Floating Madhouse Read online

  One didn’t trust her, though. Didn’t trust any of them. Michael, lighting a cigarette, looked round at Egorov. ‘Smoke?’

  ‘No – thank you—’

  ‘No breakdowns today, please God.’

  ‘Please God.’ Crossing himself, and really meaning it. A gangly young man with a toothy grin and a dry, harsh cackle. His father was a colonel of engineers on General Kuropatkin’s staff in Manchuria, so he had this added personal anxiety – desperation, it looked like sometimes – to reach Port Arthur before its defences collapsed. All the obvious reasons – the squadron’s raison d’etre in fact – but on top of that, fears for his father’s safety, because rumours of the land war situation were all bad – and on the other side of the coin a daydream of steaming into Port Arthur with bands playing and Papa delirious with happiness on the quayside. He’d talked about it one night in the wardroom – brandy playing its part of course, but oddly enough as a foreigner one did now and again find oneself the recipient of confidences.

  ‘Perhaps we’ll get news soon, Gavril Ivan’ich.’ Michael added a warning, ‘Not at this next stop, mind you.’

  Egorov had his glasses up. ‘Why not at—’

  ‘Well – as you know, we’ll be coaling outside. Probably won’t have any contact with the shore. Anchoring three miles out – if weather conditions are right.’

  ‘Look good enough now.’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Mikhail Ivan’ich – fresh trouble ahead, I think they’re—’

  ‘Stop both engines!’

  The telegraphs clanged. Ahead, Enqvist’s ships were under helm and starring – Nachimov and Aurora to port, Donskoi to starboard – and there was confusion in the left-hand column, the transports. The signal yeoman of the watch had been howled at by Egorov to hoist the black ball as warning to the Orel, and Zakharov was in the bridge, coming at a trot from his sea-cabin – in pyjama trousers only, perching himself on his high stool in the starboard for’ard corner and snatching up binoculars.

  ‘What’s it this time?’

  ‘One of the transports – don’t yet know which, sir.’ Michael looking astern to make sure the Orel was staying clear. As she was. Her merchant navy officers did seem to know their onions – at any rate hadn’t been caught napping yet.

  ‘Could be the Malay again, sir.’ He gave Zakharov a ‘sir’ occasionally – always when he was on watch with others in earshot – although more frequently of late he’d been addressing him as ‘skipper’, acknowledging the fact that he was this ship’s commanding officer, but not wanting to overdo it. Especially as in Russian naval usage a ‘sir’ to one’s captain involved not just one syllable but six.

  ‘It is the Malay.’ Zakharov glanced round at Egorov. ‘Don’t worry, Gavril Ivan’ich. Remember the tortoise and the hare.’

  ‘Signal to the Malay from Flag, sir: What is the matter?’

  ‘Same as last time, probably.’

  ‘Could be anything. Steering, or her engine – or her bottom’s fallen out—’

  ‘Reply from the Malay, sir: Cross-head pin of the air-pump broken. Regret this necessitates lengthy repair. Would be glad of attendance by engineer-constructor.’

  ‘Meaning that fellow Narumov.’

  ‘Further signal to the Malay from Flag, sir: Engineer-constructor will transfer to you immediately. If repair is to take more than an hour or two the Rus will take you in tow.’

  ‘Scared of the weather breaking, no doubt.’

  ‘Oh God, yes…’

  Two reasons for praying that wouldn’t happen. One, the fact that many of these ships weren’t seaworthy, and two, the physical impossibility of coaling in the open sea if the wind did get up.

  * * *

  It took the Rus, whose crew were either new to the job or badly out of practice, almost two hours to pass the tow to the Malay. They got her moving then at about four and a half knots, and there were six hours of this slow crawl before the repair was completed. Tow cast off then, Narumov back in the flagship, and the great caravan lumbering on at nine and a half knots again. Shaping an eastward course by then, heading for the Gulf of Biafra, Cape Palmas abaft the beam to port.

