Free The Lion at Sea by Max Hennessy Page B

Or did he, perhaps, prefer not to? God forbid, he thought, that I should end up like him, pretending, lying to myself. Thinking of Charley, he felt he never would.
    Everley had moved to the front of the bridge now and was staring towards the bows. Suddenly his hangdog face seemed alive. Perhaps the poor devil preferred to be at sea. Perhaps at sea he felt safe. Perhaps at sea he didn’t have to look at his wife and realise what a mistake he’d made. As Fanshawe had said, the Navy was full of sad people like Everley, swept away by their emotions after serving too long in some torrid Far East port. The China Station where he’d come from was notorious as the graveyard of reputations, and men were always being sent home ruined by drink, speculative gambling, or women. Perhaps Everley was one.
    One eye to port, Everley leaned on the bridge rail. At least, whatever else he’d lost, he’d not lost his touch. He made no gestures, just words spoken against a background hum from the ship’s generators, the occasional clatter of feet in the distance and low murmurs from the men on the deck waiting for him to give his orders.
    ‘Slow ahead together,’ he said quietly.
    Bells jangled and the quivering that ran through the deck increased.
    ‘Slip!’
    A harsh flurry of orders came from the forecastle with the rasping clatter of the wire. ‘All gone forrard, sir!’
    Everley peered over the bridge coaming. ‘Watch her head, quartermaster. Half ahead port.’ There was a pause. ‘Slow ahead together.’
    The white cliffs behind them began to swing and the oil-black water alongside slipped astern, littered with sagging armchairs, abandoned possessions, and the peacetime straw hats they’d worn ashore.
    ‘Forecastle secured for sea, sir!’
    ‘Very good. Fall out the hands and stand by to exercise action stations. I want every one checked.’ Everley permitted himself a small frosty smile. ‘After all, it is the first day of the war.’
    As they turned west, heading towards the Outer Gabbard Light in the approaches to the Thames, the W/T office began to pick up signals from other ships and there was a stream of messages to the bridge.
    ‘I think the war’s started,’ Everley said with an unexpected cheerfulness, as if all his life he’d been waiting for this moment.
    Fanshawe leaned across to Kelly. ‘Tyrwhitt’s out, and itching to draw the first blood of the war,’ he whispered. ‘Third Destroyer Flotilla’s making a sweep towards Holland.’
    The sea was calm and the seamen moved about their duties quietly and efficiently. During the morning, the ship increased speed and the word was passed round that the destroyers were already being led into action by the light cruiser, Amphion. Immediately the air became electric.
    ‘That was quick,’ Kelly said. ‘What is it? High Seas Fleet come out?’
    ‘Nothing quite so important,’ Fanshawe said, ‘We’ve picked up a signal that a suspicious-looking steamer’s been seen throwing things overboard in the mouth of the Thames. The destroyers are searching for her and now, it seems, so are we, because they might be mines.’
    At 10.30, they sighted Amphion through the haze, accompanied by the sleek shapes of several destroyers, one of which immediately swung round to challenge them. Recognising Clarendon, she took up a position alongside.
    ‘Steamer identified as Königin Luise seen laying mines,’ she flashed across the grey water. ‘Position west of longitude three east.’
    Shortly afterwards, they came up on a converging course with other destroyers, and in the distance saw a small grey steamer heading eastwards at full speed, smoke pouring from her funnels. With Clarendon close behind and hauling up fast, the destroyers began to fire. Then Clarendon ’sguns barked; the crash as the forward battery opened up seemed to be the signal for the start of their new life, and they caught their first whiff of cordite fumes in wartime.
    ‘By God, we’ve hit her!’ The