Hollow Sea (36 page)

'
MUST
MAKE
WAY
!
WOUNDED
ON
BOARD
.'

'
DROP
YOUR
ANCHOR
AND
AWAIT
ORDERS
,' came the reply. The two men on the bridge just stared at each other. What could it mean? Dunford saw only the same unreason, the same idiocy. Mr. Deveney on the other hand saw reason.

'There is every reason for all berthings being occupied, Mr. Dunford,' he said.

'Yes. But damn it, man, I can't carry this responsibility much further. Goddam! Why proceed under orders at all? Why not have one's own? We're only a confounded number to them! Where's the flesh and blood behind this? Does it exist? Or are we listening to some wooden puppet? We are ordered here, it is essential that way be given us, they're cracked.'

'But we may only anchor an hour or two.'

'That had nothing whatever to do with it. You see, she's veered off. Do you know what the position is, Mr. Deveney? I'll tell you! They've suddenly remembered us. And now they've gone off; they want a few hours to collect their scattered wits, understand? They want time to think it over. And meanwhile, the wounded can fester, the dead rot, the living shut their mouths and keep silent. H'm! Are we living in Bedlam, or are we only dreaming? Of course the harbour's full, and ships are full, and ships are empty, the water is choked with them, men are herded together, waiting. Waiting for orders. So are we, whilst this deity thinks it out.'

'I really think,' began Mr. Deveney, but Mr. Dunford burst out in anger:

'Then don't! For Heaven's sake, don't! You only insult them by thinking! Well, let her go! Quartermaster, tell the bosun to get his men on the fo'c'sle-head. Carpenter, stand by the windlass.' Dunford looked into the wheel-house. Dead silence there! An immovable figure, a floating needle.

'Stop, Mr. Deveney. The responsibility is all theirs. Not mine.'

The telegraph rang again. The sudden stoppage of the engines brought everybody out on deck. The silence which followed was a kind of awed silence, the cessation of sound, like the cessation of ringing in the ears, and the temporary dizziness that follows. The silence was clear, unmistakable, something you could almost touch, men stared at one another. 'She's stopped,' a voice said. That was quick, wasn't it? Where the hell are we?'

One voice now grew to many voices, the air was filled with questionings. 'But beggar me! They've got the crowd on the fo'c'sle-head. There's the windlass.' What could it mean? Why, there were lights flashing everywhere. Surely they had reached Alex. They were in the river. But what the hell was wrong? Wasn't she going in after all? And somebody standing under the starboard fo'c'sle-head ladder, laughing. 'Well, my lucky lads, who's right? Me or bloody you? What'd I tell you! We're only a goddam muck ship. We're not respectable enough, eh? That's it, isn't it? Ah! You can't tell me things and reckon I'll swallow them like a mug. She's going to stick here, sailors! Yes, sir! We're going to be a target for the bloody forts now, unless of course one of those damned submarines happens along, then you'll have a clean break with fibs and stinks and all the rest of it. Listen! There she goes! There she goes! You might as well put your money back in your pockets, mates. Yes, sir, and turn in, cover yourself with the clothes and forget about it. They'll wake you soon a bloody enough if anything happens. Listen 'em gabbling on the bridge! Christ! These top-nots don't half like talking. Like to hear themselves now and again. Well, I say that on the lot of them, Alexandria included.' He snapped his fingers angrily.

And he left the excited crowd, still talking, asking questions. There were no answers. Only questions. The answer was written somewhere, where they did not know, nor did any man know. Captain or mate, cook or fireman, peggy or trimmer! It was written somewhere very far away. Even Mr. Walters and Mr. Hump, standing outside the saloon, looked baffled. To come all that way, and suddenly to stop, to drop anchor. Well, it took the biscuit so far as he was concerned. Mr. Hump, more patient, suggested it was only temporary. Probably for examination of the ship.

'Examination my backside!' said Mr. Walters with apparent disgust. 'All is known. And good God! If they've noses they can smell, can't they? I'll swear you can smell this ship from Sister Street.'

'Mr. Walters!'

The chief steward looked round at Mr. Hump. Mr. Hump looked rather a strange sight, so he thought. He couldn't see him very well, but he could see that egg-shaped head and glory be! wasn't there a clear bald patch showing in the middle, or, well, fancy that!

