‘This is the U-boat captain,’ McKinnon said to Dr Sinclair. ‘He may be suffering from the bends—you know, nitrogen poisoning.’
‘Alas, Bo’sun, we have no decompression chamber aboard.’
‘I know, sir. He may just be suffering from the effects of having surfaced from a great depth. I don’t know, all I know is he’s suffering pretty badly. The rest are well enough, all they need is dry clothing.’ He turned to Jamieson who had just joined him on deck. ‘Perhaps, sir, you would be kind enough to supervise their change of clothing?’
‘You mean to make sure that they’re not carrying anything they shouldn’t be carrying?’
McKinnon smiled and turned to Patterson. ‘How are the for’ard watertight bulkheads, sir?’
‘Holding. I’ve had a look myself. Bent and buckled but holding.’
‘With your permission, sir, I’ll get a diving suit and have a look.’
‘Now? Couldn’t that wait a bit?’
‘I’m afraid waiting is the one thing we can’t afford. We can be reasonably certain that the U-boat was in contact with Trondheim right up to the moment that he signalled us to stop—I think it would be very silly of us to assume otherwise. Flannelfoot is still with us. The Germans know exactly where we are. Till now, for reasons best known to themselves, they have been treating us with kid gloves. Maybe now they’ll be feeling like taking those gloves off, I shouldn’t imagine that Admiral Doenitz will take too kindly to the idea of one of his U-boats having been sunk by a hospital ship. I think it behoves us, sir, to get out of here and with all speed. Trouble is, we’ve got to make up our minds whether to go full speed ahead or full speed astern.’
‘Ah. Yes. I see. You have a point.’
‘Yes, sir. If the hole in our bows is big enough, then if we make any speed at all I don’t see the watertight bulkheads standing up to the pressure for very long. In that case we’d have to go astern. I don’t much fancy that. It not only slows us down but it makes steering damn difficult. But it can be done. I knew of a tanker that hit a German U-boat about seven hundred miles from its port of destination. It made it—going astern all the way. But I don’t much care for the idea of going stern first all the way to Aberdeen, especially if the weather breaks up.’
‘You make me feel downright nervous, Bo’sun. With all speed, Bo’sun, as you say, with all speed. How long will this take?’
‘Just as long as it takes me to collect a rubber suit, mask and torch, then get there and back again. At the most, twenty minutes.’
McKinnon was back in fifteen minutes. Mask in one hand, torch in the other, he climbed up the gangway to where Patterson was awaiting him at the top.
‘We can go ahead, sir,’ McKinnon said. ‘Full ahead, I should think.’
‘Good, good, good. Damage relatively slight, I take it. How small is the hole?’
‘It’s not a small hole. It’s a bloody great hole, big as a barn door. There’s a ragged piece of that U-boat, about eight foot by six, embedded in our bows. Seems to be forming a pretty secure plug and I should imagine that the faster we go the more securely it will be lodged.’
‘And if we stop, or have to go astern, or run into heavy weather—I mean, what if the plug falls off?’
‘I’d be glad, sir, if you didn’t talk about such things.’
EIGHT
‘And what are you doing there?’ McKinnon looked down on the recumbent form of Janet Magnusson who, her face very pale, was lying on, not in, the bed nearest the desk where she normally sat.
‘I normally have a rest at this time of the morning.’ She tried to inject an acid tone into her voice but her heart wasn’t in it and she smiled, albeit wanly. ‘I have been badly wounded, Archie McKinnon. Thanks to you.’
‘Oh dear.’ McKinnon sat on her bedside and put his hand on her shoulder. ‘I am sorry. How—’
‘Not there.’ She pushed his hand away. ‘That’s where I’ve been wounded.’
‘Sorry again.’ He looked up at Dr Sinclair. ‘How bad is badly?’
‘Nurse Magnusson has a very slight graze on her right shoulder. Piece of shrapnel.’ Sinclair pointed to a jagged hole in the bulkhead about six feet above deck level, then indicated the scarred and pock-marked deckhead. ‘That’s where the rest of the shrapnel appears to have gone. But Nurse Magnusson was standing at the time and caught quite a bit of the blast effect. She was thrown across the bed she’s on now—it was, providentially, empty at the time—and it took us ten minutes to bring her round. Shock, that’s all.’
