Cast No Shadow, Peter Sharp [books to get back into reading txt] 📗

fallen for it! “Hard a starboard! Hard a starboard!” he shouted into the bridge, the alarm clear in his voice.

A shuddering explosion rocked the ship sending debris rocketing skywards as the whole of the bow erupted in flames. The two officers were flung viciously against the bulkhead of the bridge as the ship lurched sideways, rocking violently.

Kelly sprang to his feet and tried to clear his ringing head. Conran was slumped against the bulkhead, clearly unconscious. Lieutenant Jackson, the second-in-command, would have been down with the depth charge party.

That left him to make the decisions. “Hard a starboard! Steer 70!” he shouted into the bridge. He watched as some men regained their feet, while others did not.

“Come on move yourselves!” he urged. Kelly knew his frigate had to get back to the main convoy before they could allow themselves the luxury of assessing the damage. He feared this would be severe - all the more reason to move into the vicinity of the other ships.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a pencil line being drawn across the water towards them. His heart sank. Time seemed to stand still as the moonlight reflected on the torpedo wake. It moved relentlessly closer, becoming wider as it neared the ship. He shouted orders for evasive action, but his words were whipped away and lost as, with a thunderous crash, the world exploded around him. The blast whipped the air out of his lungs and then he was falling … falling …

He gagged as he swallowed water while his body resisted the desperate urge to gasp and cough. Clamping his jaw tightly shut, he kicked off his one remaining sea boot while at the same time pulling for the surface. As an experienced swimmer he knew that the overwhelming desire to gasp was caused by the coldness of the water, not the lack of air. He sensed that he was not in danger of drowning because he hadn’t been submerged for long enough. As Kelly broke the surface, he allowed his natural instincts full reign, gasping again and again as the bitter cold Norwegian waters penetrated his very soul.

Treading water, he manoeuvred himself around to get his bearings. The ship was some distance to his right; he had been thrown quite a way. What little was left of the frigate above the water was in flames from stem to stern. There were no cries coming from that direction and Kelly, remembering the primed depth charges, understood that the majority of his crew must have been killed instantly.

To his left lay the coast and the lights of the Norwegian village that he had been admiring so recently. The abortive submarine chase had brought them about a mile from the coast. What had seemed such a short distance from the relative safety of the deck now seemed like an impossible distance to swim.

Kelly was clear about his options. He could not return to what was left of the ship. All of the lifeboats would have been incinerated. The convoy was nowhere in sight. If he stayed put and treaded water, he had about thirty minutes of life left before he died of hypothermia. If he swam for the coastline, at his estimate one mile away, the bitter cold would sap his energy before he covered half the distance.

He would drown.

“Hell!” he said aloud between chattering teeth. “May as well go down fighting!” It was a statement born of necessity, not bravery. Without a second thought, he struck out for the Norwegian coast.

On a sunny day, in the waters off Torquay, swimming a mile would have presented no problem to Kelly. He was a strong and experienced swimmer. As a child, his parents had scraped the money together to pay for his swimming club fees but this had subsequently paid dividends. A keen and successful young sportsman, it had been a bitter disappointment to him to find he was ineligible for the Scottish youth team because of his parentage.

Unfortunately, this wasn’t a sunny day, and it wasn’t Torquay. He was swimming at night, through Norwegian waters, with a sea temperature just a few degrees above freezing.

He struck out using his favourite front crawl, which under normal circumstances he made look deceptively simple. After about 300 yards he reverted to breaststroke to conserve his precious energy. The cold feeling had begun to abate, but he didn’t fool himself that he was “warming up.” What he was feeling was the onset of numbness, an early symptom of hypothermia.

Kelly changed to front crawl again. At least with this stroke he did seem to be making some progress. After another quarter of a mile, he had to revert to breaststroke in order to rest. He was desperately exhausted and failing fast. He cursed the clothing he was wearing, his uniform now seemed to weigh a ton and, being completely saturated, it was affording him no protection.

Again, he changed to the crawl and hauled himself forward to the best of his deteriorating abilities. Kelly had been in the water for nearly thirty minutes. He knew it couldn’t possibly be long now; there was no way he could make up the distance. He made one last desperate effort. Painful stroke after painful stroke seemed to produce little progress and he knew he was done. He had given his all and was totally exhausted; even the effort to pull himself along with the breaststroke was too much. He was going to die and he was angry!

Only a quarter of a mile left, but it was a quarter of a mile too much.

With a gasp and a half-choked sob of bitter frustration, Kelly stopped swimming and allowed himself to sink …

His feet touched something solid.

With a start, he drew his feet back up then planted them firmly down again, his head just above the water and the swell of the waves lapping at his ears. He was standing on rough rocks. Looking forward he saw small breakers about a hundred yards towards