CHAPTER NINETEEN   ADRIFT

Change had always been stimulating to Nancy, but this time she found she could not shake off her depression even after she was aboard ship. Koshu Island was a safe haven she was reluctant to leave. In total darkness they went aboard the transport and in total darkness they moved out to sea again. This ship had detached itself from the convoy to pick up the nurses and several hundred troops. Perhaps by daylight they would again be part of a great flotilla.

The air on deck was cold after the tropical nights they had endured ashore. Nancy’s weakened condition made her super-sensitive to chill. She buttoned her overcoat tightly and turned up her collar, keeping her Mae West slung over her shoulder. Immediately on going aboard, and even before they were on the move, they had an abandon ship drill and became acquainted with the position of their lifeboats. Nancy’s and Mabel’s boat was number four, not more than fifty steps from the lounge where they were to spend the night.

There was not a bunk left on the tightly packed ship to assign to these last passengers. They were merely super-cargo, picked up enroute to the ship’s destination. Since they expected to go ashore some time the following morning, their discomforts would not be too prolonged.

“I surely hate to leave,” said Mabel as Koshu Island became a dark smudge on the horizon. “Our life back there will be something to remember forever.”

As usual leave-takings were hard for Nancy, too. But most of all she had hated to say good-bye to Vernon Goodwin. He had brought Tommy so close to her once more. How she had hated to disturb him with the news of her departure! She had urged him to insist that they send out a searching plane as soon as he was able to go.

“I’ve made Major Reed promise to see it through,” Nancy told Vernon. “Now everything depends on your speedy recovery.”

“I’ll do my best,” he promised. “But I surely hate to see you go.”

“No more than I hate to go—with so much at stake here,” she replied. “But when you’re in the service it’s Uncle Sam who gives the orders.”

Vernon’s bony hand took hers a moment. “If it hadn’t been for you, Miss Nancy, I doubt if I would have come through.”

“The whole staff was pulling for you,” she reminded him.

He saw how frail and worried she looked, and tried to speak consolingly. “You go on to your new duties with an easy mind, Miss Nancy. I’ll give ’em no rest till a plane goes looking for Tom. We’ll bring him back if he’s still on that island.”

There were others, too, whom Nancy had left behind with real regret—Miss Hauser, Major Reed, Ida and Shorty were special favorites. Having Mabel with her, however, meant more than any of the others could have.

“They’ll be following pretty soon,” said Mabel, who seemed able to drift more lightly through the changing currents of their life than Nancy could.

“I know that’s the program now, but you never can tell what will happen in this man’s war.”

They spoke almost in whispers for they had been warned against loud speech on deck. The great ship moved silently over the dark waters. So quiet was everything aboard that the wash of the waves along the hull was the only audible sound above the low throb of the engines. Only once did they hear the drone of a plane, low on the horizon. Their journey promised to be as peaceful and uneventful as a summer excursion up the Hudson.

Mabel, Janice and a couple of men officers made up a bridge game toward midnight, but Nancy felt too exhausted to play. With her musette bag and helmet beside her, her Mae West dangling from one shoulder she tried to get some sleep on a two-seated couch. By drawing her knees up under her chin she was fairly comfortable. The game near by was still going on when she dozed.

At the sound of a terrific explosion, shaking the ship from prow to stem, Nancy woke with a jolt to find herself on the floor. Total darkness shut her in like a pall, while pandemonium broke loose. She clutched at her life-preserver, buckling it into place as she called through the wild confusion, “Mabel, where are you?”

Her friend must have been sleeping on the floor near by, for she replied almost in Nancy’s ear, “Here! So this is it!”

Even while she spoke there came the thunderous voice of the captain through the loud speakers, “Abandon ship! We have been struck! We are going down!”

To Nancy’s surprise now that the crisis was upon them, she felt calm and collected. All lights had gone out with that first impact, but she had carefully memorized the route from her couch to the lifeboat. Clinging to Mabel with one hand, she felt around for her musette bag and helmet. She couldn’t locate her helmet, but she did find her bag.

“Got your bag?” she asked Mabel.

“Went to sleep on it.” Even as she spoke Mabel fished out a flashlight, dimmed with blue paper.

Lights twinkled here and there as people hurried by, some babbling hysterically, others silently intent on reaching their boats. The deck listed with a sickening lurch just as Nancy and Mabel got through the door. They went sliding with alarming speed toward the rail. Some, caught completely off their guard, were plunged into the water.

“God help us,” moaned Mabel. “She’s going under before we can get to our boat.”

“No, here it is!” exclaimed Nancy, swinging her own light to a focus on number four.

It was one of the smaller boats, but three people were already inside. A man gave them a hand.

A woman spoke as they climbed in, “Where are the rest? There’re supposed to be many more.”

“I don’t know,” Mabel replied.

The woman’s voice was not that of any of their own nurses.

“We can’t wait much longer,” said the man. “She’s listing badly.”

“Why don’t they hurry?” wailed the woman.

“Don’t be frightened. Here’s someone now,” said another man reassuringly.

“Is this number eight?” A man’s voice asked as he stumbled toward the boat.

“No, but you get in,” said the man who had spoken first. “No time to hunt yours. She’s going down any minute.”

He gave the man’s arm a jerk and pulled him into the boat. Another man, evidently a sailor, let the boat into the water. The ship lurched dangerously and oily spray drenched the boat. They were not a dozen oar strokes away when acrid smoke billowed from every opening as the ship suddenly burst into flames. The oarsmen had a race to clear the area where flames lapped at the oil-coated water.