‘Layabout.’ McKinnon stood. ‘I’ll be back. Anybody else hurt here, Doctor?’
‘Two. At the far end of the ward. Seamen from the Argos. One in the chest, the other in the leg. Shrapnel ricocheting from the ceiling and pretty spent shrapnel at that. Didn’t even have to dig it out. Not even bandages—cotton wool and plaster.’
McKinnon looked at the man, restless and muttering, in the bed opposite. ‘Oberleutnant Klaussen—the U-boat commander. How is he?’
‘Delirious, as you can see. The trouble with him—I’ve no idea. I tend to go along with your suggestion that he must have come up from a very great depth. If that’s the case, I’m dealing with the unknown. Sorry and all that.’
‘I hardly think there’s any need to be sorry, sir. Every other doctor would be in the same boat. I don’t think anyone has ever escaped from a depth greater than two hundred and fifty feet before. If Klaussen did—well, it’s uncharted territory. There simply can’t be any literature on it.’
‘Archie.’
McKinnon turned round. Janet Magnusson was propped up on an elbow.
‘You’re supposed to be resting.’
‘I’m getting up. What are you doing with that sledgehammer and chisel in your hand?’
‘I’m going to try to open a jammed door.’
‘I see.’ She was silent for some moments while she bit her lower lip. ‘The recovery room, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Dr Singh and the two men from the Argos—the one with the multiple burns and the other with the fractured pelvis—they’re in there, aren’t they?’
‘So I’m told.’
‘Well, why don’t you go to them?’ She sounded almost angry. ‘Why stand around here blethering and doing nothing?’
‘I hardly think that’s quite fair, Nurse Magnusson.’ Jamieson, who was accompanying McKinnon and Sinclair, spoke in tones of gentle reproof. ‘Doing nothing? The Bo’sun does more than the whole lot of us put together.’
‘I’m thinking perhaps there’s no great hurry, Janet,’ McKinnon said. ‘People have been banging on that door for the past fifteen minutes and there’s been no reply. Could mean anything or nothing. Point is, there was no point in trying to force that door till there was a doctor at hand and Dr Sinclair has just finished in the wards.’
‘What you mean—what you really mean, Archie—is that you don’t think the people inside the recovery room will be requiring the services of a doctor.’
‘I hope I’m wrong but, yes, that’s what I’m afraid of.’
She sank back in her bed. ‘As Mr Jamieson didn’t say, I was talking out of turn. I’m sorry.’
‘There’s really nothing to be sorry about.’ McKinnon turned away and went into Ward A. The first person to catch his attention was Margaret Morrison. Even paler than Janet Magnusson had been, she was sitting in her chair behind her desk while Sister Maria carefully tied a bandage around her head. McKinnon didn’t immediately go to her but went to the far right-hand side of the ward where Lieutenant Ulbricht was sitting up in his bed while Bowen and Kennet lay flat in theirs.
‘Three more victims,’ Sinclair said. ‘Well, unfortunates, I should say. While the blast in Ward B went upwards I’m afraid it was slightly downwards here…’
McKinnon looked at Ulbricht. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ Ulbricht had a thick bandage round his neck.
‘I’ll tell you what’s the matter with him,’ Sinclair said. ‘Luck. The devil’
s own luck. A piece of shrapnel—it must have been as sharp as a razor—sliced through the side of his neck. Another quarter-inch to the right and it would have sliced through the carotid artery as well and then he’d have been very much the late Lieutenant Ulbricht.’
Ulbricht looked at McKinnon with little in the way of expression on his face. ‘I thought you sent us down here for our own safety.’
‘That’s what I thought, too. I was certain they’d concentrate their fire on the bridge. I’m making no excuses but I don’t think I miscalculated. I think the U-boat’s gun crew panicked. I’m sure that Klaussen gave no instructions to fire into the hull.’
‘Klaussen?’
‘Oberleutnant. The captain. He survived. He seems fairly ill.’
‘How many survivors altogether?’
‘Six.’
‘And the rest you sent to the bottom.’
‘I’m the guilty party, if that’s what you mean. I don’t feel particularly guilty. But I’m responsible, yes.’
