Audacity (Commander Cochrane Smith series)

by Alan Evans

  He ordered Ross, ‘Tell Bennett to rig that platform now.’ Then he turned to Gallagher. ‘You’re ready, I see.’

  The pilot shrugged. ‘Any time. Bring on the Zepp.’ That was not bragging, just an easy confidence. This was his job and he knew he could do it; he’d done it before.

  Bennett appeared on the deck forward of the mast, his gang of men with him. The box between mast and fo’c’sle was struck down. The frames and supports hidden inside it, that the carpenter and his mates had constructed in every available minute, were taken out and set up. The top and sides of the box itself would form part of the completed platform.

  Smith watched the work as Audacity steamed steadily westward. The sections of the platform were hammered into place one by one, fitting like the pieces of the plan he had formed that day they fought the old destroyer off Kurgala, when he believed Audacity’s identity was no longer a secret. He knew then that to get out of the Baltic he had to evade the patrols at either end of the Sound and traverse the length of it in one night. There would be just enough time if he made the approach in daylight, as now, but then Audacity would be seen by the Zeppelin. So he had wanted the Camel and Gallagher, and Königsberg for her timber, both as a disguise and for the platform. And he had needed to get them all here, and now.

  He had done it.

  The Camel and the platform might still not be necessary, this might be one of the days the Zeppelin did not fly, but he dared not have relied on that any more than on fog. Audacity could not wait to pick her time.

  The platform was complete for half its length, Bennett and his gang working now on the last twenty feet that extended out over the fo’c’sle. Smith warned, ‘Keep a sharp lookout overhead. We might see her soon.’ They were four hours away from the Sound and there were still three hours of daylight left. He lifted his glasses from where they hung against his chest and slowly swept the horizon ahead. The sky was empty.

  ‘Sir!’ There was excitement in McLeod’s voice as he approached.

  Smith glanced around at him. ‘Yes?’

  ‘From Sparks, sir. I’ve just decoded it.’ He held out the flimsy and added as Smith took it, ‘He says reception is very good today.’ As always when Audacity was out of sight of land or other shipping, her wireless aerial was rigged and the operator keeping a listening watch.

  Smith read the signal, looked up and saw Ross waiting curiously and told him, ‘One of our destroyers reporting to Admiralty that she’s in pursuit of a German raider.’

  The signal gave a position and McLeod anticipated the next question. ‘I plotted it, sir. About a hundred miles north-west of Bergen.’

  There were grins all around the bridge and Ross said delightedly, ‘She’s bound to catch the bastard! Marvellous!’

  ‘She should.’ Smith handed the signal back to McLeod. ‘My thanks to Sparks and tell him to keep listening.’

  He saw that only Gallagher was not smiling, did not seem to have heard and was staring absently ahead.

  *

  Danby had met him on his way up to the bridge and said, ‘I meant to give you these before but it slipped my mind. We’ve all been pretty busy.’ He dug into a pocket of the damn silly jacket that was three sizes too big for him, produced the goggles and held them out. ‘They were Johnny’s. I thought you’d want them so I hung on to them. They were all that was left…’ His voice tailed off into embarrassed, nervous silence.

  Then one of the armourers shouted from the box where he was working on the Camel, ‘Mr. Danby, sir!’

  ‘Coming!’ Danby almost ran away and Gallagher glared after him…

  Petrograd had been an awful place. The Russian Empire was falling apart and mobs roved the streets. The Flight was resting after some costly operations and Gallagher went to Petrograd with Johnny. They were both a bit low because they’d lost Miller and Young, two good pilots, on the same day. They needed something to set them up again but they didn’t find it in that cold, strife-torn city. Only Russian vodka. Then just two days after they’d got back to the Flight, Johnny was shot down and taken off to the hospital. And when he came back…

  *

  ‘There she is, twenty on the starboard bow.’

  Ross said it quietly but they were all silent on the bridge now. Smith trained his glasses, searched the sky and found the far-off speck.

  McLeod said, ‘She’s heading south—and about twenty miles away?’

