Only Time Will Tell
Page 80Finally, he descended a narrow ladder that led to the boiler room, and Mr Patterson's domain. He heaved open the heavy metal hatch and, like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, marched boldly into the fiery furnace. He stood and watched as half a dozen squat, muscle-bound men, their vests soiled with black dust, sweat pouring down their backs, shovelled coal into two gaping mouths that needed to be fed more than four meals a day.
As Captain Havens had predicted, it was only a few minutes before Harry had to stagger back into the corridor, sweating and gasping for breath. It was some time before he recovered enough to make his way back up on to the deck, where he fell on his knees and gulped in the fresh air. He could only wonder how those men could survive in such conditions and be expected to carry out three two-hour shifts a day, seven days a week.
Once Harry had recovered, he made his way back up to the bridge, armed with a hundred questions, from which star in the Plough points to the North Star, to how many nautical miles the ship could average per day, to how many tons of coal were required for ... The captain happily answered them all, without once appearing exasperated by the young fourth officer's unquenchable thirst for knowledge. In fact, Captain Havens remarked to Mr Bradshaw during Harry's break that what impressed him most about the lad was that he never asked the same question twice.
During the next few days, Harry learnt how to check the compass against the dotted line on the chart, how to gauge wind direction by watching seagulls, and how to take the ship through the trough of a wave and still maintain a constant course. By the end of the first week, he was allowed to take over the wheel whenever an officer took a meal break. By night, the captain taught him the names of the stars, which, he pointed out, were every bit as reliable as a compass, but he confessed his knowledge was limited to the northern hemisphere as the Devonian had never crossed the equator in all her twenty-six years on the high seas.
After ten days at sea, the captain was almost hoping for a storm, not only to stop the endless questions but also to see if there was anything that could throw this young man off his stride. Jim Patterson had already warned him that Mr Clifton had survived for an hour in the boiler room that morning and was determined to complete a full shift before they docked in Cuba.
'At least you're spared his endless questions down there,' remarked the captain.
'This week,' responded the chief engineer.
Captain Havens wondered if a time would come when he learnt something from his fourth officer. It happened on the twelfth day of the voyage, just after Harry had completed his first two-hour shift in the boiler room.
'Did you know that Mr Patterson collects stamps, sir?' Harry asked.
'Yes, I did,' replied the captain confidently.
'Yes, I did,' repeated the captain.
'And that the collection is now worth more than his home in Mablethorpe?'
'It's only a cottage, damn it,' said the captain, trying to hold his own, and before Harry could ask his next question, he added, 'I'd be more interested if you could find out as much about Tom Bradshaw as you seem to have wormed out of my chief engineer. Because frankly, Harry, I know more about you after twelve days than I do about my third officer after three years, and until now, I'd never thought of Americans as being a reserved race.'
The more Harry thought about the captain's observation, the more he realized just how little he too knew about Tom, despite having spent many hours with him on the bridge. He had no idea if the man had any brothers or sisters, what his father did for a living, where his parents lived, or whether he even had a girlfriend. And only his accent gave away the fact that he was an American, because Harry didn't know which town, or even state, he hailed from.
Seven bells rang. 'Would you take over the wheel, Mr Clifton,' said the captain, 'while I join Mr Patterson and Mr Bradshaw for dinner? Don't hesitate to let me know if you spot anything,' he added as he left the bridge, 'especially if it's bigger than we are.'
'Aye aye, sir,' said Harry, delighted to be left in charge, even if it was only for forty minutes, although those forty minutes were being extended each day.
It was when Harry asked him how many more days it would be before they reached Cuba that Captain Havens realized the precocious youth was already bored. He was beginning to feel some sympathy for the captain of HMS Resolution, who had no idea what he was letting himself in for.
Harry had recently been taking over the wheel after dinner so that the other officers could enjoy a few hands of gin rummy before returning to the bridge. And whenever the Chinaman took up Harry's mug of tea now, it was always piping hot, with the requested one lump of sugar.
Mr Patterson was heard to remark to the captain one evening that should Mr Clifton decide to take over the ship before they got back to Bristol, he wasn't sure who he'd side with.
'No, but I must warn you, skipper, that the young turk has already reorganized the shifts in the boiler room. So I know whose side my lads would be on.'
'Then the least we can do,' said Havens, pouring himself a glass of rum, 'is order the flag officer to send a message to the Resolution, warning them what they'll be up against.'
'But we don't have a flag officer,' said Patterson.
'Then we'll have to clap the lad in irons,' said the captain.
'Good idea, skipper. It's just a shame we don't have any irons.'
'More's the pity. Remind me to pick some up as soon as we get back to Bristol.'
'But you seem to have forgotten Clifton's leaving us to join the Resolution the moment we dock,' Patterson said.
The captain swallowed a mouthful of rum before repeating, 'More's the pity.'
53
The length of time Tom left him in charge of the bridge was becoming longer and longer with each watch, but Harry never complained, because he enjoyed the illusion that for an hour a day the ship was under his command.
He checked the arrow on the compass and steered the course that had been set by the captain. He had even been entrusted with entering their position on the chart and writing up the daily log before he came off duty.
As Harry stood alone on the bridge, a full moon, a calm sea, and a thousand miles of ocean ahead of him, his thoughts drifted back to England. He wondered what Emma was doing at that moment.
Emma was sitting in her room at Somerville College, Oxford, tuning her radio to the Home Service so she could hear Mr Neville Chamberlain address the nation.
'This is the BBC in London. You will now hear a statement from the Prime Minister.'
'I am speaking to you from the Cabinet room, Ten Downing Street. This morning the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German government a final note, stating that unless we heard from them by eleven o'clock, that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us. I have to tell you now, that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently, this country is at war with Germany.'