Torpedo Run (1981) (7 page)

Devane looked at him. So it had touched him too. You never knew with Beresford.

Some of the British seamen gave an ironic cheer as the third MTB came up tautly against her lines some thirty yards from the shore. Once again, the operation was impressive, with vehicles and Russian engineers to manage the final unloading of the boats into their natural element.

Devane stood on the beach and watched. It was like seeing an amphibious invasion in reverse. Men scrambled over the gently swaying hulls, as if eager to free themselves from the land, to give their boats life again. Two destroyers cruised slowly off shore, and there was the distant drone of a patrolling aircraft to show they were still under protection. Devane watched the blunt-bowed fuel lighter chugging towards the first MTB to be slipped into the water. It was just as well they had air and sea cover, he thought. For until
Parthian
reached the Russian naval base at Tuapse, which according to his map lay some one hundred miles to the north-west of where he now stood, they would be unarmed and defenceless.

The fourth MTB, Lieutenant Willy Walker’s, edged down the great ramps, guided and controlled by steel warps as thick as a man’s wrist. He could see Walker fussing about
below her bridge, pointing and jabbing with his hands as if he were shadow-boxing.

A motley bunch. But they had worked and exercised together as a flotilla. In the Bristol Channel and up the Welsh coast, making mock attacks, and acting in cooperation with some commando units for good measure. Until the moment of completing the exercises, most of them had imagined they were getting ready for the invasion of Europe.

Devane tried to relax his limbs as the last of the boats moved slowly towards the ramps. His own. Where he would get to know the mettle of his small company and the strength of the flotilla he would now lead.

He had already met Dundas, his Number One, and what he saw he liked. The new third hand too, Lieutenant Seymour, a slim, willowy young man whose gentle appearance was totally at odds with his Distinguished Service Cross and a hair-raising battle he had fought off Crete to win it.

But Devane was not going to make the mistake of being too friendly from the beginning. He was to lead them, but first he must win their respect.

Dundas had been the only man so far to mention Richie by name. He had been the one to find him dead in a cabin aboard the fast transport which had carried the newly formed flotilla from the Mediterranean to the Gulf.

Bitterly Dundas had said, ‘I never thought he was that sort. He was full of drive. I sometimes hated him for being so damned good at his job.’ He had made it sound like a betrayal.

Devane found he had been clenching his fists as the boat came under the control of the line-handling parties and slewed round like a thoroughbred. Set against the shark-blue water which rippled on her flared hull, she was a boat which any man would give his arm to command. With her triple screws and three rudders she could accelerate from eight to thirty-nine knots in about eleven seconds.

He could see Dundas climbing astride one of the eighteen-inch torpedo tubes, beckoning to a seaman to lower a fender outboard as a fuel lighter puffed purposefully in his direction.

Even after her torpedoes had been fired each boat was still
a deadly force to be reckoned with. In addition to her power-operated six-pounder forward and twin Oerlikons aft, she also carried a variety of machine-guns and depth charges.

Devane could remember those first lectures at Gosport; it seemed like a century ago rather than three years. A stiff-backed torpedo gunner’s mate had lectured the new coastal forces officers on the substance of the boats they might one day command. The irony in his tone was not lost on them. Only half of those officers had come through unscathed.

That same petty officer had lingered over his carefully rehearsed statistics like a salesman. The hulls were constructed of laminated mahogany, with glue and four hundred thousand screws to hold them together, to say nothing of the copper rivets, a mile or so of wire and a few other bewildering items.

The MTB was swinging to an anchor now, and to his astonishment Devane saw that someone had even found the time to hoist a new white ensign at her gaff.

A great engine spluttered into life, and like tired monsters the big Russian carriers began to move up the beach towards the road. Some of the soldiers had gathered to watch the five restless motor torpedo boats, but they gave no hint of their feelings. Envy, contempt, it could have been anything.

Devane heard boots squeaking in the sand and turned to see Sorokin watching the anchored flotilla with professional interest.

Devane spoke carefully. ‘I should like to thank you, sir, for getting them here in safety. It must have been a great responsibility.’

