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Hardy looked at Land in shock. “Cease fire?”
“Yes, sir,” Land said. “Captain D's signal.”
Hardy pushed Land to one side and called down the voice tube, “W.T.? Read that signal.”
“W.T. Bridge. From Captain D, âBreak off action immediately. Proceed Scapa Flow.' End message.”
“Surely he can't mean that. What is all this nonsense? We've got the bloody bastard dead-to-rights.” Hardy slapped back the cover on the voice tube. “W.T.? Bridge.”
“W.T. here, sir.”
“Make to Captain D, âYour last transmission garbled. Resend.
Firedancer
. End message.' Understood, W.T.?”
The wireless/telegraph operator read back the message to Hardy's satisfaction.
“Those bloody U-boats will swarm in and out of this pack of sheep all night long,” Hardy said to no one in particular. “They'll bite a hunk out of the convoy's body to port and one to starboard and come astern when it suits them. The whole thing will bleed to death until there's nothing left. And now some idiot dispatches
Firedancer
, fully ten percent of this convoy's protection, to Scapa Flowâ”
“Bridge. W.T.”
“Yes!” Hardy shouted.
“Message from Captain D.”
“Yes, you bloody imbecile!”
Land could tell that the sailor on the other end of the voice tube was hesitant. “âCome on,
Firedancer
. No one uses that old dodge anymore. Orders are orders. No matter how asinine. Now go and do your duty.' End of message.”
Hardy walked to the windscreen in frustration. He stared across the darkness, past the flaming tanker, and was somehow lost. He turned to Land. “Acknowledge, âReceived, Captain D. Proceeding as ordered.'”
He moved back to the windscreen and watched the little red dots bob up and down in the water. There were hundreds of them, floating about in a random pattern of death. He felt sick, standing high above them, as if in life he were given some sort of superiority over the little red dots. And secretly, he was glad that he was far removed from the lights. That only added to the guilt of course, not only that he was alive and they weren't, and he shouldn't have felt superior? He felt that he had somehow allowed them to die and the voice of reason that could have reassured him that of course that was nonsense went unheeded. His shame sprang from guilt, like some horrible flower from the putrid earth. If he had done his job thenâif he had done his job beforeâmen would not have died.
The ideas, the horrible pronouncements swirled around his mind like waterspouts chasing across the sea. No end to one, no beginning to anotherâjust existence and with it the knowledge that he was responsible, somehow.
Each of those hundreds of silent, little red lights was attached to a cork life vest, and each vest held a dead man. They were men who had abandoned their burning ships and sought the false sanctuary of the frigid sea. But they had only forestalled death and not escaped it. The cold killed them in minutes so at best they had not suffered the horror of being burned alive, or the slow agony of drowning, trapped deep belowdecks of the dying ship.
These lights, to Hardy, were marks upon a tally sheet of his failures. He was responsible for saving those menâhe did not, a mark against him. He should have sunk the U-boatâhe had failed, another mark.
Hardy turned away from the floating lights. It was the Second Night all over again.
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Cole waited impatiently, a debate raging in his mind.
Ask her, hang up, you idiot!
He heard the muffled sounds of the nurses' station coming through the telephone after a nurse with a squeaky voice said, “Rebecca? Yes, she's here. Who shall I say is calling?”
Cole suddenly panicked, not out of a sense of guilt but propriety. A married nurse receiving a telephone call from a man when her husband was missing in action might lead to gossip. The kind that would hurt Rebeccaâsomething that Cole did not want to do. He threw together a plan that sounded weak and transparent.
“I'm a friend of Sublieutenant Moore's,” he said. “I'm just calling to see how he is.”
“If you'll give me just a minute I'll be happy to check his chartâ”
“Just let me talk to Nurse Blair,” Cole said, exasperated. To hell with it; let people talk. He was never good at being subtle anyway. He heard her voice in the background, speaking first to someone about a patient's condition, and then to another nurse about doctors' incompetence, and finally he heard the telephone being picked up.
“Rebecca Blair,” she said, the voice hesitant and a little puzzled. “You've a question about Sublieutenant Moore's condition?”
Cole was relieved and excited at the same time. He realized how important it was to him to hear her voice again. “Kind of,” he said.
There was a moment of silence before Rebecca said, “I beg your pardon?”
“Rebecca?” Cole said. “This is Jordan. How are you?”
There was even a longer silence before she replied and Cole could tell that she was startled. Now he really did feel like an idiot. He'd get out of this somehow; make up some excuse, or blame it on work....
“I'm very well, Lieutenant Cole. How are you? It's so kind of you to inquire about Sublieutenant Moore. He's doing much better. He should be up on crutches shortly.”
He was thrilled. She was covering but she kept the conversation going, and every word was a chance to Coleâa chance that she might accept.
“Look, I'm sorry to call you at work but I didn't know your home number.” He spoke quickly, hoping that she would not hang up. “I'd like to see you again.”
Silence.
“Maybe this isn't right. Maybe you have every right to tell me to go jump in the lake, but I just wanted to see you again.”
Silence. Then it was interrupted by muffled laughter and he heard Rebecca's name called several times and the sound of papers ruffling and the telephone being knocked about before he heard her voice again.
“Yes,” she said, her voice even softer than before. His heart soared and he tried to calm himself.
“The weather's nice. At least nice for England. I can get my landlady to fix a picnic basket for us. Is that okay?”
