Orphans of the Storm (Commander Cochrane Smith series)

by Alan Evans

  It was confirmed when Smith came before Kapitän zur See Gustav Moehle, seated behind the desk in his cabin. Kurt Larsen stood at one side, cap under his arm. Moehle was sharp-eyed and alert, of Smith’s height and build as he was of Smith’s generation. They were contemporaries and professional equals but more than the desk separated them now they were at war. Brandenburg’s captain studied Smith, then glanced down at the sheet of paper Kurt Larsen had laid on his desk and read from it Smith’s name and rank. He looked up: “Correct?” And when Smith nodded, Moehle asked, “Your ship?”

  Smith answered, “You have my name and rank. That is all the information I am required to give under the Geneva Convention.”

  Moehle was silent for a moment, examining this man in civilian dress, nondescript save for the pale blue eyes. Moehle said, “If you are only a naval officer then that is the case.” He pointed at the young officer and said, “This is Oberleutnant zur See Kurt Larsen. He says he saw you in Spain and that you were the British agent who kidnapped a prisoner from the Guardias. He says he saw you again in Berlin not long before the outbreak of war. What do you say to that?”

  Smith shook his head, “I have nothing to add.”

  Moehle nodded acceptance of that, but: “If we find that you are not simply a naval officer when we return to Germany it will be a different matter. That will be soon.”

  Smith was taken down to a cabin below the waterline, one of several doors in a row, a lifejacket hanging outside each one. He was locked into it, Kurt Larsen telling him drily, “All these cabins were fitted with locks because we expected visitors.”

  The steel door closed and the key turned. Smith sat down on the side of his bunk. Moehle had said his ship would soon return to Germany. Once there the evidence of the young Oberleutnant would convict Smith. He had no doubt of that. This morning he had been bitter because he had not been given a command. Now he was to be shot as a spy.

  In his cabin Moehle told Larsen, “Their wireless operator tried to get off a signal but we jammed it.”

  Whitby’s Wireless Officer had sent the signal opening: “RRR Gunned cruiser …” and added the position Maltby had given him. The signal had been picked up by Commodore Harwood’s squadron off the estuary of the River Plate. The ‘RRR’ signifying an attack by a raider had come through clearly but jamming had rendered the Whitby’s position unreadable.

  Minutes later Harwood’s three cruisers were in a fight to the death.

  Chapter Nine – “Enemy in sight!”

  As Smith had stepped out onto the deck of the Whitby before dawn that morning so Robert Hurst had rolled lithely out of his hammock on the mess deck of Exeter. He was running still half-asleep as the alarm rattlers sounded and the bugles blared the call to ‘Action Stations’. He was aware of the burly figure of Bill Donovan pounding behind as he joined in the streams of running men who crowded the passages and ladders of the cruiser. Streams joined to become rivers, or split, or crossed but there was never a collision. The crew of the Exeter, like those of Ajax and Achilles, had done this before.

  Their mouths were open as they panted and their faces yellow under the lights, eyes blank like his own and only seconds from sleep. Then he was out on the upper deck in the coolness of the night air with the stars pin-pricking the pre-dawn darkness. The cruiser was making fourteen knots and the wind of her passage was at his back as he headed aft, still running hard.

  He found the rest of the damage control party in the waist, stopped as he came up to them and caught his breath. Donovan had been only a yard behind him and they exchanged grins. The race had barely winded them and the rest of this party, all of them young men in their teens or early twenties. All, that is, except the Stoker Petty Officer in command, an ageing veteran close on thirty.

  But they were fit and used to this, could make jokes even as they grumbled as a matter of principle. This was not preparation for a battle but only a precaution. This was Dawn Action Stations and all their days at sea began this way.

  Someone asked out of the darkness, “What day is this?”

  Another replied, “Wednesday.”

  “No, I meant what date.” He paused, then finished, “I thought yesterday was the twelfth. Right?”

  There was silence a moment then Hurst said, “That’s right. Today’s the thirteenth.”