'They're afraid of something, Mr. Walters. You know there's a queer feeling about. Yes, you can feel they're afraid. Did you notice how that destroyer slunk off. Slunk off and then put on top speed.' Mr. Hump pointed to the four corners of the compass. Perhaps this was to symbolize the something big, the something strange and frightening about this silence. This dead stop in dark waters. This being lost in the night. No action! Nothing moving.

'I never saw the destroyer,' Walters replied. He coughed.

'But I did! And now it's gone! And we know nothing.' He threw his hands in the air. A gesture of despair.

'Less than nothing,' Walters said, as though to seal it. 'Well, I'm not standing here, anyhow. There's plenty to be done,' he said.

Yes, thought Mr. Hump. Plenty to be done. A steward's work was never done. He followed Mr. Walters down the saloon stairs, along to the saloon galley. The Scotch cook who only put his head out of the port once every day, and stole up in the evening to have a quiet look round, was astonished when his chief steward said: We'll have the last tinned partridges to-night, Duggan, and the peaches, and those tinned peas.'

They passed on. Went to their room. Both men lit pipes. Here was a situation that called for a little clear thinking. Did they belong to anything? Anybody? Was the war over? Or had some evil come over the ship? One could think these things out calmly with a pipe.

'I wouldn't give a damn if they sent us to Timbuctoo this minute,' said Walters, 'so long as they get these fellows ashore! I'm getting sick of it.'

'How sick of it those fellows in number four hold must be,' remarked Hump.

'That's enough, Hump. We don't want any of that sort of stuff here! This is a bloody prison, this ship is. Think about that! I always said, I told Mr. Camithers the night we sailed, I said, "Well, so they've taken her name off bow and stern." "Yes," he said. "And there's your number, A.10." And I thought to myself, "That's done it. We're a number now. And there's millions of numbers. It's easy to forget a number, but not a name. Who could ever forget the name
Helicon
? I couldn't. That's what's happened, Hump. They've forgotten us, suddenly remembered. They're human. Give 'em a chance, they have to think out something for us."
 
' He puffed away irritably at his pipe. Seated thus, pipe between his teeth, that mock serious face had something Puckish about it. In this moment, all things could fall away from him as water from a stone: Irritation, worry, fear, repellent sights, ears deaf to groans, crazy shoutings. A.10 rooted in the darkness, these two men seated quiet within her, each thinking his own thoughts, and around a greater quietness, hushed voices, vain wonderings, a spell upon the tongue that had gabbled of so many futures for A.10. All waiting. Quietly waiting. There! The anchor was home! Silence again.

In the fo'c'sle itself there had been much argument the moment struck, stripped all apathy, all indifference from their faces, revealed restlessness there, shouting died down, they talked in low voices as though their tones were indeed fashioned from the uncertainty of this hour. And at last no tongue spoke. They looked at each other.

Upon the bridge Mr. Deveney looked at the junior officer, the junior officer looked at Mr. Dunford. They were standing there in line. Each one seemed to say to the other: What do you think?

The night might be everlasting, but not to the crew's cook, who worked quietly in the galley, a nonchalant air about him. His galley doors were closed. He
was
indifferent. Three minutes previous a man had come to him, complained about the food for dinner. 'H'm,' he thought, 'men are funny sorts of cows.'

Aft, and far below the dead lay, stank, lay and were free. Nothing would touch them, no voice rouse. They were beyond all things. It was black darkness there. They were close together, huddled. They knew no fear. In the saloon the wounded lay, and they were beyond wondering, they slept, snored or sighed. For them the world span through space, zigzagged, tumbled, they were wounded – they were one wound.

Suddenly the spell was broken. Broken by sound, by a bell, a light. The waiting was over, that which lay beyond thought was evaporating, the incoherent taking form, vision broke, meaning was no longer flux. It had taken flesh. The order came through to Dunford. Very clear, very definite, '
PROCEED
AT
ONCE
TO
PORT
OF
REGISTRY
,
DUMP
YOUR
DEAD
.' Dunford was holding a pair of night glasses in his hand, '
PROCEED
AT
ONCE
.'

The glasses fell out of his hand, broke, their fragments showered the deck like fine dust.

'I protest! These wounded must be landed.'

'
THE
PORT
IS
CHOKED
WITH
SHIPPING
,
THERE
ARE
FEARS
OF
PLAGUE
.
PROCEED
.'

'Good God! I am carrying one hundred and twenty-one
 
.
 