  He discussed the matter with Ross and used his sextant to measure the vertical angle between the distant horizon and the Zeppelin edging slowly across the sky just below the cloud ceiling. Gallagher irritably broke in, ‘She’s making fifty to sixty knots at ten thousand feet.’

  McLeod looked up from his calculations and blinked. ‘I work it out to that.’

  Smith judged that the Zeppelin was now on the southbound leg of her patrol. Her captain must have seen Audacity’s smoke but would not turn towards it: he knew he’d be over this ship when he returned on the northbound leg in an hour or so. Then he would be able to see what kind of vessel it was and where it was headed—south to Kiel or west to the Sound—and report to the destroyer. Or destroyers; after Audacity’s rampaging there might be more than one waiting off the Sound.

  He ordered, ‘Slow ahead,’ and to Ross, ‘Transfer the Camel.’

  Audacity’s speed dropped until she just had steerage way.

  Ross supervised the plane’s transfer, using the derricks fore and aft of the mast to lift the Camel, swing it up from the box and out over the sea then inboard again to its new resting place on the rear end of the platform just forward of the mast. Smith saw it settled, then called for: ‘Half ahead.’ Soon it would be full ahead. He glanced across at Gallagher who still stood at the rail, his eyes on the Camel, and wondered what the pilot was thinking.

  *

  Russia had been bad from the start and those last weeks it got worse until the last day, and that was the worst of all. He’d flown the first patrol with Griffiths, knowing he’d have to fly the second with Danby and not looking forward to that. The Russians were falling back and the Camels being used for low-level attacks on German troops and transport. Nobody liked that job. They still had four machines but only himself and the other two pilots to fly them. Danby was very raw. Griffiths had loads of experience but had become very shaky lately and said he couldn’t sleep.

  So Gallagher planned to take each one with him in turn and if that meant he flew all day, well, he was the flight commander and the bloody ace, wasn’t he? But that first patrol with Griffiths had been disastrous. They took off loaded with four twenty-five-pound bombs each, found a column and bombed it, then swept along it with the twin Vickers blazing, but there were all kinds of stuff coming up at them from machine-gun fire to the shells from field pieces. Gallagher thought it was one of those shells that hit Griffiths but all he saw was the machine blown apart in mid-air and the bits of it falling along the road among the burning transport and dead infantry.

  Gallagher was in trouble, anyway. His Camel was shot full of holes and he was hit; he didn’t know how badly but he felt sick and sleepy so he had to squint to focus. He nursed the Camel back to the field at Kunda Bay and slapped it down on that apology for a runway. The ground-crew started pulling him out and that hurt so he yelled, but they yelled back that a flight of German Albatrosses had trailed him back to the field and he had to be out of it before the attack came in. Then he saw Johnny, back from hospital, and he knew it was going to be all right. Johnny stood by the cockpit, watching the men lifting Gallagher out. He looked changed, thinner, and older. Gallagher asked him, ‘When did you get back?’

  ‘Half an hour ago.’ Johnny’s voice had changed, too; it was hoarse, the words blurred.

  But Gallagher’s mind was on other things. ‘You and Danby get those two Camels into the air before Jerry attacks.’

  Johnny asked slowly, ‘You want me to fly now?’ What the hell was he on about? ‘Of course I want you to fly! You’ve got to! Somebody has to look after that
squirt, so no heroics or fancy stuff. Those two Camels are all we have left, Johnny, and we don’t want them shot up. Get them off the ground and out of the way.’

  Johnny nodded. ‘If you say so.’

  ‘I’m bloody glad to see you. You’re the only one I can rely on.’

  ‘All right.’

  Then they lifted the stretcher and trotted with it across the field to the ambulance. They loaded him into it, he heard the engines of the Camels running up and then the surge of power as they ran away along the field.

  And then the smash.

  And then they told him the Camels had collided on take-off and Mr. Vincent was dead. And the German planes never attacked. They turned back, for some reason, just short of the airfield.

  *

  The Camel was waiting on the platform.

  Gallagher turned and walked aft past the wheelhouse, then Smith’s cabin, towards the ladder. Danby came up it quickly and asked, ‘Anything I can do?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I could run her up for a minute or so while you—’ Gallagher had pushed past him. Now he turned. ‘You heard what I said! Keep out of my way. Don’t you realise, every bloody time I look at you I remember Johnny?’

