But Villar was the admiral’s secretary, and he considered that that placed him in a different sphere entirely.
Everyone had a story somewhere inside him, and Villar would often make it his business to uncover it.
He turned his head slightly as something squeaked, a damp leather wiping one of the thick glass scuttles.
Villar tapped his teeth with his pencil. There was probably a story there, he thought, although he doubted that he would ever take the trouble to discover it.
The rating who was cleaning the glass turned and looked at him.
‘Anything else, sir?’
Villar regarded him severely. ‘That cabinet. Better being in here than out on that cold deck, right?’
Ordinary Seaman Alan Mowbray was young, and looked no more than a boy, although Villar knew he was almost nineteen. Even in his working overalls, he always looked smart, his hair neatly combed and clean. How he had ended up in a battlecruiser was beyond Villar. He had been listed as a former officer candidate who had been rejected, ‘dipped’, somewhere along the way. Villar had often wondered why. Mowbray had qualities equal to many of those officers Villar met every day in the wardroom, a pleasant manner, and he was quietly well-spoken. Perhaps he had simply lacked the ambition of his classmates.
He watched him polishing the cabinet. He had delicate, almost feminine hands, but he seemed to have fitted into the crowded, roughly ruled world of the messdecks. Otherwise, Villar would have heard about it.
He said suddenly, ‘What did you do before you joined up, Mowbray, if anything?’
The youth looked at him. ‘I was a student, sir.’ He hesitated. ‘An art student.’
‘I see. And were you very disappointed when you lost your chance of a commission?’
He considered it. ‘It was something that happened, sir. I’m not sure what I really wanted.’ He continued his polishing.
‘Were you any good? As an artist, I mean?’
The duster stopped again. ‘I think so, sir.’ He looked up, frowning, vulnerable. ‘I still do some work when I can get the time.’
Villar was losing interest in the conversation. ‘You’ll have to show me one of your masterpieces some day.’
He looked round as someone rapped on the door.
‘Yes?’
It was a total stranger, a sub-lieutenant so new that the single wavy stripe on his sleeve looked like pure gold.
‘I was looking for the Commander, sir. I’ve just come aboard to join. Sub-Lieutenant Peter Forbes . . .’
‘Wrong place. I’m the admiral’s secretary.’ The phone rang by his elbow, shattering the sudden silence.
Villar snatched it up. It was Howe, the flag lieutenant.
‘The Boss wants you down aft, chop-chop!’
But Villar barely heard him. He was looking at the newly appointed subbie and the rating, who was on his knees by the cabinet.
Forbes was saying, ‘Alan, it’s you! I didn’t know you were in Reliant! You should have told me . . . written or something!’
The boy stood up, twisting the duster in his hands.
‘I’m sorry, Peter . . . I mean, sir. I couldn’t . . .’
Villar said softly into the telephone, ‘I’m on my way, Flags!’ But he was still observing them covertly, saw them reach out and touch hands; sensed the pain and the dismay at this encounter. And something more.
He put down the telephone loudly. ‘I’m going that way, Sub. I’ll show you,’ and to the young seaman, ‘You carry on here. This won’t take long. Might need you.’
He saw their quick exchange of glances and was satisfied. There was, indeed, a story.
And while Petty Officer Long packed the captain’s case for his trip south, and considered the change he had seen in him, and as Lieutenant Dick Rayner of Toronto dubiously agreed to the proposal of a run ashore with Eddy Buck, Reliant carried them all. Twelve hundred officers and men, from Rear-Admiral Stagg to the lowliest rating, they were as strong only as the ship which ruled their lives.
The taxi must have been built long before the war. Every time the driver changed gear, it sounded as though it might be the last. The night was pitch dark, and the shades on the headlights, conforming with the air raid precautions, made it impossible to see where they were going. Rayner wiped the window with his sleeve and peered at a darkened house as it loomed above the road.
‘Where the hell is this place, Eddy?’
Buck said hopefully, ‘I think we’re nearly there, Dick.’
Rayner grimaced in the darkness. ‘Yeah? Well, I think we’re lost!’
