The White Guns (1989) (37 page)

Then it was just as suddenly over, the crowd spilling out on to the road, more confetti and cheers, old boots and cans tied to the back of the hired car before they roared away to change their clothes at a local pub. But for just a few seconds more Penny and Vere looked at each other alone. Then she tossed him the bouquet and laughed, as if she were symbolically casting off her past life.

She cried out above the din,
'Take her the rose, Vere! Do it if
–' The rest was lost as the car vanished in a clattering chorus of tin cans. Marriott stared at the empty road for a full minute.

So he had told her. He touched his uniform and felt the wallet there. He was suddenly glad. Sharing it. For the first time in his life.

He went back into the room and knew he wanted to get away to think.

He heard his mother say, 'And this is our Chris – always so busy, and yet never slow to help me when I need him!'

Marriott moved away and was confronted by a wing-commander with a chest full of decorations and a moustache as wide as his jaw.

'I'm Peter Winters.' His Canadian accent and his medals marked him out as one of Penny's fliers.

He added, 'So you're Penny's brother, eh? Heard a lot about you.' He seemed nervous, on edge; then he blurted out, 'Did you ever meet a Canuck serving with you guys – a Bob Winters? Lieutenant Bob Winters? He was my brother. So I guess we've got something in common.'

Marriott stared past him as the vision flashed through his mind. A motor-gunboat rolling over at full speed, having just taken a direct hit from an armed trawler off the Belgian coast. The scream of machinery as it tore apart, spurting flames, then oblivion. He remembered this man's brother very well. He always wore a big red maple leaf painted on the back of his leather jacket. Now nothing; like Stephen, like Tim Elliott.

The wing-commander asked gruffly, 'Had enough?' He looked at the door. 'I've got a bottle of good old Canadian Club down the road. Like to share it?' As they strolled through the dying sunlight he went on, 'Jack's a lucky guy. Got a wizard girl like Penny, and now a good job waiting for him.' He touched his pilot's wings and medal ribbons with quiet affection. 'Me? I've got fuck-all, but what the hell!'

Marriott grinned. 'You shouldn't have joined!'

They laughed together. 'If you can't take a joke!'

Lieutenant Mike Fairfax stood near a busy derrick and watched the last net of stores being hoisted from a tank landing-craft and lowered expertly on to the dockside. It had been a scene of constant activity since first light when three such vessels had entered Kiel, each fully loaded with stores. They were mostly cans and tins of food, not for the forces here but for the German population.

Fairfax had tried to keep up to date with affairs, just in case he was summoned unexpectedly to face a board who would consider his appointment to the regular navy. He often thought about the firing-squad, of the man's terrible screams which had continued in his brain long after the hail of bullets had smashed him down, and the sailors had been marched away by the formidable CGM named Hawkins.

But in the passing weeks he had made himself accept it. Nobody discussed it with him, and there had been several more summary executions throughout the command to make it somehow acceptable. Or so he told himself.

Of one thing he was certain; his longing to remain in the navy had strengthened, as if he had passed some harsher form of test. He looked at the teeming figures who were hauling the stores on to trestles before being loaded into army lorries. It took good teamwork, with German interpreters ready to iron out mistakes made by impatient and frustrated NCOs.

With the Kiel Canal cleared of hazards, wrecks and abandoned mines, smaller vessels were running a regular shuttle service back and forth to Dover. Food, blankets, building materials – somebody in Whitehall was obviously planning well ahead for a hard winter.

Fairfax wondered how Marriott was getting on in England. He should be back soon. Perhaps he might be able to arrange a similar duty for him? It would enable him to keep his hand in, to improve his ship-handling, something else to stand him in good stead when so required.

Meikle had mentioned leave for him too in the near future. He had said nothing when Fairfax had offered the opportunity to another lieutenant. Suppose his one and only chance of an interview arrived when he was on leave in England? Besides which, he quite enjoyed his work here: the mess life at the barracks, the evenings at a local theatre or cafe. He had made several new friends, mostly about his own age, but so far had avoided mentioning his desire to 'stay on'.

What he would really like was an appointment to a warship, large enough to gain more experience. He could still smile at the thought. Small enough
to be noticed.
Several destroyers had visited Kiel. One of them would be just fine.

He realised that a chief petty officer from the Supply Branch was looking up at him from the landing-craft's side deck.

'What is it, Chief?'

'I've been over this vessel
six
times, sir. My Jack Dusty has checked every item with me. It doesn't tally.' He eyed him challengingly. 'Take my word for it, sir!'

Fairfax replied, 'I will, if you explain, Chief.'

The chief petty officer frowned. He was not dealing with some green amateur after all.

He said in a more patient tone, 'Two nets are missing. That's about sixty tins of meat.'

The implication filtered through Fairfax's mind. 'Are you sure?'

'I'm sure. According to this pad, it all left Dover, and everything's been unloaded, so it's gone.' He pushed his cap to the back of his head.
'Walked.'

Fairfax stared at the nearest lorries. Sixty of those big tins. Enough to feed a platoon. He saw the CPO's expression. Or to make a small fortune on the black market.

