Cotton's War

by Cotton's War (retail) (epub)

  ‘It’s good to be married.’ Annoula had been silent for a while and her words brought him back to the present.

  ‘Yes,’ Cotton said.

  To the right bird, he thought. He wasn’t going to end up like his Old Man. Cotton wanted to be accepted as an Englishman, and a blonde wife and fair-haired children seemed a good investment.

  ‘Yes,’ he said again. ‘To the right person.’

  Ten

  Most of the damage to Loukia was aft and, apart from splinter holes, there was remarkably little forward. By evening, Gully had constructed a platform out of a door and a couple of big rocks they’d pushed into the water, and was already at work patching the bow with canvas, oakum, tallow and wood. Docherty had almost reassembled the port engine already and was pleased with himself.

  ‘We need a drink to celebrate,’ he suggested.

  Cotton passed round the raki that old Varvara had given them and Gully pulled his concertina from the drab pile of rubbish he called clothing and started to play ‘The Lambeth Walk’. Immediately, Docherty’s feet started moving and he grabbed the girl and began to dance with her on the sand. Her face lit up and she responded at once, her eyes merry. Cotton watched them, aware how attractive she looked when she was happy, and even faintly jealous. In his mad fashion, Docherty had a way with him and Cotton could see how he managed to get the girls.

  Then he pulled himself up sharp. What’s this bloody regiment coming to, he thought, dancing when the Germans were only on the other side of the hill? It was as bad as that Roman geezer fiddling while Rome burned. On the other hand Cotton paused, newly aware of the trials of command – all work and no play made Jack a bloody dull sailor and Docherty was the sort of man who needed lightness in his life. Cotton rubbed a big hand over his face. Jesus, he thought, no wonder ships’ captains always seemed so bloody wise. They needed to be trick-cyclists, commanders, disciplinarians, teachers and bloody fathers to their crews all at the same time.

  ‘Shorter cruises, longer boozes,’ Docherty grinned. ‘I used to be dead smashing at this. Rammer Docherty, the hearts and flowers kid of Tyneside. There’s nothing like a smoochy last waltz to strip a girl’s good intentions down to her ankles.’

  He gave Annoula a salacious grin but she obviously hadn’t properly understood him and Cotton decided it was time the larking stopped.

  ‘That’s enough,’ he said sharply. ‘We got work to do.’

  ‘Ach—’ Docherty flashed his mad grin at the girl ‘—you’ve got more bull and flannel than a battleship. What’s wrong with a bit of fun? A hint and a tiddly bit of music. It’s just what we want.’

  ‘It’s enough,’ Cotton said and Annoula gave him a frightened glance and backed away from Docherty.

  ‘Marines,’ Docherty observed, ‘are about as much use as a blind bunting-tosser. You’re as bad as that lot on the bridge with all the poached egg on their caps, Royal. Always spoiling a matelot’s bit of fun.’

  ‘We’ve got a lot to do,’ Cotton said stiffly. ‘We haven’t time for stand-easies.’

  Docherty scowled. ‘What wouldn’t I give for a pint of wallop, a plate of fish and chips and a turn round the Palais with a willing bird.’ He grinned at Cotton. ‘NCOs and petty officers come in three sizes – them with stripes but no authority, them with authority but no stripes, and them with neither. Join the navy and see the world. Join the Marines and scrub it.’

  He went back to work, defiantly singing, ‘Officers don’t worry me – not much!’

  As the sun began to sink Cotton set off to fetch the dinghy with one of the drums of petrol. Bisset and Kitcat went with him, and they took the donkey to bring back the propeller Docherty had detached.

  It was already dark by the time they reached Kharasso Bay but there was a moon now and they were able, by the use of the torch, to uncover the drums and roll one of them down to the beach. Covering the others again with the rocks, they unearthed the dinghy and loaded it with the drum. There was still plenty of freeboard, so they pushed the rubber dinghy into it as well and fastened two or three planks across the stern. Then, waist-deep in the water, they launched the dinghy and Cotton started rowing.

  It was hard work and by the time he reached the point, he was sweating heavily and his arms were aching. When he reached Xiloparissia Bay, the girl met him on the beach and together they dragged the boat up the sand.

