Hillier’s eyes were like saucers. He was probably already planning another letter to Dunedin. Today Captain Beaumont told us how it was done.
Salter leaned forward to watch as the crew on B gun was relieved in seconds. When the other crew had vanished below for their evening meal it was impossible to tell that there had been any change at all.
He said, “The C.O. doesn’t seem to have much faith in this operation.”
Beaumont looked at Drummond and shot him a ready grin. “Really? Cold feet?”
Drummond removed his cap and ran his fingers through his hair. It felt matted with salt.
“Not my words, sir. ” He glanced at Salter’s back. “Ask me about the way it’ll be reported. That’s something else again.”
The grin broadened. “Touche, Miles! You shouldn’t play with this one, you know!”
Feet clattered on a ladder and Midshipman Keyes appeared breathless below Drummond’s chair.
“Signal from Admiralty, sir. I’ve been helping with the decoding.” He saw Beaumont for the first time and flushed. “I–I’m sorry, sir.”
Drummond snapped, “Read it.”
“It says, sir, that the Spanish ship, S.S. Aragon, was reported as leaving Bilbao yesterday. Heading west.” He sounded mystified.
Beaumont clapped him on the shoulder but kept his eyes on Drummond.
“See? The bastards have taken the bait! Provided our decoy gets here on time, I think we’re in business.”
Drummond smiled. “She must be a communications ship of some sort. If we can pick up one transmission, to show she’s aiding the enemy, we’ll take her.”
Salter laughed. “Sounds exciting!” He looked uneasy.
Beaumont eyed him fiercely. “It’s time for a bit of hitting back, Miles! Good for the country, and good for your programmes, eh?” It seemed to amuse him.
Sheridan saluted. “Port watch closed up at defence stations, sir. I’ll hang on until Pilot comes up from the W/T office.”
There was a question in his eyes, and Drummond said, “All right, Number One, you can pass the word round now. Tell everyone what we’re doing, or hope to do. Then go round the ship yourself and check that nothing has been overlooked. ” He glanced at his watch. “Action stations from midnight, I’m afraid, but see ‘that there’s a regular supply of cocoa and sandwiches for gun crews and watchkeepers.”
“Aye, aye, sir.” Sheridan touched the midshipman’s arm and said quietly, “Don’t stare, laddy, it’s rude.”
Keyes grinned and followed him towards the hatch.
Drummond thrust his hands into his pockets and frowned. Another letter home. Today I carried the signal which came from London. I decoded it and gave it to Captain Beaumont. Drummond glanced at Beaumont’s profile. He certainly seemed to be enjoying it.
“Radar-Bridge!”
Sheridan snatched up the handset. “Forebridge.” “Getting a strong echo at Red oh-three-five. Range twelve thousand yards.”
Drummond was out of his chair and across to the small radar repeater which had appeared on the bridge during a boiler-clean in Chatham.
It took time, as it always did. After hours of sitting and staring at the sea it was hard to adjust to the dim picture in the small, enclosed screen. Echoes and writhing outlines moved with the radar’s probing eye like weed on the sea-bed. And then he saw it, a bright, solid blip. A ship, with another, smaller drip of green light close against it.
To confirm his thoughts he heard Sheridan say, “Radar reports a second echo, sir. Must be the tug. Nothing else around.”
Beaumont rubbed his hands. “Soon will be!”
Drummond straightened his back and returned to the chair, his mind calculating and discarding.
“Take a look, Number One.” He saw Wingate’s head rising over the hatch coaming. “Check with radar, Pilot. Then lay off a course to intercept. Get the chief for me. I’ll want maximum revolutions in a moment.”
He knew Salter was staring at him, memorising every detail, like someone watching a piece of hoarded machinery coming alive again.
“Chief, sir.”
He snatched the handset.
“Chief? This is the captain. Decoy in radar contact. Standby for full revs.”
Galbraith sounded very calm. “Aye, sir. Expecting trouble, are we?”
“God knows.” He saw Wingate at the table, his dividers busy. “Well?”
“Course to steer is one-three-zero, sir,”
“Good. Bring her round.” To Beaumont he said, “Decoy will be in sight well before sunset, sir. Would be now but for this mist.”
Wingate glanced at Sheridan and winked. “Tally bloodyho!”
Then he said into the voice-pipe, “Port fifteen.”
“Fifteen of port wheel on.” Even through the pipe it was obvious that the helmsman had his mouth full of sandwich or chocolate.
“Midships. Steady. Steer one-three-zero.”
Drummond looked up at the tallest funnel, the sudden strengthening of vapour above its stained lip.
“Full ahead together.”
As if she, too, had been waiting and gathering her energy for this moment, Warlockdug her stem into the swell and cut across it like a ploughshare. With every mounting revolution the bow wave grew higher, higher, until the creaming water rose level with the iron deck as she thrust her way through the water. Below, and throughout the ship, every plate and rivet seemed to be vibrating in protest or approval, and in the crowded messdecks the relieved watchkeepers braced themselves against the tables and tried to stomach their evening meal. Few spoke or even looked at each other. A glance could be a question. And the answer might be too grim to contemplate.
Sheridan, on his way aft to the wardroom, clung to a stanchion and paused to watch the great surge of sea and spray alongside. He was still thinking of Drummond, seeing him come alive, the doubt and anxiety slipping from his face like an unwanted mask. And he had thought he had begun to know him.
He had looked like a stranger. A fighter.
He saw Mangin and the chief stoker standing below the pompom mounting contemplating the listening bow wave with grave interest.
“Suit you, ‘Swain?”
Mangin shrugged. “Poor old cow ‘11 shake ‘ erself apart one o’ these days!” He grinned. “Sir.”
They all looked up at the tall bridge as a signal lamp clattered shortly.
Mangin remarked, “Sighted ‘er then.”
Sheridan watched the signalman’s black silhouette as he shuttered off another brief acknowledgement. No need to pass the word. Everyone knew they were going to have a crack at something. The rights and wrongs of it were nobody’s concern but the skipper’s, apparently.
As if to confirm Mangin’s words, the great bow wave began to sigh away, falling and smoothing until Warlock’s speed had dropped to even less than her original one. Only the great, seething white wake, spreading and intermingling with the swell like a pale arrowhead, gave a hint of her momentary return to her true glory.
Sheridan continued aft. Now, all they had to do was hold the other ship on the radar, listen for some hint of a sighting signal from the Spaniard, and then, as Wingate had wryly remarked, it would be tally bloody-ho indeed.
At the rear of the bridge Drummond saw Sheridan walking towards the quarterdeck, but his mind was elsewhere. That momentary contact with the other ship had been like a trust. The brief stab of signal lights from the elderly destroyer and from that murky outline of the decoy meant that time for supposition and doubt was almost over.
It would probably be a solitary U-boat to which any sort of sighting signal would be made. The Germans were unlikely to deploy more than one boat for possible stragglers, no matter how desperately they needed information about convoys and their contents. The other three destroyers would be close by to catch the submarine when the time came. It would be up to Warlock to corner the spy-ship.