“Top Secret” slide past us and topple over the side.
“I’m going to be sick,” says Mr Patterson.
“Hold on,” says Penny. “We’re swinging over to the other side now.” Suddenly we find ourselves pressed flat against one of the metal studded walls. Ooh, it is uncomfortable!
“Are we out of the harbour yet?” Nobody has to answer my question because I turn my head just in time to see a man in a small lighthouse standing with his hands over his eyes. The image is suspended before me for a fraction of a second and then whipped away as the destroyer charges into the open sea. Behind us, a grisly funeral pyre of black smoke has obliterated the town.
“What are we going to do?” I ask desperately.
“I don’t know,” says Penny. “Would you recognise the Russian flag if you saw it?”
“I think so. Why?”
“I believe there’s one ahead of us.”
“No!” I follow her pointing finger and there is an enormous boat flying the hammer and sickle. We are heading straight for it.
“That’s the Slobovitch,” groans Patterson. “One of their new Brezhnev class atomic cruisers. You realise what this means?”
“World War Three?” says Penny grimly. Patterson nods and turns his face towards the rivets.
“At least we’re not going to know much about it,” I say, trying to be cheerful.
“If only it wasn’t a courtesy visit,” groans Patterson.
Miss Bondage has slid down the deck and is now forty feet away. “I think the Admiralty are going to get a bit sticky about this,” she shouts. “We may have to approach the R.A.F.”
“Stupid old bag!” hisses Penny. “She got us into this mess, and now listen to her.”
Just at that moment, H.M.S. Trueheart veers sharply to the side and I see the crew of the Slobovitch gazing down at us in amazement as we scoot paSt. I look back to where Miss Bondage was hanging on and—she has disappeared!
“Crumbs! She’s fallen overboard,” says Penny.
“We’d better go back for her.”
“Are you mad? This thing isn’t going to stop until it hits France.”
“Poor Miss Bondage. She was very conscientious.”
“I know, I know,” soothes Penny. “I expect there will be a collection for her.”
“It isn’t going to do her much good,” I say, brushing away a tear.
“I meant a collection to set up a memorial,” says Penny. “Every year someone will throw a wreath into the bomb crater, or something like that.”
The destroyer has now righted itself and seems to be trying to catch up with the horizon. On the deck, Patterson groans.
“We’d better get him inside the cabin,” says Penny. “You minister to him and I’ll try and round up the girls.”
All round us there are shouts and screams and a pair of knickers comes fluttering down from above. They look rather big for a girl and they have a slit up the front. I do hope—
“I think they’re playing forfeits,” says Penny. “I’d better get up there before things get out of hand.” She helps me drag Patterson into the cabin and darts off with a light wave—it splashes her heels as she reaches the companion way.
“Uuuuurh. Are we all right?” Patterson grips my arm like a vice and I can see that he is in an advanced state of shock. The hair at his temples has been bleached white by the sun and the skin is stretched tight over his strong features. He smells of pipe smoke and I take an instant liking to him. This was the kind of clean-cut young Englishman I secretly dreamed of meeting when I entered the teaching profession.
“Relax,” I say. “Everything is going to be all right. Do you want to loosen your trousers—I mean, your collar?”
Oh dear! How embarrassing! Why did I have to say that? I wasn’t thinking about his trousers. It must have just slipped out. Fortunately he does not seem to have heard me.
“I can’t take much more,” he says. “It’s the upper third. They’re driving me insane.”
“I know exactly how you feel,” I say. “It’s lower remove B with me. They’re all trouble makers. I caught one of them trying to saw through a rope in the gym.”
“That’s nothing. One of ours tried to saw through his housemaster’s neck with a bread knife.”
“How ghastly!” I say—it’s an expression I have picked up from the girls. “Was he all right?”
“He sprained his thumb a bit. The knife was so blunt, you see.”
“I meant, the housemaster!” I say. Really, how dim can you get? It must be shock.
“Oh, Rumbelow. Yes he was all right.” Patterson sits bolt upright and his eyes open wide. “Don’t send me back there! I can’t take any more. I survived for fourteen days in the Libyan desert without water—”
“Package holiday?” I inquire.
“No. Plane crash.” Patterson buries his face in his hands. “That was horrible but-but-but Bog-Bog-Bogsdown makes it seem like heaven on earth.” A strange expression comes over his face. “I think perhaps I will take my trousers off.” He starts to fiddle with the catch at the top of his flies.
“I didn’t think you’d heard,” I say. “It was a slip of the tongue.”
“If you like,” says Patterson. “Alistair’s the name. Do what you like but I’m not going back.”
The poor man is definitely deranged. What shall I do? He is now pulling down his underpants and revealing a love truncheon of heroic proportions. It is amazing the effect fear can have on people.
“Lie back and I’ll put this blanket over you,” I say soothingly. “Forty winks, that’s what you need.”
“Forty what!?”
“Winks,” I say, sculpting the word with my tongue and lips. Alistair Patterson lies back. “Oh,” he says, relieved, “I thought you said ‘winks’.”
I try and drape the blanket over him but it is very difficult. It is like trying to throw a tarpaulin over a tent pole.
“You know what my old nanny used to do to send me to sleep?” says Alistair.
“How old was she?” I ask.
“Not all that old, really,” says Alistair obviously thinking about it seriously for the first time.
“I think I can guess,” I say, trying to move away. The hand clamps on my wrist like a handcuff.
“She
