Goss must be a good seaman, and Maxwell had sounded competent on matters of gunnery. Even Barker seemed shrewd and active in the affairs of his vital department. But Lindsay, even after much heart-searching, could not find much to like about any of them. Most ships’ engineer officers were men apart, from his experience, defending their private worlds of roaring machinery from all comers, including captains, to the death. Fraser, on the other hand, was almost insulting about his trade and about the ships he had served. He had been at sea since he was seventeen. He was now fifty.
He had only been chief in the Benbecula for eight months, but had served before that in her sister ship, the Eriskay.
‘Alike as two peas in a pod,’ he had said without enthusiasm. ‘Sometimes when I’m doing my rounds I almost forget I’ve changed bloody ships!’
When Lindsay had asked him about his previous service Fraser had said, ‘I was with,Cunard for ten years, y’know. Now there was a company!’
‘Why did you leave?’
Fraser had run his wintry eye around the mass of glittering dials and throbbing generators before replying slowly, ‘Got fed up with the wife. Longer voyages in this crabby company was the only peace I could get!’
As Lindsay had made to leave the engine room’s humid air Fraser had said simply, ‘You and I’ll not fight, sir. I can give you fifteen, maybe sixteen knots. But if you want more I’ll do what I can.’ He had grinned, showing his small, uneven teeth like a knowing fox. ‘If I have to blow the guts out of this old bucket!’
The whisky glass was empty, and he licked his lips as Jupp refilled it soundlessly from a decanter. He had hardly noticed it,going down, and that was a bad sign. The doctor had said … he shut his mind to the memory like a steel trap.
Instead he turned over the rain-dampened envelope which the guardboat had dropped aboard during the first dog watch. Orders. But nothing fresh or even informative. The ship would remain at her present moorings and notice for steam until further notice.
Muffled by the thick glass scuttles he heard the plaintive note of a bugle. Probably one of the battleships. He felt suddenly tired and strangely cut off. Lonely. In a small, ship you were always in each others’ pockets. You knew everyone, whereas here…. He sipped the second drink, listening to the muted wind, the muffled footsteps of a signalman on the bridge above.
Jupp asked discreetly, ‘Will you be dining aboard, sir?’
He thought suddenly of the small Wren with the wind-reddened face. He could go ashore and give her a call. Take her somewhere for a drink. But where? Anyway, she would probably laugh at him.
He replied, ‘Yes.’ He thought Jupp seemed pleased by his answer.
‘I will try and arrange something special for you, sir.’ Jupp glanced at the bulkhead clock as if troubled and then hurried purposefully away.
Lindsay switched on the radio repeater above the sideboard, half listening to the smooth, tired voice of the announcer. Air raids, and another setback in the Western desert. Last night our light coastal forces engaged enemy E-boats in the Channel. Losses were inflicted. The Secretary of the Admiralty regrets to announce the loss of H.M. trawler Milford Queen. Next of kin have been informed. He switched it off angrily without knowing why. Words, words. What did they mean to those who were crouching in the cellars and shelters, listening to the drone of bombers, waiting for their world to cave in on them?
There was a tap on the door. It was Fraser.
‘Yes, Chief?’ He thrust his hands behind him, knowing they were shaking violently.
The engineer officer held out a bottle of gin. ‘I thought you might care to take a dram with me, sir?’ His eye fell on the decanter. ‘But of course if you were to offer something else, well now….’
Lindsay smiled and waved Fraser to a chair, thankful he had come. Glad not to be alone on this first evening aboard. Knowing too why Jupp had been so concerned. Goss’ was first lieutenant and senior officer in the wardroom. He should have invited the new captain down to meet the other officers. Break the ice. Jupp would have been expecting it.
He looked at Fraser and realised he was studying him with fixed attention.
‘Your health, Chief.’
Fraser held the glass to the light and said quietly, ‘Ah well, we’re both Scots, so there’s some hope for this bloody ship!’
Beyond the tall sides of the hull the wind eased slightly, but the rain mounted in intensity, beating the black water like bullets.
Ashore, sitting in her cramped billet and darning a stocking, Wren Collins cocked her head to listen to it. Aloud she said vehemently, ‘Bloody Scapa!’
2
The nightmare
Andrew Lindsay awoke from his nightmare, struggling and tearing at the sheet and blankets, gasping for air, and knowing from the soreness in his throat he had been shouting aloud. Shouting to break the torment.
Hold it at bay.
Stumbling and sobbing in the pitch darkness he groped his way across the cabin, crashing into unfamiliar furniture, almost falling, until he had found a scuttle. He could hear himself cursing, as he fought to raise the heavy deadlight and then to unscrew the clips around the glass scuttle.
As he heaved it open he had the breath knocked from him as with savage eagerness the rain sluiced across his face and chest, soaking his hair and pyjamas until he was shivering both from chill and sheer panic. He thrust his head through the open scuttle, letting the rain drench over him, feeling the cold brass rim against his shoulders. The scuttle was large. Big enough to wriggle through if you tried hard enough.
Breathing unsteadily he peered through the rain. The sky was lighter, and he thought he saw the outline of another ship anchored nearby. It was impossible to tell what time it was, or how long the dream had lasted, or when it had begun. He had never been able to tell. Just that it was always the same.
Wearily he slammed down the deadlight and groped back to the bunk where he switched on the overhead reading lamp.
The sheet was damp, but not only from his rain-soaked body. He, had been sweating as he had relived it. Sweating and fighting to free its grip on him.
He felt his breath slowing down andd pulled his dressing gown from a hook. He was ice cold and shivering badly.
Around him the ship was like a tomb, as if she were listening to him. Not a footfall or even a creak broke the stillness.
Be logical. Face up to it. He went painstakingly through the motions, even filling his pipe unseeingly to steady himself. Suppose it would never loosen its grip? That the doctors had been wrong. After all, naval hospitals were overworked, too glutted with an unending stream of burned, scalded, savaged wrecks to care much about one more casualty.
He lit the pipe carefully, tasting the raw whisky from the previous night’s drinking; and knowing he had been close to vomiting.
Across the cabin he saw his face in a mirror, picked out in the match flame as if floating. He shuddered. Drowning. The face was too young for the way he felt. Tousled hair, wide, staring eyes. Like a stranger’s.
The tobacco smoke swirled around him as he stood up and walked vaguely back and forth on the carpet.
Perhaps if it had not happened right after the Vengeur’s sinking he would have been able to cope. Or maybe unknowingly he had already seen and done too much.
Used up his resistance.
Feet clattered on a ladder overhead. The morning watchmen getting their cocoa carried to them while they tried to stay awake on the bridge.
It was strange to realise that throughout his life in the Navy he had been content with almost everything, Perhaps because it was everything to him. His father he could hardly remember. He had been wounded in that other war at Jutland and had never really recovered. His mother, worn out with worry for her husband; nursing him, and hating the Service which had turned him into a remote, broken man, had remarried almost immediately after his death. Staying only long enough to carry out her dead husband’s wish, that Andrew should be entered into the R.N.. College at Dartmouth. She had married a Canadian, a much older man with a thriving business in Alberta, and had never returned. In her own way she was getting as far as possible from the sea which had taken her husband and separated her from her only son.