by Nevil Shute
In the cuddy the day passed slowly. Boden and Colvin slept, and lay awake, and ate, and slept again; the vessel heaved and strained and water dripped in through the skylight, making the place wet and squalid. Colvin had a dog’s-eared copy of an American paper magazine entitled True Stories of the West; he lay on his back on the bunk reading about cowboys and their broncos till the light began to fail in the dim cuddy about mid-afternoon. From time to time he got up and called up to André in the wheel-house, but there was nothing to report.
He sat down on his bunk at last, idle, and stared around. “Time goes slow, don’t it?” he observed to Boden.
The R.N.V.R. officer said: “Fed up with reading?”
“Aye. It’s getting too dark. We ought to have a radio.” It had never struck them that they would have time to listen to the wireless on operations in that ship.
Boden said: “Try the light over the chart-table. You can read there.”
Colvin shook his head. “No. I like them stories well enough, but when you read the one you’ve read the lot.” He paused. “You didn’t think to bring them poker dice?”
They had nothing, not even a pack of cards. Boden said: “Try writing letters. Use the back of the signal-pad.”
“Who’d I write a letter to?”
The other said: “You might try Junie.”
There was a silence lasting into minutes. “You want to keep your mouth shut about what don’t concern you,” Colvin said at last. He got on to his bunk and turned over for sleep, his back to Boden.
They stood into the coast with the last of the light and picked up their bearings again. In the darkness they edged in till the cliffs loomed near them and they heard the wash of waves on rocks; then they anchored, not quite knowing where they were. At about eight o’clock the weather cleared for a brief spell; the moon was setting down near the horizon and gave light enough for them to take a bearing on the high bluff of La Chèvre. They got up anchor, crept a short way back westwards along the coast, and found their cove without great difficulty.
They went right inshore there, anchoring barely a hundred yards from the beach. Presently they put their dinghy into the water to be in readiness.
At midnight, punctually, they saw the flashes of the torch that meant that Simon was there. Two of the Breton lads went tumbling into the boat and Boden followed them, carrying a Tommy-gun in case of accidents. A few minutes later they were back with Simon, still in his civilian clothes and very wet.
Simon went straight to Colvin. “Is all ready for fighting?” he enquired.
The other said: “Sure it is. Who do you want to fight?”
“Listen, and I will tell you.” The other officers gathered by them; he told them all that he had seen in Douarnenez. “They are there now,” he said, “moored up beside the quay. It is a snip; we will get both of them, and also the two guns as well.”
Colvin laughed. “Try everything once,” he said. “How are we going to get in the harbour without being spotted? Like as if we was one of them trawlers in the bay, got left out late? We’ll want an orange shade over the light.”
It had begun to rain again. “Can you find the entrance to the harbour in the dark?”
“I guess so,” Colvin said. “It’s not so difficult, built out into the bay the way it is. If we hit up against a rock that’s just too bad.”
They weighed anchor and made off to the north in the direction of La Chèvre. Half-way there they altered course for Douarnenez; it was raining steadily by then and visibility was very poor. They lit their lantern, fixed the orange shade on it, and set it up upon the mast, confident that in that weather nobody would see the light come into being. Then they set themselves to prepare for action.
They found the harbour without difficulty. Another orange light appeared on their port bow converging on their course; they guessed correctly that it was another fishing vessel making for the harbour after trawling in the bay. It was then about one o’clock in the morning. They slowed a little and set themselves to follow in her wake. Presently a green light showed up through the darkness, high up and straight ahead of them.
“That’s on the end of the jetty,” Colvin said softly. He turned to the maître. “André, be ready to get that orange light off her soon as I say.”
They slowed to a mere crawl. The orange light ahead of them turned the end of the jetty under the green light and vanished behind the stonework. Simon, in the wheel-house by Colvin, bent to the speaking-tube.
“Rhodes,” he said softly. “Is everything quite ready?”
