Cuttlefish (28 page)

“No shore leave today. There's word from the Straitsmen that the Royal Navy have put sailors out in lifeboats to come and search the swamps,” said Lieutenant Ambrose, when Tim reported for duty. “We need everyone on board, ready to move or dive.”

He looked particularly upset about something. Tim, who had got a lot more friendly with the lieutenant than he would have thought possible a few months ago, asked what was wrong, a little later, when he brought some maps to the lieutenant.

“If I can't trust you, Barnabas, I can't trust anyone,” said the lieutenant. “It's just that one of the Straitsmen—press-ganged to be a pilot for a Royal Navy ship coming into Lady Barron—overheard the captain saying they'd picked up a signal from the east coast. So we must still have a spy and another transmitter…or some kind of signalling device on the boat. It's really upset the skipper. Me too, I suppose.” He smiled. “Have you and your co-conspirator got any more clever ideas about what we should have spotted this time?”

“Um. I'll ask her,” said Tim.

The lieutenant chuckled. “And heaven knows what sort of trouble that'll lead us into. Only this time tell me what you're doing, please. I'm not going to stop you. Well, probably not.”

So Tim soon found a reason to go to the galley, where Clara was pulling faces as she helped Cookie turn several wallaby into dinner. Part of it included skinning the tails.

“They look like rats!”

Tim nodded. “Yes, tasty. But much bigger than tunnel rats.”

Clara's look reminded him again of what different backgrounds they came from. He was about to tell her what Lieutenant Ambrose had said, when it occurred to him that he'd been trusted…and that meant not telling anyone but Clara. He understood then, why Lieutenant Ambrose had been looking so uncomfortable. Cookie…Cookie
was a friend. But this situation turned anyone into a possible enemy. “Um, Cookie. Clara's mother wanted to speak to her for a minute or two. Can you spare her?”

Cookie gave him a knowing smile. “Run along. Don't be long and don't be caught.”

Tim felt his face glow. He was a terrible hand at lying. Clara, however, had washed her hands and was looking worried.

“What's wrong with my mother?” she asked quietly, as they got to the companionway.

“Nothing. She doesn't want to see you. I just made it up because I needed to talk to you privately.”

“Oh, Tim! You'll get us into such trouble. I—”

“Lieutenant Ambrose and Skipper think there is another spy on the boat.” Quickly and quietly Tim explained. “And you're not to do anything without telling the lieutenant. And your mother. And me.”

“I'm not a baby! Don't you trust me?” she snapped, firing up.

“I'd trust you with my life,” said Tim, earnestly. “Anytime, anywhere. I just know what you can do! And we'd better get back to work.”

“Um. It's a confusing boy you are, Tim Barnabas,” she said. “I thought you wanted to kiss me.”

“Always. But I gave my word about that too.”

She bit her lip. “I'd better think of a story for Cookie.”

“Yep. But I bet he won't ask.”

Tim was right. Cookie didn't ask. Clara thought over what Tim had told her, as she chopped and washed. There was something there, lurking on the edge of her memory that she felt was a clue. The Royal Navy were getting a signal.…

She nearly cut her own fingers off. “Cookie. I need to go and talk to my mother. Right now.”

He looked a little worried. “And there I thought it was just that Tim-boy wanted to kiss you. Something wrong, missy?”

“No. I just think I have an answer.”

“Go then. We've got an hour before first sitting,” he said cheerfully. “If it was any closer I'd have said answers wait, but good food don't. And then you can tell me the answer too. I been looking for it.”

“Not this one,” said Clara as she ran off.

Her mother was checking rows of figures on a pad. “Hello, dear. What brings you here?” she asked, obviously determinedly pulling herself away from her work. “I hear we may have to move again.”

“Yes. But I need your help.”

“Oh. Well, I am at your disposal,” said her mother, pushing the papers aside. “Better than you rushing off and doing it without me.”

“Tim made me promise to tell you,” said Clara, scowling a bit. “The sub has to move because the Royal Navy is following a signal.…”

Her mother closed her eyes briefly with an expression of pain. “I thought…I so hoped once Werner was gone, the spying would be over, but by the way they've followed us, I suppose I was wrong.”

“Well, maybe not. That's what Tim and Lieutenant Ambrose and the captain thought too, that we must have another traitor.…But Mother, you remember when I just got the crystal radio going? When I got you to listen to that funny noise? And Sparks said it was junk, very high…whatchamacallit…”

“Frequency,” said her mother. “I am a chemist, but I seem to recall that high frequency has a shorter range. I think you need your crystal radio, and we should talk to the captain.”

