Dunkirk Spirit Part 47

'There's a minesweeper,' said Burnell, so tired he spoke in a monotone. 'Let's off-load them and make our own way home.'

'Sounds like a good plan to me.' Charlie nudged Tom in the ribs. 'You heard the officer! Make it so!'

'Captain's compliments, sir,' said a remarkably young midshipman. 'But he says, if you like, you can have his cabin. There's a bunk in there and you can get your head down.'

'Well, that's remarkable kind of him,' said the Padre. 'Are you sure he doesn't mind? Won't he want to use his bunk?'

The midshipman laughed. 'The skipper's not been to bed since last Sat.u.r.day, sir. I'm sure he can spare it for a few hours yet. Come this way, please.'

'Well, this is wonderful,' smiled the Padre. He stepped inside the tiny cabin and looked straight at the bunk.

'Make yourself comfy, sir,' said the midshipman. 'We won't be off for a while. Signals duty,' he explained. 'The steward will be round in a moment. I can't promise anything hot but you're sure to get a nightcap. Sleep well!' He stepped back and slid shut the door.

Joy filled the Padre's heart. An awful weight rose from his shoulders and his soul lightened. He sat on the bunk and bounced up and down. The cot was hard but more inviting than any feather bed. He stroked the course blanket with both hands and shut his eyes. His feet were so hot that he could visualise them as two sizzling pork chops squeezed inside his boots. He opened his eyes and began untangling the laces. He had removed both tattered socks, peeling them off like a second layer of skin, and was examining the filth caked between his toes, when his nostrils rebelled. The Padre was mortified. His feet stank to high Heaven. The steward might be here any minute. He might die from sheer embarra.s.sment.

The socks were not worth putting back on. He quickly slipped his feet inside the cold wet boots and bundled the socks into a ball. He was working to unscrew the last b.u.t.terfly nut on the sole porthole when there came a gentle tap at the door and then it slid open.

'Good evening, sir,' announced the steward. He sniffed the air. 'Got you a nice fried egg sandwich and a large whisky and soda.' He held the tray in his hands and tilted his head to one side as he studied the Padre. 'Is there anything wrong, sir?' he asked.

The Padre was as lost for words as he had been in the presence of Miss Julia Shaw. He felt his face flush red. 'I, urgh, I was just trying to get some fresh air,' he finally explained.

The steward stepped forward and placed the tray down. 'Oh, you don't want to do that, sir. Not when we're at action stations. Got to keep the barky watertight, you know.' He spoke as if he had a heavy head cold. 'Anyway, sir,' he said, stepping back into the companionway. 'Get that down yer, and then have a good kip. I'm sure you've earned it!'

'Well, I found the problem,' announced Charlie, stepping back onto the bridge. 'The fuel's contaminated. There's water in it.'

'What!' exclaimed Burnell.

'Yeah,' confirmed Charlie. 'That would account for it.'

'Can't you siphon it off?' asked Burnell.

'Don't be daft! Don't they teach you nothing in the Navy?'

'Navigation's my line,' explained Burnell. 'I'm not very good with motors and things.'

'Well, we're b.u.g.g.e.red, either way,' announced Charlie. 'We're gonna have to wait 'till first light and get a tow.' He tilted his head towards Phoebe's crowded decks. 'Or we could 'ave this lot get out and push.'

'I could ring the bell,' suggested Tom.

'Yeah, you do that,' agreed Charlie. 'I'm gaggin' for a cuppa but there's no way I'm squeezing my way back through that lot,' he exclaimed. 'How many blokes you got aboard this time?' he asked Burnell.

'Search me!'

'K'dong! K'dong!'

'I'm glad this is the last day,' announced Charlie. 'I'm getting too old for this malarkey.'

Burnell looked at him.

'I could be sitting in my shed,' he explained. 'Not this time of night, obviously, but instead of all this, I mean.'

'Shed?' asked Burnell.

'K'dong! K'dong!'

'Yeah,' explained Charlie. 'I've got a nice shed on my allotment at Teddington. It's my home from home. I've got things set up just how I like 'em. I've got my little portable wireless, a primus stove and a very comfy armchair.'

'What sort of things do you grow, on your allotment?' asked Burnell.

'Well, I didn't bother much, not 'till this lot kicked off. I used to go more for the luxury items, like strawberries and other soft fruits. Now,' he sighed. 'Now, it's all potatoes and carrots, runner beans and cabbages. I like the soft fruits. I can eat them in my shed.'

'K'dong! K'dong!'

'Can't really chew on a cabbage, can you?' laughed Burnell. 'I'm hoping to get a little place with a garden myself. I'm just married, you know.'

'Yeah, I know. You told me.'

'I've always liked Hampshire. I had a job in Southampton in shipping. Lovely country around that way. I thought I could grow vegetables and things. It paints a lovely cosy image, baskets of fresh flowers, the smell of baking bread from the kitchen.'

'A screaming brat, wet nappies hanging all over the place...'

'K'dong! K'dong!'

'Zzzzzz! Zzzzzz!'

'Bull's eye!' exclaimed Burnell.

'And now we can get our tow home,' laughed Charlie. He cupped his hands to his mouth. 'Taxi!'

'You can't credit some peoples' luck, can you?'

'How d'you mean?'

'Well,' explained the sergeant major. Both men wore the shoulder flash of the Royal Suss.e.x Regiment. 'What are the chances of picking up those blokes like that? In the near total dark?'

'Hundreds to one,' speculated the corporal. 'Thousands to one?'

'Something like that. I only hope it don't slow us down any, towing that little pleasure cruiser behind us. Me, I can't wait to get home.'

'What's the first thing you're going to do?' asked the corporal.

'Hot meal.'

'What about a drink?'

'Okay, a couple of stiff drinks, then a piping hot meal.'

