Night Sky (55 page)

Her heart thudded. She made herself concentrate on what had to be done. She moved along the groups of airmen and said to each, ‘You will see two small boats arriving soon. You must not move until you are told. Do you understand?’ Then she crouched beside them and waited.

The surfboats seemed to take a long time. Then at last they were there, first one then the other gliding in to the beach, two solid dark shapes against the paler sea. Julie waited half a minute, then stood up and called softly, ‘Groups One and Two?’ The men – it should be fourteen in all – rose and followed her down towards the waiting boats. The surfboat crews came forward and Julie directed the two groups to different boats. The surfboat crews were in a hurry. They were already pushing their boats out and bundling their passengers in. Julie tried to get a look at their faces. But he wasn’t there, she already knew it. Then they were gone.

Twenty minutes later the boats were back. Julie called two more groups of airmen forward. This time some of them didn’t listen to her instructions and too many men peeled off in the direction of the first boat. Julie sorted them out and took the three extra men across to the second boat, which was already loaded and waiting. The three men waded into the water, rolled into the boat, and then it was gone.

Julie stared after it for a moment before turning away. One more journey, and they would be finished.

Someone was hurrying along the sand towards her. Gérard? No, too tall.

Then suddenly she knew exactly who it was.

She moved tentatively forward, laughing a little. Then he was hugging her, so tight she could hardly breathe. He put his cheek against hers and with a sudden shock she remembered the feel of his skin and the lovely animal scent of him. And she remembered his body, and how lovely it had felt against hers, and she murmured, ‘Oh, how I’ve missed you.’

‘Julie—’

He pulled away, trying to see her face in the darkness. He whispered, ‘There’s not much time and I must know – First, are you all right?’

‘Yes, yes!
I’m
all right!’

‘But is it safe? I bet it isn’t!’

‘It’s fine, now. Really! Everyone’s very careful. Really!’ She laughed and pushed herself up on tiptoe and put her arms round his neck and kissed him. He kissed her back, hard. Then, after a while, he pulled away again. ‘Julie, listen – I’ve had an idea. It’s all been okayed. I’ve cleared it with everyone … Julie, you and Peter must come back to England. On the gunboat.’

Julie frowned in the darkness. ‘What—? I—’

‘Look, we can fix it for the next trip. You can just disappear. No-one will ever guess where you’ve gone. And then you’ll be safe,
both
of you. Julie, say you will!’

‘But … I don’t know. I … I’ll have to think about it.’

‘But Julie, it
must
be the right thing to do! You’re running terrible risks, don’t you realise that? If you got caught, well – what
then
?

‘Yes, I … I suppose you’re right.’ She’d never thought about going herself. It had never occurred to her. But it wasn’t that simple – and she couldn’t explain.

He said urgently, ‘Please, say you’ll come!’

‘I don’t know – I don’t know! I need time!’

‘There may not
be
any time …’

She could hear the disappointment in his voice, and understood. He must have been planning this for ages, and now she was being reluctant and ungrateful. She said, ‘Please – I love you with all my heart. But I must
think
. My family are here, and the others, and … It’s all so sudden, Richard. Please, let me think and plan … And, next time you come, I’ll tell you for sure, I promise. You
will
be coming again, won’t you?’

‘Yes. Yes …’

He was still disappointed, she could tell. She pulled at his arm and sat down on the sand. He sat beside her and put his arm round her. ‘Julie – I thought you’d
want
to …’

‘But I do! I do!’

‘Then?’

Julie thought: He’s right. I should go. I should get Peter to safety. I should be with him – I
want
to be with him. She said, ‘Yes … perhaps you’re right! I’ll try. I promise!’

He squeezed her arm. ‘Good! Good!’ Then he chuckled. ‘I thought for a moment your affections had been stolen by a tall, dark Frenchman!’

She laughed quietly. ‘No, I ran after him, but he wouldn’t have me!’

‘He must have been mad!’

They grinned at each other in the darkness.

After a while there was the gentle sound of muffled oars and she stiffened. He pulled her to her feet. She suddenly realised she hadn’t mustered the airmen. She said, ‘I’d better get the passengers,’ and, before he could reply, ran quickly up the beach. When she got back the boats were ready and waiting and there was no more time.

She found him by the second boat. He said, ‘We’ll be back in a week or so. Come then, Julie! Please!’

‘I’ll try!’

He kissed her and ran quickly into the water to where the boat was waiting.

Then he was gone, vanished into the darkness that was the sea.

T
HERE WAS CLOUD
at two thousand feet. The moon shed a soft silvery sheen over it as it appeared in a rapidly growing mantle beneath the cruising Wellington.

The pilot leant his head against the side cockpit window and looked down. The cloud was thickening all the time. He regarded it with satisfaction. The U-boats would think they were safely hidden under that lot.

The pilot peered at his watch and said into his mike, ‘How long to turnaround, Wally?’

There was a crackle and the navigator’s voice came through the earphones, ‘Fifteen minutes, sir.’

‘Right-ho.’

They were flying to the limit tonight, like they always did. Eight hundred miles west-south-west into the Atlantic, then a zigzag course east-south-east, across the Bay of Biscay to the French coast, then home. The pattern might yield up a U-boat or two. The only problem was, the U-boats usually knew they were coming.

It had all been so simple when they’d first got the ASV radar more than a year before. If the conditions were right you just turned the thing on and waited for the magic words, ‘Radar to Skipper. Target thirteen miles to port. Angle twenty degrees.’ Then you turned into the darkest part of the sky and approached up-moon, so that the U-boat was beautifully silhouetted against the moon-path. By the time the U-boat spotted you it was too late for them to dive – or even fight. The pilot had got a good tally in those days: two definite hits and a probable.

