H. M. S. Ulysses

by Alistair MacLean

‘I don’t know, sir. It’s—it’s just bits and pieces in the FDR, if you follow me. But if he was there—’

  ‘He would be,’ Tyndall interrupted heavily. ‘He never left it during Action Stations . . . ’ He stopped abruptly, broken hands clenched involuntarily as the high-pitched scream and impact explosion of HE shells blurred into shattering cacophony, appalling in its closeness.

  ‘My God!’ Tyndall whispered. ‘That was close! Davies! What the hell . . . !’

  His voice choked off in an agonized grunt, arms flailing wildly at the empty air, as his back crashed against the deck of the bridge, driving every last ounce of breath from his body. Wordlessly, convulsively, propelled by desperately thrusting feet and launched by the powerful back-thrust of arms pivoting on the handrails, Davies had just catapulted himself up the last three steps of the ladder, head and shoulders socketing into the Admiral’s body with irresistible force. And now Davies, too, was down, stretched his length on the deck, spreadeagled across Tyndall’s legs. He lay very still.

  Slowly, the cruel breath rasping his tortured lungs, Tyndall surfaced from the black depths of unconsciousness. Blindly, instinctively he struggled to sit up, but his broken hand collapsed under the weight of his body. His legs didn’t seem to be much help either: they were quite powerless, as if he were paralysed from the waist down. The fog was gone now, and blinding flashes of colour, red, green and white were coruscating brilliantly across the darkening sky. Starshells? Was the enemy using a new type of starshell? Dimly, with a great effort of will, he realized that there must be some connection between these dazzling flashes and the now excruciating pain behind his forehead. He reached up the back of his right hand: his eyes were still screwed tightly shut . . . Then the realization faded and was gone.

  ‘Are you all right, sir? Don’t move. We’ll soon have you out of this!’ The voice, deep, authoritative, boomed directly above the Admiral’s head. Tyndall shrank back, shook his head in imperceptible despair. It was Turner who was speaking, and Turner, he knew, was gone. Was this, then, what it was like to be dead? he wondered dully. This frightening, confused world of blackness and blinding light at the same time, a darkbright world of pain and powerlessness and voices from the past?

  Then suddenly, of their own volition almost, his eyelids flickered and were open. Barely a foot above him were the lean, piratical features of the Commander, who was kneeling anxiously at his side.

  ‘Turner! Turner?’ A questioning hand reached out in tentative hope, clutched gratefully, oblivious to the pain, at the reassuring solidity of the Commander’s arm. ‘Turner! It is you! I thought—’

  ‘The After Tower, eh?’ Turner smiled briefly. ‘No, sir—I wasn’t within a mile of it. I was coming here, just climbing up to the fo’c’sle deck, when that first hit threw me back down to the main deck . . . How are you, sir?’

  ‘Thank God! Thank God! I don’t know how I am. My legs . . . What in the name of heaven is that?’

  His eyes focusing normally again, widened in baffled disbelief. Just above Turner’s head, angling for’ard and upward to port, a great white treetrunk stretched as far as he could see in either direction. Reaching up, he could just touch the massive bole with his hand.

  ‘The foremast, sir,’ Turner explained. ‘It was sheared clean off by that last shell, just above the lower yardarm. The back blast flung it on to the bridge. Took most of the AA tower with it, I’m afraid—and caved in the Main Tower. I don’t think young Courtney could have had much chance . . . Davies saw it coming—I was just below him at the time. He was very quick—’

  ‘Davies!’ Tyndall’s dazed mind had forgotten all about him. ‘Of course! Davies!’ It must be Davies who was pinioning his legs. He craned his neck forward, saw the huddled figure at his feet, the great weight of the mast lying across his back. ‘For God’s sake, Commander, get him out of that!’

  ‘Just lie down, sir, till Brooks gets here. Davies is all right.’

  ‘All right? All right!’ Tyndall was almost screaming, oblivious to the silent figures who were gathering around him. ‘Are you mad, Turner? The poor bastard must be in agony!’ He struggled frantically to rise, but several pairs of hands held him down, firmly, carefully.

  ‘He’s all right, sir.’ Turner’s voice was surprisingly gentle. ‘Really he is, sir. He’s all right. Davies doesn’t feel a thing. Not any more.’ And all at once the Admiral knew and he fell back limply to the deck, his eyes closed in shocked understanding.

