James Benn - Billy Boyle

“Ready!” yelled Harry and slewed the boat to starboard, running at the lead E-boat. Machine guns and the forward 20mm started firing, seeking out the E-boat as it closed on us and we on it. Cannon fire from the V-boat was flying over our heads and hitting the water where we had just been. Harry was talking at me, but I couldn’t hear a thing. I watched his face, still focused on the water ahead of us, as he opened his mouth and yelled. No words could be heard, only the chatter of machine guns, the roar of wide-open engines, and the splashes of near misses all around us. The twin. 50 caliber machine guns on either side of us were firing rapidly, shell casings spewing out, clinking and smoking on the deck around us. The 20mm gun was firing at a slower rate, a steady pow, pow, pow as the gunner scored several direct hits on the E-boat. Suddenly he was cut down as a line of machine-gun fire hit the bow of our boat and chewed up the deck, hurling him back against the wheelhouse. Higgins ran to the 20mm and braced himself against the shoulder harness. He fired, wildly at first, but then found his target. The other gunners did, too, and one E-boat was soon blazing, dead in the water.

Harry leaned over to me and said something. All I heard was “mix it up.” He pointed to my Thompson. I got it. He was deliberately getting in close to the E-boats so the slower Vorpostenboot couldn’t fire without risking hitting the E-boats. The shooting had slackened off, and now the remaining E-boat was running a loop around Harry, firing and then circling to get back to the safety of the bigger boat, where we couldn’t follow.

“Make smoke!” Harry bellowed into the intercom, as he turned hard to port and tried to cut off the E-boat. Plumes of thick smoke began to appear out of a rear-facing funnel, and the E-boat turned to starboard, trying to bring all guns to bear at once. Harry had anticipated this and was turning toward port again, doing to the Germans exactly what they were trying to do to us. The E-boat was raked by our fire, but one of its forward machine guns found us as well. I ducked as shells splintered the wood all around the wheelhouse. Harry yelled again and turned the 718 away from the E-boat, seeking the safety of the smoke screen he had just laid. I ran back to the stern and fired my Thompson at our pursuer. I was putting in a fresh clip when a blast hit just below me, churning up water at the stern and sending chunks of the hull flying. There was a muffled explosion belowdecks and suddenly we were making black smoke. Not artificial smoke, but the real thing, from an engine fire. The E-boat finally turned away, our return fire scoring direct hits all over it. Our bow became heavy as if we were was taking on water. Then we entered into the smoke screen and everything went gray.

I made my way forward. Men were being carried up from belowdecks, coughing and hacking as thick black smoke curled up out of the passageway.

“Report!” demanded Harry. His left arm dangled uselessly at his side, a stream of blood collecting in a pool at his feet. With the other arm he gripped the wheel, keeping the boat on course and probably holding himself up.

“Can’t see much yet, Cap’n,” said a short, barrel-chested seaman, grease and soot darkening his features. “Looks like number one and two have had it. Three’s damaged but working, number four is fine. And you’re wounded, sir, left arm.”

“Casualties below?” Harry ignored his last comment.

“Two men dead, Cap’n. One other, burned pretty bad.”

“Very well, Chief. Shut down one through three and make repairs as you can.”

“Aye, sir. Better get that arm bandaged now, sir.” The chief waited until Harry nodded, then went back down into the smoke. A crewman with a medical kit came into the wheelhouse from the bow and ripped away the sleeves from Harry’s sweater and shirt.

“How’s Higgins?” Harry asked.

“Dead, sir.”

Harry winced as antiseptic was poured over his wound. “A good lad

…” Harry looked faint and I grabbed him before he fell over.

“Hang on, captain. There’s a splinter…” Before he could finish, the crewman pulled a long, sharp piece of wood out of Harry’s upper arm. Blood gushed. More antiseptic was poured and the shock of it probably kept Harry conscious.

“Not as bad as it looks, sir,” said the crewman as he applied a gauze pad and wrapped the wound tight.

“Oh, I’d say it’s as bad as it looks, wouldn’t you, Billy?”

Harry glanced around at the boat, bullet holes everywhere, two men dead above deck, two men dead below, and three engines out of commission. His face was pale and beaded with sweat.

“Yeah, Harry, it’s bad. Now how do we get to Tomma?” I asked.

“That bit’s easy.”

He checked his compass as the crewman rigged up a sling and gently placed his arm in it. He winced, and then adjusted course slightly. “We’re headed there now, with the smoke between us and the Germans. That E-boat won’t follow, and the V-boat will stay offshore, looking to hit us when we come out. We’ll circle a few islands and drop you at Tomma, then… well, then you’ll have other worries.”

“How can you make it on one engine?”

“Slowly. But we can make it. If the Vorpostenboot and the Luftwaffe cooperate.”

I couldn’t look at him. The truth of the situation was written all over his face, and I felt sure guilt was etched on mine. Buried deep within the smoke screen, there was nowhere else to turn my eyes and escape the reality of what I had created. I looked forward and saw the bodies of young Higgins and the other gunner. I turned away and looked to my rear. The black smoke was thinning out and I could see lines of bullet holes where they had struck the engine compartment. Empty shell casings rolled back and forth on the deck, and worried men gripped their guns in white-knuckled embraces. They were wide-eyed and jumpy. I didn’t like looking at them either. I felt that they would be able to see right through me, to see that I had brought them to this place, perhaps to die here. I closed my eyes.

“First time in action, Billy?” Harry misread me, and his question caught me by surprise. It had been, and I hadn’t been scared. Not what I had expected. I did feel awful now, but I realized it actually had been exciting.

“Yes.”

“Well, you didn’t try to hide or jump overboard, so you’ll probably be all right.”

“I feel sort of strange now.”

“Yes,” Harry nodded. “It happens to me all the time. It’s almost magical, the feeling of being alive, isn’t it?”

“I don’t really feel very magical, Harry. Just scared.”

I didn’t want to go into my real reasons for feeling bad. There were four dead men on my conscience and I didn’t want any more.

“That’s good, Billy. Means you still have your senses about you. And you’re going to need them.”

“What do you mean?”

He took his eyes off the water long enough to look me in the eyes. Right now he wasn’t the happy-go-lucky pirate captain he played for his crew. Right now he was dead serious, delivering news he knew wasn’t good.

“Billy, I can’t stop to row you ashore. With only one engine, we can’t slow down and allow ourselves to be cornered. We’d never get out and your mission would be compromised.”

“I don’t like the way this sounds, Harry, but go ahead.”

“We’ll continue making smoke as we head around Tomma. When we get behind it, I’ll double back and go out through our smoke screen. I’ll bring her in as close as possible, but you’ll have to jump ship and swim to shore. We can’t let you take a boat, because the Germans would find it and then there’d be hell to pay.”

“How far?”

“I can probably get you close to some rocks you can climb ashore from. Perhaps a hundred-yard swim. You can swim, can’t you?”