It had all sounded straightforward, but then most things suggested by Buck usually did. It was the Malcolm Hotel, ‘just a few miles up the Queensferry Road’. There would be music and dancing. Mostly men from the local army camp, and of course girls, from as far away as Dunfermline, which Buck had made sound like Las Vegas.
The driver, withdrawn to the point of surliness, had made it clear from the start: pay in advance, and double fare for the return trip to Rosyth. Buck had dismissed it, saying, ‘You can always get a lift back with somebody, army or R.A.F., easy.’ It was only later that he admitted he had only been to this hotel once before, and that had been in broad daylight.
Rayner said, ‘We should have stayed aboard, or gone across to that cruiser for a drink. It would have been more fun than this.’
At least it wasn’t raining, for a change. A sort of wet mist clung to the windscreen; not that it mattered, Rayner thought, there was nothing to see, anyway.
He had been intending to write home when Buck had badgered him into going ashore for a run. He had wanted to tell his parents about his experience, even though he knew there wasn’t a cat in hell’s chance of it getting past the censor. He only knew that he wanted to confide in them, to share the fact that he had killed two Germans, two airmen like himself. Not to make excuses, or justify his action. War wasn’t like that . . .
Buck said, ‘Ahah. I recognize that, Dick. Not long now!’
Rayner grinned. ‘You and your goddamned short cuts!’
It was funny when you thought about it. Two young men from the opposite ends of the earth groping around in Scotland for some momentary release from machines and routine, boredom, and sudden danger.
He would write to them about that.
He heard the driver muttering something, and then Buck saying, ‘Some fool parked on the corner. Bloody dangerous, with no lights.’
Rayner said, ‘Well, it’s not exactly busy around here, is it?’
They groped past the car, which was pointing the other way. Somebody who could still get gas, he thought, in spite of the severe rationing.
He reached out and jabbed the driver’s arm. ‘Stop the taxi!’
The driver applied the brakes. ‘What d’you see, man?’
It was the same feeling, ice cold and alert, an instinct.
Buck said, ‘Oh, for God’s sake. Can’t you wait till we get there?’
But Rayner was out of the taxi, his shoes slipping on loose stones as he crossed the road toward the darkened car.
It all happened in a second, even though his mind recorded every small fragment, like touching down to land, twisting to avoid an unexpected burst of flak. He wrenched open the door and saw the man staring at him, his eyes wild in the safety light; he was lashing out with his fist but Rayner scarcely felt the blow. Instead, he saw the girl, bent back in the passenger’s seat, her skirt dragged up over her legs, one shoulder bare where her dress had been ripped.
She seemed to be trying to scream, or speak, her mute terror matched only by her disbelief.
Rayner tasted blood on his mouth, and was suddenly, blindly angry. ‘You bastard! You son of a bitch!’ He felt the pain lance up his arm with the force of the blow, and was vaguely aware that Buck was trying to reach round him to lend a hand.
Rayner did not need a hand from anybody.
The man was falling from the car, hitting out wildly, his fury giving way to fear as Rayner hi
t him again, and again. Buck called, ‘Easy, you mad bugger! He’s out for the count!’
Rayner was on the other side, wrenching the door open. She made no attempt to resist as he put his arms round her, nor did she utter a sound as he attempted to cover her legs with her skirt. Only her eyes moved, their expression hidden, shadowed, although Rayner sensed her realization, the shock, when she allowed herself to believe that she was safe.
She stood beside him on the road. Rayner dragged off his blue raincoat and guided each of her arms in turn into the sleeves, covering her with the coat, then buttoning it slowly, his fingers hesitant as they touched the skin where her dress had been torn.
He said, ‘That’s better,’ and to Buck, ‘Get the taxi, Eddy.’
Buck said, ‘He’s done a bunk. A big help, he was!’
She looked at the inert shape on the ground. ‘The hotel is just round the corner.’ She spoke very carefully, as if afraid of what it might arouse. ‘It was a birthday party. There are quite a few of our people there, but I had to get back. He offered me a lift.’ She pointed suddenly, and the cuff of Rayner’s raincoat slipped over her hand. ‘My purse is in there. Could you get it, please?’