Clara grinned. “Not until I've told Lieutenant Ambrose and Tim.”

“What? Why? I mean…the captain needs to know as soon as possible.”

“Yes, but I also need to prove that I don't always get into trouble,” said Clara, impishly. “Let me pick up my crystal radio and go and find them.”

“I think I am only getting a part of this,” said Clara's mother, shaking her head. “But I will go along with that part.”

Lieutenant Ambrose had just got up, preparing for the evening watch, and was embarrassed to have opened his door to two ladies when he was half-shaved with shaving foam on his face. “My apologies. I thought…well, I thought it was someone else. Let me just wash my face.”

The smell of the foam, and the sight of it, brought a flood of memories back to Clara, of her father. “Um. We could go away. It's just that I think I may have some idea of how it is that we're being tracked.”

“That's more important than shaving. Tell.”

Clara explained. And before she'd even finished, the lieutenant, not worrying about his half-shaved state, took them up to the bridge. Captain Malkis blinked at him. “What's wrong, Ambrose?”

“Hopefully something is right, sir. My apologies coming to you like this, but the sooner we do something about it the better. I know you were going to run the compressors this afternoon, and maybe we'd better not.”

“I like to keep the tanks full, Lieutenant. Explain.”

“I'd better leave that to Miss Calland and her crystal radio, sir.”

So Clara had to explain again. And the captain called Sparks over.

Sparks blinked. “Could be right, Captain. And it ties in with their Marconi chatter. I just…never thought of it. We only use the medium frequencies and long waves.”

“If they have some kind of signal strength measure, they could triangulate on us, Captain,” said Lieutenant Ambrose.

Captain Malkis tugged his beard. “We need to eliminate this, gentlemen, um and ladies. Find it and suppress it.”

“We could do one better,” said Clara. “We could let them follow it.…”

The lieutenant raised his eyebrows. “We're all out of tick-tocks, Captain.”

“Let me talk to the chief engineer about that! Miss Calland, may I borrow your crystal radio? If this is correct, I may tell you, you've taken a weight off my mind.”

Clara felt pleased with herself. And then she caught sight of the chronometer. “I've got to get back to Cookie! He's got first sitting in eighteen minutes.” She thrust her radio at the captain. “Excuse me, sir.”

He smiled as he took it. “Dismissed…Cadet! Run. Tell the cook my apologies for having kept you.”

Clara had time while she ran to feel guilty about not having told Tim.

Tim was working in the engine room when the captain came down there. He recognized the crystal radio set in the captain's hand. What had she been up to now? He soon found out. “The aftermath of your radio hunting is still with us, Barnabas,” said the captain with smile. “Miss Calland has, I think, found an answer to how they're following us, Chief.” He explained. “I've brought Sparks down to see what can be done to hide it, or to change the output, at least. And to discuss making another decoy, Chief Engineer.”

“Clockwork mechanism is a bit beyond our making in short order, sir,” said the chief.

Captain Malkis looked thoughtful. “Yes. But how much calcium carbide do we have, Chief?”

“Maybe twenty pounds, sir.”

“Enough to turn a drogue into a torpedo?

The chief beamed at the idea. “No sir. But if you wanted that, I suppose something could be devised. I've got a little thermite, and I've seen a fairly good rocket made with that and some water. Those mad Westralians do it with ice in their shore-defence rockets. Dangerous as hell, of course.”

“So is living, Chief, so is living. Design me something that will move an empty drogue, putting out a nice radio transmission, and move it very fast.”

The chief engineer enjoyed that sort of challenge. So did Tim. It was fun making a dangerous rocket-propelled decoy. And now that they knew what the Royal Navy were tracking, it was easy to give them some signals from forty miles away. That gave them some security to launch the small test decoy on the Cameron Lakes.

The chief's little party were all stripped off to their breeches, standing in the water, holding ropes to the welded tubular device. “Right. She needs a little speed to get going. On the count of three, we run,” said the chief. “I'll shout when to let go.”

They ran through the shallows hauling, Tim with the rest…and then suddenly the small torpedo took off with an express train roar. Tim, from hauling, found himself skiing along on his belly. He clung for dear life…and then realized maybe he shouldn't, and let go. The shore was a fair way back for Tim to swim. Fortunately most of the water was quite shallow and he could touch bottom for a rest.