Of course, it hadn’t been
that
easy. The radar was a bit temperamental and it was no good in rain, snow, sleet or heavy seas. But when the conditions
were
good, it could work quite well.

Then it all changed and the devilish U-boats kept disappearing before one’s very eyes. You’d pick them up all right, but by the time you homed in on them they’d bloody disappeared. Of course, there was only one way they could do it so consistently – by counter-measure. A radar detector.

Bound to happen, of course, but still frustrating. Eventually Coastal Command worked out a counter-strategy. As soon as a target was picked up you ordered the radar scanner to be stopped and the radar aimed aft, where its waves couldn’t be picked up. Then you manoeuvred slowly into position, asking for the radar to be turned through a full circle only once every minute or so, just to make sure you hadn’t lost the U-boat. Only on the final run in did you leave the radar on continuously. At between one and two miles you turned on the two-million-candle-power Leigh light and, even if you didn’t pick the U-boat up immediately, with a bit of luck the U-boat gunners wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation of firing at it, thus, most obligingly, guiding you straight in to your target.

The strategy worked fairly well, but as often as not the U-boat sussed you out before you ever got near. Real cat and mouse stuff. Trouble was, the mouse got away with it far too often.

It would be nice to gain the upper hand again.

And, with a bit of luck, they might. There was a new box of tricks on board. An experimental device. He was rather proud of the fact that his old girl was the first in Coastal Command to be fitted with one.

H
₂
S, the boffins called it. Which, if he remembered his school chemistry correctly, was the chemical formula that stunk of rotten eggs. Some boffin somewhere had a sense of humour.

It was a new radar. They’d explained it to him. A completely new type, they said, which would give wonderful definition in
every
direction. Read the sea and the land like a map.

Certainly the radar operators were mad keen on it. The navigator, too – finding his way back to the coast was a piece of cake.

The new-fangled device had been fitted only three days before, so they were continuing to use the old ASV radar as well, to be on the safe side.

The pilot looked at his watch. Two minutes to the final turn and the start of the journey home. They were deep into the Bay now, only twenty miles from the French coast. They’d run parallel to the coast as far as Brest, then turn for home.

They turned. The engines droned on. An hour passed.

‘Captain to Navigator. Position, Wally?’

‘Fifty miles south-west of Lorient, Skipper.’

Good hunting country, this. Close to both Lorient and St Nazaire. ‘Captain to crew. Extra sharp lookout now – above
and
below.’ Fighters weren’t much of a problem in the Bay, but you never knew.

The acknowledgements from the nine-man crew came back through the ear-phones, one by one. The pilot leant his face against the side-screen and looked down at the thick cloud below. No chance of a visual. But somewhere down there was a U-boat, perhaps
several
.

Damn it, all he wanted was a stab at one.
Just a stab
.

The young officer watched the long nose of the submarine carve swathes of white foam through the dark sea and could hardly believe this great monster was really his.

Even now it seemed incredible that they had given him command. He was just twenty-six and had been an Oberleutnant zur See for only a year.

He wished he felt completely confident – but it was impossible. Not when he’d looked up to the great U-boat commanders for so long: men like Gunther Prien who took U47 into Scapa Flow and sank the
Royal Oak
; or Karl Fischer, the commander with the greatest single tally of ships sunk. How could he think of himself on the same level? It was impossible.

He looked up. A thin veil of cloud was covering the moon. That would give them some cover at least. They needed it: the air patrols were heavy nowadays. He remembered the beginning of the war when he was a Leutnant zur See fresh from training. Then enemy aircraft had been rare and usually came in daylight.

It was five hours since they’d left St Nazaire. They’d left late, because of engine problems, and they’d left disorganised, because of last-minute crew changes. Half the men on board had been transferred from another, crippled, boat and at least ten were fresh recruits who’d completed only half their proper training. It was unsatisfactory, to say the least. As soon as they were clear of the Bay he would put the men through their paces and do some intensive training sessions. It wouldn’t make up for the lack of an experienced, well-trained crew, but it would have to do.

He looked at his watch. Seven hours of darkness left. Not enough to clear the Bay. He stamped his feet. The winter had come early this year and it was very cold.

The junior watch officer was at his shoulder. ‘Radar bleep, Herr Oberleu.’

The young commander nodded. It was nothing to get excited about. The radar detector bleeped and whined and whistled all the time. Often the thing drove commanders so mad that they ordered it to be turned off. The device seemed to hear planes everywhere.

Still, better check it. After all, he was responsible now.

He stepped across to the other side of the bridge and looked at the aerial. It had been introduced as a temporary measure when the British first started using radar, and had quickly been dubbed the Biscay Cross. Now, a year later, they were still using it. This one had certainly seen better days. It looked as though it had been thrown hastily down the hatch and patched together dozens of times. Nevertheless the fragile wooden structure was correctly positioned and the wires properly connected. Nothing wrong there then.

He nodded to the second watch officer and went down the hatch to the control room. The Metox technician was bent over the set, fiddling with a knob. The set emitted a piercing shriek. The technician saw the young commander and said, ‘Sorry, Herr Oberleu, it seems to be playing up. Shall I open it up and have a look? It would mean turning it off for a while …’

By habit the young officer almost referred the matter to the commander until he remembered with a slight shock that he
was
the commander. The eyes of several of the men were on him. Decision time.

He hesitated. The men’s eyes hardened. He
must
decide. Suddenly he said, ‘No! Don’t dismantle it until we’re clear of the Bay. Leave it on!’