Dust on the Sea (1999)

by Reeman, Douglas

  Only a dream.

  5

  ‘Don’t Ask. Just Do It!’

  Captain Mike Blackwood lay on his back, his hands behind his head while he stared into the darkness. He was fully dressed and wide awake, his ears picking out the motor gunboat’s internal sounds, the muted tremble of the big Rolls-Royce engines, the clatter of loose gear, or someone moving on deck above his bunk. Sounds which had become familiar in so short a time since they had climbed aboard, yet again under cover of darkness to maintain any vestige of secrecy in such a crowded harbour.

  The M.G.B.’s small company were taking it well, he thought. Overcrowded at the best of times, it had been no easy thing to accommodate ten Royal Marines and two officers. They had all somehow found spaces to sit down, even sleep, once they had become used to the motion and the occasional bursts of speed, to avoid other vessels, to dodge enemy aircraft, or merely to make up distance: to the marines it could have been anything.

  It was the same gunboat in which Blackwood had been carried to the schooners before Lucifer. Even the purpose behind that seemed hard to understand any more; it refused to fit into a pattern.

  Like his men, Blackwood was fully trained, and probably more experienced than any of them except the characters like ‘Sticks’ Welland, and the withdrawn Despard, trained to assess any situation as he found it, and to react accordingly. Doubt and personal safety did not come into it. In his mind he could picture the chart as if he had just been studying it with Gaillard and the boat’s skipper, Lieutenant David Falconer, the veteran who had once been a schoolmaster. At least his pupils would know the truth about this war, if he ever went back to teaching. If he lived that long. On the first night at sea in company with two other M.G.B.s, Falconer had touched on it only briefly. This little special squadron had consisted of eight boats when he had arrived in the Med. Now there were only three. He was not resigned, and not bitter. It was his war; the rest was somebody else’s problem.

  It had reminded Blackwood of his father, and one of those rare evenings at Hawks Hill when he had spoken about that other war, of the appalling waste and horrific casualty lists, because the general staff had been unable to adapt to a type of warfare which had outreached their experience and imagination.

  He had said more than once, ‘You should always remember. Individuals can win or lose a war. Not some unthinking mass of men, a flag on a map, or simply because it is something which needs doing. Remember the lonely men, the ones who are always on the prongs of an advance, or those left to cover a retreat. The individuals.’

  Blackwood often recalled those words. He had thought of them at the hastily convened conference in the operations room after his whirlwind drive from Rosetta. As the S.N.O.’s secretary had commented, ‘There’s a bit of a flap on.’

  Blackwood had imagined there had been a reverse in the desert war; even after all the Desert Rats’ success, it could still happen. Or perhaps another convoy had been attacked, the one which would eventually bring the full marine detachment to Alex. Or that the Americans who had landed in North Africa in Operation Torch had been overwhelmed by the more experienced and hardened troops of the Afrika Korps. But again, that was another war, and despite all the efforts of war correspondents and broadcasters there was not much love for the Americans. In England there was a standard reply when asked what was wrong with the Yanks anyway? Three things. They’re overpaid, oversexed and over here! In Devon, Blackwood had seen the same sentiment scrawled on the back of an army Bedford truck. Don’t cheer, girls. We’re British!

  But the conference had nothing to do with allied friction. There had been various expressions of surprise and even annoyance when Commander St John had made his announcement. Admiral Darlan, the governor-general of French North Africa, was dead. Not killed in an accident, or murdered by terrorists as well he might have been, but shot by a haphazard assassin who had walked into his room and emptied a revolver into him without threat or explanation.

  The ordinary squaddie in the line or Jolly Jack bargain-hunting in the souk might have been excused for saying, so what? Who cares? Darlan was, after all, a Nazi puppet, who had shown his bias by accepting high office from France’s new German masters, rather than making any attempt to rouse resistance against the enemy.

  In England, there was only bitterness that men like Darlan had chosen to collaborate and to betray. But to the confused and unhappy French inhabitants of North and West Africa, Darlan had represented a form of unity. Perhaps he had been biding his time, waiting to change sides yet again, now that the Allies were gaining ground despite all that the German army and the Luftwaffe could throw against them.