‘I suppose that makes two of us. Responsible but not guilty.’ Ulbricht shrugged and seemed disinclined to continue the conversation. McKinnon moved to the Captain’s bed.
‘Sorry to hear you’ve been hurt again, sir.’
‘Me and Kennet. Left thighs. Both of us. Dr Sinclair tells me it’s only a scratch and as I can’t see it I have to take his word for it. Doesn’t feel like a scratch, I can tell you. Well, Archie my boy, you’ve done it. I knew you would. If it weren’t for those damned bandages I’d shake hands with you. Congratulations. You must feel pretty good about this.’
‘I don’t feel good at all, sir. If there were any survivors and if they managed to find a sealed compartment they’ll be gasping out their lives—now—on the floor of the Norwegian Sea.’
‘There’s that, of course, there’s that. But not to reproach yourself, Archie. Them or us. Unpleasant, but still well done.’ Bowen adroitly switched the subject. ‘Building up speed, aren’t we? Limited damage up front, I take it.’
‘Far from limited, sir. We’re badly holed. But there’s a large chunk of the U-boat’s casing embedded in that hole. Let’s just hope it stays there.’
‘We can but pray, Bo’sun, we can but pray. And regardless of how you feel, every person aboard this boat is deeply in your debt.’
‘I’ll see you later, sir.’
He turned away, looked at Margaret Morrison, then at Dr Sinclair. ‘Is she hurt? Badly, I mean.’
‘She’s the worst of the lot but nothing dangerous, you understand. She was sitting by Captain Bowen’s bedside at the time and was hit twice. Nasty gash on the upper right arm and a minor scalp wound—that’s the one Sister Maria has just finished bandaging.’
‘Shouldn’t she be in bed?’
‘Yes. I tried to insist on it but I can tell you I won’t be doing it again. How about you trying?’
‘No, thank you.’ McKinnon approached the girl, who looked at him with reproachful brown eyes that were slightly dulled with pain.
‘This is all your fault, Archie McKinnon.’
McKinnon sighed. ‘Exactly what Janet said to me. It’s difficult to please everybody. I’m very, very sorry.’
‘And so you should be. Not for this, though. The physical pain, I can tell you, is nothing compared to the mental hurt. You deceived me. Our greatly respected Bo’sun is exactly what he accused me of being—a fibber.’
‘Oh dear. Long-suffering Bo’sun back in court again. What am I supposed to have done wrong now?’
‘Not only that but you’ve made me feel very, very foolish.’
‘I have? I would never do that.’
‘You did. Remember on the bridge you suggested—in jest, of course—that you might fight the U-boat with a fusillade of stale bread and old potatoes. Well, something like that.’
‘Ah!’
‘Yes, ah! Remember that emotional scene on the bridge—well, emotional on my part, I cringe when I think about it—when I begged you to fight them and fight them and fight them. You remember, don’t you?’
‘Yes, I think I do.’
‘He thinks he does! You had already made up your mind to fight them, hadn’t you?’
‘Well, yes.’
‘Well, yes,’ she mimicked. ‘You had already made up your mind to ram that U-boat.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me, Archie?’
‘Because you might have casually mentioned it to somebody who might have casually mentioned it—unknowingly, of course—to Flannelfoot who would far from casually have mentioned it to the U-boat captain who would have made damn certain that he would never put himself in a position where he could be rammed. You might even—again unknowingly—have mentioned it directly to Flannelfoot.’
She made no attempt to conceal the hurt in her eyes. ‘So you don’t trust me. You said you did.’
‘I trust you absolutely. I did say that.’
‘Then why—’
‘It was one of those then-and-now things. Then you were Sister Morrison. I didn’t know there was a Margaret Morrison. I know now.’
‘Ah!’ She pursed her lips, then smiled, clearly mollified. ‘I see.’
McKinnon left her, joined Dr Sinclair and Jamieson, and together they went to the door of the recovery room. Jamieson was carrying with him an electric drill, a hammer and some tapered wooden pegs. Jamieson said: ‘You saw the entry hole made by the shell when you went up to examine the bows?’
‘Yes. Just on—well, an inch or two above—the waterline. Could be water inside. Or not. It’s impossible to say.’
