A few shots cracked into the submarine’s hull and conning tower but a savage burst of fire from the Brownings took care of them, and cut down anyone stupid enough to remain in view.
‘Slow ahead!’ It was not possible. Ross saw the three U-Boats neatly moored alongside their new mother-ship. There were perhaps two more on the other side. Could it be the whole group?
Fifty yards, thirty, with occasional shots slamming into the hull or glancing off the abandoned deck-gun.
Someone shouted wildly, ‘Another boat comin’!’
Ross stared at the raked bows of the three U-Boats until his eyes watered. The new arrival was too late. He could hear Murray yelling in the control-room, the periscope dipped now to measure the final approach. A scuttle in the depot-ship’s straight side opened and a rifle appeared.
Tucker caught one of the Browning gunners as he fell gasping on the rough plating, and took over the gun himself.
‘Here, you bastards!’ Then he shouted, ‘Christ, it’s the bloody marines!’
The boat which, unbelievably, appeared to be a pilot cutter, crashed alongside, and wild-looking marines and Gurkhas spilled on to the casing even as Murray stopped the engines. Like athletes their arms went up and then over, their grenades bursting almost instantly on the depot-ship’s decks.
Major Sinclair was striding through them. ‘Single shots! Save your ammo! This is not bloody Whale Island!’
Then he clambered up the ladder and said, ‘Thought the boat would come in handy. It’ll get us ashore. After that, it’s up to us.’ He lifted his Sten-gun and fired almost from the hip, and somebody slithered into the sea alongside.
Sinclair snapped, ‘Get Villiers up here with his bag of tricks. The outboard targets might escape otherwise.’
He was watching the seaplane, lifting and circling again like a startled bird.
Ross felt the bows snag into the U-Boats’ headropes, nudging between two of the hulls in a screeching embrace. Tybalt felt heavier, and when he peered down at the foredeck he saw that the water was almost up to the open hatch.
‘We lost a chariot.’
Sinclair barely turned. ‘I had a spot of bother on the road. Three of mine copped it.’
‘Dead?’ Ross saw the surprise in Sinclair’s eyes.
‘Well, they are now.’
Villiers lurched through the hatch. ‘What’s happening?’ He seemed dazed by the silence. Just a few random shots and the dead seaman, and a slow-moving pall of smoke from the riddled launch.
‘We’re getting out. Go with Major Sinclair and sabotage the moorings on the other side. Where’s Number One?’
Villiers looked at his sleeve. It was spattered with blood.
He said quietly, ‘He was coming up to give you a hand. Stray bullet.’ He shook his head as if it was all suddenly too much for him to comprehend. ‘He’s alive, but I couldn’t move him. He just stared at me and said he’d stay with Tybalt.’
Sinclair said impatiently, ‘Well, let’s get a bloody move on. Won’t be quiet much longer!’ He fired two single shots at an open scuttle, and Ross guessed it was probably his last Sten magazine.
Ross ran to the scarred plating and looked at the forward hatch as the first trickle of water overran the coaming.
He said, ‘Clear the boat. We’ve got less than half an hour.’ To Villiers he called, ‘Don’t hang about.’ He thought of the first lieutenant, down there dying and alone. Aloud he said bitterly, ‘I know how he feels!’
Mike Tucker tossed the scarlet flag with its cross and swastika over the side. ‘There. All done.’ Murray would even have his own flag at the end.
Ross touched his holster and realized that it was still clipped shut.
Another bullet ricocheted from the conning tower and whimpered away over the smoke. Sinclair’s men were retreating to their stolen pilot cutter. Some were being carried, a few just managing to hop over the littered deck. Tybalt’s Chief was the last to leave, with barely a glance at the water as it surged through the big forehatch. The bows were beginning to go under.
‘Plane’s having another go, sir!’
Ross heard the rattle of machine-guns and saw Sinclair’s men diving for cover, while one of them fired at the seaplane with a Bren-gun until it was empty.
‘Ready when you are, sir!’ Youthful and surprisingly fresh-looking, Captain Bobby Pleydell reloaded his revolver without once taking his eyes from the depot-ship’s rails and bridge.
‘Wait another minute.’ Should he have sent Villiers when they had already done so much, and paid so dearly?
Pleydell was saying, ‘It was a bit dicey.’ He grinned and looked even younger. ‘But then, it always is in this outfit!’
The pilot boat’s engine roared into life, and Ross saw two of the marines holding one of their comrades in a sitting position so that he could see what was happening.
Mike Tucker was also watching. He saw the man die in their arms and be laid at peace in the scuppers. Somehow he knew. The White Ensign he had hoisted for Ross’s benefit had been the last thing that dying marine had seen.
Ross said, ‘It’s taking too long.’ A mooring wire was beginning to fray as Tybalt put her full weight against it.
Pleydell said, ‘I’ll send two of my chaps to fetch him. They can get round there over some lighters.’ He strode away, slim and erect amid so much pain.
The submarine gave a violent lurch and sank swiftly between the two inboard U-Boats. As Tybalt hit the bottom the two other boats seemed to crowd together again. Ross turned away. The periscope was still raised: it was as shallow as they had expected. But all he could think of was the periscope. As if Murray was still there, keeping an eye on things.
The air quivered to new explosions: Sinclair’s booby-traps offering their challenge. It would slow the enemy down. It would not stop them.
