She stepped out on to the deck, the bridge-coat heavy across her shoulders. The ship was quiet and still, and she realised that the engine had stopped. She crossed to the rail and stood silently in the shadow of the boatdeck. The afterdeck was dappled in bright moonlight criss-crossed with black bars, made by the shadows of the rigging and spars overhead. Beyond the rail the dark water gleamed silver, and the horizon below the pale moon looked like a long, scattered necklace.

  She saw the small huddle of figures by the rail, the bared heads, and the rank of still shapes on the scarred planking. She saw, too, von Steiger, his coat still hanging like a cape across his shoulders, reading the burial service by the light of a shaded lantern. Her heart jumped each time one of the pathetic bundles splashed over the side, and she found herself counting. Nine men. Some of them might have spoken to her, or leered at her passing. And some of them she would never have noticed. Now they were on their last journey. The night was so beautiful that she wanted to cry. Someone should cry, she thought, before hatred took even tears away.

  When she looked again the deck was clear, and the small party of mourners had vanished. She shook herself, and found that she was almost running along the boatdeck. The sentry at the end of the passageway did not move as she passed him, his chin was on his chest, and he slept on his feet.

  She closed the door behind her, and without even switching on the light sat down on the wide bunk. The packet of pills rolled across the polished floor, and she, too, was asleep.

  Outside, the mast spiralled gently around the distant stars, and the engine began its symphony once more.

  * * *

  Niklas slid his buttocks forward to the edge of the chair and thrust his thin legs beneath the table. His chin, stiff with stubble, was resting on his interwoven fingers, so that he appeared to be squinting at his captain like a knowing sparrow.

  The sea cabin was heavy with smoke from cheroots and the old cracked pipe which Niklas usually favoured, and the table was still littered with books, charts and scraps of paper of all sorts Von Steiger lay on his bunk, his body bare to the waist and one hand gingerly exploring the bandage across his chest. He looked spent, but his voice still sounded controlled and even.

  ‘Well, I have buried nine good men, Niklas. I am only sorry that their passing will hardly be noticed by those other than ourselves!’

  ‘You did well to bury them at night. The crew are doleful enough after their little battle, without being reminded of their closeness to the grave!’

  Von Steiger frowned. ‘I am afraid they have a lot to learn! It was all fine while we were doing as we pleased, but a bloody nose is not the same when you have to wear it!’

  Niklas looked at the clock and groaned. ‘Look at the time! It will be dawn in a few hours! Why do I encourage you in your campaign against sleep?’

  Von Steiger tried to laugh, but the soreness in his chest made him quiver and a rash of sweat break out on his forehead. ‘Go away, you old fraud! Go and find peace with your engine!’

  Niklas noticed the freckles across von Steiger’s shoulders, and envied him his ability to hold on to youth. ‘I am going. Why not do what everyone else but the watchkeepers are doing? Go to sleep yourself!’

  As he moved stiffly from the sea cabin, the Captain swung his legs over the edge of the bunk and stared with distaste at the disordered cabin. It would all be waiting for him when he awoke. The chart with its new course—a near-straight line, desperate in haste, running to the south and to the sun. He tried to remember what a clear hot sky looked like, and what it was like to feel clean.

  He remembered the beauty of the sea as he had buried his dead seamen, and its apparent emptiness. It was just another illusion. Even now, as he sat here, they were being hunted. The air would be alive with signals, and weary captains would probably be called from their beds to weigh anchor, or to leave a convoy and search for the German raider.

  He shook his head. Not much of a raider. Not much to show for his efforts. It was strange how he was changing. He had wanted only peace in which to hide his misery. His officers had desired otherwise. They thirsted after honours and glories, which he knew were not to be had; they wanted to destroy the enemy, when he could have told them that their own destruction was the more likely. Now it was all changed. One action with a destroyer and their eagerness had collapsed into fear and resentment.

  He scrambled to his feet and began to pace. Aloud he said: ‘Now I am the one who has had the legacy of their ideals passed to me for solution. Against my will, and in spite of what I know must be inevitable, I must now drive them along a course which I despise! I can no longer find comfort in knowing them to be wrong, because their realisation has come too late for all of us!’

  He halted, breathing painfully. Why did not that splinter do its work? When it had struck him, the agony had rendered him incapable of thought or even the ability to cry out. As the seconds passed he had waited to die, expecting the peace which he had always imagined would follow the one final wound. He had tried to think of Freda, but even through the mists of pain he was unable to recall her face. This shock alone had jolted him back to life. He had returned with the knowledge that in some strange way he had been cheated.

  When he had inspected the damage to his ship he had realised, perhaps for the first time, just what she had come to mean to him. As he had limped painfully from deck to deck, the men had stood back, respectful, yet hostile. He represented their safety, but at the same time he was the one man who could destroy them.

  He had peered into the open door of the sick quarters and watched the girl helping Steuer. He had wanted her to see him, so that he could tell if she had changed since her return from the sea and her appearance on the bridge. She had thanked him for taking the ship back for her. She would never guess just how important that had been to him. Returning from the dead, he had driven the ship like a madman. A cheated madman, who could not remember the face of his wife. Because she had been part of another life and another world which had rejected him, and which he had rejected. Only here in this ship was there reality. But the girl in the white smock had not seen him. Her eyes had passed over him like a blind girl’s, and her face had been empty of everything but determination.

