Thunder at Dawn (20 page)

He had half an hour to sluice himself down, change into clean clothes and then sit quietly in his cabin. Far below in the stokehold they would be starting already on the long job of trimming and getting up steam with the grate and clang of the shovels. They were busy. But most of the other hands were fallen out below, cooks piped to the galley for the evening meal and there would be beer as well. It was quiet.

He could hear the tick of the clock. It was a background to his thoughts as he re-examined his plans. He was not smiling now.

It might have seemed that he had at least a limited number of courses he could pursue. In fact he knew, as he had known from the beginning, that he would have to fight. They had hunted him down though he had gone half across the world and he could see them …

The rap at the door snapped his eyes open and the word from him in a savage bark: “
Yes?”

Vincent’s voice came nervously, “Boat putting off from
Ariadne
, sir.”

“Thank you.”

He thought that when there was only one course you could take it became terribly simple. He was smiling as he went to join his officers where they waited in a well-scrubbed, shining group, neat in their best dress.

*

The mess-decks were crowded. Mess-decks are always crowded, even on a ship as short-handed as
Thunder
, but this day it was made worse by the damage to the ship, some parts being too badly burned to be inhabited. They stank. So
Thunder’s
crew jammed in together in a grousing matiness, sweated, talked, and wondered.

Chalky White ate furiously, nervously, shovelling the food into his mouth. Through it he mumbled, “What can ’e do? What I
ask
yer! Too slow to run away. That’s been proved. They ’aven’t got better than a knot or two over us but that’s enough. Too much. Either one o’ them’s got twice the big guns we have. So what can he
do
? I
asks
you!”

Farmer Bates said placidly, “Why don’t you shut up?” He had drawn Gibb’s beer besides his own; Gibb was in the cells.

“I just want to
know
.” Chalky tapped his chest. “I’m on this bleeder same as him. What happens to ’er ’appens ter
me
. I just want to
know
. Blimey, what beats me is what that Gibb came back for.” He stood up. “I’m going to draw me beer.”

At that moment Daddy Horsfall hobbled through in his best boots that were crippling him and a starched white mess-jacket that threatened to choke him, on his way aft to the wardroom.

Chalky seized on opportunity. “Hey! Daddy!”

Daddy glanced around, saw him.

Farmer Bates said, “Don’t ask him.”

Chalky whispered, “Not ask him? He’s the skipper’s servant, right alongside of him. If anybody knows —”

“Don’t ask him.”

Daddy called, “What d’yer want, Chalky? I’m supposed to be waiting on, man.”

Chalky asked, “What’s he goin’ to do? The skipper, I mean.”

“Do?”

“
Do!
About — this! He’s got to have a plan, ain’t he?”

“Ah! Plan.” Daddy nodded, understanding now. “Well, that’s simple enough. He’s made no secret of it.”

“What?”

Daddy said, “Get them to drop one on us.”

Chalky gaped at him. “
What
?”

Daddy nodded. “An’ when the bloody great cloud of rust goes up we can sneak away through it like it was a smoke screen.” He hobbled away through the guffaws.

Farmer said, “I told you not to ask the old bastard.” But Chalky went off, muttering.

Burton squeezed in beside Farmer and glanced at the bottles of beer. “You’re not going to drink all that at your age?”

Farmer said amiably, “You’re a scrounging bastard.” He shoved along a bottle.

Burton took it. “Always was.”

They drank. Farmer said, “That was a bit of a lark ashore.” They grinned. Farmer asked, “What do you think?”

“Smith? Deep, that one. Dunno what he
can
do but he won’t back down.”

Farmer nodded agreement. “Just have to wait and see.”

They had talked to Rattray, who said indifferently, “All right, I’ll leave the little bleeder alone if they ever let him out. Don’t matter now, does it? Not with what’s coming off tomorrow.”

Farmer and Burton sat in companionable silence in the midst of the teeming life around them. The moments of comparative peace would not, could not, last much longer. They would not waste them.

*

No bugle nor pipe sounded but the crew of
Thunder
had finished their brief breathing space, and their beer, and now turned to under the Petty Officers and Chiefs. They swarmed below deck like a disturbed ants’ nest, destructive ants, and the din they created built on itself until it came in bedlam waves and went on and on.

In the wardroom the Chilean Admiral and Encalada were stiffly polite but their ladies openly excited. Neither officer mentioned Smith’s request for more time but Cherry sought him out and whispered, “They’ve agreed. You have until six tomorrow morning but not a minute longer.”

“Well done!”

“And here!” Cherry handed him a telegram.

It was a signal from Admiralty. Cherry was to inform the
Thunder’s
commander that a sighting of the cruisers had been reported in error, and if the cruisers arrived in the Pacific he was to avoid action until joined by a stronger force.

Cherry said bitterly, “They’re a little late.”

