Killing Ground Read online

  Disinterested this aircraft was not. He had watched them so many times circling a convoy in the Atlantic, close enough to see everything, but keeping out of range of the guns while homing the U-Boat pack on to their victims. It was a Focke-Wulf Condor, that great four-engined long-range reconnaissance bomber that had made history at sea between plane and submarine.

  “From commodore, sir. Increase to fourteen knots. Stand by for alteration of course.”

  They all turned as a sudden throaty roar thundered across the water like a marauding aircraft. It was the solitary Hurricane perched on its catapult, smoke darting around it while men cowered away, their reason and purpose lost in distance.

  Howard said, “The commodore’s sending him in pursuit, for God’s sake.” He looked away in case the others saw his sudden anger. This was not the Atlantic, and the Focke-Wulf was within easy reach of its airfield and support.

  Treherne observed mildly, “He might catch the bastard, sir.”

  Howard knew that Marrack and Ayres had come to the bridge but he was alone in his thoughts as he said, “Tell W/T to make this request at once to the commodore. From Gladiator. Request you withhold aircraft until—”

  He turned on his heels as the Hurricane roared along the catapult, dipped momentarily towards the eager water, and then climbed rapidly towards the clouds.

  “Belay that!” Howard watched the fighter getting smaller and smaller until it was lost in another flurry of light snow.

  The commodore wouldn’t have listened anyway. A young man he had never met, and he had just seen him thrown away. “For bloody nothing!” He realised that he had spoken the last thought aloud and added, “Prepare the sea-boat, Number One. It’ll be too dark to see anything soon.” He stared at the patch of bright sky, now so treacherous and empty.

  Treherne asked quietly, “Shall I sound off action stations, sir?”

  “No, I shouldn’t think so. They’re in no hurry now. They’ve got all the time in the world.”

  A boatswain’s mate called, “Sea-boat lowering party standing by, sir. The first lieutenant and th’ Buffer are in charge.”

  They all looked at the clouds and Howard heard the far-off tapping sound of machine-guns. Like woodpeckers on a summer’s afternoon.

  Treherne watched him. “He could stand a chance, sir?”

  “Perhaps.” So Treherne was thinking of the pilot, and not his hopeless mission. He looked at the young signalman and tried to smile but his mouth felt rigid. “Good work, Lee.” If only he would stop staring; his eyes seemed to fill his face.

  There was no sound of a distant explosion or the great four-engined bomber dropping through the clouds. It was as if neither plane had ever been. Only the empty catapult made it a lie.

  The Hurricane when it reappeared raised a cheer from some of the boat-handling party who waited by the whaler’s falls while the crew in their oilskins and life-jackets prepared to be dropped into the water alongside. The cheer died instantly as the Hurricane dipped and then fought its way up again, the engine coughing and roaring out suddenly with fresh hope, as if the plane and not a man were dying.

  The pilot managed to turn towards the slow-moving destroyer; it was usually Tail-end Charlie they were told to make for. Perhaps he could even see the men at the falls, the whaler already swung out above the sea, finding hope, praying.

  There was a chorus of shouts as the plane staggered suddenly, then seemed to tilt right over on to one wingtip before hitting the water. It exploded in a livid fireball while fragments showered all around it. Then there was just the drifting smoke. Then nothing.

  Howard said, “Secure the sea-boat. Increase revolutions to resume station, Pilot.” He hung on to the rail beneath the screen and was as close to vomiting as he could remember.

  He heard his orders being passed, the increased tremble of the bridge and fittings around and below him.

  When he spoke his voice was calm again. Too calm. “Make to commodore, Aircraft lost. Pilot killed.” He wanted to scream it out loud, as if the commodore and all those others might hear. Instead he climbed into his chair and held it all back. He could even offer a smile of sorts. Perhaps the cynical Mister Mills had been right after all.

  “From commodore, sir. Alter course in succession. Steer one-four-zero degrees.”

  By the compass platform Treherne filled an extra pipe with pusser’s tobacco and watched the quiet preparations around him. Gladiator was at action stations and had been since the first hint of daylight. He saw Ayres at the voicepipe which connected him with Midshipman Esmonde and Morgan, his navigator’s yeoman. They would be watching the plot table, ready to change to a different scale of chart. To perform miracles up here if the whole bridge party was wiped out.

