Brown was the first on the scene. Picking his way gingerly, he climbed up to the entrance of 'Y' turret. Watchers in the port and starboard alleyways saw him pause there, fighting to tie back the heavy steel door-it had been crashing monotonously backwards and forwards with the rolling of. the cruiser. Then they saw him step inside. Less than ten seconds later they saw him appear at the door again, on his knees and clutching desperately at the side for support. His entire body was arching convulsively and he was being violently sick into his oxygen mask.
Nicholls saw this, wasted time neither on 'Y' turret nor on the charred skeltons still trapped in the incinerated fuselage of the Condor. He climbed quickly up the vertical steel ladders to 'X' gun-deck, moved round to the back and tried to open the door. The clips were jammed, immovable, whether from cold or metal distortion he did not know. He looked round for some lever, stepped aside as he saw Doyle, duffel coat smouldering, haggard face set and purposeful under the beard, approaching with a sledge in his hand. A dozen heavy, well- directed blows-the clanging, Nicholls thought, must be almost intolerable inside the hollow amplifier of the turret- and the door was open. Doyle secured it, stepped aside to let Nicholls enter.
Nicholls climbed inside. There had been no need to worry about that racket outside, he thought wryly. Every man in the turret was stone dead. Colour-Sergeant Evans was sitting bolt upright in his seat, rigid and alert in death as he had been in life: beside him lay Foster, the dashing, fiery Captain of Marines, whom death became so ill. The rest were all sitting or lying quietly at their stations, apparently unharmed and quite unmarked except for an occasional tiny trickle of blood from ear and mouth, trickles already coagulated in the intense cold-the speed of the Ulysses had carried the flames aft, away from the turret. The concussion must have been tremendous, death instantaneous. Heavily, Nicholls bent over the communications number, gently detached his headset, and called the bridge.
Vallery himself took the message, turned back to Turner. He looked old, defeated.
'That was Nicholls,' he said. Despite all he could do, the shock and sorrow showed clearly in every deeply- etched line in that pitiably wasted face. ''Y' turret is gone, no survivors. 'X' turret seems intact, but everyone inside is dead. Concussion, he says. Fires in the after mess-deck still not under control... Yes, boy, what is it?'
''Y' magazine, sir,' the seaman said uncertainly. 'They want to speak to the gunnery officer.'
'Tell them he's not available,' Vallery said shortly. 'We haven't time...' He broke off, looked up sharply. 'Did you say 'Y' magazine?
Here, let me have that phone.'
He took the receiver, pushed back the hood of his duffel coat.
'Captain speaking, 'Y' magazine. What is it?... What? Speak up man, I can't hear you... Oh, damn!' He swung round on the bridge L.T.O.
'Can you switch this receiver on to the relay amplifier? I can't hear a... Ah, that's better.'
The amplifier above the chart-house crackled into life-a peculiarly throaty, husky life, doubly difficult to understand under the heavy overlay of a slurred Glasgow accent. j 'Can ye hear me now?' the speaker boomed. !
'I can hear you.' Vallery's own voice echoed loudly over the amplifier.
'McQuater, isn't it?'
'Aye, it's me, sir. How did ye ken?' Even through the 'speaker the surprise was unmistakable. Shocked and exhausted though he was, Vallery found himself smiling.
'Never mind that now, McQuater. Who's in charge down : there-Gardiner, isn't it?' !
'Yes, sir. Gardiner.'
'Put him on, will you?' There was a pause.
'Ah canna, sir. Gardiner's deid.'
'Dead!' Vallery was incredulous. 'Did you say' dead,' McQuater?'
'Aye, and he's no' the only one.' The voice was almost truculent, but Vallery's ear caught the faint tremor below. 'Ah was knocked oot masel', but Ah'm fine now.'
Vallery paused, waited for the boy's bout of hoarse, harsh coughing to pass.
'But-but-what happened?'
