Battlecruiser (1997)

by Reeman, Douglas

  Rayner saw some of the men grinning, and he heard an ironic cheer from one of the gun mountings. He hoped Sherbrooke would hear it, too.

  ‘I have to tell you that it was not without cost. Reliant had twenty-eight casualties, half of which were fatal. Montagu’s losses must have been considerable. It is something we have to accept, but to which we can never become accustomed.’

  He heard Niven say, ‘Told you. I was about right!’

  Rayner did not reply. He wanted to hit him, like the man in the car, who had been trying to rape the girl. My girl.

  ‘There will be an issue of rum shortly.’ Rayner thought he heard or imagined a catch in Sherbrooke’s voice, distorted as it was over the tannoy. ‘I am very proud of you.’

  Buck had joined them, in an unusually serious mood. ‘That’s what I like about him. No bullshit.’ He did not look at the other pilot. ‘Not like some!’

  He would tell Andy about it when they next met. Why am I so sure we will? Don’t write about it, tell her. She would understand, better than most, what it cost men who had to fight, and give, and keep on giving. Like the pilot called Jamie.

  He leaned out to see all that he could. There was no cheering, nothing heroic or dramatic. They had lost some men they had known, but they had survived. Until the next action. And now there would be an extra rum ration. The silence made it all the more memorable, he thought. As he was about to turn away he saw two seamen coming around the after turret, who almost collided.

  Obviously, they were seeing one another for the first time since the cease-fire gongs had sounded. One was carrying a broom, the other a canvas bucket. But they stopped, oblivious to everyone else and to the silent, shrouded shapes laid by the rail to await burial, and then they shook hands, as if they were meeting on a street or in some country lane. Rayner thought he would tell her that, too. It said it all.

  Surgeon Commander Farleigh stood by the chart room door, and observed the activities of some seamen clearing up broken glass. He was still wearing his white coat, and there were spots of blood on it.

  He said, ‘Two amputations, sir. I did not count the cuts and bruises brigade. They’ll mend quickly enough.’ He held out a list. ‘Here are the others.’

  Sherbrooke reached out for it, but Stagg, who was sitting on the chart locker, said, ‘Here, let me see it.’

  Sherbrooke watched the flecked eyes moving over the list.

  Stagg asked, ‘And my flag lieutenant died instantly?’

  Farleigh regarded him without expression. ‘He was directly beneath the point of impact, sir.’ He sounded almost surprised at the question. ‘An explosion like that would leave nothing of the body. Total disintegration. Oblivion.’

  Stagg nodded gravely, and returned the list to Sherbrooke.

  ‘I see. I shall write to his father, the admiral. A sad loss. I shall tell him what a promising officer Stephen Howe turned out to be.’

  Sherbrooke glanced through the list, able to put faces to most of the names, and recalling Stagg’s vicious comments on Lieutenant Howe. A violent, terrible death had given the ‘jellyfish’ unexpected status.

  Stagg stood up. ‘I shall be down aft if you need me,’ and to the surgeon, ‘Good work.’

  Sherbrooke heard someone laugh, probably in the W/T office; the shock was dissipating.

  He saw the correspondent writing rapidly in his notebook. He seemed to feel Sherbrooke’s gaze, and looked up, his eyes like slate in the reflected glare.

  ‘Not too many casualties, Captain? In those circumstances you might have suffered far worse, I’d have thought.’

  He recalled Montagu’s failure to acknowledge the order to avoid action, and later, Stagg’s insistence that Reliant should remain on the same course. But for the gunnery department’s quick observations and reactions, Reliant could have been crippled before a target had been selected. Could have been. Might have been . . .

  He was tired and feeling the strain, a bruising of mind and body, like that evening in London after the bomb had fallen.

  He said, ‘I accept that. Did you get what you wanted?’

  Drury looked away.

  ‘More than enough. I recorded some of it, but the first message will tell my people what to expect . . . what to do.’

  Sherbrooke said, ‘You make it sound easy.’ His hands were very steady, something he observed without emotion.

