McKinnon tapped the same door. ‘And what do we do here?’
‘What, indeed?’ Jamieson sat on a paint drum and thought. ‘Three choices, I would say. We can get an air compressor down here, drill a hole through the bulkhead at about shoulder level and force the water out which would be fine if we knew where the level of the hole in the hull is. We don’t. Besides, the chances are that the compressed air in the ballast room would escape before we could get the nozzle of the compressed air hose into the hole we drilled which could only mean that more water would pour into the ballast room. Or we could reinforce the bulkhead. The third choice is to do nothing. I’m for the third choice. It’s a pretty solid bulkhead. We’d have to reduce speed, of course. No bulkhead is going to stand up to the pressure at full speed if there’s a hole the size of a barn door in the hull.’
‘A barn door would not be convenient,’ McKinnon said, ‘I think I’ll go and have a look.’
It was a very cold and rather bruised McKinnon who half-climbed and was half-pulled up to the foredeck of the San Andreas, which, engines stopped, was wallowing heavily in quartering seas. In the pale half-light given by the again functioning deck arc lamps they presented a strange quartet, Jamieson, Ferguson and McCrimmon, wraithlike figures completely shrouded in snow, McKinnon a weirdly-gleaming creature, the sea water on his rubber suit, aqualung and waterproof torch already, in that 35° below temperature, beginning to harden into ice. At a gesture from Jamieson, McCrimmon left for the engine-room while Ferguson pulled in the rope-ladder: Jamieson took McKinnon’s arm and led him, the newly-formed ice on the rubber suit crackling as he stumbled along, towards the shelter of the superstructure where McKinnon pulled off his aqualung. His teeth were chattering uncontrollably.
‘Pretty bad down there, Bo’sun?’
‘Not that, sir. This damned rubber suit.’ He fingered a waist-high gash in the material. ‘Tore it on a jagged piece of metal. From here down the suit is filled with water.’
‘Good God! You’ll freeze to death, man. Hurry, hurrry!’ In what was left of his cabin McKinnon began to strip off his rubber suit. ‘You located the damage?’
‘No problem—and no barn door. Just a ragged hole about the size of my fist.’
Jamieson smiled. ‘Worth risking pneumonia to find that out. I’m going to the bridge. See you in the Captain’s cabin.’
When McKinnon, in dry clothing but still shivering violently, joined Jamieson and Naseby in the Captain’s cabin, the San Andreas was back on course and steadily picking up speed. Jamieson pushed a glass of Scotch across to him.
‘I’m afraid the Captain’s supplies are taking a fearful beating, Bo’sun. This shouldn’t increase the risk of pneumonia—I’ve left the water out. I’ve been speaking to Mr Patterson and the Captain—we’ve got a line through to the hospital now. When I told him you’d been over the side in this weather, he didn’t say thank-you or anything like that, just said to tell you that you’re mad.’
‘Captain Bowen is not often wrong and that’s a fact.’ McKinnon’s hands were shaking so badly that he spilt liquid from his admittedly brimming glass. ‘Any instructions from the Captain or Mr Patterson?’
‘None. Both say they’re quite happy to leave the topside to you.’
‘That’s kind of them. What they really mean is that they have no option—there’s only George and myself.’
‘George?’
‘Sorry, sir. Naseby, here. He’s a bo’sun, too. We’ve been shipmates on and off, friends for twenty years.’
‘I didn’t know.’ Jamieson looked thoughtfully at Naseby. ‘I can see it now. You’ve made arrangements for up here, Bo’sun?’
‘About to, sir. George and I will take turns here, looking after the family jewels, so to speak. I’ll have Trent, Ferguson and Curran spell one another on the wheel. I’ll tell them to give me a shake—if I’m asleep—when or if the weather clears.’
‘Cue for Lieutenant Ulbricht?’
‘Indeed. I would like to make a suggestion, sir, if I may. I would like to have some people keeping watch at the fore and aft exits of the hospital, just to make absolutely certain that nobody’s going to start sleepwalking during the night.’
‘Who’s going to watch the watchers?’
‘A point, sir. The watchers I would suggest are Jones, McGuigan, McCrimmon and Stephen. Unless they’re wonderful actors, the first two are too young and innocent to be criminals. McCrimmon may, indeed, have a criminal bent, but I think he’s an honest criminal. And Stephen strikes me as being a fairly trustworthy lad. More important, he’s not likely to forget that it was a naval minesweeper that picked him up out of the North Sea.’
