Winged Escort

by Douglas Reeman

  ‘I’ve just received a signal from the C. in C.’ Chadwick’s tone was clipped, unemotional. ‘The Americans have had a bit of bother. They underwent a bad battering off Mindanao, a full-scale air attack. Severe losses. It will take them time to regroup.’

  Buchan waited, and thought he heard him breathing.

  Chadwick said, ‘So our operation is on. It’s no mock attack. I will inform the group.’

  ‘I see, sir.’ Buchan tried to think. ‘I’d like to discuss it with you.’

  Chadwick sounded impatient. ‘This is our real chance. Perhaps the only one we’ll get.’ He slammed down the telephone.

  Buchan walked out into the hot wind again and watched the activity around the tethered aircraft. From the Americans to the British naval staff in Sydney. Information and confirmation. Availability. That was the word they always used at staff college or on a command course. It meant you used what you had. He looked along his ship, at the dip and roll of her flight deck. And they were right here, ready to be used. He felt light-headed, as if he was going to be sick.

  Another telephone buzzed. This time it was the Commander (Flying).

  Kitto said, ‘I’ve just been told, sir. It sounds like a tall order.’

  Buchan looked beyond the bridge. His domain. Kitto had nothing really to tell him. He merely wanted to be reassured.

  Buchan replied, ‘We’ll do what we can.’ He hesitated, afraid of showing doubt. ‘Have you spoken to the met. officer?’

  ‘There’s a chance of more heavy rain squalls ahead of this south-easterly, sir. If it gets bad we’ll have to call it off.’

  Buchan tightened his jaw. He had said too much already.

  ‘Get your people together. The attack is timed for dawn. Four days from now. You know the rest.’

  At the other end of the line Kitto replaced the handset very gently and looked at Rowan.

  ‘It’s on, Tim. I know the target. A Jap oil dump. Only recently completed.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘I was beginning to think it was a mock attack to draw the enemy. It seems I was wrong after all.’ He became brisk and businesslike. ‘As of now we will have to fly extra patrols. If a Jap recce plane appears it must be clobbered fast.’ He banged his hand on the table. ‘God, if only we had more fighters and fewer Swordfish, just this once.’

  A communications rating looked up from a telephone. ‘Signal, sir. More enemy attacks on American shipping south-east of the Phillipines.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Kitto looked at Rowan. ‘Do you really believe that our little effort can make any difference? To another battle two thousand miles away?’ He nodded, answering his own question. ‘Out here, things seem to move fast. I suppose it just might.’

  A messenger approached Rowan. ‘The admiral wants you on the bridge, sir.’

  Rowan shrugged. ‘Advice, I expect.’

  He left the Ops Room and started towards the bridge ladder. This was the first contact. It had to be.

  He found Chadwick in the chart house, smoking a cigarette and drinking coffee.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Ah, Rowan. How’s the leg?’

  It took him off guard, as it was intended.

  ‘Fine now, sir.’

  ‘Good.’ Chadwick picked a shred of tobacco from his tongue and looked at it thoughtfully. ‘Are you happy about the raid?’

  Happy? What a question.

  ‘I’ve been looking at the maps and sketches, sir.’

  ‘That’s not what I asked.’

  Rowan watched him gravely. ‘I think it’s risky to send escort carriers to do a job like this one, sir. If you want honesty, I believe that whoever thought of the idea has no notion of what war is about.’

  Chadwick smiled. ‘When I first flew it was off a platform affair on a battleship. Yet a week back I flew a Swordfish, carrier to carrier, no bother.’

  Rowan had heard from the Swordfish pilot how Chadwick had taken over the controls when he had visited Hustler. Chadwick had flown within feet of the ship’s mast, and had been waved off by the batsman three times before making a landing which had almost shaken the teeth from his head. He had apparently been quite unruffled by the experience and had said breezily, ‘Nothing to it.’

