After Dunkirk Page 13

  Stunned, Jeremy struggled to his knees. Below him, lying still on the floor, was the major, his eyes staring vacantly. Panting heavily, Jeremy checked for a pulse on the man’s neck. He found none.

  The children.

  The thought came to Jeremy with blunt intensity and he reeled as he cut through the crowd of confused people toward the room where he had seen the civilians. Black smoke hung against the ceiling and descended to the floor such that he saw only a few feet inside.

  A small boy, perhaps two years old, sat near the doorframe, terrified. He rolled to one side and started to crawl back into the room. With waning strength, Jeremy grabbed his shirt. The toddler shrieked and fought as Jeremy pulled him back and lifted him.

  “Mummy!” the boy screamed in terror, mouth wide. “Mummy.” He struggled as Jeremy wrapped both arms around him and pressed the child against his chest.

  “We’ll find your mummy,” Jeremy said hoarsely. He leaned against the doorframe with the little boy’s head near his own while searching the faces of frightened civilians who emerged from the smoke. Men, women, and children pushed out, some together and holding onto each other, some frantically seeking loved ones and joining the crush toward the exit and fresh air.

  A woman swept past, calling frantically, “My baby.” She stopped and whirled where she stood, her face panic-stricken. “Oh please,” she implored to no one in particular. “I can’t find my baby.” Tears streamed from her eyes. “Timmy,” she called.

  Hearing his name and his mother’s voice, the child pushed against Jeremy. “Mummy!” he cried. “Mummy!”

  Just then, the ship began to roll to starboard, the floor sloping as the bow dipped, causing Jeremy to stumble forward. Momentarily unable to stop his momentum, he grabbed the woman’s arm. She had stepped backward to regain balance, teetered as she fought for control, and fell into Jeremy.

  At first startled, she saw her son in Jeremy’s arms. “Oh God, Timmy!” she called. As mother and child struggled for each other, adrenaline coursing through Jeremy’s brain cleared his mind.

  “We have to get Timmy out of here,” he yelled. “Where’s your husband.”

  The mother teared up again and dropped her head. “Dead,” she said, her face a mask of grief and fear as she pointed to the room. “In there.”

  “Then come on,” he said. “I’ll carry Timmy. Hold on to me.”

  As they pushed with the crowd to get outside, the ship righted itself and then began listing to port. She’s going down.

  Once on deck, the horrific scene that greeted them belied credulity. Splintered wood coated with a mix of oil and blood caused frightened people desperately seeking escape to slip and slide, a macabre sight. Huge numbers of soldiers had determined that the only route to survival lay in the water and had jumped. Already, hundreds if not thousands of heads bobbed in the water. Some troops flailed, some swam away, and some already floated on the surface, inert. More men leaped without looking for an open spot, many of them landing on top of their comrades, adding to injuries and casualties.

  As the ship listed further, Jeremy saw that the deck sloped toward the bow. He paused and looked into the woman’s frightened face.

  “Listen to me. I don’t want to scare you more, but this ship is going to sink.”

  She nodded, her jaw locked in fright, her eyes open wide. Timmy had stopped struggling, and although quiet in Jeremy’s arms, he held onto his mother’s thumb.

  “We only have minutes,” Jeremy yelled above the chaos. “What’s your name?”

  Her voice shook as she responded, “Eva.” The blood had drained from her face.

  Jeremy appraised her momentarily. She wore traveling clothes suitable for a diplomat’s wife in the summer.

  “All right, Eva. Do you swim?”

  She nodded and reached forward instinctively to caress Timmy’s forehead.

  “Good. Listen to me carefully. We’re going to jump, but first we’ll head forward.” He pointed along the increasingly inclined deck. Soldiers pushed past them in the opposite direction, seeking a higher perch. “When I tell you, get out of your clothes. They’ll weigh you down. Your shoes too. We’ll have to get over the rail and jump together. In the water, we must get as far from the ship as we can, or it will drag us under. Do you understand?”

  He saw that color had returned to her face. She gazed at Timmy with a fearful, determined expression. “I’m ready.”

