The Cruise of the Albatros

by E. C. Williams

  Sam thought about this for a moment. This made sense, but he didn't want to enlarge the circle of those in the know. He said, “Okay, leave it with me, Gadget, and go take a nap – tell the XO you have my permission to turn in during the working day.”

  Dallas handed over the thick sheaf of manuscript, and departed quickly, before the Captain could change his mind.

  Sam locked the message in a desk drawer, and went on deck. “Pass the word for Mister Kendall,” he told the midshipman of the watch. When Kendall appeared, Sam said, “I have a little chore for you, Al. Just step down to my day cabin with me, will you?”

  In the day cabin, Kendall listened with growing dismay as Sam explained the “little chore”, and produced the thick sheaf of papers and the even thicker Sea Power.

  “Go turn your division over to your gadget, then come back here and get to work. You'll have to use my mess table here – I don't want the message to leave my spaces until it's ready to transmit.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” Kendall replied with resignation, and left, to quickly return and settle down to work.

  It was encouraging that Kendall took much less time to decode the message than Dallas took to encode it, in spite of the lieutenant's total unfamiliarity with the concept at the beginning.

  “What do you think, Al?” Sam asked as the two men reviewed the original message, its encoded version, and Kendall's decode.

  “I think it'll work fine, Skipper. I found only two mistakes in coding, and they wouldn't have changed the sense of the message. The receiver could have easily guessed at the right words from the context.”

  “What were the mistakes? Not the mistakes themselves – I mean: what were the sources of error?”

  “ One was simply a minor counting mistake – the wrong position in the line for the word intended. The word decoded made no sense in the context, but the next word in the line fit perfectly.

  “The other was a bit tougher: Dallas had accidentally transposed two digits in the page number. It took me a while to work that out. It was easy enough to get the affected sentence to make sense – I underlined the nonsensical word in red, and kept decoding until I had enough context to guess the intended word. Finding the source of the coding error was tedious, though.”

  “Thanks, Al – I really appreciate your help on this. And needless to say, your discretion. Guess I'll have to delegate this chore further down the chain of command next time – I can't have my senior lieutenant tied up for hours encoding and decoding messages. But we'll work that out later.”

  Kendall took this for dismissal, excused himself, and went on deck to resume his duties.

  Sam then set to work, with a sigh, drafting, translating into formal English, and then encoding an introductory paragraph for the message. It was short, the first and last lines consisting merely of the words “URGENT URGENT URGENT” The second line was an ETA for the Albatros at French port. The third line read, “Immediately on receipt of this message please commence preparations for accomplishing the following tasks either before or shortly after arrival of Albatros”.

  Sam double-checked his coding and then passed the word for Mr. Robert, the Communications Officer. When he arrived in Sam's day cabin, Sam handed him the lengthy message.

  “Sparks, this message is encoded, obviously. Please tell your mates who transmit it that accuracy is absolutely vital – transposition of numbers, or omission or addition of a leading zero, can change or garble the meaning of the message.”

  Robert stared in wonder at the thick stack of paper, the longest single radio message he had ever been called upon to transmit.

  “You'll probably have to transmit it in sections, over a period of several nights, as propagation conditions permit. Insofar as possible, keep together each section of the message as drafted.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” replied Robert.

  There remained one pleasant duty to be performed before they sailed for home.

  Mr. Andri had, at the doctor's orders, spent every moment the Albatros was under way flat on his back in sick bay, being attended by the medical staff, suffering and ill. While the schooner was alongside in St. Pierre, and again in Port Louis, he had been able to get up, eat some solid food, and take a little exercise on the arm of an SBA. As soon as they were under way again, he was once more prostrate with sea-sickness.

  Sam wanted to show his, and the ship's, gratitude for Andri's services, and he wondered how to do that. An appropriate and symbolic gift would do, he thought. He conferred with the Carpenter and the Engineer, and they came up with something Sam thought would be suitable.