  In Ryazan, Zakharov kept them busy with internal exercises: gunnery drill, night alarms, steering breakdowns – switching at a moment’s notice to emergency rudder controls – battle and battle-damage simulations of all kinds. For some of them Michael tagged on to the doctor, Baranov, and his stretcher-bearing parties, familiarizing himself with the organization for getting wounded men to the sickbay, and so forth. He and Radzianko were steering clear of each other; Radzianko obviously humiliated that his ploy with the Prostnyekova girl’s story had failed in whatever its purpose might have been – blackmail of sorts, presumably – and Michael aware there might still be some threat in it: if the girl knew more than that, for instance. As it was, the story amounted virtually to nothing – partly because one had had the presence of mind not to react guiltily – but if it got to Zakharov it might start him thinking. Being no fool: and already in doubt of Prince Igor’s motive in sending this Englishman to sea with him.

  Would it matter?

  Yes, it would: for Tasha’s sake, if it even hinted at their affair. That was what mattered: very much less so the possibility of some constraint developing between Zakharov and oneself – on the lines for instance of that already existing vis-à-vis Radzianko. Which in fact looked like being worsened when on the night of the 23rd Michael’s starsight put them a dozen miles closer inshore than Radzianko’s dead-reckoning position, which had been based on his moon-run-sun observations of the previous morning – and Zakharov had chosen to accept Michael’s result rather than his navigator’s. Radzianko had not unnaturally been aggrieved. ‘I’m sure you’ll find we’re near enough exactly on the track I’ve laid off there. Of course, it’s your decision—’

  ‘Yes.’ Hard eyes on Radzianko – and as expressionless as always. ‘Two good reasons for it too. One, Mikhail Ivan’ich puts us twelve miles closer to danger and for that reason alone can’t be disregarded. Two, look at the particularly small dimensions of his cocked hat there. Doesn’t that tell you anything?’

  ‘Well – it might, sir—’

  ‘Easy enough to settle, anyway. I’ll take morning stars myself.’

  And later, to Michael, ‘You don’t like him, do you?’

  He shrugged: ‘Mutual, probably. Usually is, isn’t it?’ Getting his cigarettes out – Russian ones now, which he’d bought through Paymaster Lyalin. He offered Zakharov one. ‘Smoke?’

  ‘No – thank you. Listen – it’s of concern to me that he seems to be quite generally disliked. Can you put a finger on what’s wrong?’

  ‘Well – do you like him?’

  ‘As commanding officer I have to be impartial. As long as an officer behaves in an officer-like manner and does his job. Come on, what is it?’

  ‘I don’t know. Except one doesn’t trust him. Someone – I forget who - remarked that he’s sly; I’d agree with that. Also he’s addicted to gossip.’

  ‘About what?’

  Flicking ash from his cigarette… ‘Anything. Any one. I never listen, but – there it is.’ Looking back at the sharply alert eyes. No facial expression, but eyes like probes. One wondered what was in the brain behind them: speculation that some of the gossip might be about himself and the Volodnyakov connection? Michael said, ‘As a foreigner and newcomer I’m very much on the sidelines. If you were to put the same questions to Murayev or Galikovsky—’

  ‘It’s because you’re an outsider that we can have this kind of discussion, Mikhail Ivan’ich.’