  Danby flinched. ‘That was an accident.’

  ‘More like murder! He was one of the best pilots I ever saw and you killed him!’

  ‘No!’

  ‘What d’you mean: “No”? You said you didn’t know what happened. You said the pair of you were taking off and you collided. Collided! Johnny never made a damn fool mistake like that in his life—and remember, you’d already crashed one Camel on that field.’

  Danby swallowed, said, ‘He was ahead of me and well to the left but then as we lifted off he swung over in front of me. I tried to haul clear but—’

  ‘Are you saying it was his fault?’

  Danby looked away. ‘I’m only saying—’

  ‘The truth is you were too busy shitting yourself to see straight. Or perhaps you’d primed yourself with Dutch courage? Was that it? A good slug of issue rum to hold the stomach down?’

  ‘No! It was Johnny who—’ Danby stopped.

  Gallagher whispered, ‘ What?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘You were going to say he was drunk!’ Memories flashed into his mind of Johnny’s enthusiasm for Russian vodka, and the sprees they’d had. He suppressed them. ‘You lying little bastard!’

  Danby met his gaze. ‘It’s true—’

  Gallagher swung, a boxer’s right hand, but the constricting layers of clothing made the movement awkward and slow. Danby stepped back so that it only mashed his lips against his teeth. It hurt and there was blood salty in his mouth. His back slammed against the side of Smith’s cabin and he bounced off it, lashing out with his own fist. He was not a boxer and the blow was unskilful, a wild reaction, but it landed high on Gallagher’s chest with all Danby’s forward-moving weight behind it. This time it was Gallagher who was forced to take a step back to keep his balance. But there was no deck behind him, only space. He fell backwards down the ladder, turned over once in the ten-foot drop, and landed heavily with his legs tangled under him.

  *

  The messenger came to Smith on the bridge. ‘Mr. Danby says to tell you, sir, that Mr. Gallagher’s broken his leg.’

  There was shocked silence for a moment, then Ross said, ‘That’s torn it.’

  Smith went down to the wardroom. The men Danby had got together to carry Gallagher were just coming out. Smith paused in the door, hearing voices raised in anger, and saw Gallagher stretched on the table, Danby standing beside it. Gallagher grimaced with pain, but jerked up at him, ‘I don’t believe you. The groundcrew would have known if that was true.’

  Danby said, ‘I told them to keep their mouths shut. He deserved better than that sort of talk, and so did you. He was your friend.’

  Smith stepped forward into the wardroom and asked, ‘What happened?’

  Gallagher frowned, was silent for a moment. Then said, ‘I slipped and fell down the ladder.’

  Smith knew that was a lie. There was blood on Danby’s mouth and on Gallagher’s knuckles. But that was unimportant. Smith demanded brutally, ‘Can you fly?’

  Gallagher’s head moved slowly. ‘No.’ And: ‘Sorry.’

  Smith thought that the whole plan, so painfully put together, had failed now—and through bloody stupidity. But it might have failed earlier for the same or any other reason. War was a chancy business. So they simply had to start again, seek another way. If there was another way…

  He looked at Danby. ‘What about you flying the Camel?’

  Gallagher shook his head. ‘He’s Administration.’

  Smith said slowly, ‘So you told me. And none of your airmen has said he could fly but we know they hold their tongues. He’s young to be an Admin. officer, those jobs usually go to older men with a lot of experience of the right procedures—or wangles. He had some experience in boats so why didn’t he just go to sea? And wouldn’t a replacement be more likely to be a pilot, where you take your casualties, rather than an Admin. officer?’ He waited, then pressed, ‘Well?’

  Gallagher admitted reluctantly, ‘He’s a pilot, but I grounded him after he crashed his second Camel.’

  Danby broke in angrily, ‘I just explained—’

  ‘All right.’ Gallagher closed his eyes, remembering Johnny Vincent saying slowly, the words blurred, ‘You want me to fly now?’ And his own reply: ‘Of course.’ He sighed. ‘All right. We’ll agree that one wasn’t your fault. But—’

  Smith said, ‘You could always unground him.’

