The Wreck of the Mary Deare (9 page)

By the end of my watch it was possible to identify it as group-flashing two. The chart showed the south-west Minkies buoy as Gp.fl.(2). ‘About what we expected,' Patch said when he relieved me. His voice showed no lift of interest; it was flat and slurred with weariness, his face gaunt in the light of the binnacle.

And after that the light was always with us, getting a little nearer, a little clearer until it began to fade with the first grey glimmer of dawn as I took over the wheel at five-thirty in the morning. I was almost dead with exhaustion then, hardly able to stand, my knees trembling. The night in the stoke-hold had been hell, the last hour almost unendurable, shovelling coal with rivulets of water spilling across the floor and spitting steam as they swirled round the hot base of the furnace.

The tide had turned now and the double flash of the Minkies buoy began to come down on us fast, and on the wrong side of us. Soon, as the daylight strengthened, I could see the buoy itself, one of those huge pillar buoys that the French use, and, even above the wind, I thought now and then I could catch the mournful, funeral note of its whistle. We were going to pass at least half a mile inside it. I had a look at the chart and then got Patch on the voice pipe and told him to come up.

It seemed a long time before he appeared on the bridge, and when he came he moved slowly, his feet dragging as though he were just out of a sick bed. Changing watches during the night, he had been just a shadowy shape in the pale, reflected glow of the binnacle light. Now, seeing him suddenly in the cold light of day, I was shocked. He looked ghastly. ‘You're just about out on your feet,' I said.

He stared at me as though he hadn't understood. I suppose I looked pretty bad myself. ‘What is it?' he asked.

I pointed to the Minkies buoy, now almost four points on the starboard bow. ‘We're passing too far inside it,' I said. ‘At any moment we may hit the Brisants du Sud rocks.'

He went into the chartroom and I waited, expecting him to send me running below to get the engines going. He was gone a long time. Once I shouted to him, afraid that he must have gone to sleep. But he answered immediately that he was watching the buoy through the window and working something out. The tide had got a firm hold of us now. I watched the bearing of the buoy altering rapidly. It was almost abeam of us before he emerged from the chartroom. ‘It's all right,' he said. ‘There's water enough at this stage of the tide.' His voice was quite calm.

The wind had caught our stern now and we were swinging. Not two cables' length away an eddy marked a submerged rock and the heavy overfalls broke against each other in violent collision, sending up great gouts of water. And beyond was a cataract of broken water where the waves spilled in tumbled confusion, raging acres of surf. A big sea hit us, thudding against the ship's side and rolling in a white tide across the foredeck. Tons of water crashed down on the bridge. The whole ship shuddered. ‘Aren't you going to get the engines started?' I demanded.

He was standing with his back to me, staring out to starboard. He hadn't heard me. ‘For God's sake!' I cried. ‘We're being carried right on to the Minkies.'

‘We're all right for the moment.' He said it quietly, as though to soothe me.

But I didn't believe him. How could we be all right? All ahead of us was nothing but reefs with the seas pouring white across miles of submerged rock. Once we struck . . . ‘We've got to do something,' I said desperately.

He didn't answer. He was staring through the glasses out beyond the starboard bow, his legs straddled against the sickening lunges of the ship.

I didn't know what to do. He seemed calm and in control of the situation, and yet I knew that he had gone physically beyond the limits of endurance—mentally, too, perhaps. ‘We've got to get clear of the Minkies,' I told him. ‘Once we're clear of the Minkies we're all right.' I let go of the wheel and started for the companion ladder. ‘I'm going to start the engines.'

But he grabbed hold of my arm as I passed him. ‘Don't you understand?' he said. ‘We're sinking.' His face was as stony as the gaze of his dark eyes. ‘I didn't tell you before, but water is flooding through that bulkhead. I had a look at it just before I relieved you.' He let go of my arm then and stared through the glasses again, searching for something in the grey, scud-filled dawn.

‘How long—' I hesitated, unwilling to put it into words. ‘How long before she goes down?'

