“Come round to three-one-five, Number One. Four hundred revs.” Number One raised one hand in acknowledgement, and passed the order down the voice-pipe. The Captain shouted in his ear, “Just got a signal. Japs have hurled in. We’re going home!”
Jimmy peered at him through the driving rain.
“I don’t believe it!”
“All right, don’t. And don’t relax the look-out. It takes two to declare peace.” The Captain dropped through the hatch and down the ladder into the Control Room. He shook off the loose water, and reached for the microphone of the broadcasting system. Flicking the switch on, he tested by slapping the face of the instrument and hearing the thumping echo in the loud-speakers.
“D’ye hear, there? … D’ye hear, there?” The men on watch stood in a close group, the dim light glowing on their unshaven faces. The helmsman craned his neck round to stare at the Captain.
“D’ye hear, there? This is the Captain speaking. Shake your messmates and get round the loud-speakers…”
Up for’ard, Shadwell grinned to himself. He enjoyed shaking Rogers. He leaned over the hammock, grabbed his friend’s right ear, twisting and pulling at the same time. Rogers woke with his fists swinging out of the hammock: a stream of oaths ripped across the compartment.
“Now, now!” murmured Shadwell, soothingly. “’Ush, ducky. We want to ‘ear what the Captain ‘as to say, not what you’ve bin dreaming about.” The Captain’s voice came at them again from the speaker.
“I’ve an important announcement to make…”
The moon broke through a rift in the rain-clouds, gleamed on Seahound’s shiny black hull. She crashed her bow into the gentle waves, flinging them aside one after the other, tossing them in gleaming showers of spray over her steel shoulders. Number One paused for a moment in his looking-out, and watched the regular fist-slamming impact of the powerful bow as it broke steadily through, and while he watched that easy effortless motion he thought to himself that this was the way it had always been, with Seahound. She took it all so quietly. The North Atlantic at its worst had flung its weight against her: a Burma hurricane had raved and torn at her in its crazy rage. Germans had bombed her, and Japanese had shelled her: she had known the roar and the clanging blows of Italian depth-charges. The only thing she hadn’t known was Peace: and that, thought Number One, shocking himself with the truth, would be the end of the road, the scrap-heap. They’d swarm all over her, cutting with flame and steel, hacking and tearing her apart because she had served her purpose and was of no further use. Feeling the lift of her under his feet and watching the way she slammed into the waves, he thought: You’ll take this in your stride, too, you lovely, courageous old bitch! Smoothing along to the breakers’ yard, with your head in the air! Ruthless and vicious, uncomfortable to live in, stinking of shale oil and sometimes of things much worse, I’d give everything I have to save you. His hand rested on the curved timber that edged the top of the bridge, and the tip of his thumb felt the nick that had been made a year ago when they were loading spare engine parts and the crane-driver carelessly swung a heavy part against the bridge. He knew every inch of this ship.
He looked down at her bow again, and he thought: You don’t give a damn, do you? You won’t mind being scrapped. They’ll tear you up and make your steel into cars and tractors and cutlery, and maybe one day I’ll ride a bicycle and it’ll be a part of you.
Whatever they make of you, he thought, it’ll be good.
Copyright
First published in the United Kingdom in 1953 by Peter Davies Ltd.
This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2017 by Canelo Digital Publishing Limited
57 Shepherds Lane
Beaconsfield, Bucks HP9 2DU
United Kingdom
Copyright © Alexander Fullerton, 1953
The moral right of Alexander Fullerton to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781910859889
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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