“Wait, sir.”
A few seconds and Adams came wriggling over the top of the cockpit, holding onto anything he could grab. He made his way over the coaming, picked up the flask, wiped it clear of blood spatters.
“Christ, sir! Your foot’s half gone, sir. Still bleeding. Take the flask, sir.”
Adams unscrewed the top and Peter took a swig direct from the flask. It was warm rather than hot, heavily sugared, carried a slight tang from the flask itself. It was nectar.
“Thanks, Adams…”
The boy was gone, just a pair of feet visible. A minute and he crawled back with his own medical pack, eased his way down headfirst over Peter’s lap and started to bind his foot.
“Best I can do, sir. We should head straight for Plymouth, sir. That needs a hospital.”
“We stay until the destroyers come. Thank you. Go back to your own cockpit now. Carefully!”
Twenty long, slow, painful minutes, the flask emptied and his head a little clearer for the fluid.
“Destroyer in sight, sir.”
“Fire a flare.”
A green light arced out over the sea.
Peter dropped the blimp slowly and carefully to two thousand feet.
“Destroyer signalling, sir. Too fast for me to read, sir.”
“Reply. ‘Submarine on course – whatever it is. Send slowly.’”
“Acknowledged, sir.”
Ten minutes, a little less, and the destroyer had picked up the smear of oil, was above the probable location of the submarine.
Adams made another signal with the Aldis.
“I’ve told them you are seriously wounded, sir.”
Initiative on the boy’s part. Peter should have thought to give the order. His head was fuzzy.
“Reply, sir. ‘Go home. Many thanks.’”
“On their heads be it. Course for Plymouth?”
“Due north, sir.”
Peter pulled SS9 onto the course and opened the throttle, turned the crab pot to fill the ballonets and maintain a high pressure, glanced up and saw a faint sagging in the envelope.
“Losing gas, slowly, Adams. Report in that we are on course for Plymouth. Pilot wounded. Balloon perforated.”
The key rattled and there was an immediate response.
“Acknowledged, sir. Handling party will be waiting.”
Peter wondered where. He did not know Plymouth, had never used the port in his whole career. They had no charts aboard.
Adams appeared again, crawling across the nacelle.
“These bullet holes are handy to grab hold of, sir. My flask is still half-full, sir.”
Peter had to stay awake.
“Thanks, Adams. A life saver – might be literally. Can you see the destroyers still?”
“Three of them there now, sir. One of them is crossing at speed and throwing something over the side… A depth bomb, sir. Blowing now, in her wake. Two others must be watching the oil track. They are waiting, sir. Two of them signalling something, flags going up. I expect they are back on the oil. The sub must be changing course and the oil is giving her away. Bombing again, sir.”
“Looks like they will get her, Adams. Good. We are losing height, very slowly. Be ready to throw out anything that has weight. Lewis first. Spare pans after that. Try to keep the Aldis. Not much else to dump, when you think of it.”
They were at five hundred feet and sagging when Adams identified Plymouth harbour.
“Give them three red flares, Adams. Emergency.”
“They are signalling us to come to the quayside, sir, in what looks like a fishing harbour. About half an acre, sir!”
“Sod it! Better get it right first time. Be ready with the trailing rope. Aerial in.”
Narrowly over the masts of anchored fishing smacks and the rope dropped onto land and grabbed by dozens of hands.
“Engine off, sir!”
Peter had dropped into a half doze, snapped awake, performed the necessary acts, switches off and petrol cock shut.
The nacelle was hauled to earth and Peter tried to stand.
“Can’t get up. Adams. Going to have to be lifted.”
He heard voices.
“Like a bloody abattoir in the cockpit! Pull him out. Carefully!”
He was tugged up and onto a stretcher, felt men running him to an ambulance.
A few minutes and he was in some sort of hospital, he could not tell what. His clothes were being cut off, to his indignation – that had been an expensive uniform.
“Don’t worry, sir. You won’t be needing that again. Now, you will feel a sharp prick and we shall take you to the table.”
He fell asleep, wondering what the voice had meant.
He woke slowly in a hospital bed. He hurt. There was a face to his left. He turned a little and blinked.
“Josephine! How did you get here so quickly?”
“I have been here for a day – you have been asleep for two.”
That seemed very silly, somehow. He managed a smile.
“Your mother is at the hotel. We have been taking it in turns to sit at the bedside.”
“Oh. Did you think I was going to die?”
“You lost a lot of blood and your leg was badly injured. It was possible…”
She did not say that at one point it had seemed likely.
“Oh. Things seem to hurt a bit… Do you think…”
“I have called for the nurse already. She came in and left to find a doctor, a couple of minutes ago. You dropped off to sleep again for a little while.”
A bustle and a senior doctor arrived, ward sister and three nurses in his train to emphasise his importance.
“Commander Naseby! You are with us again. We had wondered how much longer you could sleep, sir!”
“Needed it, doctor. Eighteen hour patrols. Too many of them.”
“One is too many of that sort of thing, sir! Ridiculous to demand that of any man! Not to worry, you will not have to consider them again. Might as well be blunt – you are not the sort I need to pussyfoot around!”
It occurred to Peter that the doctor was a pompous oaf. He thought it wiser not to say so. He smiled politely, indicated the doctor should continue.
“We have taken your left foot, just above the ankle. The ankle and the bones on either side of it were shattered, impossible of repair.”
“I saw bits of white sticking out, sir. I wondered what I would have left.”
Josephine was green in the face, the imagery too much for her.
“Nurse! Best escort the young lady out. She needs fresh air.”
They watched Josephine as she walked away, straightening her shoulders, gulping in a deep breath.
“Been at your side since she got here, Commander. Strong girl. You are a lucky man, sir.”
“I have long thought so, doctor. So! No left foot. What else?”
“Laceration to the abdomen – stitches, sore, leave a scar, unimportant. Rub goose grease on it to keep the skin supple – old fashioned but it still works. A single bullet hole on the right calf which is a damned nuisance. Leaves the right leg weakened for the while, just when you need it to compensate for the left. Other than that, nothing. You will experience considerable pain for a few days, lesser for months. I will give you a morphine injection today which will take all of the pain away. I shall probably repeat the dose tomorrow, and then it will be finish. Morphine is a dangerous friend. Far too easy to become addicted to the stuff! Thousands, literally, in the States after their Civil War. Many hundreds – how many we don’t know, never counted – after the Boer War. Too damned many already in this war. You won’t be one of them! There are pills, and I shall prescribe them. They work to an extent. Live with pain for six months, Commander. It will go away in that time. The alternative is to live with morphine for perhaps five years and die a useless wreck, no good to yourself or anybody else!”
“That is plain speaking, doctor. Thank you. I much prefer that to, what did you call it, ‘pussyfooting around’.”