  Donovan said amiably, “Unlucky for some. That’s you and me, mate, aboard this tub when we should be in a proper ship.”

  That brought jeers, laughter and ribald comments about Ajax. The sky paled above them, reddened in the east as Exeter cut through the dark silver sea. They could see the other two cruisers ahead of her now, first Achilles then beyond her Ajax, leading the line. Then the sun was up and it was full day, the horizon all around the three ships was empty and their crews stood down from Action Stations.

  The rest of the party headed below to catch another half-hour of sleep before the start of the working day; when you kept watches you snatched sleep whenever you could. But the Stoker P.O. called, “Hey, Hurst!” And sent Robert to the bridge with a message.

  He delivered it and then lingered, sniffing the air and curious. He spotted a spare pair of binoculars and swept the horizon with them. When the smoke was sighted that same curiosity made him train the glasses around to focus on it, then wait for the vessel making it to come up on the horizon. He expected a merchantman and was not surprised when he heard the Commodore’s order to Exeter, the flags on Ajax’s yard read by the signal yeoman on Exeter’s bridge: “Investigate smoke …” and if it was a British merchantman bound for Montevideo, Exeter was to pass her a message to be delivered to the British consul there.

  Hurst swayed as the cruiser heeled in the turn, swinging out of the line, altering course to the north west to close the distant feather of smoke. Ajax and Achilles held on to the north east. Hurst took away the glasses for a moment to wipe his eyes.

  He wondered if his father was at this moment on the bridge of another ship, searching the horizon. He had shied away from asking questions aboard Ajax but in Exeter the men were virtual strangers, like people from another town.

  He had inserted seeming casual questions into conversations with some of the older men on the lower deck, veterans of the last war. So he had heard something of the actions in which Smith had fought, of his recklessness and icy calm. And of his episodes with women. He had to force a smile as he listened to those.

  But then he remembered the girl in Rio. And there had been others. So … Judge not, lest ye be judged?

  He lifted the glasses to his eyes and looked again, refocused slightly. There was the smoke made by the expected merchantman and under it, standing above the hard line of the horizon now … He stared, swallowed, seeing that big control top that could only belong to …

  He heard the sighting report bawled across the bridge as someone got his voice to work before Hurst, and then the captain ordering, “Make to the Commodore: I think it is a pocket battleship.” The image of the ship was hard and clear seen through the binoculars now, lifting above the horizon so he could see the two turrets, one forward and the other aft, each of them mounting three of those big 11-inch guns. The ship was huge in the lenses. Murderous.

  He set the glasses aside and as he started to run he saw the signal breaking out on the yard and the triangular yellow flag with a blue stripe that was the letter ‘N’ in the alphabetical flag code and meant ‘Enemy in sight’. Then he was racing down the ladders with his heart thumping and that was not just because of the physical exertion. The alarm rattlers and bugles were sounding again and this time in earnest. This was no drill or precautionary stand to at dawn. This heralded a battle.

  He ran with the rest, the ship again filled with swift snaking lines or pounding crowds of men who had left whatever they were doing, so many were only half-dressed or barely clothed in only shorts or even a towel, some part shaved or part washed. They ran at the bugle’s call for this was a matter of life or death. Hurst shivered.

  This time he
had a start on the rest and was one of the first to reach his post in action in the waist. But Donovan arrived only seconds later and panted, “What the hell’s going on?”

  Hurst told him, breathlessly, and that was not because of the running, either: “Pocket battleship.”

  “Bloody hellfire!” Donovan blinked at him and questioned hopefully, “Are you sure? They might ha’ made a mistake.”

  Hurst crushed that hope: “I saw it. I was up on the bridge with a pair of glasses and saw it, standing high as a block of flats and six big guns in two turrets. You know what those control towers look like and there’s no mistaking them. That’s a pocket battleship out there.”

  He had an audience now, the Stoker P.O. and the rest of the party crowded around him. One of them said, “Bet you’re glad you’re here and not in Ajax. One o’ those 11-inch bricks’ll go right through her.”