‘I don't know. A few minutes, an hour, maybe two.' He lowered the glasses with a little grunt of satisfaction. ‘Well, it's a slender chance, but . . .' He turned and stared at me as though assessing my worth. ‘I want pressure in that boiler for ten to fifteen minutes' steaming. Are you prepared to go below and continue stoking?' He paused and then added, ‘I should warn you that you'll stand no chance at all if that bulkhead goes whilst you're down there.'

I hesitated. ‘For how long?'

‘An hour and a half I should say.' He glanced quickly away to starboard, half nodded his head and then caught hold of my arm. ‘Come on,' he said. ‘I'll give you a hand for the first hour.'

‘What about the ship?' I asked. ‘If she strikes on one of these reefs . . .'

‘She won't strike,' he answered. ‘We're drifting down just about a mile inside the buoys.'

Down in the stoke-hold there was a strange sense of remoteness from danger. The warmth and the furnace glow and the blaze of the lights were comfortingly normal. Now that I could no longer see the seas thundering over the reefs I was enveloped in a false sense of security. Only the boom of the waves crashing against the hollow sides of the ship and the bright rivulets of water streaming from the started rivet holes reminded us of the danger we were in; that and the forward slant of the decks and the water sluicing up out of the bilges, black with coal dust, filthy with oil.

We stoked like madmen, shoulder-to-shoulder, flinging coal into the furnace with utter disregard of exhaustion. It seemed an eternity, but that bulkhead held and finally Patch looked at his watch and flung his shovel down. ‘I'm going up to the bridge,' he said. ‘You'll be on your own now. Keep on stoking until I ring for full speed. Then, when you've got the engines going, come straight up to the bridge. All right?'

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. He was pulling his clothes on and I watched him as he staggered through to the engine-room and disappeared. The sound of the waves thundering against the hull seemed louder now. I looked down at my wrist watch. It was twenty past seven. I started to shovel coal again, conscious all the time of the hull plates towering above me and of the slope of the decks; conscious that at any moment this lit world might plunge below the seas. Water was sloshing about in the bilges, spilling over on to the plates and swirling round my feet.

Half-past seven! Quarter to eight! Would he never ring for the engines? Once I paused, leaning on my shovel, certain that the deck below my feet was at a steeper angle, watching that streaming bulkhead and wondering what the hell he was doing up there on the bridge. What was this slender chance he had talked of? Exhausted, my nerves strung taut with fear and the long wait, I suddenly wasn't sure of him any more. What did I know about him? My first impressions—of a man unbalanced by circumstances—returned, stronger now because more dangerous.

And then suddenly, faint above the booming of the waves, came the jangle of the telegraph. It was almost eight o'clock. I flung my shovel down, slammed the furnace door shut and, with my clothes in my hand, staggered quickly through into the engine-room. The telegraph indicator was at Full Ahead. I turned the steam full on and as I raced up the ladders, the whole steel-traceried vault of the engine-room became alive with the pounding of the engines.

He was standing at the wheel, steering the ship, as I panted up the ladder on to the bridge. ‘Are we clear of the Minkies yet?' I gasped.

He didn't answer. His hands were gripped tight on the wheel, his whole body tense as he stared out ahead. The ship heeled in a long agonising roll and I staggered down the slope of the bridge-deck to the starboard windows. A buoy, painted red and white was sliding past us. The bows were completely submerged.

‘Almost there now.' His voice was taut, barely audible. His eyes looked out of their sunken sockets, staring fixedly. And then he shifted the balance of his feet and the wheel spun under his hands. I couldn't believe it for a moment. He was turning the wheel to port. He was turning the ship to port, turning her in towards the rock outcrops of the Minkies. ‘Are you crazy?' I shouted at him. ‘Turn to starboard! To starboard, for God's sake!' And I flung myself at the wheel, gripping the spokes, trying to turn it against the pressure of his hands.

He shouted something at me, but it was lost in the noise of a big sea crashing against the bridge. I wouldn't have heard him anyway. St Malo was only twenty miles away and the beat of the engines throbbed through the deck plates, beating a message of hope against the soles of my feet. We had to turn to starboard—away from the Minkies, towards St Malo. ‘For Christ's sake!' I screamed at him.

