Shoulder the Sky

palatable. By the second night he was relaxed enough to sleep quite well.

He woke with a start to hear feet in the passage outside, then a loud banging somewhere very close. He sat up, for a moment forgetting where he was, and feeling the hammock swing, almost tipping him out. He scrambled to regain his balance as the door burst open and a crewman shouted at him.

“Out! U-boat’s stopped us!” He was almost invisible, but his voice was sharp with fear. “We’ve got to abandon ship. Don’t hang around or you’ll go down with it. They’re giving us a chance.” He withdrew and Joseph heard his feet thudding along the short passage and then a banging on the next door.

A U-boat! Of course. They must be well into the English Channel by now.

The man’s feet were returning. He slammed the door open again, this time holding the lantern high and his face yellow in the glare of it. “Come on!” he ordered. “Get out! They’ll torpedo the ship. You’ll go down with it!”

Joseph reached for his clothes and pulled them on. He was used to sleeping in them, but here he had thought he was safe. He slid into his trousers, fingers fumbling with buttons, and grabbed his jacket. He pushed his feet into his boots without bothering to do them up, and lurched out of the door and along the passage.

It was oddly silent. It was a moment before he realized that the ship was rolling as if it were dead in the water. Of course. The engines were off.

He went up the gangway steps clumsily, his boots slipping because they were not tied. The outside air struck him in the face, cold, wind fresh and tasting of salt.

It was light on deck, because of searchlights from the U-boat. He could see its sleek, gray hull low in the water, only twenty yards away. There were men on the deck, just dark forms beyond the glare, maybe seven or eight of them. The sticklike silhouettes of guns were clear enough.

The captain of the steamer was standing stiffly near the rail. His face was bleak in the yellow beam, features almost expressionless, mouth pulled a little tight. He was in his late fifties, gray-haired, thick-bodied, a little stooped in the shoulder.

“Get your crew off, Kapitan!” The voice came drifting across the choppy water, clear, precise English with only a slight accent. “You have lifeboats!” That was a statement; they were clear enough to see in the lights.

“We need time,” the captain answered. He had no power to bargain and he knew it. The U-boat could sink the steamer whenever it wanted to, and then the lifeboats afterward as well, if they wished.

“You have ten minutes,” the answer came back. “Don’t waste it!”

The captain turned around, moving awkwardly, shock slowing his movements.

Joseph bent to tie up his boots. This was not the time to lose or fall over one’s laces. He worked quickly, his mind racing. Where were they? If they were allowed to escape in the lifeboats, which shore would they make for? Was there food? Water? How many people?

He looked across the water toward the submarine. It was an ugly thing, but swift, strong, silent beneath the waves, a wolf of the sea. The lights sparkled on the crest of the waves. They curled over, sharp ridges white-tipped, full of bubbles.

He stood up slowly. His body still ached from carrying the wounded on the Gallipoli beach. He turned toward the other men on the deck, and came face-to-face with Richard Mason.

Mason smiled. His face was white, his hair wet with spray and slicked back over his head. The flesh on his high cheekbones shone in the light and his eyes were brilliantly readable. There was bitter humor in them, and a suppressed rage, a will to live, but no enmity at all. If anything, he could see the irony in their both facing a common foe in the U-boat, and possibly the sea.

The crew were lowering the two lifeboats. The captain moved toward the open gangway. There was a shot, a loud crack, sounding different out here on the water from the way it did in the trenches. It hit something metal and ricocheted.

The captain stopped abruptly.

“Very noble to go down with your ship, Kapitan! But not necessary,” a voice called out. “Back to the rail, if you please.”

The captain hesitated.

“If you don’t, I shall shoot one of your men. Your choice.”

The captain returned slowly. In the glaring light he looked like an old man, too stiffly upright to be able to bend.

The lifeboats hit the water with a series of slaps as the waves banged against them with jolting sharpness. The sea must be rougher than it looked, even from the small height of the deck. They were not yet given permission to get into them.

Joseph realized with surprise that he was cold. Neither he nor the other man had had time to bring coats. He estimated there were about a dozen of them, including Mason, and the other two passengers. The light played over their figures, as if trying to identify one from another. The quiet man who had stared at the horizon put his hand up to shelter his eyes. The mid-European was shifting impatiently from foot to foot.

The U-boat also had launched a small boat into the water and it was now coming toward them, a hard black shape against the serrated edges of the waves, alternating light and darkness in the path of the lamp. It was easy to see two men rowing and two more standing in the bow, guns at the ready.

No one spoke while they crossed the short distance to the side of the ship, and the two with guns climbed up and on board.

“Kapitan.” The first one stood to attention, but not for an instant altering the aim of his gun at the captain’s chest. “You will come with us. Please bring your ship’s papers. You will be interned in Germany, unless of course you prefer to be shot.” It was not a question. He assumed the answer.

“Let my crew go,” the captain replied. He made no mention of passengers. Perhaps that was a deliberate omission. Sailors might be treated with more respect than civilians. Had they been neutral nationals perhaps he would have said so.

“That is already agreed,” the German told him. “Come now.” He turned to the others. “You will wait here until the captain is on board our boat, then you will get into your lifeboats and move away. If you do not, the vortex of the ship’s going down may suck you under.”

The man in the overcoat made a wild, swinging movement with his right arm. Something in his hand shone in the light, like black metal. A shot rang out from the U-boat and he fell forward, quite slowly, as if he were folding up.

One of the crewmen lunged forward to help him, and a volley of shots followed. The second German clutched his shoulder and spun around, sagging to one side.

A handgun fell on the deck and slithered toward the rail. Another crewman dived for it, caught it, and fired toward the man in the boat.

Then there was a another volley of fire, bullets cracking, ricocheting around. Joseph fell to the deck instinctively, crouching on his hands and knees behind the shelter of the housing over the hatch. People were shouting, in anger, fear, and there was more shooting. The lights were harsh, now raking over the whole boat and the sea at either end.

Someone fired back from the deck. There was an explosion in the direction of the U-boat, and the light went out.

Silence.

Then the captain’s voice came very clearly. “We surrender! I’m coming over! Let my crew get into the lifeboats and they’ll leave!” Then he must have turned around to face his own deck, because his voice was louder. “Put down the gun! They’ll torpedo the ship and we’ll all be lost. Do it now!”

Silence again.

Joseph lifted his head very carefully to peer over the hatch. He saw in the dim starlight and the sickle moon the black shape of the U-boat against the slight shimmer of the water. A group of men were clustered around the dead light, two bent over as if working to get it mended, at least temporarily, but they were keeping low; two others stood separately, their guns trained toward the steamer.

The wind was cold and the ship was rocking as she lay without help of engines. By the rail the captain stood facing his own men.

Joseph could see two bodies sprawled on the deck, motionless. They might be wounded, or dead, or they