The White Guns (1989) (26 page)

She did not seem to hear. 'You will come to see me? Soon?'

Cuff looked down at her. 'Soon as I can.' He made certain that the door was hiding them from the redcaps and their introspective sergeant. 'Just be very careful. Don't change your story, no matter what, and I'll back you up.' He reached out and touched her breast. Despite everything which had happened it immediately roused him and he added, 'I want you
right now!'

She watched him until he had walked past the ambulance and some military policemen and then turned back towards the room.

Hemmings's letter to his wife had been the perfect ending. His other letter to the Royal Navy about the lieutenant's involvement, the one she had
not
destroyed as she had lied to him, would if need be save her again in the future.

Thornhill stood up for her and pulled out a chair.

'I've sent for some coffee and later I can arrange a meal, if you wish.' He leaned over to study her cut mouth. 'I can have that treated by our medical officer.'

She shook her head. 'I will be all right. But thank you.'

Thornhill had already seen a report about the misuse of fuel at this and certain other dumps. But for that, and despite the pleading letter written by the dead man to his wife, he might have suspected that the attempted murder and then suicide was because of something very different. He could imagine how the big, dangerous-looking lieutenant with all the gongs on his tunic would appeal to an attractive woman who was probably as starved of sex as he was.

He sighed as the coffee and some sandwiches were brought in by the corporal.

'My men will be on call if you need them, Frau Ritter.' He put on his beret and recalled for no obvious reason the dark-faced petty officer who had come to see him about the dead SS officer.

As the door closed and she turned her back on the drying bloodstains, her limbs began to shake uncontrollably for the first time. Then she touched her breast as he had done and would do again.

Another day. And she had won through.

Commander Meikle glanced up from his large desk and asked irritably, 'What
is
it, Lavender? I'm too busy just now!'

Lavender eyed him reproachfully then glanced at his watch, the White Rabbit once again.

'It's Lieutenant Glazebrook, sir.'

Meikle looked around his spacious office. Somewhere he could work, away from makeshift surroundings and unstable communications. Most of the equipment had been installed after being changed several times until he had been satisfied. Through one of the windows he had a good view of some well-tended grass where a party of Germans were busily working on flowerbeds, with the glittering expanse of the Plöner See making a perfect backdrop. A far cry from Kiel and its shattered dockyard.

'Very well.' He added for his own benefit, 'Better get it over with.'

Glazebrook strode into the room, his head seeming to brush against the top of the doorway. He looked hot and angry. But that did not appear to be unusual, Meikle decided.

'I asked you to come –'

Cuff interrupted rudely, 'I just heard about my promotion, sir!'

'Yes.' Meikle leaned back in his new chair, one originally used by Grand-Admiral Dönitz's chief-of-staff. 'You could appeal against the decision, of course.'

'But you think I'd be wasting my bloody time, is that it?'

Meikle eyed him coldly. 'If you continue to take that attitude here, I shall have you escorted to your quarters,' He pulled a sheaf of papers across and looked through them. He knew exactly what each one represented, how many minutes or hours he would allot to their various contents, but it would give the massive lieutenant time to cool down, to save himself from a court martial.

Meikle said eventually, 'Your advanced promotion to lieutenant commander has been curtailed. It has happened to many. If the war has not completely ceased in every theatre it has done so sufficiently to slow down, and in some cases stop, further temporary promotions.'

Cuff glared at him. He knew he was beaten, had known it when he had received the formal announcement from the Admiralty.

He blurted out, 'Well, another command then! Surely after what I've done for them they can manage that?'

Meikle thought suddenly of Marriott. How could two men who had done so much in the same demanding warfare be so different? Marriott had been to see him three times, had even sent his own request to the Admiralty – he had been prepared to plead to anyone who might listen. But not for himself. Just for his boat. Meikle had scanned the official reports for himself. He was not much of a sailor, but even he had marvelled that MGB 801 had stayed afloat this long.

By contrast Glazebrook had not even touched on his own boat but was thinking only of his own advancement.

Meikle said, 'The work of this naval party is vital. Everything seems fine and well organised now. But look beyond the sunshine, Glazebrook, and you'll see the winter coming. The railways and harbours are in a mess and all the goodwill in the world won't save the civilian population if we can't get the flow of food and supplies moving again.' He held up one hand as Glazebrook made to interrupt. 'You have fought a hard war, and have survived it. But all that is behind you. We have to think of survival for others now, no matter what our personal views might be.'

Leading Writer Lavender peered through the door. 'Almost time, sir.'

Meikle hid his relief. Right on cue as usual.

'I'm afraid I cannot do anything further, Glazebrook. I had hoped you would settle down and use your skills under my direction.' He watched calmly, as he would the face of a prisoner in his summing-up at a trial. 'Especially after your excellent piece of work at the fuel depot when you saved that woman from being murdered, and helped the military police in their investigations. Very commendable.' He dropped his gaze to his diary. 'If you remain here, assisting my staff, I see no reason why the subject of promotion should not be raised again.'

