Эдвин Грей - Diving Stations

A naked body was spreadeagled against the side of the deckhouse. It hung suspended like a limp starfish, the wrists and ankles secured by ropes to the four corners of the primitive wooden structure, with the head drooped forward and the exposed flesh covered with hundreds of crawling flies. The breeze blowing the tangled black hair across the face made recognition impossible, but a quick inspection with the binoculars revealed that it was the body of a woman.

Hamilton’s hands trembled as he lowered the glasses. Although it was impossible to see the woman’s face, he knew instinctively that it was Chai Chen. Bringing his emotions under control and taking a deep breath, Hamilton stepped away from the rail and moved towards the voice pipe.

‘Stop motors… slow ahead starboard.’ Rapier’s bows swung towards the junk and he leaned over the for’ard screen. ‘Morgan! I’m going alongside. Use a grappling hook to secure for boarding.’

Returning to the starboard wing he waited for the submarine to drift closer. He forced himself not to look at the obscenity of the tortured girl stretched rigidly against the side of the deckhouse and he concentrated all of his attention into the task of bringing Rapier safely alongside the abandoned junk.

‘Stop starboard motor… slow astern both. Full starboard helm.’

Morgan balanced himself on the edge of the ballast tank, swung the weighted rope like a cowboy with a lasso, judged the distance with an expert eye, and let go. The grappling hook soared up from the deck of the submarine, landed squarely over the weatherworn bulwarks in the bow of the junk, and the line pulled taut as the deck party hauled in the slack.

‘Line secured, sir.’

‘Take over, Alistair. Keep her close alongside.’ Hamilton swung his leg over the conning tower coaming and shinned down the iron rungs to join the gunner’s mate and the men waiting on the foredeck. ‘Well done, Chief. I’m going aboard first. Once I’m safely over I want you and two men to follow and back me up.’

Clinging to the life line, Hamilton edged gingerly down the slippery slopes of the weed-encrusted ballast tank, balanced himself precariously at the water’s edge and carefully gauged the swing of the submarine as the two vessels drifted together in the wind. At exactly the right moment, he leapt across the narrow gap, grabbed for a handhold, and hauled himself up the slab side of the junk onto the deck. Pausing at the rail, he signaled to Morgan to follow and then made his way along the oil-stained deck towards the wooden shelter amidships.

As he came around the side of the deckhouse and saw Chai Chen’s body at close-quarters for the first time he stopped, held on to the rail for support, and was violently sick in the scuppers. Wiping the back of his hand across his mouth and steeling himself forward he started to unfasten the ropes Mihoro had used to secure his victim in position.

Chai Chen was dead. And the ugly cuts and burns on her body showed that her death had not been easy. Hamilton tried not to look as he freed the ropes binding her wrists and ankles and lowered the pitiful remains of the girl onto the deck with a gentle compassion surprising for a man with his reputation.

‘Anything I can do, sir?’ Morgan asked as Hamilton found a length of ragged canvas with which to cover the body.

Rapier’s commander knelt beside Chai Chen in silence and it was not until the gunner’s mate repeated the question that he came out of his reverie.

‘Thanks, Chief◦– I can manage. But there’s one thing you can do. Most of the De Gama Company’s junks are fitted with old Packard automobile engines◦– I remember Alburra telling me about them during one of my visits. I daresay this one’s the same as the others. See if you can locate some cans of petrol. Bring one to me and use the others to soak the decking and upperworks.’

Morgan returned a few minutes later to find Hamilton still kneeling beside the makeshift shroud. He put a two gallon can of Amoco on the deck in front of the skipper and then made his way to the stern to help the other submariners sprinkle the remaining gasoline containers over the weather worn woodwork of the junk.

Hamilton rose slowly to his feet, unscrewed the brass cap of the can, and tilted the container so that the inflammable spirit splattered over the canvas sheet covering Chai Chen’s body. When it was completely empty, he threw it into the scuppers and made his way back to the poop. There was nothing more he could do◦– nothing except to swear revenge on the barbarous savages responsible for the atrocity. The expression on his face was carved from granite as he approached the Rapier’s gunner.

‘Did your men find anyone else aboard, Chief!’

Morgan nodded vaguely towards the bows. ‘Only an old Chinaman. His legs looked like they’d been broken with the butt end of a rifle. He was dead too.’ The Welshman paused for a moment at the memory of Chen Yu’s agonized death mask. ‘What sort of bastards could torture an old man and a girl, sir?’

Hamilton’s face lost none of its grimness. ‘I don’t know, Chief. But if I ever find them…’ He left the threat unfinished. ‘Get your men back to Rapier. I can’t risk staying on the surface any longer.’

Restraining an impulse to go back to the girl, Hamilton walked to the port side of the junk and waited while Morgan and the two sailors jumped on to the submarine’s foredeck. Then, having prised the grappling hook out of the bulwarks, he leapt across the narrow width of water separating the two vessels, and joined them.

‘Get below, Chief and secure the gun hatch. We’ll be diving in a couple of minutes.’ Tossing the hook for Morgan to catch, he made his way unhurriedly down the foredeck, swung himself up the rungs on the outside of the conning tower, and dropped on to the bridge. ‘Stand by to dive … all hands below!’ He bent over the voice pipe as Scott and the look-outs slid into the hatchway and went down the ladder into the control room. ‘Slow astern both motors. Full port rudder. Call all hands to diving stations, Number One.’

‘Aye aye, sir. Standing by.’

As Rapier went astern and backed slowly away from the junk Hamilton walked to the signal locker behind the binnacle, unfastened the watertight door, and took out a Very pistol. Slipping a cartridge into the breach, he snapped it shut, and moved to the starboard, side of the bridge. He waited until the submarine was safely clear and then, aiming carefully at the base of the tall bamboo main mast, he squeezed the trigger.

The signal cartridge hissed across the water and struck a pile of petrol-soaked sacks where it came to rest, buzzing and sizzling like an angry bee as the fuse burned down. The sudden flash of the flare ignited a pool of gasoline in the shadow of the deckhouse, there was a violent explosion, and within seconds the entire deck from poop to bows was a soaring mass of roaring flames. Hamilton lowered the pistol and watched. He was not a religious man but, alone on the bridge with no one to see, he lowered his head in silent prayer…

‘I don’t suppose we’ll ever know who was responsible, sir,’ Mannon observed quietly as Hamilton clipped the lower hatch and came down the final rungs of the ladder into the bright sanity of the control room.

‘I don’t suppose we will,’ Rapier’s commander agreed grimly. ‘But I’m quite certain about one thing◦– only the Japs would have done something like that. And from now on any enemy ship we meet up with will be sunk without warning. Furthermore, no prisoners will be taken.’

Mannon made no reply. The skipper had been through a bad experience and the black mood would soon pass. Most of the Rapier’s crew had heard what had happened on board the junk and Chai Chen’s relationship with their captain was common knowledge. His reaction was understandable in the circumstances.