Thunder at Dawn

by Alan Evans

  Memory stirred. She said, “Smith. David — David C. Smith?”

  Smith blinked. “That’s right. How —”

  But then she crumpled and Albrecht caught her and she clung to him.

  The pinnace tossed in the shadow of the steel wall of Thunder’s side until the big boat derrick swung out, the winch hammered and she was whipped up from the sea and swayed inboard. Sarah Benson, covered in blankets, was passed down to the deck and hurriedly aft to the Captain’s cabin in the stem. There were already two men in the sick-bay and Smith had not moved into the Captain’s cabin that was in fact a suite. The main cabin stretched the width of the ship with its long highly-polished table but a twelve-pounder crouched at each side as a grim reminder that this was a ship of war. The sleeping cabin lay to one side, further aft still was the day-cabin and this gave access to a stern walk that curved around the stern of the ship. A Captain — the Captain — could cut himself off from the rest of the ship and live in isolation. And so could Sarah Benson. Smith did not know what to do with her but she would not stay aboard his ship a moment longer than necessary.

  He paced the bridge restlessly in the slanting rain that came in on the wind, swaying as Thunder rolled in the swell, acting the old bitch she always was in any bad weather. On the main-deck, where the crews of the guns lived and slept in the casemates, the sea would be coming in and swilling across the deck and the men would be cursing. Smith went over the girl’s story but it boiled down to that one phrase: They’re watching you.

  Why? Why?

  It was important, Smith knew it. He paused in his pacing to stare back along Thunders length, at her funnels that poured out smoke and soot and the big ventilator cowls that sprouted from her deck and marked her age like a woman’s grey hairs. He was uneasy.

  *

  They hove to again off Castillo and Knight came to him. “Any further orders, sir?”

  But Smith shook his head. Behind him Garrick glanced at Aitkyne, concerned. The story was all over the ship that there had been shooting ashore and men killed. So Smith should make a report to the authorities here.

  He knew it. But there was the girl and her story. He was fishing in strange waters. He would take her back to her master — Cherry? That was it — at Guaya. After he’d talked to Cherry he would decide on his report and to whom to make it.

  The pinnace crashed out of the night in bursting spray and Knight reported to the bridge. “Telegram sent, sir. An’ there was one for us, in code.”

  Smith nodded. “Get on with it.”

  Knight went off to decode the telegram and Smith ordered a course for Guaya and went to his sea-cabin below the bridge. As he dragged off his jacket he caught the whiff of cordite that still clung from Sarah Benson’s shot and he saw it all again, the man kicked back, the spattering blood and her face and he shivered.

  *

  Sarah Benson lay awake. Exhaustion claimed her but memory hinted then eluded her. Purkiss, the sick-berth attendant, brought her a cup of tea. He was twenty years old, nearly three years out from home and soft-hearted. He looked at her and was smitten. It was obvious and too good a chance to waste and she did not waste chances even when her eyelids dragged and her stomach rebelled. She pumped him. He talked to her about Gabriel, the sick-berth P.O., Albrecht the ’orrible ’un, Garrick and the others. And Smith. “Real mystery man. They shipped him out in a hurry — practically shanghaied him. There’s talk of a lady, a real Lady. They say he’s a reglar divil with —”

  Albrecht came then but it was enough. Memory functioned and the pieces clicked into place.

  Her sister, Alice, was a governess in London and wrote her long weekly letters in copperplate about the War and Society and The Town. Sarah read them fascinated by an alien world. And one small item concerned a Commander David C. Smith, “a handsome, charming young gentleman they say …”

  Sarah had looked to find a man in command of this ship because she felt Thunder might soon need a man. Instead there was this poodle-faking, social climber who had stared at her with horror as she shot the renegade Englishman. Oh, she knew the man and that he carried a pistol in a shoulder holster and his empty hands meant nothing. She had never before fired a shot in anger and the memory would haunt her the rest of her days. It haunted her now but she would not explain to Smith. He could think what he liked.

  She was frightened, fear coming late to shake her, miserable. She was lonely, curled small in the bed and she cried herself to sleep.

