Interlude III: Frisch Weht Der Wind, Der Heimat Zu
Well, I’ve travelled ‘round the world from year to year
And each one found me aimless; one more year, the worse for wear…
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Indian Ocean, somewhere off the South African coast
May 13, 1984
You had to hand it to the Indians: even if they’d jumped in on this convoy at the last minute, they’d done a good job of overshadowing the Australian and New Zealand contributions. Task Force Six-Four-Nine was what the Ones On High had called the two frigates and four freighters of the New Zealand contingent which had sailed from Lyttelton and Port Chalmers, and by God were those nothing alongside…
“An aircraft carrier.” Lieutenant Commander John McKirdy, skipper of HMNZS Otago, glanced at his two-eye-see. “A fucking aircraft carrier. Sir.”
The first lieutenant said this with a note of begrudging reverence in his voice as he cast his gaze to the immense bulk of Vikrant in the distance ahead of Otago, a helo buzzing in to land on the flight deck. The Skipper gave a cocked grin.
“Feeling inadequate there, Ron?”
“No, sir, course not.” An affectionate pat on the console he was standing at. “Seems like overkill, though, you know? I don’t reckon we’re in for many air-sea battles shepherding a load of freighters. Unless the Sovs sold the Angolans a few subs we didn’t hear about.”
A snort from the Skipper. “Well, looks like the fellas in Delhi decided to make a show of it. Nothing like letting London know they’ve got a nice hard one to wave around.”
“Well, if you’re gonna get shore leave in Pommieland…” Ron trailed off as he took a sudden intense interest in the carrier, which of course had nothing to do with the Skipper’s gaze boring into the back of his head.
“Anywa-ay,” drawled McKirdy, “might be some use. A little recon never hurt. Fuck knows what’s going on onshore nowadays.”
“Do you know if it’s true what they said at the briefing, sir? About the yarpies getting bombed to hell and the darkies doing their nut?”
“Could you blame ‘em? Strewth, remember the stink the Boers kicked up when we tried sending Maoris over with the team in ’76? ‘Honorary whites’, I ask you,” he responded sourly.
“I had no idea I was serving under Minto, sir.” This followed by a grin which, from anyone else in the Navy, would’ve had the Lieutenant Commander putting him on a charge.
“As you said, yes, the Indians are sending a flight out today. Aussies reckon they picked up something on their first pass in March, too, so Christ knows what we’ll find out. Thank God we don’t get to find out for ourselves. All we are is Grade A International Sea-Mail.”
“No tan for us then, eh?”
“No rugby, either.”
“Eh?”
“Sinclair kicked the ball off the side a couple hours ago when we made that low pass alongside Taranaki, and the Army boys caught it. So much for the match.”
“Bugger.” Ron said that with more feeling than anything else so far. “Typical of them; first they come for our funding, then they start sleeping in our quarters, and now,” he said in mock outrage “now they come for our bloody R-and-R. Is he confined to quarters?”
“I believe he’s hiding there for his own good.”
“Well, he could be worse off; you seen the state Taranaki’s in?”
The somewhat antiquated condition of Otago was audible in the periodic whump-whump-whump of a piston or the groan of aging metal being rocked and warped by waves or the imaginative and unprintable collection of profanities emanating from the sumpies keeping the whole outfit afloat. Compared to its sister ship, it was a trip on QEII.
“Gives you the sneaking suspicion,” mused the Skipper “that the Ministry of Defence is sending over the vessels it reckons it can afford to lose, worse comes to worst.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’s completely unjustified, sir.” Ron’s voice had taken on a tone which the Skipper had learned from long association meant the punchline was coming in three, two… “I mean, if Taranaki gets mislaid or, God forbid, sunk, New Zealand’s strategic scrap reserve is well shitted.”
That merited a snort. Well, it was nicer than openly laughing at his counterparts a mile or two aft; if being assigned to sail fourteen thousand miles on a floating antique shop wasn’t punishment duty, he didn’t know what was.