  ‘I was worried, Cotton,’ she said.

  ‘About me?’ Cotton grinned. ‘I’ve been dragging heavy weights around for years.’ He was showing off a little for her, the same he-man act he’d performed a dozen and one times for the girls in Pompey, the big, straight backed, broadshouldered Marine, muscular in body and mind, uncomplicated, proud of himself and the way he looked. Philótimo, he thought. Greek self-satisfaction. It was no different.

  Docherty appeared through the darkness. He was whistling and, as he approached, he did a few dance steps, slipped his arm round the girl’s waist, and whirled her round so that she laughed. Then, as he released her, he slipped his hand under her breast and squeezed it so that she gave a little scream and wriggled away from him. Cotton stared at them disapprovingly.

  ‘We’d better get the stuff up the beach,’ he said. ‘The others’ll be back soon with the propeller.’

  Docherty was still smiling as they rolled the drum of petrol up the beach towards the rocks, chattering all the time – about the engines, about Alexandria and Suda Bay, about the war, about all the girls he’d had and hoped to have in the future. Silence was a thing Docherty could not endure and he was as irrepressible as a rubber ball, always ready to bounce back after a disaster, morally untrustworthy, uncomplicated but indifferent to conditions and hours of work; probably the sort who’d kept the navy afloat throughout its whole history.

  ‘One day I’ll be a dirty old man,’ he was chirruping. ‘And that’s bad. But at the moment I’m a dirty young man, and that’s fine.’

  He glanced at Cotton’s disapproving expression. ‘You look like you swallowed a bun,’ he said.

  ‘You talk too bloody much, Docherty.’ Cotton spoke heavily, feeling that, if he wished, Docherty had the ability to dance quicksilver-like round his more stolid mind.

  They hid the drum of petrol among the trees and, as he turned away, Cotton saw that Docherty was with the girl again, talking to her, and she was laughing and pushing him away. He scowled.

  ‘Let’s get the planks ashore,’ he snapped and Docherty patted the girl’s behind and waltzed up to Cotton.

  ‘Let them begin the beguine,’ he was crooning. ‘Bring back a night of tropical splendour. How about a dance, Royal?’

  ‘Get stuffed.’

  ‘How about a drop of raki then?’

  Cotton gave him a look that would have spiked a gun. ‘We got things to do,’ he said. ‘Get Gully.’

  Docherty turned. ‘Gully!’ he yelled.

  Cotton grabbed him by the arm. ‘You want the whole bloody German army to hear you?’ he snapped. ‘You give me the bloody pip, Docherty! You do, straight up!’

  Docherty grinned. ‘I’m bleeding internally.’

  Gully appeared to claim the planks and as Cotton turned away he heard him speak to Docherty.

  ‘What’s up with ’im?’ he demanded.

  Cotton scowled. Though it took some doing to admit it to himself, he knew very well what the matter was. He was jealous that Docherty could make Annoula laugh whenever he wanted while he, Cotton, who could even speak her language, could only talk to her of the most mundane things, dead serious as they discussed her future or the hatred her cousin bore for them. Neither of them, he realised, were subjects which were likely to raise a song in her heart.

  Cotton slept outside the wheelhouse for the rest of the night because Docherty was still in a lively mood and he was afraid he might find the bottle of raki he’d hidden in the bilges under the captain’s cabin. The discomfort didn’t improve his temper and when they started on the propellers the next morning, Docherty seemed to enjoy torme
nting him. He had the girl in the well-deck, holding one of the lines by which he transmitted his instructions to those on deck, and he was constantly chaffing her, making her laugh and adding lewd comments to Cotton as they splashed around in the water out of earshot.

  With the experience they’d gained from removing Claudia’s propeller, it was easier to remove Loukia’s. Getting Claudia’s undamaged one back in its place was more difficult.

  ‘We’ll need a staging of some sort for it,’ Docherty pointed out. ‘You can’t tread water with fifty pounds of copper-bronze in your arms.’

  It took Gully only half an hour to attach wooden blocks to a plank to hold the propeller upright. Then, standing on the stern with heaving lines tied to the ends of the plank, they manoeuvred it beneath the boat. The weight of the propeller prevented the plank from floating and, with directions from Docherty in the water in the diving gear, they began to pull on the ropes to lift it to the end of the shaft.