  *

  Knight brought the decoded telegram to Smith. It came from the Consul in Guaya, Chile: “Request urgently your presence this port. Extreme importance.” Cherry would not know Thunder’s whereabouts. This telegram would be one of several sent to ports along the coast where she might call for news or orders. Smith handed it back to Knight without comment, grunted “Goodnight,” trying to sound like a man who wanted his sleep and was unmoved by the adventures of the day or this telegram. But when Knight had gone he lay awake. “Extreme importance.” “Request urgently.” Cherry could only request but Smith would need to have a good reason to ignore that request. In the event it did not matter. He had to be rid of the girl and that meant Guaya and Cherry. Thunder had a rendezvous with a collier to the north but that was two days hence and she held coal now for eight days’ cruising.

  Cherry’s telegram had come on the heels of the girl’s message but each carried its own warning. Of the same danger? What danger? The girl knew of no danger. Cherry spoke of none. But Smith was certain that danger was there. He lay wide-eyed, staring sightlessly at the deckhead above him with its slick of condensation and rust breaking through the white enamel in a red rash.

  He slept, to wake sweating as the big ships roared down on him out of the night and a white-faced girl shot a man again and again.

  III

  In the morning Horsfall woke Smith with a cup of coffee. Smith had inherited him. Tall and thin and lantern-jawed, he was obviously sometimes called Horse-Face but usually it was Daddy.

  Now he fussed around the cabin like an old hen.

  Daddy was a reservist, not a grandfather like Davies, the Engineer, or some of the others but he looked the oldest man aboard. He had been one of Thunder’s caretaker crew; the only one of that ancient little band who had somehow wangled his way to sea and they said he had been scraped off the dockyard wall along with the ship. He shuffled about in an old pair of plimsolls by express permission of the Doctor because his feet troubled him greatly. They also served him and a lot of the crew as a barometer because he claimed he could predict the weather by the feel of them.

  “Lovely morning, sir. Sky’s cleared beautiful but I reckon it won’t last. I can tell. Me feet, you know, sir.”

  “Yes, I know.” Smith sipped at the coffee and thought about Sarah Benson and Cherry.

  “Gabriel, that’s the Doctor’s mate, sir, he says that young lady woke up and ate a breakfast near fit for a horse and turned over again.”

  “Good.” He would be rid of her.

  “Funny her coming aboard like that, sir.”

  There was nothing funny about it. Two dead men. Smith might have been another.

  “All the lads are wondering about her, sir, keep asking me they do, what about that young lady? ’Course I can’t tell them anything.”

  “Of course not.”

  “No, sir.”

  “Well, when they ask you again you can tell them —” Smith paused, thinking.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “You can tell them I’ve sworn you to secrecy.”

  Daddy looked at him blankly and Smith went on, “Well, it’s better to be sworn to than at.”

  Daddy took the point and the empty cup philosophically. “Aye, aye, sir.”

  Smith grinned wryly at his departing back.

  *

  They raised Guaya at noon. The port itself lay two miles up-river on a big basin. They first entered what appeared to be an estuary but was really one channel of several of the river’s delta mouth
. The coast was hills dropping green forest down steeply to the sea and the river. The river ran wide from the basin for a mile then on approaching the sea split into channels that threaded through a tangle of tree-clothed islets, most of the channels so shallow as to be swamp. Thunder steamed up the most direct channel that had for that reason been cleared, and was kept clear, by dredging.

  They passed the signalling station to port where it stood on a low hill, Punta Negro. Past it another channel wound away between forest walls. The delta in that direction, north, was a huge swamp that bred a yellow fog with each dawn. The telephone line that linked the signalling station to the port looped sagging across that channel to the mainland. A small launch was moored against a little jetty from which a narrow track led up to the signalling station. The launch was the only other link between station and port; there was no road. To starboard a cove was bitten out of the forest: Stillwater Cove.

  Smith thought that Cherry would have known of Thunders arrival since the station saw her lift over the horizon. So he could expect Cherry and his explanation soon. He shifted restlessly on the bridge.

