Cuttlefish Read online

  “Sir,” said the aide. “I believe there is a Delphine-class armoured cruiser in Port Solf, undergoing repairs. The HMS Forrest. Shall I have the Marconi room make contact, and find out if she can put to sea?”

  The admiral looked at Duke Malcolm, who nodded. The aide left at a run.

  He returned a little later. “They say she should be ready to sail by midday tomorrow, Admiral. If they have their engineers work through the night.”

  “Tell them to make that three hours earlier,” said Duke Malcolm.

  The admiral shook his head. “That would have them arrive in daylight, Your Grace. The Delphine class are really obsolete. No match for American vessels. A night rendezvous off the North Coast would be more sensible. It doesn't sound like a combat situation, but more a case of needing secure transport. They can't even track the submarine, not being equipped with the radio-pulse detectors.”

  “That is true enough. Let us make it so,” said Duke Malcolm. “I'll have my man in Prussian Samoa get himself aboard the vessel so we can relay my orders directly. Hopefully, finally, we can put this matter to rest. I've got enough problems with the Canadian rout on the West Coast, and the Caliche War hotting up. The Japanese are being far too pushy in Peru.”

  The smell in the pillbox was enough to make Clara gag again. She staggered through the drifts of leaves and rubbish to the slit-window, where at least she could breathe air from outside. From the narrow window she could see the jungle slope and the sea—she had an excellent view of it, all the way along the coast from the narrow cliff-spit of an island. She took a deep breath and walked to the other long slit, and realised the pillbox perched on the top of a cliff on a narrow cape, allowing her to see into a second bay. She could just make out the edge of a corrugated iron roof, dazzling in the bright sunlight there. Most of it was hidden, though, by the branches of a tree and thick foliage.

  She went back to the first window. The sea was clean and clear, transparent.

  And unless she was very much mistaken that was a dark shape moving out there, in it, trailed by four other dark shapes. There was just a hint of haze over the water, behind it.

  If only she could tell them where she was. And then the glare of the sun off the roof and the mate's lie about signals to the shore came back to her. If only she had a mirror.

  She hadn't.

  But in among the leaf litter, next to where the radio transmitter had been taken from, someone had dropped a piece of silver foil off a cigarette carton. And there was another next to the window and a piece of stump. And another beyond that, along with several crumpled cartons, and cigarette stubs. This was plainly their smoking spot.

  Clara's hands were tied tightly together, but at least they had tied them in front of her, so she could fold the pieces of bright foil together, and shape them into a parabolic mirror and reach her hands out into the hot sunlight.

  At first she just worked on flashes. Then she decided on SOS.

  She had no idea if they would see it, or what they could do to help. She just went right on trying.

  Finally something in the situation did make her smile. At least they couldn't blame Tim for any of this.

  “If that is Miss Calland signalling, we should land some men at once. But would she know an SOS?” said the captain.

  Tim nodded. “She said it was all the Morse code she did know, sir.”

  The captain nodded. “Now that you mention that, I do think I remember her saying just that. Well, I'll need an armed party.…”

  “It's likely they'll have some sort of lookout, sir,” interrupted Lieutenant Ambrose. They'd see us landing and move her.”

  The captain tugged his neat beard. “We could land men in Vatia Bay. But that is visible from the settlement. Someone would be bound to go across to Pago Pago and tell the American military.”

  “Also there is cliff and jungle that side,” said Lieutenant Willis. “We could swim some men in, sir. Just next to it's steep shelving. We could creep in just to landward of those cockscomb-shaped rocks—that little cliff-island. The charts show that as deep to within fifty feet of the shore.”

  “I am receiving a message, Captain,” said Sparks. “It's the first mate.”

  They all crowded around the Marconi man.

  “He says to tell Dr. Calland that if she wants to see her daughter alive again, she needs to come ashore, alone,” said Sparks, listening. “He says there is a small sheltered bay three-quarters of a mile from Vatia Point. He will meet her there in an hour. If she is followed, his associates will deal with the girl.”

  “Somehow I'll have his guts for garters,” said Captain Malkis, grimly.

