The Burning Shore (33 page)

Number two, hit And yet again, while the first two tall shining columns of spray still hovered, the third leapt high in the dark air beside them. Number three, hit. As Kurt still watched, the columns of spray mingled, subsided and blew away on the wind, and the great ship ran on, seemingly unscathed.

Chase is losing speed, Horsthauzen exalted. Altering course to starboard. The doomed ship began a wide aimless turn into the wind. It would not be necessary to fire their stern tubes.

Lieutenant Horsthauzen to the bridge, Kurt said into the voice tube. It was a reward for a task perfectly performed. He knew how avidly the young lieutenant would relate every detail of the sinking to his brother officers later. The memory of this victory would sustain them all through the long days and nights of privation and hardship that lay ahead. Horsthauzen burst from the hatch and stood shoulder to shoulder with his captain, peering at their monstrous victim.

She has stopped! he cried. The British ship lay like a rock in the sea.

We will move closer, Kurt decided, and relayed the order to the helmsman.

The U-32 crept forward, butting into the creaming waves, only her conning tower above the surface, closing the range gradually and gingerly. The cruiser’s guns might still be manned and only a single lucky shot was needed to hole the submarine’s thin plating.

Listen! Kurt ordered abruptly, turning his head to catch the sounds that came to them faintly above the clamour of the wind.

I hear nothing.

Stop engines! Kurt ordered, and the vibration and hum of the diesels ceased. Now they could hear it more clearly.

Voices! Horsthauzen whispered. It was a pathetic chorus, borne to them on the wind. The shouts and cries of men in dire distress, rising and falling on the vagaries of the wind, punctuated by a wild scream as somebody fell or leapt from the high deck.

She is listing heavily. They were close enough to see her against the stars.

She’s sinking by the bows. The great stem was rearing out of the black. She’s going quickly, very quickly They could hear the crackle and rumble of her hull as the waters raced through her, and twisted and distorted her plating.

Man the searchlight, Kurt ordered, and Horsthauzen turned to stare at him.

Did you hear my order? Horsthauzen roused himself.

It went against all a submariner’s instincts to betray himself so blatantly to the eyes of the enemy, but he crossed to the searchlight in the wing of the deck.

Switch on! Kurt urged him when he hesitated still, and the long white beam leapt out across half a mile of tempestuous sea and darkness. It struck the hull of the ship and was reflected in a dazzle of purest white.

Kurt threw himself across the bridge and shouldered his lieutenant from the searchlight. He gripped the handles and swung the solid beam across and down, slitting his eyes against the dazzling reflection from the ship’s paintwork; he searched frantically and then froze, with his fingers hooked like claws over the searchlight handles.

In the perfect round circle of the searchlight beam, the scarlet arms of the huge painted cross were outflung, like the limbs of a condemned man upon the crucifix.

Mother of the Almighty God, Kurt whispered, what have I done? With horrid fascination he moved the beam slowly from side to side. The decks of the white ship were canted steeply towards him, so he could see the clusters of human figures that scurried about them, trying to reach the lifeboats dangling from their davits. Some of them dragging stretchers or leading stumbling figures dressed in long blue hospital robes, and their cries and supplications sounded like a colony of nesting birds at sunset.

As Kurt watched, the ship suddenly tipped towards him with a rush, and the men on the decks were sent sliding across them, piling up against the railings. Then singly and in clusters they began to fall overboard.

One of the lifeboats let go and dropped out of control to hit the water alongside the hull and immediately capsized. Still men were dropping from the high decks, and he could hear their faint shrieks above the wind, see the small spouts of white spray as they struck the water.

What can we do? Horsthauzen whispered beside Kurt, staring with him down the searchlight beam, his expression pale and appalled.

Kurt switched off the searchlight. After the intense light, the darkness was crushing.

Nothing, said Kurt in the darkness. There is nothing we can do.”And he turned and stumbled to the hatchway.

By the time he reached the bottom of the ladder, he had control of himself again, and his voice was flat and his expression stony as he gave his orders.

