Blake turned away. Masters would take-off if he asked him. He would just as certainly never be able to land-on again. In a big sea his Seafox would break up in seconds.
Blake wanted Stagg to go aft again to his cabin, to leave him with his thoughts. The fact that the commodore was obviously getting rattled did not help at all.
Scovell stamped his feet on the gratings and glared as Palliser appeared on the bridge.
‘Are you supposed to be my relief, Guns? Or is yours the watch after this one?’
Palliser grinned. ‘Sorry, Number One. I was delayed.’
Scovell slammed from the bridge muttering to himself.
Palliser checked the chart and spoke with the wheelhouse, then he walked forward and peered down at the two turrets below the bridge.
Blake looked away. No matter what they all said, they knew there was a raider out there somewhere. Somewhere.
Rietz opened his eyes and looked at Storch’s face for several seconds without recognition. He had been trying to sleep in the hutchlike cabin at the rear of Salamander’s charthouse, but the dank air, and his own restlessness, had done him more harm than good.
‘Sorry to rouse you, Captain.’ Storch waited as Rietz threw his legs over the side of the bunk. ‘We have received a signal.’
Rietz fought to bring his mind back under control. He had been dozing and waking, more often than not thinking about his wife. Was she managing to keep healthy on her rations, to stay safe from the raids?
‘About the decoy, Rudi?’
Storch shook his head. ‘No, sir. She sailed just as our agents reported. This is another. A naval oiler, outward bound from Aden.’ He watched the understanding pushing some of Rietz’s lines aside. ‘A full cargo. She is in trouble and requires instant attention when she berths at Williamstown. Our man there has done well.’
Reitz got to his feet, his ears picking out the noisy clatter of loose gear, the hull’s groan as she swayed in a steep swell. The glass was steady enough, but that meant nothing. There was a big storm coming. But it was no cause for idiotic action.
‘Is the Waipawa still anchored?’
‘Yes, Captain. But Lieutenant Ruesch requests permission to weigh and stand offshore. The anchor is dragging. If the swell gets worse we will have to steam well away from the island.’
Rietz felt the deck pitching heavily. Even her eight thousand tons could not act as substitute for her falling fuel gauges.
Rietz stared at himself in the cabin mirror, hating how he felt, the smell of damp and unwashed clothing. He had ordered rationing for all essential stores, from fresh water to soap.
Gunfire, the grinding anxieties of being hunted by enemy warships, all these things they had managed to accept. But in war a sense of defeat showed itself in other guises. In what they found aboard their prizes, for instance. After four and a half years of war the enemy still had good woollen clothing and warm garments for their watchkeepers. Fine soap and real coffee, Virginia cigarettes and nourishing tinned meats, which most of Rietz’s men had long forgotten.
‘Very well, Rudi. Signal the group to get under way. Then we will steer north while we examine the enemy’s intentions and the exact position of this oiler – ’ he smiled ‘ – from heaven.’
In the brightly lit chart and plotting room, shuttered and concealed from the outside world by its dull-painted steel, Rietz went over the chart and his navigator’s calculations, item by item.
He was still unsure, in spite of Storch’s youthful confidence and the past reliability of the secret agents in Australia. Where better to have a special spy? His brief but powerful transmissions were virtually undetectable amid the mass of radio traffic which came and went from Williamstown and from up the bay in Melbourne. But they had been cruising for too long, and too soon after the previous raider’s downfall. Stagg, he knew, would give anything to run him to ground. He glanced at Blake’s newspaper picture on the bulkhead. He would be a hard one to beat, too. He was young, not a lot older than Storch, and well used to the harsh demands of battle.
There was talk of another troop convoy en route to the Pacific. To be able to scatter that, even destroy some of its overcrowded ships, would offer a suitable moment to retire from the area. But to do it they had to have fuel, and be certain that the cruiser force was nowhere within possible contact.
He looked at Blake’s face again. Suppose the decoy ship had been a deliberate hoax, to give the raiders the impression they were safe to move at will? It would be just like Stagg to think of that. The cruisers might even now be making another sweep, in the hopes that Rietz would go for the troopships.
