Thursday, September 19, 6:00 AM
The sound of moaning woke Ken up. He’d been dreaming that his legs were pinned under a truck. He couldn’t move them at all. They were cold and stiff and hurt so much. He realized it was the sound of his own moaning that woke him.
He opened his eyes. He was squeezed in beside Howard and Fred on the wooden bottom of the boat. He tried to stretch his legs, but he banged into Father O’Sullivan, who was flat on his back in the middle of the boat. Ken kicked his legs up in the air, and shook them to try and get the numbness out.
With the morning, there was a bit of sunshine, and his face felt dry and warm. A lot of rain had fallen in the night, and there was water sloshing about in the boat. Which was why my back is sopping, thought Ken. We’ll have a lot of bailing to do today.
But the bailing bucket had other uses first. There were no toilets on the lifeboat. Gunner Peard had shown the boys how to pee off the side of the boat. “There’s a trick to standing so you don’t fall out of the boat,” he’d said, showing them how to push their hips forward and their shoulders backward. They’d almost fallen out of the boat just from laughing so hard.
For other business, they had to ask to use the bucket. But with so little to eat they didn’t need to use it very often.
It was different for Auntie Mary, though. She was allowed to use the bucket whenever she needed. “Memsahib needs the bucket,” Ramjam would call out, and it was passed down to her in the duck hole. Ken, Fred, and Howard would stand as best they could with their backs to the duck hole to give her some privacy.
The other morning ritual was the lascars’ prayers. Ken began to recognize that there were three distinct groups, each wearing their own kind of turban or cap and saying different kinds of prayers. Some sat on their feet and bowed their heads, like Father O’Sullivan. Others squatted, facing east—which was the direction that the sun came up—and bent their bodies down to touch their foreheads to the bottom of the boat. Others lay completely face downwards. That meant everyone else had to shift positions. Yesterday, they’d said prayers several times during the day. This morning, they started just as the sun was coming up.
Before they said their prayers, the lascars rinsed their mouths out with seawater. Ken tried to imagine rinsing his mouth and not swallowing. He wasn’t sure he could do it. He was so very thirsty. They all waited until the lascars had finished their prayers before Steward Purvis passed out the breakfast rations.
A beaker of water, a ship’s biscuit, half a sardine. Forty-six dips of water, forty-six biscuits, forty-six half sardines.
“Bless us, O Lord, and these, Thy gifts, which we are about to receive from Thy bounty. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen.” Father O’Sullivan crossed himself weakly from the bottom of the boat.
Saying grace seemed to make the meal last a bit longer.
Ken remembered to drink his water slowly this time. The water dipper was tiny. There were probably only three little sips in total.
“I’m still thirsty,” Paul complained softly.
“What?” Gunner Peard was standing in the bow, near the duck hole, stretching. “What did you say?” he asked Paul.
“I’m still thirsty,” Paul repeated. Ken saw a slight look of panic in his eyes.
“Have you no buttons?” asked Gunner Peard.
“Buttons?”
“Yeah,” growled Peard, “Buttons. Everybody knows that if you’re thirsty you have to suck on your buttons. Didn’t that school marm teach you anything?”
Auntie Mary glared at Gunner Peard, but said nothing.
Ken watched Paul and Billy shyly put their pyjama buttons in their mouths. When he was sure no one was looking, he put one in his mouth. It just tasted salty, like everything else on the boat.
“I’m going to use my lucky lamb,” said Derek. “The one the Reverend King gave me back on the boat. Maybe it will taste like a roast.”
Suddenly, the boat rocked. Splash! Harry the Gunner was swimming in vigorous circles around the boat. “Mr. Peard,” called Ken, “Why do you keep swimming every morning?”
“Got to keep in practice in case we get torpedoed again!”
Ken burst out laughing at the thought of their little lifeboat being torpedoed. Looked like they couldn’t even be found, let alone torpedoed. Peard sang as he swam.
Run rabbit—run rabbit—Run! Run! Run!
Run rabbit —run rabbit—Run! Run! Run!
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Ken and Howard joined in. “Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!” The Germans had torpedoed their ship, but the Royal Navy would rescue them and blow that U-boat out of the water.