“Aye, aye, sir. All ready.”
“Listen then, carefully. We are going in now, and the plan is not changed at all. The Raumboote will be on our starboard side. We shall go past the first one and stop between the two of them, and about fifty yards away. It is quite clear?”
“Quite clear, sir. Oil first on the outermost Raumboote, then the inner one, and then the two casemates. That’s the right order?”
“That is right. And then the flame first to the guns, because the gun crews, they will be the most alert.”
“Very good, sir.”
“Wait now, and do not shoot the oil until I tell you...”
They crept in slowly, the big engine just ticking over. The green light passed above them, and the rough stones of the jetty. There was a man standing under the green light looking down upon them, a man in uniform. He made no movement; there was no hail. The orange light upon the mast was passport for them at the harbour mouth.
The anchorage opened before them, thick with vessels. The jetty ran away from them upon the starboard bow, seen dimly in the glow of their lamp; ahead of them the anchored fishing vessels loomed dim in the rain. The transom of the first Raumboote appeared beside the wall, a dark mass, unlit. Colvin threw out the gear; the Diesel choked and hunted irregularly in neutral, and they crept slowly forward to the anchored ships. The bow of the first Raumboote showed upon the beam, and the transom of the second one; above the jetty they could see the two faint lumps that were the guns behind their shields.
Colvin put the gear into reverse to check way. Simon said down the tube: “Rhodes, can you see the ships?”
“I see the ships, sir. I’m not sure about the guns.”
“Look carefully,” said Simon calmly. “Over the funnel of the inner boat there is a sort of lump upon the jetty. Do you see it? That is the one gun there.”
“I see that now. There’s another lump above the forecastle of the outer boat. Is that the other gun?”
“That is quite right. One moment now...”
He turned to Colvin. Way was off the vessel and the engine was again in neutral; they were poised motionless upon the water of the harbour. The rain beat against the ship and dripped in little quiet trickles. “Get going soon as you like,” said Colvin quietly. “I can’t hold her this way for long. The wind’ll carry us foul of them boats.”
Simon bent to the tube. “Rhodes, go on and shoot the oil now.”
“Okay, sir.”
There was a whistling, wet hiss. They did not see the black jet in the night, but they saw a great black splash upon the stonework of the jetty up above the stern of the Raumboote. Simon leaped for the voice-pipe. “Ten feet too high,” he shouted. “Down a bit, Rhodes.” But Rhodes had corrected, and the oil was deluging the Raumboote at the quay.
Very slowly, the jet travelled up her length. It paused for a few seconds at the bridge, and then went forward, steadily and slowly. Quite suddenly, a tumult of voices became audible. The jet travelled on to the stern of the next boat and moved inshore along her length, slowly, methodically. On the jetty lights began to flash from torches down on to the vessels.
Colvin breathed tensely. “They haven’t got on to it yet. Gosh, this is better’n a play....”
The jet lifted from the bow of the Raumboote and travelled blackly up the jetty to the dimly seen lump at the top. There was an instant babel of cries and oaths from the gun’s crew. It paused there second after second
, a long time. Then it swept swiftly round towards the other gun.
A shot rang out, and then another one; they heard a bullet whip into the hull. Simon bent down to the tube. “The flame, Rhodes! Now the flame!”
The fire burst from the nozzle of the gun and travelled in a fearful, writhing arc towards the jetty, slowly, inexorably. They saw the oil-soaked men around the guns turn towards it, watching it, appalled. They saw some of them begin to run, and some of them crouch down beside the ammunition lockers. Then it came to them, and fire hid everything from view.
The harbour, ships, and town were now as bright as day in the huge yellow light. From the wheel-house Colvin shouted: “André — get down that mast-head light. Quick about it.” Then he turned back to the jetty as the fire swung swiftly to the further gun. The firing now had stopped, and the sole noise was the hoarse rushing of the blazing oil and the hoarse shouts of men. The flame dropped to the bow of the inmost Raumboote, and they saw fire shoot along her decks before the jet.