Smith shrugged. “Thank you, anyway.” He put the signal carefully away in his pocket.

Ballard was openly elated by
Thunder’s
performance and Smith’s handling of her but after Smith spoke briefly and quietly with him he became preoccupied.

Donoghue and Corrigan, his Flag-Captain, were easy and friendly looking frankly at the damage, appraising it and the work done but saying nothing. The ship was tolerably clean; for a coal-burning ship that had recently passed through heavy weather and hostile action she was remarkably clean. She still stank of burnt cordite and smoke.

The party was complete. It had an air of unreality as Smith had suspected when he issued the invitation but now he was glad that he had done so. It had been issued as an act of bravado, a gesture, but the party was useful for several reasons. For one thing his officers were readily obeying his orders, they were enjoying themselves. For another, Sarah Benson was here.

The white-jacketed stewards served tea, cake and wafer-thin sandwiches. Wakely’s gramophone rag-timed away, decorously muted by one of Wakely’s socks stuffed down its horn. Wakely himself scurried between his gramophone and the group of officers who surrounded Sarah Benson. She had come aboard with Jim Bradley, who was pale and bandaged and told Smith, “The Doc’s allowed me up for one hour. I wasn’t going to miss this!”

Sarah looked anything but a survivor now. During the day she had made demands of Mrs. Cherry and that lady had met them nobly so that Sarah’s hair was piled and shone and her dress was expensive and — well, fitted. She was polite and quiet with Smith when she came aboard but she had come alive in the wardroom. Bradley watched the officers clustered around her with tolerant amusement.

Smith thought Bradley could grin like a Cheshire cat because he would be taking the girl away.

Smith laboured at small talk. He was a poor hand at it and with the Chileans it was hard work. They all avoided mention of the war and Smith knew little of Chile. He talked a little of London but London was hard to recall.

Encalada finally noticed the racket below deck. “Your men are still working very hard.”

Smith nodded. “Yes.”

“Below? I understood you were hit fore and aft and your wireless destroyed — but not below.”

“That is correct.”

That stopped the conversation and Smith could have left it there but he said disarmingly, “It sounds as though someone’s trying to steal the engines! In fact we have a small engine repair, not connected with the action. And of course, we are trimming bunkers. But we will sail on time and shift our anchorage to Stillwater Cove tonight.”

Encalada nodded, but Ballard blurted out eagerly, “Captain, there’s a mist at dawn —” He bit his tongue.

Smith said quickly, “You came aboard in more comfortable style this evening, Miss Benson.”

“But no more eagerly.”

They all laughed at that.

Smith said wickedly, “It is a pleasure to open our doors to you.”

“Now.” And her lips twitched.

“Always.”

“Distance lending enchantment to the view?”

“I was — preoccupied at that time.”

“I know, and understand.”

He had apologised and she had accepted. He was pleased at that and he felt like a tight-rope walker, was enjoying it and tried his hand again. “Normally I would hope to see more of you but in the circumstances —”

“More? In the circumstances that would be difficult.” And she looked him straight in the eye and laughed.

*

When the party ended and the guests departed Ballard stood at the head of the ladder, his hand in Smith’s, and muttered, “Was that all right?”

“Perfect.”

Thunder
was left to herself.

Donoghue found orders waiting for him aboard
Kansas
, orders for the Atlantic and he called for steam from midnight onwards.

Commander David Cochrane Smith paced the deck of his ship, his mind busy. Davies had raised steam and the smoke hung low on the still air. Soon, now.

He remembered Sarah Benson going down into the boat and thought that he had seen the last of her and, now that they had made some sort of peace, he would have liked to have seen her again. But the chance was gone.

XII

Sarah Benson had not enjoyed the party. She suspected Smith had given it for reasons of his own, one of them probably that it was the last thing anyone would expect him to do. He had succeeded in that; she had seen the Chileans looking about them in baffled perplexity as the scrubbed officers sipped tea and that fat, pink-faced boy with the worshipping eyes had wound away at his gramophone. She had gone to the party as a duty, as an act of thanks and apology and that had been accepted. She had hated it. Tomorrow was in her mind.

She was wondering about Smith. The stories about a man who haunted parties did not ring true now. Smith was obviously a poor hand at parties, and except for the brief exchange with her his conversation had limped. And a devil with the ladies? No. So maybe the stories were only half-truths and there was another side to them?

Did it matter now?
Thunder
would sail out in the dawn, she was certain of that, and the cruisers would be waiting for her. If only
Thunder
could gain more time.

She stood on the deck of
Ariadne
and stared across at
Thunder
as the night came down.
Ariadne
’
s
deck was dotted with little groups of passengers watching as she did but she stood alone, a small, dejected figure. Cherry found her there.

She turned to him with hope. “Any news?”

