sick. I mean, what if I miss a signal? What if the man on the other end transmits too quickly and I can’t keep up with him? They do, you know. Some of those operators are stingo. Oh, it was fine at wireless school. Mistakes didn’t matter so much, but now – well, it’s for real, isn’t it, and maybe lives depending on me. Wish I didn’t have to go on watch.’
‘You’ll be all right. We both will. We can only do our best. They can’t put us against a wall and shoot us if –’
‘Hullo. You’re the new girls, aren’t you? They said you’d be coming. Bainbridge and Kendal, isn’t it? I’m Molly Malone, Mary, really, but with a name like Malone …’ The Wren who introduced herself was slim and smart in a uniform which fitted her perfectly. She had a wide smile, a freckle-dusted nose and a distinctly Irish accent. ‘I work in the teleprinter room in the CCO. Like to come on board with me?’
‘Please. We feel very strange.’ Lucinda forced a smile. ‘CCO – that’s central communications office, isn’t it?’
‘It is, and it all goes on there: wireless, coding, decoding, signal distribution. We like to think we’re indispensable, that the flotilla couldn’t manage without us. Our submarines are all operational, you see, except for a couple of recent arrivals that are working up; new boats getting a crew together, that is, doing sea trials and dummy runs with torpedoes. The CCO looks after submarines at sea and keeps –’
‘Don’t!’ Lucinda had gone visibly pale. ‘I’m so nervous I can’t think straight.’
‘Then don’t be. You’ll be working with a great crowd. Have either of you ever been on an HM ship before?’
They shook their heads forlornly.
‘Then you’ll not know about saluting the quarterdeck?’
‘We’d heard, but where is the quarterdeck, and how will we know when we’re on it?’
‘You’ll know. It’s aft, always. At the back end, that is, and as soon as you step on to it, you salute. It’ll get to be second nature, don’t worry. And you’re both wearing your blackouts, aren’t you?’
‘Yes.’ Jane frowned. ‘But what’s so important about knickers?’
‘You’ll see, when we get on board. Look! There’s the launch now. That’s Lilith’s lot bringing it in. They’re the only Wren crew in the flotilla, so they’ve got to be good.’
‘Why?’ Jane demanded blankly.
‘Because they’re women in a man’s world. We all are. Wrens rarely get a real ship, you see, and some of the old hands look on us as intruders, to say the least. A few openly resent us; that’s why we’ve got to try to be as good as they are.’
‘Resent us?’ Lucinda’s stomach turned a somersault. It was going to be worse even than she had feared. Pictures formed in her mind of bloody-minded leading hands and a frowning chief telegraphist, all of them men and all of them waiting, grim-faced, for Bainbridge, L. V. to make her first mistake; a mistake so terrible that talk of its consequences would reverberate around the Home Fleet for years to come. ‘Isn’t that a bit unfair?’
‘Well, they don’t actually resent us, I suppose. Not really. But we’ve got to live by their rules and not expect privileges because we happen to be women.’ Molly shrugged. ‘But will you look at that boat’s crew? Aren’t they as good as any men?’
The all-woman crew were bringing the launch in, leaping with fearless agility to the jetty and tying up efficiently, as though they had been born on boats and lived on them all their life.
‘Let’s have you then!’ the coxswain called. ‘All aboard. Chop chop!’
They followed Molly on to the launch, hitching up their skirts as she did as they swung over the side, taking their places beside her, feeling strange and excited and apprehensive.
‘There’ll be a high gangway to climb when we get alongside Omega,’ she told them. ‘Well, more of a ladder, really. First time you go up it can be a bit frightening, but hang on with both hands and don’t look down. Okay?’
They nodded mutely.
‘And when you get to the top you’ll be on the quarterdeck, so don’t forget to –’
‘Salute,’ they chorused.
‘Let go for’ard! Let go aft!’
A boathook pushed the launch from the jetty, a wheel spun in capable hands, the engine coughed them on their way. Then a half-turn astern, and they were heading confidently to the depot ship Omega.
‘Makes you feel proud, so it does,’ Molly beamed. ‘Men won’t ever be able to sit on us women again, when this war’s over. Lilith’s as good as any man. I never worry when we’re out in a force-eight gale; not if she’s in charge.’
Force-eight gales? High ladders from which she must not look down? And, when she reached the wireless office, men who might resent her being there and fiends who transmitted Morse at devilish speeds …
‘I feel sick,’ Lucinda whispered. ‘Very sick, and it’s got nothing at all to do with the sea.’
The shore receded, the depot ship and its clinging submarines drew closer. Now Omega was not dull grey as distance had suggested, but a mottle of khaki and black and olive-green, the colours of camouflage. Now the ship appeared ungainly and broad-beamed. Not for Omega the greyhound outline of a frigate but rather that of a clumsy old sow with submarine piglets suckling beside her.
‘It’s bigger than you’d think.’ Jane gazed up at the towering bulk. And Molly Malone was right: the gangway was little better than a ladder that clung to the ship’s side with fragile tenacity. Up and up. How many steps? Twenty? Thirty?
‘Don’t be looking so worried.’ Molly Malone’s smile was altogether too smug, Lucinda considered bleakly. And how was anyone to make even the bottom step of that wretched ladder thing when the launch was rising and falling like a demented yo-yo?
The engine slowed and died. A boathook reached out and latched on to the ship’s side, and a small, dark-haired crewgirl pulled them in until they touched with a gentle bump. Then, one foot on the launch, one on the gangway, she held them steady.
‘Carry on!’ At once the gangway came alive, trembling and shaking and bucking as forty feet slammed up it.
Jane held on with both hands, gazing ahead at Molly’s legs, counting every step, praying she would reach the top before the whole thing collapsed beneath their weight and they all fell, helpless, into the water below. Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three, and she was there. Ahead of her, Molly stepped on to the deck, lifting her right hand in salute. Bemused, Jane did the same. Now she knew why sailors saluted the quarterdeck. It was not that Nelson had died there, nor was it because many years ago the crucifix that hung there demanded obeisance. Oh, no. It was because everyone was so desperately grateful to get off the shifting, jerking, swaying ladders the Navy called gangways.
‘All right?’ she croaked.
‘Think so,’ Lucinda muttered.
‘Right, then.’ Like virgins to the sacrificial