  True. And the pocket battleship’s big guns hurled a broadside 3,000 yards further than any of the cruisers and with a weight of 4,500 pounds, while their three broadsides together only totalled 3,000 pounds. On paper the pocket battleship would murder the three cruisers.

  She could be seen over the bow on the far horizon. The other two cruisers were away to starboard of Exeter and rapidly diverging away from her. Harwood had always intended to split his force in two divisions in this fashion so as to hold the enemy in a crossfire between them. Those were sound tactics. But Hurst reasoned coldly that if the German skipper knew what he was doing he would neutralise Exeter first, as she was the worst threat to his ship with her 8-inch guns. He could stand off and use his greater range to hit her without being hit. Hurst thought that neutralise was another word for sink, burn or blow to pieces this ship whose deck throbbed beneath his feet. And what of himself, a frail human target?

  His father had fought in actions like the one which lay ahead but he was fearless, cool. Or so people said of him. But had he known the excitement and the dry-mouthed terror that Robert was feeling now? And suppressed them, hidden them and so gained that reputation for cold courage?

  Robert looked at the faces around him and saw tension but not fear. Donovan was grinning at him and Hurst found one corner of his own mouth twitching in a responsive smile. It came naturally and was not a bluff; he was glad of that.

  The ship shook as the turrets fired a broadside, all six 8-inch guns speaking with one thunderous voice. Then again, the long barrels pointing skyward at extreme elevation and hurling the shells across ten miles of sea, soaring a mile high in their flight before plunging down to their target. The enemy was firing back, huge towers of dirty water lifting out of the sea on either side of Exeter; she was straddled. Then one of the big 11-inch shells burst in the sea close alongside.

  Steel splinters scythed across the cruiser’s deck and hull like a traversing machine-gun. They tore holes in the hull, cut cables and wrecked one of the two Walrus flying-boats on its catapult. They tore holes in men. So Hurst’s party ran not only to deal with damage to the ship but to aid the wounded and take away the dead. And Exeter was being hit now.

  He and Donovan carried a man below, cradled in their arms between them with his blood soaking them. They took him to a sick bay that was steadily filling with wounded. It had taken a direct hit from an 11-inch shell that had passed through but by some miracle had not burst. Smoke and fumes swirled, setting them coughing and wiping at smarting eyes. But they had to leave their wounded man with the others ranked in the sick bay; there was nowhere else for him to go.

  They climbed to the deck again and did what they could where they could. There was more than enough work for the damage control parties. Hurst and Donovan went where their duty called them as Exeter was hit again and again. ‘B’ turret was split open and the crews of the two guns decimated. The splinters from that burst riddled the bridge and slaughtered all but a handful of the bridge staff. Hurst saw the captain, face bleeding and eyes lacerated by tiny shards of steel, leading the handful away to the after steering position to con the cruiser from there.

  ‘A’ turret was hit and mangled, fired no more.

  Hurst laboured in the waist, Donovan at his side, hauling at wreckage in a mist of petrol shed by one of the tubby little Walrus flying boats, its tank ripped open by splinters. Both of them were aware that if the petrol ignited they and all around them would burn like torches. The wire stay between foremast and main had come down across the two aircraft, pinning them to the catapults. But one man climbed up, ignoring the bursting shells and the blast as the twin 8-inch guns in ‘Y’ turret fired, the only turret in action now. He dragged the heavy wire away so the two wrecked Walrus could be manhandled over the side into the sea.

  Hurst exclaimed, “My God! Who’s that?”

  Donovan answered, “Feller called Shoesmith. Got his nerve.”

  Hurst silently agreed to that. Then he led a party forward as Exeter was hit right in the bow. He saw the smoke of Ajax and Achilles distantly to starboard, so Harwood’s two divisions still held the enemy between them. The pocket battleship tearing Exeter apart was a toy seen over the starboard bow on the far horizon. Then Hurst realised that she had turned away and was now heading into the estuary of the River Plate. She would have to turn again to fight her way past the three cruisers — or end bottled up in Buenos Aires or Montevideo.

