A Prayer for the Ship (3 page)

“Boat dead ahead. Dead ahead!”

And there it was, fine on the port bow, with the distance shortening at an alarming rate. His head was suddenly clear, and he felt strangely resigned.

“Hard a-starboard. Stop. Full astern together.”

The boat reeled round to starboard, and the engines screamed in protest. Vaguely from below he heard the crash of breaking crockery, but still they rushed on, until every detail was visible on the other boat. Then, when a crash seemed inevitable, the engines began to tell, and with maddening slowness she slewed round and glided up along the other boat's starboard quarter.

Saved! He licked his lips, now trembling. “Slow ahead together, Quartermaster, resume previous station.”

Emberson's loud-hailer clicked on: “Mother, there's someone at the back door!”

Royce waved to him with relief, and watched anxiously as the other boats astern sorted themselves out and resumed patrol in an orderly line.

He was then aware of Harston's dark figure below the bridge, and he stiffened for the onslaught.

Instead: “Well done, nothing like livening things up a bit!” and he was gone.

When the Captain returned to the bridge, just before midnight he found the new Number One with his eyes glued to the next ahead, his lesson learned. He smiled to himself. It would not do for Royce to know that the Coxswain had shaken him awake to inform him that the new officer was rushing at full speed into the rest of the flotilla, apparently out of control!

In the far distance, a pin-point of light stabbed at the blackness, and the Senior Officer replied to the challenge, which had come from one of the convoy's escorts, and the next instant the slowly moving merchant ships were looming past. Coasters, oil tankers, freighters, and all the rest, huge, and yet so helpless, and dependent on the anxious escorts which dashed backwards and forwards around the convoy like ferrets smelling out a rabbit.

Harston jerked his head in their direction. “Rather them than me. Look at those blessed escorts. One destroyer, vintage about 1917, two converted trawlers. It makes you sick; you've got your politicians to thank for this state of affairs.”

In a few moments, the convoy was swallowed up by the night, and the anxious business of station-keeping began again, but now Harston remained on the bridge, which was now whipped by a keen breeze that removed all traces of drowsiness from the watchkeepers, and with an unlit pipe clenched between his teeth, he constantly swept the starboard beam through his night glasses.

“Not much to worry about with that little convoy,” he observed. “It's the big northbound we've got to watch out for. They break up the convoy here to take it through the swept channel, and the E-boats sometimes have a go for the stragglers.” Then he stiffened. “Ah, there she is, right on time.”

And there was another light flashing, far away on the starboard bow, and soon the familiar, hulking shapes of the groping merchantmen were gliding past, their empty hulls rising like giant forts, and their half-exposed screws churning white patches of froth against the inky backcloth. Again the escorts raced back and forth, through their cumbersome charges, but a stronger guard this time, two destroyers, and some corvettes—taking no chances.

Ship after ship rolled past, till Royce lost count, and then, with a final protesting hiss of steam from an ancient freighter, they too were gone.

The flotilla swung about to steer north-east, the “top leg” of the patrol area, slackening speed over the dark swell, so that their engines just seemed to be ticking over, and it was again possible to talk without shouting above the din.

Harston rested his chin on folded arms, as he leaned across the screen. “Sorry you joined, Number One?” he grinned.

The other looked up quickly from the dimly lit compass. “I guess I'll be all right,” he said thoughtfully. “I must say I wish I had the knack of being fierce enough to get things done without worrying about their feelings.” He nodded towards the huddled gun's crew. “It's difficult to get people to look up to you without giving them the impression that you're looking down on them, if you follow me,” he finished lamely.

“Heavens, what a complicated mind you've got.” The muffled figure shook with soft laughter. “But I think I know what you mean; it happens to all of us at first. Take my advice, don't try to be too definite in your ideas until you've got to know the lads as individuals; you'll be right on top line then.”

They lapsed into contented silence as a can of hot, sweet tea was heaved on to the bridge, the scalding liquid running through Royce like a fresh confidence.

