How long I lay there I do not know. Time is relative, (a mental calculation that measures activity. I was inactive then, my brain numbed, my mind hardly functioning. It might have been only a minute. It might have been an hour, two hours. I didn’t sleep. I’m certain of that. I was conscious all the time of the shaking of the hut, of the battering, ceaseless noise of the wind; conscious, too, that there was something I had to do, some urgent intention that had forced me to struggle up from the beach. I dragged myself to my feet, staggering vaguely through the hut until I came to the radio, drawn to it by some action of my subconscious.
I realised then why I’d made the effort. The outside world. Somebody must be told. Help alerted. I slumped into the operator’s chair, wondering whether there was any point, still that picture in my mind of the bridge crushed against sheer rock and the waves pounding. Could any of the crew have survived, any of those men huddled like sheep awaiting slaughter in the narrow alleyway out of which I’d clawed my way? But the wind had changed and they’d be under the lee. There was just that chance and I reached out my hand, switching on the set. I didn’t touch the tuning. I just sat there waiting for the hum that would tell me the set had warmed up. But nothing happened. It was dead and it took time for my brain to work that out — the generator silent and no current coming through. There were emergency batteries below the table and by following the cables back I was able to cut them in.
The set came alive then and a voice answered almost immediately. It was thin and faint. ‘
We’ve been calling and calling. If you’re still on Laerg why didn’t you answer before?’
He didn’t give me a chance to explain. ‘I’ve got Glasgow on the line for you. They’ve found Mrs McGregor. Hold on.’ There was a click and then silence, and I sat there, helpless, the salt taste of sea water on my mouth. Fifty men battered to pieces on the rocks of Sgeir Mhor and they had to fling Mrs McGregor at me. Why couldn’t they have waited for me to tell them what had happened? ‘You’re through.’ The police first, and then a woman’s voice, soft and very Scots, asking for news of her son. I felt almost sick, remembering what had happened, the tiller flat flooded and the poor devil’s body tombed up there. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs McGregor. I can’t tell you anything yet.’ And I cut her off, overcome by nausea, the sweat out all over me and my head reeling.
When I got them again, my brother was there. Recognising his voice I felt a flood of instant relief. ‘Iain. Iain, thank God!’ I was back on Ardnamurchan, crying to my elder brother for help — a rock to cling to in moments of desperation.
But this was no rock. This was a man as sick and frightened as myself. ‘Major Braddock here.’ His voice, strained and uneasy, had the snap of panic in it.
‘Iain,’ I cried again. ‘For God’s sake. It’s Donald.’ But the appeal was wasted and his voice when it came was harsh and grating.
‘Braddock here. Who’s that? What’s happened?’ The time was then 08.35 and Braddock had been almost six hours in the Movements Office, waiting for news. God knows what he must have been feeling. Flint said he’d paced up and down, hour after hour, grey-faced and silent, whilst the periodic reports came through from our own radio operator and from the man on L4400. Up to the moment when disaster overtook us Movements had a fairly clear picture of what was happening. And then suddenly that Mayday call, and after that silence. ‘Get them,’ Braddock had shouted at the Signals operator. ‘Christ man! Get them again.’ But all the operator could get was L4400 announcing flatly that they were in the storm centre steaming for the shelter of the other side of the island.
‘It’s Eight-six-one-o I want,’ Braddock had almost screamed. ‘Get them, man. Keep on trying.’
He’d had far too little sleep that night and the interview he’d had with Standing at two-thirty in the morning cannot have been a pleasant one. Standing had been roused from his bed by a duty driver at twelve-forty, and Ferguson described him as literally shaking with rage when he realised what Braddock had done. The first thing he did was to speak to Stratton on the R/T and then he walked across to the quarters and saw Cliff Morgan. ‘White-faced he was, man,’ was the way Cliff put it. ‘Calling me all sorts of names for interfering. But when I’d explained the situation, he calmed down a bit. He even thanked me. And then he went out, saying it was all Braddock’s fault and if anything went wrong he’d get the bloody man slung out of the Service.’
Standing had gone straight to his office and sent for Braddock. There was nobody else present at that meeting so that there is no record of what passed between them. But immediately afterwards Braddock had teleprinted BGS direct, giving his reasons for ordering an immediate evacuation on his own responsibility. And after that he’d remained in the Movements Office waiting for news; and when our Mayday call went out, it was he, not Standing, who had alerted Scottish Command and set the whole emergency machinery in motion. At hah0 past eight he’d walked over to the Met. Office. He was with Cliff Morgan for about ten minutes and it was during those ten minutes that I called Base. A relief operator had just taken over, which was why I was given the Glasgow call instead of being put straight through either to Braddock at the Met. Office or Standing, who was waiting alone in his office.
Probably if I’d got Standing his reaction would have been as slow as my brother’s, for neither of them could have any idea of the appalling ferocity of that storm or the magnitude of the disaster. He didn’t seem able to understand at first. ‘You and one other chap. …? that all? Are you certain?’ I wasn’t certain of anything except the memory of the ship on her beam ends and the waves driving her against the rocks. ‘If you’d seen the seas…. It was Sgeir Mhor she hit.’
‘Jesus Christ, Donald?’ It was the first time he’d used my name and it made a deep impression. ‘Jesus Christ! There must be others. There’ve got to be others.’ But I didn’t think there could be then. ‘I’ve told you, the whole bridge deck was concertinaed in a matter of seconds. They can’t possibly …’
‘Well, have a look. Go and find out.’ ‘The wind,’ I said wearily. ‘Don’t you realise? You can’t stand.’
‘Then crawl, laddie — crawl. I must know. I must be certain. Surely to God it can’t be as bad as you say.’ He was almost screaming at me. And then his voice dropped abruptly to a wheedling tone. ‘For my sake, laddie — please. Find out whether there are any other survivors.’ His voice. It was so strange — it was Iain’s voice now, my own brother’s, and the accent Scots. The years fell away … ‘All right, Iain. I’ll try.’ It was Mavis all over again — Mavis and all the other times. ‘I’ll try,’ I said again and switched the set off, going down the hut and out into a blast that whipped the door from my hand and knocked me to the ground.
I met the other fellow coming up from the beach, crawling on his hands and knees and crying with the pain of his broken arm. He called to me, but I heard no sound, only his mouth wide open and his good arm pointing seaward. But there was nothing there, nothing but the seething waters of the bay churned by the wind; all the rest was blotted out by rain and Sgeir Mhor a vague blur. ‘What is it?’ I yelled in his ear and I almost fell on top of him as the wind came down, a solid, breath-taking wall of air.
‘The rocks, sir. Sgeir Mhor. I thought I saw …’ I lost the rest. It was almost dark, a grey gloom with the clouds racing, and so low I could almost have reached up and touched them.
, ‘Saw what?’ I shouted. ‘What did you think you saw?’
‘It was clear for a moment, and there were figures — men. I could have sworn….’ But he wasn’t certain. You couldn’t be certain of anything in those conditions. And your eyes played tricks.