Villar said, ‘Gibbons, sir. He’s good.’
Blake crossed to the rack of telephones and lifted one from its case.
‘Gibbons? This is the captain. What do you make of it?’
‘The range is about the same, sir, but I’m almost certain she had altered course. We’re getting a lot of interference.’ He sounded apologetic. As if it was his fault. ‘But I’m pretty sure she was steering south-east. Now we’re on the same track.’
‘Good work, Gibbons.’ He put down the handset. ‘Sound off action stations, if you please. Tell the engineroom to increase revolutions for twenty knots.’
Villar glanced at the surging crests alongside as if to say, in this?
Seconds later the alarm bells jangled throughout the ship and men surged towards their stations, their movements automatic, even if their minds were still below in their messes.
Palliser left to go to his director control tower, and Blake said to Villar, ‘Muster your plotting team, Pilot. I want every move, every thought put on paper!’
‘Ship at action stations, sir.’
‘Very well.’
Blake jammed his cap in the signal locker to allow the spray to soak his hair and face until his mind was clear again.
‘Alter course. Steer zero-eight-zero. Tell radar to keep watching for any change of course by the other ship.’ He had almost said enemy.
‘Aye-aye, sir.’
The bridge groaned and rocked as the mounting revolutions reached up through the glistening steel.
Blake heard the gunnery speaker click on and then Palliser’s voice from the director.
‘Ship bears Green oh-five. Range one-five-five.’
The right gun of B turret rose a few degrees and then dipped again, as if it, not the contents of the turret, was coming to life.
Villar came back banging his wet hands together. ‘Hell, look at it!’ He glared through the screen at the low, angry clouds. The sea was violent and in disorder as it mounted under the cruiser’s stern and then smashed over the side in solid sheets.
Sub-Lieutenant Walker staggered to Villar’s side. ‘Will we make a signal to base, sir?’
Villar grinned through the falling spray. ‘Why, Sub? There’s nothing between us and the nearest land but sixteen hundred miles of bloody ocean and that ship!’
‘The ship is still on course, sir.’
Blake moved restlessly about the bridge, his shoes slipping on the wooden gratings. The other vessel was not equipped with radar, otherwise they would have detected it by now. She must have been keeping a damn good lookout to spot Andromeda’s upper works in this visibility, even with the sun behind her. That was unusual for the run-of-the-mill merchantman, especially in these waters.
He thrust his hands into his pockets and examined his reactions like a surgeon at the operating table.
Was he over-reacting because of what had happened?
He said, ‘Yeoman, write this down and pass it to the W/T office. Am investigating strange ship in position so and so.’ He heard the Toby Jug’s pencil pause over his pad, then added, ‘I will transmit my amended ETA when satisfied.’
He strode to the chart, beckoning Villar to follow. Beneath the canvas hood they peered at the stained chart, their own pencilled track, the neat procession of crosses where Villar had recorded the other ship’s positions.
Blake said, ‘Give the yeoman a position about here.’ He pointed to the north of their intended course. ‘A nice easy one, about a hundred miles away. If that other ship is an enemy, he’ll think we’re in company and our consort has made a contact further north. We’ll see what he does about it.’
They ducked out into the wind and Villar handed his scribbled latitude and longitude of the mythical sighting report to the yeoman of signals before asking, ‘What then, sir?’
‘He’ll get the hell out of it, thankful that we were stupid enough to go after the wrong ship. If he’s on the level, he’ll not only fail to comprehend our signal, but will remain thankfully on his lawful occasions.’
The yeoman said thickly, ‘W/T informed, sir.’
‘Alter course. Steer due north. Tell radar and DCT what we’re doing.’
Beam on to the big rollers, Andromeda heaved and swayed to a sickening angle. Her lee side was buried several times beneath tons of water, and Blake pitied the damage control parties throughout the hull who were trying to keep equipment and vital machinery from tearing itself adrift.
The minutes ticked past, and Blake could sense the disappointment around him. Wrong again. A waste of time, as Scovell would soon be saying.
‘Radar . . . bridge!’
