The Glory Boys by Douglas Reeman

Author:Douglas Reeman
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781446494899
Publisher: Random House

10

No Guts … No Glory

LIEUTENANT TOBY AINSLIE sat in a corner of the M.T.B.’s crowded wardroom and wondered why it should feel so different. He knew all but one of the faces here, at least by sight; he had always had a good memory for those. Names were something else. Stirling, the Canadian commanding officer, had made him welcome enough, and had apologized for the lack of hospitality. Time did not allow it.

Like their own boat, this one had been built to exactly the same design, and in the same British yard, and probably launched within a few weeks of 992. All the fittings and armament matched, so there was no chance of losing your sense of direction during the night watches. So where was the difference? Ainslie could not define it, but it was here. The voices, the smells from an identical galley, a couple of framed photographs on the bulkhead, a hockey team on skates, another of a sailing cutter with an iceberg close abeam. But he was still not certain …

He could feel the vibrating murmur of generators, hear loose gear being dragged across the deck. Making ready for sea. He knew that was the real reason for his anxiety. Maybe if they had been ordered to sail again soon after their last grim assignment, but in their own boat, it might not have been so upsetting. He was not afraid; surely he would know that by now.

There was plenty of coffee, hot and strong. He sipped it gratefully, and saw the first lieutenant, Tom Cusack, watching him. “Too powerful, Toby?” He was smiling, but there was something else, reminiscent of the moment when the Skipper had introduced him as ‘Pilot’.

Cusack had been smiling then. “Don’t trust us, eh?”

Ainslie listened to the others. Mostyn, the other commanding officer, and his first lieutenant, who would be remaining here on stand-by. And Spiers, holding the fort and keeping an eye on the repairs. It was hard to know how he felt about being left behind.

He darted a quick glance at the other stranger in the wardroom, a Lieutenant Warren: he had not caught his first name. Kearton had met him on the upper deck. It had been quiet, unemotional, and all the more moving for that.

Kearton had gripped Warren by the shoulders and had held him without speaking. Then, “How long? For God’s sake, I thought …” He had not continued. Warren had nodded, his eyes never leaving Kearton’s.

“I thought so too, Bob. Took them six months to put me together again.”

Kearton had said to Ainslie, “Eighteen months ago, maybe more. We were based at Dover a while …” He had touched Warren’s arm again. “It was rough going, at the time.”

Warren wore a leather glove on what remained of his right hand. Ainslie had seen it when he had been unfastening a folder of charts: more like a claw than a hand, it was a miracle he could still use it. He had seen Ainslie’s expression, and made a joke of it.

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