When Peard got back in the boat, Cadet Critchley and Officer Cooper ran up the sail.
“Ireland, next stop!” said Officer Cooper. “Master Ken Sparks, Master Howard Claytor: you’re on duty at the Fleming gears. With your muscles, we’ll get there all the sooner.”
Ken and Howard pushed and pulled along with Critchley and Purvis. There was a good wind. They seemed to be moving at a good clip, but with no shore and nothing stationary, it was impossible to tell how fast they were going.
By the time Fred and Derek took their shift on the gears, Ken’s hands were blistered and sore. Not that he was going to complain. He realized that being a sailor was hard work. He knew his blisters would turn to calluses and his hands would get tougher and stronger. He sat on the side bench, looking over the endless sea. He dipped his hands in the salty water. It stung, but the pain made him feel more grown-up. The day wore on with no sign of land or rescue.
“I know,” said Auntie Mary. “How about a game of I Spy? I spy with my little eye, something that is pink,” she said.
“The flag,” said Fred. “There’s nothing else pink anywhere.”
“Good,” she said. “Now it’s your turn.”
“I spy with my little eye something that is blue,” said Fred.
“Water,” said Howard. “This is boring. There isn’t exactly a lot to see.”
Ken’s legs were cramping terribly. He wanted to find a place to sit by himself, where he could stretch, but it was impossible. Howard was on one side of him, little Billy squirming on the other. Auntie Mary was in the duck hole with Paul. There was a little bit of room there, if he wanted to squish in and lie down. But he’d be pretty cramped. He thought about going over to the other side of the boat. Maybe Mr. Nagorski could slide over, just a little bit. But Gunner Peard was there, cleaning his nails with a penknife, and he sure didn’t want to disturb him. Besides, to even get to the other side, he’d have to step over Father O’Sullivan. Further down, in the middle of the boat, the lascars were spread around the Fleming gears in their groups. They hummed to themselves, occasionally speaking a few words that sounded like a prayer of some kind. Officer Cooper stood in the stern at the tiller. No one could move and there was nothing to do.
“What about Animal, Vegetable, Mineral?” offered Auntie Mary. “Why don’t you start, Paul?”
Ken looked over at Paul. He looked like he was in a kind of trance. His face was blank, and his salt-encrusted mouth hung loosely. His eyes were open, but he didn’t look like he was seeing anything.
Fear suddenly flashed through Ken. His mind was flooded with images of people in the water, screaming. What had happened to Terry? Or that boy Louis, with his train engine? Did they get rescued? What had happened to Captain Nicoll? Had he actually gone down with the ship, the way that captains are supposed to do? The reality of the situation started to flood through him. People have died, he realized with a shock.
And what about us? Ireland is a long way away. What if our water runs out? You need water to live, thought Ken. He remembered a plant that his stepmother had forgotten to water. He had noticed it one day, on a hot windowsill. It was all thin and grey. The leaves had fallen off. Would it be like that for them? He looked at Paul’s face again. It looked colourless and withered already.
Will we dry out and die here in the ocean?
Ken shivered as this last thought took hold of him. As if in response to his thoughts, Auntie Mary suddenly said, “All right, gather around me. It’s time for a story.”
“A story? What kind of story?” asked Billy.
“Is it an adventure? Will there be pirates?” asked Howard.
Suddenly, everyone was awake. Even Paul’s face lit up.
“It’s a Bulldog Drummond story,” she said.
Bulldog Drummond! The best! The bravest of the brave. A hero’s hero. Bulldog Drummond, hero of the Great War, who came home to find life after the war dull. Ken had memorized the best part.
Bulldog Drummond put an ad in a local paper:
Demobilized officer finding peace incredibly tedious would welcome diversion. Legitimate if possible; but crime of a humorous description, no objection. Excitement essential.
“The Contessa de Guy,” began Auntie Mary, “had assembled some of the richest and most dastardly men in the whole world in a remote corner of Africa. In Morocco, in fact. Of course, her name wasn’t really Contessa de Guy, for she was none other than the conniving and vicious Irma, arch enemy of Bulldog Drummond.”