  Blackwood had seen the reports of the fierce resistance encountered by the Americans landing at Oran and other strategic points, not from the Germans, but from the French army. It would not be forgotten by young American soldiers who had come so far to do so much, as they had believed, to help free the French nation.

  But with Darlan alive and ready to keep peace amongst his own people and the allied invaders, to say nothing of his dealings with Berlin, there was some show of that elusive unity.

  Individuals can win, or lose a war.

  Blackwood stretched, but his movements were restrained by his webbing belt and ammunition pouches.

  And now there was another contender, Admiral Avice, one of Darlan’s trusted commanders and a man known to favour closer ties with the Vichy government, and therefore with Germany.

  Blackwood pictured the chart again. At this very moment the gunboat was lying almost stopped in the Strait of Sicily, that savagely contested channel between Sicily and Cape Bon in Tunisia. It was barely seventy miles across at the narrowest part, where the sea bed was littered with ships of every kind, and their crews with them. The hard-fought convoys to Malta, just to keep that island alive, even though enemy airfields were only a short flight away; submarines, minefields and dive-bombers; men against machines. Because of its position, the Strait had become vital to both sides. From Sicily and the Italian mainland stores and weapons were being forced through to the Afrika Korps, which was now in full retreat, at least from the Libyan desert. And at the other side of the campaign was the port of Bone, which had been seized after the landings of Torch. All the thousands of men, tanks, ammunition and supplies for the First Army and the Americans had to pass through Bone. Bombed around the clock and with too few R.A.F. or American planes to defend it, it was a lynchpin which could still swing either way.

  But the navy continued to be resourceful. Most of the troops shuttled between Bone and Algiers were carried over the weeks by just four small ships. In peacetime they had been cross-Channel steamers, hardly designed for war. Despard had remarked as much, no doubt remembering them from his days in Jersey.

  Intelligence had reported that the enemy was equally cunning. But where? These were not the waters for heavy transport, no matter how well they were armed or protected by air cover. Even if they succeeded in landing their supplies, it was unlikely they would be allowed to make a return trip.

  And so this hitherto unknown French admiral, Avice, had been put forward as the most likely culprit. He had refused to co-operate with the Allies; he had always staunchly supported Darlan, outwardly at least. It was not much for the Operational staff to work on, and at such short notice. The King is dead . . . And Avice was known for his unswerving views.

  Blackwood touched the wooden side of the cabin. Probably not all that far from here. The Gulf of Hammamet, south of Tunis and not easy to observe by sea or from the air, was said to have suitable facilities for small craft. It was protected by a fortress which had once been a base of the French Foreign Legion. It was now Avice’s headquarters.

  Perhaps Darlan had been killed by his order. Patriot or terrorist, it only mattered which side you were on in the end.

  He sighed and stood up, away from the bunk, to test the motion.

  I’m getting as cynical as Gaillard.

  He looked at his watch. Soon now, or not at all.
He groped his way to the ladder and peered up towards the bridge. There were a few tiny stars, swaying from side to side. The air was foul with petrol and crowded humanity, and he could not shake that same feeling of unreality.

  The small open bridge seemed crowded, and he was glad of the duffle coat he had thrown over his shoulders. The breeze across the screen was like a knife. Hard to believe it had been so warm during the day.

  He knew Gaillard was hating it, and why. Because of Brigadier Naismith.

  Just the job for your chaps, Major Gaillard, I’d have thought.

  What about the ‘something big’? Keeping it for himself, possibly. The next step up the ladder.

  Falconer pushed between them, an unlit pipe jutting from his jaw like a tusk.

  ‘No bloody E-Boats about, anyway. You can hear those buggers for miles!’ Somebody stifled a yawn. No excitement, only routine, at least to them.

  Gaillard said sharply, ‘If anything shows up, we go straight in, right? No heroics, just do the job and fast out again!’ He sounded strained, on edge, and Blackwood was reminded of her words only last week. How is your major? Still angry with everything?

