‘Tenedos!’ Dickie exclaimed, as the dark shape of the little Turkish island came into view, set in the purple nightscape of the fragrant Aegean Sea.
All was quiet. There was no sound save the gentle purr of the Swordfish’s engines as they approached the island at five knots. On the bridge, an anxious, tense Smith raised his night glasses. He swept the island, which was mainly populated by Turkish fishermen, so Doyle had told him. Here and there a few yellow lights still burned. But there was no lighthouse and as far as he knew no Turkish garrison. All seemed to be going well.
He turned to a waiting Ginger Kerrigan. ‘All right, Ginger,’ he commanded, ‘send the signal.’
Ginger hesitated a fraction of a second. He knew the danger they were all in. If there were Turkish troops on the island just off the coast of the mainland and they spotted the signal, too, all hell would probably break loose. Then he sent the signal on his Aldis. It was the Morse for ‘SOS’, the only Morse signal they thought an illiterate Turkish fisherman would recognise.
Nothing happened.
No light illuminated the darkness. Smith peered through the gloom. Next to him a worried Dickie said, ‘Hell’s teeth, do you think they’re not—’
He stopped short suddenly. About a mile away a faint yellow light was flickering off and on slowly. ‘Answer, sir,’ Ginger said excitedly. ‘It’s them!’
‘Keep it down to a dull roar, Ginger, please. They can probably hear you all the way to Istanbul.’
‘Sorry, sir.’ Ginger gave a quick flick of his Aldis lamp to acknowledge receipt. Then Smith ordered the engines stopped and so they waited, no sound heard but the soft lap-lap of the Aegean against Swordfish’s hull. Now they waited, with a double lookout posted and Billy Bennett tensed behind the Lewis gun. For they knew from Doyle that there had been increased patrolling of these coastal waters by Turkish gunboats and light craft. The Turks were on the lookout for any attempt by the Greeks to escape from Smyrna to the north of their present position.
‘What did the Levantine say again?’ Dickie asked in a low voice.
‘Pay the Turk in instalments of twenty Horsemen of St George at regular intervals during the passage up the Straits,’ Smith replied. ‘Twenty at KumKale. Twenty at Chanuk. Twenty when we’re through the Narrows and so on.’
‘Donkey and carrot sort of thing,’ Dickie said.
‘Exactly… I say, Dickie,’ Smith’s voice rose, ‘there she is! To port. Can you see?’
Hurriedly Dickie turned in that direction. A dark shape was emerging from the purple-scented gloom and now the young officers could hear the soft chug-chug of an ancient engine. Together they raised their glasses. The low shape of a fishing caique slipped into the bright circle of glass. It was the Turks, all right, Smith told himself. Still he did not relax his guard. ‘Stand by gun crew,’ he ordered. ‘Billy, keep your eyes peeled.’
‘Like tinned tomatoes,’ Billy replied in the old naval fashion, and tucked the butt into his shoulder – just in case.
But there was no need for him to use the Lewis gun. Five minutes later, the caique nudged against the side of the Swordfish, giving off a penetrating odour, composed of rotten fish, oil and perfumed Turkish tobacco.
‘Abdul the Terrible,’ a deep bass voice announced from the deck of the Turkish craft, ‘feared from Montreal to Miami.’ The voice was pure American-English. ‘Never been beaten… Well,’ the voice corrected itself, ‘now and again, he has.’
Next moment the owner of the voice appeared over the side of the Swordfish and Ginger crossed himself in mock panic, exclaiming, ‘Gawd Almighty. Heaven help a sailor on a night like this!’
Next to him Dickie Bird’s mouth dropped open in sheer awe. The Turkish skipper was a huge mountain of a man. His head was clean-shaven, a gold earring glittered in his left ear and his broad mouth was full of gold teeth. With a hand like a small steam shovel he pulled himself over the side of the Swordfish and dropped to the deck with surprising agility for such a giant of a man. For a moment he poised there, knees bent and huge hands held out to his front, as if he were half expecting a fight – or worse. Then he thrust out his right hand at Smith.
The latter took it gingerly. Next moment he wished he hadn’t. The Turkish skipper gave it a squeeze, saying, ‘I’m welcoming any friend of that Jewboy, Sammy Kahn.’
Smith’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. In a strangled voice, he said, ‘How do you do?’
‘Doing very good,’ the big Turk answered. ‘But I was doing more good in the good ole US of A., God’s own country.’ For a moment he straightened up to the position of attention and looked very solemn. ‘Then the bums gave me the old heave-ho in seventeen when America entered the war. Sent me back here – to crappy Turkey. But Sammy, the Jewboy, has promised me a passport, visa, work permit – the whole shoot – if I help you limey gents.’ He licked his thick lips. ‘You got no English whisky like those limeys in skirts make?’
Five minutes later Abdul the Terrible was filling the tiny wardroom, drinking pink gin – ‘we have no English whisky made by the limeys in skirts’ – explaining how they were going to penetrate the Straits. The ex-wrestler, for that had been his profession in the United States, said, ‘You see that Turkish jerk Kemal Ataturk hasn’t got enough doughboys. All used up, fighting the goddam Greeks.’ His big face lit up suddenly. ‘I once had a bout with a Greek. Gussie the Gorgeous Greek, they called him. Big handsome guy. He wasn’t very gorgeous when Abdul had finished with him.’
Smith flashed Dickie a look which said, ‘I’m not surprised – with those paws of his.’
