For Valour (17 page)

She sat up and put her feet on the floor, pulling her pyjamas across her body.

“Tell me.”

Crawford studied her impassively. “In this work we know too much, hear too much. We must never forget all those out there who are depending on our absolute reliability.” She waved her hand vaguely, as if to encompass the whole of the Western Ocean. “Dedication.”

She walked to the blackout shutter across the window and adjusted it, although it did not need it. She said, “When I was at college I took up fencing. It taught me a lot about other people's reactions, strengths or otherwise. That's how it is up here. Hate and revenge are no longer enough. Perhaps they never were. The enemy gets a new weapon, then we have to discover countermeasures. It never stops, and the men who are doing the fighting need all the help they can get, everything we can give them.”

“I won't crack up, if that's what you mean.”

Crawfie looked at her and smiled. Anna had not realized before what fine eyes she had. Like someone else looking out.

“I know that. I just wanted you to know what it demands. I wanted it all, just like most girls. My brother was lost in
Repulse,
and the man I hoped to marry was shot down during the Crete fiasco. Now, all I want to do is
win.
”

Anna started to get dressed. The bedside clock said four in the morning.

“Take your time. Always look your best. Set an example.” She took out a cigarette case and lit one.

She said, “You've got a nice body. Don't waste it.”

Anna peered at herself in the mirror. Cracked, like the one at Plymouth.
The war, you know.
They always used it as an excuse in England.

She said, “Thanks for what you did. I won't forget.”

Crawfie shrugged. “You'll get letters from home soon. Then you'll have to go through it all over again.” She turned her head, listening to the jangle of bells in the street, police, fire, ambulance; it could be all three in Liverpool.

“The Boss would get you sent back to Canada.” She watched her reflection in the glass. “No half-measures with our Commodore.”

Anna turned and faced her. “I want to be part of this. It's what I've been trained for, what I can do.”

The other woman nodded, and then looked round for an ashtray.

“So be it. Join me down at Operations.” She saw the sudden understanding and was moved by it, and a little surprised at herself. After Crete . . .

“It will be today. Or not at all. That's why it's so important.”

The door closed and Anna stared at the other bed, where her friend with the Ingrid Bergman hairstyle slept. She had been sent to the anti-submarine exercise area, and would be back tomorrow. She looked at her reflection again, into her own eyes. She had to get herself through it. It was something that was happening every day, every hour: letter, telegram or word of mouth from “people who knew people,” like Commodore Raikes.

Nothing could bring Tim back. Crawfie was right about the letters. She could imagine what it would do to her mother, and her father too. And she had not told them anything about Paul's death aboard
Hakka.
It had been through her father that they had been introduced, when Paul had been on some exchange visit with the R.C.N.

Paul. She thought of the hand on her shoulder, and the dream.

She reached for her hat.
This is all I want now. All I need.

She looked at herself again, and tried to ignore the lie.

9 | Win One . . . Lose One

First light, always the most testing time in any Atlantic convoy. And worst of all was the knowledge that it was almost over, with thoughts of a safe harbour, doing ordinary things, pushing your nerves back from the edge, within reach.

Tempers flared because of an unnecessary sound; there was resentment at any seemingly superfluous order.

Martineau could feel it all around him, below the bridge, throughout his command. In the engine and boiler rooms, where the mind could play tricks at the slightest change of note in the racing shafts. The curved hull, picturing the torpedo transforming that whole section into hell. In the sickbay and emergency first aid stations, the damage control parties, crouching, staring at nothing, drained by the cold and the lack of something hot to drink when they most needed it. And up at the gun positions, the short-range Oerlikon and pom-poms as well as the main armament, the crews rubbed their salt-reddened eyes and waited.

Martineau looked at the sky directly ahead of the ship. The heavy clouds had gone and the light was hard and bright, like molten pewter. There was no sun, only a glare from horizon to horizon.

A pencil clattered from the chart space, and Findlay the leading signalman turned, his face contorted with anger. And he was an old hand, experienced. Kidd was wiping his binoculars; he had forgotten how many times. He wanted to stretch, to yawn out loud, but knew it was dangerous. Men yawned when they were apprehensive. Afraid. He tried to push it aside, but recalled what she had said to him.
Is it bad, Roger? What it's done to you?

He had never allowed himself to consider it before. You put up with it. You survived. You drank too much afterwards.
Afterwards.

Perhaps that was it. He had not weighed the chances, because there was no one in his life to worry about. To love.