  ‘We can’t afford to clutter up valuable space on naval wireless, Captain. We use codes, a bit like your chaps.’

  A messenger called, ‘Chaplain requests permission to come to the bridge, sir.’

  Sherbrooke saw Yorke, the yeoman of signals, pause in polishing his telescope and give a grimace. They all knew what that was for.

  Sherbrooke said, ‘Ask him to wait, please. I have things to do at the moment.’

  Drury raised his book as though he had found something else to write, and then decided against it. He looked instead at the broken glass, the smoke still rising above the place where he had felt and heard the shell explode. He had thought for a moment that the whole bridge would go. He must have dropped to his knees, a reaction born of experience, just by being with, and watching, men at war. Men with faces slashed by flying glass, somebody screaming, and screaming, until he could feel his mind cringe from the sound as if in physical pain.

  When he had opened his eyes again, Sherbrooke had been by the voicepipes with the navigating officer; order had been returning; the effects of the explosion and another alongside were being assessed and dealt with. He almost smiled. I have things to do at the moment.

  And he had seen the signals petty officer they called a yeoman make a disparaging face at one of his team. They shared the humour and the reason for the joke; they knew, also, that Sherbrooke would be down there with them when the bodies went over the side. It would make a moving story, broadcast, and in print.

  He said casually, ‘I understand you know somebody in the D.O.I., Captain?’

  He felt Sherbrooke’s eyes settle on him. ‘Yes.’

  Stagg must have been talking. Surprisingly, he felt no resentment. It could not hurt her.

  Drury understood. He was not getting any more. Yet.

  ‘Signal in W/T, sir. Immediate.’

  Drury watched the grave profile for some revelation of strain or anxiety.

  Sherbrooke said, ‘Tell them to send it up right away.’

  Frazier appeared on the bridge, his white uniform as filthy as any stoker’s. He had come to report the damage which he had investigated for himself.

  The C.P.O. Telegraphist, Cliff Elphick, who had been born and raised in Rutland, which was about as far as you could get from the sea in England, brought the signal in person.

  Sherbrooke took it, remembering all the others.

  Frazier said, ‘Shall I inform the admiral, sir?’

  Sherbrooke looked at him, and then smiled. ‘Not yet, John.’ He opened it, and said, ‘It’s addressed to Reliant. The ship.’

  He listened to the beat of engines, the muffled clatter of hammers, the sound of temporary repairs.

  Soon he would go and bury their dead.

  He said, ‘It’s from the Commander-in-Chief, on board H.M.S. Warspite.’

  Yorke’s leading signalman would like that; he had served in the old Warspite. He glanced around at their faces, seeing only the ship, another veteran.

  ‘It reads, Congratulations Reliant. You turned the tide. They’re on the run.’ He folded the signal. ‘Ends.’

  Only Admiral Cunningham, the C-in-C, would find the time to make a signal like that. He had never forgotten what it was like; what it cost.

  ‘Take over, Pilot.’ He looked at Frazier. ‘Come with me. We’ll tell the admiral together.’

  Drury watched them leave. He had enough for the moment; anything else would be an intrusion. He grinned, and dragged a shred of cloth from his torn sleeve. Even for me.

  14

  No Turning Back

  Andrea Collins paused by a window that overlooked
the hospital driveway and adjusted some flowers in a vase, left, she thought, by a visitor. In this place, a touch of colour was always welcome.

  She could see her reflection faintly in the window, and made certain that her hair was properly confined. Not too flippant, as one old matron had called it.

  She was aware of warmth on her skin through the glass, the sun brilliant on these drab buildings, the shrubs, and the clothing of a few visitors who were getting into the bus that would take them to the station. They were parents, for the most part: few of the men who were brought here seemed to be married. And they all had the same anxious, drained faces. She often wondered if they were more concerned for themselves than those whom they were visiting.

  She turned and looked back along the passageway at the line of doors, where the smell of fresh paint marked the retreat of the carpenters and workmen who had finally completed a whole new wing. She had noticed that most of the patients avoided contact of any kind with the workmen. As if they were ashamed of what they had become, afraid of kindness, or the eyes of people they did not know or see every day.

