Blackest of Lies (29 page)

“Now look.  I am trying to be polite.  Lieutenant Rice has tried to be polite but you
bloody
people simply will not listen.”

“It is my job to help save the lives of your men and we’re standing here wasting time.  How in God’s name do you expect me …” Thomson cocked his head to one side to catch the muted sound of laughter coming from the inner office.  The clinking of glasses was unmistakeable.  He snarled at Walker. “While you drink your … your
pink gins
, mothers’ sons are gasping their last.”

“You will
not
interfere in Naval matters,” bellowed Walker.  “It is none of your bloody business!”  He shook an infuriated index finger in Thomson’s face.  “And I’ll go one step further – if you dare to put to sea, it’ll be mutiny.  Do you hear me, it’ll be
munity!
  If I hear another word on this subject, I’ll have the whole lot of you locked up.”

Walker turned sharply about and strode back to his office door, turning at the last minute to shout. “For the bloody duration!”

**********

Duquesne’s arms were rubbed raw by the abrasive ratlines of the raft but at least they had kept him from being flung out into the sea to die.  Two men had already gone that way since the ‘entertainer’ and three or four more had simply succumbed to the cold – big men, too.  Funny – the cold wasn’t bothering him anymore.  He felt warm and sleepy and ready to drift off.  With any luck, he’d be picked up before he woke.  And why shouldn’t he have a quick nap?  Hadn’t he deserved it?  Kitchener would never survive this weather – he was a dead man – and he, Fritz Joubert Duquesne, was the man responsible.  Pride filled him with a comforting glow like strong liquor, swelling his chest.  “I did it, Mama!” he whispered.  Smiling quietly, he laid his head back against the cork lining of the raft, snuggling against it in an effort to make himself comfortable, and let the warmth engulf him like his mother’s embrace.

“Oi! Wake up you stupid crab!  Wake up!”

Duquesne found himself shattered out of his warm cocoon by the Petty Officer’s boot in his side, snapping him awake.  Christ!  That had been close!  That had been damn close!  He had seen so many of his friends die that way in the Veldt when they were fighting the British. 
He should have known better
.  The constant, exhausting shivering had started again but at least it told him he was still alive.  He glanced at the sailor who had saved him and nodded an exhausted ‘Thank you’, but he had to wonder how much longer he could take this.  Time had ceased to matter to him now – how many times had he painfully vomited seawater, how many times had he almost been catapulted over the side, how many men in his raft had already died of exposure?  “I’ll
survive
,” he croaked and, with that, the raft was driven abrasively onto the sands of Skaill Bay.  Duquesne felt the constant movement of the raft cease and painfully – gingerly – he unwrapped his arms from the ratlines.  He pulled himself wearily up and rolled over the top of the floats into the shallow water.  A final wave hammered him up the slope ahead of the raft, leaving him beached there like a pin-striped whale just below the waterline of piled seaweed and other rubbish dumped by the storm.  Blearily, he could see lights from a building not far away and he reached out a wavering arm towards it before he subsided face down into the harsh sand.

The last of his will power had gone just as he needed it.

**********

Boissier was sure that he was close to Skaill Bay but this God-awful weather and the failing light were making things tiresome.  He got Pickup to shine his torch on the map and checked the route so many times as he drove along that he almost collided with a crofter staggering down the road carrying a bundle.  “Jesus!” exclaimed Pickup.

“That was a close one, sir!” shouted Boissier to the old man.  “Where are you off to on a night like this?”

“A ship’s just gone down.  There’s probably going to be some sailors from it coming ashore at Skaill Bay.  It’s where things wash up always.  I brought some things to help them.”

“That’s all right, sir, you can go back home. No point in putting yourself at risk.  My colleague here is a naval doctor and we have military forces meeting us at Skaill House.  We have all the help we need without inconveniencing you.  You get yourself back home before you catch your death.”  Boissier was at his most emollient.

“Well,” hesitated the crofter, “if you’re sure, now.”