  His eyes were still shut when Brooks appeared, doubly welcome in his confidence and competence. Within seconds, almost, the Admiral was on his feet, shocked, badly bruised, but otherwise unharmed. Doggedly, and in open defiance of Brooks, Tyndall demanded that he be assisted back to the bridge. His eyes lit up momentarily as he saw Vallery standing shakily on his feet, a white towel to his mouth. But he said nothing. His head bowed, he hoisted himself painfully into his chair.

  ‘WT—bridge. WT—bridge. Please acknowledge signal.’

  ‘Is that bloody idiot still there?’ Tyndall demanded querulously. ‘Why doesn’t someone—?’

  ‘You’ve only been gone a couple of minutes, sir,’ the Kapok Kid ventured.

  ‘Two minutes!’ Tyndall stared at him, lapsed into silence. He glanced down at Brooks, busy bandaging his right hand. ‘Have you nothing better to do, Brooks?’ he asked harshly.

  ‘No, I haven’t,’ Brooks replied truculently. ‘When shells explode inside four walls, there isn’t much work left for a doctor . . . except signing death certificates,’ he added brutally. Vallery and Turner exchanged glances. Vallery wondered if Brooks had any idea how far through Tyndall was.

  ‘WT—bridge. WT—bridge. Vectra repeats request for instruction. Urgent. Urgent.’

  ‘The Vectra!’ Vallery glanced at the Admiral, silent now and motionless, and turned to the bridge messenger. ‘Chrysler! Get through to WT Any way you can. Ask them to repeat the first message.’

  He looked again at Turner, following the Admiral’s sick gaze over the side. He looked down, recoiled in horror, fighting down the instant nausea. The gunner in the sponson below—just another boy like Chrysler—must have seen the falling mast, must have made a panic-stricken attempt to escape. He had barely cleared his cockpit when the radar screen, a hundred square feet of meshed steel carrying the crushing weight of the mast as it had snapped over the edge of the bridge, had caught him fairly and squarely. He lay still now, mangled, broken, something less than human, spreadeagled in outflung crucifixion across the twin barrels of his Oerlikon.

  Vallery turned away, sick in body and mind. God, the craziness, the futile insanity of war. Damn that German cruiser, damn those German gunners, damn them, damn them! . . . But why should he? They, too, were only doing a job—and doing it terribly well. He gazed sightlessly at the wrecked shambles of his bridge. What damnably accurate gunnery! He wondered, vaguely, if the Ulysses had registered any hits. Probably not, and now, of course, it was impossible. It was impossible now because the Ulysses, still racing southeast through the fog, was completely blind, both radar eyes gone, victims to the weather and the German guns. Worse still, all the Fire Control towers were damaged beyond repair. If this goes on, he thought wryly, all we’ll need is a set of grappling irons and a supply of cutlasses. In terms of modern naval gunnery, even although her main armament was intact, the Ulysses was hopelessly crippled. She just didn’t have a chance. What was it that Stoker Riley was supposed to have said—‘being thrown to the wolves’? Yes, that was it—‘thrown to the wolves’. But only a Nero, he reflected wearily, would have blinded a gladiator before throwing him into the arena.

  All firing had ceased. The bridge was deadly quiet. Silence, complete silence, except for the sound of rushing water, the muffled roar of the great engine-room intake fans, the monotonous, nerve-drilling pinging of the Asdic—and these, oddly enough, only served to deepen the great silence.

  Every eye, Vallery saw, was on Admiral Tyndall. Old Giles was mumbling something to himself,
too faint to catch. His face, shockingly grey, haggard and blotched, still peered over the side. He seemed fascinated by the site of the dead boy. Or was it the smashed Radar screen? Had the full significance of the broken scanner and wrecked Director Towers dawned on him yet? Vallery looked at him for a long moment, then turned away: he knew that it had.

  ‘WT—bridge. WT—bridge.’ Everyone on the bridge jumped, swung round in nerve-jangled startlement. Everyone except Tyndall. He had frozen into a graven immobility.

  ‘Signal from Vectra. First Signal. Received 0952.’ Vallery glanced at his watch. Only six minutes ago! Impossible!

  ‘Signal reads: Contacts, contacts, 3, repeat 3. Amend to 5. Heavy concentration of U-boats, ahead and abeam. Am engaging.”’

  Every eye on the bridge swung back to Tyndall. His, they knew, the responsibility, his the decision—taken alone, against the advice of his senior officer—to leave the convoy almost unguarded. Impersonally, Vallery admired the baiting, the timing, the springing of the trap. How would old Giles react to this, the culmination of a series of disastrous miscalculations—miscalculations for which, in all fairness, he could not justly be blamed . . . But he would be held accountable. The iron voice of the loudspeaker broke in on his thoughts.