  He looked at his bunk, and reached instead for his black leather coat. The fur collar felt warm about his ears, and the lining soothing against his skin and chafing bandage.

  He clapped on his cap and strode purposefully through the wheelhouse. The dark figures stiffened into watchfulness as he passed. Ebert by the chart-table, no doubt dreaming of how well his guns had behaved. Heuss on the far side of the bridge, his shoulders hunched against the chill air.

  He passed them without speaking, behind the lookouts and down the exposed ladder to the forward deck. All around him his ship was asleep and resting. As his boot stubbed against a torn plank he smiled gently and felt his own wound. It was right that he had suffered with his ship. He passed close to a hidden gun, and laid his hand on the long barrel as if still expecting to feel the heat of its fury. It was like ice, and he hurried on to the ladder which led up to the high fo’c’sle. He stepped between the unused anchor-cables, feeling the rust scraping his foot, and walked right forward to the eyes of the ship. He turned his back on the stem with its angry turbulence of white foam, and stared back along the full length of his ship. Nothing moved but the shadows caused by the low moon and the occasional lift of spray over the rail. In the moonlight it looked like a phantom ship, driving on, committed to an endless journey alone with its captain.

  The glass of the bridge windows glinted like black eyes and seemed to be watching him, and he could see the dim shape of the crow’s-nest spiralling high above the deck.

  I wonder how the lookout feels up there now? Knowing that a dead man had earlier shared his post. It was strange that he had stressed its importance so early in the voyage, and how much tragedy it had brought, either for the enemy or the men who had kept a lonely vigil there.

  He walked slowly back towards the bridge, his chin on his chest. The walk had weakened him again and his feet were heavy. He passed two seamen and sensed their animal surprise, but did not look up as they passed. He turned the end of the boatdeck and saw the shape of the sentry in the unlighted passageway.

  She was in his cabin, asleep. He had taken her from the sea to make her humble and grateful. Instead, he was the one who had been humbled. He dragged himself back to his tiny cabin on the bridge and lowered himself on to his bunk.

  There was so much to think about. Coal, repairs, even disguising the ship would have to be tackled in the morning.

  In the mirror he saw a bright-red spot in the centre of his bandage and cursed weakly.

  A bell chimed in the distance, and he heard the Morning Watch assembling on the lower deck.

  He lay down and tried to place the different sounds, which were like the heartbeats of his ship, and think about the nine men he had buried.

  Von Steiger fell into an uneasy sleep as his ship carried him to the south. Behind the ship, and beyond her wake, lay confusion and the rallying calls of pursuit and vengeance.

  As the Morning Watch moved listlessly to their posts, Schiller and Pieck sat in their messdeck, looking at each other.

  Pieck said: ‘The Captain did not see us! He walked right past!’

  Schiller grunted, and clambered into his bunk. ‘Von Steiger would understand! After all, he has buried nine of us, we only buried one petty officer!’

  Part Three

  ‘At thirteen-fifteen the enemy opened fire’

  12

  EXTRACT FROM VON STEIGER’S report

  January 31st, 1918.

  It is now thirty-five days since we sailed from Kiel, and in that time we have covered over six thousand miles. At noon today our approximate position was one thousand miles north-east of the Brazilian coast, and eight hundred miles west of the African Continent. At this moment we are crossing the Fifteenth Parallel, and also what was once the busiest trade route between the South Americas and Europe.

  It is nine days since our skirmish with the destroyer, and yet we have sighted nothing but a small ship in the far distance, which altered course away from us before its size and class could be identified. The sea is empty, and yet I feel that we are being hunted for every mile that we steam.

  Another of the wounded men has died, bringing the total to ten, and of the wounded, two of the seamen are in real danger, having succumbed to gangrene poisoning.

  Food is a problem, there being no vegetables of any kind left in the stores, and personal fresh water is rationed to a pint a day for each man aboard. Morale is as good as can be expected, but the majority of the ship’s company are still unused to the demanding ways of the sea, and are finding the hardships of bad food and lack of personal cleanliness difficult to surmount.

  It is eleven days since we replenished the bunkers from the collier Nemesis, and I shall endeavour to make contact with her at the first opportunity, as coal is getting dangerously low once more.

  Against this, however, I am pleased to see the change in the weather as we move still closer to the Equator. The skies remain clear, and the sun helps to make up for much of the harshness of life on board for my men.

  There is still no fresh information about the loss of Petty Officer Brandt, but I feel an undercurrent which I cannot explain in connection with this matter.

  The prisoners are in good condition, and the woman has been a great help to the sick, and quite unselfish in her voluntary help with these unfortunate fellows. I shall, however, try to put them aboard a neutral ship, or perhaps land them at an early opportunity.

  I am desperate for information of the outside world, of the conduct of the war and of the deployment of enemy naval forces. I am like a blind man, and must feel my way at every step.

  My officers are doing their duties well, but are showing signs of strain.