Lookouts to the bridge. Revolutions for 12 knots, new course i5o degrees. He stood at ease as they turned away from the sinking ship, fighting theurge to lift his hands to cover his ears.

He knew he could not shut out the cries and shrieks that still echoed in his skull. He knew he would never be able to shut them out, and that he would hear them again at the hour of his own death.

Secure from action stations, he said with dead eyes, his waxen features wet with spray and sweat.

Resume patrol routine.

Centaine was perched on the foot of the lowest bunk in her favourite ward on C deck. She had the book open on herlap.

It was one of the larger cabins, with eight bunks, and all the young men in the bunks were spinals. Not one of them would ever walk again, and almost in defiance of this fact they were the noisiest, gayest and most opinionated bunch on board the Protea Castle.

Every evenin& during the hour before lights-out, Centaine read to them, or that was the intention. It usually only required a few minutes of the author’s opinions to trigger a spirited debate which ran unchecked until the dinner gong finally intervened.

Centaine enjoyed these sessions as much as any of them, and she invariably chose a book on a subject about which she wanted to know more, always an African theme.

This evening she had selected volume 11 of Levaillant’s Voyage dans Pint6rieur de IAfrique in the original French. She translated directly from the page of Levaillant’s description of a hippopotamus hunt which her audience followed avidly, until she reached the description:The female beast was flayed and cut up on the spot. I ordered a bowl to be brought me, which I filled with her milk. It appears to be much less disagreeable than that of the elephant and the next day had changed almost wholly to cream. It had an amphibious taste, and a filthy smell which gave disgust, but in coffee it was even pleasant. There were cries of revulsion from the bunks. My God! somebody exclaimed. Those Frenchies! Anybody who will drink hippo milk and eat frogs- Instantly they all turned upon him. Sunshine is a Frenchy, you dog! Apologize immediately! and a barrage of pillows was hurled across the cabin at the offender.

Laughing, Centaine jumped up to restore order, and as she did so the deck bucked under her feet and she was hurled backwards on to the bunk again, and the blast of a massive explosion ripped through the ship.

Centaine struggled up and was knocked down again by another explosion more violent than the first.

What is happening? she screamed, and a third explosion plunged them into darkness and threw her from the bunk on to the deck. In the utter darkness somebody tumbled on top of her, pinning her in a welter of bedclothes.

She felt herself suffocating and she screamed again. The ship rang to other cries and shouts.

Get off me! Centaine fought to free herself, crawled to the doorway and pulled herself upright, The pandemonium all around her, the rush of bodies in the dark, the shouts and senseless bawling of orders, the sudden terrifying tilt of the deck under Centaine’s feet panicked her. She lashed out to protect herself as an unseen body crashed into her, and then groped her way down the long narrow corridor.

The alarm bells began to ring through the darkness, a shrill, nerve-ripping sound that added to the confusion, and a voice roared, The ship is sinking, they are abandoning ship.

We’ll be trapped down here. There was an immediate rush to the companionway, and Centaine found herself borne along helplessly, fighting to keep her balance, for she knew if she fell she would be trampled. Instinctively she tried to protect her belly, but she was sent reeling into the bulkhead with a force that clashed her teeth and she bit her own tongue. As she fell, her mouth filled with the slick metallic taste of blood; she flung out both hands and they closed on the guide rail of the companionway and she hung on with all her strength. She dragged herself up the staircase, sobbing with the effort to keep her feet in the crush of panicstricken bodies.

My baby! She heard herself saying it aloud. You can’t kill my baby. The ship lurched, and there was the crackle and shriek of metal on metal, the crash of breaking glass, and the renewed rush and trample of feet all around her.

It’s going down! shrieked a voice beside her. We’ve got to get out! Let me out- The lights went on again, and she saw the companionway to the upper deck choked with struggling, cursing men. She felt bruised and crushed and helpless.

My baby! she sobbed, as she was pinned against the bulkhead. The lights seemed to sober the men around her, shaming them out of their blind terror.

Here’s Sunshine! a voice bellowed. It was a big Afrikaner, one of her most fervent admirers, and he swung his crutch to forge an opening for her.

