“Right, Captain. We’ll make Pyrmont pretty near on time, I reckon.” He glanced up at the sky, then over at the swell rolling up against the Heads. He added, “I’ll tell you something. It’s going to clear a little more soon.”
“Good. And now I’ll tell you something, Frazer.” Sir Donald took a deep breath. “I’ve never been so damn glad to see Sydney in all my life!” The pilot gave him a look of inquiry, but Sir Donald was already walking away. Going into the wheelhouse, he ordered briskly: “Half ahead, port ten.”
The New South Wales vibrated into life, made inwards for the entrance between the great green mounds of the Heads. And then, as if in sudden golden welcome, the sun came streaming through a cloud-break which showed the brightest of blues in the gap. The rays of that sun streamed down across the liner, lighting her decks, bringing up the white-capped blue water inside the Heads, sparkled on that wind-blown, superb harbour, on the fresh green of the seaward-sloping stretches of the land, on the distant buildings of Sydney. As his ship moved in, Sir Donald could see the Manly ferry from Circular Quay turning to the north of Middle Head to heave-to just clear of the channel on the Manly side, so that her milling crowds of passengers could get a nice close-up view. The harbour seemed to be crammed with other craft as well, smaller boats, anything in fact that floated.
The New South Wales moved in, like a great gull on the waters, a vast and towering gull. Her decks were lined deep with passengers crowding to the rails. And then, as she moved on faster and neared the Heads, the officer-of-the-watch, who had been looking in puzzlement through binoculars to port, came across to the Captain.
He said, “Captain, sir. There’s a small boat making up to us. It looks like Commander Shaw aboard, and he seems to be signalling.”
As the hours passed and he’d come up infinitesimally closer to the liner but never quite close enough to see more than her top superstructure, Shaw had found hope diminishing and had begun unwillingly to see that the lack of any ability to make contact was going to lose him this last battle after all. It had been a useless endeavour.
He swore aloud between his teeth, the oaths ripping out into the tearing wind.
And then, as the gale lessened, the liner appeared to reduce speed and he began to close the gap faster. Just after eleven-thirty he saw her turn off the Heads and then stop.
That gave him his chance and he felt a thrill of hope. But, just as he’d got to within some six cables of the liner, she’d got under way again and was steaming inwards. Luck, however, was with him just a little yet, for her turn for entry brought her across his course.
He yelled down the voice-pipe to James in the engine-room, his shout cutting through the wind. “Come up, sir — and quick. Bring one of the others.”
James was up in a flash with one of the security men, looking pale and ill. Shaw yelled in James’s ear, “I’m going to try to send a semaphore message from the foredeck and hope they’ll see me… Can you hold on to my legs?”
James nodded, his face set. “I’ll hold you, all right.”
Shaw hauled himself up, clambered out into the open, met the full remaining force of the wind and thanked God the gale had declined. James wound the screen down and he and the other man reached through and wrapped their arms tightly round Shaw’s legs, holding him upright.
Desperately he began waving his arms, calling up the New South Wales, praying that some one would see him.
He let out a great gasp of relief when a small figure ran into the liner’s high bridge-wing and a signal lamp beamed out its acknowledgment across the water. Bracing himself against the motion of the vessel, he passed his message:
EXPLOSIVE CHARGE IN NUMBER FIVE DOUBLE BOTTOM
PLACED BY ENGINEER SIGGINGS. DO NOT REPEAT NOT FLOOD
TANK. WILL BOARD YOU.
Upon the liner’s bridge Sir Donald Mackinnon swung round on his Staff Commander. He snapped, “Stanford, get a pilot-ladder down from the starboard gunport right away. I’ll stop her and give Shaw a lee. Meanwhile nothing’s to be said to alarm the passengers. I’ll pass further orders shortly.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” Stanford about-turned, ran for the ladder. Sir Donald said, “Stop engines. Slow astern together, wheel amidships. Get me the Chief Engineer on the phone.”
The New South Wales backed slowly away from the South Head.
Shaw brought the M.T.B. fast round the liner’s great bluff counter. She bucketed and wallowed in the seas. When he had rounded the stern and come into the lee provided by the high, sheer decks, the motion was easier, but the little craft was smaller and lighter than the pilot-cutter and was taking the weather that much the worse.
Shaw grasped James’s shoulder, yelled close to his ear: “Take the wheel… I’ll stand by to jump. I suggest you go right on into the harbour after I’m clear.”
James nodded, took over the wheel from Shaw, edged the boat in towards the New South Wales. Hundreds of faces peered down at them. Shaw, clinging to a stanchion, looked upwards at the towering decks, at the fluttering dresses, the coloured shirts. Closer and closer, so slowly — too slowly— they came. The pilot-ladder, half borne along the wind blowing round the stern, swung out from the gunport. Closer, closer… inching in, holding back so as not to be thrown violently by the surging waves against the liner’s side and split like a nut… and then, as a lift of ‘the sea took the M.T.B. nearer to that dangling, rope-sided ladder, Shaw tensed his leg muscles and jumped.
He came clear of the deck, grabbed, got his hands round the ropes just above the ladder’s bottom rung. He sensed rather than saw the M.T.B. fall away and turn to head clear, vaguely heard James’s shout of good luck. Clinging to the very end of the swaying ladder he felt the sea surge over his legs, his knees, his thighs. He clung on for his life, felt the drag-back as the water fell away again, struggled to get his feet on to that bottom rung. The huge side of the liner, its tiered decks looming over him like a precipice, a precipice edged with staring faces, made him feel giddy as he looked up. He knew he couldn’t hold on for much longer; and then he felt himself rising, being drawn upwards, bumping on the plates as the men at the gunport door hauled away on the ladder, pulling him up bodily. He bore off with his feet, and then hands reached out to help him in through the ship’s side and, as he almost fell inboard, everything swam before his eyes, the foyer was going up and down, up and down… he felt all in, finished and done. But there was so much to do yet, so much to do… he pulled himself together, gasped:
“The charge… it’s due to go up maybe any time now. Siggings knows…”
Grimly, thin-lipped, the Staff Commander interrupted. “Siggings jumped ship in Melbourne. The Chief’s going down himself, and—”
“I’m going down.” Shaw passed a hand over his damp, hot forehead. “I’ve a good idea what the thing looks like so I’ll find it quicker and I may be able to dismantle it.”
The moment Shaw was reported aboard, Sir Donald turned his ship round to the northward and stood well clear of the Heads. He ordered a message to be sent to the signal station at the Outer South Head for transmission to the Captain of the Port at Garden Island, telling him what had happened and that the New South Wales did not intend to enter but would proceed to sea as soon as possible. Sir Donald asked for a lighter to be sent out to off-load REDCAP, adding that in the meantime he intended clearing his ship of all passengers and non-essential crew, lowering the boats to head into the harbour. He asked the Captain of the Port to provide fast naval launches to meet his lifeboats and give them a tow inwards.