He saw snowy columns of water shooting skywards and a whole confusions of ship’s wakes and exploding depth charges. Amidst all the fierce-looking waves they lacked their usual menace, but to anyone on the receiving end it would seem as bad as ever. And there were two Swordfish, flying very slowly and almost diagonally in a strong cross-wind as they added their depth charges to the display.
‘Hello, Jonah. This is Lapwing. Return to base. Over.’
He checked the compass and his gauges. Turpin was probably eager to hear about the seaplane from him directly.
He flew low over the two sloops, watching their churning wakes burst upwards again as another pattern was rolled off their quarterdecks and fired from either beam.
Then he saw the Hustler on his starboard bow, her side very clearly outlined by leaping spray as she edged round in a quarter sea. A light was blinking towards him, and he began to concentrate on his approach. She was about four miles away and wallowing heavily. It would need a very careful, last-minute decision.
He realised he was humming aloud. Perhaps he always did and had not noticed before.
‘This is Jonah. Permission to land-on.’
To his surprise, the voice replied, ‘Negative.’
Then he saw another Seafire coming in to port and slightly below him. He tried to see its markings, but the visibility was too poor.
An emergency landing. He levelled off, his mind chilled as he watched the other pilot making his run-in.
He was near enough to see the water boiling under the carrier’s blunt stern as she lifted and crashed down in the troughs. Her deck was shining dully, soaked with falling spray, despite the height from the sea.
He was following the other Seafire, and would pass over the ship’s length and begin another turn round. Wait his chance.
Almost there. The Seafire’s wheels were down, as were the flaps. He could imagine the pilot changing hands, gauging the deck’s rise and fall. As Kitto often said, like putting your last hand of poker on the table.
Rowan heard the voice in his headphones very loud and sharp. ‘Stand off! Torpedo running to starboard!’
It all seemed to happen in a second, and yet lasted forever. The carrier heeling violently, twisting like an armoured mammoth as she turned towards her danger.
Rowan could see no torpedo, but saw the Seafire hesitate and then make a final attempt to land. Instead it struck the deck at an angle, one wheel collapsing even as the ship continued to swing.
Rowan went into a dive, looking for a sign of the submarine which had fired, yet unable to tear his eyes from the Seafire as it ploughed along the deck, breaking up, and skidding finally into the base of the island, its tail in the air, its prop smashed into the planking.
A Swordfish flew past, dropping two charges, and Rowan looked again, expecting to see a tell-tale column of water burst alongside Hustler to show that a torpedo had found its mark.
A destroyer had appeared from somewhere, charging through the waves like a plough, smoke streaming from her funnels as her guns swung round towards the broken water.
More depth charges, and then a great, dirty stain which seemed to flatten the waves in a spreading pattern of filth.
The destroyer let go another salvo of charges, and this time there was no doubt. Like a shining finger, the U-boat’s pointed stern lifted above the oil slick, as if making one last effort to surface. Shells burst around her, and one scored a direct hit by her hydroplanes. She dived immediately, taking her crew to the bottom, to the worst death of all.
Rowan acknowledged his new orders and began his approach. He felt ice-cold, without fear or feelings of any kind.
As he prepared to land-on he saw only the other pilot in his mind, as if he was watching himself, so that he almost expected to hear one more frantic call to stay clear. Too late.
He watched the deck lifting towards him, the sea frothing around the carrier’s screw. As it began to dip once more he went in, feeling the shock of his wheels, the insistent pressure of the arrester wire. He cut the engine and threw open the cockpit, pushing away hands which tried to help him as he half climbed, half stumbled to the deck.
He ran past the busy seamen and the fire parties with their extinguishers and hoses, pushing through the overalled figures until he had reached the upended fighter.
The doctor and his sick berth attendants were already there, but they had to wait while some stokers cut away the cockpit.
Rowan made himself look at the pilot’s face. He was hanging in his harness, his head to one side. The crash had probably broken his neck.
There was some blood running under his goggles, and his eyes were wide open, even angry.