  The construction of an additional wing meant more casualties were expected. Here they could offer better facilities, and a saline bath unit equal to the one where she had trained, at East Grinstead. It seemed a million years ago now.

  She thought of the letter she had received from the Canadian airman, although she had no idea where it had begun its travels. He had been careful to say nothing about the climate or anything else that might arouse the attention of a censor.

  She had read it several times and was still surprised that it had moved her so much. It was a sincere, simple letter, but it had been like hearing him talk. A strong, outwardly confident naval officer; she had seen that strength that night at the hotel when the ‘respectable citizen’ had attacked her. He never mentioned the incident any more, as if he wanted to shield her from the memory, and had never seemed to expect any gratitude for what he had done. But there was also a sort of gentleness, which came through in his letter, a quality she had found rare in the young men who came and went here, who wanted only to be again as they had been once, and could not come to terms with what they were.

  Dick Rayner had been more concerned about his dead crewman than himself. He had seemed unable to accept it, to leave the blame elsewhere. She had heard some of them making jokes about death. What did you expect? D’you want to live forever? Or, you shouldn’t have joined if you can’t take a joke! Maybe it helped them in some way, callous though it seemed.

  She paused at another window; the bus had gone. As if to a signal, two figures in blue dressing gowns emerged from the opposite building and walked amongst the flowers, as if they hadn’t a care in the world. She knew them both, and had been proud of the courage with which they had ticked off the dates as their transfer to a final recuperation hospital drew near.

  One of them, a veteran of twenty-one, had told her, ‘You have to see the world through your own eyes. It hasn’t changed. Try not to think what they see when they look at you!’

  Did he really believe that?

  Two nights ago, sitting in her small room with her feet bare after standing all day, she had been half-listening to her wireless, and the well-modulated tones of the announcer recounting the latest news of the war in North Africa. He had mentioned some of the ships which had been taking part, and she had heard Reliant’s name mentioned, and that she had been involved. No details, not when, where or why; but she had sat upright in her chair, shocked, and deeply apprehensive.

  The following day, the news had broken in every headline around the country. The German forces and their Italian allies in North Africa had surrendered: the legendary Afrika Korps was defeated. As Churchill proclaimed, ‘Africa is ours!’

  What would it mean now? The new wards and operating theatres told their own story. There would be an allied invasion somewhere. Wherever it was, there would be more casualties . . . many more.

  She heard somebody whistling softly and, without looking, knew it was Nobby, one of the senior orderlies. He must have another name, but to everybody from surgeon to trainee nurse and to the patients themselves, he was simply Nobby.

  ‘Hello, Sister! I was just thinkin’ about you!’ He regarded her cheerfully. ‘I often does, of course!’

  A Londoner. How he had arrived up here in Scotland was another mystery.

  ‘Trouble, Nobby?’

  He shrugged. ‘The usual. Some ambulances are coming in. We just had the buzz about them, but everything’s lined up an’ ready.’ Then he grinned. ‘That young feller who come ’ere to see you, Sister. The Canadian chap?’

  ‘What about him?’ She tried to remain calm. It was like hearing the news on the wireless.

  Nobby beamed at her. ‘Reliant, the battlecruiser, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘She’s in, Sister! ’Ere, back in Rosyth!’

  ‘But how can that be? I heard just a few days ago that the ship was involved in the North African campaign. I heard it.’

  ‘Well, she’s ’ere now, large as life. I ’eard that. One of the drivers told me. Bit knocked about, she is – probably ’ere for repairs.’

  She stared at him. How badly knocked about? She thought of the announcer’s voice and the glaring headlines. Africa is ours. It was suddenly meaningless.

  One of the senior surgeons appeared in the passageway, and glanced at her over his glasses.

  ‘Ah, Sister Collins. Glad you’re still about. I know you should have been off duty an hour ago. But these ambulances. Got waylaid somewhere. Can’t rely on anything.’ He always spoke in short, staccato sentences, even in the operating theatre.

  ‘That’s all right. I – I was just saying . . .’

