The Burning Shore - Smith Wilbur - Страница 60

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My baby! she sobbed, as she was pinned against the bulkhead. The lights seemed to sober the men around her, shaming them out of their blind terror.

Here's Sunshine! a voice bellowed. It was a big Afrikaner, one of her most fervent admirers, and he swung his crutch to forge an opening for her.

Let her through, stand back, you bastards, let Sunshine through. Hands seized her, and she was lifted off her feet. Let Sunshine through! They passed her overhead, like a doll. She lost her veil and one of her shoes.

Here's Sunshine, pass her up" She found herself sobbing as she was jostled and hard fingers seized her and bit painfully into her flesh, but she was borne swiftly upwards.

At the top of the companionway, other hands grabbed her and hustled her out on to the open deck. it was dark out here and the wind snatched at her hair and wrapped her skirts constrictingly about her legs. The deck was listing heavily, but as she stepped upon it, it canted even more viciously and she was hurled against a stanchion with a force that made her cry out.

Suddenly she thought about the helplessly maimed young men that she had left down there on C deck.

I should have tried to help them, she told herself, and then she thought of Anna. Hesitating and confused she looked back. Men still swarmed up and out of the companionways. It would be impossible to move against that throng, and she knew that she did not have the strength needed to assist a man who could not walk himself.

All around her the officers were trying to restore order, but most of these men who had stoically borne the hell of the trenches were terrified witless by the thought of being trapped in a sinking ship, and their faces were contorted and their eyes wild with unreasoning terror. However, there were others who were dragging out the cripples and the blind and leading them to the lifeboats along the rail.

Clinging to the stanchion, Centaine was torn with indecision and fear and horror for the hundreds of men below who she knew would never reach the deck. Then beneath her the ship rumbled and belched in its death throes, air rushed from the holes beneath her waterline with the roarings of a sea monster and the sound decided Centaine.

My baby, she thought. I have to save him, the others don't matter, only my baby! Sunshine! One of the officers had seen her and he slid down the steep deck to her and put an arm around her protectively.

You've got to get to a lifeboat, the ship will go at any moment. With his free hand he ripped open the tapes that secured his bulky canvas life-jacket, and he pulled it off his shoulders and lifted it over Centaine's head.

What happened? Centaine gasped as he knotted the tapes of the life-jacket under her chin and down her chest.

We've been torpedoed. Come on. He dragged her along with him, reaching for handholds, for it was impossible to stand unaided on the steep angle of the deck.

That lifeboat! We've got to get you into it. just ahead of them a crowded lifeboat was swinging wildly on its davits, an officer was bellowing orders as they tried to clear the jammed tackle.

Looking down the ship's side, Centaine saw the black sea boiling and foaming, and the wind blew her hair into her face and half-blinded her.

Then, from far out on the black waters, a solid white shaft of light burst over them, and they flung up their hands to protect their eyes from the cruel glare.

Submarine! shouted the officer who held Centaine in the crook of his arm. The swine has come to gloat on his butchery. The beam of light left them and swivelled away down the side of the hull.

Come on, Sunshine. He dragged her towards the ship's rail, but at that moment the tackle of the lifeboat gave way at the bows, and spilled its frantic cargo screaming into the pounding waves far below.

With yet another vast exhalation of air from her underwater wounds the ship swung further outwards to an impossible angle, and Centaine and the officer slid irresistibly across the deck and hit the rail together.

The merciless beam of white light moved from one end of the ship to the other and when it passed over them, it left them blinded and it seemed the night was even blacker and more menacing than before.

The swines! The bloody swines! The officer's voice was rough and hoarse with rage.

We must jump! Centaine shouted back at him. We have to get off!

When the first torpedo struck, Anna was seated at the dressing-table in the cabin. She also had spent the afternoon working with the men on C deck and had left them only to help Centaine prepare for dinner. She had expected Centaine to be in the cabin waiting for her and was mildly irritated when she was not.

That child has no idea of time, she muttered, but laid out clean underwear for her charge before beginning her own toilet.

The first explosion threw Anna off the stool and she struck the back of her head on the corner of the bed. She lay there stunned while the successive blasts tore into the ship, and then darkness blinded her. She dragged herself on to her knees with the alarm bells deafening her, and forced herself to begin the drill that they had practised almost daily since leaving Calais.

Lifejacket! She groped under the bed and pulled the clumsy apparatus over her head and began to crawl towards the door. Suddenly the lights went on again and she dragged herself to her feet and leaned against the bulkhead and massaged the lump on the back of her head.

Her senses cleared and immediately she thought of Centaine.

My baby! She- started towards the door and the ship lurched under her. She was thrown back against the dressing-table and at the same moment Centaine's jewelbox slid across the table-top and would have fallen, but instinctively Anna caught it and held it to her chest.

Abandon ship! a voice shrieked outside the cabin. The ship is sinking! Abandon ship! Anna had learned enough English to understand. Her practical phlegmatic sense reasserted itself.

The jewelbox contained all their money and documents. She opened the locker over her head and pulled out the carpet bag and dropped the box into it. Then she looked around her swiftly. She swept the silver frame with the photographs of Centaine, her mother and Michael's squadron into the bag, then she jerked open the drawer and stuffed warm clothing for Centaine and herself on top of the jewelbox and the picture frame. She fastened the bag as she glanced quickly about the cabin.

That was all of value that they possessed, and she heaved open the door and stepped into the passageway beyond.

Immediately she was picked up in the relentless stream of men, most of them still struggling with their lifejackets. She tried to turn back -'I must find Centaine, I must find my baby!', but she was borne out on to the dark deck and hustled towards one of the lifeboats.

Two seamen grabbed her. Come on then, Itiv. Ups-adaisy! and though she aimed a blow at the head of one of them with the carpet bag, they boosted her over the side of the lifeboat and she landed in a tangle of skirts and limbs between the thwarts. She dragged herself up, still clutching the carpet bag, and tried to climb out of the boat again.

Catch hold of that silly bitch, somebody! a seaman shouted with exasperation, and rough hands seized her and pulled her down.

In minutes the lifeboat was so crowded that Anna was packed helplessly between bodies and could only rave and implore in Flemish and French and broken English.

You must let me out. I have to find my little girl-Nobody took any notice of her, and her voice was drowned out by the shouting and scurrying, by the moaning of the wind and the Crash of waves against the steel hull, and by the ship's own groans and squeals and dying roars.

We can't take any more! a commanding voice shouted. Swing her out and let go! There was a gut-swooping drop down through the darkness and the lifeboat struck the surface with such force that water was sprayed over them and Anna was once more thrown to the half-flooded deck with a huddle of bodies on top of her. She dragged herself up again, with the lifeboat tossing and leaping and thudding against the ship's side.

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