Rowan turned away. He had seen the pilot once or twice, but he was nobody he knew.
He paused by a screen door, oblivious to the spray on his face, the bitter wind which moaned through the bridge structure and lattice mast.
When he glanced at the crashed Seafire he saw them lifting the pilot clear. His boots were sticking out under the arms of the stokers, and one jerked up and down as he was carried towards the forward lift.
Rowan tore off his helmet and wiped his face with spray. It was not right for a man to look like that in death. It had no dignity.
He reached the bridge without seeing a foot of the way.
Captain Turpin was sitting in a steel chair. One like Buchan’s.
Rowan did not wait for him to speak. He said harshly, ‘It wasn’t a ruse, sir. There may be a battle-cruiser to the north-east, but there’s something else bloody big coming our way.’
Turpin watched him, his eyes cold. ‘Is that the way you usually speak to your superior officers?’
Rowan eyed him calmly. ‘Not usually, sir.’
The Commander (Flying) said, ‘It was definitely a little seaplane, not a Heinkel 115?’
Rowan looked past him, through the squeaking clear-view screens.
‘I’m sure. I put it down. It might have been around for some time, but I doubt it. I didn’t see any sign of the ship.’
A lieutenant said, ‘Operations have been in contact with Growler, sir. She’s rejoining the group tonight.’ He kept his voice hushed, his eyes on Rowan.
‘I see.’ Turpin walked to one side of the bridge, his body angled to the deck. Then he said, ‘You can carry on.’
Rowan turned on his heel and left the bridge. He could not face the questions in the wardroom and went instead to the hangar deck. He was just in time to see Jonah being trundled to her place where a team of mechanics waited like surgeons with their lamps and instruments.
To the petty officer he said abruptly, ‘Could you get me a mug of something, please?’ His legs felt as if they would collapse under him. ‘Anything.’
‘Certainly.’
The man hurried away and returned almost immediately with a chipped and steaming mug of tea. He watched Rowan as he sipped it and said, ‘Don’t let on, sir, or I’ll get busted.’
Rowan realised that a third of the mug was neat rum.
He smiled. ‘Thanks.’
The man wiped his greasy hands on a rag. ‘I saw the tin-fish. Streaked right down the port side, it did. Missed the old cow by no more than twenty feet at a guess.’
Rowan considered it. The U-boat’s commander had been that confident. He had fired just one torpedo, saving the rest for the convoy, the real prize. He had known that Hustler’s little escorts were after one of his consorts, that there was nothing else between him and a good angle-shot.
So he knew too that something heavier was on the way. A ship which could sink a crippled carrier in seconds. His confidence had destroyed him instead.
A lift rattled into life and the crashed fighter was lowered slowly into the hangar deck. Men hurried towards it to check that the deck party had done its bit and there was no fire risk.
The petty officer said quietly, ‘That was Mr Maynard’s. Nice young chap. Twenty last week.’ He studied Rowan’s face. ‘Still, I suppose the Old Man had to choose. It wa
s him or all the rest of us. But still . . .’ He did not finish it.
The tannoy bellowed, ‘D’you hear there! Range a strike of two Swordfish at the after end of the flight deck at the hurry! Stand by to fly-off aircraft!’
Rowan went to his borrowed cabin and found Bill waiting for him.
They sat side by side on a bunk, and Bill said suddenly, ‘You know something? I think the Jerries are going to wipe out this convoy.’
Rowan looked at him. It was not like Bill at all.
He said, ‘Then we’ll have to stop ’em, right?’
Bill grinned. ‘It seems as if we’re the only ones who can, eh?’ He leaned back on the bunk. ‘How do you feel, Tim?’
Rowan considered it. He felt calmer. It must be the rum.
‘Sometimes I think I’m going out of my mind. Just now on the bridge I was bloody rude to the captain. I couldn’t help it. And I put that seaplane down in the drink when I should have done it properly and killed the bastards. We’re not playing cricket,’ he faced his friend, ‘or rugby either, for that matter. And yet we go on pretending, posturing. It makes me sick.’