One of the bridge lookouts lowered his glasses. “Leader's turning, sir, comin' back down the line.”

Paskins's boat cruised slowly down the line and as he came abreast of them, he shouted through his megaphone, “We'll stop here for a bit, in case Jerry's sending anyone across to intercept the convoy.” And as he raced back to the head of his flotilla, the boats cut their engines, and rolled uneasily in the freshening breeze. With legs braced, the two officers stood back to back with their glasses trained into the blackness, Royce noting with sympathy the dismal retching of the young signalman as he fought his private battle with the sea.

Half an hour passed. Their eyes smarted, their bodies ached with the constant readjustment to the irregular pitching of the slender hull, and only Harston seemed cheerful and alert. Without warning, a bright orange flash lit the horizon, and seconds later a dull boom echoed across the water, yet before it had died away, the R-T speaker crackled into life.

“Leader calling. General chase!”

Harston's orders jerked Royce back to reality. “Full ahead, steer due west.”

All round, the eager engines coughed and roared to life, and with a mighty flurry of foam they were off, their graceful high-speed hulls surging and leaping over the steep, little waves towards the distant fire which slowly ebbed and then died, as if extinguished by a giant hand. Emberson's boat was well out ahead of the pack, throwing up two solid sheets of spray as she tore into the night like a grey avenger.

Royce scrambled down to the pom-pom platform on the bucking fo'c'sle, as the gunners stripped off the spray shields, and trained their weapon round. His heart thumped madly, and he felt the sour taste of vomit forming in his throat, the icy fingers of real fear clutched at his inside, until he felt his head reeling. With an effort he steadied himself against the rail, and then noticed that Leading Seaman Parker was the gunlayer, his face hard and set, his large, red hands controlling his gun with ease and practice. For a moment their eyes met, and Parker's heavy face twisted into a grin. “Now d' you see why I want a bloody refit?” he yelled, and Royce found himself laughing crazily in return. His voice sounded unnatural too, as he called back, “I'll need one myself after this!”

He found himself falling through space as the boat rolled to her beam, the tiller hard over, but Parker's vice-like grip pulled him up with a jerk, and as if in a dream he caught a brief glimpse of a lump of wreckage in the water that Harston had narrowly avoided, and two upturned white faces that were immediately lost in their boiling wake. As they swung back on course, they caught up with the rear ships of the convoy, and Royce had many blurred impressions of gleaming black hulls and rusty plates skimming past within feet of his touch. A destroyer was firing rapidly across the head of the columns at a twisting, silver-grey shape brilliantly framed by a well-placed star shell.

“E-boat, Green one-one-oh!” yelled the rating wearing the head-set, and the pom-pom swung round farther still, but the target was blotted out by a madly zig-zagging tanker, which broke away from the neat line of ships.

“For Christ's sake, what's he doing?” cursed Parker, and as if in answer, a fresh explosion rent the night in two, and a blinding flash lit up the stricken tanker's bridge and rigging like a hideous monument, and a searing pain shot through Royce's eyeballs, as he cringed from the shock. Already the ship was rolling in her death agony, and in the light of the fires on board they could clearly see small, pathetic figures scrambling down the sloping decks. As they crossed her bows they saw the killer turning towards them, the long, low shape gleaming in the flickering light from the tanker. With a deafening rattle the starboard Oerlikon opened fire, the red tracer clawing over the rapidly shortening range, then the heavy thud, thud, thud of the pom-pom joined in, as the two boats closed each other. Then Royce saw the green tracer climbing, apparently lazily, from the E-boat's guns, and pitching down straight for him. He felt a sudden, hot breath on his cheek, and heard the clang of metal behind him, while somewhere on the bridge he heard Harston's cool voice shout: “Watch your steering, Cox'n, there's another ship dead ahead!”