  Chadwick was saying, ‘This ship is a platform for a purpose. To carry bombs to that damned oil dump, or whatever else is decided. Just as Nelson’s Victory was a platform for her broadsides, and a bloody uncomfortable one to all accounts. Except that the Jack Tars of his Navy didn’t come back to coffee and ice cream after half an hour’s work, eh?’ He was smiling, but there was no mistaking the steel in his tone.

  Rowan said, ‘I didn’t mean we couldn’t do it, sir.’ He felt angry at his own compliance, but at the same time knew it had to come some day.

  ‘That’s good news.’

  Chadwick poured another cup of coffee. There were dark patches of sweat on his back and armpits. It did not seem right for Chadwick.

  He said offhandedly, ‘If we pull it off, I will make certain we all get something better. It will probably be your last operational job . . .’ He turned slowly to watch Rowan’s reaction. ‘No, not in that way!’

  Rowan said nothing, feeling his anger grow. That had been quite deliberate. To let him think he had already been written off.

  The admiral said, ‘Transfer to something larger, or a staff job maybe. We’ll see.’

  ‘And you, sir?’ Rowan could not resist it. ‘What will you do?’

  Chadwick regarded him calmly. ‘My duty.’ He smiled. ‘In the best way I know.’

  Rowan moved slightly towards the door. He needed to be alone. To face and then discard the possibility of being killed.

  Chadwick said, ‘I understand you met my wife in Sydney?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘It was not by chance.’

  ‘If you asked the flag lieutenant –’

  ‘I’m not asking anyone, Rowan. I’m telling you to mind your manners.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Rowan felt the chart house closing in on him, so that Chadwick seemed to fill it.

  ‘I don’t care what she may have said to you, Rowan. And in any case, our private affairs are nothing to do with a junior officer who thinks he knows more than he should.’ He was in control again. Entirely relaxed. ‘I will decide what is to happen.’

  Rowan looked at him impassively, feeling the anger being replaced by contempt.

  ‘I am in love with her, sir. There is no point in pretending.’

  Surprisingly, Chadwick remained very still. ‘I suspected as much. It’s nonsense of course. But if you insist in deluding yourself it will mean a rather sordid picture in the law courts. For her and for you. I don’t feel there’ll be much love left to crow about when it’s over.’

  Rowan turned away. He had fallen right into it. What she had tried to stave off. No matter what anyone said or suspected about Chadwick, he would appear as the blameless and wronged one when the news got out.

  ‘Of course, if you act with some last fragment of common sense, we might still sort something out.’

  ‘Is that all, sir?’ It was unnerving to hear himself. So calm. Flat.

  ‘Yes. Carry on.’

  As the door closed behind him Chadwick added harshly, ‘And go to bloody hell!’

  Rowan walked through the bridge and saw Buchan speaking with Bray, the Navigating Officer.

  Buchan said. ‘Still no change in the met report. Everything all right?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ He stood there, rocking with the hull, remembering that time when Buchan had sent for him to tell him about his parents.

  ‘What is it?’ Buchan shook his head and Bray moved away. ‘Something you want to tell me?’

  ‘It’s a letter, sir. If anything goes wrong. There’s someone I’d like to get it.’

  Buchan did not scoff or argue. ‘I see. Certainly.’

  Rowan added, ‘Thank you, sir.’ He could not give it to Bill. It might unsettle him. Even if he survived. ‘I appreciate it.’

&nbs
p; Buchan watched him leave the bridge. He did not know Rowan had anyone to leave a letter for.

  Bray’s voice swept all else out of his thoughts.

  ‘Signal from Redshank, sir! Aircraft in sight to the north-west!’

  He nodded, reaching for his glasses. ‘Sound off action stations and inform the Ops Room.’

  He strode out into the harsh glare, searching for the small frigate, which like a pointer led the little fleet towards the horizon. Klaxons and bells echoed throughout the ship, while across the water he heard the blare of a bugle as the French cruiser went to quarters.

  Below the island he saw the deck handling party sprinting to the stand-by flight of Seafires, the gun muzzles on the sponsons below the flight deck training outboard.

  ‘The commander reports ship at action stations, sir.’

  Crump – crump – crump. The distant thud of anti-aircraft fire rebounded against the bridge plating.