Colvin heaved the gear over to reverse and lifted the brass throttle lever slowly. “Time we was out of this,” he said. “Tell him to watch his training, because I’m moving out astern.”
The engine of the boat plugged heavily; the water creamed in eddies back along her topsides; she moved infinitely slowly. The whole quay seemed to be ablaze, and every detail of Geneviève was visible. The flame poured from her midships, travelling slowly to the outer Raumboote and to the men upon her deck; from somewhere a few shots came whistling around them.
Simon leaned from the wheel-house and shouted to Boden, lying flat upon the deck behind the low bulwarks with his Bren and Tommy-gunners. “Boden,” he shouted, “watch out soon now for the searchlights, when the fire dies down. Shoot them immediately if they pick us up. Shoot them, and put them out.”
The other raised his hand and nodded. Simon glanced back at the blazing boats; they were an inferno from stem to stern. The heat from them was so great that it blistered; he threw his hand up to protect his face. He bent down to the tube. “Cease fire!” he shouted. “That is now enough.”
The flame pouring from the gun shut off abruptly; the truncated end of it went sailing through the air and fell blazing to the water near the Raumboote. They were now moving slowly astern; the Raumboote were ahead of them and the green light at the jetty end was now abeam. A great fire was raging on the jetty and the boats, pouring black wreathing clouds of smoke up into the dark sky in its own light. But they were farther from it now, the heat was less, and the light on board was not quite so intense. Behind them lay the friendly darkness of the bay, and the safe shroud of rain.
From the shore on their port side a brilliant sheet of white light shone out behind them, and focused instantly to a sharp pencil of great brilliance, groping and searching astern of them. Another sprang out farther along the shore, an intense white eye. In the white light Simon saw the gunners, led by Boden, spring across the hatch; the Bren guns spat and rattled and the second light went out abruptly. But now the first had found them, and from shore rifle-fire zipped over them and smacked into their sides.
They were driving astern from the harbour at a good speed now, making stern first out into the bay and the shelter of the rain. From the shore end of the jetty a stream of tracer came out suddenly, spraying around them and a little to the port side. Then, providentially and mercifully, Boden’s gunners got the other searchlight, and the firing crossed them and sprayed wide upon the starboard side, bright sheaves of little yellow sparks. The white illumination vanished and they were back in the half-light of the fire at the jetty, now much farther off.
Colvin, wrestling with the wheel, made heavy with their stern-way, said: “Watch out for them searchlights.” And as he spoke, a third blazed out at them on their port bow from some point above the jetty in the town. It lit them mercilessly, and in a moment the cannon fire was flying through the air at them again, bright yellow sparks.
The gun was somewhere at the shore end of the jetty, firing down its length at them. Colvin hauled madly at the wheel; a few feet more to starboard and the jetty itself would interpose between them and the gun. The Bren guns clattered at the third searchlight. There was a deafening crack beside them, and the framework of the wheel-house on the port side shivered and collapsed. Simon was on that side; he swung half round and his left arm flew backwards; he staggered for a moment, and recovered himself. At the bow there was a flash and flying timber. Amidships there was a flash and a bright yellow fire that sprang up suddenly around the flame-thrower. Then Rhodes, muffled in his anti-flash clothing, was rolling on the hatch; the fire ran along the deck as if pursuing him.
Abruptly there were flashes on the jetty, and the tracer that had been flying round them ceased. The Bren guns were still firing at the searchlight, and in a minute that went out. Now there were only isolated rifle shots directed at the fire amidships at the flame-thrower.
Colvin roared out: “Get that fire out, quick!” and saw Boden with a foam extinguisher. Presently there were two extinguishers in action, and the fire died down.
