Aitkyne’s brows lifted. “Better? Unfortunate choice of word, old cock. My will is with the family solicitor in Gloucester. If you haven’t made yours then I suggest you get on with it, just in case the thousand-odd to one shot comes off and he is right. Hedging your bets, old cock.”
Garrick swung on him sharply. He found Aitkyne smiling, but very serious.
VII
They called Smith at dusk. Garrick’s voice came urgent down the voice-pipe: “Captain, sir! Ship in distress off the starboard bow! I’m altering course!”
“Very good!” Smith could feel the heel of her as she turned tightly onto the new heading. Still stumbling from legs asleep, he yanked his oilskin from its hook and dragged it on as he climbed the ladder, the folds of it streaming out behind and clapping as the wind tried to tear it from him. The rain ran down his face and he was wide awake when he stepped onto the bridge gratings.
Garrick pointed. “There she is, sir.”
Smith wrapped an arm around a stanchion to steady himself against Thunder’s pitching and rolling. Her engines still rammed her on at that punishing and coal-devouring fifteen knots because Smith was certain the cruisers were somewhere astern of him and Ariadne and Elizabeth Bell waited in Malaguay for Thunder’s protection. Such as it was.
He lifted his glasses, steadied them, focussed, swept and found. She was a black ship on a wild, dark ocean as the night came down on her, and close inshore. Thunder was racing down on her.
Garrick said, “We signalled her by searchlight and she answered, She’s only got a poor signalling lamp but we made it out. Her engines have broken down and she’s sprung plates all along her bottom. She’s sinking but she reckons she’ll go ashore first. She lost one anchor and the other’s dragging.”
Aitkyne butted in, “Damn all chance she has either way. I know this coast. She’ll break up in minutes when she goes ashore.”
“What ship is she?” Smith asked, absently surprised that Garrick had not told him already. He stared at the image that danced in the glasses, thinking of the men aboard her, of their thoughts at this moment with that awful sea waiting to swallow them. Whatever the cost he would take them off. He lowered the glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I asked ‘what ship?’”
Garrick’s face streamed water but he licked his lips. “She’s the Mary Ellen, sir.”
Smith lowered the hand from his eyes and peered at Garrick, eyes strained, or wincing. “The Mary Ellen? Our collier? That Mary Ellen?”
“Yes, sir.” And Garrick lowered his voice. “We — we’re only a couple of hours or so out from Malaguay but we’ll barely have coal to go on to Guaya, sir. At fifteen knots —”
“I know!” Smith snarled it at him. He peered at the Mary Ellen not wanting to believe it was her and ground out, “What the hell is she doing here? I told Thackeray I wanted her at Malaguay not —” Then he clamped his mouth shut. It would do no good to bewail the fact as it would do no good for him to plead excuses when they broke him for leaving Thunder powerless and helpless. The collier was here before him and sinking, that was the fact. And she carried a crew of frightened men who would be hoping now. He pounded softly on the rail with his fist. Aitkyne looked from him to Garrick and there was sympathy in their exchange of glances. Smith’s fist was still, the knuckles white. Then he stared through Aitkyne and said huskily, “So you know this coast. Show me the chart.”
They went into the chartroom and stayed there long minutes. When they emerged Smith clung to the stanchion again and scowled stone-faced at the Mary Ellen as they closed her.
Then at last he came alive. “Slow ahead. Make to her: Stand by for a line. I will tow you.” He swung on the gaping Garrick. “Make ready to tow her.”
They could not believe it. Garrick looked at the shore and the sea then saw his thoughts mirrored in Aitkyne’s stare: It was impossible!
It was dark now, the Mary Ellen a tossing black bulk. There were lights on her bridge and there were lights on Thunder’s deck now and men milling aft where they worked frenziedly to rouse out the big towing hawser. From the Mary Ellen a signal-lamp faltered through a reply.
Knight read: “She says: Ship is sinking. Will you take off crew?”
Smith had read the signal himself and his answer was ready. “Reply: Negative. Stand by for my line.”
There was a shifting behind him on the bridge, a restive ripple that ran through the men there. He was aware of it, ignored it, eyes fast on the Mary Ellen. The lamp blinked again, still stumbling but faster now with a desperation about it. He watched and read it: Boats gone. Urgently request —
He did not wait for the rest of it. He could see for himself that her boats were smashed. She had taken a beating as she lay powerless under the storm. “Make: Negative. Stand by for line.”
Again that shifting, that ripple.
Garrick knew their eyes were on him, that if anyone should speak to the Captain it should be he but he was learning about this Captain, had learned a deal today as the Maria exploded and sank. He hesitated.
Smith sensed that hesitation as he had been aware of the shifting. “Everything ready aft, Mr. Garrick?”
“Yes, sir.”
The use of boats was out of the question in this sea. Ideally he should hold Thunder safely clear of the collier and drift a line down to her fastened to a cask. But time was against all of them. He said, “I want a man to throw a line from the stem. What about that big leading hand of yours —’’ he turned on Manton, “Buckley? Is he good?”
“V-very good, sir.”
Smith turned back to Garrick. “We’ll want fenders over the stern and this must be done handsomely. Better go aft yourself and see to it.”
So Garrick took himself aft and his uneasy conscience with him.
Smith ordered, “Port four points.”
“Four points of port wheel on, sir.”
“Midships.” Thunder steadied on the new course that would take her alongside of the collier. There was a light in the bows of the Mary Ellen now and figures moved on her fo’c’sle, crouched as the seas burst over them in spray. He could see the cable of the anchor she had tried to use to save herself. He snapped, “Starboard a point!” He would have liked the hawser made fast aboard the Mary Ellen to a length of her anchor cable. The towing hawser was wire, immensely strong but with little elasticity except that given by the curve in its length. The anchor cable was far heavier and would steepen that curve and give more spring, more elasticity to the tow to prevent it breaking. But there was no time for that operation. It was up to him not to break the tow. He edged Thunder closer as she drew abreast of the collier and crept past her. Thunder rolled and pitched and the Mary Ellen soared and fell and wallowed.
Smith was out on the starboard wing of the bridge now, eyes on the collier, gauging Thunder’s crawling progress against the collier’s dead rolling, narrowing on the strip of water that separated them. He was aware of the pale blur of faces on the bridge of the Mary Ellen and of one man who had to be her master, his mouth opening and closing and fists lifted and shaking at Smith.