Submariner (2008) (41 page)

They’d discussed this. It was roughly what Mike had expected. As well as the things they’d known about before she had a cracked
engine bed-plate, which had made itself known when he’d surfaced her in the late afternoon and started the generators. The
need to take it easy had slowed them down considerably in their night’s passage on the surface.

He’d asked the engineer, ‘What about
Unsung
?’

‘Oh, two or three weeks’ll have her in shape. So we’ll fix her up first. Do her here mostly, shift this one to the dockyard.’

‘Right.’

‘Rotten luck, Nicholson. Bagged a destroyer though, I’m told.’

‘A tiddler. But with respect, sir, outstandingly
good
luck, overall. We were at 150 feet, this was just one pattern of five charges, and I heard the clicks of pistols cocking
themselves. Despite which the Chief and I are here talking to you …’

‘Enormously to your credit.’

‘Bloody lucky.’

‘That too. Still a remarkable achievement.’

McIver had growled, ‘An experience I personally could’a done wi’oot.’

There’d been letters, including one from his father which he’d opened and skimmed through in case it contained news of Alan
– which it did, but not the kind against which one habitually steeled oneself. Much to the contrary – Alan had been promoted
and was being moved to an air station in Sussex. The letter was back in Mike’s pocket, to be read more thoroughly later, and
meanwhile he thanked God … If one didn’t, next time it might be
bad
news.

All right – more out of superstition than fear of the Almighty. But if it went any distance towards averting anything so absolutely
frightful – well, thank Him night and day and twice on Sundays.

‘Why the grim regard, Signo?’

Abbie. Looking – well, actually he’d forgotten
how
fantastic … Was on his feet, were then in each other’s arms. Telling her he didn’t know, in any case couldn’t possibly be
looking grim
now
: only staggered, overwhelmed, happier than he’d ever been. ‘Just the sight of you, Abbie. You’re
blindingly
attractive.
Beautiful
if you like, but it’s more than that, it’s
something else entirely. Even more so than I’ve had you pictured for the past five days.
Five
, please note?’

‘Oh, duly noted!’ Laughing, or could have been crying, or a mix of both. ‘Crazy for you, Mike!’

‘Enough to marry me?’

‘For that one doesn’t have to be crazy at all. One can be just sort of medium stupid.’

Laughing more, hugging; he still had his arms round her and they were attracting notice. With Grand Harbour as busy as it
was now there were a lot of spectators lingering on these stone galleries – people enjoying their lunch-breaks in the fresh
air, children out of school, so forth. She’d stopped laughing, told him seriously, ‘Straight answer right between those anxious
eyes of yours because I’ve been giving it quite a bit of thought – yes, more than crazy enough, if we still want to when we’re
home, that is. But you’ll be going home now, won’t you – and OK, so will I,
one
day, maybe in six months or a year – by which time they’ll have sent you to Japan or –’

‘You’re going to have me around some while in any case, my darling.
Ursa
’s going to be in dock about two months – so I was informed half an hour ago –’

‘More wrong with her than there was before?’

‘What I’m pointing out is if we were to announce our engagement it would make things a hell of a lot easier –’

‘What I
asked
was have you been in some kind of trouble in these past five days?’

‘Well, yes. Haven’t been at my most brilliant.’

‘What happened?’

He’d grimaced. ‘Got depth-charged. Does happen, on occasion. Sooner not talk about it, though. Not supposed to, either. I
do terribly want to kiss you, Abbie. To be frank, I don’t think I can wait. Scoot along to Strada Mezzodi, might we?’

‘Oddly enough,
I’d
thought we might. And we’d better, if you’re going to start behaving badly. Did you get in last night, or this morning?’

‘If I’d got in last night, my darling, I’d have –’

‘All right – first thing this morning, then –’

‘Not quite first thing. Mid-forenoon. Then there was a lot to see to, and the usual grilling by old Shrimp, and I was
looking
for Charles Melhuish, who’d got in a few hours before I did, but he’d turned in, apparently. Shrimp did mention he’d seemed
all-in. I expect I’ll see him this evening. Abbie – Strada Mezzodi now?’

