Page 12 of Tides of Resistance
Lizzie followed her gaze. The sky had lightened, and the fierce jolts of pink from the morning had transformed into a gentle golden hue with the sun just beginning to descend slowly over the horizon.
‘Right then,’ said Lizzie, facing Val, her shoulders squared and a determined expression on her face.
‘Godspeed, Seagrove,’ Val said, patting her shoulder. ‘I won’t come aboard—they barely have space for an extra passenger as it is, but I look forward to your message as soon as you’re set up.’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ Lizzie replied. ‘I will do my best.’
‘And that’s all we may ask of you,’ Val said. She hovered near Lizzie for a few seconds longer as if she didn’t want to leave her, and then cleared her throat and walked away without looking back, leaving Lizzie standing on the quay watching her disappear.
Her mentor was gone, and with her the last thread of her connection to Jack.
CHAPTER 7
Lizzie climbed through the conning tower hatch, a circular opening so narrow her shoulders brushed against the sides as she dropped into the interior of the vessel via a ladder.
She followed her guide through the cramped steel tube, her eyes gradually adjusting to the bright cabin lights. Members of the crew milled about as she moved gingerly through the submarine. Lizzie felt a shudder run through the vessel, and the engine croaked and rumbled.
‘How long until we leave?’ she asked the amiable sailor just in front of her.
‘Only a few minutes now. I’m afraid there’s not much space for luxuries in here. Come through to the officers’ mess. Perhaps we can find you a spot to sit down.’
The officers’ mess sounded far grander than it was. The small table was covered with charts, and there was nowhere to sit, so she stood to one side. She watched submariners dart into the nearby control room,checking their stations.
‘How many are on board?’ Lizzie asked.
‘We’re forty-four plus you, so it’s tight. Here, let me get you a folding stool. You can move it about when you need to get out of the way.’
Lizzie hadn’t known what to expect, but she hadn’t imagined the submarine would be as compact as this. It looked like the predicted six-to-eight-hour journey would seem much longer.
‘Try to rest a bit,’ the kind sailor said, excusing himself to continue his duties.
Lizzie scanned the area from her stool, which was wedged against the curved wall of the hull. The smell of diesel fuel and sweat assailed her nostrils in the humid air. The engine coughed and spluttered as it grew louder, and everything around Lizzie vibrated.
A voice echoed overhead. ‘Stand by to cast off.’
Lizzie listened to the sound of boots pounding on the metal deck, fascinated by the preparations. Now she understood why the allocation of a submarine needed to be approved by the War Cabinet. It was altogether a more complex operation than flying into France perched in the cabin of a tiny Lysander aircraft and flinging herself into the sky with a parachute.
A short time later, a commanding voice shouted, ‘All hands to their stations.’
A pipe poked into Lizzie’s back, and she shifted to a different position, but it was impossible to get comfortable. Every surface of the interior was put to use, and she sat there in awe, never having seen anything like it.
As the vessel submerged, Lizzie felt intense pressure in her ears and nose, and a crew member took pity on her and signalled for her to do as he did, yawning and swallowing. It was unpleasant but soon passed, and the journey towards enemy-occupied territory was underway.
Time dragged by in Lizzie’s eerily lit new world, and she tried not to think about the fact that they were below sea.
A sailor sat on an ammunition box nearby, and Lizzie struck up a conversation with him. ‘How on earth do you sleep on here?’
The stout blond fellow in navy uniform grinned. ‘We hot bunk, miss.’
Lizzie raised one eyebrow to show her confusion, and he continued. ‘We don’t have enough bunks for every crew member, so we take it in turns. There’s rarely a cold bunk on board a submarine!’
Lizzie smiled at the pleasant man, grateful to have her mind taken off her impending night swim, which inched closer with every mile of sea the submarine covered.
‘Miss, miss,’ called a voice, shaking Lizzie’s shoulder.
Adrenaline surged through her body the instant she opened her eyes. The duty watch officer had organised a hot bunk for her so she could snatch an hour’s sleep after eating a dish of warm stew and a hunk of bread. Now he was back to wake her as promised.
Lizzie squinted in the dim light at her special waterproof watch supplied by the SOE wardrobe department. It was midnight on the dot, and she calculated the submarine must be approaching the Brittany coast. She was due to disembark around 2 a.m. under the crew’s calculations of St. Malo’s extreme tidal range.