  Gallagher shook his head again. ‘He’s only done fifteen hours and then only on Pups.’

  ‘They’re not the same as Camels, are they?’

  ‘No,’ said Gallagher shortly, ‘they bloody well aren’t.’

  Smith asked Danby, ‘What do you think?’

  Danby looked from Smith’s cool stare to Gallagher’s scowl. ‘Well’—he hesitated—‘as I understand it, if this Zeppelin reports us, then sooner or later we’re sunk.’ Smith thought, Sooner rather than later. Danby went on, eyeing Gallagher stubbornly, ‘That second time I took off right. I think I could do this. You could tell me how.’

  Smith glanced at his watch. The Zeppelin would be turning to head north soon. There were seventy-odd souls aboard Audacity. God help him for what he was about to do. He asked Gallagher, ‘Could you coach him?’

  ‘I’m not letting him try to—’

  ‘No,’ Smith cut in, voice harsh, ‘I’m ordering him to!’

  Gallagher thought, hard as nails. Sees his objective and goes after it. He scowled at Danby. This was no Johnny Vincent, no easy grin nor years of experience. This poor little bugger didn’t know what he was letting himself in for. If this boy—if any of them—were to survive, Gallagher would have to pump into him the know-how, and then the confidence that came with it. But Johnny had always been ready to try anything, right from the beginning.

  Gallagher said, ‘In that case I’d better do what I can.’

  There was a tap at the door and the S.B.A. entered. ‘They tell me there’s a suspected broken leg in here, sir.’

  Smith told him, ‘Yes, come on.’

  Pearson felt carefully along the leg, then winced. ‘Yes, sir, it’s broken. I’ll have to set it.’ He studied the leg, chewing his lip. ‘I’ve done one before but I’d want to look at the book first, to refresh my memory, like.’

  Gallagher said, ‘Setting will hurt, won’t it?’

  ‘Well—’ It would hurt like hell, Pearson remembered that much.

  ‘Leave it for a bit. First I’ve got a flying lesson to give.’ Gallagher glanced at Smith, who said, ‘Carry on, Mr. Gallagher.’

  The flight commander turned on Danby. ‘You’ll have to get some extra trousers and socks, bigger boots. And you’ll have to listen!’

  Smith left them to it and returned to the bridge. Ross turned and asked, ‘How is he, sir? Is it broken?’


  ‘It’s broken, so Danby is flying instead.’

  ‘Danby!’

  ‘He’s a pilot.’ Of some sort or other. Fifteen hours on the docile Pup and two Camels wrecked. But there was no point in sharing his fear with the others so he spoke easily, as if the change was just routine.

  Ross said, ‘I didn’t know.’ But then, reassured, ‘That’s all right, then.’

  Smith said, ‘The Zeppelin hasn’t showed up again yet.’ Not a question; he would be told the instant it was sighted. ‘Not yet, sir.’

  Danby must be in the air well before it came. There might be just enough time because the wind was out of the north and the Zeppelin would be butting into it. There was only a moderate sea and that was a blessing, Audacity hammering through it at fifteen knots or better. ‘Starboard five.’ He turned her until she was headed into the wind, her funnel smoke rolling down along the white track of her wake. Then he went quickly down to the wardroom, met Danby already on his way out and told him, ‘The wind is ten knots and we’re making fifteen.’

  Danby was now squat in layers of clothing, long woollen underwear, two pairs of trousers and of socks, and a fitter’s boots a size bigger than his own, with Gallagher’s overcoat on top and reaching almost to his ankles. He wore Gallagher’s balaclava and scarf with Johnny Vincent’s goggles pushed up on his forehead. His face glistened with grease to combat frostbite. He answered, ‘Gallagher said they used to fly off at thirty but he thinks twenty-five or so should be enough with this length of platform.’ He shivered and pulled on his gloves. He was only eighteen years old and looked it. ‘No point in hanging about. It’s bloody cold.’ He clumped forward to the ladder and climbed down to the deck.

  Gallagher called from inside the wardroom, ‘Sir! The S.B.A.’s collecting some men to carry me up to the bridge. I—ought to be there. Is that all right?’