A Twist Of Sand

"luff! luff! luff! Get the sails off her, you sons-of-bitches! By the mark four! God, only four under her and it's coming up from south-west! See that over there, Mister Mate? No, not there — 326 degrees? Yes? Looks like porridge, but they're breakers. Clan Alpine. Alecto was there the year before too. No, you can't see it ordinarily, and Clan Alpine didn't either. Of course we're going in! No damn you, we had a good sight of the sun at Ponta da Marca and I reckon by now I can smell the Clan Alpine. Three hills. Magnificent bearing. Here — look at the chart. Don't be damn stupid, this is my own chart; the Germans think they know the coast, but this is my own and not even the Admiralty knows. Captain Williams! Bah, that chartman! I know Captain Williams. Farilhao Point… must make southing tonight or else we'll beat against the inshore current all day to-morrow…"

For hours the old man had been rambling. I sat by the bedside of my grandfather, old Captain Peace, who was indeed making his last landfall the hard way. Doctor Chelvers had told me when I arrived from London the previous night that by rights the old captain should have been dead days ago. Coronary thrombosis, not a stroke. But he was fighting it out to the last, although he had made his number to Lloyds.

I sat in the quiet room and listened to the old sailorman's phrases of the sea, in sharp contrast to the lovely Exe Valley, where everything was of that tender young green which one sees nowhere in the world except England, and nowhere lovelier in England than the Exe Valley.

Doctor Chelvers had said that morning that it might only be a matter of hours before old Captain Peace died, or it might be days. I looked at the weather-beaten face against the pillows, and thought of Trout and what was waiting for her. No peaceful sick-bed at the last for me! A sharp rattle from a depth-charge, or more likely the quiet, lethal whisper of a torpedo screw in the hydrophone operator's ears coming nearer… nearer… nearer…

London had been a failure. I had taken my chief's advice and tried to get drunk. I had given it up in disgust. Somewhere in the club had been that Intelligence man, but I never saw him. I had rung Wendy with the firm intention of spending one last night with her. Half-way there the air raid sirens went and the mood of depression became so strong that I never got as far as her flat. The thought of the sheer hopelessness of it all overwhelmed me. The absolute secrecy was a further burden. The prospects if the Germans made use of their frightful new weapon in the Atlantic, as they were bound to when NP I. returned from her successful cruise, were appalling. I decided to get out of London and see old Captain Peace before he died. The sight of the old sailor dying so manfully, with a flood of nautical phrases and oaths on his lips, affected me more even than unburdening my secret would have done. The old captain had been delirious off and on since my arrival the previous night. Now the salt of a sea life blew like spindrift through the sickroom.

The nurse came and took the dying man's pulse. She looked across at me and shook her head slightly She was middle-aged, bosomy, and kind. I have never yet encountered the blonde, glamorous nurse of the cinema sickroom. The more crow's feet at the corners of their eyes, the better nurses they have been.

"It's a wonder he has lasted all this time," she said "He must have a constitution like iron. You know, if thrombosis doesn't kill in the first attack, they sometimes linger on. The following fortnight is the dangerous time."

"You don't think he'll make it?" I asked. Death seemed everywhere.

She glanced at me keenly. "No, he can't. He is very near the end, now. You should take some rest yourself."

My laughter rang harshly in my own ears. Rest! I'd soon rest throughout eternity.

She came round the bed and stood looking down at me as I sat. "I don't know what your job is in this war, but you've been through it, I can see. Forget what has happened."

"Look," I said. "You're very kind to show an interest in me. All I can say is that I envy that old man dying in his bed."

Tears filled her eyes, and she hurried from the room.

NP I must have a base. That thought went through my mind, over and over again. The two naval chiefs were sure that she had not. I sat in the pleasant morning sunshine by old Captain Peace and turned the problem over in my mind, while from the bed came half-incoherent oaths, sailing-ship directions, mutterings all about winds and tides.