To Risks Unknown (7 page)

Crespin eyed him gravely. ‘Don't just look on the lower deck. Grudges have been known to appear elsewhere.' He glanced at the bulkhead clock. ‘I'm going to turn in.'

But with the door of the tiny sea cabin closed behind him he knew he would not be able to sleep. With the ship blacked out and deadlights screwed over every scuttle the compartment was like an oven. Even when he stripped off his shirt and stood directly beneath the deckhead fan he could find little relief. Corvettes had been designed mainly to face the Atlantic, where a lack of ventilation was often a real advantage. The dockyard's hasty additions to the air ducts were anything but adequate for the fierce sunlight of the day and the oppressive humidity in the overcrowded cabins and messdeck.

Perhaps that was why he had made another dig at Wemyss' opinions and attitude over the missing German. Wemyss was everything a first lieutenant should be and he was an excellent seaman. But when it came to other matters, outside the actual running of the ship, he seemed unwilling to be drawn, as if by shutting his mind to the problem it would automatically cease to exist.

Crespin knew otherwise. Somewhere between decks, or standing his watch right now beneath the great canopy of stars, was a murderer. Perhaps in his own mind this man, whoever he was, had already justified his action. But a man who could kill secretly and with such cool judgement was a menace to everyone around him. The more reasonable his deed might appear in his mind, the more dangerous he would become.

Crespin threw himself on his back and stared up at the darkness. And it had sounded from what Commander Gleeson had said at Gibraltar that the unknown killer would soon have plenty of opportunity to act again, if he had a mind to.

He felt the engine vibrations coursing through the bunk and imagined Magot cursing him from his private world of noise and pounding machinery. Some of the vibrations seemed to aggravate the wound in his leg, and with a groan he rolled on to his side, the effort making the sweat break out across his bare chest and run freely beneath his armpits.

It was strange that he was going to Sousse. It had been less than fifty miles from there that his boat had been surprised and sunk. The agonizing weeks in hospital which had followed, the dazed and jumbled recollections of screaming men and blazing fuel had, strangely enough, become clearer now, so that he could piece the events together in his mind like a complicated jigsaw. But it was more as an impartial onlooker than as one of the three survivors. Very few actual faces stood out in the pattern. Without effort he could still see the small patrol of soldiers rising from behind a sand-dune like one more cruel mirage, their unshaven faces changing from watchfulness to surprise and then compassion as Crespin and his delirious companions had stumbled at their feet. They had been carrying the other sailor all day and did not even know he had died somewhere along the haphazard path which Crespin had taken, with only the mocking strip of sea and the blazing, relentless sun to guide him.

There had been one other face, but that was more vague and could have been part of the nightmare. In hospital, tossing and sweating in his bed, Crespin had relived the actual moment a thousand times, when with his men he had been swimming and floating under the stars surrounded by a patch of fuel and a few pieces of flotsam. All that remained of the M.T.B.

Crespin remembered swimming around the widening circle of bobbing heads, calling encouragement, threatening and pleading, doing and saying anything which might make them hold on to life and hope until daylight. A patrol would find them. If not some of his own flotilla, then one of the patrolling destroyers, or even a reconnaissance seaplane.

Then, it must have been two hours later, Crespin still could not remember, they had heard the low, throbbing note of high-speed engines. Some of his men had little red lamps on their lifejackets, and they held them above their heads, yelling and cheering as the unseen craft drew nearer and nearer. A few of the men were sobbing with relief and did not care if the approaching craft was friend or foe. It just meant rescue, and that was more than enough.

Crespin pressed his face into the damp pillow and tried to recall exactly what happened next. But all he could really remember was the eye-searing beam of a searchlight and the sudden stammer of machine-guns.

The cheers had changed to cries of anger and fear and then to terrible screams as the boat had reduced speed and had moved methodically through the struggling figures while the guns had slashed the water into a bloody carnage.

The fact that Crespin had been swimming around his men probably saved his life. The boat's bow wave swept over his head, forcing him under and filling his lungs until he thought he was drowning, and when he eventually rose gasping to the surface he had seen the boat's flat stern right over him, so that he had to fight with all his remaining strength to kick clear of the whirling screws.