Let her through, stand back, you bastards, let Sunshine through. Hands seized her, and she was lifted off her feet. Let Sunshine through! They passed her overhead, like a doll. She lost her veil and one of her shoes.

Here’s Sunshine, pass her up” She found herself sobbing as she was jostled and hard fingers seized her and bit painfully into her flesh, but she was borne swiftly upwards.

At the top of the companionway, other hands grabbed her and hustled her out on to the open deck. it was dark out here and the wind snatched at her hair and wrapped her skirts constrictingly about her legs. The deck was listing heavily, but as she stepped upon it, it canted even more viciously and she was hurled against a stanchion with a force that made her cry out.

Suddenly she thought about the helplessly maimed young men that she had left down there on C deck.

I should have tried to help them, she told herself, and then she thought of Anna. Hesitating and confused she looked back. Men still swarmed up and out of the companionways. It would be impossible to move against that throng, and she knew that she did not have the strength needed to assist a man who could not walk himself.

All around her the officers were trying to restore order, but most of these men who had stoically borne the hell of the trenches were terrified witless by the thought of being trapped in a sinking ship, and their faces were contorted and their eyes wild with unreasoning terror. However, there were others who were dragging out the cripples and the blind and leading them to the lifeboats along the rail.

Clinging to the stanchion, Centaine was torn with indecision and fear and horror for the hundreds of men below who she knew would never reach the deck. Then beneath her the ship rumbled and belched in its death throes, air rushed from the holes beneath her waterline with the roarings of a sea monster and the sound decided Centaine.

My baby, she thought. I have to save him, the others don’t matter, only my baby! Sunshine! One of the officers had seen her and he slid down the steep deck to her and put an arm around her protectively.

You’ve got to get to a lifeboat, the ship will go at any moment. With his free hand he ripped open the tapes that secured his bulky canvas life-jacket, and he pulled it off his shoulders and lifted it over Centaine’s head.

What happened? Centaine gasped as he knotted the tapes of the life-jacket under her chin and down her chest.

We’ve been torpedoed. Come on. He dragged her along with him, reaching for handholds, for it was impossible to stand unaided on the steep angle of the deck.

That lifeboat! We’ve got to get you into it. just ahead of them a crowded lifeboat was swinging wildly on its davits, an officer was bellowing orders as they tried to clear the jammed tackle.

Looking down the ship’s side, Centaine saw the black sea boiling and foaming, and the wind blew her hair into her face and half-blinded her.

Then, from far out on the black waters, a solid white shaft of light burst over them, and they flung up their hands to protect their eyes from the cruel glare.

Submarine! shouted the officer who held Centaine in the crook of his arm. The swine has come to gloat on his butchery. The beam of light left them and swivelled away down the side of the hull.

Come on, Sunshine. He dragged her towards the ship’s rail, but at that moment the tackle of the lifeboat gave way at the bows, and spilled its frantic cargo screaming into the pounding waves far below.

With yet another vast exhalation of air from her underwater wounds the ship swung further outwards to an impossible angle, and Centaine and the officer slid irresistibly across the deck and hit the rail together.

The merciless beam of white light moved from one end of the ship to the other and when it passed over them, it left them blinded and it seemed the night was even blacker and more menacing than before.

The swines! The bloody swines! The officer’s voice was rough and hoarse with rage.

We must jump! Centaine shouted back at him. We have to get off!

When the first torpedo struck, Anna was seated at the dressing-table in the cabin. She also had spent the afternoon working with the men on C deck and had left them only to help Centaine prepare for dinner. She had expected Centaine to be in the cabin waiting for her and was mildly irritated when she was not.

That child has no idea of time, she muttered, but laid out clean underwear for her charge before beginning her own toilet.

The first explosion threw Anna off the stool and she struck the back of her head on the corner of the bed. She lay there stunned while the successive blasts tore into the ship, and then darkness blinded her. She dragged herself on to her knees with the alarm bells deafening her, and forced herself to begin the drill that they had practised almost daily since leaving Calais.