“Wheel relieved, sir. Able Seaman Jevers on it now.” Sheridan dropped his voice. “Is it all right about him yet, sir?”
“I don’t know, Number One. I haven’t heard anything about Vaughan’s handling of the matter.”
Sheridan ducked as some droplets of spray danced over the screen. “I’m off then, sir. I’ve got the morning watch.”
Wingate was saying to Hillier, “We will alter course in ten minutes. Course to steer zero-three-zero. ” He called across, “It seems peaceful enough.” It was his way of giving a hint.
Drummond smiled. “Yes. I’ll go to my sea cabin for a nap.”
As he left the bridge Wingate relaxed and unbuttoned the throat of his leather jacket. He heard Hillier breathing heavily as he sprawled beneath the canvas hood on the chart table, and grinned. Nice and quiet. Time to think. To put yourself together. He thought suddenly of the girl at the hotel. Georgina. It was a bloody shame really. But then…
He crossed the bridge and trained his glasses above the salt-dappled screen. He could just make out the jagged line of Lomond’s small bow wave, the darker smudge of her hull riding above it. Right on station. He hoped the ones at the tail-end were keeping a good lookout. Despite all the information and monitoring which had been done, it was still possible for a solitary, sneaky U-boat to be in the area.
Georgina. What a girl. So alive and sensual, and as fluffy as a young kitten. And what a figure. Through her dress he had seen the full curve of her breasts, the restless way she crossed her legs as she had spoken with him. When he had started to tell her what Keyes had said she had sounded puzzled. Then, “Oh, him!” She had leaned forward and laid one hand on his knee. “Such a sweet boy!” After that, Wingate had known the full extent of her interest in poor Allan Keyes.
She had asked, “Will you be going home to England soon?”
“Can’t tell you that, my love.” He had grinned, feeling the surge of desire running through him. “Ask_ me something else.”
She had pretended to scowl. “This show is going to London next month.” She had given him a small card. ‘‘This is the number to ring.”
He had said bluntly, “I’d like that. ” She had not budged as he had run his fingers up her arm. “I think we’d be rather good with each other, don’t you?”
She had been called away, but had kissed him very quickly on the cheek, her breast brushing his shoulder for just those few extra seconds.
“I think we’d be perfect.”
He had returned to the ship, wondering how he was going to explain the facts of life to Keyes. When he had seen him fidgeting at the top of the gangway, all his resolve had crumbled. After all, he might never make it to London. They could very well get made into mincemeat within the next few days.
He had lied cheerfully, “She sends her love, Allan. She’s a real fine girl.”
It had been worth it to lie. Keyes had looked so pathetically happy.
“She is, Pilot! I shall write to her when we get back. Buy her something.”
Aloud Wingate said, “You do that thing.” Hillier asked, “What was that?”
“Nothing. I’m getting bloody old. ” He peered at his watch. “Get ready. The flotilla will be taking up the new course soon. Tell the captain. He’ll want to know, although thank God he trusts me.”
“Unlike some, I suppose?”
“You could say that.” Wingate trained his glasses again. “Some skippers would check the toilet paper used by each watch just to satisfy their officers were not wasteful!”
In the stuffy wheelhouse beneath Wingate’s booted feet Able Seaman Jevers leaned on the spokes, the lower half of his face glowing faintly in the compass light. The telegraphsmen lounged nearby, and behind a thick canvas screen he could hear Midshipman Keyes speaking quietly with the navigator’s yeoman as they adjusted the vibrating plot table.
What the hell was the doctor up to? Was he trying to discover something about Janice? Or did they think he was so much under strain that he needed special leave? He relaxed slightly, watching the luminous gyro repeater as it ticked a degree off course. That would be a laugh. A nice long leave. He would give a year’s pay to see that bloody Yank’s face!
“Port ten!” Wingate’s voice through the great bell-mouth above his head made him flinch.
“Port ten, sir. Ten of port wheel on.”
“Midships. ” He heard feet on the internal ladder. Hot kye for the watchkeepers. “Steady.”
“Steady, sir. Course zero-three-three.”
“Steer zero-three-zero. And watch your head, Quartermaster!” There was a rasp in Wingate’s voice.
“Aye, aye, sir. ” Jevers grinned and muttered, “Bugger you, mate.”
A bosun’s mate called, “Kye up, lads!”
Through the stout canvas curtain Keyes heard the clatter of mugs and tried to keep awake as he stared at the clicking light which marked the ship’s course and position on the plot table. Further and further away from land. Like heading out into a desert. He peered at the chart. And God, it was deep. Close on two thousand fathoms. A black, silent, unmoving world. There would be wrecks, too. Right back to-he tried to think what sort of ships would have been in these waters when men first ventured towards the top of the world.
Rigge, the navigator’s yeoman, brought two mugs of cocoa from the wheelhouse and smiled to himself as Keyes’ head lolled slowly forward on to the chart.
He said, “I reckon you should go below, sir.”
Keyes shook himself. “I will. Thanks.”
As he thrust out of the curtain, still holding his mug of cocoa, the yeoman whispered to the bosun’s mate, “Got it bad, Taff. Picked up some party ashore, by the looks of him.”
The other seaman grinned. “So long as that’s all he’s picked up, boyo!”
And so with her consorts Warlock steamed into the darkness, while within her hull her company slept or stood watch as their roles dictated. Only two were absent, the man who was in hospital for observation, and Badger, the cat. A few minutes before sailing he had been secretly transferred to the repair ship in his basket. He would be waiting for his own ship when they got back. It was safer, everyone agreed. But not to see his belligerent stare from some dark corner or other made more than one sailor feel uneasy.
In his little cabin behind the bridge Drummond sat wedged in his bunk, filling his new pipe and remembering her voice, the touch of her hand. Her husband must be a bloody fool. He rolled over and snatched the phone before it had buzzed for more than two seconds.
“Captain!”
“It’s getting light, sir.”
“Already?”
He rubbed his eyes. They felt sore. And they had not even reached Bear Island yet. He yawned.
“I’ll come up. Have some coffee brought to the bridge, will you?”
He thrust the pipe into his pocket and stretched his arms. At moments like this he wished he had made the Army his career after all.
11
Side by Side
“Signal from the Santiago, sir.” The yeoman of signals had his stocky legs wide apart in order to steady himself and hold his telescope on the nearest oil tanker. “Come alongside when ready.”
“Thank you, Yeo. ” Drummond watched the Lomond’s screws thrashing great gouts of froth as she swung away from the other tanker. “Acknowledge.”
From first light, when they had taken up their places like customers in a food queue, the destroyers had gone through the tiresome and sometimes dangerous business of fuelling while under way. The two tanker captains were old hands at the game, although their fat, rust-streaked hulls showed plenty of deep scars and dents where naval vessels had found the operation more hazardous than they might have expected.