Landfall (9 page)

The Air Force officer said keenly: “So that you must have been worried about her before 1541?”

Rutherford nodded. “In a way, we were. We should have been very worried if she had been diving. But there was no reason for her to dive on a passage of that sort. We thought it was probably a temporary wireless failure. We kept on sending to her till we got the signal from T.383.”

Dickens turned to the captain. “It’s a point to remember, sir.”

Burnaby nodded. “Certainly. I think there is no doubt that she was late on her schedule, and that she
became late after passing. It looks to me as if she had some accident or mechanical trouble which delayed her, and cut the current off from her wireless. Is that likely, Rutherford?”

The submarine officer shook his head. “I don’t think that quite fits. The wireless feeds straight from the battery.”

There was a tap at the door. A signalman entered and laid a slip of paper in front of Captain Burnaby.

“The captain of T.383 is outside, gentlemen,” he said. He turned to the signalman. “Ask him to come in.”

They all rose from the table as the new officer came into the room. He was a burly man, in shabby uniform. He wore sea-boots and a thick, dirty white sweater that rolled heavily around his neck beneath a very old monkey jacket stained with salt. On his sleeve the blackening gold braid ran in the undulating rings of a lieutenant in the R.N.V.R. In his hand he carried a half-empty seaman’s kitbag with some articles in it.

Burnaby said: “Good evening, Mitcheson. Is that what you picked up?”

The man said: “That’s right, sir. I brought it right along, soon as we docked, because I thought you’d want to see it. Hope you’ll forgive me coming in like this.”

He spoke in an undefinable manner as a civilian, which, in fact, he was. Twenty-one years before, as a young man, he had commanded just such another trawler as the one that he had now, on just such duties. In the years between he had longed for his naval uniform. He had had ups and downs of fortune. He had been in the motor trade in Bournemouth and in the wool trade in Bradford; for a time he had managed a laundry in Cheltenham. He had managed a road-house near London, on the Great West Road, and he had travelled in haberdashery. None of these ventures had been a great success, none of them utter failure. All the
time he had longed passionately for the sea. He knew that he had been better as a junior naval officer than in any of his other jobs. As war drew nearer he made all his preparations, pulled all his strings and got himself back into the Volunteer Reserve. War came and he was called up. Twenty years slipped off him like a cloak. Gieves, the naval tailor on Portsmouth Hard, gave him another sort of cloak, on tick. The Admiralty gave him
Rosy and Kate
, of Grimsby. God gave him happiness, and he went to work.

Burnaby said: “That’s all right, man. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

The burly man looked round. “Where will you have them? They’re all over oil and water still.”

Beyond the carpet there was a patch of linoleum by the window. “Put it there.”

The trawler officer untied the neck of the kitbag and turned it back. He put his arm in and drew out carefully some pieces of sodden pasteboard. Without a word he gave them to the captain.

Soaked through with fuel oil and wet with salt water, there was no mistaking them. They were the cartons of two packets of twenty Players’ cigarettes, more or less intact. Burnaby turned them over in his hand.

“Can you be sure these came out of the submarine?” he said.

Mitcheson said: “When I got there, there was a great deal of air coming up from something on the bottom, and there was a lot of oil about. These were floating in the middle of the slick, near the clothing.”

He turned the kitbag upside down and tipped its contents out on to the linoleum. A dark blue mass that was a seaman’s jumper fell out with a sodden flop, and a seaman’s cap rolled over to a corner. He reached into the bag and pulled out another cap. “That’s the lot, sir.”

A smell of fuel oil penetrated the room. Rutherford
picked up the jumper. “Has it got a number on it?”

The trawler officer said: “I looked for that, but I couldn’t find it.”

Dale said: “It’s probably a new issue.”

They turned over the articles. There were no numbers on them, though one of the caps had the initials A.C.P. inked on the leather band. All were sodden with fuel oil: they dripped little pools of it upon the floor.

Rutherford said: “I can’t see how they got so soaked in oil.” He glanced at Dale. “Funny, isn’t it?”

The other nodded. “Looks as if they’d been blown into a tank by the explosions.”

Burnaby said: “Anything might have caused that.”