Ken saw that even the lascars were all listening and watching Auntie Mary, although he was sure they couldn’t understand a word. But they could see that she was telling an exciting story. Even Mr. Nagorski and Harry the Gunner were listening.
“Irma, distraught over the fact that Drummond had killed her lover Carl Peterson. So she concocted a scheme that would ruin Drummond, cause the collapse of the manufacturing industry, and ultimately bankrupt England.
“Irma wouldn’t rest until she destroyed everything that an Englishman holds dear. She set the wheels in motion for her grand plans.”
She stopped.
“What’s next, Auntie Mary?” asked Derek.
“You’ll have to wait until storytime tomorrow,” she said.
“No!” cried Ken. There were groans all around.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “but that’s all there is for today. Bulldog Drummond and the Tale of the African Diamonds, to be continued tomorrow.”
Ken looked out at the endless sea. For a brief time Auntie Mary’s story had made him forget where he was. He had even forgotten his thirst. To be continued tomorrow. It seemed impossible to imagine that they would be sitting here tomorrow. But if they were heading to Ireland, they might be here for many more days.
At least he could look forward to Bulldog Drummond.
The wind picked up as the sun began to set on their second night in the lifeboat. “Looks like we’re heading into a bit of weather,” said Officer Cooper. “Purvis, Critchley, get that sail down. Peard, put the sea anchor out.”
Ken lay scrunched on the bottom of the boat with Derek, Billy, Fred, and Howard, covered by a blanket. Paul was beside Auntie Mary, covered by the only other blanket in the boat.
As it became windy and the sky grew dark, Ken looked out over the gloomy boat. The lascars were piled in their groups, curled on top of each other. They looked so cold with no blankets, no shelter.
The boat began to pitch and roll. Ken’s legs felt so cramped that he didn’t know how he would ever be able to sleep. He hadn’t walked in two days. Shooting pains tightened the muscles along the sides of his shins. He kicked out, trying to stretch them, and banged into Billy in the dark.
“Watch it,” said Billy, but his voice sounded funny. Ken realized that he was crying. And as Billy’s sobs grew louder, Ken heard Derek start to cry too.
“I’m worried about Alan. He doesn’t know where I am,” sobbed Derek.
“Peter needs me,” cried Billy.
“Hey now, what’s all this?” Gunner Peard growled from his perch on the gunwale beside them. He poked his head into the duck hole.
“What’s this sniffing and snivelling? It’s just a little shipwreck. No big thing at all. You just wait. Another day or two and we’ll be rescued. Do you think the Royal Navy is going to let you down? Brave boys need feel no fear.”
“But Alan …” Derek started.
“Your brothers are feastin’ on cake and ice cream. Havin’ a great party. But they’ll be sorry to have missed this! It’s not every boy who gets to spend time on a lifeboat! Now you close your eyes and get off to sleep. We’ll need your muscles in the morning to push those Fleming gears.”
Derek and Billy were quiet and Ken was just starting to nod off to sleep when he overheard Peard talking to Mr. Nagorski. What he heard sent a stab of fear through his body.
“We ought to be halfway to Ireland by now,” the gunner hissed to Mr. Nagorski. “Cooper isn’t working those lascars half hard enough. They need to put their backs into those damned Fleming gears. Our supplies aren’t going to last forever. In fact, I’d be surprised if we make it through another day, two at most. The chances of making it out of here alive are slim.”
“Mr. Peard,” Mr. Nagorski said, “I would appreciate it if you kept your calculations to yourself. While I may share some of your concerns, I don’t think it a good idea to further demoralize the boat.”
Peard sniffed. “Have it your own way. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Ken felt Derek’s body jerk with sobs. Before he could stop himself, he began to cry too.
“Now, now,” said Auntie Mary softly. “There’s no room for tears here. You are all heroes of a real adventure. Have you ever heard of a hero who snivelled? Why, any boy in England would love to take your place in this lifeboat right now,” she said. “When you get home, they’ll write stories about you.”
Ken was ashamed of his tears. He imagined being the star of an adventure book. He looked at Derek. Derek looked back with a small smile. Derek Drummond. Bulldog Ken.
Who ever heard of a hero who snivelled?