H.M.S Saracen (1965)

by Reeman, Douglas

  ‘Yes, I’d like that.’

  She moved towards him, but Erskine said quickly, ‘There are one or two more people you should meet, Ann.’

  ‘Come with me.’ Wickersley took her arm, an idea forming in his reeling mind.

  He almost pushed the girl out of the small semicircle, and then Erskine tried to bar his path. ‘I think you’ve had a bit too much to drink, Doc!’

  Wickersley weighed up the facts with elaborate care. The girl was very willing to leave Erskine. She was not putting on an act now. He leaned across to Erskine and said in his ear, ‘Go and get stuffed!’ Then with a fixed smile on his streaming face he guided the girl through the swaying dancers and towards the quarterdeck ladder.

  ‘It’s cooler on deck,’ he said. ‘Much nicer.’

  Erskine had mentioned this girl once or twice. Like a possession, he thought. Now, if half the rumours were right, he was getting rid of her too. ‘I apologise for my haste, Ann. But, as you see, I’ve had a hard day.’

  The quarterdeck was deserted but for an anonymous couple huddled right aft below the ensign staff. Side awnings had been rigged to protect any strollers from the cool harbour breeze and to contain the glare of light from the wardroom hatch. Wickersley led the girl to a gap in the awnings and pointed across the glittering water.

  ‘A bit of air does the patient good, y’know!’

  Her teeth gleamed in the purple half-light. ‘Thank you for pulling me out of that crowd. I was beginning to wonder why I came at all!’

  Wickersley fumbled for his cigarettes. We are all playing parts, he thought. Each hiding some inner worry from the next and thinking it doesn’t show.

  She took the proffered cigarette and waited as he clicked his lighter. ‘I’m not usually like this,’ he said after a moment, ‘but things have been a bit hectic here lately.’ And, by the way, my wife has run off with a good friend of mine, he wanted to add. ‘It’s like a calm after a storm.’

  He felt her start and turn to the footsteps which thudded across the deck planking.

  Erskine loomed out of the darkness, his mess-jacket gleaming like a ghost. ‘Now what the hell are you playing at?’

  Wickersley was not sure which one of them was being addressed, but the irritated rasp in Erskine’s tone was the final straw. ‘Go away!’

  ‘You’re drunk!’ Erskine seemed twice his normal size in Wickersley’s misty vision. ‘D’you think this is the way to behave in front of my guest?’

  The Doctor shrugged. ‘I’m past caring what you think.’

  The girl threw her cigarette over the rail. ‘Really, John, don’t be so stuffy! Anyway, I’m not your guest. I’m not your anything any more!’

  Erskine seemed to recoil. ‘So that’s the way of it. Drop one, grab another!’

  She turned her face away, and Wickersley said thickly, ‘If you don’t shove off I’m going to forget my oath and smash that arrogant face in!’

  There was a quiet footfall by the hatch and Chesnaye stood motionless against the pale awning.

  The other three stood like statues. Erskine with hands on his hips, jaw jutting forward, Wickersley, whose fists were already raised but frozen in mid-air. Only the girl seemed real. She had half turned and was watching Chesnaye’s tall figure as if to gauge the power he seemed to hold over the others.

  Chesnaye said evenly: ‘There are guests below, Number One. There seems to be a preponderance of ship’s officers up here.’

  Erskine said, ‘I was dealing with the Doctor, sir, he——’

  Wickersley interrupted calmly, ‘I was just going to knock his head off.’

  There was a pause and Chesnaye continued, ‘When I was a midshipman I once knocked a senior officer to the deck!’ Surprisingly he chuckled. ‘It did me a power of good!’ Then, as the other officers gaped at him: ‘Now go below and behave yourselves. If anybody in this ship has a right to beat somebody brains out I think I have already proved myself eligible by my early example!’

  Erskine sounded confused. ‘Yes, sir.’ Without another word he walked to the ladder.

  Wickersley decided it was time for another drink. A large one. It had been a remarkably simple feat, really. Get the girl on deck and Erskine, and the Captain was bound to follow.