“Absolutely – but we’d better be off.  Every second counts, you know.”  With a wave, Boissier drove off, leaving the old man to feel his way back home in the teeth of the gale.

“Every second counts!” sneered Pickup, gently massaging the bruise on the side of his head.  “I don’t know how you think them up.”

Within five minutes, they were on the edge of the bay.  Both men got out of the car and walked over the encircling grass to the edge of the sand.  The bay was a mess – vast swathes of seaweed had been dumped almost up to the edge of the links below the house on the far side.  A yellowish light in an upper window glinted but there was no movement from inside.

Pickup pointed to the grass below the house, covered in bodies cast there by the waves.  One or two of them were moving feebly.  “Don’t look like army types,” he said, mournfully.

“No, you’re probably right.  But this is about as far south as they’d get before being blown out into open water.  Perhaps we should head back up …” A tiny flicker of movement at the north end of the bay caught his eye.  A man, dressed in dark civilian clothing and almost submerged beneath a layer of kelp, was feebly gesturing towards the lights of the house.  “Come on!” he shouted to Pickup.  Both men ran down onto the sand towards the survivor.  Who would it be?  Perhaps O’Beirne or one of the other servants.  Ten yards away, Boissier could see it was Duquesne.  Pity – it might have been better for him to simply have disappeared in the sea but, then, Kell wanted him recovered if possible.  A thought struck him and he nudged Pickup. “It’s Duquesne.  Now remember for God’s sake, call me Colonel Datchett!  That’s how he knows me.”

The Boer, however, was past caring and barely moving.  Pickup carried him quickly to the car where they forced some whisky past his salt-caked lips and swaddled him in the rough navy blankets they had carried with them from Stromness.  As Pickup cranked the car, Boissier dragged the unconscious body of a soldier past him and manhandled him into the rear seat with Duquesne.

“He was in the raft,” panted Boissier.  He gestured north and they set off again.  A quick check of the cliffs on the way – just in case – then they’d head east to Evie to keep clear of any official rescue parties and turn back south again, this time towards Kirkwall.  Vance had made arrangements for any survivors picked up by them to be given private wards in the Balfour Hospital under assumed names.

**********

Like Duquesne, Hubert’s last reserves of endurance were gradually slipping away from him.  Twice in the past half hour, he found himself drifting off despite the bitter cold of the water, and only the sensation of Farmer slipping from his grasp woke him in time.  Henry was a dead weight. 
Dead – please, God, no!
  The weather made it too dark to see if he was truly gone and his own fingers were so cold he couldn’t feel for a pulse in the older man’s neck.  Once again, Hubert kicked vigorously to raise Henry’s chin as far above water as he could.

Odd memories slipped in and out of his consciousness and he saw himself back in Ottowa, ‘starting at the bottom’, to use his father’s hackneyed expression. Then there was that girl on the reception desk – the dark haired French one – hotel work clearly had its good points, he thought.  But his father had noticed and, within the hour, she was gone from the building.  He loathed him for that – not so much for spoiling his adolescent fun but for destroying her livelihood.  He saw him standing there in those stupid tails of that stupid morning coat he normally wore … and then, smoothly, the black of the coat turned to khaki and his father had become his commanding officer, complete with Sam Browne belt and pistol holster.  But with
tails
. Why was the CO in tails?  Didn’t make sense.

He coughed painfully and retched, bringing up a little more salt water.  His cracked ribs moved a little, causing him to gasp in pain.  Boissier and his side-kick – what
was
his name again? – flitted briefly through his thoughts but for no good reason that he could think of.  He grasped Henry’s life preserver tighter as a wave, steeper than normal, lifted them high up and submerged them into the following trough.  For a terrifying moment, he thought he had lost Farmer in the dark, turbulent waters but a lucky sweep of the arm latched back on to his cork jacket.  The relief brought him fleetingly back to lucidity.  “Henry!  Henry, old man, I don’t know if you can hear me or if you’ve gone off to rip that tunic of yours but I think … I think we’re probably finished.  I’ve nothing left.”  The salt had left his voice a harsh whisper.  “I’m sorry I got you into this hellish mess.  Honest to …”

Guilty tears briefly flooded, unfelt and unseen, down his swollen face before he slipped finally into oblivion and drifted gradually away from his friend.