Then, and this was where reality became confused with the nightmare, he remembered a face. It was leaning over the boat's guardrail, arctic blue in the searchlight's reflected glare, and seemed to be shouting. Or it could have been vomiting.

Crespin closed his eyes tightly. The man, whoever he was, had good cause to vomit. The sea had been alight, and in the dancing fires Crespin had watched his remaining men, some of them too badly wounded to swim at all, while they were devoured by the spreading pool of flames. The last to go had been an eighteen-year-old midshipman. It had been his first patrol. Crespin could still hear his shrill cries. It had been like a woman screaming in agony.

The burning fuel had flickered and died, and as if satisfied the boat had cut her searchlight and with a roar of engines had faded into the darkness.

When daylight had at last come Crespin had discovered that the land was only a mile away. At the time it had seemed endless, and when he and the remaining three men had crawled up on to the burning sand the impossibility of their position had been almost too hard to bear.

Now, looking back, it was even harder to understand why the commander of that patrol boat had done what he had. He must have known exactly what he was doing. Must have wanted to do it. For if he had been unwilling to burden himself with prisoners he could have left them to fend for themselves, knowing that the land was within their reach. After that they could have managed for themselves as far as he was concerned, but at least his conscience would have been clear.

Crespin sat up on the bunk and shivered. The sweat on his body felt like ice water. It was mad to go on like this. It was over. Finished.

But as he pulled a blanket over his shoulders he knew in his heart that he would never forget. Nor could he find it within himself to forgive.

Eventually, worn out by his tortured thoughts, Crespin fell back on the bunk and was instantly asleep.

The small Tunisian port of Sousse seemed shrouded in a permanent dust cloud through which the sun only just managed to penetrate. It was hardly surprising, for it had been one of the last vital supply routes for the retreating Afrika Korps, a final toe-hold in North Africa, and although it had been in Allied hands for almost two months it still looked desolate and ground down by the machinery of war. But amidst the ruined buildings and along the waterfront with its ravaged houses and cratered jetties there was an air of purposeful rejuvenation. Troops and vehicles slogged through the swirling dust, while sappers and bulldozers pushed away the wreckage of past battles and laid a foundation for the next one. It was a clearing-up process. North Africa was cleansed of the enemy, and Rommel had gone. The remnants of his desert army were either captured or had managed to escape across the Strait of Sicily, where, if they had avoided being bombed or torpedoed on the journey, they were no doubt licking their wounds and awaiting what must be an inevitable invasion of their own territory.

After exchanging signals with a red-faced and overworked berthing officer the
Thistle
groped her way alongside a burned out Italian storeship and stopped her engine. It was a poor berth, but with the harbour littered with wrecks and filled almost to overflowing with the victors, they were, as the redfaced officer implied, lucky to get one at all.

As at Gibraltar, the build-up of power was impressive to see. Warships of every kind, landing craft and supply vessels, while overhead friendly aircraft maintained a regular umbrella to ensure that the preparations remained undisturbed.

Crespin leaned over the bridge screen and watched as Petty Officer Dunbar clambered along the other ship's scorched and splintered deck and supervised the final arrangement of mooring wires.

They had done it. Three days, with hardly a complaint from Magot, and not a single hour wasted in repairs or faults.

It would probably turn out to be an anticlimax. Crespin knew his Service well enough to expect this sort of thing. In the Navy you did everything earlier than necessary. If you went to sea it was always at the crack of dawn, or in the dead of night when the hands were too tired even to think properly. It must be left over from the days of sail, he thought, when their lordships were always worried in case the wind died and their ships were still far from their prescribed stations.

Wemyss climbed on to the bridge and saluted. ‘Ship secured, sir.'

‘Thank you. Well, I don't imagine that our people will want any leave
here
, Number One. The place looks a bit the worse for wear.'

Wemyss grinned. ‘There's always somewhere left where you can find a bit of pleasure, sir.'