  ‘Second signal reads: “Close contact. Depthcharging. Depth-charging. One vessel torpedoed, sinking. Tanker torpedoed, damaged, still afloat, under command. Please advise. Please assist. Urgent. Urgent!”’

  The speaker clicked off. Again that hushed silence, strained, unnatural. Five seconds it lasted, ten, twenty—then everyone stiffened, looked carefully away.

  Tyndall was climbing down from his chair. His movements were stiff, slow with the careful faltering shuffle of the very old. He limped heavily. His right hand, startling white in its snowy sheath of bandage, cradled his broken wrist. There was about him a queer, twisted sort of dignity, and if his face held any expression at all, it was the far-off echo of a smile. When he spoke, he spoke as a man might talk to himself, aloud.

  ‘I am not well,’ he said. ‘I am going below.’ Chrysler, not too young to have an inkling of the tragedy, held open the gate, caught Tyndall as he stumbled on the step. He glanced back over his shoulder, a quick, pleading look, caught and understood Vallery’s compassionate nod. Side by side, the old and the young, they moved slowly aft. Gradually, the shuffling died away and they were gone.

  The shattered bridge was curiously empty now, the men felt strangely alone. Giles, the cheerful, buoyant, indestructible Giles was gone. The speed, the extent of the collapse was not for immediate comprehension: the only sensation at the moment was that of being unprotected and defenceless and alone.

  ‘Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings . . . ’ Inevitably, the first to break the silence was Brooks. ‘Nicholls always maintained that . . . ’ He stopped short, his head shaking in slow incredulity. ‘I must see what I can do,’ he finished abruptly, and hurried off the bridge.

  Vallery watched him go, then turned to Bentley. The Captain’s face, haggard, shadowed with grizzled beard, the colour of death in the weird halflight of the fog, was quite expressionless.

  ‘Three signals, Chief. First to Vectra. “Steer 360°. Do not disperse. Repeat, do not disperse. Am coming to your assistance.”’ He paused, then went on: ‘Sign it, “Admiral, 14 ACS.” Got it? . . . Right. No time to code it. Plain language. Send one of your men to the WT at once.’

  ‘Second: To Stirling, Sirrus and Viking. “Abandon pursuit immediate. Course north-east. Maximum speed.” Plain language also.’ He turned to the Kapok Kid. ‘How’s your forehead, Pilot? Can you carry on?’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘Thank you, boy. You heard me? Convoy rerouted north—say in a few minutes’ time, at 1015. Six knots. Give me an intersection course as soon as possible.’

  ‘Third signal, Bentley: To Stirling, Sirrus and Viking: “Radar out of action. Cannot pick you up on screen. Stream fog-buoys. Siren at two-minute intervals.” Have that message coded. All acknowledgements to the bridge at once. Commander!’

  ‘Sir?’ Turner was at his elbow.

  ‘Hands to defence stations. It’s my guess the pack will have gone before we get there. Who’ll be off watch?’

  ‘Lord only knows,’ said Turner frankly. ‘Let’s call it port.’

  Vallery smiled faintly. ‘Port it is. Organize two parties. First of port to clear away all loose wreckage: over the side with the lot— keep nothing. You’ll need the blacksmith and his mate, and I’m sure Dodson will provide you with an oxyacetylene crew. Take charge yourself. Second of port as burial party. Nicholls in charge. All bodies recovered to be laid out in the canteen when it’s clear . . . Perhaps you could give me a full report of casualties and damage inside the hour?’

  ‘Long before that, sir . . . Could I have a word with you in private?’

  They walked aft. As the shelter door shut behind them, Vallery looked at the Commander curiously, half-humorously. ‘Another mutiny, perhaps, Commander?’

  ‘No, sir.’ Turner unbuttoned his coat, his hand struggling into the depths of a hip-pocket. He dragged out a flat half-bottle, held it up to the light. ‘Thank the Lord for that!’ he said piously. ‘I was afraid it got smashed when I fell . . . Rum, sir. Neat. I know you hate the stuff, but never mind. Come on, you need this!’

  Vallery’s brows came down in a straight line.

  ‘Rum. Look here, Commander, do you—?’

