by Nevil Shute
The sick-bay steward came in for the second time, and I got up to go. “Don’t worry about that,” I said. “I’ll have it cleaned for you.”
I travelled back to London that afternoon, and went straight to my office. There was a note there asking me to ring McNeil as soon as I came in; I picked up the telephone and spoke to him at once.
“Is that Martin?” he said. “I’ve got a bit of news for you from the other side. Two messages.”
“I’ve got a bit for you,” I said. “I’ve seen Colvin. He’s in Haslar Hospital.” I told him very shortly how he had been picked up.
“That’s fine,” he said. “Look, would you like me to come round to you?”
“No, I’ll come to you,” I said. “I’ve got to go out anyway. I’ll be with you in half an hour.”
I rang off, and then rang up N.O.I.C. Dartmouth. “Commander Martin speaking,” I said. “Admiralty. Look, sir, you remember that Wren who used to drive the truck for my party?”
“Leading Wren Wright?” he said.
“That’s the one. She was engaged to one of the officers, Lieutenant Rhodes.”
“Was she? I didn’t know.”
“I can’t get any news of Rhodes,” I said. “But one of the other officers, Lieutenant Colvin, has turned up. He’s in Haslar. Would you tell her that? As a matter of fact, it would be quite a good thing, if you could spare her for a day or so, if she went to Haslar to see Colvin. They were all in it together, and he has no relatives in this country. I think we might give her a railway warrant for that, if she wants to go.”
“All right,” he said. “I’ll see to that. I’d like to know as soon as you hear anything further.”
“I’ll keep you informed,” I said.
I went out then, and took a taxi to the London Chronometer Company in the Minories. I asked to see the manager, and when he came I remembered him and he remembered me. “I came to see you about five years ago with the recording chronographs we had in Foxhound,” I said.
He nodded. “I remember, sir. How are you keeping?”
“Not so bad.” I gave him Colvin’s watch. “It’s had sea water in it for a week,” I said. “I want a really good job made of it, and I want it done quickly.”
“You don’t want much, do you?” he said dryly.
“Look, do the best you can,” I said. I told him a little of the story. “It’s a case we’re interested in at Admiralty.”
“What if I find it needs a new movement altogether?”
“Give it one,” I said. “But get it looking like it was before.”
I left it with him, and took a taxi back to McNeil’s office in Pall Mall. He passed me two messages across the table, both of them marked across the top in red MOST SECRET, as was usual.
The first said:
RENNES. The 145th regiment of infantry, part of the 64th Division, has arrived in Rennes. This division has been on the Russian front in the Rostov sector, and has now been transferred to Brittany because of the increasing unrest in this district. Units of the division are to be quartered at Morlaix, Carhaix, Douarnenez, and Quimper. The division is much under strength and is now not more than 5,000 men. The clothing and equipment of the men is in bad condition. Ends.
I glanced at McNeil. “This is very good news,” I said quietly. “This is what you have been working for.”
“Anything that takes pressure off the Russians is good news,” he said. “Look at the other one.” He said that in a tone I didn’t like.
I picked up the second message. It read:
DOUARNENEZ. A proclamation issued by the Commandant announces that thirty hostages have been arrested, comprising ten men past working age, ten women, and ten children. It is stated that the town is harbouring an English officer who is believed to be a survivor from a British ship sunk in the Iroise and to have been concerned in setting fire to German vessels. The hostages are to be shot on November 15th unless this officer is given up. Ends.
I stared at this thing, not knowing what to say. “It’s probably Simon,” I said at last. “He must have got ashore.”
The brigadier said: “Simon is the least likely of the lot. Simon can pass anywhere as a Frenchman; he’d have no need to go into hiding. No, it may be Boden or it may be Rhodes. One of them, at least, is still alive.”
“Just,” I said bitterly.
There was absolutely nothing we could do, and nothing much to be said. It was one of those things it’s really better not to think about too much.
“How’s Colvin?” McNeil asked at last.