  They pressed against the wall, Timmy and Eva clinging to Jeremy. The Lancastria’s bow continued to sink farther into the water, making the deck steeper, and with blood and oil coating it, footing became even more slippery.

  A gap appeared by the rail. Jeremy darted over, pulling Eva with him. “Now,” he said.

  Without hesitation, Eva drew her dress over her head, shook off her shoes, and climbed over the rail. No one stopped to take notice. Meanwhile, Jeremy had lifted his shirt from over one shoulder and struggled to shift Timmy from one arm to the other in order to remove the rest of the shirt. Eva helped him, and then took the boy so Jeremy could clamber over next to her.

  “What about your trousers and boots?” Eva asked.

  “No time. Later.” He looked down at the swirling water. Fewer heads and bodies bobbed there than closer to midship.

  He spotted a clear area below and estimated the drop at roughly twenty-five feet. Pointing it out to Eva, he told her, “That’s where we’re going. Hold your nose tight but keep both arms close to your body. Don’t think of Timmy now. Give him to me. I’m a strong swimmer. We’ll jump together. On three. Ready?”

  Eva nodded nervously. “Just take care of Timmy.”

  “With my life,” Jeremy said. He took the boy from Eva and pulled him against his chest. Crossing one arm around the child’s tiny back, Jeremy cupped his other hand over the little face and wedged the small head close between his own neck and shoulder. Then he counted off. Together, they leaped.

  20

  Lance had been sitting with Horton against a wall on the aft deck when the enemy planes struck. Sirens blared before anyone saw the bombers. Soldiers bolted upright, their exhausted eyes raised first to the sky and then to each other. The drone of many engines drowned the wailing sirens, and then a mass of airplanes appeared on the horizon, heading their way.

  The soldiers jumped to their feet, their eyes fixed on the fast-approaching Junker Ju-88 bombers. Then they heard the loud reports of the anti-aircraft guns from the top deck, followed by a swift response from the bombers that opened up with sprays of machine gun fire.

  The first rounds struck the ship’s stern. The next ones pierced steel walls, bodies, wood, and anything else in their path, ricocheting into another deadly flight path and ripping through the deck. Within seconds, the area transformed into a writhing mass of panicked soldiers, sprayed blood, and agonized cries for medics.

  The flight of nineteen aircraft closed in over their targets and released their deadly cargoes. The bombs whistled through the air as they plunged. All around the ship, columns of water sprang out of the sea.

  At midship, a huge explosion rocked the Lancastria, followed by three more as the projectiles found their targets. The shock sent a shudder through the hull.

  Lance and Horton stared. Soldiers sitting on the rails dropped onto the hard deck or tumbled into the water far below. The air filled with the acrid smell of gunpowder and burning oil.

  “Direct hits,” Lance muttered. “Four of them.”

  The entire mass of soldiers stood stock-still momentarily as the impact sank in. Then, the clamor started up again at a fever pitch.

  Unable to see beyond the heads of those in their immediate vicinity, Lance turned to Horton. “What do you think we should do?” he yelled above the din.

  Horton shrugged. “I don’t know. Stay here for now, I guess. We don’t know how bad the ship’s been hit.”

  No sooner had he uttered those words than the Lancastria began a slow roll to its starboard.

  “Bollocks,” he said. �
��It’s bad.”

  Lance agreed. They held their position, standing against the wall while soldiers struggled to move away from the danger, perceived differently by individuals and thus resulting in frantic men pushing against each other in search of safety.

  Then, the Lancastria righted itself. The soldiers paused in their struggles, looking skyward and exchanging wondering glances.

  Above them, the ship’s anti-aircraft guns continued to bellow. The drone of Junkers faded away forward, a view of them blocked by the ship’s superstructure.

  At first barely perceptibly, and then with increasing rapidity, Lance felt the deck under his feet canting to port. Then, as he and Horton stood with their backs against the wall and facing aft, they sensed that the stern had begun to rise. The bow must be sliding toward the sea.