Lord Algy peered in at them. ‘Frank’s sitting up and taking some nourishment. How say we pay him a visit? I’ve fixed it with the doc.’
They stood up, glad to be freed from confidences, from themselves.
Far above their heads the deck vibrated and trembled to the beat of engines as the next patrol trundled along the slippery planking to take their chances beyond the convoy.
8
Separation
ROWAN SAT AT a wardroom table and watched the stewards handing out the morning offering. An arm came over his shoulder and withdrew. He studied his plate. Two tinned sausages and an uneven circle of powdered egg, the whole sliding in a puddle of grease.
A steward on the opposite side of the table saw his face and grinned. ‘It’s war, sir.’
Rowan looked across the other table and saw the way the ship was sloping away from him. The sea had risen further overnight. He had heard that the convoy had cracked on more speed, so there was a faint chance that with the worsening sea they might lose the U-boats for another day.
He tried to think clearly, shut out the creak and shudder of the hull and superstructure, the half-hearted conversation of the few officers who were free to take breakfast at this civilised time. The signal from Admiralty had suggested there were seven U-boats nearby. One was a definite kill. A second, the one he had reported, may have been damaged by the sloops. That left five. It didn’t sound too bad for a Russian convoy.
Five submarines. He broke them down in his mind, trying to imagine them and their crews. Each boat carried about sixty men, so right now, as he sat staring at his rapidly congealing breakfast, there were some three hundred Germans out there in the Arctic, waiting to have a go at the ships.
He smiled bitterly. Round the bend. He must be.
Bill Ellis thumped down beside him and groaned as the ship slid heavily into a deep trough.
‘Christ, I hope there’s no flying today, mate!’
Rowan nodded, thinking of Creswell down in the Hustler’s sickbay. He wondered why the builders had put the medical section right up forward. To anyone in real pain, the rise and plunge of the carrier’s bows would be no help at all. But young Frank Creswell seemed bright enough. Maybe that was why they never let you see a friend immediately after a crash or a bad injury. It protected the visitor, just as it gave the injured man time to recover his guard.
He had been very pale, and somehow older. They had stayed with him beside the bunk, keeping their talk silly and light.
But Creswell had said suddenly, ‘We’re slowing down, why?’
They had all looked at each other, Rowan, Bill and Lord Algy, at a loss for words when they were really needed.
The tannoy had been muffled. ‘Attention on the upper deck, face aft and salute.’
A pause, and then the steady increase in engine revolutions again.
Creswell had said in a small voice, ‘They just buried someone, didn’t they?’
Rowan pushed his plate away and reached for some toast. At least the bread was always good in these American-built carriers.
He found himself thinking of the miles they had steamed overnight. That pilot with the angry eyes and broken neck was way, way astern now, hundreds of fathoms deep.
He came out of his brooding as the wardroom tannoy squeaked into life.
It brought a chorus of angry protests and curses, and shouts of ‘Switch that bloody thing off!’
Then, ‘This is the captain speaking.’
Bill said. ‘No wonder they couldn’t shut it off. Like trying to silence God!’
Turpin said, ‘This morning I received an important signal from the Admiralty.’
In the brief pause Rowan thought of the millions of messages which filled the air at every second of every day. One had brought news of his parents’ deaths.
‘It informed me that our shadowing force from the Home Fleet engaged heavy enemy units during the night, one of which was probably the battle-cruiser Scharnhorst. The engagement was carried out at extreme range, and severe damage inflicted on the German ships. Our own force received some damage and casualties, but no vessel was lost.’
He paused, and Rowan thought there should have been cheering in the distance. It was always like that on the films.
The captain’s unemotional voice continued, ‘I have been instructed to take steps to avoid meeting with those same units, and the admiral commanding the Home Fleet will do all in his power to head off any such attempt by the enemy to pursue another attack.’
Several of the officers banged the tables with their knives and forks, and one said, ‘I should jolly well think so!’