‘How high up?’
‘Eighteen inches, say. Anybody’s guess.’
Jamieson plugged in his drill and pressed the trigger. The tungsten carbide bit sank easily into the heavy steel of the door. Sinclair said: ‘What happens if there’s water behind?’
‘Tap in one of those wooden pegs, then try higher up.’
‘Through,’ Jamieson said. He withdrew the bit. ‘Clear.’
McKinnon struck the steel handle twice with the sledge. The handle did not even budge a fraction of an inch. On the third blow it sheared off and fell to the deck.
‘Pity,’ McKinnon said. ‘But we have to find out.’
Jamieson shrugged. ‘No option. Torch?’
‘Please.’ Jamieson left and was back in two minutes with the torch, followed by McCrimmon carrying the gas cylinder and a lamp on the end of a wandering lead. Jamieson lit the oxy-acetylene flame and began to carve a semi-circle round the space where the handle had been: McCrimmon plugged in the wandering lead and the wire-caged lamp burned brightly.
Jamieson said from behind his plastic face-shield: ‘We’re only assuming that this is where the door is jammed.’
‘If we’re wrong we’ll cut away round the hinges. I don’t think we’ll have to. The door isn’t buckled in any way. It’s nearly always the lock or latch that’s jammed.’
The compartment was filled with stinging acrid smoke when Jamieson finally straightened. He gave the lock a couple of blows with the side of his fist, then desisted.
‘I’m sure I’ve cut through but the damn thing doesn’t seem to want to fall away.’
‘The latch is still in its socket.’ McKinnon tapped the door with his sledge, not heavily, and the semi-circular piece of metal fell away inside. He hit the door again, heavily this time, and it gave an inch. With a second blow it gave several more inches. He laid aside the sledge and pushed against the door until, squeaking and protesting, it was almost wide open. He took the wandering lead from McCrimmon and went inside.
There was water on the deck, not much, perhaps two inches. Bulkheads and deckhead had been heavily starred and pock-marked by shrapnel from the exploding shell. The entrance hole formed by the shell in the outer bulkhead was a jagged circle not more than a foot above the deck.
The two men from the Argos were still lying in their beds while Dr Singh, head bowed to his chest, was sitting in a small armchair. All three me
n seemed unharmed, unmarked. The Bo’sun brought the light closer to Dr Singh’s face. Whatever shrapnel may have been embedded in his body, none had touched his face. The only sign of anything untoward were tiny trickles of blood from his ears and nose. McKinnon handed the lamp to Dr Sinclair, who stooped over his dead colleague.
‘Good God! Dr Singh.’ He examined him for a few seconds, then straightened. ‘That this should happen to a fine doctor, a fine man like this.’
‘You didn’t really expect to find anything else, did you, Doctor?’
‘No. Not really. Had to be this or something like this.’ He examined, briefly, the two men lying in their beds, shook his head and turned away. ‘Still comes as a bit of a shock.’ It was obvious that he was referring to Dr Singh.
McKinnon nodded. ‘I know. I don’t want to sound callous, Doctor, I know it might sound that way, but—you won’t be needing those men any more? I mean, no postmortems, nothing of that kind.’
‘Good lord, no. Death must have been instantaneous. Concussion. If it’s any consolation, they died without knowing.’ He paused. ‘You might look through their clothing, Bo’sun. Or maybe it’s in their effects or perhaps Captain Andropolous has the details.’
‘You mean names, birth-dates, things like that, sir?’
‘Yes. I have to fill out the death certificates.’
‘I’ll attend to that.’
‘Thank you, Bo’sun.’ Sinclair essayed a smile but it could hardly have been rated as a success. ‘As usual, I’ll leave the grisly part to you.’ With that he was gone, a man glad to be gone. The Bo’sun turned to Jamieson.
‘Could I borrow McCrimmon, sir?’
‘Of course.’
‘McCrimmon, go and find Curran and Trent, will you? Tell them what’s happened. Curran will know what size of canvases to bring.’
‘Needles and thread, Bo’sun?’
‘Curran is a sailmaker. Just leave it to him. And you could tell him that it’s a clean job this time.’
San Andreas Page 18