'How should Ah know-Ah mean, Ah dinna ken-Ah don't know, sir. A helluva bang and then-ach, Ah'm no' sure whit happened... Gardiner's mooth's all blood.'
'How-how many of you are left?'
'Just Barker, Williamson and masel', sir. Naebody else, just us.'
'And-and they're all right, McQuater?'
'Ach, they're fine. But Barker thinks he's deein'. He's in a gey bad wey. Ah think he's gone clean aff his trolley, 'sir.'
'He's what!'
'Loony, sir,' McQuater explained patiently. 'Daft. Some bluidy nonsense aboot goin' to meet his Maker, and him wi' naething behind him but a lifetime o' swindlin' his fellow-man.' Vallery heard Turner's sudden chuckle, remembered that Barker was the canteen manager.
'Williamson's busy shovin' cartridges back into the racks-floor's littered with the bluidy things.'
'McQuater!' Vallery's voice was sharp, automatic in reproof.
'Aye, Ah'm sorry, sir. Ah clean forgot... Whit's to be done, sir?'
'Done about what?' Vallery demanded impatiently.
'This place, sir. 'Y' magazine. Is the boat on fire oot-side? It's bilin' in here-hotter than the hinges o' hell!'
'What! What did you say?' Vallery shouted. This time he forgot to reprimand McQuater. 'Hot, did you say? How hot? Quickly, boy!'
'Ah canna touch the after bulkheid, sir,' McQuater answered simply. 'It 'ud tak 'the fingers aff me.'
'But the sprinklers-what's the matter with them?' Vallery shouted.
'Aren't they working? Good God, boy, the magazine will go up any minute!'
'Aye.' McQuater's voice was noncommittal. 'Aye, Ah kinna thought that might be the wey o' it. No, sir, the sprinklers arena workin'-and it's akeady 20 degrees above the operatin' temperature, sir.'
'Don't just stand there,' Vallery said desperately. 'Turn them on by hand! The water in the sprinklers can't possibly be frozen if it's as hot as you say it is. Hurry, man, hurry. If the mag. goes up, the Ulysses is finished. For God's sake, hurry!'
'Ah've tried them, sir,' McQuater said softly. 'It's nae bluidy use.
They're solid!'
'Then break them open! There must be a tommy bar lying about somewhere. Smash them open, man! Hurry!'
'Aye, richt ye are, sir. But-but if Ah do that, sir, how am Ah to shut the valves aff again?' There was a note almost of quiet desperation in the boy's voice, some trick of reproduction in the amplifier, Vallery guessed.
'You can't! It's impossible! But never mind that!' Vallery said impatiently, his voice ragged with anxiety. 'We'll pump it all out later. Hurry, McQuater, hurry!'
There was a brief silence followed by a muffled shout and a soft thud, then they heard a thin metallic clanging echoing through the amplifier, a rapid, staccato succession of strokes. McQuater must have been raining a veritable hail of blows on the valve handles. Abruptly, the noise ceased.
Vallery waited until he heard the phone being picked up, called anxiously: 'Well, how is it? Sprinklers all right?'
'Goin' like the clappers, sir.' There was a new note in his voice, a note of pride and satisfaction. 'Ah've just crowned Barker wi' the tommy bar,' he added cheerfully. 'You've wharf'
'Laid oot old Barker,' said McQuater distinctly. 'He tried to stop me. Windy auld bastard.... Ach, he's no' worth mentionin'... My they sprinklers are grand things, sir. Ah've never seen them workin' before.
Place is ankle deep a'ready. And the steam's fair sizzlin' aff the bulkheid!'
'That's enough!' Vallery's voice was sharp. 'Get out at once, and make sure that you take Barker with you.'
'Ah saw a picture once. In the Paramount in Glasgow, Ah think. Ah must've been flush.' The tone was almost conversational, pleasurably reminiscent. Vallery exchanged glances with Turner, saw that he too, was fighting off the feeling of unreality. 'Rain, it was cried. But it wasnae hauf as bad as this. There certainly wisnae