  The captain was standing by his chair, his pipe well alight, the wind burning it away in minutes. He looked less tired now, Treherne thought. It was something he had never got used to with Howard. The prospect of action, set against the chance of surviving the day; his reactions were never what Treherne expected.

  He often wondered if the captain had a girl somewhere. If so, he kept her safely stowed away. Treherne thought of his own wife, Carol, who had just walked out of his life after two years of marriage. He didn’t understand that either; she was, after all, a sailor’s daughter. He smiled to himself. Maybe that was the reason. Maybe she wanted something more in her life than hello and goodbye.

  Treherne had been born and raised in the little port of Fowey. He had always wanted to go to sea, even as a nipper. It was in his blood; almost every family around that busy harbour had a sailor in its midst. It seemed natural, expected, perhaps that he should choose one of the local china-clay steamers for his first step. But he soon lost his heart to the deep water ships, and the lure of the Caribbean had taken him all the way.

  When his ship, packed to the deck seams with bananas, had crossed and recrossed the great Western Ocean, he had never thought that those same waters might one day be a terrible enemy, not only to him and his companions, but the one real, unbeatable menace to his country.

  He felt the deck lift and slide as Gladiator came round on the new course and he heard Howard speaking with the coxswain in the wheelhouse. The team. Boots on a ladder and the welcome clatter of mugs as they waited for the promised hot tea in its dented fanny.

  Here and there a light flickered in the convoy or there was a stammer of static from the W/T office voicepipe.

  The commodore was getting jumpy. Rounding up his flock while one of the wing escorts entered the convoy and steamed fussily up the ranks of heavily laden ships. Demanding more speed and less smoke, telling one of the masters to watch his course, another to acknowledge signals and not just take it as read.

  It was funny if you thought about it. Treherne was a highly skilled navigating officer like so many RNR people who had once served in peaceful ships. He knew the dangers and the stupidity of some masters who preferred to go their own way, but he still resented the manner in which they were chased around by the Navy. They were, after all, civilians; they were also well aware that they were themselves the main targets. Bomb, torpedo, or the impartial mine—they faced it all, and still went back for more.

  He realised that Howard had joined him, his pipe smoke thinning as he took another long puff. I must be getting shagged out, Treherne thought. I didn’t even see him move.

  Howard eyed him thoughtfully. “Any views, Pilot?”

  Treherne grinned and felt his skin crinkle where he had once got frost-bite in the North Atlantic. One of the reasons he had grown a full set.

  “I think it’ll be today, sir.”

  Howard glanced at the men around him. Hands reached out for mugs to be filled, but the lookouts never took their eyes from their various sectors.

  “I agree. No more signals about the German ship out of Tromsø. No bloody news of anything!” He seemed to make up his mind. “You know what I think? They’re going to come at us from the air.”

  They both looked up at the fas
t-moving wisps of cloud. The sky would be properly blue when the day finally opened up. No cover.

  The young signalman Rosie Lee stared up with them, as if to see something terrible there. But he heard Treherne chuckle and saw him hand his tobacco pouch to the captain. It was all right after all.

  “God, look at the sun!”

  Howard turned and saw the two funnels slowly light up like burnished copper as the first rays spilled from the horizon. It was as if the light were being poured across it, molten metal over a dam.

  Faces became personalities again, the muzzles and barrels of the anti-aircraft guns shone as the sunlight played over the glistening ice and the huddled figures of their crews.

  Treherne glanced at the White Ensign as it flapped out stiffly from the gaff. Their sea-going one, torn and shredded by a hundred gales. It could not last much longer. The yeoman of signals had a system. The best ensigns were used only in harbour, and for covering the dead awaiting burial. After that they took their chances aloft.

  A boatswain’s mate by the voicepipes called sharply, “From commodore, sir! Aircraft sighted at Red four-five. Four miles.” He was squinting with concentration as he pressed his ear to the pipe. “Believed to be Focke-Wulf Condor again.”