I told him the story briefly. “He’ll be all right,” I said in the end. “I suppose he’ll be about a month in hospital. He must have been in that boat for five days and nights, and that’s not funny in this weather.”
“No,” he said, “it’s not.”
I left him soon after that, and went back to my office. It was November the 9th, and there were six more days to go before November the 15th. I turned to the arrears of my ordinary work as anodyne, but I could not tire myself sufficiently to sleep.
I went down to Newhaven to see the admiral next day, to report to him how the matter stood. It was a winding-up report, of course; as an operation of war the Geneviève incident was over and done with. All that remained to do was the final clearing of the paper work, dockets to Casualties Section, and that sort of thing, and in that the admiral was not much interested.
“Will you want to see Lieutenant Colvin, sir?” I asked.
“I don’t think so, Martin,” he replied. “Not unless he particularly wants to see me. See the Second Sea Lord’s office when the time comes about his posting. See that he gets a job that will suit him.”
“Very good, sir,” I said.
It was a relief to turn to other work.
I went back to London and the days dragged on. They were grey, windy days, raining most of the time. I heard indirectly that Barbara Wright had been to Haslar to see Colvin and had gone back to Dartmouth next day, but I did not get in touch with either of them. I had nothing good to say.
No further messages came from the other side.
My two years at Admiralty expired about that time, and I raised the matter with V.A.C.O. one day when he was in the office. “My two years is up at the end of this month, sir,” I said. “I’d like to get to sea again, if possible.”
He nodded. “I knew it was about this time.” And then he said, rather unexpectedly: “I shall miss you, Martin. You’ve been a great help to me.”
I said awkwardly: “That’s decent, sir. Would you — do you want me specially to stay on?”
He smiled. “I suppose you hate it here. You’d rather go to sea.”
I said: “Well — quite frankly, yes. I’d rather be at sea. But if you want me, sir, I’m quite willing to stay.”
He shook his head. “I wouldn’t stand in your way.”
That was that, and I went on in the office in a better frame of mind. And the next day I had a telephone call from Plymouth, from the Chief of Staff.
He said: “Martin, is an R.N.V.R. officer called Rhodes anything to do with that party of yours? Operation Blanket?”
“Yes, sir,” I said. “He was the — er — the special gunner.”
He said: “Well, he’s back. He came back wounded, with a boatful of French fishermen. They came into Falmouth this morning.”
A sort of sick wave of relief passed over me. “I’m glad to hear it, sir,” I said. “Is he much hurt?”
“Chest and lungs, I think,” he said. “He’s in the naval hospital there.”
I said in wonder: “It’s nearly a fortnight old, that operation, sir. He must have been ashore — on the other side.”
“I think he has.”
I glanced at my watch. “I think I’d better slip down to Falmouth myself, right away.”
He said: “Well, I think you might. There are one or two rather curious features that I can’t very well tell you over the telephone.”
I said: “I’ll go down
there to-day.”
“You’ll find our Intelligence Officer down there,” he said. “I’ll ring through to him and tell him that you’re coming.”
I rang up McNeil to tell him, but he was out of London. So I caught the afternoon train to Cornwall alone, and sat all day wondering and speculating about what had happened on the other side. The train was late and we did not get in till nearly midnight; I turned into the hotel and slept uneasily.
I was down at the Naval Centre early next morning, and met the Intelligence Officer, a retired lieutenant-commander. He was most interested in checking up the bona fides of the fishermen and he was taking them all off to London on the morning train. “I haven’t seen this officer, Rhodes,” he said. “He wasn’t very well yesterday.” He paused and then he said cautiously: “If what I’ve heard is true it’s a very queer story.”
“What’s queer about it?” I enquired.
He shrank back into the maddening caution of the Intelligence. “I’d really rather not discuss the matter at the moment,” he said. “It’s all got to be sifted.”
I said: “I’m down here to see Rhodes and to find out what happened to my party. The fishermen aren’t my concern. Suppose I stay down here and see my officer, and then meet you back in London? What I learn from him may pad out what you get from them.”