“Yes,” she said, and then her voice dropped nearly to a whisper. “I would like that very much. Have you a pencil?”
Cole snatched a pen from its holder. “Yes.”
“Is two o'clock today all right? I have a few off hours that I can take.”
“That's great.”
“Warren Square. Number twenty-two. Can you find it?”
“I'll find it,” he said. Cole heard her name called with playful urgency and heard someone try to take the telephone away from her.
All Rebecca managed was: “Good-bye, then.”
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Cole had a hell of a time finding the row house in Warren Square. He rang the doorbell and waited. The door opened and she appeared, and her quick smile made Cole smile in return. She was as glad to see him as he was she.
“I hope that I haven't kept you waiting,” she said, unnecessarily.
“You haven't,” Cole said and there was much more emotion in his voice than he had intended. “My car's just over there. I bribed my landlady to fix a picnic lunch. No potato salad but we've got some kind of noodle salad.”
They drove to Hyde Park, Cole excited that Rebecca sat next to him in the tiny car, Rebecca silent, watching all that swept past them. So much destruction, notices posted on telephone boxes and lamppostsâ
Have you seen so-and-so? So-and-so, come to your cousin's.
People displaced, families missing; a list of dead next to a list of those who were luckierâin the hospital.
When they arrived and found a quiet spot near a stand of trees Cole spread the blanket, and Rebecca began setting the places and unpacking the food. It was natural for them to do that, Cole thought, and for an instant he saw them married but quickly dismissed the idea. He was being foolish. They sat for some time without saying a word, watching a group of children play across the way.
“My husband and I used to come here quite often,” Rebecca said.
Cole was disappointed to hear her mention her husband. No, it was more than thatâhe didn't know anything about the guy and Cole hated him already.
“Gregory,” Rebecca continued. “He prefers Greg. He's a banker. Well, not now of course. He's with the army . . . in North Africa. Missing in action.”
“I guess this was a bad idea . . .” he started to say but he didn't mean it. He was selfish enough to want Greg in an Italian prisoner of war camp for the duration.
“No,” she said. “No, I'm very glad that you asked me. I've been thinking about you since we met at hospital. I suppose that's a bit bold, isn't it?”
“No,” he said. He'd been doing a lot of thinking as well.
She looked at the sky. It was a soft blue and the barrage of balloons drifted about easily on their long tethers, as if they had always been there and had not come because of the war. “It is a lovely day, isn't it?” Rebecca said.
“Yeah,” Cole said, following her gaze. “Maybe I ought to take a picture since these days are few and far between.”
“The vagaries of English weather,” she teased.
Cole returned her smile. “Why'd you go into nursing?”
Rebecca handed Cole a bottle of beer and took a drink before speaking. “My father, really. Daddy is very rich and very powerful. Because of the war he will become more so. Manufacturing. My mother, who is beautiful and refined, dotes on Daddy. He in turn keeps mistresses. I suppose that I just needed to find a place in life.”
“Look,” Cole said, the words tumbling out, “I've been around. I just wanted you to know that up front.” He felt awkward and stupid. He was a young man again, trying to be sincere but all he managed was clumsiness.
“You say up front,” Rebecca said softly, “as if you expect that there will be more to follow.”
Cole took a drink of beer and then examined the label on the bottle.
“You have difficulty talking, don't you?” she said.
Cole shook his head. “Not really. Some people even call me glib.”
“I don't mean that,” Rebecca said. “I mean sharing what's inside you. Telling people how you feel.”
“Yeah,” Cole said. “I've heard that before. Maybe. I don't know. I guess I have trouble getting things out. But if people don't know how you feel,” he added, “they can't use it against you.”
Rebecca took Cole's hand. Her touch was almost electric. “Jordan,” she said, those caring eyes searching his, “that's half a life.”
Cole heard the children's laughter but he never took his eyes from Rebecca's. The children were shouting and running and screaming with joy because no bombs were falling and they did not have to spend time in the dank, putrid bomb shelters. They could be children again and play as children should and worry about nothing.
Cole leaned closer to Rebecca and kissed her gently. He drew back and saw tears in her eyes, which made him want to tell her that everything was going to be all right, but when he began to speak, she pressed her slender fingers against his lips. He nodded, knowing that words were unnecessary. Rebecca removed her hand and leaned into Cole, kissing him deeply.
When they parted Cole said, “Why are you crying?”
“I've been on a raw edge lately. I'm so sick and tired of seeing dead and dying. The men are bad enough but there are women and children. Babies. I cannot let them see me cry. They bring people in missing arms and legs, horribly burned . . . they must not see me cry.”
Cole watched her take another drink of beer and fish through her purse to find a handkerchief. She patted her eyes, careful not to smudge her mascara. “I must look a dreadful sight,” she said.
“No,” Cole said, “you look fine.”
“Makeup costs a bloody fortune and if I've cried any off I shall be very cross.”
“Everything's right where it should be.”
“I love my husband, you see.” She wiped away a stray tear.
“It was only a kiss,” Cole said, trying to help, but he saw immediately that he'd said the wrong thing.
“Is it very common for you?” she said, her voice strangely sad. “To be with women?” She saw the hurt look on his face. “Oh, I'm so very sorry. What a perfectly horrible thing to say. Please forgive me.”
“Maybe you're right,” he said, suddenly ashamed of himself. He hated himself for the answer but he didn't want to lie to her. “I just never thought of it that way.”