  Thunder rode rock-steady in this sheltered water, only the slightest nodding of her bow as she butted into the current, steaming slowly with the engines thump-thumping over, slipping through the water of the river that was brown with mud. On either hand the hills rose up from the river and climbed to the sky. A bend in the river lay ahead. They hauled slowly up on it, rounded it and opened up the basin and Guaya. There were a score of ships in the basin and room for them. Most lay out at anchor but three lay at a long wharf taking on copper ore. Guaya was a mushroom town. Twenty years before it had been a village, but then the copper mines opened inland and it had boomed.

  Smith took in the town, white buildings against the green of the hills behind. He also took in the ships in the basin and one of them in particular. As Thunder’s three-pounder saluting gun began its metronomic popping, saluting the port, Smith stared at the ship.

  Garrick, telescope to his eye, said quickly, “U.S.S. Kansas, sir. She was reported in these waters. Brand new, her first cruise. Rear-Admiral Donoghue.”

  America was still neutral.

  Smith grunted. “He rates a salute. See to it.”

  Aitkyne said softly, “By God, what a ship. Twenty-one knots and thirty-odd thousand tons.” (Thunder was twelve thousand.) “Twelve fourteen-inch guns and twenty-two fiveinch.”

  “And one of those fourteen-inch shells weighs half-a-ton.” Smith grinned at him. “So if they look our way, smile.”

  The salutes rolled flatly across the basin, Thunder rode to her anchor, the port medical officer came and went and Cherry came aboard. He was short and dapper, dabbing at his round face with a handkerchief.

  He held out his hand. “Cherry. Delighted to meet you, Commander. Only wish in the circumstances — your Captain —” He shook his head then fished an envelope from his pocket. “Telegram for you, coded.” And as Smith passed it to Knight: “Can we talk?”

  Smith led the way to his cabin on the upper deck but not before he growled an aside to the plump and pink-checked Midshipman Wakely. “Ask Miss Benson if she’ll be good enough to join us in my cabin.”

  “Aye, aye, sir!” Wakely shot away.

  Cherry asked, “Did you say Benson? Would that be Sarah Benson?”

  “It would.” Smith’s tone was neutral. Once in his cabin he told Cherry how he had brought the girl aboard. “You understand, I must make a report. I should have reported to the authorities ashore immediately after the incident but in view of Miss Benson’s position — I thought it best to see you first.”

  Cherry nodded. “I’ve been worried about that girl. Had no word from her for a week. I recruited her when the war started and she’s the best agent I have but I feel a special responsibility for her. I’ve known her a long time. Her father came out to South America from Wapping ten years ago. He works on building harbours, a foreman. He started in Argentina and later moved over to this coast. So Sarah speaks Spanish and Portuguese like a native and she learnt German from a ganger who boarded with the family for two years. On top of that she’s clever and brave, sometimes too brave for her own good and my peace of mind.” He thought for a moment then shook his head. “Say nothing. Report to the Admiralty, of course. I will do the same in confirmation. But say nothing to the Chileans and I’ll lay the Germans will keep their mouths shut. They can’t make things awkward for us without exposing their own involvement and they don’t want the Chileans lifting any rocks.” He grinned. “Any more than we do.” The grin slipped away and he pulled at his chin. “So they won’t say anything about that business. But one thing they have done already is to lodge a complaint with the Chileans about Sarah and now the Chileans want to ask her about her activities and possible involvement in espionage. We can’t have that so she can’t go ashore.”

  Smith protested, “But this is a warship not a liner! If she can’t go ashore then she must be put aboard a British merchantman.”

  Cherry said apologetically, “That would be a good idea. Unfortunately, for once there isn’t a British ship in this port.”

  Smith glared at him. This coast swarmed with British shipping but it was his bad luck to find a port without a British vessel. Cherry scribbled in a notebook with a pencil and tore out the page. “If this could be given to my boatman, Francis, to give to my wife urgently.”

  There was a rap at the door and Sarah Benson entered. Smith scowled past her: “Here, Mr. Wakely.” He passed him Cherry’s note. “For Mrs. Cherry and it’s urgent.”

  Sarah Benson said emphatically, “Damn!” as Cherry explained why she could not go ashore.

