Free Kleber's Convoy by Antony Trew

time to say that and much effort. Some of it had to be repeated because the yeoman didn’t answer and Redman needed to hear his voice again to check direction. The yeoman, like Redman, had no survivor’s light. He sounded as if he were fifty yards away.
    â€˜Can’t you answer, yeoman?’ he shouted. ‘For God’s sake man, try. I don’t know where you are.’ That, too, took a lot of saying.
    There was a longish pause. After it Patterson’s voice camedownwind, hoarser, weaker, more broken. ‘Thank you … sir.’
    Redman spat out a mouthful of sea and oil, inhaled deeply, changed his grip on the grating and pushed it round so that it was facing in Patterson’s direction. He struck out with his free hand, paddling in icy water which he could feel but not see. But it was a hopeless floundering, a meaningless thrashing of the sea, and he could not tell in the darkness if he was making headway. His calls to Patterson were no longer answered.
    Quite suddenly Redman gave up. He didn’t know for how long he’d tried or how hard he’d tried, but he remembered deciding he’d made an effort and could do no more. Afterwards, as the obsession grew, he believed he could have done more, shown greater resolution. His legs had been weak, not his arms and shoulders.
    Afterwards, lying in hospital through drab timeless days, and in the months that followed, the conviction grew that he’d given in too easily. He might have saved Patterson. He did not think he’d tried really hard. Perhaps he’d not wanted to reach the yeoman for fear the grating could not support them both. He remembered thinking about that at the time. Had it influenced him? How much was real, how much fantasy? He didn’t know. He compared his feeble efforts with those of Hans on the glacier above Crans-sur-Sierre. Hans, a stranger, had struggled for hours in a blizzard, alone, just as Redman had been alone after the sinking. But Hans had refused to give up and in the end he’d succeeded. That was why Redman was alive.
    To him those last words of Patterson’s were a reproach: ‘Thank you-sir.’ Thank you for what?
    Redman turned over and re-wedged himself between bunk-board and bulkhead.
    He felt wretched and miserable and prayed that sleep would come to deaden his thoughts.
    Â 
    It was the best part of an hour before the first-lieutenant’s voice woke him once more from fitful sleep.
    â€˜Forebridge – captain, sir.’
    â€˜What is it, Number One?’
    â€˜ Fidelix reports bandits one, bearing two-three-oh, thirtymiles, fifteen hundred feet. She’s turning into wind now to fly off aircraft to intercept.’
    â€˜Sound the alarm. I’m coming up.’
    â€˜Aye, aye, sir.’
    As Redman made for the bridge the alarm bells sounded a series of shorts and longs and sleepy men stumbled and groped through the darkness to their anti-aircraft stations. The first lieutenant standing at the bridge screen was silhouetted against the distant glow of the northern lights. Redman moved up alongside him. Not long afterwards the yeoman arrived, then Pownall. The midshipman-of-the-watch, Bowrie, was standing by the radar phone.
    Redman said, ‘Our two-nine-one on to that aircraft yet, Number Qne?’ The 291 radar was used for the detection and tracking of aircraft.
    â€˜Not yet, sir. Just outside maximum range, I think.’
    â€˜Jerry’ll be shadowing by radar. Not likely to close the range while he can keep contact.’ Redman cleared his throat. ‘Better weather was bound to attract our chums. Expect Jerry’s using the cloud base for cover.’
    Pownall’s voice came out of the darkness. He was passing instructions to the pilot. The buzzer from the radar nut sounded. The midshipman reported that 291 radar had picked up the enemy aircraft. He passed the bearing, range and height to gun positions. The TBS bridge-speaker crackled