“Well,” said McKirdy, “Reckon it’s about time we head down the mess. We may as well make the most of our strategic mutton reserve ‘fore it goes off too, eh?”
“After you, sir.”
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And I’ve been back to Southeast Asia
But the answer sure ain’t there…
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South Atlantic Ocean
May 18, 1984
The three pips on the Captain’s shoulder had been replaced with a single crown, the rising tide having lifted his own little boat up to the level of Major. Accordingly, the Lance Corporal showed that little bit more respect to the CO, born as it was in the fear that he could have him left in Europe if he so much as let one of his section sneeze out of turn. They’d been drilling on the deck whenever the weather and sea allowed and, for what had at the start of the year been a fairly rough-and-ready group of reservists, the Company had gotten itself into good shape.
Had been getting itself into good shape, anyway; the Lance Corporal had just smacked his head on a low door for the twentieth time (he’d taken to wearing his helmet during stormy weather, which had at least stopped him getting properly concussed after the example provided by Neilson in A Section) and was swearing his way through a doorframe when the sounds of densely-packed laughter and swearing led him to investigate a nearby bunkroom. As it turned out, Privates Scott, Zitnik, Tangaroa, Jameson, and a couple of Navy boys were gathered around on the floor with a pack of cards, playing…yep, poker from the looks of it. The half dozen huddled in the room kept on playing even as the Lance Corporal made his ungainly way into the doorframe, the sound of his belt clinking against the metal finally catching their attention, heads swivelling to face him like possums caught in the headlights.
“No, no, don’t stop on my account,” he smiled. Thank God it’s only Mudgway, came the silent response from the faces in the dim light, for a moment there it looked like we were in trouble. “Though if one of yez could deal me in…”
That broke whatever tension was there pretty well, and they eventually fell back into the rhythm of the game. Hold ‘em was the game, which was fortunate for the Lance Corporal as it was the only one he was even faintly accompanied with, being a man who preferred to do his gambling via the TAB. They played for money or other items beyond monetary value they’d picked up before coming aboard. Not gold or silver (though apparently Scott had gathered a couple of watches from God alone knew where), but more immediately rewarding rareties like the Fruit and Nut thrown into the pot by Tangaroa. These tended to draw the attention like a bomb flash on the horizon.
“Someone fancies himself a winner, eh?” murmured Zitnik. To his own credit, Tangaroa’s permanent half-grin remained as unreadable as ever.
“We’ll say three dollars for the choccy, if you do, yourself.”
The Coromandel boy's eyes narrowed like one of his partisan ancestors might have squinted at a German through crosshairs back in the old country.
“Awright’en,” he drawled, counting out six silver cartwheels and plonking them on the table, “I’ll see your Cadbury. Mudgie?”
“Ah, piss on that,” replied the Lance Corporal. “I fold.”
“Makes two of us,” said Scott, immediately validating the Lance Corporal’s tactical manoeuvre. When a shark like him was jumping out of the water, you knew it was about to start boiling.
“Well, show us what yer got, then,” prompted one of the sumpies. Zitnik laid down his hand first.
“Three-of-a-kind, eights. What’s the damage then, mate?”
Tangaroa stared at the cards for a good long moment, shifted his gaze to Tommy Zitnik, and then grinned even wider and threw his cards on the table.
“Reckon it’s about a Fruit and Nut’s worth; I’ve got two nines.”
“Cheeky fucker,” Tommy said around a grin as it dawned like the sun over the sea, shattering the tension of the bet with unexpected humour. “You had me shittin’ myself.”
“What can I say,” said Tangaroa. “You enter a pissing match with a fella, sometimes God sends it back in yer face.”
The Lance Corporal had his eyes closed when Zitnik spoke. Perhaps that was why he heard him say what he did; focusing on one sense or something like that. Whatever it was, he certainly heard Zitnik mutter “cheeky bloody darkie,” around his smile as he shuffled the cards back into the pack.