Turpin had not finished. ‘I have been in contact with the commodore of the convoy, and he is of my opinion. That we should alter course now and make a more southernly approach to our destination. As Growler did not rejoin us as expected, I have no alternative but to act independently. That is all.’
The murmur of speculation came back as the tannoy went dead.
Bill Ellis said, ‘Maybe he’s right. It seems daft to take a wide detour when the real enemy is being pinned down by the big boys. I’ll bet it was some show, Tim. All the guns firing over miles of sea, with neither side being able to see more than a shadow of each other.’
Rowan had spoken to the pilot who had been sent to make contact with Growler. She had been steaming right on course, with the four sloops strung around her like watchful terriers. The interchange of signals had been brief. Rear Admiral Chadwick was rejoining the group. But he had not, and Turpin had decided not to wait for him.
Bill ran his fingers through his hair and yawned. ‘We’ll soon know what’s what. Turpin’ll scramble a few kites, and if the way is clear he’ll give the signal to alter course.’
Rowan tried not to think of Growler being out of it. It was bad to get too attached to a ship in wartime. Yet the little carrier had come to mean a lot to him, and he belonged with her, not with Turpin.
It would be a feather in Turpin’s cap when he anchored with the convoy under the Russian shore batteries. Maybe it was wrong to dwell on personalities. The convoy safe, a swift victory over an attacking German battle-cruiser and her consorts would be just what the public wanted to read and hear in war-grey Britain.
Another lieutenant had heard Bill’s comments and said, ‘Lucky if we could fly-off the Met. Officer’s balloon in this gale!’
Bill looked up as Rowan made to leave the table. ‘What’s wrong?’
Rowan shrugged vaguely. ‘All this. What we just heard. It’s not adding up right. And what about the seaplane? I didn’t imagine it.’
‘I expect the Old Man thinks he’s in the clear now.’ He sounded worried. ‘I should drop it, Tim.’
Rowan knew the others near him had stopped eating and talking to stare at him. He knew he was being ridiculous. Yours not to reason why.
He said abrupt
ly, ‘I’m going to the Ops Room.’
The other lieutenant asked quietly, ‘Your pal all right?’
Bill rubbed his chin. ‘He’s fine. Been pushing it a bit for some time. He had some bad news from home, too.’
The lieutenant said, ‘Oh.’ Then, ‘Pass the jam, old son.’
Bill smiled sadly. The unwritten code. Fill the gaps. Move on. Don’t speak of other people’s troubles. Usually you had plenty of your own.
Rowan reached the Operations Room and found it unusually busy. Plots ticked and murmured, and from every side came the hum of electricity, the discreet tick of morse and an occasional tinny voice over an intercom.
The Operations Officer looked at him wearily. ‘You’re not on stand-by, are you?’
‘No, sir.’ He felt stupid now that he was here. ‘I was thinking about the captain’s announcement.’ He shrugged, almost lost. ‘It’s all too glib, too simple.’
‘And you came up here just to tell me that?’
‘What’s bothering you?’ It was Commander (Flying) who had appeared around a glass screen.
‘He says that we’re being hoodwinked in some way.’ The Operations Officer sounded dangerously calm. ‘The commodore, the Home Fleet, Intelligence and the Admiralty all think we’re halfway home and dry, but he knows differently!’
Rowan said hotly, ‘I’m not a complete fool, sir, just because I’ve got two wavy stripes on my sleeve and didn’t serve in the China Station in nineteen hundred and seven.’
‘That’ll do.’ Commander (Flying) stepped between them. ‘Both of you.’
He looked at Rowan, seeing the strain, the fatigue of unbroken sea duty.
He said very quietly, ‘You think the Jerries are letting us make each move, that it’s all planned to go just as it is?’
Rowan nodded. ‘I do, sir. I’ve been on this run before. The Germans have never let us get a convoy this far without a real hard thrust at it.’ He pointed to the tall glass screen where the convoy’s position and various other information had been chalked for easy plotting. ‘If the enemy had used some cruisers to make an attack from the north-east, the Home Fleet ships would have stayed put, kept the screen intact, in case a bigger unit was out.’
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