  Smith said stiffly, “A warship is no place for a lady but we’ll try to make your stay as pleasant as circumstances permit.” He swore at himself for being pompous but this girl forced him to it.

  She thought he could not understand the life she’d led these past three years. Besides, she was not a society hostess, not a Lady. She laid the cockney on thick. “Well, it’s not my fault I’m a woman. What do you want me to do? Swim ashore in me shift and give meself up to keep your ship a virgin?”

  “Sarah! Please!” Cherry was embarrassed and annoyed. He had sensed the atmosphere of hostility and was baffled. What had got into the girl? “The Captain is right. He should not have to accept responsibility for you in this ship. And I’m certain you were glad enough to come aboard her.”

  Sarah was silent a moment, then: “That I was.” It came quietly. She looked up at Smith. “I’m sorry. I’ll try not to be a nuisance.” It was an apology, no more, justice being done.

  Smith inclined his head. He saw she wore a medallion, a large gold piece that hung on her breast from a fine chain around her neck. Her hand went to it. “It’s very old. My father found it and gave it to me. For luck.”

  Smith thought it was barbaric.

  She said bitterly, “I’m not sure if it works.”

  But Smith looked at Cherry. They had wasted enough time. “You sent for me.”

  Cherry glanced from one to the other then got down to business. “I believe we have a contraband runner in this port. When Miss Benson passed through on her way north she remarked on a ship that had just arrived. She was Argentinian, a seemingly ordinary tramp of three thousand tons but fitted with modern wireless.” He paused for effect and Smith’s eyebrows rose. Fitting wireless was expensive, and unusual in that class of ship to say the least. Cherry went on, “I asked our people in Argentina about her, the Gerda she’s called. She was one of a pair bought by an Argentinian firm only three months ago and fitted with wireless. This is their first cruise. Their skippers and crews, every manjack are of German birth or extraction and the money for the ships came from German funds in the Argentine. That last can’t be proved but it’s known.”

  He paused for breath and Sarah Benson beat Smith to the question. “You said a pair?”

  Cherry nodded. “The other is the Maria. I made enquiries and found she was at Ma
laguay.” A port a hundred and fifty miles to the south of Guaya. “The Gerda has laid here for nine days. She hasn’t discharged her cargo and she claims to have engine trouble which her own engineers are working on. I asked Thackeray and he confirmed that the Maria is telling the same story there.”

  Smith asked, “Thackeray?”

  “Consul in Malaguay.”

  Sarah Benson said caustically, “You’d have to ask him to confirm. He’d do nothing on his own. He doesn’t want anybody stirring up the water in his little pool.”

  Cherry said, “It’s my belief they’re just waiting while a cargo of nitrates is arranged for each of them. Then they’ll discharge and mend their engines quickly enough.”

  Smith asked, “What are they carrying now?”

  “Welsh steam coal, both of them. But it’s nitrates they’re after, I’m sure of it.”

  It could well be. Munitions needed nitrates and Germany needed munitions.

  Cherry said, “I’ve protested to the Chileans, of course, but there is a large German element in the population and they have a deal of influence. The Chileans say that I’m only voicing suspicions and have no evidence that the ships are really German. They said there were unusual aspects, particularly that there were a pair of ships but that these probably had a simple explanation. Like coincidence. Coincidence!”

  Smith said, “It would seem to have a long arm in these parts. So they won’t intern them nor send them on their way.”

  Cherry grumbled, “Correct. They will do nothing. That’s why we need you outside of here or Malaguay when they sail, to stop and search them. They’re certain to have some evidence aboard.” He stopped and dabbed at his face. He looked relieved and Smith knew the reason: the decisions were out of Cherry’s hands now and instead in those of Smith.

  Smith shifted impatiently. “I want to see her.”

  They walked forward of the bridge until they stood under the muzzle of the 9.2 and Cherry pointed at the collier. Gerda lay at anchor near the northern shore which was almost deserted, the buildings of the town being spread in a halfmoon around the eastern and southern shores of the pool so it was not surprising there was no other ship near her. She was rusty and grimy but the wireless aerials strung from her masts were easily seen.