  That tiny silhouette of a ship prickled with flashes of winking light as she fired her broadsides. Some instinct or a guardian angel warned Hurst and he bawled to the men with him, “Get down!” They copied him as he sprawled flat behind the mangled ‘A’ turret, just as a shell fragmented in the sea close alongside flinging another lethal hail of steel fragments across the deck. Any man standing would have been cut down. Then he was shouting, “Come on!” And they were up again and running.

  Then later in the nightmare, as the pounding went on, a shell smashed through Exeter’s side and burst on the lower deck. Hurst and Donovan led their own little knot of men down into the passages. They were filled with smoke and pitch dark as the power supply had been cut. Hurst peered out through the eyepieces of his respirator, trying to pierce the darkness with the beam of his torch but it only showed the coiling, rolling clouds of smoke — and Donovan’s big frame just ahead of him. Then Exeter heeled in a turn, Donovan was caught off-balance and staggered, disappeared.

  Now Hurst saw the hole through which Donovan had fallen, four or five feet across and with edges of curled, ragged steel plate, as if the deck had been opened up with a huge tin-opener. He saw it silhouetted against the red light of the flames below and as he knelt at the edge and peered down he saw the fire burning on the flat beneath him and Donovan lying close by it, unmoving.

  Hurst shoved back from the edge and turned on the others in the party crowding close behind him. He snatched the coil of line, rope an inch thick, from the shoulder of one of them, took a turn around his waist and thrust the rest at the others. They grabbed it, tailed onto it and he went down through the hole to the hell below.

  As he spun briefly on the end of the rope he saw all around the flat, or saw all he could through the smoke. It was an unrecognisable tangle of torn plates and twisted piping lit by the glare from the flames. The fire was close and as his feet touched the deck he felt the heat on the exposed skin of his face and hands, and coming up from below through the soles of his shoes. Donovan’s clothes were smouldering and Hurst knew he had only seconds to get out of that hole or he would die there.

  He crouched beside Donovan and now the big man’s head lifted. He was regaining some sort of consciousness but Hurst could not wait for him to look after himself. He passed the rope around Donovan and made it fast, jerked at the slack dangling down from above and saw it snap taut as the other men above took the strain. Hurst got his hands under Donovan’s shoulders, started to lift him and now Donovan tried to stand. He was too weak and his legs wavered and buckled but Hurst was able to shove him upright. Then the rope thrummed under his fingers as the men tailed onto it on the deck overhead and walked away wi
th it. Donovan was snatched from the deck and hauled up to the hole through which he had fallen. Hands reached down and seized him, pulled him through.

  Hurst waited, choking inside the respirator, lifting one foot after the other as each became too hot to stand on the deck heated by the fire below. He was being grilled alive. He gasped out, “Hurry up! For God’s sake!” Then the end of the rope dropped down, he twisted it around him, jerked at it again and he was yanked from the deck and hauled out through the hole as Donovan had been.

  He saw there were extinguishers and a hose being brought into action now, but the men who had lifted him out of the hole shoved him along, passing him from hand to hand until he was out on the upper deck again. He found Donovan there, sitting with his back propped against the galley and legs stretched out, his respirator pulled off and lying on the deck beside him. Hurst sank down on the deck at his side, dragged off his own respirator and gulped in air. It was tainted with smoke, fumes and the stench of cordite but he could breathe.

  After a minute Donovan stirred and turned to Hurst, told him, “I remember falling, then seeing you bending over me. It was bloody hot. That fire … I could see it, feel it. I knew we had to get out but when I tried to stand … I think I fell on my head, hell of a bump there.” His fingers explored it, gingerly prodding at his hair. He said, “Anyhow, point is, I couldn’t ha’ got out o’ there on my own. If you hadn’t …”

  Hurst flapped a hand at him then and silenced him, Donovan realising that he was causing embarrassment. Hurst said, “Well, if you fell on your head you can’t have done any damage.”

  Donovan smiled slowly and said, “All right.” Then he was silent.

  Hurst started to climb to his feet then paused. He said, “I haven’t heard ‘Y’ turret fire since I came up.”