I felt a kind of triumph at handing the message to Bennett. That I listen and send nothing in return was the cry of someone who still relied on chance to protect him. The drill of departure left no flexibility of manoeuvre. Seaplanes would reconnoitre for whatever vessel acknowledged each message from the Difda. If Bennett’s luck held and the attacker, assuming the Difda to be the only ship in the area, ceased all W/T listening – hearing neither their pleas for help nor my responses – they would only look for us on finding no gold on the fuel ship, by which time it would be too late because we would be away.
I handed in the message. ‘Who are they?’
He let the paper drop. ‘A rival company. They want the stuff too. Who wouldn’t? I thought we would beat them to it by a few days. But you can’t win every leg on the chart.’
‘You knew we’d bump into them?’
‘I supposed there was a chance.’
‘It seems we’re trapped.’
He was grey at the face. ‘I wouldn’t say so. The sum of the probability of errors has usually managed to avoid the fickle finger of fate – at least in my experience. So get back to your box of tricks, and leave the cogitations to me.’
The pennant showed little wind, and the sky had the markings of a fine morning. We had a sufficient stretch of water to get airborne, despite our perilous overload, but the latter part of our long runway ended in a minefield. To avoid this by going around the headland into the western fjord for take-off, where there were no mines, would bring us against the armed ship still in the process of persuading the Difda to heave-to. We would be blown to pieces by mines or blasted by shell-fire. Either way would mean an enormous fireball when several thousand gallons of high octane spirit exploded. And yet the enemy would not fire once it was realized that we carried the gold. Again, Bennett had them nailed, but we had to get airborne because if they caught us on the water they would force us into surrender. Five of us would be no match for them, and the gold would be theirs. Fate’s finger was never more fickle than at that moment.
Bennett called from the top of the steps that he wanted to see Rose for a navigation briefing. The dinghy had been hauled aboard, and I helped Nash rope it down. Sweat poured from him after the effort. He wiped his chest with a rag and stood up to reach his shirt which lay across one of the boxes. ‘I haven’t seen him, sir.’
‘Then where the devil is he?’
‘He was in the tail, at stand-to.’
‘Get him.’ He went back into his room.
There was no crawling on your belly to reach a thimble-sized turret – as at the end of a bomber. The flying boat had a cat-walk and you could go in comfort. The door was half open, Rose slumped over the guns inside. Sleep was our only escape, and I hesitated to wake him. The strain of going out on a limb, forever forward and with no prospect of return, had shagged us utterly. All the same, I reached forward and gripped his shoulder.
An inch of tongue protruded from between his teeth. He fell to one side and grinned at me. Getting the turret door open, I pulled him free. The Smith and Wesson clattered. Accustomed to pinpointing the stars, he had made no mistake in finding his heart. I felt more dead for a few moments than he could ever be. The vast scar which we thought he had learned to live with looked as if he had merely slept awhile with his face against the corrugations of a heavily embroidered cushion. In another half hour, if he had been alive, all marks would have disappeared.
An explosion of cannonfire must have hidden the sound of his last star sight. The heavenly body came down to the horizon. Flak got him, I told myself. He’s been killed in action as we all might be, so shed no tears while there’s work to be done. Who wants a memorial service that you can’t take part in? I put the gun, wet with Rose’s blood, into my jacket and made my way back to the flight deck.
16
Bennett reasoned – if you could call it that – that the dead were dead. Fair enough. Old times would not return. If you mourned the dead by letting them disrupt your life, new and better days would never come. Even so, Nash said, I thought the skipper had had it when I told him. He asked for an apple, but there were none left. He had to chew on something else. Shouted he was surrounded by desertion, treachery and incompetence – as he lit a cigar. There would be a Court of Enquiry when we got back. Count on it. He would notify all concerned, taking care to record illegal absences, accidental deaths, deficiencies in property, oaths taken and not kept. Separate courts would be convened to account for sub-headings yet to be defined. Nothing would be left out to prevent the court from putting together the true state of affairs. If I didn’t know the skipper, said Nash, I’d have thought he was off his rocker.
In the meantime, Mr Nash, there’s work to be done. The late navigator perished in the highest traditions of the Service. Bring his effects to me so that I can put them in a special box. As soon as practicable the next of kin of those men lost must be informed, and you may be sure I shall write proper letters of condolence, explaining how they died doing their duty while on active service. As there is no time to inter Flying Officer Rose on land we shall do it now, since we have to shed unnecessary cargo in order to get away. Find a weight to help him under the water.
It was action stations, and we prepared to cast off. A message was halfway through when I got back to the radio: … ‘HEMMED IN COVE STOP LIFEBOAT HIT STOP YOUR CHAP KILLED SLEEPING IN STOP TWO OTHERS DOWN WAIT WAIT WAIT.’
Bennett carried out pre-flight checks: controls free and fuel cocks off while the exactors were bled. Should I tell him about Armatage? He’s had it, Skipper. A shell struck the lifeboat and gave their ship a coat of paint. He couldn’t escape the net of God Almighty. Nor would I talk to Nash, or let lack of moral fibre take me over.
Vibrations from the port outer brought back life, and a willingness to do the utmost. Not to question showed pure health: stiff upper lip and press on regardless. The sound of propellers beating the air beyond the portholes set us breathing freely in our separate corners. The starboard outer roared its music up as if to push the cliffs further apart and reach the rest of the world so that even the deaf would hear. Bennett signalled Nash in the bows to slip our moorings. Outers and inners were run up in pairs, and we moved from the shore.
‘BOARDING PARTY ON US STOP SHIP GOING SOUTH TO YOU.’
I passed the chit to Bennett who, involved in the complications of take-off, relayed the info over the intercom. Nash responded from the tail, blood still wet. ‘Who forgot to swab the turret, then?’
Bennett was calm. ‘We’ll turn the cape, and take off as they come towards us.’
‘Mind their gun, Skipper.’
‘Will do.’
‘As we pass over their heads we’ll rake their decks.’
‘Good show, Nash.’
‘We’ve been in hotter spots, Skipper.’
‘You there, Appleyard?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘See what you can do from the front turret.’
‘I’ll shoot ’em with shit.’
‘Sparks?’
‘Skipper?’
‘What’s going on?’
Atmospherics raged like the noise of a forest fire. ‘I’m listening.’
‘Roger-dodger.’
‘Hi-di-hi,’ said Nash.
‘Ho-di-ho,’ Bennett said.
We taxied towards the water-runway of the straits. The Difda operator sent: ‘NOTHING TO BE DONE STOP CHEERIO QRU QRT.’ I tapped ‘GOOD LUCK’ – thinking it deserved to be our turn next but hoping for no such downfall. He pounded SOS three times, then screwed his key onto a continuous note so that anyone with a mind for rescue could home in on the bearing. After a few seconds his penny-whistle stopped.