  He was feeling a bit sorry for Radzianko, as it happened. Being generally disliked couldn’t improve things, exactly. He felt it didn’t help either when Zakharov’s morning stars gave a precise run-on position from Michael’s six hours earlier. Neither Zakharov nor Radzianko commented – at least, not in Michael’s hearing – but there it was on the chart, plain to see. They’d had a straight run du
ring the night, no breakdowns that held them up at all, only the flagship at about two a.m. losing all her electric power. She kept going but went dark, causing the Alexander, her next astern, and the Kamchatka on her beam to spout frantic signals – effectively she’d disappeared, might have sunk. The failure lasted only a few minutes: long enough for Lieutenant Tselinyev as officer of the watch to send his messenger running to shake Zakharov: the squadron meanwhile thundering on through the blackness of the night – there was no moon – and Zakharov almost before he had his eyes open passing a light signal to the Orel that he expected to be stopping engines shortly, at the same time passing orders for calling away both the whaler and the gig, also to searchlight crews to stand by – his entirely reasonable notion being that there might be survivors in the water, even though the rest of the squadron would have ploughed through them by that time. In the event, the Suvarov’s lights came on suddenly and the news was passed swiftly through the fleet, Zakharov’s warning to the Orel being promptly cancelled. Michael and the others heard about this at breakfast, from Tselinyev; the general view of the wardroom officers was that their skipper might be the only one in the entire squadron who had his head screwed on.

  * * *

  ‘Doesn’t look good, Mikhail Ivan’ich.’

  Referring to the swell. Ahead, all the black monsters cavorting like drunken elephants, and astern the Orel’s fine white clipper bow soaring and plunging. This was November 25th, one day short of expected arrival south of the Gabon River, Michael had the afternoon watch, with Egorov as his number two again, and Zakharov had just come into the bridge from his sea-cabin where he’d been taking a post-prandial nap. Adding now, with his glasses focused on the old Donskoi’s gyrations, ‘Could have been much worse. If we’d run into this four or five days ago. For one thing we’d have had it on the beam, and for another we’re now lighter by five days’ steaming, all that weight shifted down. Are you using your cabin now?’

  ‘Not to sleep in. Sleeping in the wardroom – mattress on the deck. Hot enough in there but worse in the cabin with the scuttle shut. Do you think we might get a mail—’ He checked himself. ‘No – of course not, silly question. If we’re to have no contact with the shore—’

  ‘It’s possible, if some steamer had brought it. Not likely – the settlement doesn’t even have a telegraph. Have to wait until we make Great Fish Bay perhaps. Expecting to hear from home, are you? From England?’

  ‘Hoping…’

  ‘Big family there?’

  ‘Very small. My mother, elder brother and his wife. She’s the one who writes – and I’ve asked her to send me news-cuttings of anything about this squadron or the war in the East.’

  ‘That’s all the family you have, eh?’

  ‘I have a sister – older than me and married. Otherwise – yes.’

  ‘A sister is all I have, as it happens… If you do receive any such news cuttings, I’d like to see them.’

  ‘With pleasure, Nikolai Timofey’ich.’

  ‘Even if they’re hostile to us. You needn’t be shy of that. You’d have to translate them for me, of course.’

  ‘Let’s hope there’ll be some good news.’

  A grunt. ‘My guess is there won’t be.’

  ‘You think Port Arthur’ll soon fall?’

  He’d glanced round – made sure Egorov wasn’t hearing this. Shrugging. ‘If it does, a likely outcome is that the admiral will be in no hurry to get there. Since the only destination we could have then would be Vladivostok – and no use getting there in winter when it’s iced-up.’

  ‘So we’d mark time.’

  ‘If we had the news by then, perhaps in Madagascar.’

  ‘God help us. Mosquitoes the size of sparrows. D’you think we’d get through to Vladivostok anyway?’

  ‘Having waited for the ice to melt, fight our way past Togo, you mean? Or trick our way past him somehow. There’s a choice of approaches, of course. But – in battle, how would you rate our chances?’

  ‘With the squadron composed as it is – frankly, not very highly.’

  ‘There you are, then. But since you’re giving frank answers this morning, Mikhail Ivan’ich, here’s a different kind of question.’ Michael looked at him, waiting for it, lowering his glasses halfway and guessing – from that preamble, the lowered tone of voice and the quick glance round – at the sort of question it might be. Had guessed right, too – Zakharov asking him quietly, ‘Do you expect Natasha Igorovna – knowing her as you do – would you say she’ll reconcile herself to the prospect of becoming my wife?’