**********

Pickup sat like a dark blot in the waiting room of the Balfour while Boissier did his smooth stuff with the Registrar.  Bored, he picked up an elderly “War Illustrated” and flicked through some of the pictures of refugees from “Plucky Belgium” being housed in Alexandra Palace –
bloody freeloaders
– and the usual jingoistic stuff about the beastly Hun.  He snorted quietly to himself.  Who could believe this manure?

The hospital had turned out to be a small, single-storied affair with quaint chimneys – more of a cottage hospital than anything else.  Pickup thought he had seen better boarding houses but one of the nurses was a little stunner.  If only he could hang around to ‘look after our injured colleagues’, he might get to know her better.  That little Banfield piece had escaped justice, so to speak, and he was itching for some vicious fun.

Sensing someone walking past, he looked up from his magazine and
bloody hell
there she was – walking away from him, her shoes clack-clacking on the wooden floor … little tease! As she passed through the double swing doors at the end of the room furthest away from him, Boissier’s voice floated through, talking to that doctor.  Looked like the army bod had pegged it.  No surprise, really – those ‘Six’ types were all chinless inbreds – but the doc was telling Boissier that the civilian was ‘tougher than he looked’.  Well, bully for you, Fritz of the Veldt.  Now all we have to do is to spirit you away somewhere safe once you can walk.

**********

In the end, it was a wooden toilet seat from the
Hampshire
that saved their lives.  Sliding down the slope of a wave, it hit Hubert on the face
precisely
where he’d been coshed by Duquesne.  The shock and pain brought him back to the real world, even if only for a moment or two.  He could feel himself slipping back when the noise caught his attention.  After being in the water for over three hours and hearing only the shrieking of the wind, his ears were sensitive to any man-made sounds.  About fifty yards away, a fishing boat was looming through the darkness and sea spray.  They’d never see them and
where was Henry!
  Cursing his own weakness, he thrashed feebly around, frantically scanning the wave tops for any sight of him.  “Henry!” he shouted noiselessly. 
Nothing!
  They’d have a better view from the deck of the trawler, though.  He grabbed the toilet seat, almost out of reach within those few seconds, and ignoring the burning pain in his chest, waved it above his head.  Shouting was out of the question and they’d never have heard him anyway.

The boat moved slowly to his left, maintaining its distance.  It hadn’t seen him and his last hope for his friend began to die when he saw the boat slow and stop dead in the water, pitching about in the swell.  Through his swollen eyes, he could just make out something dark being dropped over the side –
a scramble net!
  Perhaps they had found Henry.  Each time he was lifted to the top of a wave, he could see the figure of a young boy climbing over the side and then grabbing hold of a heavy object in the water.  Soon, a man joined him to drag a figure over the weatherboard.  God!  He hoped it was Henry and he was still alive!  He relaxed back into the water, little caring if he were found or not, and looked blankly at the flag streaming back from the boat’s main mast –
Dutch
– what the hell was a Dutch fishing boat doing up here? 

Henry hopefully taken care of, Chris began to allow the warmth to insinuate itself back into his bones and seduce him to sleep when a further impact shattered him back to life.  “Not another bloody toilet seat,” he murmured as he felt a firm grip from above take hold of his life-preserver.  The boy, clad in a sodden Arran jumper and tea-cosy hat helped drag him over and dump him in a pile on the deck.  The smell of diesel and oil wafted around him like expensive perfume after his wretched time in the water.  Weakly, he tried to hold up his hand towards his saviours and thank them when he felt it grasped by the boy and held gently to his young cheek.  For a moment, he found this puzzling, to say the least – they were clearly a friendly bunch in Holland – when recognition struck him. 

“Took your time, Special”.