Fingers gripped my hair, forcing my head back. He was shouting at me to let go of the wheel, and my eyes, half-closed with pain, caught a glimpse of his face, set and hard and shining with sweat, the lips drawn back from his teeth and the muscles of his jaw knotted. ‘It's our only chance.' His voice was barely audible above the roar of the seas. And then the muscles of my neck cracked as he flung me back and I was caught on a downward plunge and fetched up against the window ledge with such force that all the breath was knocked out of me. A patch of broken water slid past on the port side and almost ahead of us the sea flung a curling wave-top round a little huddle of rocks that were just showing their teeth. I felt suddenly sick.

‘Will you take the wheel now?' His voice was distant, quite cool. I stared at him, dazed and not understanding. ‘Quick, man,' he said. ‘Take the wheel.' He was on his own bridge, giving an order, expecting it to be obeyed. The acceptance of obedience was implicit in his tone. I dragged myself to my feet and he handed over to me. ‘Steer north ten degrees east.' He fetched the hand-bearing compass from the chartroom and went out with it on to the starboard wing of the bridge. For a long time he stood there, quite motionless, occasionally raising the compass to his eye and taking a bearing on some object behind us.

And all the time I stood there at the wheel, holding the ship to ten degrees east of north and wondering what in God's name we were doing sailing straight in towards the reefs like this. I was dizzy, still a little sick, too scared now to do anything but hold on to the course I had been told, for I knew we must be in among the rocks and to try to turn the ship would mean certain disaster. And through the windows, out in that maelstrom of white water that filled all my horizon, there gradually emerged the shapes of more rocks, whole masses of rocks, getting nearer and nearer every minute.

‘Steer due north now.' His voice was still calm. Yet all ahead of us was nothing but waves tumbling and falling and cascading on the half-exposed reefs. There was one lone island of rock nearer than the rest and, as the ship drove towards it, he was back at my side. ‘I'll take her now.' There was a gentleness in the way he spoke and I let him have the wheel, not saying anything, not asking any questions, for his face had a strange, set look as though he were withdrawn inside himself, out of reach of any human.

And then we struck—not suddenly with an impact, but slowly, gently, a long grinding to a halt that sent me staggering forward until I was brought up against the window ledge. The ship checked, her keel making a noise that was felt in vibration rather than heard above the roar of the storm. For a moment she seemed to tear herself loose and go reeling on through the water; then she struck again and ground to a sudden, sickening halt. The engines continued without pause as though the heart of her had refused to recognise death.

It was a queer moment. Patch was still standing there at the wheel, still staring out ahead with set face and the knuckles of his hands white with the violence of his grip on the wheel spokes. The wheelhouse looked exactly the same, and for'ard, through the glass windows, the bows remained submerged with the waves rolling across them. The deck under my feet still pulsed with life. Nothing had changed; only that we were now motionless and at rest.

Trembling, I wiped the cold sweat from my forehead with my hand. We were aground on the Minkies now. I felt a sense of finality. I turned and looked at him. He seemed dazed. His face, where it had been wiped clear of coal dust, was chalk-white, his dark eyes staring. He was gazing out across the tumbled waste of the sea. ‘I did what I could,' he breathed. And then again, louder: ‘God in heaven, I did what I could.' There was no blasphemy in the way he said it; only the sense of a man in torment. And finally his hands dropped slackly from the spokes of the wheel as though relinquishing at last his command of the ship and he turned away and walked, slowly and deliberately in the manner of a sleep-walker, through into the chartroom.

I pulled myself together then and followed him.

He was bent over the chart and he didn't look up. A wave crashed against the ship's side, throwing a solid mass of water against the chartroom window, momentarily blocking out the daylight. As it fell away he pulled the log book towards him and, picking up the pencil, began to write. When he had finished, he closed the book and straightened up, as though he had written
Finis
to that section of his life. His eyes came slowly round and met mine. ‘I'm sorry,' he said. ‘I should have explained what I was going to do.' He was like a man woken from a dream and suddenly rational. ‘It was a question of hitting the tide just right.'

‘But we should have headed towards St Malo.' I was still dazed, a little stupid—I didn't understand.