“Asdic reports no contact, sir.”
In the twinkling of an eye.
He put his hand in his pocket and felt for his pipe. It had been snapped in two, yet he had not felt himself doing it.
He said, “Keep a good lookout for lifejacket lights and wreckage. Pass the word to the doctor.”
Drummond could feel his limbs shaking badly, although when he touched his thighs they felt like metal, cold and unmoving.
Sheridan said in a tight voice, “And for what?”
Drummond regarded him for several seconds. “For a gesture, Number One. I suggest you remember it.”
Sheridan walked unsteadily towards the bridge ladder. “I will, sir. I’ll never forget tonight, of that I’m certain.”
Rankin gripped the screen and said dully, “Bloody bad luck.” He looked sideways at Drummond and added, “Makes us the half-leader though.”
He walked away, his mind already grappling with whatever new duties would now come his way.
Drummond could barely breathe. Perhaps it was better to be like Rankin. Without imagination there could be no pain. And no guilt.
8
Missing Persons
Galbraith climbed to the upper bridge and waited until he had caught Drummond’s attention.
“Oil intake complete, sir. ” He gestured to the rust-streaked tanker alongside where some stokers were already grappling with the great dripping hoses. “Whirlpool’s next.”
Drummond nodded and glanced at the sky. It was still cloudy, but there was a hint of sunshine which was already feeling its way across the houses by the harbour and the strange, pinkcoloured landscape beyond. The quaint houses with their Scandinavian-style windows and coloured, corrugated-iron roofs were as different from Falmouth as they could be. But the harbour could have been almost anywhere. Reykjavik was jammed with all the usual mixture of minor war vessels, trawlers and motor gunboats, armed drifters and corvettes. The latter were the escort from the convoy. He glanced across the tanker’s littered deck at the busy jetty. Ambulances had been and gone. It had probably been a familiar job for them
They had picked up thirty survivors all told. Gasping, shocked and half choked by the filthy oil. Some had been so badly scalded by escaping steam it was a miracle they had got this far. Now they were somewhere beyond the town, in the naval camp or at the R.A.F. hospital. He had sent Vaughan with them. It was all he could do.
At the time he had been almost grateful to have picked up as many as he had. While the other two ships had kept a constant watch for submarines, Warlock had made a slow* and careful search. The great patch of oil had been their marker. It usually was. Corpses in various attitudes of restful abandon. The living splashing feebly like dying fish, obscene in their skin of black oil.
But now in harbour, with normality and efficiency on every hand, it did not seem so many. Thirty out of a whole company. Over a hundred gone. There had been only one officer survivor. The ship’s eighteen-year-old midshipman. He had been in the wheelhouse with the plot operator. He had heard the coxswain shouting something, then felt a great pain in his back. The latter must have been caused by his hitting the sea as the ship turned turtle and exploded like a bomb in their midst. The torpedoes, the actual sinking, the horror of total destruction was mercifully wiped from his memory.
Sheridan clattered up the bridge ladder and saluted formally.
“Ready to move ship, sir.” His face looked dark with stubble, and his eyes were like dull stones.
“Yes. We will tie up ahead of the oiler.”
Drummond was so desperately tired he felt he could not move from the gratings. They had arrived in the first light, having been too late to make an entrance earlier. The search for survivors, the need to allow the convoy to reach port ahead of them and disperse. It had all taken time.
He heard Hillier say, “I thought it would be all snow and ice.”
Galbraith wiped his forehead with one gloved hand and left another streak of grease on it.
He said, “Stay here a wee while, Sub, and you’ll get all the snow you want. They’ve only got two seasons in Iceland. July and winter!”
Tucker, the yeoman of signals, who was examining the halliards above the bridge, snorted, “Bloody Icelanders. They’d rather have the Jerries here than us!”
Drummond felt for his pipe, touching the broken stern with his thumb.
“I see that Lomond and the others beat us to it.”
He had already exchanged signals with Beaumont’s ship, which in her new dazzle paint lay across the harbour at the best mooring. Ten minutes’ walk from the officers’ club.
Sheridan said awkwardly, “Shall I take over, sir?”
Drummond nodded, fighting back a yawn. “Yes. Warp her forrard when you get the go-ahead from the dock party. They’ve a little engine on rails. You just pass them the warps and they do the rest.”
He touched his cap to Galbraith and the others, his mind already on his report. What he would say. How he would say it.
Galbraith thrust his hands inside his flapping white boiler suit and muttered, “He feels it badly.”
Sheridan stared at him. “What about Warden’s people?”
“I’m an engineer, Number One. I told you that. I admire a brave man, but I canna abide a fool. Warden’s gone west, an’ a hundred of her lads with her. That we know for certain.” He looked up at some circling gulls, hopefully watching the newcomers. “We’ll never know if that U-boat was any real menace to the convoy. So in my book Duvall was a bloody fool.” He strode to the ladder, adding tersely, “You do things properly, or you don’t do ‘em at all. That’s the law of the engine room. It should be the same on th’ bloody bridge!”
Wingate whistled. “The old chief’s getting steam up again.”
Sheridan looked at him bitterly. “What the hell’s the matter with everyone? Don’t you care either?”
“Of course I care.” Wingate was pulling his charts from the ready-use table with quick, savage motions. “But what good does it do to show it, eh? I care that a ship, and all the other ships I’ve seen go to hell, are lying on the bottom! I care that the chief gunner’s mate’s wife and daughter were killed last night in an air-raid on Chatham, and nobody’s been able to tell him yet. I care about all these things, and a lot more, Number One, but I know that I don’t have to do a damn thing about them.” He gestured angrily at the empty ladder. “He will though!”
Feet clattered through the other gate and broke the sudden stillness like an explosion. Sheridan stared at the petty officer who was watching all of them with tired resignation. It was the chief gunner’s mate.
He said, “Beg pardon, sir, but the dock party is ready to take our wires. I’ve mustered the duty watch for you.”
Sheridan swallowed hard. “Thank you, Abbott.”
Wingate said harshly, “Haven’t you forgotten something, Number One?”
Sheridan said, “Go and see the captain, will you, Abbott.” He saw the man’s face growing pale. “Quick as you can.”
As the petty officer hurried away Wingate said softly, “See? All you have to do is pass the buck.” He walked past him, his eyes cold. “Just don’t ask if I care, that’s all.”
Fitzroy, the petty officer telegraphist, appeared from the rear of the bridge.
“Captain (D) wants the skipper over aboard Lomond, Yeo. ” He saw Sheridan and added, “Sorry, sir. I thought you were down aft.”
“I’ll tell him. Thank you.” He moved very slowly to the ladder. “He’s seeing Petty Officer Abbott at the moment.”
Fitzroy and Tucker exchanged quick glances. Then the bearded yeoman said, “We’ll take him ashore tonight, eh, Maurice? Fetch a jar of heaters with us, too.”