The engine was stopped, but the ship had good stern way upon her still. Already the blaze upon the jetty had grown dim; it was raining heavily and the rain made a curtain to shield them. Unless there were another searchlight very near they had respite for the moment. Another searchlight came on a long way to the north — two miles away, perhaps. It lit them up, but not intensely.
Colvin shouted: “Don’t fire at that!” The curtain of the rain, he thought, would shroud them from the shore in that weak light. The beam wavered, and began searching farther out to sea, and they were back in the half-light of the fire upon the quay.
By his side, Simon was holding the artery of his left arm; his hand was a mess of blood. He said: “I am all right. The engine, is that hit?”
“I dunno.” Colvin turned forward. “André, la voile.”
Boden answered: “André’s been hit, sir. You want the main-sail?”
“Aye, get it up quick, ‘n let’s get out of this.”
The wind was in the south-west; under sail they could do no more than reach across the bay in the direction of La Chèvre or Morgat. They could hardly beat up into wind at all; their sail was too small for that. The most that it would do for them was to carry them out into the bay away from Douarnenez.
Colvin called Rollot to the wheel, and leaped down to the engine-room. The two engineers were uninjured and were already hard at work, but it was clear that they had a big job ahead of them. Water was pouring from the aft cylinder; a gaping hole showed in the deck above. In mixed French and English Colvin heard their diagnosis. The engine was jammed, immovable. The piston in that cylinder was cracked or seized; it would be necessary to take off the pot. There were some fractured fuel oil-pipes as well. There was no other damage. They would do all they could, but it would be, perhaps, three hours before they could attempt to start her up again.
Colvin went back on deck. The sail was up and Rollot was at the wheel; they were drawing forward. The fire upon the jetty was now less intense, and gave them little light. He spoke to Rollot about the course, then went forward. Simon was sitting on the hatch and Rhodes was putting a dressing on his hand; Boden was still watchful at the guns. One of the Danes was very badly hit. André, the maître, was lying dead up in the bows.
So, in the darkness and the rain, they drew away from land.
Two hours later they were about two miles east of La Chèvre. Searchlights were still groping for them in the bay, but the rain saved them from detection. Their quiet passage may have helped, of course, under the sail alone. They had a respite and down in the cramped engine-room the men worked like beavers. With great difficulty they got the cylinder off. The piston was cracked and useless, and the connecting-rod distorted. They took off the piston with a hacksaw, undid the big end and drew out the connecting-rod through the crank-case inspection cover, and made a fibre plate to cover over where the cylinder had been. They repaired the shattered w
ater pipes and fuel pipes with insulating tape and cod line, and at about 03.15 in the morning Colvin heard the engine run. It ran with a good deal of vibration and a hard, uneven beat, as was only to be expected on five cylinders. But it gave them about eight knots of speed, and there were still three hours of darkness before them in which they could clear the land, and the rain held.
And that, really, is all there is to say about their venture. They headed straight out into the Atlantic, meaning to give Ushant a wide berth and make for Falmouth with their wounded. With the dawn the wind began to veer towards the north, about force 5 or 6, and settled to about north-west by 09.00. They were somewhere to the north of Ushant then, and making only about four knots through the water on their course for Falmouth against the foul wind; the prospects of getting in before dark were poor. The only port open to them in the hours of darkness was Dartmouth, so they bore away up Channel and hoisted their sail to give them a lift along. They sailed and motored slowly through the day with continual engine stoppages. They berthed at Dartmouth at about 03.00 the next morning, and moved up to Dittisham soon after that.
One personal incident occurred that morning that I heard of some time afterwards. They were going to bed in the villas; the doctor was looking after them, and I had gone back to the hotel. Colvin went in to Boden’s room and found him sitting on the bed, still in his sea clothes, too tired to undress.
“Say,” he said wearily. “You want to get to bed.”
The lad raised his head. His face was very white at all times, and his hair a staring red; with his fatigue, in the hard light of the unshaded bulb, he looked desperately ill.