  Sparks continued. “And we'd better be quick about it because half the Royal Navy is on its way here.”

  “Can you get me there in time, Captain?” asked Clara's mother. “If…if you can take that trunk, my mother's trunk, to Westralia. Any competent team of chemists should be able to work out at least the basics of the process from there.”

  “Easily, ma'am. We could do it ten times over,” said the captain. “I think you should go to your cabin and prepare as many notes as possible, in the time available, detailing your own thoughts. If you don't mind.” He gestured to the door of the bridge.

  She nodded. “Thank you. Thank you all for everything.” She paused a moment. “And thank you especially, young man,” she said to Tim. “Clara told me you were no thief. She told me so again when she picked up the radio message. I should have believed her. I wish I had. I wish to heaven I had!”

  Tim swallowed. “Uh.”

  The captain put his finger to his lips before what Tim wanted to say could come out. “Go, Dr. Calland. We don't have that much time,” he said.

  As she walked away, he kept his finger to his lips.

  As soon as Tim heard her on the companionway, he burst out in a low voice, “We can't just let him get away with this, sir!”

  The captain's eyes were narrowed. “I have no intention of doing so. I just wanted the child's mother out of the way. Ambrose, I want the drogues dropped with a buoy, now. I want both divers, ten strong swimmers, and weapons in waterproof containers ready in ten minutes, gentlemen. Report to the bridge. We'll go with your plan, Lieutenant Willis.”

  “He's starting to repeat his message, Captain,” said Sparks. “Shall I acknowledge?”

  “Ah. Let him repeat again. Then tell him we are east of Vatia Point. We will attempt to be there on time. He knows us too well to allow us to play for time. But this will give us a little.”

  “Captain,” said the watchman on periscope duty. It was Albert, the other diver. “Pardon me, sir. But if we're to go out the escape hatch, well, good swimmers won't do. We need to stay underwater with the hookah. Big Eddie and I can do it. Nicholl has done a bit of diving too sir.…”

  “And me,” said Tim.

  Albert gave him a grin. “And him.”

  Tim saw the captain's look of doubt. “I've earned my place, sir. And anyway you threw me out of the crew. I'd best get ashore,” he said with a little smile.

  The humour of it was lost on the captain. “You have earned your place, Barnabas,” said Captain Malkis. “And of course I want you back as part of my crew. I was wrong, and I make good on my mistakes. But you also need to learn some respect, young man.”

  “I never lost it for you, sir,” said Tim stoutly. “Not even in the brig. I wouldn't believe Clara about it maybe being you. You treated me decently. You'd decided to at least drop me in Australia. And I'll always be a part of the Cuttlefish crew, no matter if I'm not with her. She's my home, and you're my family.”

  “I had not decided that,” said the captain. “Although Ambrose, Willis, and a few of the senior ratings and the chief engineer, the cook, and Mr. Amos all tried to prevail on me to do so. The mate is one of the few people who never mentioned the subject.”

  “Oh. That was just another thing the Mate lied to Clara about,” said Tim. “He told Clara he'd got you to agree to it. Well, can I go, sir? I
can swim with a hookah, and I can keep my head, sir. And I will follow orders. Please, sir?”

  For the first time since he'd been caught ferreting in Lieutenant Ambrose's locker, Tim saw that hint of a smile on the captain's face. “I said you'd earned your place. I'm a man of my word. Get to Mr. Amos; fetch the gear you need, Barnabas. We shall get the feelers out and edge this boat as close inshore as possible. Lieutenants. Diver Venables. I need to speak with you.”

  Tim ran as fast as his legs would carry him. And he was back on the bridge in the allotted time. Someone motioned him to silence. The skipper was edging the submarine forward very slowly, which was always difficult because they lost steerage at low speeds. There was a faint scrape and a touch.

  “We are forty feet below the surface. Just to the lee of a very large rock. Fortunately with the swell from the present direction, Vatia Point shelters us almost completely. Now I calculate we are within seventy feet of the shore. Lieutenant Willis will be leading the shore party. Divers Venables and Markis will take the men in, as you will have to share mouthpieces. You will need to keep calm. The revolvers will be sent to the surface in the waterproof buoy and be pulled ashore. Good luck, men,” said the captain. He smiled. “And I am quite angry with my officers for refusing to allow me to lead this expedition.”