  Treherne thought of the exploding Hurricane. “Cheeky bastard!”

  But Howard’s mind was exploring another route. The commodore was using his radio more than usual to save time. Because he knows. There was no hiding-place now.

  He heard the crump-crump-crump of gunfire, far away beyond the head of the convoy. That would be the RCN’s Beothuck; she mounted eight four-point-sevens in twin turrets. Most destroyers like Gladiator mounted only four. There was virtually no chance of hitting the German reconnaissance bomber, but the escort commander would let fly just to break the tension. The anger and frustration of seeing the big aircraft flying lazily around the convoy, just out of useful range, close enough to count the ships then radio back a full report. Loosing off a few shells was better than nothing.

  He heard signalman Lee murmur, “I’ll bet it’s the same one I saw!” He made it sound suddenly personal.

  A voice yelled, “There it goes, Green four-five, angle of sight two-five!” Right across the path of the convoy. But the sun was so harsh and bright that the aircraft only showed occasionally, like a sliver of glass or bright metal.

  Howard lowered his binoculars, his eyes stinging. They would have a perfect view from up there, he thought. He tried to remember all the lectures he had endured on aircraft recognition. How many were there in a Condor’s crew? It was eight. Probably sitting in the sunlight, sipping erzatz coffee while they speculated on their chances of getting back to base in time for lunch.

  A party of men scampered down the starboard side, one with a big Red Cross satchel bouncing on his hip. Another part of the ship’s intricate pattern, like the damage control party which would be waiting to douse fires, shore up bulkheads, patch holes while their messmates fought the guns. The six survivors would be doing their best, although one was so badly burned that he could scarcely move. Prosser, the sick berth attendant, had given him some bandages to unpack in case they were needed. It was very likely the same in the other ships which had managed to snatch up some survivors. To sit and do nothing, in pain or not, was worse than being occupied; work kept you from thinking the ship that had saved you might be the next one to catch it.

  Sub-Lieutenant Ayres lowered his glasses and wiped his eyes with a glove. His breath poured through the blue and red scarf around his neck and mouth so that it looked like steam. Little gems of ice clung to the scarf as his breath froze on it.

  He had seen the slow-moving aircraft, now a mere speck above the hard horizon. “The bright face of danger.” He said it without emotion, his tone almost matter-of-fact.

  Treherne looked at him searchingly. He guessed the scarf was part of the earlier Ayres. The schoolboy.

  “What was that, Sub?”

  Ayres gave a little shrug. “Something I had to learn once.”

  Howard moved to the forepart of the bridge. He knew what the big, bearded navigator was thinking. Ayres could easily give up right now. There was no fear any more. You only felt fear when you retained some hope of survival.

  “From commodore, sir! Aircraft approaching from Green one-five—” The rest was lost in the din of commands and the crisp Scottish voice of Finlay in his control position.

  Howard looked at his bridge team. “We shall close the convoy to offer anti-aircraft support. Revs for twenty-five knots, Pilot.”

  He felt his ship begin to quiver as Lieutenant (E) Evan Price, the son of a Swansea collier, opened the throttles on his thirty-four thousand shaft horsepower like a man raising weir gates on a flooded river.

  “Aircraft, sir! Bearing Green three-oh, angle of sight two-oh!”

  Finlay’s voice, calm and unhurried over the bridge speaker: “Twenty-plus bandits! All guns stand by!”

  Howard stood high on the forward gratings and watched A- and B-guns swinging on to their targets. The snick of metal, a man’s quick, nervous cough, like one in church before the sermon.

  Finlay again. “Barrage!” He was speaking to one of his men but had left the speaker switch down. “Ju 88’s. Coming low. Feeling their way.”

  Howard lifted his glasses. By excluding all the other ships it felt as if Gladiator was completely alone. He stared at the two arrowheads of aircraft. The sky was full of them, or appeared to be.

  “From commodore, sir. Open fire at will.”

  A seaman gave a tight laugh. “Who’s Will, then?”

  “Barrage—Commence!”