Cherry shook his head gloomily. “Bad news or good, it depends on how you look at it. No diver. There are two working out of this port but both were hired for a job up the coast and went the day before yesterday. They won’t be back for a week. They were hired by Muller, not directly but through a couple of intermediaries and know ’em both. What makes it look good is they must have gone because Muller doesn’t want a diver operating here until he has one he can trust to keep his mouth shut. And
that
means something in the wreck. Before suspected it but now I’m certain. But without a diver I can’t
prove
it.”

Sarah asked, “What kind of proof?”

“I’ve thought about that.” Cherry paused. “Smith got a whole lot of stuff from her, log, ship’s papers, everything of that sort and it was all in order.”

“So …?”

“Wait a minute,” Cherry snapped testily, worried and on edge, “I’m
getting
to it. She was a collier for the cruisers and she had a first-class wireless. So — she’d send in code.”

“A book!”

“Right! And one of the places they didn’t get the chance to search was the wireless office. It’s in the superstructure and that’s where the book will be. If I only had a
diver
—” He groaned in frustration.

They were silent a moment, then Sarah said quietly, “I’m a good swimmer.” She was not boasting, simply stating a fact, staring out across the pool at the stained and battered
Thunder
.

“I daresay young lady, but I’m talking about diving.”

“So am I.”

Cherry explained shortly, “I don’t mean diving
in
. I mean diving
under
to a depth of ten or twenty feet
into
the superstructure!” His patience was stretched thin by the tension that tautened the nerves of both of them as the hours slid away.

It set her snapping at him. “I’m not a damn fool and don’t you dare treat me as one.”

“I’m not —”

“I know the diving you’re talking about and I can do it. I’ve swum around in that depth of water plenty of times.”

Cherry peered at her, upset and not liking the idea at all and his face showed it. He believed her. Once when he’d talked with her father that abrasive little man had said the girl could swim like a bloody fish. Cherry had worried himself sick over Sarah in the past but he’d had to put up with it because he needed her. But this —

Sarah still stared at
Thunder
and she spoke her thoughts aloud. “The Commander and I never got along very well. Maybe I’m partly to blame. But there’s a man who can make a decision. We can either sit on our rumps and do nothing; or —”

*

The sun dropped down behind the overcast in a red glow that faded and died. The town twinkled with lights and
Thunder
lay in a pool of radiance of her own making. Men worked on her decks, seemingly still repairing the ravages of the fighting that were visible to anyone who cared to look. Donoghue stood on
Kansas’s
quarterdeck, Corrigan by his side.

Donoghue said, “So he’s hauling up to Stillwater Cove tonight. He’s not going to be interned. He’s going to make a running fight of it.”

Corrigan sniffed. “He can’t run. Those cruisers can give that old lady two or three knots. It sounds like he hopes to use the mist that comes up just before dawn, but …” His voice tailed away and he shook his head.

“That’s right. But.” Donoghue scowled. “That mist hangs around the river and its mouth and that’s all. It’ll give him a few minutes of cover, just a little time. He can’t evade that gunboat and they’ll be out there waiting for him when he comes out of the mist. The light will be behind him and he’ll make one hell of a target.”

“He’s just trying everything he can.” Corrigan paused, then said, “They’re still working aboard her. Looked pretty good to me, both the ship and the men I saw. She should be ready when she leaves, ready as she’ll ever be.”

Donoghue said heavily, “God help them.”

*

Cherry’s boat took him ashore and then returned to
Ariadne
. Cherry held a diplomatic post and could not be involved. He walked up to the consulate, to wait.

His boatman, Francis, handed Sarah Benson into the boat when she descended the accommodation ladder. He was an expatriate Geordie, squat and barrel-chested. He had not shaved for several days and smelt strongly of the tobacco he chewed. He wore dirty trousers and a singlet that was blackstreaked with oil, hair curling through the rents in it. Cherry had told him all about it and he disapproved but he started the engine and swung the boat away from
Ariadne
.

Sarah sat on a thwart and said tonelessly, “I think we can do without the lights in a minute.”

Francis shrugged heavy shoulders. “Don’t suppose anybody’ll take any notice of us; they’ll all be watching her.” He jerked his head at
Thunder
. “Still, does no harm to be careful.”

He extinguished the boat’s lights.

Francis was mistaken. One pair of eyes noted their progress, blinked as the lights went out then strained to follow the boat as it slid softly across the dark water. The eyes belonged to Friedrich Kaufmann who sat in his own boat below the quay. He was there to watch
Thunder
but now he watched the boat and saw it slow, drift it to the stub of
Gerda’s
funnel that still showed above water, and come to rest there.

Sarah Benson stared at the black water that flickered jewelled reflections from
Thunder’s
distant lights. She sat in pale gloom, the darkness thinned by those lights and shivered.

Francis clambered forward over the thwarts, crouched before her with the light line coiled in his hand and asked uneasily, “You did say you had done a lot of this, miss?”