The good humour bled out of the room quickly, like one of those patients in don’t think about Wellington not now not now and faded away into the gunmetal grey of the walls. Tangaroa’s chuckle had died in his throat, and as Zitnik looked up incomprehension dawned in his eyes. Mudgway had seen it before; the look of someone who’d realised he’d put his foot in it. And as an underofficer and the immediate superior of these blokes, he was the one who’d be called upon to pull Tommy’s foot out of it. His mouth had gone dry. It always went dry like this, when he was being forced to use his own initiative. It was a bitch for a number of reasons – he wasn’t even scared! Why did his gob have to go making his job harder like this?
“Takes one to know one, you cheeky bloody Dallie.”
Tangaroa’s mouth had kept smiling, but his eyes were flat now. Expressionless. Dead. The Lance Corporal’s leg muscles began tightening as the mixture of instinct and procedure five years in the Army had taught him began to kick in. Breathe in. Breathe out. Survey the surroundings, measure up the men in the room, get ready to pull apart anyone fighting, get the lungs ready to shout at them beforehand. If you could get them with your voice, you saved your fists a lot of trouble.
As the tension in the small room began spiking, slicing through the dull stink of poorly-washed men in close quarters like a firehose through bulldust, Zitnik managed a weak chuckle and a grin like a laid-out corpse.
“Y-yeah. S’pose so.”
The Lance Corporal felt something slacken within him as the room took a collective breath, before he stood (narrowly missing a crossbeam which would certainly have given the others one hell of a distraction if he’d made contact; and as relieved as he would be to break the tension, that would not have been worth it) and spoke in the slightly rushed, slightly too loud voice of the relief teacher who knew hometime was soon and that if they could shoo the kids away from this mess, whatever happened next wasn’t their problem.
“Right, I reckon that’s about enough high-rolling for one day, eh? C’mon,” he added as the others began showing signs of activity towards the door, “I heard one of the fellas in C Section caught a-hold’a the ball from the Southern boys on the Otago. Go get yourselves some sunshine, and we can all hope the CO doesn’t find out about our little extra-ca-rick-ler activities, eh? Go on, then.”
In twelve seconds the room was empty, and the Lance Corporal bent down to pick up the Fruit and Nut the riverboat gamblers had left behind them. A faintly desperate smile flashed across his face as he buried in the recesses of his pockets (and, for that matter, plausible deniability).
“This shit isn't worth shit,” he declared philosophically, leaving a roomful of pent-up anxiety to rejoin the owners of a boatful of pent-up anxiety.
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Now carparks make me jumpy
And I’ve never stopped the dreams…
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North Atlantic Ocean off Santiago, Cape Verde
May 23, 1984
Three hundred thousand had lived on these islands before the war, more than half on the island of Santiago, and they had all been very hungry since the collapse of the countries on the mainland put a stop to trade. Portuguese fishermen picking their way south had helped to feed a few for a time, but when the fuel ran out – which it did, in very short order – the inhabitants of these dry little rocks had been forced to scratch a living from the parched land.
By the time the convoy had come within hailing distance, it had become apparent that something had finally given since their last visit six weeks ago.
Ross Bailey (Captain, Royal Australian Navy, Commanding Officer His Majesty’s Australian Ship Perth) stood just outside the bridge, big red hands gripping the railing tightly as he watched the glow from the fires on the eastern horizon. It wasn’t as bad as what they’d glimpsed off the Cape of Good Hope – and wouldn’t it be interesting to get a closer look at that on the way back, just? – but they could yank another card out of Hawkie’s diplomatic Rolodex in Melbourne.
The dull thud of feet approached, barely perceptible over the sound of a ship on a mission at the close of the day, and the Captain’s back straightened as the Royal Navy Commander – Hardwick, his name was – made his way out.
“We’ve notified the rest of the convoy, sir; course change has been logged and we’ll loop around the rest of the islands to make straight for Portsmouth.”
“Right. Good.” Bailey had remained terse around the Poms, and so the silence dragged on awkwardly as Hardwick stood in the doorway, until the Captain drew another breath and pressed on with “Anyone waiting for you when you get back home, Commander?”, the sudden personal question taking him quite by surprise.