At the swing of the wheel, the M.T.B. swerved again across the path of the E-boat, the range dropping to twenty yards, before another looming merchantman hid the E-boat from view. In the distance, they saw Emberson's boat take up the chase, and the tracers intermingled in a fresh, deadly pattern, as the German captain twisted and turned in desperation to break off the action. Yet another M.T.B. burst out of the convoy and opened fire immediately, and in the concentrated cross-fire, they saw the enemy stagger and lose speed as small orange flashes rippled across her bridge and decks, and pieces of the hull broke away as the cannon shells struck home. Without warning the E-boat ploughed to a stop, and burst into flames, burning petrol spewing out of her like life-blood. Within seconds she flopped on to her side, and with a searing hiss slid under the surface. The silence which followed seemed to burst the eardrums, and even the racing engines appeared quieter. Shakily Royce drew his glove across his cold, wet face, gulping in the keen air to rid his throat of the tang of cordite and fire.

“All right, sir?”

He was aware of Parker peering at him through the gloom, a look of concern on his large face. He nodded shakily, feeling incapable of speech, and only dimly conscious of his surroundings.

Parker rounded on his gun's crew who were watching Royce with interest. “Come on you lazy lot!” he bawled. “There may be some more of the perishers about yet, so don't look so ruddy cocky!”

The pale blob of Harston's head appeared over the bridge screen. “Very nice shooting,” he called. “You can secure now and get rid of the empties; Jerry has broken off the action. Come on to the bridge, Number One.”

As Royce clambered over the glittering shell cases to the ladder, he forced himself to think straight, and to try to piece together the violent events of this unreal and nightmarish encounter with the enemy, and immediately his mind was assailed with fresh doubts as to his competence in such a terrible situation.

Making a great effort to keep his voice steady, he nodded in the direction of the convoy, “What happens now, sir? Do we stick with them, or press on after the E-boats?”

Harston was studying him keenly. “Well, I'm happy to say, neither. They'll be quite safe now, and Jerry got a bloody nose. One E-boat sunk by that lucky old lawyer, Artie, and the destroyer mauled another. Pity about those two ships,” he added, “but at least they were empty, except for their crews, and God only knows where they are now, poor devils. There are a couple of trawlers looking for them.”

He glanced up at a pinpoint of light ahead, and focussed his glasses. After a moment he turned, his face suddenly tired. “Make a signal with the lamp to the next astern:
Resume formation.
We're returning to base.”

Royce forced a smile. “Bunts still seasick?”

Harston stared at him for several seconds before replying, then waved vaguely to the darkened corner of the bridge. “Afraid he's bought it,” he said harshly.

Royce lurched over to the small figure sitting awkwardly against the signal locker, and knelt down at his side. The young signalman's legs were sticking straight out in front of him, his hands still clutching his Aldis lamp against the oversized duffle coat. His face was thrown back, and the fair, curly hair rippled gently in the cold breeze, as the glazing blue eyes stared up at the scudding clouds, as if amazed at what he saw. Through the thin plating at his back was a small, round hole.

Royce, suddenly ice-cold, choked back the lump in his throat, very gently prized the lamp from the stiff, chilled hands, and blindly triggered the signal to the dark shape astern.

As the flotilla reformed into line, Harston swore softly out to sea. “Damn them to hell! He was just telling me that he wasn't afraid!”

He pounded his fist on the rail, then seemed to go limp. “You did well, Number One, but don't ever worry about being afraid. The man who says he isn't is either a liar, or a bloody lunatic!”

The Coxswain stepped out of the darkness and touched his cap. “Everything's secure below, no damage,” he reported. “I'll get a couple of the lads to give me a hand with young Mead here.” He fumbled under his oilskin, and produced a bottle and two enamel mugs. “I brought you a couple of tots of neaters, sir. I reckon you can do with it up here.”

Harston downed his rum with one gulp, and walked stiffly to the compass. “I'm going below to write my report, Number One. It saves a bit of time when we get in. Do you think you can handle her now?”