It was awful to see that towering bulk become a flaming carnival for some Jap, watching through the periscope of the sub that had struck them. A few minutes later the mighty ship went down with such an explosive churning of water that those in the lifeboats had to cling to the gunwale to keep from being swept overboard. For some time after the flames were extinguished they drifted in Stygian darkness. Nancy couldn’t even see Mabel sitting next to her.

In those first stunned moments of escape Nancy had been aware of other boats around them, and people in the water. But when they found themselves in calmer seas some time after the sinking they seemed to be utterly alone.

“Where are the others?” the strange woman across from them asked.

“God only knows,” replied her companion.

By the location of their voices Nancy surmised they also were sitting side by side. There was some comfort in feeling the physical nearness of another in that vast, empty darkness.

“We’ll drop anchor and ride it out here till morning,” the seaman decided. “We were due to be in sight of the convoy by dawn. If they got our SOS somebody should pick us up then.”

The last man they had taken aboard had not spoken since their arrival. Nancy wondered if he had gone overboard while the boat pitched so wildly after the ship went down. But a few minutes later she realized she was ankle deep in water. When she lifted her feet she struck something in the bottom of the boat.

“Somebody’s lying in the bottom!” she exclaimed. She found she had lost her flashlight in the scramble, but Mabel had hers.

“Don’t use a flash!” warned the sailor. “Those yellow devils can see one miles away.”

They could tell he was bending in the bottom of the boat as he spoke. Then they could hear him tugging at something. “It’s that last chap who came aboard,” he said. “He must have been knocked out.”

“Lucky he is—not knowing he has anything to worry about,” said the other man.

The sailor eased the man’s head to a higher level and began bailing out the water. But the small boat heaved and pulled on her anchor chain so they took in almost as much as he cleared out. In another hour the girl across from Nancy was violently sick. But it was not long before Nancy, Mabel and the other man were all agonizing over the side of the boat. Only the sailor and the sleeping man in the bottom of the boat kept steady stomachs.

For the first time in her life Nancy prayed for death to relieve her suffering. Sick, cold and miserable as she was, the struggle didn’t seem worth the effort.

From troubled dozing against Mabel’s shoulder Nancy woke to find dawn breaking on a sea as empty and placid as a mountain lake. No rescue ship, nor even any lifeboat was visible on all that gray expanse. How could she endure this awful plight that daylight had revealed?

Nancy’s gaze came back from her futile search to look around at her companions. The bluejacket sat on the floor in the prow, his arms bent over the seat, cradling his head. She discovered it was a young corporal who had come aboard last. He still slept in the bottom of the boat. The girl across from them was a nurse of another unit. She lay on the seat. The first class private who sat beside her couldn’t have been more than nineteen Nancy thought, as she studied the sleeping face.

Everyone was covered with an oily scum that had swept over them from the sinking boat, and Nancy knew she must look as repulsive as the rest. Even before her inspection was finished the sailor roused and dragged himself to the seat. He took one look across the empty water.

“Well if that ain’t a way to do us!” he growled, when the drowsy corporal sat up and wanted to know what the row was about. “They all beat it off to safety without ever waiting to see who else was here.”

“They may have gone under for all you know,” said Mabel.

“Where’s the water?” asked the corporal. “I’m dry as a desert.”

“You’ll get your share along with the rest,” stated the bluejacket. He had the look of a seasoned seaman. Nancy judged him to be well over thirty, the oldest person aboard. Suddenly he seemed to accept the situation with what grace he could. He glanced around at his boat-mates and said, “Well, ladies and gentlemen, looks like we’re in for it.”

Even while he spoke a brilliant red sun slowly became a burning disk where sea and sky met. It seemed a warning of what they had to endure.

“First thing in order,” said the sailor, “is to take stock of all supplies—food and water.”

Nancy and Mabel reached into their musette bags to bring out their bars of chocolate and the small tins of concentrated food to add to the common stock.

Nancy noticed that the girl across from them had her canteen, but no bag.

“I see the young ladies are good seamen and have brought their canteens,” continued the sailor.

“I have mine, too,” said the private, putting his hand to his hip.

“Looks like I forgot mine,” said the dazed corporal, making a futile search for his canteen.

The bluejacket got out the boat’s supplies and stored with them what Nancy and Mabel had contributed. There was food and water enough surely to last until they were picked up, and navigation instruments, too, in case no help came.

The Corporal Reached for the Water Keg

“I want some water now,” demanded the complaining corporal, reaching for the water keg between the bluejacket’s feet.

“You’ll get your water when portions are dealt to all alike,” stated the sailor.

“That’s what you think,” growled the corporal and made a lunge for the water.

The young private sitting behind him swung out a strong hand and drew the man back before he could reach the sailor. It took some handling to get him quiet in the stem of the boat, well away from the frightened women.

“You’ll face court martial for this!” growled the corporal. “I’m your superior officer. I’m in command of this boat!”

“If anyone is put in command it must be one of the nurses,” said the private promptly. “They are all lieutenants.”

“That suits me fine,” said the bluejacket.

“We know nothing about what should be done here,” Nancy told them miserably. “Or at least I don’t. I’ll leave it up to Mabel or—” she paused to glance at the other girl.

“Hilda Newton,” said the strange nurse. “But heavens, I have no idea what we should do.”

“Neither have I,” stated Mabel. “If you’re all agreed I move we put the bluejacket in command. He probably knows more about this business than all of us put together.”

This met with the hearty approval of all except the surly, still befuddled corporal. The sailor introduced himself as Olan Meyer, and the rest in turn told their names.

A few minutes later Olan dealt out the morning’s portion of food and water. And so began the monotonous round of nights and days that were to stretch on as endlessly as the sea on which they drifted.