  As Andri came on deck to leave the Albatros – if not for the last time, then certainly for a considerable period – the watch, on a prearranged warning by sick bay, passed the word: “Now hear this, now hear this. Attention on deck. All hands face aft and remain steady and silent.”

  Andri gazed around him curiously at this, then saw Sam, the XO, and Lieutenant Kendall approach him as a group.

  “Mister Andri, as we say farewell – but not, we hope, good bye – we would like to present you with this token of our appreciation for your services to the Albatros, which you undertook without complaint at considerable discomfort and danger to yourself.

  “Mister Kendall, will you do the honors?”

  Kendall took a small bundle, wrapped in sail cloth, from under his arm and opened it. It was a shield-shaped piece of tropical hardwood, sanded and spar-varnished to a mirror finish. Bolted to the center was a circular medallion, cast in lead and painted, with a raised relief of a stylized albatross gripping a fouled anchor within a border of anchor chain, with the legend RKS Albatros in raised letters across the bottom. Mounted under the medallion a polished brass plate read: “To the Hon Mr ANDRIATSIFERANARIVO for courageous service above and beyond the call of duty,” followed by the dates of his service aboard the Albatros. Kendall read the legend on the plate slowly, in a voice loud enough to be heard the length of the weather-deck. Then he presented the plaque to Andri and shook his hand. Sam and Bill followed suit. The Boatswain then bellowed, “Three cheers for Mister Andri! Hip, hip...”. And the lusty cheers resounded around the harbor.

  Andri struggled to remain impassive throughout this brief ceremony, but he wasn't totally successful; Sam could see a brightness in his eyes betraying moisture. “Thank you, Captain Bowditch,” he said simply, then turned and said, in a louder voice, “And thank you, men of the Albatros, for doing me the honor of including me in your number.” This raised more, and this time spontaneous, applause from the crew. All hands remained at attention – or the posture that passed for attention among the sailors – while Sam personally escorted Andri down the gangway, his only luggage his spare lamba rolled up under his arm. Once he was ashore, the word was passed to “carry on”, and the hands resumed their work.

  Sam sought out the Carpenter and the Engineer, and congratulated them on the job they had done with the plaque. “Keep that mold, Mister Yeo,” he said. “We may need it again.”

  Sam then went looking for the Navigator, and found him in the chartroom. He consulted him on the state of the tide, then passed the word for the XO.

  “Bill, we're sailing at midnight tonight. Make all the necessary preparations.”

  Ennis reacted as Sam expected. He practically wept as he assured his captain that it was impossible, no way, couldn't be done. Sam hardened his heart, and simply said, “Midnight, Bill. Make it so.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” the XO replied with resignation, and dashed off to start on the innumerable tasks that would have to be accomplished before sailing, just as “up spirits” was piped.

  Sam knew that Bill had a frantic thirteen hours ahead of him, and sympathized. But he also knew that his XO would have the schooner ready on time. He hoped that, sooner rather than later, he would be able to grant Ennis the reward he deserved: a command of his own.

  Elevenses, the daily issue of a shot of vodka – rum in the Indian Ocean – mixed with water, was usually a pleasa
nt interlude from the day's work, a time of jokes, laughter, and skylarking. Today, under the lash of the Boatswain's tongue, all hands gulped their drink and hurried back to work in a matter of minutes. Mr. Weeks, the Purser, whose purview included messing, was sent by the XO to harry Cook into producing dinner a bell earlier than usual, and the hands were given only ten minutes to gobble it down and turn to again.

  Sam watched with approval as Bill dealt with a procession of officers, each complaining that his division or department could not possibly be ready for a midnight sailing and attempting to explain why. Bill, stony-faced, entertained no excuses or explanations, and did not succumb to the temptation to court popularity by condoling with them about their tyrannous and unreasonable Old Man. He simply sent each back to work on the double with a flea in his ear. Sam overheard him growl to one lieutenant, “We made you an officer for a reason – find a way to make it happen, or I'll find someone else who will.”