Villar had the telephone to his ear in a second. ‘Fore-bridge!’
‘The ship is altering course, sir. Turning to starboard.’
To confirm this, Palliser’s voice came through the speaker again. ‘Ship now bears one-three-zero. Range one-six-oh.’
Villar exclaimed, ‘The bastard’s heading away, sir. He swallowed it, the whole bloody bit!’
Blake stared at him, his mind like ice. ‘Bring her round, Pilot. Course to overhaul and intercept. Twenty-five knots.’
A boatswain’s mate looked at his friend and grinned. ‘Tally-bloody-ho!’
Like an avenging beast, Andromeda swung steeply to starboard, her guard-rails buried in spray as she pointed her stem towards her invisible quarry.
Down in his brightly lit corridor of roaring machinery, Weir looked at his subordinate and then shook a gloved fist at the telegraphs.
He mouthed the words through the din. ‘They’re going bloody mad up top!’
The second engineer nodded agreement and then turned back to his gauges.
Weir stared at his stokers and ERAs bowing and lurching through the oily mist like phantoms. One slip and you were mincemeat. He wished Blake would ease up. But from what he had heard, the skipper had his reasons.
The second engineer patted his shoulder. ‘You okay, Chief?’
‘An’ why shouldn’t I be, man?’
Weir swung away before the lieutenant could see his face. It often hit him like that. Remembering his wife and two children, buried in a common grave after the air raid.
He thought of the islands they had left astern, what the returning landing party had said. He ran his hand along the polished rail of his catwalk and said softly, ‘Come on, my lass, let’s be having you, an’ none of your tricks now!’
The second engineer glanced at him curiously. It was as if the Chief was speaking to the ship.
12
No Proof
WHILE ANDROMEDA POUNDED after the unknown ship, low cloud and a heavy downpour reduced visibility to less than a mile. Only the radar’s invisible eye and the gunnery control’s blurred glimpses of the other ship told them they were not alone or charging after a phantom.
‘The ship is resuming course, sir. Range now down to five miles.’
Blake wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. It was hard to think with the rain sweeping across the bridge like pellets, the ship lifting and surging forward in great sickening swoops.
‘Warn Guns. Be ready to open fire instantly.’
He tried to picture the other ship. She had seen them at last. Or had already picked up Andromeda’s radar on a detector. Only another warship would turn and fight. A merchantman would stand no chance against the cruiser’s speed, which at this moment was over twenty-five knots, with a few more in hand if required.
The stranger would appear on Andromeda’s starboard bow, unless she made some last effort to wriggle away as darkness closed in for the night.
Blake thrust an empty pipe into his mouth and bit on the stem. There was no sense in prolonging it.
‘Fire star-shell. Yeoman, use your big light and signal her to heave to. You know the drill.’
As if the signalmen had been waiting for the order, the biggest searchlight clattered into life, the glacier beam probing through the oncoming rain with quick, irregular flashes.
Stop inst
antly. This is a British warship. Do not attempt to scuttle.
Someone gave a yelp of pain as a four-inch gun crashed out, and seconds later the low cloud exploded into life from the star-shell.
It was all there. The other ship, almost end on, her high stern glistening in spray and the glare from the drifting flare.
Villar said, ‘Christ, he’s switched on his navigation lights, the crafty bastard!’
More lights appeared through the rain, and Blake saw the Spanish colours painted on the vessel’s side, the urgent flash of a morse lamp from her bridge.
The Toby Jug growled, ‘Says she’s the Jacinto Verdaguer, sir.’ Even his clumsy pronunciation failed to disguise his contempt, his anger.
‘She’s not stopping, sir.’
Blake picked up a handset but kept his eyes on the fading shape of the other ship as the flare began to die.
‘Guns? One round. Close as you like.’
The violent crash and recoil of B turret’s right gun made the bridge jump as if kicked.
Blake watched for the fall of shot, saw the blurred flash of the explosion and a leaping column of water, which had it been any nearer would have exploded inside her hull.
‘She’s stopping, sir.’ A seaman strapped in his Oerlikon gun gave an ironic cheer.