  “Where to?” Horton called.

  “Get to the rails,” Lance replied. “That way.” He pointed to the starboard side.

  “Why there?”

  “If the ship stays afloat, that side will be high.”

  “I don’t know,” Horton said. “If she sinks fast, we’ll have a very long jump to have a chance of swimming away from the suction.”

  “What’re the alternatives?”

  Horton closed his eyes and shook his head. “No good ones. If we go to the other side and the ship goes down fast, we could still be pulled in by the drag.” He exhaled. “I guess we go to starboard.”

  They headed diagonally across the deck, struggling against men who had decided that their best options were elsewhere. At last, they reached the rail forward of the stern. They felt the deck rise further and saw it sloping toward the bow while the ship continued to list to port at an increasing rate. Already, soldiers leaped into the sea, some with life vests, others without, some wearing full kit, others stripped down. Black oil coated the surface of the water.

  “We might have guessed wrong,” Horton quipped, forcing a grin. “This doesn’t look good.”

  “Hard to say,” Lance replied. Because the ship sank faster on the opposite side, instead of a vertical drop, the hull sloped away. In the water, heads bobbed, bodies floated, and soldiers swam in an expanding arc.

  Horton nudged him. “Look.” He indicated the hull, which, in the short time they had clung to the handrails, had raised its starboard side to an obvious slant. “We’d better get on the other side of these rails, or we’re going to be hanging on to them.”

  Other men had the same thought. They clambered over to the other side of the rail and pressed against it.

  The Lancastria’s roll accelerated, and then, unbelievably, the propeller lifted into the air. It hung there, supported by its shaft with its casing clearly visible above the water line.

  “The shaft tube forms a shelf,” Lance exclaimed. “We can slide to it and have a shorter jump.”

  “On the way,” Horton yelled as the roll continued at a slower pace. Wearing only their field uniforms, they lowered their legs over the side of the hull, turned onto their backs, and let go.

  The angle of the hull now was such that gravity had to be assisted. By sitting on their buttocks and pulling with their legs, they descended at a controlled rate, but they felt every bump, nick, and scrape of the Lancastria’s rough surface that had seemed so smooth from a distance. To their left and right, other soldiers saw them and followed. When they reached the shaft casing, they rested as other soldiers spread out on either side of them. There, the noise of the chaos had faded, punctuated by faint cries for help from above and below.

  Horton peered over the edge. “Clothes on or off?”

  “We can swim better without them,” Lance replied, “and they would weigh us down, particularly the boots.”

  A voice behind them cut into their conversation. “I’m keeping mine on,” its owner said. “They’ll keep me warm.”

  Lance scoffed, but Horton reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a small waterproof bag containing a single cigarette and a box of matches. Lance stared at him in disbelief.

  “What are you doing? I didn’t know you smoked.”

  Horton sat back against the hull and took his time to light his cigarette. His eyes closed to slits as he inhaled and then sighed in satisfaction.

  “Mind if I join you?” the man who had broken in on their conversation asked.

  “It’s a free country, for the moment,” Horton responded. “Be my guest.”

  Aghast, Lance raised his voice. “What are you doing? We have to go.” To his surprise, other soldiers along the casing had also lit up.

  Horton turned to Lance with a peaceful smile. “I smoked them until I ran out, except for this one.” He waved it in the air, its wispy rings carrying the aroma. “It’s my last cigarette, and I’ve been saving it for the right occasion.” He grinned. “This seems to be it, and I’m going to enjoy it.”

  He shifted his view to the men struggling in the water below and then the small crowd gathered on the casing. “Blokes up there are dead and dying,” he continued, “and same for the ones below. For the time it takes to smoke this cigarette, at least I can do it here in peace.” He put the cigarette back between his lips and inhaled.

  Off to their right, someone started singing “Roll Out the Barrel,” and was soon joined by others gathering in greater numbers on the shelf, belting out the jovial lyrics. When they had finished, they became more somber, singing the defiant words to “There’ll Always be an England.” Then, they fell silent.