Beyond the depot-ship’s protective hull the explosions seemed much closer. Villiers felt his heart beating wildly, his breathing so fierce that he could barely fill his lungs. He could feel Sinclair behind him, see his ramrod-straight shadow as he watched for any threat or movement from the ship’s deck.
The tape clung to his fingers and he heard himself sob with anger like some fretting child. He gripped the detonator until his mind cleared again. No time for anything fancy. Ross would be waiting for him.
Sinclair said unhurriedly, ‘Don’t be too long about it. I’ve got to get your people out of here, in one piece if I can!’ He laughed. An odd, menacing sound, but when Villiers lurched round on his knees to look at him, he seemed completely calm, one wrist raised while he studied the compass he carried there.
Villiers turned away, and despite the danger he found that he could attach and set the time-fuse. He had done it so often in training on H.M.S. Vernon that he could do it blindfolded, and yet before he had volunteered for Special Service he had had difficulty even re-setting a clock.
It was all so clear and stark. Like the time at the hospital when he and Ross had gone to collect Sinclair, and Caryl had been there too. He stood up. ‘It’s set. Twenty minutes, with a bit of luck.’
He watched as Sinclair re-cocked his Sten-gun. ‘I thought you were in a hurry.’
It was as if he had said nothing. Sinclair looked past him towards the shore, the quivering mass of green trees.
‘I’ve known for quite a long time, you see?’ He smiled. ‘It was the envelope I recognized, not the writing.’ He added sharply, ‘You were both too bloody clever for that!’
Villiers said, ‘I think we’d better leave!’ He dropped his hands to his sides as the Sten’s muzzle moved slightly. ‘So you found out. What are you going to do, gun me down? You seem to be good at that!’
Sinclair did not rise to the remark. If anything, it seemed to calm him further.
‘I shall see her when I go back, of course. Tell her what a hero you were. She’d like that, dear Caryl!’
Villiers stood perfectly still. Sinclair was mad. Somebody should have seen it, have listened. He w
ould shoot, and in a few minutes the charges he himself had just set would explode. And when Tybalt went up there would be nothing left. Nothing.
If he could reason with him, somebody would come looking for them. Ross would not leave him. But who would know?
He made to move but Sinclair said, ‘Stand still! Do something right!’
Villiers thought of the overgrown garden, the place where he knew he had found his parents and Ross had been with him. He clenched his fists and winced as the sun lanced into his eyes.
‘That’s the ticket! Nice and easy. Like a gentleman!’
Villiers swayed, unable even to see what was happening. But how could it be? It was like the final nightmare. The sun was in the wrong place. He put his hand to his eyes and saw the glare reflected from a scuttle in the Java Maru’s side. Like a mirror, or a heliograph, which his father had often described.
He heard himself scream, ‘Look out! For Christ’s sake!’
The amused disbelief on Sinclair’s face changed as something in his reeling mind detected the truth in Villiers’ frantic warning. He turned lightly on his heels and fired from the hip, an automatic burst this time, the last he had.
Villiers heard the crash of glass and was in time to see a bloodied face fall away from the scuttle. He did not hear the other shot at all. Sinclair lay propped against a mooring bollard, his eyes staring down at his chest, as if he could feel nothing, even as the blood pumped out of him.
Villiers wanted to move but felt unable to grasp what had happened.
He said, ‘I’ll fetch help!’
Sinclair looked at him emptily. ‘You would, too. You’re just the sort.’
He must be in agony, Villiers thought. Even so, he was shocked by the intensity of his anger and his contempt. Even his eyes were blazing with hate. A face from hell.
‘Spot of bother, old son?’ Captain Pleydell climbed over a lighter, his eyes everywhere, a Gurkha and an armed marine close behind him.
Villiers said harshly, ‘He was shot. From up there. But he got the bastard who did it.’
Pleydell nodded. ‘Quite. Could have been you, y’know.’ He bent over Sinclair’s legs and unbuttoned his denim blouse. ‘The major’s bought it, I’m afraid.’ He opened Sinclair’s wallet and remarked, ‘Funny thing to carry about, I’d have thought?’
Villiers allowed the young captain to grip his arm and push him around the line of lighters. Once he looked back and saw that Sinclair was still staring after him, but the dead eyes were without menace.
Pleydell waved to the swaying pilot cutter, and Villiers felt himself being dragged bodily over the side.
A muffled explosion boomed around the anchorage, and minutes later they saw the U-Boats’ tanker begin to settle down.
Ross lowered his glasses. One of the chariots had made it. They might never know which.
Pleydell said calmly, ‘If somebody drops a match in that little lot they’ll really be in trouble.’
Villiers looked up and saw Ross turning the Wren officer’s badge in his fingers. From Sinclair’s wallet. A souvenir, somebody had called it . . .
Mike Tucker was also watching, sharing what they had all done. Together.
He saw Ross throw the pale blue badge into the sea, and wondered if they would ever get back; and if so, if Ross would ever tell his girl about it.
Right on time, as they stumbled through secondary jungle following their Gurkha scouts, they heard the main charges in Tybalt explode. Like an earthquake, so that even here the ground shook. Or trembled, perhaps, at what men could do.
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Copyright © Bolitho Maritime Productions Ltd 1996
Douglas Reeman has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in Great Britain in 1996 by William Heinemann
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ISBN 9780099502340
A Dawn Like Thunder Page 31