“I’ve been swimming since I was able to walk, I can swim better than most men and that includes under water.” She stood up, setting the boat to rocking gently. “Let’s get on with it.”

She pulled the dress over her head. Under it she wore only drawers and a short chemise that tucked into the waist of the drawers. She took the line from Francis and knotted it around her waist while he muttered, “Remember, I keep it pretty taut so it won’t foul your legs. And if you get into any trouble —”

“I tug and keep tugging.”

“Right.”

Sarah wondered what he could do about it if she ran into trouble down there. She knew that Francis, like many another fisherman, could not swim at all. Now he was muttering, “Remember what Mr. Cherry told you about the wireless cabin, the layout; it should be something like that.”

“I remember.”

“There should be a table, a drawer or two under it.”

She nodded. She was shivering uncontrollably now and annoyed with herself because of it. The night air was not cold. She said again, “Let’s get on with it.”

Francis hesitated. He had an idea of the dangers involved in entering a submerged wreck, without an airline, in pitch blackness. Moreover this was a girl only half his age and half his size, terribly vulnerable now as she stood with pinched face and shivered. This was a job to be done and this girl had volunteered but he did not like it.

He said, “Take care, bonny lass. And good luck.”

Sarah lowered herself over the side, gasped as the chill of the water took her breath, hung on and breathed deeply, then went under. Francis saw her legs kicking, waving pale below the surface, and then they were gone leaving a trail of bubbles.

She had expected blackness but it was far worse than her fears. She worked by touch alone, striking down until one hand scraped on iron and she fumbled her way along the superstructure, passed one door, closed, reached the second that was the wireless office and found it open.

She dared not enter. She kicked up for the surface, broke into the air five yards from the boat and stroked towards it and clung to the side, gasping.

Francis stooped over her, peering closely and she panted, “About over there. But look, when I go down again I’ll have to find the thing all over. Take off this line, will you?”

“You’ve got to have a line!”

“I need it for something else.” And as he reluctantly picked at the knot, “The only way I can do it is to use the line as a guide.”

“I don’t like it.”

“Have you got a better idea?”

Francis had: pack the lot in. But he shook his head and she took the end of the line from him. Her breasts rose and fell under the now transparent chemise as she breathed deeply, then she was gone again.

That dive sufficed to mark the wireless office and she tied the line to the handle of the door.

On the third dive she followed the line and entered the office. After long seconds of awkward groping she located the desk and a drawer beneath. It was open and she felt a key in the lock but the drawer was empty. She turned to re-surface and found she had lost her bearings and went bumping around in the steel cell, fumbling for the door. She found it only when her lungs were bursting and lights wheeled across her eyes, kicked clumsily through it and up.

She paddled only feebly to the boat and clung to the side, exhausted. Francis said, “Good God! Here, let’s have you in.” He reached for her but she flapped at his hands.

“No! Leave me alone! Just give me a minute.”

He had to wait while she tried to fight down fear and fixed her mind on
Thunder
and the six hundred men aboard her … David Cochrane Smith. She said, “All right. I should have taken the slack of the line in with me. That’s what I’ll do. I found the desk and a drawer but it was empty. Must be another one.”

Francis said, “Wait a minute. The drawer was open?”

“That’s right. Key in the lock. Why? What is it?”

Francis said slowly, “If the feller in there had thought the ship was in danger or that somebody might get hold of the book he would have got it out ready to ditch it.”

“So it could be kicking around on the deck in there.”

Francis thought glumly, ‘Or lying at the bottom of the bay.’

Sarah said, “I’ll try the office again.”

Francis chewed his lip then said grudgingly, “Once more, then that’s the finish.”

“I’ll finish when I’m ready.”

He caught her eye and did not waste time on argument, but privily decided that this was the last dive and she would be hauled aboard whether she liked it or not.

He said, “It’ll be heavy, weighted so it would sink —”

“I know
that
!” She dived, and he waited.

She entered the office, taking the slack of the line with her in a loop around her wrist, feeling the light strain kept on it by Francis in the boat. She felt below the desk, around the chair bolted there, moved back towards the door… She felt rough canvas, a bag, a handle to it. It was weighty and rested on something. The thing moved, touching her arm as she lifted the bag. She felt at it with the hand that trailed the rope, meaning to push it away, but her hand clasped another, fingers groping.

Air exploded from her with shock. She kicked and went hand over hand up the line, banging through the door, iron stripping skin from her shoulders.

On the surface Francis felt her tugging and hauled in on the line, only to be checked as it tautened between him and the door below. Then Sarah burst up scarcely a yard away, threshed wildly one-handed, spat and took a whooping breath.

Francis thrust the boat away from the funnel and as it moved to her he reached over, grabbed her and manhandled her in over the side to lie gasping, shuddering. She still held the bag and Francis took it from her. “What happened?”