Rietz considered it from every angle. His chief engineer was getting really worried. On the other hand, Vogel might see his caution as an unwillingness to sacrifice his own ship and thus be unable to take his report to Berlin on the Wölfchen’s atrocities.
The lights went out and came on again as Petty Officer Fackler lurched through the door from the bridge.
‘Captain!’ He could barely stop himself from grinning. ‘Another signal. The Australian cruiser Fremantle has been seen in Williamstown with her bows stove in!’
Storch exclaimed, ‘You are certain, man?’
Fackler nodded excitedly. ‘She hit a Yankee destroyer!’
Rietz turned back to the chart. In his heart he knew he would have avoided contact with the oiler. He had never risked his ship or men without a good chance of success.
Vogel was said to have powerful friends in Germany, but even that would not have deterred Rietz. This made everything different. With Fremantle out of the game, the odds had shifted considerably, decoy or not.
‘Tell Schoningen I want him to lay off a course to intercept this, er, gift from heaven. Advise Wölfchen of what I intend and prepare the Arados for take-off.’
He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, ‘Then find out all you can about the oiler and plan accordingly. We may have to go alongside in a heavy swell, so I want every hammock, fender, spare cordage and canvas on deck ready to be slung between the two hulls. If we strike, I want to bounce off again in one piece!’
Storch strode away to fetch the navigating officer, his mind dwelling on the captain’s complete confidence. Minutes before there had been doubt, anxiety. Now the news had changed all that. Even the prospect of finding the damaged oiler and taking her intact in worsening weather seemed to have been brushed aside as trivial.
When he got home . . . Storch paused and gripped the rust-streaked guard-rail hard to steady himself. His girl was dead, and yet he kept thinking of her as being there, waiting for his return. There was no home.
With the captured freighter Waipawa trailing astern, the two raiders steered away from their tiny islet, which in a mounting swell had all but vanished.
Rietz left the charthouse and walked on to the flying bridge. Sticky and humid, and there was more rain about somewhere.
If they could fill the bunkers, even half fill them, there was a good chance for their survival. They had done what they had set out to do, and his men deserved far more than the misery of a prisoner of war cage with the additional smear of Vogel’s cruelty on their heads.
He raised his powerful glasses and sought out the captured freighter. It was early evening, but the visibility was so poor it could have been night.
All the same, he would take no chances. A wild animal was caught usually because of hunger and a deadly moment of carelessness. The gun or the trap did the rest.
He thought of Stagg and wondered what he would say when he heard the news. If hunger often put paid to the wild beast, then hate surely killed many a hunter.
It was almost midnight, and in her office in Melbourne Claire Grenfell sat at her desk, her chin resting on one hand as she stared at the last of the signals which had been checked in.
The letters and figures seemed to blur, both from strain and from emotion. She had been working doubly hard since the Andromeda had sailed and Fremantle had made her own ignominous return under tow.
<
br /> The building was so quiet it seemed to be holding its breath. She loosened her shirt and plucked it away from her damp skin. As she did so her fingers touched her breast, and like a pain it all came back again. The room, Richard holding her, loving her, making her react as she had never believed possible.
She knew she should go to her quarters, and yet could not face it. The friendly smiles, but the eyes which asked, what was it like? What did you do?
She had even seen it on her mother’s face when she had gone home for a few hours’ break. Her father had understood, even though it had not been mentioned. It was as if he had always known. That, and his trust, had helped a bit.
The door opened with a crash and Quintin stood looking at her, his face aflame with triumph.
‘Ta-ra! See the mighty have risen again!’ He was balanced precariously on two sticks. ‘I did it, all the way from the car!’
She ran to help him into a chair. ‘You’re beat!’
Quintin grinned at her. ‘Too right. But who cares? Any coffee about?’
He watched her as she walked to the table. A lovely girl. Funny, when she had first come to his department he had merely thought of her as a reliable, highly trained officer. But she was a girl. It seemed that the neat uniform could no longer hide or protect the fact.