  ‘To hell with KRs and AFOs!’ Turner interrupted rudely. ‘Take it—you need it badly! You’ve been hurt, you’ve lost a lot more blood and you’re almost frozen to death.’ He uncorked it, thrust the bottle into Vallery’s reluctant hands. ‘Face facts. We need you—more than ever now—and you’re almost dead on your feet—and I mean dead on your feet,’ he added brutally. ‘This might keep you going a few more hours.’

  ‘You put things so nicely,’ Vallery murmured. ‘Very well. Against my better judgement . . . ’

  He paused, the bottle to his mouth.

  ‘And you give me an idea, Commander. Have the bosun break out the rum. Pipe “Up spirits.” Double ration to each man. They, too, are going to need it.’ He swallowed, pulled the bottle away, and the grimace was not for the rum.

  ‘Especially,’ he added soberly, ‘the burial party.’

  TEN

  Friday Afternoon

  The switch clicked on and the harsh fluorescent light flooded the darkening surgery. Nicholls woke with a start, one hand coming up automatically to shield exhausted eyes. The light hurt. He screwed his eyes to slits, peered painfully at the hands of his wrist-watch. Four o’clock! Had he been asleep that long? God, it was bitterly cold!

  He hoisted himself stiffly forward in the dentist’s chair, twisted his head round. Brooks was standing with his back to the door, snow-covered hood framing his silver hair, numbed fingers fumbling with a packet of cigarettes. Finally he managed to pull one out. He looked up quizzically over a flaring match-head.

  ‘Hallo, there, Johnny! Sorry to waken you, but the skipper wants you. Plenty of time, though.’ He dipped the cigarette into the dying flame, looked up again. Nicholls, he thought with sudden compassion, looked ill, desperately tired and overstrained; but no point in telling him so. ‘How are you? On second thoughts, don’t tell me! I’m a damned sight worse myself. Have you any of that poison left?’

  ‘Poison, sir?’ The levity was almost automatic, part of their relationship with each other. ‘Just because you make one wrong diagnosis? The Admiral will be all right—’

  ‘Gad! The intolerance of the very young—especially on the providentially few occasions that they happen to be right . . . I was referring to that bottle of bootleg hooch from the Isle of Mull.’

  ‘Coll,’ Nicholls corrected. ‘Not that it matters—you’ve drunk it all, anyway,’ he added unkindly. He grinned tiredly at the Commander’s crestfallen face, then relented. ‘But we do have a bottle of Talisker left.’ He crossed over to the posion cupboard, unscrewed the top of a
bottle marked ‘Lysol’. He heard, rather than saw, the clatter of glass against glass, wondered vaguely, with a kind of clinical detachment, why his hands were shaking so badly.

  Brooks drained his glass, sighed in bliss as he felt the grateful warmth sinking down inside him.

  ‘Thank you, my boy. Thank you. You have the makings of a first-class doctor.’

  ‘You think so, sir? I don’t. Not any longer. Not after today.’ He winced, remembering. ‘Forty-four of them, sir, over the side in ten minutes, one after the other, like—like so many sacks of rubbish.’

  ‘Forty-four?’ Brooks looked up. ‘So many, Johnny?’

  ‘Not really, sir. That was the number of missing. About thirty, rather, and God only knows how many bits and pieces . . . It was a brush and shovel job in the FDR’ He smiled, mirthlessly. ‘I had no dinner, today. I don’t think anybody else in the burial party had either . . . I’d better screen that porthole.’

  He turned away quickly, walked across the surgery. Low on the horizon, through the thinlyfalling snow, he caught intermittent sight of an evening star. That meant that the fog was gone—the fog that had saved the convoy, had hidden them from the U-boats when it had turned so sharply to the north. He could see the Vectra, her depth-charge racks empty and nothing to show for it. He could see the Vytura, the damaged tanker, close by, almost awash in the water, hanging grimly on to the convoy. He could see four of the Victory ships, big, powerful, reassuring, so pitifully deceptive in their indestructible permanence . . . He slammed the scuttle, screwed home the last butterfly nut, then swung round abruptly.

  ‘Why the hell don’t we turn back?’ he burst out. ‘Who does the old man think he’s kidding—us or the Germans? No air cover, nor radar, not the faintest chance of help! The Germans have us pinned down to an inch now—and it’ll be easier still for them as we go on. And there’s a thousand miles to go!’ His voice rose. ‘And every bloody enemy ship, U-boat and plane in the Arctic smacking their lips and waiting to pick us off at their leisure.’ He shook his head in despair. ‘I’ll take my chance with anybody else, sir. You know that. But this is just murder—or suicide. Take your pick, sir. It’s all the same when you’re dead.’