“Ah, y-yes, sir. My wife and children.”
Bailey nodded. “Same here. The missus was in Albany with her auntie when Perth copped it. Thank Christ she wasn’t on base. The kids thought it was great fun, I’m told.” A quirk of the lip which might have been a smile or indigestion. “You gotta wonder how much they understand of all this.” His eyes never moved from the pinkish-orange streak on the horizon.
Feeling that this sudden loquacity (this was the longest the Captain had ever gone on about life off the ship) demanded a response, Hardwick ventured to reply.
“My eldest, John, was at school when the TTW - the Transition To War – began. His mother refused to pull him out before the shooting started, though; she’s a great believer in education.” A brief smile. “I did insist that she get the other two, David and Celia, out of nursery school, though.”
“Yeah, Shannon’s like that with ours, too. Darla’s not unhappy to find out school’s out for the duration, I’m told.”
Hardwick gave a sage nod in reply, and the conversation lapsed back into silence.
The glow to the east was a paltry nothing compared to the furious beauty of the sunset to the west, where regal purple warred with violent red and angry orange, sickly yellow and eerie green melding on the fringes and bleeding into the deep mauve of an early evening sky. Turner would have given his left arm to have seen this, let alone to have had the chance to paint it, thought Hardwick, before the sound of the Captain’s harsh drawl snapped him out of his Romantic reverie.
“Well, you wanna see ‘em?”
“Pardon, sir?”
“Me kids. I mean, if you’re interested,” he added hastily in a tone which hinted at nagging doubts that this conversation had been a mistake, “otherwise I’m sure you’re needed elsewhere…”
Bailey was awkwardly deferential to the Commander, and not just, suspected Hardwick, because he’d been his equal on the pay chart only a few weeks ago. His recommendation and reports of treatment would go a long way towards making sure none of the Aussies enjoying an extended stay in Portsmouth or Corsham would fail to make it back Down Under once the time came for them to be on the boat back home; no harm done, then, in being at least tepid towards him. This seemed more…honest, though. After all, they were two fathers five thousand miles from their wives and children. A little reminiscence helped sometimes, reminded you both that there was someone back there to go home to and for whom you kept on struggling. So it was with no guile whatsoever that Hardwick ventured a faint smile and gave a quiet affirmative, whereupon Bailey gave a surprised grin in response. Clearly expecting me to tell him to bog off.
“Well…ah…bugger, reckon they’re in my cabin. Come on with, Commander; I’ve got a bottle of something in there, too.”
“After you, sir.”
“So there’s Shannon, with the kids: that’s Darla, here – she’s a bit taller since, you know what they’re like at her age; won’t be surprised to get back and find out she’s taller’n I am – and this is Greg.” Bailey handed over the photograph to Hardwick, an Oxo tin full of Polaroids clutched between his knees like the Ark of the Covenant.
“Big lad, isn’t he?”
“Too right. He was a ruckman in the A team at his college last year, and he would’ve been there again if the war hadn’t got in the way.”
“Damn shame, that,” responded the Englishman as he took a pensive sip of the grog the Captain kept hidden for “special occasions”.
“You know, I swear he looks up to Peter Moore more than he does me – ah, footy player,” explained the Australian as he saw the abject incomprehension on the other man’s face. “But, ah, Darla there, she’s a sharp one, takes after her mum.”
“The old adage, eh?”
“Yeah, yeah – but look, I’m yammering on; howzabout yours?”
“Well,” said Hardwick as he handed back Bailey’s photo and fished about in his shirt pocket before pulling out his own snapshots “this one’s a little older, taken…oh, it’d be about eighty-one; I hadn’t been to the Falklands yet, because the Rover’s still in this picture here, so it’s missing David – he was with his mother at the hospital that day, you know – but there’s Celia” a smiling girl with blonde ringlets who didn’t look too different from Darla “and John” a boy of maybe eight or nine in a school uniform. “And this” he continued, shuffling the photos to one of a much younger boy “is David here.”