  Inevitably, Sam soon saw the Doctor striding aft in righteous indignation, obviously on her way to see him. He sighed – he had been dreading this moment, because while he could administer a blistering rebuke to any officer or seaman who needed one without giving it a second thought, for some reason he hated confrontation with the prickly medical officer. But it was past time she was brought up with a round turn. Her tenure aboard as a privileged character had gone on for far too long.

  She came up to him on the quarterdeck, and without preamble began, “Captain, Commander Ennis just told me...”

  “Let's take this down to my day cabin, Doctor,” Sam interrupted her, and she followed him below. Sam sat down behind his desk, and when the doctor made as if to take the guest chair, he said, “I did not invite you to sit, ma'am.”

  Girard stared at him in astonished indignation, but remained standing.

  “Now, what was it you wanted to see me about?”

  “Captain, I can't possibly have the medical department ready for a midnight departure...”

  “That is a problem for you to work out with the Executive Officer. Our sailing time is fixed.”

  “But Captain...!”

  “The chain of command in a military organization exists for a reason, Doctor. And may I just observe that every time you go over the Executive Officer's head to me you diminish his authority in the eyes of your subordinates? An order from the XO is an order from me, ma'am, and is to be carried out without question.”

  Girard was scarlet with anger by now. “This is...!”

  “This is the way it is aboard the Albatros so long as I am her commander, and I will brook no further discussion of the issue.” Sam paused and then added, “I've given you a lot of slack, Doctor – plenty of time to learn Navy ways of doing things. Much more time than I would have given a male officer, I'm afraid, and that was wrong of me, and unfair to you. Now you must decide if you can conform to the behavior I expect of every officer aboard … or I can pay you off here in Hell-ville. I'm sure you'll have no trouble finding an early passage back to the Rock, and we'll make do with your mates until we can ship a replacement for you.

  “So, ma'am, which is it to be?”

  Girard's flush of anger disappeared, and she turned white with shock. Her mouth hung open, and she stared at Sam without speaking for a long moment.

  She finally said, “Sir, I respectfully request that I be allowed to stay aboard the Albatros. I will make every effort to correct my shortcomings.”

  Sam stared back at her, trying to gauge her sincerity. Then he said, “Very well, ma'am. Consider yourself in a probationary status for the duration of this next cruise. Consult the XO whenever you're in doubt about the proper thing to do – officer professional development is part of his job. Carry on, Doctor Girard.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” she replied – one of the very few times Sam had ever heard that expression from her.

  After Girard had left his day cabin, Sam heaved a great sigh, and the tension went out of his shoulders, tension he hadn't realized was there until it left him. He reckoned that he had either just saved a very valuable officer for the Navy – or alienated her permanently from it.

  Sam realized now that it was his own fault that the problem had been allowed to fester for so long. He knew that it was only a half-truth that he had allowed her so much leeway simply because she was a woman. It was because she was a woman to whom he felt strongly attracted; the only woman, in fact, other than Maddie Dupree, who had ever excited in him more than a mild and purely physical interest.

  Not that his attraction to the Doctor didn't have a physical component – a very strong one. Sam reflected that his inability to deal with her as he would any other officer stemmed from the sexual tension he had felt, if only subconsciously, from the first moment he had met her. He wondered if he shouldn't avert any future problems by simply paying her off in French Port regardless of her behavior on the southbound voyage. Well, time enough to ponder that.

  Midnight found the Albatros ready for sailing after all, stores and munitions loaded and stowed, fresh water and motor fuel tanks topped up, mooring lines singled up, and the motor sloop alongside, engine idling, ready to tow the schooner out to sea, all hands aboard and reasonably sober. The damaged one-inch rifle was now repaired, although that had been a close-run thing: Sam saw a pair of gunner's mates half-running down the pier with the rifle, an awkward burden to carry at the double, and the Gunner hobbling along behind at his best post-wound speed, with only minutes to spare. Sam was so glad to have the rest of his main battery restored to him that he decided to ignore the standing order that all hands were to be aboard one full hour prior to sailing.

