Read Online The White Guns (1989) by Douglas Reeman - Free Book Online

exciting. He had seen no fighting. Yet. His eyes were far away. But one day . ..
     
Fairfax glanced along the sidedeck and chuckled. 'Dreaming again.'
     
Marriott thought suddenly of Stephen, how it might have been if they had shared this victory together.
     
'Dreams, Number One.' He touched his arm, then turned away as another face seemed to overshadow Fairfax's. 'Leave him those at least.'
     
Marriott leaned on the rail beneath the bridge screen and watched the familiar activity on the forecastle, where Leading Seaman Townsend was supervising the mooring lines while Lowes, very dashing with a white silk scarf around his throat, tried to keep out of everyone's way. The gentle purr of generators and the rising vapour alongside told Marriott all he needed to know about the engineroom department. The Chief would make the hull move with his bare hands if need be.
     
Fairfax climbed to the bridge. 'All our people are aboard, sir. Ready to proceed.'
     
Marriott nodded. There was not much fear of leaving without a full complement, he thought, not with all the sentries and armed shore patrols.
     
It was evening and the sky still bright. What was strange was that you hardly noticed the smoke any more. It was part of it, like the oil slicks and the smell of decay. It was warmer too. Not much, but Marriott could feel his shirt clinging to his skin. Or was it just nerves? Leaving harbour like all those other times, but with the knowledge that barring accidents they would be back alongside, perhaps this time tomorrow.
     
He saw a seaman walking along the dockyard wall with a large satchel slung over his shoulder, chatting to a patrolman.
     
Fairfax followed his glance. 'Postman, sir?'
     
Marriott shook his head. 'Too soon. Maybe in a day or so.'
     
Letters from home, newspapers to tell them about that other world where the end of the war in Europe would mean so much in so many different ways.
     
There might be leave soon. Marriott tried not to think about it. Everything would be so different now. With Stephen gone, and Penny probably still away, it would be an awkward affair.
     
He thought of Penny and smiled sadly. The baby of the family, so lively and vivacious and as changeable as the wind. Even at school she had been convinced she would be a writer or an actress, something artistic. She had got on well with poor Mimi, much to their mother's disapproval. It was probably no coincidence that Penny had joined up immediately after Stephen's death and Mimi's wretched end. She was now serving in the plotting room of a fighter station in Kent and was a corporal in the WAAF. The small airstrip had been constantly involved in the daily defence of London and later the support of the army across the Channel. Reading between the lines, Penny had had several wild crushes on some of the young fighter pilots she knew. Some had moved on, others had never returned from dog-fights and sorties over the Channel.
     
Something had happened to change her. She had written to him more than once of a man she claimed she would marry if he asked her. He was the Met Officer at the station, an older man, or a wingless wonder as she affectionately called him. There was a snag; he was a Canadian and would want her to go with him when the war was finally ended. What would their mother have to say about that?
     
Leading Signalman Silver called, 'Five minutes, sir!'
     
'Single up all lines!' Marriott caught Fairfax's sleeve. 'Hold it!' A jeep with RN painted on the side was pitching and bucking over the rubble like a boat in surf.
     
Marriott saw the flashing gold leaves around Meikle's cap, the rabbit-like Lavender sitting beside him with a briefcase clutched across his lap, while two armed seamen occupied the rear seats. So Meikle liked to drive himself. Another surprise.
     
'I'd better go to him.' Marriott felt both uneasy and vaguely annoyed. Did Meikle not trust him to take his boat out of harbour without his supervision?
     
Marriott clambered