.
 
.
 
one hundred and
twenty-one
.
 
.
 
.
 
'

'
THEN
CLEAR
TO
HELL
OUT
OF
THIS
,
IT
IS
SUICIDE
TO
ENTER
HERE
!
FEVER
IS
THREATENED
.'

'All right! By heavens, all right! Mr. Ericson! Fo'c'sle. Anchor up. Stand by for orders, Mr. Deveney. We are going home,
HOME
! Think of that!
HOME
.'

'But these men, sir! It's outrageous! I.
 
.
 
.
 
'

'These men will probably die. And like the others they will smell. Mr. Deveney, I shall lay them fore and aft— fore and aft, d'you hear me? There she goes! Anchor coming up. Stand by there! Stand by.'

'T
HERE
is this much to be said,' began Mr. Pearson, but Dunford interrupted at once.

'There is nothing to be said, Mr. Pearson, except to repeat what I myself said ten minutes ago. If you feel you are so far above the thing then, I'll lower a boat, man it, and I'll give you a quarter of an hour to make up your mind.'

Mr. Dunford began pacing up and down the chart-room.

'But it's monstrous, Mr. Dunford. Mind you, I'm a man who says very little. I keep to myself. But now – well, I just had to come up. There are orders we know. But there are orders
and
orders. But this, this turning about and returning on that order. Why it's simply crazy. And not only that. Oh no! It's this sailing about as though we weren't wanted or something, this damn sneaking about waters as though we were outcasts or something, had nowhere to go. Weren't, oh damn it man. I—'

Dunford took out his watch then.

'Now, Mr. Pearson, it simply comes to this. You want to get into port. Then hurry up and pack your things. It's just thirty odd miles to port. They say there's bubonic plague threatening. The harbour is bottled up with ships. The ships are bottled up with men. They're afraid to move. The port for the time being, anyhow, is closed to other ships. And all the ships and all the men. Well, they have them now. God knows they cried out hard enough for them.'

'Ah! That's only your conscience, Mr. Dunford. Look at it in a plain way.'

Dunford forced a laugh. He hadn't wanted to laugh at all, really, but that expression on the engineer's face, well he just
had
to laugh.

'Conscience be hanged,' he cried. 'I was simply trying to illustrate to you their wonderful strategy, Mr. Pearson.'

He pulled up short by the mahogany table.

'Strategy,' exploded Pearson, 'strategy.' He turned now, as though to rush from the room.

'Strategy is forgetting the mistakes you've made,' Dunford said.

'Rubbish,' snapped Mr. Pearson. 'Rubbish. Forgetting you've been fooled more likely, I should say.'

Mr. Dunford was all attention. 'Listen to that,' he said. 'Listen.' It was the cable coming up. But Mr. Pearson did not wait to listen. Without another word he left the cabin, banging the door noisily behind him. He was gone, the bent figure already swallowed up in the darkness outside. But had Mr. Dunford followed behind him, he would have seen the engineer sauntering along the bridge-deck, throwing first one hand and then the other into the air, with a sort of despairful resignation. He would have heard him muttering all the way along that bridge-deck. But Dunford had not moved. He stood quite still listening to the rattling sound. And when it had finally ceased, and the silence came, following that tempestuous din, he went to his table and sat down, resting his hands on it, eyes covering its highly polished surface, through which he could see the dull reflection of his own hands. He knew he had better go out now. Voices rang in his ears. The little clock in his cabin began to chime. Yes, he had better go out at once. But he sat on.

The closed harbour. The strange voice, the ethereal voice that gave orders. The anchor coming up. The turning about. The retreat from O. Turning one's back on old things. Going forward to new ones. There was a day and an hour he was remembering now. That was yesterday. Yesterday was in the sullen places, in the hollow seas, under the pressure of a purpose. Yesterday was doing something that had to be done, and now was done. There was worth in it, and there was dirt in it, and it had to be done. They hadn't wanted to do it, and they did it just because they hadn't wanted to. Purpose had a hollow voice. And that, like yesterday, had passed beyond the reaches of silence. Yesterday was in the sullen places. Sullen and a great heat all about. Words were coined upon tongues in the heat of that hour, and he remembered them. And the flesh yielded. The net dragged and the will stiffened, the spirit held. The eye saw, but no door was closed against rage. In the sullen places. Yesterday.