The chief was standing with his hands on his hips when he got to the shallows. “And how long is it, Barnabas, since I last told you you were an idiot?”

“Um. Twenty minutes, sir,” said Tim. The chief sometimes let it go that long.

“Right. You haven't changed in that time. Why didn't you let go, boy?”

“Didn't hear you shout, sir.”

The chief engineer rolled his eyes. “I'll make up for that now,” he bellowed. “You were supposed to tow it, not get towed by it.”

Tim decided it was maybe not a good idea to tell the chief it had been a lot of fun, while it lasted.

The test torpedo travelled three miles along the lake before bursting into flames and sinking. Tim was glad that he hadn't hung on till the very end.

Shovelling the caliche out of one of the drogues was less fun. It smelled and burned his eyes and nose and throat. Tim also knew what this meant. The island idyll was over. So was his chance of sneaking a kiss on a walk.

The next night the Straitsmen would launch the drogue-decoy for them from some miles away, and they would run.

T
im was on the bridge, captain's messenger, and on periscope duty, when the
Cuttlefish
crept down the scoured channel to Stellar's Lagoon. “Your night-spotting has not passed unnoticed, Barnabas,” Captain Malkis had told him when he reported to the bridge for duty. “We note in the log what ships have been spotted at night, and at what range, and by whom. You and Submariner Gordon have the best records, and so you're on periscope duty for this section. It's a black night out there.”

It was a heavy responsibility. As soon as the “all quiet” light came on Tim's stomach knotted itself with tension.

He stared so hard into the blackness that he had a headache. But he saw no sign of a vessel out there. Taking a deep breath, and hoping he was not wrong, he signed “all clear” from the periscope.

The captain waved Gordon to the periscope instead, and held a note for Tim to carry to the engine room. They were taking no chances at all. Tim ran as quietly as he could down to the engine room. And then back up to the bridge, as they eased over the bar in the cover of a wave, and out to sea.

Running silent but not daring to run deeper than periscope depth, or too fast in these treacherous waters, they slipped south. Tim was again peering through the periscope into the dark when he saw something frightening enough to make him break silence. “Breakers! Waterspout!”

Captain Malkis nodded, put a finger on his lips, and came to look.

He adjusted course very slightly…and then, just as Tim had taken the periscope again, the submarine began to roll and shudder. In alarm Tim looked hastily back to the captain, who appeared completely calm even though the boat was now behaving like a restive horse.…The “all quiet” light was off.

“Potboil Shoal tide-race, Barnabas. They couldn't hear us above the water noise. If we have it right, we'll be fine,” said the captain, as the submarine pitched and rolled. “If not, we're going to drown. Keep a good lookout, when possible. And hold tight. It will get worse.

He was, Tim realized, not joking about any of it. It was a noisy, bucketing, wild ride that had Tim clinging to the periscope handles as the water slapped and raced around the submarine. There was a brief grating touch against the sand, and then they were no longer being thrown about.

“Phew!” said Tim.

The captain tapped his shoulder. Pointed. The “all quiet” light burned again.

Slowly and silently, they crept west.

Eventually he was relieved on periscope duty, and just had to stand there and watch…and think. The atmosphere on the bridge was tense and quiet as they navigated through shallow, dangerous waters in the dark.

It was odd that he could be so scared and yet…so secure with his “family.” Because this was home, and this was his family now. He loved the submarine, and he hadn't realized that he really hadn't had anyone but his mam before. It struck him as he stood there, silent, thinking, waiting, that being sentenced to be marooned and exiled from it had done one thing for him—he knew just who his friends really were, now: some who had spoken up for him with the captain, some who had brought him things to help him survive. And one who had never stopped working on getting him free. She was a confusing girl for a boy to have in his life.

Clara found it easiest to keep herself busy. She reported for duty every morning. After all, the captain had called her “cadet.” So, she'd be one. Busy was best right now. Her head was a mixed-up place. The crew let her work, but not all the jobs were good at keeping her head occupied, even if her hands were working. She ended up polishing, or working in the mess often enough. She saw how the constant vigilance and stress were wearing all of the crew down, especially the captain.

He came into the mess days after they left Flinders, when he ought have been off for many hours.…Sat down, and yawned. “Pardon me, Miss Calland. We're just burning the candle at both ends at the moment. It is difficult managing—though I never thought I'd say this after his treachery—without Werner. He may have been a spy and a traitor, but he was also good at his job and very knowledgeable about these waters. My lieutenants are good men, but neither are very experienced as yet. So we're relying on good fortune. That always runs out, eventually.”