Rutherford glanced at the trawler captain. “Is this all there was? Just these things?”

The man said: “That’s all we could see. It was just on dark, you know.” He hesitated, and then said: “As soon as I saw these I put a spar buoy down, right in the middle where the air was coming up.”

The submarine officer nodded. “What’s the depth?”

“Thirty-five to forty fathoms at low springs.”

Rutherford said very quietly: “Christ. We’ll never get a diver down to her.” He turned to Mitcheson again. “Did you hear anything upon the hydrophones?”

“Not a thing. We listened for a quarter of an hour before the drifter came up to take over. We heard the sound of air blowing out of something on the bottom. But nothing else.”

“No tapping?”

“No, sir. Nothing at all.”

Burnaby said:
“Redeemer
has been warned. She’s loading two air-compressors now. She’ll be ready to sail at midnight, with six divers on board.”

Lieutenant-Commander Dale said quietly: “There’s a gale warning, sir. Came through about an hour ago.”

There was a momentary silence.

Rutherford said wearily: “I doubt if it’s much good. Keep the drifter there, in case some of them get out with the Davis apparatus. But if there’s no more sound from her, I shouldn’t think it’s going to be much good to send out the
Redeemer
. You’d need a flat calm and slack water to put down a diver to that depth.”

The captain said: “I know.” He bit his lip; there was the risk to the
Redeemer
to be thought about. Salvage vessels were at a premium with ships being torpedoed daily round the coast: it would not do to have
Redeemer
anchored in the middle of the Channel, a sitting target for all passing German submarines. If there were any prospect of salvaging
Caranx
the risk must be taken: he dared not send the vessel out upon the slender hope of salvage that appeared at present.

He said: “I shall keep
Redeemer
standing by.” He turned to Dale. “Send
Redeemer
a signal, ordering steam at half an hour’s notice from midnight onwards.”

“Very good, sir.” The young man left the room.

The captain turned to the trawler officer. “I don’t think you need stay, Mitcheson. You can leave that stuff there.”

The man said: “All right,” and turned to go.

“Let me have your written report as soon as possible.”

“Very good, sir.”

The door closed behind him. The captain turned to his desk, away from the sad heap of sodden clothing on the floor beneath the window. The smell of fuel oil filled the room, a reminder in this quiet place of the grim facts of war. For once Captain Burnaby was tired. He was tired of being responsible for the safety of ships. He was worn out with his anxieties. He was tired of being stern with men to make them careful. All he had done could not avert disaster. First
Lochentie
, practically right beneath his nose in spite of his patrols, and
now
Caranx
. God knew, he had tried hard enough. He had not spared himself.

The two Air Force officers and the commander from Fort Blockhouse waited patiently for him to resume the meeting.

Mechanically the captain reached for a cigarette from the silver box upon his desk. His sleeve brushed an Air Force cap and overturned it. There was a metallic clatter on the desk. An object rolled over on to the blotting-pad and miraculously became alight. A moulded glass rabbit glowed suddenly upon the writing-desk, staring at the captain with illuminated crimson eyes.

Burnaby stared at it, startled from his mood.
Caranx
was lost, and this rabbit was a grotesque joke. It was no time for jokes. The swift, choleric anger rose in him; he stared round at the officers beneath the beetling, bushy eyebrows. “Who does this thing belong to?”

Chambers said: “I’m sorry, sir. It’s mine.” He stepped forward and picked it up, switching it off.

The captain said icily: “I might have guessed that, Mr. Chambers.” He strode over to the green baize table and sat down again at the head of it, suddenly furious. The others sat down in their chairs again.

Burnaby said: “Well, gentlemen, I shan’t keep you much longer. You’ve heard what has been said. I shall report to the C.-in-C., and he, of course, will order a Court of Enquiry to be convened.”

He stared grimly at Dickens. “I don’t know what your view is, Wing-Commander. In my mind there is no doubt that
Caranx
was sunk by this young gentleman with you, who does not seem to me to be sufficiently responsible to carry out the duties you entrust him with. The Court of Enquiry will settle where the blame should lie for the accident, whether with the captain of
Caranx
or with the pilot. And we must try to get the Court to make some recommendations that will prevent
such valuable vessels being lost like this in future. I think that’s all. Is there anything else before we disperse, Wing-Commander?”