‘I didn’t know that, either. You seem to be better informed about my own department than I am. I’ll arrange for Stephen and McCrimmon, you look after the others. Our resident saboteur is not about to give up all that easily?’
‘I would be surprised if he did. Wouldn’t you?’
‘Very much. I wonder what form of sabotage his next attempt to nobble us will take?’
‘I just have no idea. But another thought occurs, sir. The person you have keeping an eye on the aft exit from the hospital might also keep an eye on the entrance to A Ward.’
‘A Ward? That bunch of crooks? Whatever for?’
‘The person or persons who are trying to slow us and are doing their best to get us lost might think it a rather good idea to nobble Lieutenant Ulbricht.’
‘Indeed they might. I’ll stay in the ward myself tonight. There’s a spare bed. If I do drop off, the duty nurse can always give me a shake if anyone comes in who shouldn’t be coming in.’ Jamieson was silent for a few moments. ‘What’s behind it all, Bo’sun?’
‘I think you know as well as I do, sir. Somebody, somewhere, wants to take over the San Andreas, although why anyone should want to take over a hospital ship I can’t even begin to imagine.’
‘No more can I. A U-boat, you think?’
‘It would have to be, wouldn’t it? I mean, you can’t capture a ship from the air and they’re hardly likely to send the Tirpitz after us.’ McKinnon shook his head. ‘A U-boat? Any fishing boat, with a few armed and determined men, could take us over whenever they felt like it.’
* * *
* Throughout the wartime convoy sailings to Murmansk and Archangel the use of rescue ships remained a bone of contention between the Royal Navy at sea and the Royal Navy on land—the latter being the London-based Admiralty which acquitted itself with something less than distinction during the long years of the Russian convoys. In the earlier days, the use of rescue ships was the rule, not the exception. After the loss of the Zafaaran and the Stockport, which was lost with all hands including the many survivors that had been picked up from other sunken vessels, the Admiralty forbade the further use of rescue ships.
This was a rule that was observed in the breach. In certain convoys a self-selected member of the escort group, usually a destroyer or smaller, would assign to itself the role of rescue ship, an assignment in which the force commander would acquiesce or to which he turned a blind eye. The task of the rescue ships was a hazardous one indeed. There was never any question of a convoy stopping or of their escorts leaving the convoy, so that, almost invariably the rescue ship was left alone and unprotected. The sight of a Royal Naval vessel stopped in the water alongside a sinking vessel was an irresistible target for many U-boat commanders.
* It was neither appreciated nor reported that the Russians hada few submarines operational in the area at that time. One of them almost certainly damaged the Tirpitz sufficiently to make it return to its moorings in Alta Fjord.
FIVE
McKinnon, deep in sleep though he was, was instantly awake at Naseby’s shake and swung his legs over the edge of Captain Bowen’s bunk.
‘What’s the time, George?’
‘Six a.m. Curran’s just been down from the bridge. Says the blizzard has blown itself out.’
‘Stars?’
‘He didn’t
say.’
The Bo’sun pulled on an extra jersey, duffel coat and sea-boots, made his way up to the bridge, spoke briefly to Curran and went out on the starboard wing. Within only a second or two, bent double and with his back to the gale-force wind, coughing and gasping as the ice-chilled air reached down into his lungs, he was beginning to wish himself anywhere except where he was. He switched on his torch and picked up the thermometer. It showed—8° 40° of frost on the Fahrenheit scale. Combined with the strong wind the temperature, expressed in terms of the chill factor on exposed skin, was in the region of—80°F.
He straightened slowly and looked out towards the bows. In the light of the Red Cross arc lamps on the foredeck it was at once clear, as Curran had said, that the blizzard had blown itself out. Against the deep indigo of the sky, the stars were preternaturally bright and clear. Breathing through a mittened hand that covered both mouth and nose, McKinnon turned into the wind and looked aft.
At first he could see nothing, for the bitter wind brought instantaneous tears to his eyes. He ducked below the shelter of the canvas windbreaker, fumbled a pair of goggles from his coat pocket, strapped them under his duffel hood, straightened again, and, by dint of wiping the back of his free mitten against the glasses, was able to see, intermittently, what was going on astern.