Quintin said, ‘The Met Office think there’s a storm blowing up in mid-ocean.’ He saw her arm stiffen.
She said, ‘I heard. But they might miss it.’
‘Yeh.’ Quintin went around what he had in his mind and decided to go straight to the point. ‘You’re in love with him, aren’t you?’
She turned, lightly, warily, like a cat.
Quintin shook his head. ‘I’m not interfering. I just want to help.’
She placed the coffee cup carefully by his elbow, and Quintin could see the strain in her eyes, the way her chin lifted as she said, ‘Yes, I love him. I’d do anything, anything for him. He told me a lot about himself, his father, the house in England. I could have killed his wife for what she did.’ She looked directly at Quintin, her breasts moving quickly as she added, ‘That woman may try to make trouble for us, but we’ll be ready!’
Quintin smiled. ‘I’m sure. But I don’t feel you’ll get any bother from her now. She’s beaten at her own game. I’ve no doubt it will all be done by some nice, trustworthy lawyer with a quick settlement at the end of it. But that’s not what you’re telling me, is it, Claire?’
‘No, not really.’ She tossed the hair from her eyes. ‘He’s been through so much. Even you and I when we were with him in that dinghy saw what he was like. And for him, it’s been going on for years.’ She shook her head slowly. ‘No, I don’t reckon anyone will hurt either of us after that.’
Quintin watched her cross to the shuttered window, seeing all the familiar movements and gestures he had taken for granted before and which now seemed new, like someone else.
She said, ‘When I asked him to meet me, d’you know what he said? Should he come in uniform. As if he was making an apology for what he was, for what he’d done. When I think of some of the drifters, the glory-boys who want to send everyone else off to fight but themselves, I get steamed up. I did then. I wanted him to know I was proud of him, to be seen with him.’
Quintin waited. It was coming, like the storm which was soon to break out there in the ocean. He was disturbed, but moved that he was the one to share it with her.
‘Before he left,’ she groped in her jacket which was draped on the back of a chair, ‘he gave me this. I didn’t know until he’d gone. He wanted me to have it.’
Quintin saw her hand shake as she held it out to him, the cross with the crimson ribbon.
‘Don’t you see? He thinks he’s going to be killed, and this is all he’s got to give me.’
She seemed to realize he was trying to get on his feet and said brokenly, ‘I’m all right. Don’t send me away, please. I want to be here.’
She sat down at her desk, the bronze cross gleaming dully in the office lights.
Blake put down a half-eaten sandwich and looked at Villar as he stepped into the sea cabin.
The motion was still very uncomfortable, although less violent, but Blake knew the signs, and the most recently intercepted signals had confirmed a storm of unknown intensity approaching from the south-west. With luck they might pass through the fringe, but with no luck at all they might never find the Empire Prince.
Villar grinned at him. ‘Provided the Empire Prince is on station, sir, we should pick her up tomorrow morning.’ He gripped the hand-basin as the deck slid away once more. ‘Though radar isn’t too hopeful. This sea is not helping it much.’
Blake stretched his arms. Another day, and now another night. The ships blundering towards each other like helpless drunks. One signal would be enough, but if Rietz was anywhere nearby it would be all that was needed to smash everything.
The weather was the one enemy they had not allowed for. Fairfax was to make another signal when he was in contact with the enemy. An ordinary follow-up to his original one about damage. A signal would be flashed instantly to Andromeda, the rest was mostly up to Weir. But they had to be certain where Fairfax was. An auxiliary oiler was not the most manoeuvrable of vessels. She could have drifted in the swell, been forced miles off course.
Villar said quietly, ‘You could send Masters at first light, sir. He’s done it before.’
Blake pictured the Seafox dipping and circling the yellow dinghy, the sense of gratitude and pride he had felt for its pilot. But Villar was right. The sea might ease tomorrow. Already he knew he was finding an excuse from sending two men to do the impossible.
‘I’ll think about it, Pilot.’
Andromeda’s bows lifted and then smashed through a steep roller like a giant plough, the impact making the bridge shiver, the guns rattle on their mountings.