  Chesnaye was completely alone, but unlike any other man aboard he could not share his emptiness. This Ann Curzon might make him forget, even for an evening. The near disaster had been worth it. Erskine needed a good hiding anyway.

  Wickersley bowed to the girl and then said: ‘Permission to fall out, sir? Perhaps you would take over my duties as escort?’

  Chesnaye grinned. ‘Go below before you fall over.’

  They watched Wickersley stagger towards the ladder, neither aware of his inner misery, but on the deserted deck each suddenly conscious of one another.

  ‘It’s a beautiful view from here.’

  * * * * *

  The night air was almost cold as it fanned across the upper bridge, but the girl did not seem to notice it. She stood on the port gratings, her body pale against the grey steel, her arms wide as she rested them on the broken screen.

  Chesnaye stood in the centre of the deserted bridge, his mind unable to associate this girl’s presence with what had gone before. The ship was quite still and he could no longer hear the raucous beat of the wardroom gramophone, nor the almost hysterical gaiety from the remaining visitors. Overhead, the stars were large and very low, and it was quite impossible to imagine what had been enacted above this very place. The screaming bombers and the last desperate attack by that fanatical pilot.

  Without even returning to the wardroom party Chesnaye and the girl had moved slowly along the deserted upper deck. Sometimes Chesnaye had talked, answered her questions, and other times they had both found a strange contentment in silence and looking across the darkened harbour.

  She said, ‘I still can’t believe that the Germans may be here soon.’ Her arm moved above the screen. ‘Their ships where ours are now.’

  ‘I don’t think it will happen.’ Chesnaye climbed on to the gratings, again conscious of her nearness, the scent of her body. ‘Necessity makes our people achieve remarkable things.’

  She shivered and he said quickly, ‘Would you like to go down?’

  ‘Not yet.’ She half turned, and he sensed the sadness in her voice. ‘I may not get another chance. It’s been wonderful.’

  Chesnaye asked, ‘What made you come out here in the first place?’

  She shrugged. ‘I was in Malta when the war started. On holiday. I got sort of involved with things, and no one seemed to mind.’ Some hair blew across her cheek as she said dreamily: ‘I couldn’t go back to England after that. My parents wanted me to, but I felt I belonged here.’

  ‘Where is home?’ Chesnaye felt that he wanted every last scrap of information about her. He could no longer explain his desire, nor the hopelessness of it.

  She chuckled. ‘Surbiton. Exotic, isn’t it?’

  ‘And now you want to go back to Malta?’

  ‘I am going.’ She touched the cold metal below her. ‘I work with the Red Cross, although God knows how it happened. I’m really very squeamish!’

  Somewhere below a pipe shrilled and a metallic voice intoned: ‘Duty fire party fall in! Men under punishment to muster!’

  She was facing him now, her eyes like dark pools in her face. ‘You’re not a bit as I imagined you would be. You’re not even like the others.’

  Chesnaye grinned. ‘I haven’t got two heads!’

  ‘No, I’m not joking. Perhaps it’s because you’ve been away from the Navy for all that time. New Zealand, everything. Some of the others in your position are so——so pompous, does that sound silly?’

  ‘It’s a compliment.’

  ‘And the way you are about this ship. I’ve been listening to you for hours. I could go on listening, and that’s not like me at all! John is quite different. He always worries about something he can’t even see.’

  ‘He’s a good
officer.’ Chesnaye no longer knew what to say.

  She shrugged impatiently. ‘So is Goering, I expect!’

  ‘I think I know what you mean.’ He looked past her at the flapping signal halyards. ‘You must put every ounce of energy into a ship. Whatever ship it may be at the time. Otherwise it’s just a pile of metal and spare parts!’

  There was a movement of people on the deck below, and Chesnaye knew that the last of the visitors were leaving. He could feel another sensation of loss already, and he knew he was unable to prevent it.

  She said quietly: ‘I came here prepared to hate everything. But I don’t remember when I’ve been so happy.’ She laughed, but sounded unsure and suddenly nervous. ‘That just proves what a weird creature I am!’

  She turned to step from the gratings, but the heel of her shoe caught in one of the small holes and she fell heavily against him. For another long moment they stayed quite still, and Chesnaye could feel his heart pounding uncontrollably against her warm body.