He thought of Fairfax, down there in the T/S, the ship's nerve centre which could, if necessary, control the guns and torpedoes and just about everything else. Fairfax was a good friend and an experienced officer. He would be ready to take over command if the bridge was destroyed. He could remember how they had discussed the advantages and the folly of becoming involved with someone, let alone getting married.
We all agreed.
He glanced at Martineau by the gyro compass. Like his predecessor.
Too chancy in wartime.
Kidd had heard rumours about him since he had died here, and he had seen the hurt on Fairfax's open features.

He looked at the Captain again. His wife had left him. He stifled the yawn angrily. Better to end it before it got serious.

He turned away. It already
was
serious.

“Radar—Bridge!”

What everyone expected, but it was still a shock.

“Bridge. Captain speaking.”

“Aircraft. Bearing three-two-zero. Range two-double-oh. Closing.” The voice was very calm and unhurried, as if addressing a mathematics class.

“Start tracking.” Martineau raised his glasses and adjusted them with care. The glare was almost painful. Twenty thousand yards: ten miles. Before radar it would have been far beyond the limits of a man's eyesight.

Hakka
was on the port bow of the formation. The aircraft had probably circled round to make a careful approach.

He heard the rattle of orders, and saw the muzzles of the guns below the bridge swing to port, lifting in unison as if to sniff at the danger. Maybe it was Coastal Command. In his heart he knew otherwise. Four destroyers, with the great liner steering between them, even bigger now in the metallic glare. The U-boat, and now an aircraft, when there was little time or space left to make a wide alteration of course.

“Signal the group to keep close station
at all times.
” Unnecessary, when they were all professionals? He bit on the stem of his pipe.
No chances.

“All guns follow Director.” That was Driscoll. He sounded wide awake.

“Aircraft! Red four-five! Angle of sight three-oh! Closing!”

Martineau held his breath and steadied his glasses while he waited for the ship to lift over a long, unbroken roller.

Then he saw it, and held it in the lenses as the ranges and bearings chattered all around him. A big aircraft. One of their long-range Focke-Wulf reconnaissance bombers which had proved so effective in locating and shadowing convoys while they wirelessed information for the U-boat packs. Usually they kept out of range, and flew around a convoy until support arrived. This crew had probably enjoyed a hot breakfast in France while
Hakka
had been reeling about trying to keep station on her charge. He watched the glistening shape shorten suddenly, and heard the nearest bridge lookout call, “Approach angle zero!”

Kidd said, “What the hell does he hope to do?”

The gunnery speaker intoned, “A, B, X, Y,
load, load, load!
”

Martineau stared over the screen and aft along the deserted deck. Only the slender muzzles of the anti-aircraft weapons moved, and further still he saw the other guns of the main armament following their instructions. The Tribals were different from other destroyers in that they had mounted extra guns at the expense of one set of torpedo tubes. Martineau had not seen the sense of it when he had first studied the details of this class of ship. But like others in the “trade,” he had too often watched torpedoes being used on their own ships to prevent their capture after they had been rendered useless in an attack.

Once, he had picked up survivors of such a destroyer off the Norwegian coast. The other ship's Captain had been one of them. Martineau had seen his face when he had ordered the torpedo to be fired. It could have been his own.

“Still closing, sir!”

Martineau said, “Signal
Ocean Monarch. I am taking station ahead of you.
” He ignored the clatter of the light and added, “Warn the Chief. Full ahead, then tell
Kinsale
to assume our station immediately.” He looked around, picturing the four destroyers and their arc of fire.
Ocean Monarch
could supply some flak, but not enough.

He felt the bridge jerk violently as the revolutions mounted, with the sea boiling away astern in a dirty yellow furrow.

He looked again. The aircraft had turned very slightly, and he could see the light glinting on its perspex and fittings.

Too big. It was not built for this sort of thing.

The pilot would know.
As I did.
No alternative. Hit the target. Others will finish the job.

He gripped the back of his chair; it was shaking.

“Open fire!”

“Barrage! Commence, commence, commence!”

The four-point-seven guns recoiled immediately, the smoke swept away even as the next shells were slammed into their breeches.

And it was still coming. Martineau wanted to wipe his glasses but dared not lower them. The four shining arcs of the bomber's props; it had turned very slightly. He saw smoke spurting past it, then long snaking lines of bright green tracer. Other shells too, bursting like stars, drawing together, closer and closer, but the bomber seemed unstoppable. It was planing down in a steep descent, the bay doors open, a machine-gun firing from somewhere, its tracer apparently unaimed.

“Got the bastard!”