Like a chanting monk, one of Palliser’s gunnery ratings was repeating, ‘B gun reload, semi-armour-piercing.’
Sub-Lieutenant Walker shouted, ‘From W/T, sir! That ship’s transmitting!’ He sounded confused. ‘Says she’s being fired on by British warship, it’s an SOS, sir!’
Scovell appeared on the bridge, his boots skidding in the slopping water.
‘Shall I send off a boarding party, sir?’
Blake levelled his glasses again. He was not mistaken. One of the other ship’s boats was beginning to jerk down the falls towards the waves alongside as the ship began to drift downwind.
He said, ‘Signal her again! Do not scuttle! Do not abandon! Stand by to receive my boarding party!’
He heard Palliser’s voice again, calm and detached, as he trained the two forward turrets on the drifting ship.
It might be a ruse, a last attempt to lure Andromeda near enough to loose off torpedoes or open fire with some concealed guns.
The swift change of events, the other ship’s sudden call for help seemed totally at odds with her previous movements.
Scovell said, ‘We’ll have to get closer if we’re to send a boat across, sir.’
Blake glanced at him. ‘If we don’t put some hands aboard, every scrap of evidence will go over the side before dawn, you can bank on that!’
Walker yelled, ‘That was an explosion, sir!’
A dull, metallic thud rolled against Andromeda’s hull, as if she had charged across a submerged wreck.
Smoke belched through the other ship’s forward deck, to be driven instantly downwind.
Scovell rasped, ‘Bloody hell! They’ve fired a scuttling charge!’
Blake looked across at the ship. In his imagination he could already detect a list.
‘Make to her once more. Do not abandon.’
Villar staggered across the gratings. ‘Tell ’em we’ll leave every mother’s son to drown if they do!’ He looked helplessly at Blake. ‘Why not, sir? They’d do it to us.’
The lamp clattered and the yeoman said, ‘No acknowledgement, sir, and they’re lowering another boat.’
The ship had begun to list. She was obviously well loaded, and her cargo was lending its weight to her execution.
‘Slow ahead together. Pilot, alter course to make a lee for those boats.’ He could not disguise his bitterness as he added, ‘Maybe they would, Pilot. But they obviously know us better than we do ourselves.’
Villar strode to the compass platform muttering, ‘If it was my decision I’d –’
Scovell snapped, ‘Well, it’s not, so stop bloody well moaning about it!’
Another bang echoed across the water, a scuttling charge or some internal explosion, it was impossible to tell.
‘She’s settling down.’
Able Seaman ‘Shiner’ Wright, the navigator’s yeoman, peered through the rain.
‘I’ve checked her on the list, sir. The name’s genuine anyway. Spanish ship under charter to a company in South America, Buenos Aires, to be exact.’
He withdrew hurriedly as Villar glared at him.
Scovell said softly, ‘Well, there’s a thing.’
The tannoy bellowed, ‘Stand by to take on survivors. Scrambling nets, lower away!’
Lieutenant Trevett, Villar’s assistant, said savagely, ‘Survivors my ass!’
Blake looked at him. A newcomer to the ship, and an Australian from another way of life. But already he was sharing it. Could feel the same bitterness as himself.
He said, ‘Number One, I want every man from that ship put under guard. Nobody is to converse, nothing is to be discarded.’
Scovell’s eyes were in shadow. ‘You still believe it was an enemy –’ He broke off as the ship heeled over and plunged beneath the surface in a welter of boiling foam and steam. ‘A supply vessel of sorts?’ Without waiting for an answer he left the bridge, calling for some armed marines to receive the floundering boats alongside.
Blake said, ‘Fall out action stations. Lay off a new course for base, Pilot.’
Villar looked across the ticking gyro-compass. ‘Well, I think she was a bandit, sir.’
The speaker intoned, ‘Fall out action stations. Port watch to defence stations. Hands to supper.’
Blake climbed on to his seat again, going over the fast-moving chain of events. Villar shared his views. Why had the ship displayed no lights nor an indication of her neutrality? How had an ordinary merchantman under charter managed to detect Andromeda’s approach and her sudden alteration of course?