  In a breathless voice she said, ‘If this was a film they would say I planned that fall!’

  He felt her hair against his cheek and with sudden desperation pulled her tightly to him. She did not resist but stayed motionless, her breast pressed against his heart.

  Her voice seemed to come from far away. ‘Why didn’t this happen earlier?’

  Chesnaye held her bare arms and guided her across the bridge. There were so many things he wanted to say, so many fears to share. She was not for him. It was her natural reaction to Erskine’s behaviour. In any case she was nearly twenty years younger. She was going away. He might never see her again, even if she wanted to after tonight.

  But instead he said, ‘Can I see you?’

  She turned lightly in his hands, and he could see the brightness of her eyes. Like tears, he thought.

  ‘I want to see you!’ She tried to laugh. ‘Do you think you can tear yourself from the ship for a while?’

  If anyone else had said that Chesnaye knew he would have reacted differently. But they both stood on the empty. bridge, smiling through the darkness like conspirators.

  Quickly she said, ‘I’ll give you my address before I go.’

  ‘If I’m delayed—’

  She cut him short. ‘I’ll still be waiting.’ She reached out and touched his hand. ‘You just get there somehow!’

  Below on the quarterdeck Wickersley watched them pass. He was near complete oblivion but not quite there. His eyes drooped, and when he opened them again the girl had vanished. The Captain was standing over him, and Wickersley realised for the first time that he must have fallen to the deck.

  Through the mist he had built up to stave off the misery of that letter he nevertheless heard Chesnaye say quietly, ‘You may be unconscious now, Doc, but you’ll never know what you’ve done for me.’ Then the Doctor felt strong hands under his armpits and allowed himself to be carried down to an all-enveloping darkness.

  7

  Convoy

  Chesnaye finished tamping down his pipe and reached for his matches. The reflected glare from the shimmering sea was so intense in the noon sun that he was wearing sun-glasses, and his white drill tunic, although freshly laundered, felt clammy against his skin. He drew in on the pipe and watched the blue smoke hover uncertainly across the baking bridge.

  Lieutenant Norris, red-cheeked and perspiring freely, moved to the front of the bridge and saluted. ‘Afternoon Watch closed up at Defence Stations, sir. Course two-seven-five, steady at six knots.’

  ‘Very well.’ Chesnaye eased his limbs more comfortably on the hard chair and stared absently at the empty horizon. Four and a half days out from Alexandria, six hundred miles of empty sea.

  Norris sounded strained, he thought. It was strange how he changed once the ship was at sea again. In harbour he had been a different man. Whenever his duties permitted he had been ashore and usually returned on board slightly the worse for drink.

  He heard Harbridge, the Gunner (T), say: ‘Take the slack off them halyards, Bunts! Like a bloody Naafi boat!’

  Chesnaye swung round in his chair and levelled his glasses astern. As he did so he saw the watchkeepers avert their eyes and become engrossed in their duties. It was all as usual.

  His glasses settled on their one faithful companion. Squat, purposeful and seemingly out of place, H.M. Rescue Tug Goliath was keeping in perfect station about half a mile astern. Her bulky hull was garish in dazzle paint with the additional adornment of a giant bow wave which was as false as her appearance. Sometime tomorrow the fast convoy from Alexandria would overtake the Saracen and her consort and consolidate in readiness for action. The rescue tug would be busy enough then. A friendly scavenger to remind every ship in the convoy of its constant peril.

  On the fo’c’sle Chesnaye could see Mr. Joslin supervising a working party by the anchor cables, and other seamen were busy scraping and painting one of the capstans. Chesnaye bit on his pipe and refused to accept the everyday task as a waste of time. Whatever else happened, Saracen would not look uncared for when she entered Malta.

  Erskine appeared with his usual quietness. ‘We’ve just decoded that signal, sir. It’s all over in Crete.’

  Chesnaye did not look at him, but stared hard at the friendly water and the cloudless sky beyond the bows. ‘I see.’ So the British Army had pulled out of yet another impossible position. How was it that everything seemed so peaceful and quiet when only two hundred miles away that bloodied island would be the scene of so much suffering and despair? Where would the next blow fall?