  Suddenly, a wide-eyed Horton sprang to his feet. “Look,” he exclaimed, pointing.

  Lance gazed toward the midship. There, a fuel-oil slick had ignited, and soldiers swam desperately to escape the flames, their screams heard clearly across the distance. Some emerged with burned scalps and arms. Some beat the water furiously, attempting to swim out of the flames. Some succumbed and disappeared, not to be seen again.

  Lance stepped in front of Horton. “If we’re going to get past our own oil slick down there…” He thrust a finger at the area immediately below them.

  “I know, I know,” Horton snorted, taking one last puff and snuffing out the cigarette on the hull. “We’ve got to go—” He started ripping off his clothes. “Our boots have to come off now,” he grumbled, pulling at them. “It’s a lot harder to do in the water, and they are bloody hell for swimming.”

  Undressed to their skivvies, the two men took only enough time to look over the edge, find an opening among the struggling soldiers, and leap into the oily water below.

  21

  Streaked with oil, Lance and Horton clung to opposite ends of a thick board floating on the seas. They had survived the jump, swum out of the oil patches, and tried for shore, but found that the current carried them farther and farther out to sea. Each of them wore a Mae West life jacket, taken from corpses whose necks had been broken on impact. The mistake of the unfortunates had been to put on the jackets before leaping. The impact of their chins striking the water had thrown their heads back hard against the device intended for lifesaving, sealing their fates.

  Weak swimmers and non-swimmers had thrashed in the water, grabbing for anything or anyone that floated. Before Lance had acquired his Mae West, a big man grabbed for him. Both of their bodies were slick with oil. Nevertheless, the man managed to get an arm around Lance’s neck. He held on, and they both sank.

  Lance had gulped air just before going down, and the two struggled underwater, the man desperately grasping, and Lance pushing to break contact. Just when Lance thought his lungs would burst, the man’s body went limp, his arm relaxed, and he floated away.

  On breaking the surface, Lance had heaved for air. Horton, who had not seen the struggle, saw him surface gasping, and swam over to check on him.

  “Are you all right?” he called. Lance drew closer and told him what had happened.

  Despite the calm sea, wavelets obstructed their ability to see very far. But when they had swum a distance sufficient to be safe from the Lancastria’s suction on its final plunge, they turne
d to watch, fascinated by the spectacle.

  The aft section of the ship’s keel rolled to the side, high in the air. Soldiers, presumably non-swimmers, still clung at the shaft casing on a slant below the propeller. One by one, they slipped into the brine and struggled in the gathering suction. Then, with an audible rush of air, the vessel slid below the surface and was gone.

  Five hours had passed since the sinking, during which time the receding tide and the current from the estuary carried Lance and Horton farther out to sea and dispersed the bobbing heads, bodies, flotsam, and jetsam. At one point, a ship seemed headed their way only to be blown up by a flight of Junkers.

  Land was still within sight, but they could no longer make out definitive shapes close to shore. They had seen a fighter plane fly over and drop flares into oil globs, igniting them, and then strafe the ships and men in the water.

  For several hours, the two companions floated alone, holding onto a board that might be their final means to salvation. Most of the time, they did not speak, their numb minds dreaming of home, a meal, and clear, cold drinking water.

  For Lance, a darker thought pervaded. “I mucked this up,” he croaked to himself.

  Horton heard the words barely enough to catch their meaning. “What?”

  Lance let out a long breath. “I keep thinking about that big man back there. He just wanted to live, like the rest of us. I pushed him away to a horrific death.”

  “If you hadn’t, you’d be dead too.”

  “I know, but then there are the others.”

  “What others?”

  “Our group from Dunkirk. I lost five of them; I don’t know about the two I told to jump onto the coaler at Saint-Nazaire, and then there was François.” He paused as his jaw quivered. When he spoke again, his voice caught. “I caused his death.”

  Horton slid along the board closer to Lance. “I want you to listen to me and listen good.” He threw an arm up over the board and rested his chin on it to better see Lance. “If not for you, most of that group would be dead, me included.”