Crespin wondered what Wemyss considered as pleasure. It was hard to picture him doing anything else but his job.

Leading Signalman Griffin interrupted his thoughts. ‘Beg pardon, sir, but there's a motor boat heading this way.'

Crespin nodded. ‘Very good. Man the side, Number One. This must be Commander Scarlett.'

He climbed stiffly down to the main deck feeling the sun beating across his neck. God, this Scarlett did not waste any time. He must have been sitting in the ruins with his glass trained on the harbour entrance.

He paused and glanced swiftly around him. The seamen working on the upper deck were stripped to their shorts, and some were already looking sunburned, while others displayed a goodly selection of tattoos. The ship was cluttered with mooring wires and clothing hung up to dry. And the new paint could not hide her old scars and dents. But for all that she looked tough and competent, and he felt vaguely satisfied. Yet when he had learned of his appointment his spirits had dropped so low that he could never imagine himself feeling anything but resentment. But the
Thistle
had a character all of her own. It was useless to compare her with a thirty-knot M.T.B. or a graceful destroyer. Like her design her personality was uncompromising. She seemed to say, Well, here I am. Take it or leave it.

Crespin turned as Wemyss said quietly, ‘There are three passengers in the boat, sir. Two of them seem to be soldiers.'

Crespin was already looking at the tall figure standing very straight-backed beside the boat's coxswain. He was dressed in khaki shirt and slacks, and as far as Crespin could see wore no badges of rank at all. But on his head, tilted at a somewhat rakish angle, was a brightly oak-leaved cap. So he was obviously Scarlett.

The boat sighed to a halt alongside, and almost before the bowman had hooked on the commander heaved himself aboard, returning the salutes from the side party and gripping Crespin's hand in a firm clasp in what appeared to be one movement.

He was over six feet tall, lean and very tanned. From beneath the peak of his gleaming cap, his eyes were blue and restless, so that as he spoke they were moving around the upper deck, missing nothing, as if working independently for their owner.

‘Crespin? I'm Peter Scarlett. Damn glad you made it on time.' He had a more resonant voice than Crespin had expected, and when he smiled he seemed very conscious of it, and Crespin suspected that nothing this man did was ever to no set purpose.

Scarlett gestured to the two soldiers. ‘Major Barnaby and Lieutenant Muir. They've come along to look over the ship.' He did not explain what he meant but hurried on, ‘Where can we talk?'

Crespin led the way down to his cabin, and was glad to see that Wemyss had had the presence of mind to prepare it at such short notice. The scuttle was open, and someone had tidied up the littered desk and had placed some clean glasses on a tray and a jug of tepid-looking water.

Scarlett laid his cap carefully on the bunk and glanced around the small cabin. Without the cap he looked older, and Crespin put his age at about forty. He had thick wavy hair touched with grey, and this, added to his strange uniform and the pistol-holder on one hip, gave an unreal, even theatrical impression which, Crespin guessed, was no accident.

‘I expect Gleeson filled in some of the details when you paused at Gib, eh?' Scarlett's eyes fell on the glasses. ‘Scotch for me, if you have it.' He waited until Crespin had found a bottle and added briskly, ‘I heard about your trip from the U.K., the missing Jerry and so forth. You mustn't blame yourself, you know. These things can't be helped.' He downed the whisky in one swallow and breathed out noisily. ‘Good stuff. I've just been in Algiers swapping yarns with our American friends. Got back an hour ago, as a matter of fact. A relief to see you alongside, I can tell you.'

Crespin refilled the glasses carefully. ‘I understand that I am to serve directly under you, sir?'

‘Correct.' Scarlett regarded him over the rim of the glass. ‘Why, are you a bit peeved about it?'

Crespin stared at him. ‘I don't quite understand, sir?'

Scarlett threw back his head and laughed. He had excellent teeth. ‘Good God, I suppose they forgot to tell you!' He became serious again. ‘I'm R.N.V.R., old chap. One of those bloody temporary fellows!' He could not stop the grin from spreading again. ‘So you see, Crespin, the normal scheme of things has been reversed.'