Dickens said slowly: “I don’t think so. From what I’ve heard I feel that the blame does not rest solely on Mr. Chambers for this accident. The only other thing I have to say is what I am sure you know already—that we in the Air Force regret the accident most deeply.”

The captain said coldly: “Thank you, Wing-Commander.” He got to his feet and the others rose with him.

Chambers said hesitantly: “I’d like to say one thing. If I did make a mistake, I’m most frightfully sorry.” He paused and then said: “It’s sometimes a bit difficult when you’ve got to act very quickly.”

The captain nodded shortly, a grim, square-jawed figure; the iron-grey hair and bushy eyebrows were more formidable than ever. “No doubt, Mr. Chambers,” he said curtly. “But when you act quickly you’ve got to be right.”

He bowed to them as they left the room. At his side the commander from the submarine depot gathered up his papers. The captain stood staring at the closing door and then relaxed. “A bad business,” he said quietly.

The submarine commander said: “Yes, sir.” The only thing to do was to look upon one’s mates as ciphers, figures that left no more regret than figures on a blackboard when they were rubbed out. Deep personal friendships were no good in time of war. They were luxuries of peace-time, like the ski-ing holiday in Switzerland that he ached for in these black months of the winter.

His mind reverted to the technical aspects of the case, and his brow wrinkled in perplexity. “I can’t make out why
Caranx’s
hull should have been rusty,” he said. “I
wonder if any of this new degaussing stuff is doing it? I hope to goodness we’re not in for trouble there.”

The captain nodded. Technical matters were impersonal and easy, a relief to talk about. “You might have a word with Simmonds in the
Vernon
about that.” He was silent for a minute, and then said: “Funny the way those things were soaked in fuel oil.”

They glanced down at the sodden heap on the linoleum. The commander said: “I suppose in a mixture of oil and water they take up the oil in preference to the water.”

The captain said directly: “Well, I thought it was the other way about. I thought the surface tension of oil was greater than water, and that in a mixture they would take up water rather than the oil.”

The commander smiled. “I’m afraid you’ve got me there, sir. I should have to look up the text-books.”

Captain Burnaby turned away, a little heavily. “I must be wrong about it—anyway, it doesn’t matter.” There was a little pause. Outside the rising wind whipped round the building with a faint moan in the utter darkness. “We can’t send out
Redeemer
,” he said quietly. “I don’t think it’s justifiable.”

The submarine officer inclined his head. “I don’t think it is.” Thirty miles away, deep under the black, wintry sea, young Sandy Anderson must be already dead. That letter to his mother was going to be the worst one of the lot, much worse than the ones to the wives. It would be foolish to expose
Redeemer
to the risk of a torpedo. Burnaby was right.

He said heavily: “The only thing to do now, sir, is to see that this can never happen again.”

The captain’s lips set in a thin line, the bushy eyebrows drew together in a frown. “I’ll do that,” he said grimly, “if I’ve got to put a naval officer in every aeroplane of the Coastal Command.”

I
N
the car on the way back to the aerodrome, creeping at slow speed through the utter darkness, Chambers said to the wing-commander beside him:

“I know it looks bad, sir. But I’m still absolutely positive that there was nothing on the hydrovanes.”

From the blackness of the seat beside him Dickens said: “I wonder if the paint could have got rubbed off?”

“No, sir. I saw grey paint—definitely.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have a job to convince the Navy of that, in face of all the other evidence.”

The boy shrugged his shoulders hopelessly. “I can only tell you what I saw.”

They drove on in silence. In the chill blackness the wing-commander sat huddled up in his coat in his corner of the saloon, thinking ruefully of the enquiries that would follow. He would not escape censure for his modification of the order about
Caranx
. He had done it for the best, or so he had thought at the time, but it would be chalked up against him in the service. This static war might last for ever; peace might come and find a surplus of wing-commanders in the Royal Air Force. He might be forced into retirement at the age of forty, all through this young fool Chambers.