She swayed slightly, and Rayner held her gently upright while Buck recovered the purse.
Buck reached into the car again and removed the ignition key. ‘I’ll ring the cops, Dick.’
They walked around the bend, and there was the hotel. It was not much of a place, and there was certainly no music or dancing, not this particular evening, in any case.
They pushed through the smoky black-out curtains and into the harsh light. There were several people there, most of them in uniform, some of them nurses. One of the latter was standing by a birthday cake, and Rayner thought irrelevantly that it must have taken all of their rations to produce it. He had learned a lot since coming to Britain.
She turned, and he saw her face for the first time. She was pretty, with hair as fair as his own.
Then she took the handkerchief from his reefer pocket and dabbed his mouth, very gently but firmly. ‘You’ll have a bad bruise there tomorrow.’
Buck grinned. ‘So will that bastard outside!’
She glanced down and saw the wings on Rayner’s sleeve. It seemed to surprise, even discomfit her. ‘You’re a flier. I – I thought – when I saw the uniform . . .’
Everybody was crowding round, asking questions, wanting to help; someone handed her a glass of something. In the next bar, Rayner could hear another voice speaking on the telephone, asking for the police.
He said gently, ‘Hey, what’s the big deal? Don’t you like fliers?’ It was something to say, to hold on to the moment. She was trying to swallow the drink, and he felt the senseless anger again when he saw the scratches on her throat and cheek.
She choked, and eventually said, ‘No . . . it’s not that. I work at the new hospital . . . it’s not far from here. It’s for recuperation . . . burns. We get a lot of fliers sent to us.’
He said, ‘Yeah. Off the beaten track,’ and could not disguise his bitterness. He had known pilots who had been badly burned, disfigured, who were sent to remote places like this, where they wouldn’t embarrass people.
He said, ‘That man. Did you know him?’
‘I don’t think so. He knew I was a nurse . . . must have been listening.’ She closed her eyes as if to erase the memory. ‘You must never tell them you’re a nurse. They think you’re anybody’s.’
Someone called, ‘I’ll drive you back right now, Andy!’
It was getting out of hand. Rayner heard doors banging, the authoritative voices which differed very little from cops in Toronto.
She was holding his arm, searching for the words, like people being parted at a railway station, when those words would never come.
She said, ‘I’ll send you your coat. I don’t even know . . .’
‘Dick Rayner. I’m in Reliant.’ He could almost read the warning posters. Careless talk costs lives! Be like Dad, Keep Mum! But he did not care.
‘I’ll call you. Tomorrow.’ He saw her uncertainty, the fear and shock coming back. ‘I don’t want to lose you. Not now.’
She said, very softly, ‘I’m Andrea Collins.’ Again, she attempted to smile. ‘My friends call me Andy.’
She gripped his arm so tightly then that he could feel her pain, her revulsion.
‘He tried to rape me . . .’ Then she fainted, and would have fallen but for Rayner’s arms around her.
‘It’s all right, Lieutenant. We’ll take care of her.’ The speaker was an older nurse; she must have been very pretty when she was young, he thought. She was the one who was having a birthday celebration.
‘Take this card,’ she said. ‘It’s the staff quarters. That was a fine thing you did.’
Then suddenly the place was empty, except for Buck and two large policemen.
One of the constables said, ‘Did I hear ye say H.M.S. Reliant, sir? Now there’s a thing, eh, Jamie? A real hero!’ He fixed the landlord with a stare. ‘A bottle of your best, Alex.’ He beamed at the two naval officers. ‘An’ then I’ll be troubling you gentlemen for a wee statement.’ He shook Rayner’s hand warmly. ‘But first, the malt. And dinna fret aboot the ship. We’ll take ye back.’
Rayner looked at his sleeve, remembering how she had gripped it. Then he grinned at his friend. Even Eddy would never be able to top this for a run ashore.