  He peered at her. ‘Been overdoing it? I’ve had my eye on you. No good to anybody if you crack up.’ He broke off and stared out of the window. ‘Here they are. I wonder what the excuse will be this time.’ He strode away, calling over his shoulder, ‘Get things started, Nobby!’

  The orderly said, ‘Course, sir,’ then he looked at her again. ‘I reckon ’e’s right, though, for once. You ’ave been on the go, ever since that disgusting court case. We’d ’ave known what to do with the likes of ’im down in Paddington Green!’

  It was a well-practised drill. The ambulances wheeling into line, orderlies and nurses with lists, and one doctor on the steps, hands in pockets to show how calm he was.

  It did not take long; there were only seven of them, two in wheelchairs, the others being guided toward the steps, the nurses chatting inconsequentially. It was something to which they had had to become accustomed, no matter what they saw or felt.

  Then the orderlies with the few bags and items of personal clothing. Something these men always clung to, to give them reality and purpose and identity, when their world had exploded.

  Doors opening, the murmur of voices. Thank God all the visitors had departed. It was bad enough without witnesses. The way the burned and wounded looked around, as if seeking something familiar, nodding to acknowledge what was said, one staring at the floor, not wanting to see or to be seen.

  She said, ‘Well, Nobby, it looks as though we’re going to need the extra space.’

  Nobby grimaced. ‘Least it’s not bloody well rainin’, makes a change for this place.’ Then he said sharply, ‘’Ere, what is it? ’Old on, I’ll get someone!’

  She barely heard him; she was looking at the clothing draped over one of the other orderlies’ arms. Not pale blue like most of them, but dark, like his, with two wavy gold stripes on the sleeve. Like his.

  The man halted and looked anxiously at Nobby. ‘What?’

  She stepped forward and lifted the sleeve of the uniform jacket. It was not a dream. She saw the gold pilot’s wings above the curl.

  A phone was ringing somewhere, and Nobby was saying, ‘For Christ’s sake, get somebody!’

  Another nurse was here, with one arm around her waist, as he had done that night beside the car. ‘An
dy, love, what’s the matter?’

  She tried again. I must go to him. He must know I’m here. But no words would come.

  She felt Nobby touching her arm, heard him saying, ‘There’s a call for you, Sister. If you want me to get rid of ’im, say the word!’ He was peering around. ‘Like a bloody copper, you can never find a doctor when you needs one!’

  She shook her head and gripped the phone. She must hold on. Not let him see her like this. He needs me now.

  ‘Yes?’

  Rayner’s voice was right in her ear, as if they were standing close together.

  ‘It’s me, Andy! The bad penny!’ He hesitated. ‘Is this a bad time? I’m sorry, Andy . . . I just wanted you to know . . .’

  She was crying and laughing in the same breath. ‘It’s not! It’s a perfect time! Don’t go away!’

  When he spoke again, his voice was very even, gentle. As if he were here, and had seen it for himself, and understood.

  ‘I’ll never go away. I’ve thought about you so much . . .’ The slightest pause. ‘I love you, girl.’

  As though from another planet, she heard someone calling her name. She straightened her back, and tried to smile at Nobby and the nurses.

  ‘Come for me tomorrow. I’m free.’

  ‘Sister Collins, please!’

  She said softly, ‘Thank you so much for calling.’ She replaced the telephone and walked quickly to the open door. A swift glance at the little card, and she stepped into the room.

  ‘Well, what’s it to be? Do I call you Lieutenant Carter, or just Paul?’

  She did not look at the uniform jacket on the chair: she dared not. One bandaged hand reached out and covered hers.

  For him, it was a beginning. For her, it had been a very close thing.

  The dockyard manager was a short, almost squat man, hardened to the demands and the suspicions of naval officers, particularly the captains of the various ships that passed through his hands for repair and overhaul. The list was endless, the work equally so. Ships bombed or torpedoed, others almost cut in halves, having been rammed in convoy on pitch-black Atlantic nights, and always the work was urgent, vital, and any delay was looked upon as a betrayal of the war effort.