  They probably had Gaillards in the Raf, too.

  Where was she now? On the ship she had been expecting? Passage back to England? Would she remember how it had been, what they had done together? The word seemed to speak aloud. Together.

  He had been unable to contact her. Under orders. It was hard not to consider it, even if the smallest breach of security could put men’s lives at risk.

  Somebody asked hoarsely, ‘What, sir?’ It was Balfour, the young first lieutenant. Blackwood had seen him writing a letter in the tiny wardroom, next to the W/T office with its stammer of morse. To his girl somewhere; he had had her photograph in a case lying open beside him.

  He heard Falconer reply, ‘It’s them. Glad we shut down, eh?’ He sounded very calm, but his mind was busy. Trained for it, ready to move. The schoolmaster, like the archaeologist in his battered schooner. Individuals.

  Blackwood turned his head, hearing it for the first time. A droning sound, more than one craft, moving fast. In and out. Or they might even lie up for a day under camouflage nets, as the little schooners did among the islands.

  ‘Pass the word, and tell the Chief now.’ The other two boats must be close by. The survivors. Blackwood heard the click of a magazine, or maybe a buckle as a gunner strapped himself into the twin Oerlikon mounting.

  He saw faces light up as a flare burst somewhere over the starboard bow.

  Gaillard muttered, ‘Cheeky bastards! Must be sure of themselves!’

  The muffled roar of engines was louder, as if they should be able to see something. But Falconer did not move, and Blackwood saw his hand tapping a slow tattoo on the flag locker.

  He said, ‘Let’s hope they don’t have any of that fancy detection gear.’

  He ducked down to peer at the compass. His first lieutenant had gone to his own station by the heavy machine guns below the bridge. The old precaution, Blackwood thought. So all the eggs weren’t in one basket if the worst should happen.

  Falconer had moved again, and was standing beside the coxswain at the wheel.

  ‘Be ready, Swain. Steer nor’west, and full speed when I give the word!’

  Blackwood recognised the excitement in the voice, the madness, the acceptance of the unacceptable.

  He wanted to think of her, to hold on to the sweetness of memory. But he knew he could not, must not. It could be fatal.

  Falconer yelled, ‘There go the bastards! Full ahead!’

  The rest was lost in a sudden roar of power which almost threw them off their feet.

  Blackwood clung to a stanchion and turned to stare as the rising bow wave surged away from the hull to break and cascade across something solid. Land. They were that close. There was another flare, from a different bearing this time.

  He heard someone shout, ‘Too bloody late, chum!’

  Then tracer. He made himself watch it, like balls of liquid fire, rising with such deceptive slowness, then passing their peak and flashing down, spitting smoke and spray as bullets or cannon shells clawed across the water.

  They did not return the fire. Blackwood felt the steel fingers ease around his guts. Weekend sailors, they used to call them.

  Now they were the true professionals.

  Aboard the second of the three motor gunboats, they had already heard the fast-moving engines and seen the unexpected flare.

  Lieutenant George Despard found himself wedged into one corner of the small, box-like bridge, his hip pressed painfully into some immovable fitting, his arm brushing occasionally against a rating at a mounted machine gun.

  Despard had heard the boat’s skipper, a young lieutenant, giving his Number One some stick just before they had gone to Action Stations. His subordinate had been more embarrassed than angry, probably because it had been in front of him. A Royal Marine, another passenger, and so a liability as far as they were concerned. He smiled grimly in the darkness. In front of a ranker. He could find some amusement in it now. It set him apart as something different, neither one thing nor the other.

  They had joked about it in the sergeants’ mess before Christmas. In many ways he was still one of them, but the barrier was there all the same. Some could take it for granted, like the lieutenant in the third gunboat, a willowy young man called Robyns, son of a lieutenant-general in the Corps. He was competent enough, and his men appeared to respect him, although one of the sergeants had described him as ‘a toffee-nosed, patronising prat’. Despard had felt irritation, but had decided to ignore it.