'And then?'

'Bed. I'm going to sleep for a thousand years.'

The corporal's face light up as if he had stepped into the limelight. The sergeant major then felt a blast of hot air across the back of his neck and his helmet slammed forward, giving him a nasty crack on the nose.

'f.u.c.k me!' exclaimed the corporal. 'What the f.u.c.k was that?'

'G.o.d knows!' winced the sergeant major, visibly shaken. He turned around but there was nothing to see. There was the sound of hissing water and the soft splash of debris. .h.i.tting the surface. But he failed to notice that the towrope had gone slack.

Sub-Lieutenant Kenneth John Burnell, Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve; Leading Seaman Thomas Norman Armstrong, Sea Cadet Corp; Charles Aloysius Lavender, retired Thames Lighterman; and four-hundred-and-eighty-three men known unto G.o.d.

Day Seven.

01:15 Sat.u.r.day 1 June 1940.

Off La Panne, Belgium.

's.h.i.t! There goes another one.' Leading Seaman Stewart Cragg winced. The horizon flashed momentarily white and a bright orange point glowed for an instant like the tip of a child's sparkler. He turned his head to one side, just in time to see Nipper's heavily lined face illuminated like a Guy Fawkes mask.

'f.o.o.king mines,' mumbled Nipper.

The crew of HMS Cameron's starboard 20mm anti-aircraft gun waited in silence for the sound of the blast to reach them. First came the shockwave, racing like a tropical wind, rippling the surface of the black sea, and then pa.s.sing through the body of every man aboard the quietened ship. A gush of nausea forced Cragg to screw his eyes tightly shut. He could see the point of the explosion etched inside his eyelids. Then came the sound, a deadly, low-level boom that tore at his brain and reverberated deep inside his chest. Although the night fell silent again, a dull ringing tone continued inside his head.

'f.o.o.king mines,' mumbled Nipper again after several minutes of comparative quiet. He spoke in barely a whisper. 'Give me something I can shoot back at. Not those nasty, lurking things.'

A deathly silence cloaked the ship. Only the far-away hum of her engines and generators penetrated the steel decks. They stood in strained silence, scouring the dark night and waiting.

b.u.mp!

Cragg and the rest of the gun crew went rigid. He could hear his heart pounding in his ears. There came another thump out of the dark on the port side of the ship and cold sweat broke through the skin on his forehead soaking into his anti-flash hood.

'Sweet Jesus!' Cragg reached down and pinched his thigh, ensuring he was still alive. He let his breath out in relief. 'Go see what that was,' he jerked his head towards Soapy.

The gun's number three stood frozen, his eyes startlingly white in the night.

'Go on!' repeated Cragg. 'Go see what that was. And make it snappy!'

Cragg and Nipper watched Soapy disappear into the dark. They gave each other concerned looks.

'It's the skiff come back,' explained Soapy some minutes later. 'They said we're wasting our time.'

'What?' asked Cragg.

'There ain't no one left.'

'So what we doing here then?' asked Cragg. 'All this creeping about in the dark is getting on my nerves. Give me something to shoot at!'

'That's what I said,' huffed Nipper, indignant.

'Well that was a waste of time,' said Lieutenant Commander Gordon Hubbard to himself. He lent towards the voice pipe. 'Slow ahead both.'

He consulted the chart in the glow of the binnacle light. There was a clear channel running all the way to Bray. He could afford to pull further off from the sh.o.r.e until they reached the Zuydcoote Pa.s.s. 'Starboard five.'

'Starboard five it is, sir.'

'Steer two-six-zero.'

'Two-six-zero it is, sir.'

'Don't let your cocoa get cold, Number One,' smiled the Skipper stepping out of the gloom.

Gordon smiled back. The drink was already stone cold. He lifted the mug and took a lengthy gulp.

'We shall have better luck at Bray,' said the Skipper. 'And let's be away before first light.'

HMS Cameron cruised slowly away from Belgian waters and along the silent French coast. The sandbanks might not be so treacherous but their route lay littered with wrecks and mines. Back at Dover there had been talk of E-boats and submarines, too, including one report of a n.a.z.i E-boat donning false mast and sails so she could lurk in the dark and blend in with the rescue fleet.

'Something up ahead, sir,' hissed one of the lookouts.

Gordon looked up from the chart and spoke into the voice pipes. 'Dead slow ahead. Starboard ten.'

'Wreck off the port bow,' came a hushed call from the eyes of the ship. 'Three cables away.'

'Starboard five,' called Gordon, swinging Cameron out of harm's way. 'Midships. Slow ahead both.'

'Signal from the wreck, sir.' The lookout startled every one on the bridge.

'Why we stopping again?' asked Cragg. 'Talk about sittings ducks!'

Nipper shook his head. They felt the vibrations beneath their feet drop a pitch as Cameron came to a dead stop in the water. The gun crew p.r.i.c.ked their ears for any clues. First came the sound of running feet, then a few hushed orders, and finally dozens of small thumping sounds.

'Go on Soapy! Go have another look.'

'Why me?'

''Cos I b.l.o.o.d.y say so. Now go on. Look lively!'

Gordon stood near the rail watching the solders clamber aboard Cameron. He made a count and kept his eyes open for officers. Eventually, he moved to the edge and leaned over.

'Any more down there?' he called to a seaman clinging from the netting below.

'No, that's the lot, sir.'

'Up you come then.' Gordon stepped back. The seamen were fussing over the survivors, draping arms and blankets around their shoulders, offering cigarettes that they themselves were forbidden to smoke, and giving promises of rum, tea and safety. A ripple of fear ran down Gordon's back. What promises could anyone keep? He watched as the men were guided below into the bowels of the ship.

'So?' asked Cragg the very instant Soapy appeared back out of the gloom.