The waves—the weather had not yet worsened to the extent that the seas had become broken and confused—were between twelve and fifteen feet in height, their lee sides whitely streaked with spume and half-hidden in flying spray as the wind tore their tops away. The stars were as brilliant as they had been in the other direction and McKinnon soon located the Pole Star, off the starboard quarter. The wind was no longer backing to the north and the San Andreas, as far as he could judge, was still heading roughly between southwest and south-south-west.
McKinnon moved back into the bridge, thankfully closed the door and pondered briefly. Their present course, it was safe to assume, offered no danger: on the other hand it was not safe to assume that they would or could maintain their present course. The weather, in this grey and undefined area between the Barents and Norwegian Seas, was notoriously fickle. He had not, for instance, expected—and had said as much—that the skies would clear that night: there was equally no guarantee that they would remain clear and that the wind would not back further to the north. He descended two decks, selected an armful of warm clothing from the now mostly abandoned crew’s quarters and made for the hospital area. Crossing the dangerously slippery upper deck and guided only by the lifeline, he became acutely and painfully aware that a change was already under way, a factor that he had not experienced on the starboard wing only a few minutes ago. Needle-pointed ice spicules were beginning to lance into the unprotected areas of his skin. It augured ill.
In the hospital mess-deck he came across both Jones and McGuigan, both of whom assured him that no one was or had been abroad. He passed into B ward, at the far end of which Janet Magnusson was seated at her desk, her elbows propped on it, her chin propped on her hands, and her eyes closed.
‘Aha!’ McKinnon said. ‘Asleep on the job, Nurse Magnusson.’
She looked up, startled, blinked and tried to sound indignant. ‘Asleep? Of course not.’ She peered at his armful of clothing. ‘What on earth is that for? Have you moved into the old rags trade, Archie? No, don’t tell me. It’s for that poor man in there. Maggie’s in there too—she won’t be pleased.’
‘As far as your precious Maggie is concerned, I would have thought that a little suffering for Lieutenant Ulbricht would be preferable to none. No salt tears for either Sister Morrison or the Lieutenant.’
‘Archie!’ She was on her feet. ‘Your face. Blood!’
‘As far as the Lieutenant and myself are both concerned that should please your friend.’ He wiped the blood off his face. ‘It’s not nice up top.’
‘Archie.’ She looked at him uncertainly, concern in the tired eyes.
‘It’s all right, Janet.’ He touched her shoulder and passed into A ward. Sister Morrison and Lieutenant Ulbricht were both awake and drinking tea, the sister at her desk, Ulbricht sitting up in bed: clear-eyed and rested, the German pilot, as Dr Singh had said, unquestionably had quite remarkable recuperative powers. Jamieson, fully clothed and stretched out on the top of a bed, opened an eye as McKinnon passed by.
‘‘Morning, Bo’sun. It is morning, isn’t it?’
‘Six-twenty, sir.’
‘Good lord. Selfishness, that’s what it is—I’ve been asleep for seven hours. How are things?’
‘A quiet night up top. Here, too?’
‘Must have been—no one gave me a shake.’ He looked at the bundle of clothing that McKinnon was carrying, then at Ulbricht. ‘Stars?’
‘Yes, sir. At the moment, that is. I don’t think they’ll be there for long.’
‘Mr McKinnon!’ Sister Morrison’s voice was cold, with a touch of asperity, as it usually was when addressing the Bo’sun. ‘Do you intend to drag that poor man out of bed on a night like this? He’s been shot several times.’
‘I know he’s been shot several times—or have you forgotten who picked him out of the water?’ The Bo’sun was an innately courteous man but never at his best when dealing with Sister Morrison. ‘So he’s a poor man, now—well, it’s better than being a filthy Nazi murderer. What do you mean—on a night like this?’
‘I mean the weather, of course.’ Her fists were actually clenched. Jamieson surveyed the ward deckhead.
‘What do you know about the weather? You haven’t been out of here all night. If you had been, I would have known.’ He turned a dismissive back on her and looked at Ulbricht. ‘How do you feel, Lieutenant?’
‘I have an option?’ Ulbricht smiled. ‘I feel well enough. Even if I didn’t I’m still coming. Don’t be too hard on the ward sister, Bo’sun—even your lady with a lamp in the Crimea had a pretty short way with difficult patients—but she’s overlooking my natural selfishness. I’m on this ship too.’ He climbed stiffly out of bed and, with the assistance of McKinnon and Jamieson, started to pull clothing on over his pyjamas while Sister Morrison looked on in frigid disapproval. The disapproval finally culminated in the drumming of fingertips on the table.