'By you, sir?'

Meikle nodded gently. 'Of course.'

'Well, in that case, sir.' Cuff was feeling confused by the new tactics. 'I'd like to give it a go.'

Meikle replied, 'Fine.' He stood up and patted his uniform into shape. 'If that's all?'

Glazebrook swallowed his anger. 'For the present, sir.' He marched past the leading writer and slammed out of the building.

Half to himself Meikle said, 'I cannot imagine what sort of officer he really was. My only surprise is that he was commissioned at all!'

Leading Writer Lavender asked timidly, 'Can I reach you anywhere, sir?'

Meikle paused by a mirror and straightened his tie. 'The duty operations officer can deal with anything urgent.' He added distantly, 'I have to see someone who is about to do what I imagine to be the most difficult thing in the world.' He thought suddenly of Glazebrook's belligerent intolerance. 'For
him
anyway.'

'Ship's company,
'shun!'

Fairfax wheeled round and saluted smartly.

'Ready for inspection,
sir!'

Marriott looked him straight in the eyes, then replied, 'Thank you, Number One. Stand them at ease.'

He watched as Fairfax shouted the order and looked along the lines of uniformed men he had come to know so well. Each one in his best blues, the red and gold badges, the very few good-conduct stripes which would show if a man had behaved himself for three years on the trot. Three years' undiscovered crime, as the old skates would have it.

Lowes in front of the main division of seamen, Adair, the Chief, at the head of his stokers and motor-mechanics. From commanding officer to the greenest recruit, twenty-nine souls in all, now that Evans had left them.

In harbour, rare enough before VE-Day, this kind of routine within the family had kept them going. A moment when they were all together, not divided by watches or at nerve-searing action stations off some enemy coast in pitch darkness.

A moment for them to moan about, to be nagged by their officers, petty officers and leading rates, but one which was secretly cherished because no outsider could share it, still less understand it.

But this time it was not like that at all.
Marriott clenched his fists and pressed them against his trousers to steel himself. Each day he had tried to keep it at the back of his mind, to lose himself in the endless chit-signing and stocktaking which were part and parcel of handing over even the smallest warship.

A week of seeing the gunboat through different eyes, like trying to pack a lifetime into seven days. Now it was all behind him. Not next week, or even tomorrow. It was now.

He had hunted down Commander Meikle and had tried to get him to fix a postponement but to no avail. Marriott had even produced a whole batch of requests he had made over the months for spare parts and the chance of a longer refit for a hull which had been worn out by relentless and unending service.

To the people watching from the dockside the motor gunboat probably looked no different from usual except for the extra smartness of her company. Cuff's boat had gone to the outer yard yesterday, which only seemed to add to the finality of the occasion.

Marriott saw there were a lot of onlookers standing in the bright noon sunshine. Some were from ships in the harbour as well as several of Cuff's disbanded crew. Once he caught sight of Meikle's oak-leaved cap at the rear of the crowd, here for reasons of his own, as a spectator like the rest.

With a start he realised that Fairfax was waiting for him. He wanted it to end and at the same time he did not want to begin it.

Some faces he had seen at their best and worst in battle, eyes staring into the flashes, voices shouting unheard words of encouragement or hatred into the clattering din which had been their world. Some he had seen rather too often across the defaulters' table. Hurt, innocent, reproachful, they were usually the most guilty, like Scouse Arkright, now standing with his cap in his hand, its huge tiddley bow hidden against his flapping trouser-leg.

'Sorry it's over, Arkright?'

The eyes shifted from a point beyond Marriott's shoulder.

'Not arf, sir. Back to th' Pool soon, eh?' But his eyes did not respond.

Telegraphist Knocker White, the one man who had kept them all in touch with hope and support, who had brought news of victory together with that of loved ones lost in air-raids at home. Paler than most of the hands because he saw little of the sunshine, cooped up in his W/T office. He was to be transferred to the big Signals Section at Plön. But as he had said when he had been told, 'I'll miss this old bucket, sir!'

Stoker Gilhooly, who had seen so many fights and brawls each time he had stepped ashore that his nose and eyelids were bruised and scarred beyond recovery, answered Marriott in much the same fashion.

'I wanted to finish in 'er, sir. Not ponce about in some flamin' barracks!'

So it would be the defaulters' table again for him, Marriott thought. A lump of a man, but one who had saved several of his mates from blazing fuel when his previous boat had brewed up.

Acting-Petty Officer Arthur Townsend gave a brief grin. 'I'll go for my full rate, I suppose, sir.' He shrugged, summing it up. 'An' what for? All dressed up an' nowhere to go!'

Leading Seaman Rae, their crackshot machine-gunner, said much the same. Perhaps one of the best seamen Marriott had met. Just a hostilities-only recruit like the vast majority of the wartime navy, and he was one to be proud of.