  His eyes watered as he watched the tiny dots in the sky as the leading frigate and then some of the other escorts joined in.

  It could not have happened at a worse time. The wind was fairly strong and following the ships from the south-east.

  He waited as Bray hurried back from the compass.

  ‘Ready, sir.’

  ‘Make the signal, then bring her about.’

  He ignored the clatter of the lamp, the replying stabs of light from two of the destroyers as they waited to follow Growler’s steep turn into the wind.

  ‘Hard a-port!’

  Buchan reached out to steady himself as the order was acknowledged by the wheelhouse.

  The waiting game was over.

  17

  Odds on Survival

  ROWAN HELD HIS back pressed against the steel bulkhead as he watched the intent figures around the Operations Room. Blue Flight had been airborne for ten minutes, and the reports were coming in about the enemy. A twin-engined reconnaissance bomber.

  It had probably sent back a signal to its base already, although it was a long way out from land.

  He heard the muted voices of the pilots in the Ready Room as they waited to see if there was to be a full ‘scramble’. He had done it often enough, and remembered those first times. Trying to appear relaxed. That you didn’t care.

  He also recognised Kitto’s voice on the intercom. Curt, matter of fact.

  The flight was at eighteen thousand feet and in sight of the recce plane. There was a rush of static across the speaker, and he heard Bill exclaim, ‘Watch for the rear gunner!’ Then the speaker went dead again.

  Rowan watched James and Broderick with their communications ratings. They saw it from a different angle. Rowan was up there with the pilots. His stomach muscles ached, and he realised he was holding them in as if he was actually involved.

  James remarked, ‘That Jap pilot was too slow off the mark. He went after one of the Frenchman’s seaplanes and shot it down. He should have buzzed-off when he had the chance.’

  Rowan looked at him grimly, recalling the German seaplane plunging into the waves, the Walrus coming to rescue him, all the other times he had seen those maddening but essential amphibians.

  The petty officer with the headphones snapped. They’ve got it!’ He leaned forward, his face lined as he added. ‘One of ours has been hit, sir!’

  Rowan asked sharply, ‘Who is it?’

  The P.O. looked at him. ‘B for Baker, sir.’

  Rowan turned and walked through the Ready Room. He made his way to the bridge and to Kitto’s little platform. Together they peered astern, above the ships which were still steering on an opposite course.

  There was a long stain across the sky where the recce plane had plummeted towards the sea. Much lower, balanced it appeared on the upperworks of the French cruiser, was another smoke trail. Then came a bright orange flash, but no sound reached the Growler from that range as the fighter hit the water. There was no parachute.

  He watched the next patrol being ranged on the deck, and waited until the tannoy speaker announced the return of Bill’s flight.

  Later, at the debriefing, as Growler put on the revolutions to catch up with her consorts, Bill said heavily, ‘I fired a long burst into the Jap, and he started to dive. Lord Algy took a pass across his quarter. Like he always did. The rear gunner must have been sitting there waiting for him, despite the fact his own aircraft was on fire and going down.’

  ‘Did he try to get out?’

  Bill looked at him, his eyes red from strain. ‘He sort of waved to me. Then his head went forward. The flames did the rest.’

  That night as the darkened ships pushed through a sea lashed into white froth by another torrential downpour, Rowan prowled about the hangar deck and deserted flats. He could not sleep, he knew it without even trying.

  The rain reminded him of the house in Hampshire. So far away, and yet so clear in his mind and thoughts. Perhaps she was already there. With other wounded or shocked officers to comfort. He rejected it, knowing theirs was something they could not break, just as it was a bond they had not expected or prepared against.

  If only he had been able to stop himself from telling Chadwick. By defending her he had made it more likely he would never see her again.

  It had been arranged that Hustler’s fighter-bombers would go in first, then Growler’s as a second wave. If the enemy had heard nothing from their recce pilot, they would be ready enough by the time the last attack was started.

  He looked at Jonah Too’s smooth shape glinting beneath an inspection light, her wings folded at the tips, the other planes crowded around her as if for company.