  Docherty’s head appeared. ‘Only needs a shove now,’ he grinned. ‘As the actress said to the bishop when he jollied her into a shop doorway.’

  Holding the key, he ducked beneath the water, emerging a minute later, with the goggles slipped and his eyeballs red. ‘It’s on,’ he panted. ‘Gi’e us the nut.’

  They had the propeller in place and secured in surprisingly quick time, and Cotton allowed them all a swallow of raki. ‘Will it work?’ he asked.

  ‘Anything I fix,’ Docherty said, ‘stays fixed. Ask any bird I’ve been with.’

  Cotton scowled. Docherty seemed to be deliberately goading him. ‘What about the bent blade on the other one?’

  ‘I’ll do it tomorrow. Get it off, shove it on a stone and tap out the kink. Ought to be just what the doctor ordered. So long as all the blades are the same, they’ll be okay.’

  ‘What about the rudder?’

  ‘What about it?’

  A dreadful thought had occurred to Cotton. ‘When we let it go, won’t the water come in through the hole and sink her?’

  Docherty looked at him pityingly. ‘Christ, trust a bloody Boot-neck to ask a stupid question like that. The stock of the rudder goes up through a tube inside the boat and the top of the tube’s above water level.’

  Cotton wasn’t really sure what he meant and he stared at Docherty, faintly ashamed of his lack of technical knowledge. He decided to persevere.

  ‘But will the water come in?’ he asked.

  ‘No, you stupid twit.’

  Cotton nodded, satisfied. ‘And will it get us home?’

  ‘If we’re careful.’

  ‘Suppose we have to use full speed.’

  Docherty shrugged. ‘Well, the stern can only drop off,’ he said.

  * * *

  The bent propeller took less time than they’d expected and by evening they had it on the other shaft. But the day for Cotton seemed full of tensions. The girl even appeared to enjoy Docherty’s company and he went out of his way to make her smile, singing snatches of popular song to her whenever he saw her, clutching his chest with one hand like an opera singer and gesturing with the other so that she couldn’t help laughing, doing tricky little dance steps round her as he passed her on the deck in a way Cotton with his big feet could never hope to. By dusk, Cotton was actually looking forward to rowing round the point for the next drum of petrol.

  ‘Why not let someone else go?’ Bisset suggested, but Cotton shook his head.

  ‘I’m strongest,’ he said, feeling that strong arms and a weak head were the only assets he possessed.

  Once again Bisset and Kitcat were going with the donkey, to dismantle one of the mountings for the Lewises, and this time, unexpectedly, Annoula wanted to accompany them. But, with Docherty and Gully busy, she had to remain behind as look-out. She seemed unhappy about the arrangements and it puzzled Cotton because he couldn’t imagine that, after the way Docherty had made her laugh all day, she wished to come simply to be near him.

  Once again, it was dark when they reached Kharasso Bay but, with the moon and the experience of the previous night, loading the dinghy was much quicker this time and Cotton pushed off and started rowing. It seemed no nearer and no easier than it had the previous night, and he came to the conclusion that he was the mug for the whole party.

  Then – unexpectedly, because when he had set off the sky had seemed full of stars – the rain came, slowly at first and then in a drenching downpour so that he began to fear the boat would be swamped and he’d have to swim for it, losing the drum of petrol and the dinghy as well.

  Just as unexpectedly, however, it stopped, but as the hiss of the rain died, he heard another sound, a growling metallic sound that came quietly at first, threateningly, then growing in sound until it filled the heavens. Resting on his oars, he stared upwards, picking out eight aircraft which seemed to be approaching the island from the west in formation, their lights on so they could see each other.

  He was still wondering who they were, half-hoping they were the RAF come to give the Germans at Yanitsa a taste of their own medicine, when the lights changed position as the aircraft swung clear and formed up in line astern. Then, one after the other, as they came lower, the engines were cut until they passed over the tops of the hills and disappeared from sight towards the north of the island.

  The heavy rain that had soaked Baldamus and Captain Ehrhardt had stopped when they first heard the aircraft approaching.

  ‘There they are!’