Down on the forward messdeck there was a chorus of shouts and curses from the off-watch hands who were still grouped round the wooden tables. A few unguarded plates and mugs scattered in fragments amongst a growing pile of sea-boots and oilskins.
Leading Seaman Musgrave had been attempting to darn a hole in his sock and threw it down with disgust.
‘Roll on my bleedin’ twelve! I’ve just about had this!’
Another yell broke out as the ship seemed to reel over to the thrust of the sea, and they heard it thundering along the deck overhead and cascading over the side like a waterfall.
The tannoy came on. ‘Aircraft handling party and catapult crew will be required at oh-six-thirty tomorrow.’
A seaman said, ‘Skipper must be gettin’ eager. I wouldn’t fancy flyin’ in this lot!’
The tannoy again. ‘Cooks and sweepers clear up messdecks and flats for rounds. Ordinary Seaman Corker muster at the master-at-arms’ office.’
They began to tidy up their mess, a table set in a line amongst many, where they lived, slept, slung their hammocks and endured.
‘Poor old Dicky Corker’s been up to his tricks. Up before the jaunty, eh?’ There were several unsympathetic chuckles. ‘Shouldn’t have joined if he can’t take a joke!’
Musgrave looked round his domain with approval. ‘Fair enough, lads.’
He listened to the boom of the sea against the cruiser’s hull, the way the nearest scuttle was weeping sea-water each time they shipped it green. And that was in spite of a steel dead-light well screwed down over its glass.
He thought about the double line of corpses, the rain and old Horlicks rabbitting on about God and forgiveness. It made him feel uneasy. After this he would ask for a transfer to small ships, a frigate maybe, or spin it out for a bit ashore on a petty officer’s course. He grinned. Provided, of course, he didn’t go and get busted before they got home again.
Someone asked, ‘Who’s doin’ rounds tonight, Hookey?’
Musgrave frowned. ‘Lieutenant Blair, ‘our Micky’.’
He was the Australian quarters officer of B turret. He was quite popular with the lower dec
k, but they still thought him a bit odd.
Musgrave explained, ‘You know, the one ’o comes in an’ says, “ ‘Owarewealldoin’ then?” ’
A marine’s bugle shattered the calm and a petty officer bellowed, ‘Attention for rounds!’
Lieutenant Blair came through the watertight door, swaying unsteadily as the ship took another plunge.
He gave a cheerful smile and asked politely, ‘How are we all doing then?’
Commander Victor Fairfax pressed his face against the bridge windows and stared towards the oiler’s blunt bows. The Empire Prince appeared to be swinging to starboard, but he knew it was an illusion. The rollers had eased away into a long running sea, with great streaks of foam writhing across the ship’s path. It should still be daylight, but it was barely possible to make out the forecastle from the oiler’s high bridge. For several hours there had been a strange, peach-coloured sky, like an artist’s impression, without reality.
He walked to the rear of the bridge which, compared to a man-of-war’s, was spacious. The quartermaster stood on his grating behind the polished wheel, his eyes lifted to the gyrorepeater. There was a lookout on either side of the wheelhouse, a petty officer making notes in the deck-log.
The Empire Prince was so well loaded she seemed almost indifferent to the angry water around her. A rich prize for any raider.
He glanced at the faces of the men on watch and tried to memorize the others around the ship. It was strange to be serving with men he did not know. Few of them knew each other, and he guessed it was the usual arrangement for a special mission, or an ‘early suicide’ as Lieutenant Williams, his temporary second in command, had described it. Williams was the real expert, an RNR officer, he had served most of his peacetime life in oil tankers. He was a laconic, nuggety Welshman from Cardiff with few illusions left about the reliability of the top brass.
Williams entered the bridge, banging his sodden cap against his thigh, his eyes nevertheless taking in the compass, the ship’s head and the general alertness of the watchkeepers.
He nodded to Fairfax. ‘I suggest you get your head down, sir. You’ll be busy in the morning, I shouldn’t wonder.’
A Ship Must Die (1981) Page 25
