It occurred to Christopher that the Arctic fisheries would not breed a mild sort of seaman – hard men and well up for a fight, in fact.
“Get in close and make use of the pompoms, sir. It might work. Load up all of the belts we have to hand overnight, sir.”
They set to work, bringing up additional ready-use to the four inch and pulling out the spare canvas belts for the pompoms and settling the little forty mm shells into them.
“Are they explosive or shrapnel, Adams?”
“It will say on the boxes, sir.”
“So it does. Load half the belts with explosive rounds, the other half shrapnel – mark the belts up to see which is which easily. If them tramp ships is full of soldiers, which would be what the Admiral was expecting, then shrapnel will do a better job while the four inch is sinking them.”
It struck Christopher that Murchison had an amount of military knowledge.
“Were you busy during the Boer War, sir?”
“Aye, I was. Must have been nigh on a hundred of us out of Fraserburgh and the havens nearby volunteered and went out. The most of us came back, too, after a busy year or so. Not like these soft Sassenachs from their factories as were dying like flies for bad food and hard lying out in the bush there. An interesting time, it was. They made me a lieutenant by the end of it.”
Christopher was not surprised.
“I thought you had more than ordinary knowledge of shrapnel and such, sir.”
“Aye, well, a man must keep his eyes and ears open, young Adams! What do ye propose for the morning?”
“Your plan will work if they are there, sir. We will take casualties. If I could suggest, make sure that each skipper knows to form line on you and watch your helm. We will close on the Turks – if that is what they are – in line abreast, only the four inch bearing and must turn at least thirty degrees as soon as we are inside a thousand yards to allow the pompoms and Vickers to fire. It will be as well for each skipper to know your intent, sir.”
“It will, too. Jimmy!”
Jimmy roared and the five boats clustered together and briefly talked tactics, all very casually and informally.
“Will the Vickers be useful at close range, sir? They are on high-angle mountings, are they not?”
“They are, Adams, officially, that is. I know the lads have worked on ours so they will come to the horizontal as well. Good with their hands, trawlermen, used to fixing their own machinery at sea. Can’t return half-empty just because a winch or somesuch has broken, man!”
It was not the way things were done in the real Navy. It was possible that the Navy was wrong in some of its ways, Christopher concluded. Not to worry, it was no concern of his, not any longer.
They fell back from the chase and turned north after dark and before moonrise, the trawlers blacked out and as silent as they could manage. Two hours at a quiet three knots and they hove-to, the five side by side and comfortable.
“Get your head down, Adams. Four hours before we get under way and you need some sleep. You are not one of us – trawlermen sleep an hour at a time every third day, man – well known fact! You soft Navy boys need your beauty sleep!”
It was friendly banter, even if less than tactful. Christopher did as he was advised.
The moon was still high when they headed south, the sky cloud-free, as nearly always. They set a pair of lookouts in the bows and picked up speed, having decided that they wanted to enter action, if it occurred, at more than a crawl.
An hour and the lookouts called something black due south. Christopher joined them, picked up a dark lump in the distance.
“An island? Maybe thick black coal smoke…”
He ran to the wheelhouse.
“Might be clouds of smoke. If the Turks are pushing those old tramps to full speed, they will be churning it out, from all Tromso said.”
“Well thought, Adams. Jimmy! Pass the word down the line. All to man the guns and put one up the spout.”
“Aye, wish I was back home and doing just that, Skipper! Dorothea! Man the bloody guns and load ‘em! Pass the word!”
“Go back up the bows, Adams. See if you can spot their course. When’s moonset?”
“About thirty minutes. I don’t have an almanac aboard to give precise times.”
“Didn’t know there was such things, Adams! Half an hour will do. If can be, it would be useful to start shooting while we had a bit of light. Any luck, one of them will catch fire and give us a target while we stay less easy seen out in the dark. Not a simple task, aiming at gun flashes.”
Five minutes and Christopher was content that the black mass to the south was coal smoke and that it was moving somewhat east of north and at as much as ten knots.
“Crossing our bows at a slight diagonal, sir and at most two miles distant. Probably at that point in ten to fifteen minutes. Can’t be more accurate in this light, sir. We are making about eight knots now?”
“Aye… Was we to push up to eleven, say, Adams, we would be within range of the pompoms and Vickers as they crossed us.”
Christopher quickly checked the calculations in his head, agreed it to be so. Murchison called down the engineroom voicepipe for full speed.
“Jimmy! Shout eleven knots and hold close and ready to turn three points to port.”
The message went down the short line, the trawlers no more than fifty yards apart.
“Do ye wish to pick up a rifle, Adams? It will give ye something to do when we’re busy.”
“Every little helps, sir.”
Christopher noticed four of the deckhands carrying Lee-Enfields, handling them casually and familiarly. He shrugged and took one of the pair in the wheelhouse. He had been trained in the rifle at Dartmouth, was competent but doubted he was the match of the men on deck – they looked wholly at home with the weapons.
“Boer War with you, sir?”
“Aye, all four of them. They know what they’re doing. They’ll keep heads down on the bridge of one of they gunboats.”
They waited to be spotted, the layer of the four inch keeping his gun on the foremost black lump, now just visible as a warship, lower and leaner than a merchantman and with a tall mast that no commercial steamer needed.
“Within the mile, I would say, Adams.”
“Moon setting almost behind them, sir. We are out in the dark.”
“We are so, man. Well positioned; ye placed us well. They must be making a good twelve knots. Fast for tramp ships. They will have selected the best they had, no doubt.”
They waited another minute.
“Four cables, I would say, sir.”
Biggar heaved on the wheel and shouted to open fire. The four inch gave its crack and the other four joined in within the second, reloading fast even in the dark.
“Jimmy! Shout Tromso and Bergen to aim for the rear pair!”
The pompoms joined in, followed by the Vickers and they spotted hits aboard their targets.
The darkness began to ease and they could pick out all four ships clearly.
“Lead gunboat is falling off course, sir. On fire towards the stern.”
Christopher lifted the rifle to his shoulder and loosed ten rounds rapid that he thought might have come aboard the lead boat.
“Showing willing, sir!”
“Every mickle, they say, Adams!”
Fire was coming their way, the second gunboat manning a pair of twelve pounders or something like. There was an explosion aboard Bergen at the end of the line and she fell out of the formation. A heavy automatic opened up from the leading Turk and hosed across Dorothea.
“Hotchkiss revolving gun, likely sir…”
Two pompoms responded, targeting the automatic gun’s position, silencing it. Dorothea’s four inch opened fire again after a slight delay, presumably with new crew. The Vickers from the four remaining trawlers were firing prolonged bursts, using up belt after belt. Christopher hoped they knew what they were doing, had a useful target.