But suppose he was wrong. Palliser would be the first to deny that a single shell from one of his guns could have sunk the merchant ship. But the evidence now lay on the sea-bed, and at a court of enquiry the facts of the present moment would be flimsy to say the least.
‘Course to steer is zero-seven-zero, sir.’
‘Very well. Revolutions for fifteen knots until the Chief says otherwise. When you’ve done all that, have a signal coded up for our correct ETA.’
Villar watched him as he walked aft to the ladder which would lead him to his sea cabin, his prison.
To Lieutenant Trevett he said, ‘Command? You can have it, man! The way the top brass make the rules for skippers you’d think we were on the wrong side!’
In his sea cabin, the sides of which were running with condensation despite the fans, Blake threw his oilskin on the deck and lay on the bunk.
It was no longer a matter of luck. You had to be right, and to go on believing you were right, no matter what. The Spanish merchantman had been a supply ship for the raider. No other explanation fitted. Her captain had obeyed his masters very well. No evidence, but more than that, he had used attack as the best form of defence.
The German high command had chosen its people with extreme care. They knew how to drag a red-herring, how to make every Allied warship so troubled about sinking an innocent vessel that he would have to think twice before attacking. Except it was unlikely he would get a second chance.
He thought, too, about the tiny island and the hastily dug grave. Thirty-three dead men. Even one would have been too many under those conditions.
He rolled on to his side hoping the dream would return. But, like the sleep he so badly needed, it stayed away.
Commander (E) Robert Weir stood on the opposite side of Blake’s littered desk and said firmly, ‘I understand all that you’re doing and trying to do. Lord, we’ve been in each other’s pockets long enough for me to know that. But the engines are my responsibility, and I’ll not be able to answer for them if we go on like we have been of late.’
Blake stared past him, his eyes sore from strain and lack of sleep, and from long hours on the upper bridge. And yet
it was as if nothing had happened. He recalled the girl, right here in the cabin, when she had first come aboard. Her surprise, which he could have taken for doubt, at the stillness and order so soon after a savage battle.
Through an open scuttle he could see a tall gantry, drifting smoke from some dockyard machinery. Williamstown again, their new refuge.
They had docked in the early morning, to be met by a fully armed escort for the crew of the merchantman, some blank-faced intelligence officers and then the usual horde of officials and workers.
Blake said, ‘I was right. I know it.’
He thought of the Jacinto Verdaguer’s captain when he had had him brought to the bridge. Angry to the point of hysteria, but behind all the bluster Blake had detected a defiance too, a sort of wild triumph. As if by sacrificing his ship the man had done his best to crucify Blake.
Now, alongside once more, Blake’s orders were brief. Take on fuel and stores. Local leave only to be allowed, but no loose talk. One hint about what had happened, and as a cheerful Australian naval officer had said, leave would become something as unknown as a good cup of coffee.
Fremantle was due in this afternoon, her patrol having passed without incident. Stagg would send him packing when he heard what had happened. Once he might not have cared. But now it mattered. Because of the girl, and for a lot of other reasons, too.
The telephone buzzed and he lifted it to his ear, hoping a shore line was already connected.
But it was Friar, the torpedo officer, who was OOD.
‘Sorry to bother you, sir.’ Through the telephone his Australian accent seemed far more pronounced. ‘But there’s a commander come aboard to see you.’ His voice faded as he turned from the telephone and Blake heard him ask, ‘What was the name again?’
Weir muttered, ‘Another bloody “expert”, no doubt!’
Friar continued amiably, ‘Commander Wilfred Livesay, sir.’
Blake stared hard at the bulkhead, a face emerging like one at a séance. Wilfred Livesay, a slightly-built youth, with dark plastered-down hair, like a survivor from the Great War, a face which laughed too readily, and often on the defensive.
They had been in the same training cruiser as cadets. Straight out of Dartmouth with the world at their feet. He had met up with Livesay several times in his career. He never seemed to change much in spite of the war, and yet Blake felt he had never really got to know him.
A Ship Must Die (1981) Page 19