‘I think,’ she said, ’that we should have Dr Singh in here.’
McKinnon turned slowly and looked at her and when he spoke his voice was as expressionless as his face. ‘I don’t think it matters very much what you think, Sister. I suggest you just give a shake to Captain Bowen there and find out just how much your thinking matters.’
‘The Captain is under heavy sedation. When he regains consciousness, I shall report you for insolence.’
‘Insolence?’ McKinnon looked at her with indifference. ‘I think he would prefer that to stupidity—the stupidity of a person who is trying to endanger the San Andreas and all those aboard her. It’s a pity we don’t have any irons on this ship.’
She glared at him, made to speak, then turned as Dr Sinclair came into the ward. Sleepy-eyed and tousle-haired, he looked in mild astonishment at the spectacle before him.
‘Dr Sinclair! Thank heavens you’re here!’ Rapidly and urgently she began to explain the situation to him. ‘Those—those men want starsights or navigation or something and in spite of all my protests they insist on dragging a seriously ill man up to the bridge or wherever and—’
‘I can see what’s happening,’ Sinclair said mildly. ‘But if the Lieutenant is being dragged he’s not putting up much in the way of resistance, is he? And by no stretch of the imagination can you describe him as being seriously ill. But I do take your point, Sister. He should be under constant medical supervision.’
‘Ah! Thank you, Doctor.’ Sister Morrison came very close to permitting herself a smile. ‘So it’s back to bed for him.’
‘Well, no, not quite. A duffel coat, a pair of sea boots, my bag of tricks and I’ll go up with them. That way the Lieutenant will be under constant medical supervision.’
Even with thr
ee men lending what assistance they could, it took twice as long as expected to help Lieutenant Ulbricht as far as the Captain’s cabin. Once there, he sank heavily into the chair behind the table.
‘Thank you very much, gentlemen.’ He was very pale, his breathing shallow and abnormally rapid. ‘Sorry about that. It would seem that I am not as fit as I thought I was.’
‘Nonsense.’ Dr Sinclair was brisk. ‘You did splendidly. It’s that inferior English blood that we had to give you this morning, that’s all.’ He made free with Captain Bowen’s supplies. ‘Superior Scotch blood. Effects guaranteed.’
Ulbricht smiled faintly. ‘Isn’t there something about opening pores?’
‘You won’t be out in the open long enough to give your pores a chance to protest.’
Up on the bridge McKinnon adjusted Ulbricht’s goggles, then scarfed him so heavily above and below the goggles that not a square millimetre of skin was left exposed. When he was finished, Lieutenant Ulbricht was as immune to the weather as it was possible for anyone to be: two balaclavas and a tightly strung duffel hood made sure of that.
McKinnon went out on the starboard wing, hung a trailing lamp from the canvas windbreaker, went back inside, picked up the sextant, took Ulbricht by his right arm—the undamaged one—and led him outside. Even although he was so cocooned against the elements, even though the Bo’sun had warned him and even though he had already had an ominous foretaste of what lay in store in their brief journey across the upper deck, he was totally unprepared for the power and savagery of the wind that caught him as soon as he stepped out on the wing. His weakened limbs were similarly unprepared. He took two short sharp steps forward, and though he managed to clutch the top of the windbreaker, would probably have fallen but for McKinnon’s sustaining hand. Had he been carrying the sextant he would almost certainly have dropped it.
With McKinnon’s arm around him Ulbricht took three starsights, to the south, west and north, clumsily noting down the results as he did so. The first two sights were comparatively quick and simple: the third, to the north, took much longer and was far more difficult, for Ulbricht had to keep clearing away the ice spicules from his goggles and the sextant. When he had finished he handed the sextant back to McKinnon, leant his elbows on the after edge of the wing and stared out towards the stern, occasionally and mechanically wiping his goggles with the back of his hand. After almost twenty seconds of this McKinnon took his good arm and almost literally dragged him back into the shelter of the bridge, banging the door to behind him. Handing the sextant to Jamieson, he quickly removed Ulbricht’s duffel hood, balaclavas and goggles.
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