  The lights in the sky drew closer and they could hear the engines approaching as the aircraft came down out of the darkness, slipping secretly into the landing strip at Yanitsa at an hour when all the Greek workers had left.

  Only Major Baldamus, Captain Ehrhardt and a few men were there to see them arrive. There were eight aircraft, all of them big Junkers 525 and 535, and as they touched down, swung round and came into line, one after the other, they headed slowly towards where the lorries were waiting in the darkness. As the first of the machines came to a stop, its motors still running, the door opened in the side and men began to pour out. They wore overalls and small pot-shaped helmets, different from the lipped helmet that hung behind the door in Baldamus’ office. Without any instructions from Baldamus, they hurried towards the lorries, climbed aboard the first two and were immediately driven off. As the lorries vanished and the aeroplane swung round and headed for the end of the landing strip, the second aeroplane took its place. Once more it emptied of men, and as they were also driven off in the next two vehicles, the aeroplane moved away and the third machine appeared through the darkness.

  The operation was repeated until all eight aeroplanes had emptied and all the lorries had gone. As the first aeroplane took off into the night, heading north into the darkness, the second pushed into its place, and the third moved up close behind. By the time the last aeroplane’s passengers had been driven away, the fourth machine was already in the air. Within minutes, the remaining four aeroplanes had taken off and the operation was ended. The landing strip at Yanitsa was as empty as it had been before the machines had arrived.

  Ehrhardt watched with his mouth open. Baldamus smiled.

  ‘That, in my opinion,’ he said, ‘was a beautifully executed operation.’

  Ehrhardt drew a deep breath. ‘Does anybody else know about this?’

  ‘Just you and I and a few others. See that it remains that way.’

  ‘Where are they going?’

  Baldamus smiled. ‘I’ll give you three guesses,’ he said.

  ‘They’re Special Air Division troops.’

  ‘I can see you’re a good guesser, Ehrhardt.’

  * * *

  As Cotton pulled into Xiloparissia Bay he was soaked and there were several inches of water sloshing round his feet in the bottom of the boat. The rain hadn’t helped to cool him off much and his arms felt like lead. There was no sign of a light aboard Loukia and he assumed that Docherty and Gully were still working. Then he realised he couldn’t hear the chink of tools or the thump of Gully’s m
allet on a chisel and he supposed the rainstorm had driven them below deck. But no one came towards the boat as it grounded on the sand and he angrily decided that they hadn’t bothered to keep the look-out and that the girl hadn’t seen him.

  Heaving the boat up the beach, he lifted out the anchor and trod it into the sand. As he straightened up, he heard a half-muffled cry from Loukia and he swung round at once and started running. At first he thought Petrakis had arrived but then he realised that the cry was feminine, despairing rather than panicky, and he knew at once what it meant.

  Climbing on to the rocks, he began to scramble to the deck. As he did so, he heard the cry again. Lifting the forward hatch, he dropped through. Gully was snoring on one of the hunks, the bottle of raki, almost empty now, on the deck alongside him.

  The cry came again and was as abruptly cut off. Snatching open the forecastle door, Cotton bounded through into the wheelhouse, his wet clothes leaving a damp smear on the blackened paint-work. The light came from the captain’s cabin and he saw the girl’s legs framed in the doorway, uncovered up beyond her thighs. As he jumped forward, he saw that Docherty was holding her down on the bunk, one of her arms underneath her, pinned by her own weight, and was gripping her other wrist with one hand. Her dress was open to the waist and Docherty was sprawled across her trying to force her to submit to him. For a fraction of a second, her terrified eyes saw Cotton over his shoulder; then Cotton had wrenched the stoker aside and punched him in the face. Docherty crashed into the door as the girl sat up, pulling at her clothes, and his hand reached out for a heavy wrench on the table. Cotton hit him again, with both hands, and then again. The wrench clattered to the deck and Cotton, uncertain what drove him on, smashed Docherty into the bulkhead until he yelled to him to stop.

  ‘You bloody fool,’ Cotton said in a low furious voice. ‘You bloody Christ-damned fool! We’ve got no friends on this island that we know of and the only people who’ve helped us so far were those blokes with the fishing boats. She’s our only contact with them. Do you think they’re going to help if they learn she’s been raped by a bloody fool stoker from the Royal Navy?’