  “The Cuttlefish needs you, sir. We don't have Werner anymore, and neither Willis nor I have the experience,” said Lieutenant Ambrose. “Although I wish you'd let me go instead of him, sir.”

  “He has militia experience, Lieutenant Ambrose. Right. Time is a-wasting. The engineer's men have some rough weight-belts of heavy chain waiting for you at the escape hatch.”

  There was barely room to breathe with four of them squashed into the escape hatch. The water was actually pleasant, as it flooded in on them. “Right. You both know to breathe out as you head up, if you have to swim up,” said Albert.

  Tim had been buddied to share a hookah mouthpiece with Big Eddie, and he was glad of it. Eddie was grinning. “I suppose my jackknife is still in your pocket, sprog.”

  “I found it in your locker. Didn't know you wanted it,” said Tim, innocently, grinning too, as the seawater poured in.

  “Salt water'll ruin it.”

  “Yeah. Not as bad as it'll do to the chocolate,” said Tim. And then the water was up to their heads, and soon they were out and heading for the shore. It took huge self-control to take a breath of air from the hookah, and take the mouthpiece out and hand it back. But he did it, and they swam on, swapping the hookah mouthpiece. Soon Big Eddie gave him the rope to the watertight drum with the guns, and pointed at the surface. There was a huge rock edge there. Tim started to swim up. Realised he wasn't managing to go up. Nearly panicked. It was the weight-belt of heavy chain. He fumbled desperately at it. Not enough air! He was going to drown.

  And Big Eddie pushed the mouthpiece back to him. Pulled him down as he took a greedy breath, and undid the chain. Now swimming up was easy. Tim breathed out as he went up, as he'd been told, and broke water gasping. He'd popped up among the seaweed and the foam fringe around the rock. Lieutenant Willis was out already. He hauled Tim up the barnacle-covered rock into a little gully…and Tim realised he'd let go of the rope, when he'd struggled with the chain around his waist. The rope end was floating on the surface in the swell. Tim jumped back into the sea again and swam a few yards to grab it before the current took it away. Tucked beneath the cliff edge it was unlikely they'd be seen, even on the surface, Tim rationalised, feeling stupid for letting go of it. They needed those weapons.

  This time the lieutenant scraped half the skin off Tim's leg, hauling him out over the barnacles. “Chump,” he said, shaking his head with a half a smile.

  “Yessir,” said Tim. “But I shouldn't have let go.”

  They hauled on the rope together, pulling it in. The lieutenant cracked the cask open, and checked the weapons. They were still dry.

  Big Eddie and Albert brought the next two men ashore, Nicholl and Gordon.

  “Captain's orders. We're not bringing more. No time,” said Albert, hauling himself up.

  There were just six of them. How many did the ex-mate of the Cuttlefish have with him? He'd said he had “associates,” thought Tim.

  The lieutenant issued weapons. “Move it up, lads. Time's a-wasting,” he said, leading them at a running scramble through the rocks under the cliff edge, and over to the fringe of jungle.

  “Into that, sir?” asked Tim.

  “Yes. Sharpish now. We'll be out of sight in there.” But it wasn't so easy. Creepers, ground-hugging trees, and thorny bushes fought for every last bit of space, and they had to try to get through them. It was like pushing into a thorny tide-race. As soon as anyone pushed forward, branches would snap back and hit the next person. They were springy and tangled with creeper. Cutting with a cutlass was slow, and noisy too. “You're making a racket,” commented Tim, worriedly.

  “No other way of doing it,” said Albert, chopping at another branch.

  “Enough,” said Lieutenant Willis. “We haven't got more than ten yards into the jungle, and this is taking too long. Back to the beach.”

  Back on the rocky beach, the lieutenant tugged his small beard. Sighed. “I'd have guessed it was about a hundred and fifty yards of steep jungle,” said Lieutenant Willis, “to where the mirror-flash came from. We have, by now, less than half an hour to find our way to it. It could take us hours to batter our way through this tangle, if we didn't get lost.”