  Erskine had stepped back and was speaking quietly to Norris. He had given no sign or hint of his inner feelings, but Chesnaye guessed that he was watching him more closely than ever. Since that night of the mess party and the events which had followed so surprisingly quickly.

  The Saracen had been in Alexandria exactly seven days. Each morning brought a flood of repair workers aboard until it seemed as if the monitor was the last ship they expected to work on. For the British at least.

  Chesnaye could still remember Erskine’s face on the first morning as the rivet guns began to crackle and stutter overhead. Chesnaye had signed a few letters and initialled several orders, and had then said: ‘I am going ashore this afternoon. You can take control of the working parties for the moment.’ A pause. ‘Continue to give as much shore leave as possible to our people, and go easy on the libertymen when they come off.’ There had been a long string of defaulters that morning for drunkenness and so forth. ‘It does everyone good to let off steam once in a while.’

  Erskine had said quickly, ‘Where can you be reached in an emergency, sir?’

  The two men had looked at each other in silence for a few seconds, and then Chesnaye had said, ‘I’ll leave the address with my writer.’ But he knew that Erskine was well aware of his destination.

  He had found the narrow street above the harbour easily enough. It was off the mainstream of wandering sailors and hurrying townfolk. Even the inevitable traders and hawkers were few, while the bustle of the harbour was forgotten. Only the Mediterranean itself showed between the buildings in a hard blue line.

  He was not sure what he had expected to find. Surprise or embarrassment. A polite but awkward visit soon to be ended. Even when he reached the shaded door he felt on the edge of panic and uncertainty. There was nothing hesitant about her welcome, and he could still clearly remember the pleasure in her eyes as she guided him into the shady half-light of the small room.

  ‘You are prompt!’ She took his cap and then stood back with her hands on her hips. She was wearing a tan-coloured dress which seemed to accentuate her beauty and momentarily made Chesnaye marvel at Erskine’s stupidity.

  ‘This really is grand!’ She was laughing again, like an exuberant child, he thought. ‘Entertaining a full captain!’ Chesnaye was sitting on the sagging sofa, and she stooped to touch the lace bars of his shoulder straps. ‘But I simply can’t call you Captain. Do you mind Dick? Or would you prefer Richard?’


  He had forced a frown. ‘Only my close friends are allowed Dick!’

  She had jumped to her feet, her hands already reaching for the bottle of chilled wine. ‘Watch out then, Dick! I may become more than a friend!’

  And so it had continued. The small room had been full of laughter, quick changes of mood with each newly gained piece of understanding.

  When the evening shadows had crossed the dusty street they had gone out. First to an overcrowded club where naval officers had outnumbered everyone else and many curious glances had been cast at the slim tanned girl and the tall captain. They had tried to dance on the stifling floor, and Chesnaye marvelled at the fact that his thigh no longer seemed to have any effect, as if a truce had been called.

  After a while she said gravely, ‘You hate it here, don’t you?’

  He had looked at her anxiously. ‘Why d’you say that?’

  ‘All these people. You must be tired of seeing them.’

  So they had gone to the outskirts of the town, to a low-roofed café with a blaring radiogram. There were a few servicemen, mostly soldiers. But three seamen were about to leave as Chesnaye entered, his head ducking below the beams, and he stood aside as the white-clad trio lurched towards the street.

  He suddenly realised that they were three of the Saracen’s men. They stared first at him, then at the girl. The sight of their captain in this sort of place seemed to unnerve them.

  One, an able seaman named Devlin, started to salute and then said, ‘’Evenin’, sir; ’evenin’, miss!’ He had been unable to stop his huge grin. ‘I thought the officers went to all the posh places, sir?’

  Chesnaye felt sudden warmth for these three tipsy seamen. At sea they were little cogs he hardly saw. Names on a muster sheet, requestmen or defaulters perhaps. Now they were just men like himself.

  One of the seamen said, ‘No wonder we can’t find any decent girls, sir!’ and stared at Chesnaye’s companion with open admiration.

  Chesnaye coughed. ‘One of the advantages of seniority, lads!’ They had gone off laughing into the night, and Chesnaye had felt foolishly happy.