Sorokin did not turn his head, but his mouth lifted slightly in a smile.

‘I would have hoped for more vessels.’ He shrugged. ‘But that is not your concern.’ His lips came together as Beresford came striding down towards them.

Beresford glanced curiously at the Russian before saying, ‘Ready, John? Old Hector Buckhurst has admitted to some
small
satisfaction, so that must mean you can proceed safely.’ He pointed towards an elderly launch which was idling close to the ramps. ‘That will take you out. I’ve had your gear sent
across. Lioutenant Kimber is coming with the base staff.’ He grinned. ‘By road. That’ll keep the rest of us out of your hair. For the moment anway.’

Devane nodded. ‘Thanks. That was thoughtful.’ He had pictured Beresford and the grim-featured Kimber watching his every move, recording each contact with his new command.

He looked up the beach. But for the great tracks there was no sign of the massive vehicles. Devane turned to say goodbye to Sorokin, but he too was already climbing into his little scout car.

Beresford murmured, ‘Never mind that one, John. The next meeting you have with him will probably be across a table, taking a bottling because you have done something to offend the Soviets.’ He grinned again. ‘
You
should worry.’

Devane realized that he and Beresford were the only two British people left on the beach. The sailors, like the Russians and their tractors, had withdrawn into their more familiar surroundings.

Beresford said, ‘Like a piece of Kipling, isn’t it?’

Then he drew back and they saluted each other formally, as if they had just met in no-man’s-land.

As Devane walked towards the waiting boat he knew Beresford would continue to his transport without looking back. It was his way.

The five boats were anchored in an uneven line, rising and falling in a slight swell, while their companies rushed from one checkpoint to the next. It looked as if they had never been out of water, Devane thought.

Dundas and Seymour were waiting for him, and in the small open bridge he received a smart salute from Pellegrine, the coxswain. He was a sturdy man with a brick-red face. A mixture of sea-time and drink. Very soon now he would know them all. He had read as much about his own command as he could. From Dundas down to an ordinary seaman named Metcalf, who was apparently a failed candidate for a commission. Even as the lowliest member of the boat, it was to be hoped he had no plans for proving he still had a special gift of leadership to offer. It could sometimes be
fatal.

Devane’s eye continued to move, his brain recording the reports of readiness as they were called from the deck or came up the various voicepipes.

He pictured the petty officer in charge of the boat’s powerful Packard engines. His name was Ackland, before the war a garage mechanic, so he should be all right.

Carroll, the leading signalman, was stooping down to push his flags firmly into their lockers, and another leading hand with leather gauntlets to protect him from snags in the mooring wires was mustering his forecastle party ready to weigh anchor. His name was Priest. Devane was satisfied, names were falling into place already.

Carroll said, ‘The senior escort is signallin’, sir!’ He triggered an acknowledgement with his Aldis before peering at a hastily compiled list of local signals.

‘Are you ready?’

Dundas asked, ‘Shall I call up the flotilla on the R/T, sir? It’ll save time.’

Devane slung his binoculars about his neck and tugged his cap firmly over his eyes.

‘No. You do it, Bunts. The sooner we get used to a minimum of radio communicating the better.’

Dundas watched him questioningly. ‘It’s a bit like being all on our own, sir.’

‘In a way.’ Devane listened to the clack . . . clack . . . clack of the signal lamp. ‘I’m told that the Russians don’t trust anybody they don’t know. Well, maybe they’ve got the right idea.’

Carroll called, ‘All acknowledged, sir.
Affirmative.
’

Devane walked to the forepart of the bridge and looked down across the top of the chartroom to the easy pitch and roll of the bows. He ran his hand along the screen, savouring the moment, prolonging it as he had in that hotel room in Chelsea.

‘Start up.’

With a cough and a savage roar the five boats thundered into life, their hulls partially misted over by a curtain of high-octane vapour. Then as they settled down to a steady
rumble Devane said, ‘Up anchor. Bunts, signal the flotilla to form line astern and take station on the leading escort.’

There was a clang from forward. ‘Anchor’s aweigh!’