  He considered Michael Blackwood, how their paths had crossed repeatedly over the years. It must be quite a load to carry, as he had thought often enough. In the Corps you could never forget the Blackwood dynasty, even if you wanted to. At Stonehouse there was a Blackwood cup for marksmanship. He smiled again, glad of the dark. For musketry, it was still engraved. At Eastney there was a silver shield, an earlier Blackwood’s contribution, in recognition of the best sailing team. There were a lot of Royal Marine families, father to son, it was what made them special, but for Despard there had been no such connection. His father had been a bricklayer, a good one too; many of the houses around Jersey had been his work. Perhaps because of his skills, he had avoided serving in the Great War, although he was always one of the first to show his respect for the fallen on Armistice Days. Despard had seen his own future as a bricklayer, and, like his father, dropping in at the pub on his way home at the end of a long stint, until one day a destroyer from the Home Fleet had paid a courtesy visit to St Helier, and had been open to the public. Entertaining as only the navy could, as he himself had helped to do when he had joined his first ship, a light cruiser. Roundabouts made of capstan bars, ice cream and sticky buns, kids being allowed to peer down the barrel of a gun, and see the polished rifling glinting against the sky. The Royal Navy, the sure shield, as it had been then. Not the splinter-ridden ships he had seen go down protecting convoys, the survivors floundering, calling out for help when there was none to offer, because the others had obeyed the signal to hold their formation. Don’t stop. And don’t look back.

  The destroyer had, of course, carried no marines, but somebody had given him a recruiting leaflet. And even now, after all he had gone through, and everything he had seen and been forced to do, he knew in his heart that if he ever met up with the man who had given him the leaflet, he would still have thanked him.

  He had fitted in from the beginning. Drills, drills and more drills. Bellowing N.C.O.s, impatient officers, the mysteries of tradition and ceremony; he had done it. Corporal, and then the impossible: he had been made up to sergeant. That was it, and it would do very well. He had thought that if he survived the war he might even rate colour sergeant. Instead, there had been a signal, and an interview with his adjutant. ‘Take it, Sar’nt! Join the Club!’

  A good bloke, but even as he had shaken Despard’s hand he must have known that th
e new officer would always be ‘a ranker’.

  He stiffened as the skipper’s duffle coat appeared beside him.

  ‘You know what to do? If those boats go in, and are carrying supplies for the enemy, we take them!’

  Despard had learned a lot about officers, long before becoming one. It didn’t matter what uniform they wore, you could always tell. Like this one, a man to whom he had barely spoken, but who had done this kind of operation in the past. In his case, too many times. Do we know what to do? It was an insult, or many would take it as such. This one was trying to convince himself, to be someone he was not, not any more.

  Despard said, ‘They’re the enemy, as far as I’m concerned.’ It stuck in his throat. ‘Sir.’

  ‘Not your show, is it?’ Then he laughed and clapped him on the arm. ‘Piece of cake, old boy!’ The laugh was the worst part.

  Despard reached down and poked a khaki shoulder. ‘Ready, Corporal?’

  The anonymous shape nodded. ‘Both Brens, sir. Grenades too.’

  ‘Good lad.’

  Corporal Evans. A quiet enough man when he was sober, but drunk or in a fight and he was a different person entirely. And in action, at close quarters, he would change again. Evans had never learned ‘the rules’. Despard felt the anger rising once more. Who cared what the French in North Africa thought about co-operation? They had given in to Germany, but they still wanted respect. Like their warships moored at Alex; it was said that their admiral never went ashore, and had no contact with the Royal Navy, with which he had worked before the war in these same waters. In the name of France he had refused to allow his ships to serve alongside the British and their allies, the very people who were fighting and dying every day to help free France and all the other occupied countries from a ruthless enemy. The Germans had sensibly torn up the rules long ago.

  He squinted as another flare exploded, further away, drifting aimlessly to port.

  And Blackwood was over there somewhere with Gaillard. The latter had a strong reputation in the Corps. A real fire-eater, they said. Maybe he and Blackwood were right for one another. His mind refused to consider it. But they seemed so different.