  Howard let the glasses fall to his chest and took a deep breath. Here they come. He heard the staccato crash of guns over the convoy, and as Finlay passed his order the bridge shook to the instant response from the main armament.

  Howard saw the convoy spreading out on either bow, as if Gladiator would charge unchecked into its midst.

  But he heard Treherne passing his orders, the bow-wave easing slightly. Below the bridge he heard the next shells clanging into the breeches. “Gunlayer—target!” Then, “Trainer—target!”

  “Shoot!”

  The sky was already pockmarked with drifting balls of smoke, as if it were indelibly stained and would never regain its colour.

  Howard looked at the solid lines of merchantmen, their grey and dazzle-painted escorts weaving around them, automatic and close-range weapons blazing their challenge.

  He said quietly, “No, we are not alone.”

  The leading aircraft thundered overhead, their wings reflecting the cones of tracer around them as they screamed towards the ships.

  Then came the first bombs.

  Chief Petty Officer Bob Sweeney, Gladiator’s coxswain, eased the wheel carefully as the wheelhouse shook and rattled to the crash of gunfire. Despite the steel shutters across the ports and windows the air was already filled with acrid smoke from the bridge Oerlikons as they kept up their harsh rattle, pausing only briefly for the loading number to slam on a fresh magazine.

  On either side of Sweeney’s thickset figure the telegraphs were manned by Bully Bishop, the chief quartermaster, and an able seaman named Melvin. A messenger crouched by the voice-pipes while Midshipman Esmonde and the navigator’s yeoman wedged themselves in a corner behind the vibrating plot table.

  Sweeney listened to the voices from the upper bridge, a shout from one of the lookouts followed instantly by more rapid fire from the main armament as well as other ships nearby.

  He growled, “Easy, lads. ’Ere they come!”

  He concentrated on the ticking gyro-repeater and tried not to think of the bombers as they streaked towards the convoy. When Gladiator had been released from the Atlantic run to carry out a much-needed overhaul, Sweeney had gone home on leave. It was more of a formality than any sort of comfort. He no longer had a home, and his patient, long-suffering wife was buried in one of the East End’s big communal graves.

  It had be
en an eerie experience even for him, and he had seen just about everything from the Spanish Civil War to Dunkirk, from the Western Ocean to North Cape.

  The worst part had been that he had not known where he was. The streets where he had grown to boyhood before joining the Andrew, where most of his relations had lived, worked, or been on the fiddle, had simply ceased to exist. A desert of flattened and burned bricks, the roads only marked by their broken kerb stones.

  A sympathetic ARP warden had pointed out the place where his house had been. There was not even any wallpaper to show him its exact position.

  “Hard a-starboard!”

  “Hard a-starboard, sir!” The wheel seemed to spin in his meaty hands. “Thirty of starboard wheel on!”

  Boots skidded on the metal plates as the deck tilted hard over and Esmonde almost fell headlong, his face like a sheet.

  “Midships!” Sweeney ground his teeth together as the bombs screamed overhead. The Old Man sounded cool enough. Just as bloody well. He added, “Revolutions one-one-zero!”

  The chain of dull explosions seemed to lift Sweeney off his feet, and he sensed that some of the bombs must have found their targets.

  Bully Bishop exclaimed harshly, “Why th’ hell don’t we go faster, ’Swain?”

  Sweeney nodded warningly at the bell-mouthed voicepipe. “Keep yer voice down! Wot’s got into you then? ’Ad a bellyful already?”

  Esmonde touched the navigator’s yeoman’s arm and felt him jump.

  “Why don’t we?”

  Morgan eyed him wearily. “‘Cause we’ve got to stick with the merchantmen!”

  Sweeney heard the captain again. “Steady on one-seven-zero.”

  Someone whispered, “Oh God, here they come again!”

  Sweeney ignored him and listened to the muted beat of engines. Ju 88’s, Guns had said. Twin-engined and heavily armed. They were no strangers to Sweeney. Again that insane scream of bombs, and over it all a mad cheer from one of the voicepipes. “Got the bastard!”

  The explosion must have been almost alongside. Morgan jerked open a shutter in time to see a huge aircraft wing complete with black cross as it disappeared past the bridge.