‘All engines slow ahead.’ He glanced quickly at the coxswain’s set profile. ‘Steer nor’-west until we have station on Ivan.’

When next he glanced astern the other boats were following him out in a tight curve, the rearmost one’s wake already sloshing across the beach and wiping away the ruts left by the great carriers.

He saw some of his men looking at the land, probably wondering what they had got themselves into.
Never volunteer,
that was the guiding prayer in the Navy. But few ever remembered it until it was too late.

The guns were covered and pointed impotently at the shark-blue sea, and their tubes were empty.

Devane levelled his glasses on the leading destroyer. Toothless they might be, but they were back in the war.

Devane sat at his newly acquired desk and surveyed the flotilla’s shore office without enthusiasm. It was partially underground and, like Whitcombe’s HQ in London, had been constructed from gigantic slabs of concrete. There was no other similarity. The whole place seemed to throb with noises from the adjoining workshop, where Lieutenant-Commander (E) Hector Buckhurst had already set up his benches and drills, and from the strange, cavern-like dock beyond. The latter had originally been designed as a pen for Russian submarines, rather in the style of those built by the Germans along the Atlantic coastline to protect their U-boats from bombing raids.

The smells were just as difficult to live with. Diesel and high-octane, damp and boiled cabbage seemed to predominate.

He thought of their arrival at Tuapse the previous day. On the last leg of the passage from their launching point there had been several unexplained delays, which the senior Russian officer of their escort either found incapable of translating or felt it was none of Devane’s business anyway.

They had finally entered Tuapse as darkness had closed over the harbour and dockyard. It had been a depressing sight, with many of the long, finger-like wharves savaged by bombings, and several ships showing only their funnels or masts above water.

The town too, or what they had been able to see of it, was badly mauled, and a drifting smoke curtain had been hanging over it in the wake of some departing attackers.

As one seaman had remarked with some bitterness, ‘Christ, even Chatham’s better than this dump!’

Beresford had been waiting to greet them, and had been
quick to shoot down any immediate criticism from the various commanding officers. No bunks had so far been fitted in the concrete dock area, not even for the engineering and supply staff who had arrived by road. So that meant the MTB crews would have to make the best of it in their already overcrowded hulls.

And there was no mail for anyone either. It had taken a long while to move the flotilla from England to the Med, from there via the Canal to the Gulf. Even during the last part of the journey overland, somebody should have thought about the mail, how important it was to men away from home.

Beresford had hinted that the Russians might be able to help. He had said little more on the subject, but Devane suspected that the Russians considered such matters to be mere luxuries which would have to take second place. As if to prove this, Buckhurst had discovered that all the torpedoes, ammunition and spares had arrived undamaged and in mint condition.

The door opened and Beresford stamped into the room. He had a lively, intelligent face which was now marred by a frown. He slumped in a canvas chair and groped for his cigarettes. Then he sniffed the fuel-laden air and gave a wry grin. ‘On the other hand, better safe than sorry!’

Devane asked, ‘Any news of our first job?’

Beresford eyed him curiously. ‘You
are
keen.’

Devane thought of the passage to Tuapse, the way he had pushed each boat through as many drills as possible whenever the escorts had signalled them to heave to and await instructions.

They were certainly a well-trained bunch, he thought. Only
he
had felt like an outsider. They were raring to go, for the real thing. And to keep them kicking their feet in this dreary dump was bad for morale all round.

He said, ‘I don’t want it to go stale. You know the score.’

Beresford glanced at his watch. ‘I have a meeting today with the base commander. You’ll be expected to attend.’ He grimaced. ‘More vodka and champers, I expect.’

Before Devane could speak he added, ‘You’ve not asked
about Richie. That surprised me a bit. Your both coming from the same mould, so to speak.’

‘I was told to
say
nothing.’ He recalled Claudia’s voice on the telephone, the way Whitcombe and Kinross had questioned him about her, suggested they should meet. ‘I suppose he had his reasons. Remember that chap in Alex who blew himself up with a grenade because he was caught with his fingers in the mess funds? It always seems trivial to the onlookers, like us.’