He agreed to that, and I went up to the hospital. I was beginning to know the smell of hospitals quite well on this infernal job. I saw the surgeon-commander first, in his little white painted office.
“You’re Commander Martin?” he enquired. “I’m glad you’ve come. This young chap Rhodes has been asking for you ever since he came in.”
“How is he?” I asked.
“Not too grand. He’s got a wound in the left shoulder and chest that touched the lung. The trouble is that it’s a fortnight old. It’s had attention of some sort during that time, but it’s in a pretty nasty state.”
I said: “Can I see him this morning?”
The surgeon said: “Oh, yes. He won’t settle down till he’s had a talk to you. Make it as short as you can, but he’s got a lot he wants to tell you.”
He paused. “Before you go in there, there’s one thing I should like you to see,” he said. “It’s puzzled us a good bit.”
He rang the bell and a steward appeared at the door. “Get that uniform,” he said. The man went out and the surgeon turned to me. “I won’t keep you a moment.”
The steward came back with a bundle of clothes tied up with string. They unrolled it on the floor. It was a German petty officer’s uniform with short pea jacket of thick navy blue cloth bearing the eagle’s wing and swastika, a cap with the same emblem, a blue jumper with a blue naval collar, and trousers to match.
“These are the clothes he was wearing when he was admitted into hospital,” the surgeon said. “It’s a German naval uniform.”
I turned the clothes over. “So I see. What were the men with him wearing? The fishermen?”
“They were wearing ordinary Breton rig — black floppy tam-o’-shanters and those rusty-coloured sail-cloth ponchos that they wear. They weren’t in any uniform.”
I was handling the jumper, and my fingers struck a sticky mess. There was a four-inch rent in the back of it; I looked at the cloth, at my fingers, and then up at the surgeon.
“Yes,” he said. “That’s blood. The wearer of these clothes was stabbed in the back.” He picked up the pea jacket. “He had his coat on. Look, here’s the corresponding hole.”
I laid the clothes down, wondering at the morbid imagination that had made him show them to me. “I’ll get along and see him, if I may,” I said.
He stared at me. “I’m not sure if you understand,” he said. “Lieutenant Rhodes wasn’t stabbed. His wound is in the shoulder, and from the front.” He paused. “There’s no mark on his back at all.”
I said impulsively: “But the blood’s still sticky! Do you mean that somebody else was wearing this rig, and was stuck in the back?”
“I can’t see it any other way.” He paused. “I was very puzzled. I thought you ought to see the clothes before you went in to see him.”
I nodded. “It’s probably as well.”
He took me in to Rhodes. The young man was in a ward with about fifteen other patients in it. He was lying raised a bit with pillows. He was much thinner in the face than I remembered him; his black hair had been cropped close to his head, making him look very different. His left shoulder was a mass of bandages. There was a nurse with him.
“‘Morning, Rhodes,” I said cheerfully. “How are you feeling?”
He said in a thin voice: “I’m all right, sir. I’ve got a lot I want to tell you.”
The surgeon spoke to the nurse, and she began arranging screens around the bed. “You’ll be able to talk quietly in there,” he said. “Don’t be any longer than is necessary.”
I said: “Rhodes, we’ve got to be as short as possible, so that you can get some rest. I’m going to do the talking first of all, and tell you what I know. In the first place, Colvin’s back in England. He’s in Haslar Hospital, and going on all right.”
His face lit up. “Oh, good,” he breathed. “How did he get away?”
I told him briefly what had happened. Then I told him what we had learned from the M.G.B. lads, and from the secret messages that had come over from the other side. It took about ten minutes. “Now, look,” I said. “I’m going to ask you questions, and you answer them. It’ll be easier for you, that way. First of all, what happened to Simon?”