  “Werner must have a trail. We could find that,” said Tim anxiously.

  “Exactly. We'll have to find a trail. And there's no time to waste,” said the lieutenant. “We'll just have to hope Werner has gone already.” So they moved along the spiky rocks, which were black and hot underfoot. Their wet clothes were no longer dripping, and Tim almost wished that his still were. It was tricky enough balancing on the rocks, and they moved in as much silence as they could.

  The lieutenant, in the lead, motioned them all to go down.…They did, and he crawled back a little. “We'll have to do a little jungle bashing after all. There's Werner and another fellow walking along the beach. They came out of the trees just ahead. So a little way in and up and we should hit their path.”

  “Should we not go after the traitorous scum and deal with him, sir?” asked Nicholl. His tone said “deal with” meant “shoot” if the mate was lucky.

  The lieutenant shook his head. “I'd like nothing more, but that would probably be the end of the girl. We owe it to her mother to see if we can rescue her first. If it is before Dr. Calland gets off the boat, we'll signal the captain. Werner will probably do a runner, but at least we'll be rid of him.”

  “Hard choices, Lieutenant,” said Nicholl, regretfully, as they used their cutlasses to slash their way in. Fortunately, as they got a bit farther away from the coast the trees grew taller and the vegetation less dense. Tim spotted the answer. “There's a crawlway, Lieutenant.”

  “Animal track. Probably wild pig. Let's crawl, boys.”

  It was easier going for Tim than for the two big divers, or anyone else, but it was hard on the knees. He was very glad when they cut across the trail of the ex-mate and his companion. Cautiously, they walked up the steep slope. There were occasional jungle sounds, strange birds, rattling leaves, and breaking branches, all of which made them freeze. They were all false alarms, and probably just natural sounds of the tropical forest too, but everyone was nervous. At length they came to where the track ran along the base of a cliff. Here the trees were vast and there was space to walk away from the trail, which they did, cautiously, because it seemed likely they were near the brow of the ridge where the flashes had come from.

  As it turned out their caution here too was a waste of time. There was a lower cliff, almost entirely hidden in trees, which forced them back to the trail. And it didn't matter at all, because the trail led to a little bowl that had plainly been blasted out of the rock for a long-ago gun-emplacement. Big trees now shaded it, but
there was a pillbox, an earthen berm, a concrete slab, and rusting rails for moving the gun. And, sitting against the pillbox's closed metal door, a guard slept with a rifle on his knees.

  There was at least forty yards of open concrete covered in dry leaf litter between them and him. Impossible to cross quietly. The lieutenant motioned them back. “How's your tree-climbing, Barnabas?”

  “Never climbed one, sir,” admitted Tim. “They don't grow underground. But I can climb pipes. Can climb anything you need me to.”

  “Right,” said Lieutenant Willis. “It looks like the trees below the little cliff, that this nest of theirs is perched on, have grown up to just below that pillbox. There is nothing to walk along to it but the treetop branches. I think the rest of us are too heavy. Do you think you can get across there, peep in the gun slit, and see if Miss Calland is alone in there, or not? If she is, see if she can stop the door being opened. If you can, give us a signal. Thumbs up for alone. Fingers for the number of guards. And if they see you, we'll just go in shooting. Try not to fall out of the trees.”

  Tim nodded and went along to the edge of the cliff. Sure enough, the big trees from below were crowding up and pressing against it. It wasn't that difficult to get into the nearest tree.

  The hard part was that he had to get from one tree to the next. That meant climbing along a branch until it bent down and touched a branch from the next tree, and then transferring himself onto that. The new branch sagged and creaked suddenly, as it bent under his weight. Tim looked down and realised he was maybe seventy feet above the ground. He clung tightly, and then forced himself to move on.

  Clara had watched in despair as the submarine—if that was her dark shadow—slipped out of sight. She still stared out of the slit-window, and eventually was rewarded by the sight of the submarine, a good half a mile to the west, coming up. It came up a long way from shore too. Three people came out, and a small life raft was taken from one of the deck hatches.