  The entire crew was in a state of nervous exhaustion, but Sam knew that twenty-four hours of the at-sea routine, with its soothing regularity, would cure that.

  As would the news of their changed destination.

  Sam also knew that, despite his personal anxiety to get to Kerguelen as quickly as possible, waiting one more tide would have made little difference. He was not a sadist. He had set the earliest possible sailing time as a training measure. The Albatros had already once been impelled by operational circumstances to get under way from Hell-ville in a hurry, and had sailed into battle against two enemy dhows, short of half her gunner's mates and a round dozen ordinary seamen – men on duty ashore who could not be recalled in time. Sam didn't want that to happen again. A warship in commission had to be ready to go into action at the shortest possible notice, under all circumstances.

  Commander Ennis came aft to the quarterdeck, from which Sam had been observing the furious activity, and formally reported: “Captain, the schooner is ready in all respects to get under way.”

  “Thanks, Bill – terrific job! Frankly, I didn't think you could do it.” At this, Ennis' face became an almost comical study in conflicting emotions: pleasure at the compliment mixed with exasperation with his captain. Sam could read his thoughts as if they were graven on his forehead: If you didn't think we could do it then why the hell did you order it! But those thoughts remained prudently unspoken.

  “Get her under way, Mister Munro,” Sam ordered the watch officer, and the boyish lieutenant shouted the orders necessary to take in the bow line, hold the stern line, take up the slack on the towline, bring the schooner's bow around through one hundred and eighty degrees, and line her up for a passage out the Hell-ville channel. Then the stern line was cast off, and the Albatros was free of the land.

  Sam strolled over to Mooney, the navigator, who was always on deck when their youngest lieutenant had the watch – he had appointed himself the young man's professional mentor – and said with elaborate casualness, “Change of plan, Pilot. Shape a course to round Cape Bobaomby and then head south for French Port – for home.”

  Mooney stared at Sam in wonder, then a broad grin spread over his weathered face. “Aye aye, sir!” he replied, and ducked into the chartroom, remarkably cheerful for a man who had just been ordered to throw out the results of hours of meticulous voyage planning and start
all over again.

  This remark was of course overheard by those nearby – everything Sam said on the quarterdeck above a whisper was necessarily overheard on the crowded schooner – and the buzz of excited comment spread forward with lightening speed. The news had a remarkable effect on the crew. They went from being mostly silent, dragging with fatigue, to cheerful and lively in an instant.

  The XO was the only man on the ship not surprised by this change of plan. “Well, that word certainly perked 'em up, Skipper,” he said with a chuckle.

  “Yes. I'd thought of holding back the news 'til the last minute, when we were abeam of Cape Bobaomby, but that would have been too cruel. They deserved some reward for all the work and hurry of getting ready for sailing.”

  The Captain and the XO stood in companionable silence for a while, watching the motor sloop's flickering searchlight stab from port to starboard and back again as it picked up the channel buoys.

  Ennis then said, “Our good Doctor was in a strange mood today, Captain.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, she asked for permission to go ashore to expedite delivery of some medical stores she had ordered – and did it in a more respectful manner than she has ever shown me before. She also called me 'XO', as everyone else does, rather than 'Commander Ennis.' Her attitude appears to have done a one-eighty, at least towards me. All her old hauteur was gone, and she was damn near humble, if you can imagine such a thing.

  “And, wonder of wonders, she asked me if, when I had time, I would advise her on behaviors and attitudes proper to a naval officer! Have you been 're-calibrating' her lately, Skipper?” (“Re-calibration” being a nautical euphemism for the severe dressing-down of an officer.)

  Sam made non-committal noises and changed the subject. Bill, his XO and also his best friend, was someone with whom he ordinarily felt comfortable talking about almost anything, but his recent encounter with the medical officer was too raw and fresh to discuss yet. With his customary tact, Bill immediately sensed that Sam did not want to talk about it, and smoothly adapted to the change of topic.