Shrimp had said when he’d come on board after Mike had secured
Ursa
in the Lazaretto wardroom berth in mid-morning, ‘Had us in a blue funk, Michael. Your radio given up the ghost, or something?’
It had, of course, they’d simply turned up in the swept channel, identified themselves by light to the Castile signal station
and come on in, been directed to this berth. Then after Mike had told him most of what there was to tell, he’d summarised
it with ‘So your patrol report will tell me that you achieved the primary objective – put ’em ashore and brought ’em off –
incidentally they most certainly did
their
job –’

‘Deep regrets about Ormrod, sir.’

A nod. ‘Damnable. But then you saved
Unsung
from getting a worse pasting than she did get – could have been a
lot
worse, apparently.’

‘But I have to admit I shouldn’t have been anywhere near her, sir. Should have cleared out, left her to it.’

‘But Melhuish shouldn’t have been where
he
was. You took a hell of a chance, and you’re right, you had no business doing anything of the sort, and – well, I don’t have
to read you the riot act, all you’ll be doing from here on is taking
Ursa
home when she’s mended. On which subject, Michael,
I’m still not saying you’re stale, in fact you’re obviously not, but – a touch overconfident, perhaps?’

‘I’ll admit to an error of judgement, sir.’

‘You also happened to sink a Partenope, you say.’ Shrimp had shrugged, glancing at his watch. ‘Let’s have it on paper, Michael.
See Miss Gomez gets it for typing first thing in the morning.’

‘Aye, sir. Possibly before the close of business.’

‘How long were you
in daylight
on the surface?’

‘About four and a half hours, sir. Had no option, the box had had it. Aircraft I thought were going to be the main danger
– had the Lewis guns rigged of course – but not a bit of it. Earlier I’d thought of bottoming and waiting for dark, but –’

‘Bottoming in what depth, Michael?’

‘Well, exactly – with shaft glands leaking even at eighty feet. But having confessed to that, sir, mind if I brag about one
I’m quite proud of?’

‘Brag all you like.’

‘At eighty feet on one motor slow grouped down, and having realised I couldn’t bottom – in fact I’d just told McLeod we might
wind up taking our chances on the surface –’

‘Time of day?’

‘Forenoon. Nine, ten …’

‘Not such good chances, then.’

‘No, sir. But it wouldn’t have been all that great if they’d caught us as we were, either. We had no asdics, incidentally.
She couldn’t have stood much more rough stuff – or gone deep or used the port motor – and battery mostly broken glass – and
then bloody hell, there’s HE coming up on the quarter. Turbines, but low revs, obviously its ears flapping –’

‘So?’

‘We couldn’t afford to be detected, and as likely as not we would have been, so I stopped that screw, she turned out to
be heavy aft, went down by the stern. Couldn’t use the after ballast pump incidentally –
had
been doing so but it was noisy and running hot, so –’

‘Despite all of which you got away with it.’

He’d nodded. ‘Not what you’d call a stop-trim, exactly – she was at about a hundred and forty feet with a twenty-one-degree
stern-down angle on her by the time we’d lost all sound from our Wop and put the motor ahead again.’

‘And it – complied.’

‘Well, yes. Hadn’t been too sure it would. But it did, and since nothing else came near us –’

‘You deserve to be alive, Michael.’

‘Thank you, sir. I won’t put all that in the report.’

‘Why ever not?’

‘Rather a lot of typing for Miss Gomez?’

Finally, Shrimp had told him that
Unsung
’s commandos had done a good job on the Gela airfield but that only three of the eight had made it back to the rendezvous,
the other five either killed or taken prisoner. And that Melhuish’s reason for having been so far out of station and still
on the surface when he’d been put down by the Partenopes had been a whole crowd of fishing-boats he’d had to get round, and
did so that way about because earlier on there’d been Mas-boats the other side of Gela. ‘Yes, it’s a little complicated.’

‘Miss Gomez will have her work cut out. Any news of
Swordsman
, sir?’

‘Oh, yes. Gerahty put his team ashore, they ran into no problems he was aware of, and he’s now off Cape dell’Armi – with three
or four days to go. Will you be in the mess this evening, Michael?’

She padded away damp and naked, came back with two small towels and gave him one of them.

‘Really
something
, Mike.’

‘Understatement of the season. And you’re beautiful all over.’