My friends call me Andy.
He said, ‘Well, I’ll be damned.’
And they all laughed.
The Cathedral Church of St Thomas à Becket was small, even intimate, when compared with its contemporaries in other cities, but in the years of war it had risen to become a powerful symbol to all who knew it. During the relentless and continuous bombing of the first bitter months, when the city had seen its famous Guildhall reduced to a smoking shell, and streets and whole neighbourhoods were flattened, it held out hope, and gave strength to Portsmouth, to survive, to eventually fight back. Like H.M.S. Victory in her dry dock, with most of the buildings around her either blasted to rubble or burned to the ground, the cathedral was like a beacon.
On this bright, cold morning, it was almost full, the congregation consisting of senior officers, two Members of Parliament, government officials, and a small group of men and women, some very old, who still managed to join in the well-known hymns, their medals, from another war, making a brave display in this place which had known and honoured so many heroes.
Toward the rear of the cathedral sat most of the younger naval officers, many from ships in the dockyard. Sherbrooke was standing beside a massive major of marines, and glanced round briefly at the others. Probably detailed off to attend, to make up the numbers at this service, which must have been arranged with an almost unseemly haste.
The Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth, read the lesson, and the senior chaplain gave a short but moving address. Sherbrooke recalled the old man he had last seen at Rosyth, and found it hard to reconcile the memory with the hero whose life was now being celebrated.
They would never have dared to hold an assembly like this in those early days of the war. So many important people under one roof would have been tempting more than fate.
He had been at sea when that last raid had been launched against the city and its dockyard. Over three hundred bombers had kept up an almost continuous onslaught for most of the night, and many people had been killed and injured, and over three thousand made homeless. One stick of bombs had fallen across the Point, where his father had a small house overlooking the Solent. He had kept an old telescope on the verandah, so that he could watch the comings and goings of warships, most of which he knew by sight.
They must have died together, instantly. It was little consolation.
Portsmouth had erected a memorial for those who had died, and he wondered if he should walk down and see it. He glanced around at the busts and the memorial plaques, illustrious names, victories to match, the very history of a city and a navy.
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br /> Reliant was a Pompey ship, but like most major war vessels, she seldom came here. Even with growing air support and strong anti-aircraft batteries and barrage balloons, there was always the risk of a hit-and-run raid, when a battlecruiser in dock would be too rich a target to miss.
He looked down at the card in his hand. The last hymn would be For Those in Peril On The Sea. He smiled privately. It was just about the only hymn sailors spared their own crude translation.
He wondered how Frazier was coping. He had looked very much on edge at their last meeting. It was something personal; it had to be. Something outside the world of the ship, something beyond his own influence or comprehension. If you had a wife or family, and were separated by war . . . He stopped the thoughts right there. He had neither.
And after this, another convoy. The opportunity to exercise the ship in southern waters, without the constant threat of U-Boat attacks. To get to know her better, to put names to all those faces who passed him, or who chose to avoid his eyes.
He recalled his flight south from Scotland, in an R.A.F. Lysander, with a crew so casual and cheerful they could have been on a holiday jaunt. To them, he had been just so much cargo, a passing responsibility. Stagg certainly had a lot of pull, although it had only extended one way. He would have to return to Rosyth by train.
The cathedral seemed to quiver as the combined voices of servicemen and women rose with those of the veterans who had attended this memorial service because they had been a part of it, and their lives had been touched by the man whose life and death were commemorated.
For those in peril on the sea.
He was surprised that it could still move him.
He heard someone sob as the organ died away, and glanced across the aisle. Almost hidden by a pillar, he recognized her, and saw that she was looking at him. And yet, he had not seen her before this. Perhaps she had wanted it that way.
She raised her hymn card, and smiled. Almost shyly, nervously.
He picked up his cap and waited for the great and the powerful to lead the way down to the doors, back to their various messes for a drink, and the chosen few to something more substantial. The veterans walked together, one in a wheelchair, craning his head to peer up at the trappings and the past glories.
Battlecruiser (1997) Page 12
