Brave Company (15 page)

‘Russ? Hey! Boy Seaman Purchas?' Voices kept nagging at him. ‘Hey, Russ?' He tried to turn over, pull the bunk blankets up over his head. His injured shoulder stabbed, and he jerked awake.

He was in the jeep. Just him and Sa-In, who was also slumped half-asleep, wincing and clutching his ribs as he tried to struggle upright. Major Davies stood by the door; the others were gone.

Faces stared at him. O'Brien. Noel. Petty Officer Ralston. Others from
Taupo
's supply party. Some grinned; some looked worried; some seemed as though they couldn't believe their eyes.

The Red Watch PO stepped forwards to help him out, but the tattooed arm of O'Brien got there first. Russell could hardly stand. His legs shook; his head kept wobbling.

‘Easy, lad,' O'Brien went. ‘Take it easy. Suppose you'll want to be let off rubbish detail now!'

Someone cried out. The little girl – Yong Mee – came rushing across from the cookhouse to Sa-In. He put one arm around her, closed his eyes for a second. Her voice was high and frightened, and she pointed at his battered, bleeding face. As he replied, she went silent. She took a breath and said something else. Sa-In shook his head, and the girl's face crumpled into tears. Russell knew instantly what they'd been talking about. We've both lost someone, he realised. But I've been lucky: I found my person again – the real person. I know who my uncle was now.

The Korean boy took the bars of chocolate that the black soldier had given them, and passed them to his sister. He murmured something, and pointed to Russell. Once again, the small figure trotted over to him and bowed. ‘Sank you,' she said, through her tears.

‘No.' Russell had to concentrate to speak properly. If it weren't for O'Brien's arm still supporting him, he'd probably have fallen over. But he looked at Yong Mee, and he looked at her brother. ‘No,' he said again. ‘Thank
you
.'

He saw only blurred bits of the trip back to the harbour. More arms had helped him across to the lorry – the now-working lorry – then lifted him carefully into the back, laid him down on a bed of blankets and sacks and spread more blankets over him.

A few times when they stopped, or when some especially noisy vehicle roared past, he jerked half-awake and glimpsed lines of troops marching up towards the front, laden lorries grinding by. The ruined farmhouses and deserted fields slid past. He thought of Sa-In, and of the enemy soldier who'd spared their lives. Had he died in the retreat? The retreat after an attack that had brought … what?

His shoulder ached, but the pain felt further away. The air was bitter chill, even though the blankets were tucked warmly around him. How strange that all this had happened away from the frigate. He'd wanted so much to prove himself to those on board. But it had all happened somewhere else instead.

Oh well, he knew now that in his family there always
had
been a courageous person. Was he another one? He didn't know. When he was back on board, he'd … he couldn't remember what it was that he'd do.

Then he was asleep again.

They'd piped him aboard.

When the supply party finally arrived back at the harbour, after their slow, stop-start journey on the crowded road,
Taupo
was tied up to a nearly rebuilt wharf. O'Brien and others helped him out of the lorry, holding him by the elbows as he lurched. ‘You all right, lad?' PO Ralston asked. ‘They're ready for you.'

He hadn't understood at first. He saw PO Lucas and half a dozen others from Blue Watch, Kingi among them, lined up at the head of the gangway. As he stumbled across the wharf towards the ship, they all came to attention. The petty officer lifted the whistle that hung from a lanyard around his neck, and a series of shrill notes rang out on the cold air. Piping Aboard: it
was the formal welcome for visiting or returning senior officers, admirals and commodores and such. Russell stopped. Looked around to see who was coming.

Nobody. Just him and the supply party. PO Ralston smiled at him. ‘Well, come on, Boy Seaman. You don't want to keep the navy waiting.'

He couldn't believe it was happening. It shouldn't be. It wasn't right; he didn't deserve it. Even as he began to walk – stagger – up the gangway, and saw Captain Moore and Commander Yates arriving to join the others, he expected a hand to push him, and a voice call, ‘Wake up, Russ! Stop dreaming!'

But it was real. As he neared the frigate's deck, PO Lucas stopped piping, tucked the whistle away in his tunic pocket, then snapped his right hand up in a salute. The other members of Blue Watch did the same. Captain Moore stepped forwards, saluted also, then shook Russell's hand.

‘Well done, Boy Seaman Purchas. You helped save the life of one of our side. We're proud of you.'

Somehow, Russell managed to pull his mind together enough to salute in return. It wasn't me, he wanted to say. Sa-In was the one who saved him, who saved me, too. But Kingi and the other Blue Watch blokes by the gangway were watching him. Commander Yates was also stepping forwards to shake his hand, and he heard himself mumbling ‘Thank you, sir. Thank you.'

He'd done what he'd always dreamed of, he realised. He'd shown the whole ship that he could be brave. Yet … yet it wasn't really like that. It wasn't just being a hero and beating the evil commies. Everything was so much more complicated than he'd imagined. He'd have to try and work it out – sometime. Just now, all he wanted to do was sleep.

He did, all through the night, even though his shoulder, strapped up by Lieutenant Commander Merrill, jabbed through him each time he tried to turn over in his bunk. He got up for breakfast, and listened half-awake as Kingi talked excitedly about how they'd stormed out of harbour at top speed to join the bombardment as soon as news of the attack reached them. ‘Should have realised you were up there, Russ. That's why the commies tried their advance, eh? To capture someone really important?'