  Rowan had shot down several aircraft and strafed more enemy ships than he could remember. But always over the sea, or right alongside it. This target was inland, a low-level bombing attack. In and out. Bonfire night, Chadwick had said. He had never done anything like it before, except across the bombing ranges and on a grounded wreck near the Goodwin Sands.

  He thought of those who would be with him. Apart from Bill, the rest were as green as grass. Creswell, despite his second stripe and his luck, was over-confident and lacked proper experience.

  Rowan looked at Bill’s plane, a rugby ball painted on it with a glass of beer balanced on the top.

  He walked towards the next ladder. Football and beer. At least Bill had done something before the war.

  Up in the Operations Room the duty watch was lolling with weariness in the imprisoned air. Around them the plots ticked and whirred, and from a voicepipe Rowan heard the faint stammer of morse from the W/T office.

  He glanced at the illuminated chart, seeing the scimitar shape of Java curving up towards the strait which separated it from Sumatra. Over there, Japanese soldiers were guarding roads and gun-sites, or watching the skies. He knew it was so, but it was hard to accept that there was any real life beyond this ship and the men around him.

  High above Rowan’s head, on his steel chair, Buchan sat with his hands in his pockets and watched the black glass of the screen directly in front of him. He listened to the relentless rain, to it sluicing off the bridge and across the Oerlikon gunners below.

  Tomorrow it might all be over. The enemy could launch an air attack on the group and that would show they knew about it. There would be little point in pushing on after that. He reached out with one foot and touched the rough metal below the clearview screen. Get the old girl out of it. To a war she understood and had been built for.

  He heard Commander Jolly come out of the chartroom and cross to his side. He would most likely get a ship of his own after this.

  Jolly said, ‘All quiet, sir. I passed the word to go to action stations at first light.’

  ‘Good. Better to be safe.’

  In his own quarters Rear Admiral Chadwick walked back and forth across the carpet, a glass of brandy in one hand. Uphill and down again as the deck lifted and dipped beneath him.

  He thought of his wife, how she had looked at him when he had hit her and torn open her dress. He had never really wan
ted her like that before. But at that moment he had almost raped her. The thought of her being with Rowan, when he had never even imagined such a thing could occur, was still beyond his understanding.

  But it was strange how events dropped into a pattern, he thought. At one time he had imagined that everything was coming apart. Now, he was about to put a stamp on his name that nobody, no matter how high up, could ignore. She would bloody well beg and crawl to him then.

  He returned to the brandy.

  It might prove interesting.

  The enemy did not come and find them the next day, nor the ones which followed. In the rest of the world, and in the Pacific in particular, a naval war was reaching a new peak of ferocity. But on the fourth dawn, as the rain retreated from the slow-moving ships, and the wind dropped to a whisper, it was as if everything and everyone else had already died.

  Buchan watched the long, blood-red smear along the eastern horizon, and then the nearest gun-mounting as the droplets of rain on the twin muzzles glinted very faintly to betray the first light. It was extremely quiet, and at slow speed he could barely feel the beat of Laird’s great propeller.

  Below, it would all be working smoothly. Pilots briefed, plans and maps examined in total silence.

  On deck, still hidden in darkness, the aircraft had already been assembled and were waiting, their noses pointing at the sky. The armourers had done their work, and the big bombs were hung one to a plane. Like obscene fruit.

  Across the water he saw the nearest ships as black shadows, although on the Frenchman’s superstructure two scuttles had caught the dawn light and shone like a pair of angry red eyes.

  Buchan touched his breast pocket to make sure it was tightly buttoned. His oilskin pouch was safe if he had to swim for it. He also had Rowan’s letter there. Now he knew a lot more about him, and Chadwick, for he had read the woman’s name on the envelope.

  He had seen her a couple of times ashore. A very attractive girl. He wished now he had had time to speak to her. But his wife had kept him away because of Chadwick.

  ‘Commander (Flying) reports he is ready, sir.’

  ‘Very well.’

  Buchan lifted his glasses and watched Hustler’s blunt silhouette. Any moment now and the first strike would be taking-off.