Martineau saw pieces of the aircraft peel back from the nose, fragments spinning away as more shells bracketed and held on to the range and bearing. He saw the bombs falling like chips of ice while the Focke-Wulf continued its approach, heard the scream of engines, and imagined he could feel the great shadow as it tore over the ship, pursued by cannon shell with even the pom-poms joining in.

Then came the explosion, muffled and solid, like a depth charge exploding prematurely.

He gripped the screen and shouted, “Did they hit her?”

But the bomber had already ploughed into the sea, a mile clear of
Java
's starboard quarter. Kidd said thickly, “It's
Kinsale,
sir!”

Martineau stared as the destroyer began to heel over, smoke and flames suddenly erupting from her deck, when seconds earlier she had been speeding to take her position on
Ocean Monarch
's port bow. Where
Hakka
had been before the German pilot had made his suicidal attack.

Suicide? Or were more aircraft already heading to this position?

“Resume station, Pilot.” He raised his glasses and watched the
Ocean Monarch
's huge bow wave surge away from the stem, washing against and over the listing hull of the
Kinsale.
He moved the glasses again and saw a mass of khaki figures crowding the liner's guardrails, some turning to look up at the boat deck as a solitary figure in kilt and bonnet started to play the bagpipes. It was something they had seen every day, even in foul weather: the lone piper, the soldiers waving, the sailors making jokes about it.

Leading Signalman Findlay, who came from Edinburgh, said quietly, “A lament. And rightly so.” Then, surprisingly, he saluted.

Midshipman Seton gasped, “My God, that was terrible!”

Kidd seized his arm and held out his own binoculars. “Take a good look,
Mister
Seton, and don't forget it. They're not just people back there! They're me and you, see?”

When he looked back once more, Martineau saw nothing to mark what had happened. No smoke, no wreckage, although at this speed there would have been little enough. A destroyer, newer and slightly smaller than
Hakka,
had vanished. How many of her one hundred and eighty men had lived long enough to see their only hope holding formation at full speed? The bombs had been meant for the liner; one hit would not have crippled her, but it might have slowed her down, or left her drifting helplessly like the big tanker, until the wolves had come for her. But one bomb was more than enough for
Kinsale.
Moving and turning at speed to obey the last order, she must have been torn apart by the explosion. Ready-use ammunition, fuel, a magazine, it could have been anything.

They could not stop to search for survivors; it would put them all at risk. It was not a matter of conscience or even duty, it was a total responsibility.

Tell them that.

And the German pilot would never know how close he had been to achieving the impossible with such a large aircraft. He had probably been dead before he had smashed into the sea.

Martineau said, “My compliments to the first lieutenant. Tell him to stand down action stations, but to keep the hands at quarters. Have the galley send some tea and sandwiches around the ship.” He heard a boatswain's mate passing his orders, probably wondering how anybody could so callously discuss routine when some of their own had just died.

He climbed on to his chair and stared at the bright expanse of water across the port bow where he had first seen the bomber. By so doing he could exclude
Jester,
and the great bulk of the
Ocean Monarch.
It was like having the sea to yourself. Empty. Clean. He felt for the pipe in his pocket but his fingers scraped on the broken pieces. Clean? It would never be that.

An hour later more aircraft were reported, but they soon proved to be friendly, a giant Sunderland and two Catalinas of Coastal Command.

The soldiers lining the
Ocean Monarch
's rails waved and cheered, the sound blurred by the roar of fans. On
Hakka
's deck there was only silence.

Fairfax arrived on the bridge and stared up as one of the awkward-looking flying boats roared over the ships.

“We felt it down there, sir. Thought they'd hit the trooper.” He watched Martineau. “I've learned a lot since . . . well, ever since you took command.”

Martineau dragged his thoughts back into order.

“Don't worry, Jamie, you'll get a ship of your own. You can do it, all right.” He touched his arm and saw the baby-faced signalman Slade pause in folding a flag. “One thing never changes. It's still a lot easier to do a risky job yourself than to order someone else to do it.”

He thought of
Kinsale
's commanding officer: the same year at Dartmouth, the same flotilla when the Germans had marched into Poland. He had even got married around the same time as well.

At noon they sighted Malin Head, the most northerly point on the rugged Irish coast. A blur in a bank of haze, it might have been anywhere. More aircraft and two destroyers accompanied them as they headed into the North Channel, and then south into the Irish Sea, and the Mersey.

Martineau stood on the gratings and watched the towering grey hull slide past, tugs and pilot boat fussing around as if theirs was the only part which really counted. Outgoing corvettes and a fleet minesweeper were hooting wildly, and signals flashed back and forth as if it were a regatta.

Set against the loss of one destroyer, it was worth it. It had to be.