'I'd better warn the main gate.'

The other man regarded him with a pitying stare. 'Too late for that, sir. It should have been checked
twice.'

There was a heavy tread on the deck and Fairfax saw Lieutenant Cuff Glazebrook striding along from the bridge, pulling off some oil-stained gloves.

'What's th' bother?'

Fairfax said, 'I didn't know you were in command of this thing.'

Cuff grimaced. 'Thing is right. I'm just standing in. Had a good run-ashore in Dover.' He made a vulgar gesture. 'Fixed up a nice bit of crumpet in the Stag – d'you know it?'

The chief petty officer coughed. 'About these missing stores, sir. They should have been checked twice, like I said.'

Cuff turned towards him as if noticing him for the first time.

'They
were
checked. By me, as it happens.' He stuck out his jaw. 'I signalled Dover and the stores are still in the shed there. They'll be across in a day or two.' He stared at him belligerently. 'So what are you bellyaching about? Haven't you got something useful to do?'

The man flushed. 'I was only doing –'

Cuff snorted scornfully. 'Your duty? Not another arselicker, surely? A
regular,
too!'

The chief petty officer stammered something and then hurried away.

Fairfax said, 'That was a bit hard. The Chief was trying to sort it out.' He was relieved all the same. He had seen himself held responsible for the misplaced tins of meat.

'Trying to pass the buck, more like.' Cuff's Yorkshire accent intruded suddenly. 'His sort make me want to spew!'

Fairfax smiled awkwardly. There was something unreal and fearsome about the burly lieutenant. 'Thanks, anyway. I'm glad about the blessed stores.'

Cuff grinned hugely. 'That was a load of old flannel I gave him. Of
course
the stores have walked – someone's nicked them, that's what!' He laughed at Fairfax's astonishment. 'This is Germany, remember? Either they're on the road to some secret dump by now, or they never left Dover in the first place!' He fixed Fairfax with a cold stare. 'Forget it. They're all at it.' He considered telling Fairfax about his passage to Dover. Amongst a mixed cargo of secret U-Boat parts collected by submarine experts from the dockyard, he had also carried a lovely fifteen-ton yacht. There had been no papers, no explanations, other than it would be collected by a long-loading truck, and there his responsibility would end.

Cuff had been amazed that it had been so easy. No customs officers, no officials, no query about the yacht, which was to be delivered to a Hampshire address without delay. The rest had been simple. The information had come from the commodore's secretary, and the address for final delivery was Paget-Orme's.

It could prove useful if things got a bit dicey, he thought. Before, he had proclaimed it was not what you knew but
who
you knew that mattered in the navy. But in this instance, it was
what
you knew which might come in very handy.

So instead he said, 'Just stay out of it. Especially if you intend to soldier on in this regiment. I reckon you need your head testing.'

A car lurched over some train tracks and ground to a halt, and a woman's voice called, 'I say, do you know where Operations are?'

Fairfax swung round and stared at the girl who was leaning out of the window. She was fair, with candid blue eyes, and very pretty. She had her jacket and tricorn hat on her lap and he realised she was a third officer in the WRNS. He had heard they were sending some to the Schleswig-Holstein command, but he was bowled over all the same.

Cuff was not so bashful. 'Now here's a fine little piece! Just get out and walk towards me slowly, my love!'

Fairfax exclaimed, 'For God's sake, man, what's got into you?'

Cuff held up a big hand to his face and made a mock aside. 'I'd be more interested in getting into
her!'

She was still smiling from the car. 'Who's your fat friend?' Then she laughed. 'With a bay-window like that I don't think he could get near enough to do much damage!'

To Fairfax's surprise Cuff turned and stormed back on board the L.C.T.

'I don't think he's ever been spoken to like that.' He looked at her again, still embarrassed by what Cuff had said. 'I'm Mike Fairfax. I'm going to Ops myself. I can direct your driver.' He hesitated. 'We're not all like that, you know.'

She watched him climb into the car and smiled. 'Jill Wheatley. You can point out the landmarks as we go.' She smiled again. 'I
can
tell the difference, you know.'

The German driver headed for the gates, where Fairfax noticed some military policemen searching one of the dockyard workers.

Then he watched the way the sunlight shone in her hair, the damp patches on her shirt. She must have been on the road for some while.

He said, 'Welcome to Germany, um... Jill.'

The sixty tins of meat were already forgotten.

The khaki and camouflaged Bedford lorry with its divisional markings on front and back was parked close to the street-junction. It was an open lorry and the back was crammed with sports equipment. Marker flags, machines for making white lines, bench-seats and several crates of loose gear, all of which was covered by a tightly secured net. There were only two occupants in the cab. One wore a bright football jersey, the other was in army battledress. They were both smoking and drinking tea from a thermos.

Vehicles like this one were common enough on the road to Hamburg. A big match was to be held there very shortly, the first time a top-notch team would have come out from England to play against the services. To bored and lonely servicemen it would be the event of the year.