His head flopped forwards again over his mug of tea. He tried to struggle to his feet as the intercom called ‘Blue Watch on duty', but a hand stopped him. ‘Not you, Boy Seaman,' said PO Lucas. ‘We don't want any sleepwalkers on deck. Don't worry: the gun turret needs a good clean out after yesterday's firing, and we'll save that little job for you. We'll tie scrubbing brushes
to your feet if your shoulder's still crook. Back to bed in the meantime.'

Inside three minutes, he was in his bunk and asleep once more.

They all assembled on deck the next morning. Nobody knew what it was about. ‘Maybe they're going to promote you to admiral straight away?' Kingi whispered to Russell.

Captain Moore appeared, and stood them at ease. ‘Men, I regret to inform you that we've just received a signal announcing that His Majesty King George VI is gravely ill in hospital. Fears are held for his life. Caps off while we pray for His Majesty's recovery.'

They stood silent, heads bent while the freezing wind blew past. Even a king has battles to fight, Russell thought.

Two days after that, Russell had recovered enough to be back on light duties. That meant emptying rubbish (one-handed), and a short spell on bow lookout.

The rest of the crew smiled and nodded, or patted his back when they passed. It made him feel awkward.
I don't deserve it, he wanted to tell them. Buchanan went by once, and Russell heard a sneer. ‘Big hero, eh?' He said nothing.

In mid-afternoon, he stood in the bows, wrapped in a new duffle-coat (‘What did you do?' demanded Quartermaster Katene, as he examined the torn, filthy one. ‘Fire it at the enemy?'), plus gloves, woolly hat and sea boots.
Taupo
glided through a perfect green sea under a perfect blue sky.

A perfect and bitterly cold blue sky. Ice hung from rails, rigging, gun barrels. Other members of Blue Watch were chipping it off. ‘When d'you reckon your shoulder will be better?' complained Noel, as he hacked at one stubborn chunk. ‘I'm sure you'd enjoy this job.'

Russell grinned. ‘Oh, be about five years till I can help. Or ten, maybe.'

Christmas was just over a month away. There'd be extra rations for everyone, and extra pay. He was going to send some of his pay to Sa-In and Yong Mee. He didn't know how, but he'd find a way.

A hazy low line of coast lay a mile away. Sea and sky were empty and quiet, but he knew now what could be happening behind those quiet hills. The peace talks were dragging on. According to O'Brien, the front between the two sides even included a line painted down the middle of the table in the building where the talks took place. ‘Wonder what happens if somebody's
pen rolls over the line?' went Kingi. ‘Maybe they open fire on it?'

It all seemed pretty stupid to Russell. But then, so did war in some ways.

On his second day back on board, he'd been called to the captain's cabin, to describe exactly what had happened. He sat in a brown armchair, while Captain Moore sat opposite, smoking a pipe and chatting away as if he was a friend of the family. Russell told him about the jeep ride, the sudden bombardment and the shell that injured Sergeant Barnett, the terrifying enemy attack (his voice began to shake as he described it), how Sa-In had saved them. ‘He was the hero, sir. I wasn't.'

Taupo
's commanding officer watched him quietly. ‘You would have been if you had to, son. You did well.' As Russell left the cabin, Captain Moore returned his salute, and said, ‘Your uncle would have been proud of you.'

Russell remembered the artillery sergeant speaking the same words. He hoped they were both right.

A call echoed down from the crow's-nest lookout. ‘Smoke. Bearing 300 degrees. Two miles.' An acknowledgement came back from the bridge. When
Russell raised his binoculars, holding them carefully so they didn't drag at his bad shoulder, he could see a mast and funnel starting to appear above the horizon, heading in their direction. A warship. The frigate sailed steadily on; the other vessel must already have been identified as friendly.

Russell lowered the binoculars, and looked around him. He'd had a letter from his mother. One from Graham, too, talking about footie, and the motorbike he was saving for. ‘Hope you're showing those Koreans what a Kiwi bloke can do,' his friend had written. Russell knew it had been the other way round.

He hadn't replied to Graham yet, but he'd almost finished a letter to his mother. He'd told her about Uncle Trevor – not how he'd heard the truth and where he was at the time; that would only make her feel afraid for him. But he'd said how he knew just what a hero his uncle was, and how proud they could all feel of him. He didn't say anything about the letter he'd found three years ago: the letter that in some ways had started all this. He didn't tell her about being caught in the attack or being hurt, either. He didn't need to.

The other warship was closing on them fast. A US destroyer, Russell saw now as it sped past, klaxon blaring in salute while the New Zealand frigate replied. He watched the lean grey shape, the curve of foam under its bows, long barrels of guns pointing fore and
aft. Beautiful. And deadly. That was war, too.

He gazed back along his own ship's deck. Everything he saw held memories for him. The searchlight and the boat full of refugees: he hoped they were safe somewhere. The Bofors gun and the enemy ship they'd sunk: what had happened to that frightened young North Korean they'd hauled on board? Thinking of him made Russell think of the other young enemy, the soldier who had spoken to Sa-In on the battlefield.

He glanced at the ship's rails, and remembered those desperate rushes from side to side on the sandbank, while terror welled inside him. The four-inch gun turret: oh no, he was going to have to scrub it out!

Kingi had been right. The navy and war were just one weird thing after another. Maybe there'd be more of those things to come? If there were, he could handle them.

‘Boy Seaman Purchas!' He jumped at the sound of his name. PO Lucas was marching along the deck, waving a slip of paper. ‘Radio message for you. You must be getting famous.'

Kingi and the rest of Blue Watch whistled and called out. ‘The UN wants you for a beauty contest' … ‘Nah, the navy wants you to scare away seagulls.'