“Cheeky-looking little bugger, eh?”
A fatherly cluck of pride and amusement. “You don’t know the half of it; let me tell you, the stories Susan’s told…”
“Ah, terrible twos?”
“Terrible everythings, from what I hear.”
“Too true,” began Bailey as the sound of feet clumped down the passageway, the two instinctively squirrelling away their photos like schoolboys hiding dirty postcards; there was just enough time for Bailey to slide the Oxo tin back under his bed before a head popped around the doorframe.
“Sir? Sirs?” A salute attached to a sub-lieutenant. “You’re wanted on the bridge. The Kiwis and Indians want to discuss the parade once we arrive and the ROE as we get closer to Europe. They’re, ah, a bit jumpy about Russian boomers.”
“Right,” Bailey replied, standing and nodding briskly to Hardwick, “Let’s get back to it, then.”
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And it’s only other vets could understand
About the long-forgotten dockside guarantees…
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The Solent
May 29, 1984
The Poms, from the sounds of things, were fucking ecstatic at the arrival of the convoy, and those aboard Perth – which, as the flagship of the convoy, had the honour of going in first – were surprisingly happy to be getting back to their blasted and scarred little island.
All of this as a quartet of Indian Harriers screamed overhead in a low pass over the harbour (aye, go big or go home, thought the Skipper) and Vikrant followed Perth to port. Otago stood to starboard as leader of the New Zealand contingent (it being felt that the almost-clapped-out frigate was less likely to suffer an embarrassing last-minute breakdown than the completely-clapped-out frigate), with Godavari and the rest not far behind.
A band – one of several – was awaiting them on the docks (even after a nuclear war, you could rely on the Poms to bring a healthy dollop of pomp and circumstance to it all) and began playing God Save The King as the larger warships pulled in. Further along the harbour, the freighters and frigates were met with a crowd of cheering Poms.
“Geez, Wayne, they’re skinny,” said Jameson to nobody in particular as Taranaki pulled up to her assigned dock and the soldiers on deck got a closer look at their audience.
“Quiet in the ranks,” said the Sergeant as Mudgway turned to admonish the offender himself and the quiet gaze of the Major swept past like a searchlight.
The soldiers filed down the gangway after the wharfies had set up shop, the Major leading them like a Scouts expedition to form ranks on dry land for the first time in over a month. Sporadic cheering and applause came from behind the cordon of British soldiers; the civvies knew what this influx of men and ships meant, and were as appreciative as they could reasonably be expected to be.
It was worth noting that Jameson’s observation was accurate. If anything, it was an understatement.
A couple minutes of standing silent vigil followed as a Royal Navy officer came along and hobnobbed with the Major, and then they were marched along to where a more official reception had been arranged. It took a good fifteen or twenty minutes to get everyone sorted at the parking lot-cum-parade ground about half a mile from where Otago and Taranaki had docked. The Lance Corporal focused on standing at attention as the fellah in command of Otago – McKirdy, or something similarly Scottish-sounding – walked up to the small stage which had been set up for the officials, saluted the British officer who was running the whole deal, and proceeded to give a speech. The usual niceties, he supposed; “continuing a proud tradition of aiding and standing steadfast behind our Mother Country”, “returning to the home of our parents, grandparents, yadda yadda”, “your sons and cousins and friends Down Under stand by you”, and other such faintly-inspiring-faintly-insipid niceties.
The Major then received the signal from the Navy man, saluting and turning to his men and nodding at Walker from B Section to begin the waiata.
The Lance Corporal didn’t understand a word of it, naturally, and focused his attentions instead on remembering the motions he was meant to make. As the chanting started and the big ugly fuckers they’d put up front to really wow the Poms began slapping their thighs and waving their arms, those considerations rapidly gave way as he resigned himself to aping the movements of the men in front of him. From the quietly proud look the Major gave as they finished, it seemed to work, or at least made sure that folks hereabouts knew the New Zealanders had arrived.
It was going to be a long tour.
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But I’m drifting north
To check things out again…
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