The detonations were loud and frightening. The walls and roofs fell sideways, smoke and dust rose in a huge cloud and there were screams from the wreckage. An old man came from a front door like a cursing ghost, covered in dust. Four people died among the bottles and barrels of the off-licence and another three on the pavement. A pram was turned on its side, the wheels spinning with the surviving baby still strapped inside it, not even crying as it had been asleep. The mother, dirt coating her face and clothes, was crawling towards it, weeping, calling on God to help her. Then she shouted again, more loudly, as if He might not have heard first time.
Chapter Four
CARTWRIGHT HAD NEVER felt more helpless, more unneeded. ‘A spare prick at a wedding,’ he snarled to himself in the chalk cave. There was a stone balcony and he could go out into the pleasant sunshine and uselessly view the battle on the summer sea. All around men were manning guns, not firing because with the distance and the smoke, there was nothing they could fire at.
Cartwright had asked the battery commander if he could do something useful. ‘Not a single thing, old fellow,’ the officer replied casually. ‘We’re not terribly busy ourselves. We’re never going to hit an E-boat.’
Cartwright again swore quietly and walked down the chalk gallery into another. The gunners were grouped around the silent guns. A despairing bombardier suddenly shouted: ‘For Christ’s sake, let’s shoot at somebody!’
There came a huge detonation from the next position in the cliff. Every man on the gun where Cartwright stood stiffened. Five minutes later an officer almost wandered through the tunnel, saw Cartwright and said conversationally: ‘You’re the ancient-monuments chap, aren’t you?’
Cartwright only nodded. ‘A great lump of the chalk has fallen down in there, in our gun position,’ the officer said. ‘Nearly hit me. But behind it there’s a whole wall of ancient brickwork. Might be in your line.’
Cartwright could hardly believe the moment but, glad to do something, he hurried along the gallery as if he were on some rescue mission. Beyond the gun, the floor was thick with chalk and behind it, in the wall, was what he recognised at once as a Roman doorway. He stood with a sort of embarrassment. What did it matter? The officer who had told him about the wall reappeared from the tunnel. ‘They’re looking for you, captain,’ he said. ‘Houses have been bombed in the town and there are people trapped. You’re an archaeologist – they need somebody who can dig.’
Swiftly he turned and hurried, his service boots echoing, along the dull white chalk corridors.
At the main tunnel entrance the full afternoon sun hit him in the eyes. Two sentries outside saluted. One nodded towards the downward slope where there was an army truck, its engine vibrating. Soldiers’ faces lining the tailboard were turned nervously towards the sky. An uneasy-looking corporal was standing in the road.
‘We was supposed to be going to dig spuds . . . potatoes, sir,’ he said forgetting to salute. ‘But they’ve diverted us.’
‘We’re going to dig debris instead,’ said Cartwright climbing over the tailboard. Each of the men had a spade. ‘At least we’ve got the tools.’
A dozen soldiers were in the back, Pioneer Corps most of them but with two Royal Engineers. The driver said he would head for the smoke and in ten minutes they were there. Before them, like an opera scene, were the demolished houses, with fire engines and ambulances clustered together. There was a small, silent crowd. There were always spectators.
Cartwright jumped from the tailboard and almost fell before springing to his feet, desperately trying to appear confident. An engineers sergeant strode towards him.
‘Who’s in charge?’ asked Cartwright.
‘You are, sir,’ said the sergeant.
‘Oh . . . Right. What’s the situation, sergeant?’
‘Three small kids, sir. Trapped under this one house . . .’ He indicated with his thumb over his shoulder. ‘At least one of them is alive by the sound of it. There’s crying.’
Cartwright began peeling off his battledress blouse. He tightened the chin-strap of his steel helmet. ‘Let’s get them out then,’ he said.
‘One drawback, sir. I’ve only just found out.’
‘And what’s that?’
‘UXB, sir. Unexploded bomb.’
‘Fuck,’ said Cartwright thoughtfully.
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