  ‘You think she’ll need to “reconcile” herself to it?’

  ‘You know damn well she will. At any rate, if we – if I – get out of this alive, she will!’

  Glasses up again – for cover, as it were. And one was, after all, supposed to be on watch. He said diffidently, ‘I suppose having it sprung on her like that it would have come as a shock.’

  ‘Again, you know it. You were there – and you and she are very close – plainly were at that time too. What’s more – oh, that pantomime next morning, the excuse that she couldn’t be disturbed!’

  ‘You mentioned it. But as it happened, I was leaving too—’

  ‘And didn’t see her – say goodbye to her? Or hear from her afterwards? Haven’t heard from her since?’

  You’d have thought from the penetrative quality of that stare he’d have been seeing or guessing right through to the truth. Which in fact he wasn’t anywhere near, it was still Michael’s ‘big brotherly’ opinion he was on about. Michael shaking his head: ‘I’d have thought that by this time – good Lord, it was two months ago we were at Injhavino – she’d have had ample time to – your word, Nikolai Timofey’ich – reconcile—’

  ‘No.’ Brusque shake of the head: and putting his glasses up. ‘You’re not being frank at all.’

  * * *

  By the 26th, approaching a distant haze of land – French Equatorial Africa – the swell had miraculously subsided. Prayer was reckoned to have had something to do with it, most likely the intervention of Saint Seraphim of Sarof, a saint canonized only quite recently and therefore fashionable, certainly much esteemed by Myakishev. Anyway – glassy surface, no wind at all, steamy heat reaching from the jungle to enfold them as they came nosing in. By six p.m. the squadron had anchored between three and three and a half miles offshore, in a slight declivity of the coastline that could hardly be called a bay, was to all intents and purposes open sea.

  Not a collier in sight. And even through telescopes and binoculars, not a building visible against that greenish smear of coastline. Not even a mud hut. Michael remarked to Radzianko – when he’d finished in the chart-room – ‘The settlement’s right at the river mouth, isn’t it? Just inside it.’ ‘Settlement’ meaning Gabon: Libreville, which was the capital but itself not exactly a metropolis, was a few miles higher up the river. Michael engaging Radzianko in conversation now as a matter of policy – healing the breach, and not wanting to be included in the group who seemed rather to hound him. Having in any case – touch wood - as it were drawn his teeth over the Prostnyekova girl’s titbit of information: over which incidentally he’d seemed willing to meet him halfway: his first and only reference to her since that episode had been to murmur, ‘She really is a stunner, that little Nadia.’

  ‘Nadia?’

  ‘Nadyejhda Prostnyekova. The one I mentioned.’ A shrug of the heavy shoulders. ‘Perhaps should not have.’

  Michael had stuck up for him in a wardroom dispute the day after the starsight business. Radzianko at first showing surprise, even suspicion, but then seemingly accepting the olive branch. Challenged later by Murayev, Michael had explained that he felt sorry for him in that he seemed to have no friends at all – except for Padre Myakishev – and that with months of this tortoise-like progress and God only knew what else ahead of them, things could only get worse if there was no positive effort to improve them – an effort which he as an outsider might be best plac
ed to make. Murayev had agreed it might be as well: Radzianko seemed to have a skin like a rhinoceros’s but on the other hand he might be suffering inside it – in which case he’d be likely to get worse, not better. So – all right, he’d ease off a little too.

  Because the water even three miles out was so shallow and could have even shallower patches in it, Rojhestvensky had had the battleships hoist out their boats to steam in ahead of the squadron taking soundings and marking out the anchorage with flagged buoys. Somehow as a result of this, the hospital-ship had anchored on Ryazan’s quarter instead of on her beam, was thus not as isolated from the rest of the squadron as she had been elsewhere. Radzianko flipped a hand towards her. They’d strolled on to the flag deck – abaft the bridge but at that same level – and had a clear view from here of that elegant white quarter-profile.