“We're relying on a good captain,” said Clara. It was meant to be encouraging. He was a good captain, after all.

He sighed. Sipped his coffee. Gave her a crooked half-smile. “It's a heavy weight to carry, miss. I'm a captain who has made mistakes in the past, as you have proved.”

It was a shock to realize that he was admitting his own frailty. He'd always seemed…well, superhuman, about controlling the boat. “Yes, but you've never made mistakes about the sea.”

He shook his head. “I wish that were true. But there is a fair amount of luck involved in our survival. We are stretching it thin.”

Duke Malcolm put the self-congratulation of Admiral Lesseps down firmly. “We destroyed something, Admiral. Something…from which we have found no bodies. I want a watch maintained for another two weeks, or until we get some confirmation.”

The
Cuttlefish's
luck finally ran out just west of Cape Carnot.

The worst part of it, for Tim, was that it was so completely unexpected. The whole boat's crew had been nervous and vigilant right across the Bass Strait, and onward across the Spencer Gulf. They'd run on coal and not sail, staying hidden almost all of the way. The water was clear and clean, so they'd spent the days lurking as deep as was safe, or camouflaged. They'd only moved during the short summer nights, creeping westward, just below the surface at periscope depth, with the engine snuiver up, but invisible otherwise.

And Tim had found that he could only be terrified for just so long, and then…one got sort of used to it.

The first they knew of the airship was the explosion.

It actually rocked the submarine, and was deafening.

Tim knew they'd dived by the tilt and that the engines were still running by the vibration…but he couldn't hear any orders. Or anything. He'd been working in the engine room, and in the aftermath of the explosion…he'd got sprayed in the face by cold salty water. The Stirling engine relied on outside water as a heat sink, and a thin jet of pressurized seawater was spraying in from the spot where the cooling pipe penetrated the hull.

More drop-mine explosions shook and jarred the sub, and the spray had turned into a fire hose of water, as Tim's hearing recovered.

He had his tasks for this drilled into him. It kept him calm…well, kept him coping, kept him working.

The chief engineer, in the midst of the chaos, was already winding tape around the pipe. He was soaked to the skin, but he
shouted, “Tell the bridge we need to reduce depth. Less pressure. The solder on the pipe has cracked.”

The speaking tube brought the captain's voice. “Status report, engine room.”

Thorne told the captain. In the meantime the chief engineer went on winding the tape wider and closer in, while being blasted by water, which was now being forced upwards.

Someone grabbed Tim. “Help me get the bilge pumps running.”

There was a terrible sharp tearing sound, and hissing and clouds of steam filled the room. “The Stirling heat casing!” yelled someone. “It's cracked!”

The next few moments were pandemonium. The lights went out. Several more things went bang. The air was hot with steam, and thick with smoke, and there was water sloshing around underfoot. Tim didn't know what to do.

And then the emergency lights came on. Orders were yelled.

Tim found himself priming the standby bilge pump, as Thorne, bleeding from a nasty cut across his chest, cranked.

Other submariners were changing fuses and helping the injured. The proper lights came on. Water was still running down the bulkhead from where it had been spraying in before, but now it was not bucketing in.

“Damage report, engine room,” said the captain through the speaker tube.

“The heat casing on three of the Stirlings have definitely gone,” said the chief. “We need to check the rest. We've still got water coming in the solder around the cooling pipe. That can be repaired, Captain, but only on the surface. At the moment the Stirling engines are unusable.”

Tim saw bent brass rods—that he'd been greasing a few moments before—and a broken casing in the steamy smoky atmosphere, as oily water sloshed around his feet. “And we've lost at least one compressor.”

“Can we run on the electric, Chief?”

“I will check, Captain.”

Clara had been in the mess, laying tables, when it had all happened. Now she was trying to clean up broken crockery. And Cookie, somehow, was making tea. She'd seen a couple of burned submariners helped up the passage. And Cookie was making tea. “If they're not dead, they'll want it. If they're dead, they won't mind. Mind you, we have no engines, by the sounds of it. And she feels very sluggish in the water.”

Clara wondered how he could be so cool about it. But it calmed her too.

So she carried trays of tea. The engine room looked as if a bomb had hit it. It was ankle deep in water, and people, including Tim, were working frantically. “Just put it there, luv,” said the chief—he had a rough bandage around his head and was soaked to the skin. “We'll get there, if and when we can.”