‘I’ve missed you dreadfully.’

‘So marry me.’

‘Mike, darling.’ Drier, she sprawled beside him. ‘I was beginning to explain – about an hour ago? You back home in – what,
four or five months now? – me perhaps in a year, and in the course of that interval you’ve been sent to Australia, Singapore,
Shanghai, or –’

‘Don’t want to lose you, Abbie.’

‘Think you would? For lack of a damn
ring
?’

‘I never had the least inclination to be married to anyone at all. Believe me, never even thought about it – until now, wanting
you
. Marriage itself isn’t the thing, it’s us belonging to each other and making no bones about it,including making love, all
of them assuming it’s what we’re doing anyway – as in the case of whatshisname – I know,wasn’t going to mention him again,
you told me and I do believe you, I was thinking about it at sea –’

‘Apart from any other consideration, Nico Cornish has a
wife
, Mike.’

‘And?’

‘I was thinking when you were away, I should have pointed this out before – it’s something I don’t do and never would. We talked
about this, if you remember – not about Nico, in general terms – the Sunday I moved back from the Gravies’,wasn’t it. I think
I brought up the subject – morality of having affairs and so forth, and I said as long as people aren’t doing the dirty on
other people, meaning wives and husbands, I saw it as a matter of personal choice, both in principle – whether to do it at
all – and the specific, individuals concerned and circumstances. My thinking there included him – Nico, married man I liked
and enjoyed as a friend, which I can tell you wasn’t all
he
wanted. In fact
I suppose that’s how it is with most of you. I mean, if I had a husband in England or somewhere it wouldn’t stop you trying,
would it?’

‘Abbie, I fully agreed with you that afternoon –’

‘So you did.’ She laughed. ‘So you did, my darling!’

‘How’s that funny?’

‘Despite screwing the living daylights out of the wife of the submarine captain you mentioned a while ago?’

He’d frozen. ‘What are you talking about?’

Her slim hand stroked him, on the damp, rumpled single bed. ‘Exceedingly good-looking woman by the name of – oh, Anne, I think?’

‘Ann …’

‘Morals of an alley-cat, by all accounts. Oh, I don’t mean it
that
way, I mean it’s not all that incomprehensible, you’re attractive, all right, even fairly devastating. Don’t look so ashen,
darling, it’s partly what drew me to you – alleged
proficiency
, might call it. Actually I suppose I was
drawn
already, but—

‘Allegation by whom?’

‘You won’t be horrid to her for having told me?’

‘Who?’

‘Please
don’t
say anything to her about it, but – Eleanor Kingsley. You do know her.’

‘Not all that well. Girlfriend of my first lieutenant’s.’

‘The doughty James McLeod.’

‘Yes, and I think you’ve mentioned them before, but how the
hell
–’

‘He told her. In what circumstances, I know not. Usual routine, though, not a word to anyone, etc. He’s devoted to you, apparently.
But he’d met this female at a submariners’ shindig she attended with hubbie – back home, this was – then saw you together
at some pub in Scotland when you were supposed to be elsewhere – no doubt of it, apparently, and he was certain it wasn’t
a one-off. I don’t know how,
didn’t take in all the details – rather doubt Eleanor had either. You must have been pretty damn careless, Mike.’

‘And young McLeod –’

‘He admires you for it, Eleanor said. Thinks you’re the bee’s knees in any case. The lady’s a stunner – right?’

‘With your principles about people not cheating on each other –’

‘– with which as you’ve just mentioned you agree root and branch. In this instance you must absolutely have
forced
yourself?’

‘I don’t know
how
it started. In any case that was
then
.’

‘If you were in London
now
, though –’

‘No. Absolutely not.’

‘Even with you and I neither married nor engaged?’

‘
She
’s married – and I do agree with you on that issue. That’s one thing, another is I’m in love with you. No one else even bloody
well
exists
. Believe me, Abbie –’

‘All right, I will. I do.’

‘Thank you. In fact thank heavens.’

Melhuish ran
him
to earth that evening. Mike had been looking for him again and drawn a blank again, had reread his father’s letter and was
in his cabin changing into Red Sea rig for the evening when Melhuish came knocking on the door, looking both sick and slightly
hostile.