  Yesterday we passed the area where our very first commerce raider, Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse, was sunk by the British within a month of the declaration of war. We would wish to avenge her and her successors, but so far this cruise has been disappointing in its lack of prizes.

  My own wound is giving me a little trouble, but the sun is helping to give me strength, and patience. . . .

  * * * * *

  It was at two bells of the Afternoon Watch that the ship was sighted. She was so low in the water that against the glimmering sheen of the sea her upperworks appeared as a mere smudge against the hazy horizon line. The Vulkan, still under Dutch colours, but shining dully in her new paint and renamed Van Diemen, altered course immediately to intercept, the me running unwillingly from the midday meal, squinting with nervous apprehension first towards the bridge and then at the smiling sea, which shone warmly, like pale-green milk.

  Von Steiger closed the leather-bound book in which he had been writing his daily report, and listened to the alarm bells and the sudden urgent clamour of noises within the ship.

  The pale, fresh sunlight faded as Reeder slammed down the steel deadlight across the scuttle and swept the remains of the Captain’s meal on to a tray. He scurried away to his station with a first-aid party, his unhealthy face set and miserable.

  Von Steiger forgot his steward and his report as he stepped on to the bridge, his eyes taking in the orderly preparedness which, in control of everyone present, hid the worries and anxious thoughts he knew were plaguing his men as they prepared for action. Was it another warship? Why not just run away? They were the mad fleeting questions they would be asking themselves as they tore away the gun-muzzle covers and slammed the shells into the gaping breeches.

  ‘Ship closed up at Action Stations, Captain!’ Heuss saluted formally, his face impassive. ‘Masthead reports target fine on the port bow. She is just breaking out of the haze.’

  A voice-pipe cracked irritably as Ebert reported that the range-finder had found and was tracking the other ship.

  Von Steiger pursed his lips as a twinge of pain moved in the scar beneath his jacket. He decided to ignore it, and strode impatiently to the side of the bridge and felt the power of the sun magnified by the plate-glass windows, so that it enfolded his body in comfortable warmth.

  It was amazing the difference finer weather had made, and had they been better stocked and equipped, as his other raider had been, this cruise could be almost enjoyable. The bridge superstructure shone in its new buff paint, and the tall, yellow funnel, bearing a black star, gave the ship almost a holiday atmosphere. Not so the crew, he thought. Their faces looked drawn and grey with stubble, and their shoddy uniforms added to their dishevelled and wild appearance.

  It was as if they had given their own strength and vitality to the ship itself, and had been left with only their empty husks. For over a week they had been driven without mercy and reprieve, and only at close quarters could the repaired shot holes be recognised and the new planks on the scarred decks be visible for what they were.

  Von Steiger frowned. Tomorrow he would get the ship’s company changed into white uniforms. That alteration of routine and surroundings, plus the warm air, would help to shake them out of their doldrums. The extra washing which that would entail would keep them too busy to grumble, and salt-water would have to suffice for the moment.

  The bridge lookouts had picked up the other ship and were passing their information to the wheelhouse. Von Steiger remained silent and aloof, like a spectator. He could now trust his officers to cope with the preliminaries. He did not want to tire himself too early in the operation and make the one small slip in judgement which might kill them all.

  Damrosch manipulated the power of his binoculars, his lips pouting with concentration. He rarely smiled any more and his tone was always sharp, but more confident than before the action with the American warship.

  ‘She is not making any smoke, sir! I think she is stopped!’

  Von Steiger looked at the newcomer with immediate caution. She was still well away from the raider and not closing the range as she should have been. She must be stopped, he thought. He squinted painfully as an orange shaft of sunlight lanced up from the unbroken water. The sea was so inviting, he thought, yet gave the impression of immeasurable depth and patient cruelty.

  As they drew nearer he knew the reason for the stranger’s indifference. Her bow was barely a few feet above the gently lapping water, and her screw glinted brightly where her rounded stern jutted dangerously clear of the sea.

  Von Steiger could feel the taut silence within the bridge, but concentrated on that small circular world within the lenses of his glasses. The smokeless stack, the empty boat-falls dangling loose and swaying down the rusty sides, the buckled guardrails and splintered foremast, with its attendant mass of torn and tangled rigging. All these things were familiar to him. Torpedoed and abandoned, probably hundreds of miles to the east of the African coast, by one of the new ocean-going submarines, and carried dismally across the Atlantic by the Equatorial current. A ghost ship, a relic already forgotten by its crew and its country.

  He cleared his throat and saw Damrosch jump nervously. ‘Clear away port battery! Fire one round across her bows!’

  He waited as the orders were passed and the big five-point-nines showed themselves to the sun for the first time. Another agonising pause, and then a shot. Even the shot seemed reluctant to trouble the lonely wanderer, and in the warm, moist air they heard the shell thunder away across the strip of glittering water with the sound of tearing silk.

  Far away, the tall waterspout rose and vanished. Leaving only the sound of the Vulkan’s engine and the smudge of brown smoke around her fo’c’sle.

  ‘Stop engine!’

  They glided slowly towards the other ship, the gun-muzzles still following her, like uncertain dogs around a dead rabbit.