He said: “He’s still in Douarnenez. We’ve been there together. When Geneviève was sunk, the shell hit the stem. I was just getting out of the flame-thrower seat, and I got this in my shoulder. And then I was in the sea, and Simon was helping me, sir, in the water. And he pulled me along, and we got to one of the fishing-boats.”
“I see,” I said. “What happened to Boden?”
Rhodes said: “Oh, he was killed.”
“Did you see him killed?”
“No, sir.”
“Was he the officer who was on the keel of the boat, firing with a Tommy-gun?”
“Yes, sir. They were all talking about it in Douarnenez. He put out the searchlight. Jules was the other man with him, sir.”
“How do you know he was killed, if you didn’t see it?”
There was a pause. “He wanted to be killed,” Rhodes said.
I left that, and turned back to the main story. “Just tell me now, as shortly as you can, what happened when you got into the fishing-boat.”
I have put together what he told me with what we learned from the fishermen and from another source upon the other side. This is what happened:
When Rhodes was thrown into the water he bobbed up again at once, because his Mae West was blown up. He said that there were several men in the water with him. He knew that something had happened to his shoulder and he kept coughing, and each time he coughed, he said, funny things seemed to happen in his chest. He was in no great pain.
Presently he saw Simon, and Simon saw him, and swam towards him, and began to help him. Simon was unhurt. He called Rollot, the maître, and between them they took Rhodes in tow and began to swim with him towards the fishing-boats, seen dimly in the background. Those were the boats that had been with them in the Anse des Blancs Sablons.
While they were covering two or three hundred yards to the nearest of the boats the M.G.B.s roared past, dropping their charges, the duel between Boden and the destroyer went on, and the searchlight was put out. There was still a fire raging on the bridge of the destroyer which gave some light, and the moon was bright. The fishing-boats, as soon as they saw survivors swimming to them, steamed in to pick them up. Rhodes, Simon, and Rollot were taken on board one boat. He thought that about five or six, out of their crew of twelve Free Frenchmen, were taken on board another. He did not know their names, for a very good reason. As soon as they reached Douarnenez all these Frenchmen, most of whom were Breton lads, merged with the
crowd and vanished quietly away. There was no reason for them to do otherwise. It was the best thing they could do.
There was some urgency for the boat that had picked them up to get back to Douarnenez without delay, because each of the rescuing boats had on board ten Tommy-guns and ammunition. They were counting upon the events of the night and the scattering of the fleet to relax the normal supervision of the boats in harbour, and this actually happened. They steamed straight to Douarnenez at full speed, and entered harbour at about four in the morning, still in bright moonlight.
Rhodes, Simon, and Rollot came into harbour down in the fish-hold of their boat covered over with a pile of nets. They had contrived a pad and bandage for Rhodes’s wound, but they could provide no dry clothes. With the cold and wet, and with the stiffening of his wound, Rhodes was becoming feverish, and from that time onwards he saw everything opaquely, blurred by a high temperature.
The master of their boat, a man called Corondot, went on shore as soon as they picked up the mooring. He went to the little harbour-master’s office on the quay, which was also the office of the German fish control. Here, in a state of anger, he reported that he had brought his boat back, having spent a few hours dodging about the Iroise being chased by British gunboats. Where was the protection of the Reich? he asked. For himself, he was fed up. The last thing he had seen was another battle in the distance, with flame and firing and God knows what. For himself, he proposed to stay in harbour till the seas were made safe for honest fishermen.
There were five other skippers making similar complaint, each talking at the top of his voice. Besides those, most of the old German petty officers were there, each telling his own tale and adding to the din. The telephone upon the little desk rang every half-minute and had to be answered, the old harbour-master had one rating to assist him, who spoke only German. It was a fine, confused party, all concentrated in the harbour-master’s office. Nobody paid any attention to what was going on down at the quay.
The ten Tommy-guns and ammunition were landed quite easily, put on a hand-cart, and pushed unconcernedly up into the town. Simon and Rhodes with the Free Frenchmen landed at the quay. The latter melted quietly away into the darkness of the streets.