‘Well, as I was saying. Ataturk hasn’t got enough soldiers to garrison both sides of the Straits. So he is only defending the southern side. So I – and you – will sail the northern side, as far away from the troops as we can get.’
‘But they’ll still be able to spot us.’
‘Not with my boat in between you and them and with my fishing net thrown over you. All the soldier boys will see is some poor jerk of a Turkish fisherman trawling for what he can find in the Dardanelles, perhaps for the Istanbul market. You got it?’
Smith nodded his head. ‘Yes I’ve got it.’
Next to him, squeezed against the bulkhead by the Turk’s enormous girth, Dickie asked, ‘When do we start?’
Abdul the Turk lowered his glass. ‘Just before dawn when the sentries change, Admiral. That goddam Ataturk thinks he’s smart. But his shit don’t smell like ice cream. Old Abdul the Terrible’ll have him out in one round, yessir!’ He drained the rest of the waterglass, and said, ‘Say, could I have another one of them red gins. Tastes swell…’
It was just before dawn. Now the caique and the Swordfish were linked together by stout rope lines, with the superstructure of the British vessel covered by the caique’s stinking fishing net. Up ahead Smith, peering through the mesh, could just see the dark smudge that was the entrance to the Dardanelles. Periodically a bright light parted the darkness and he told himself that would be the lighthouse at Arche Baba.
Next to him Dickie said, ‘There’s a lighthouse, too, according to the chart, at KumKale. But it doesn’t appear to be operating. Abdul must be right. The Turks are only manning one side of the Straits.’
‘Let’s hope so, Dickie. Because if they rumble us in that Straits, we’re dead ducks.’
‘Very dead ducks,’ Dickie agreed.
Time passed slowly, as the Swordfish chugged along at five knots, the maximum speed of the ancient caique. Slowly the sun was beginning to rise, a blood-red ball to the east, colouring the still sea a dramatic crimson, so that it looked as if the water ran with blood.
At a snail’s pace the two craft sailed into the Straits, with the Turkish crew of the caique going about their deck duties in their usual slow manner, while the crew of the Swordfish crouched under the netting, the sweat trickling down their tense, apprehensive faces, waiting for that challenge which would spell doom for them.
From his hiding place Smith could see the sheep and goats roaming the rugged cliffs on their side of the Straits, the waterway which divided Europe from Asia. Here and there were series of trenches surrounded by rusting barbed wire, which Smith took to be the defences prepared by the Turks when the Allies had landed at the Dardanelles back in 1915. But stare as he might he could see no sign of modern Turkish soldiers, for which he was very grateful.
The hours passed. At the moment the Straits were four and a half miles wide. But soon the two craft would be approaching the Narrows, some fourteen miles upstream. There, the passage was reduced to just over a mile.There they would be at their most vulnerable.
But Abdul the Terrible, glimpsed occasionally through the netting, seemed unworried. He swaggered about his little craft, bellowing orders, sometimes cuffing one of the barefoot crew about the ears when he seemed to be too slow in reacting, and occasionally winking in an exaggerated conspiratorial fashion in the direction of the Swordfish. It was something that Smith prayed he wouldn’t do. Hadn’t the big Turk ever heard of telescopes or binoculars? For Smith was sure their passage was now being observed from the opposite side of the Straits.
Another hour passed leadenly. Now the two vessels were fighting the strong current coming down the waterway from the Sea of Marmara so that they were moving barely over two knots an hour. But already the stretch of water was beginning to narrow as they started to approach the most dangerous section of the passage and now an anxious Smith could see the batteries and forts on the southern shore quite clearly.
Smith decided to order the crew to stand. Crouched low, the men crept to their duty stations and at the wheel CPO Ferguson donned an ancient steel helmet, which he had found somewhere or other, as a clear indication that he was ready for anything. Smith shook his head and hoped it would never come to that.
At ten-thirty that long tense morning they were just beginning to pass the fort of Kilid Bahr, in the centre of the Narrows, when they were hailed by a man in uniform bearing a megaphone.
Smith chanced a look, wiping the sweat from his brow as he did so, noticing that his heart was beginning to pump excitedly.
A man was standing on a mound at the water’s edge calling something in Turkish. Behind him there was a squad of heavily armed soldiers, one of them bearing the barrel of an ancient machine gun on his shoulder.
Abdul the Terrible took it all very calmly. Balancing on the rail of his caique, he cupped his mighty paws to his lips and shouted back.
Smith bit his bottom lip. What did the official want? Were they in trouble?
‘Do you think they’ve twigged?’ Dickie asked hastily in an excited whisper. ‘Gosh, we’re for it then.’
But Dickie Bird was wrong. Abruptly the Turkish official lowered his megaphone and gave a wave of his hand, indicating that the caique should proceed.
‘Phew,’ Smith sighed and relaxed as Abdul the Terrible swaggered across the deck in apparent unconcern and whispered out of the side of his mouth. ‘A bribe, he wanted. Typical Turk – always after the baksheesh.’
‘Money?’ Smith asked.
‘Ner,’ Abdul snorted. ‘Turkish pound is no good. He wanted fish when we come back.’
‘Fish,’ the two young officers exclaimed as one.
‘Yer, you heard it,’ Abdul said and then swaggered off, leaving Smith and Dickie to stare at each other incredulously. They had bribed their way into the Sea of Marmara to torpedo two Turkish battleships at the price of a catch of wet fish!