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monochrome relief by the flares. Only a gap in the extreme starboard column attested to the missing
Patagonia
, a gap into which, her Aldis light flickering, the corvette
Aubretia
was moving. Of the U-boat which launched the attack there was no sign.
    â€˜They won’t have known anything,’ observed the Third Mate with an exhaused sigh, and then the night blew apart again, blew up around them with a fiery savagery that seared them as a torpedo struck the
Matthew Flinders
. Momentarily blinded by the flash of the impacting warhead, Mackinnon felt the deck beneath him rear up, throwing him against the gunshield. Its steel angle caught his shoulder with a sickening pain which brought the taste of bile into his throat as he fell to the deck.
    Shakily he got to his feet. He was suddenly, inexplicably, alone.
    He felt sick from the effect of the blast, but conscious that he was less frightened and more aware of his surroundings. Above the increasing roar of escaping steam he could hear the klaxon alarm, and someone shouting an unintelligible order. The angle of the deck increased sharply, then seemed to stop, and this sudden change enabled him to recover his wits. He scrambled out of the gun pit and up the tilting deck, like ananimal in a flood, instinctively seeking high ground. Oddly, there was no one in the wheelhouse and he continued upwards until he came to the opposite side of the bridge where his watch mate, Apprentice Dave Kingsley, should have been.
    â€˜Dave?’ he shouted, casting about with a sudden panic as the starshells were extinguished by the sea. The utter darkness filled him with a rank, sweating fear. Then above the venting steam he could hear orchestrated shouting.
    â€˜The boats!’ he cried in sudden comprehension, and halfslid, half-skidded back down the sloping bridge through the deserted wheelhouse, making a grab for the ladder rail that wrenched his shoulder again. Then he stumbled down on to the boat-deck where, in the gloom, he could see the white flash of men in singlets, the dull gleam of oilskins and the grey outline of the starboard lifeboat.
    â€˜Is that you, Mackinnon?’ Captain Robson’s harsh voice cut through the wet night air above him. Mackinnon turned. At the head of the ladder the Master stood, the pale stripes of his pyjamas showing beneath his bridge coat. A pale square of paper fluttered from his right fist.
    â€˜Sparks is waiting for this in the radio shack . . .’
    Reassured that some discipline prevailed and aware that the Captain must have been in the chart-room while he scuttered foolishly about the bridge, Mackinnon ran back up the ladder and took the message form. The radio shack was abaft the tall funnel and inside, under the battery-powered emergency light, the Radio Officer was dragging on a cigarette, his headphones clamped round his balding skull and a nervous hand poised over the morse key. Without a word he tore the chit out of Mackinnon’s hand and began transmitting the fate of the SS
Matthew Flinders
to the outside world. Mackinnon stood for an uncertain moment, then the sparks flung off his headphones, pulled a duffle coat from a hook on the bulkhead and shoved past the apprentice.
    â€˜Come on, she’s going!’
    The ship gave another lurch. More starshell burstoverhead and the crump of exploding depth charges could be heard in the distance above the shouts and the roar of the steam.
    â€˜Come on.’
    Mackinnon followed the Radio Officer. Back on the boat-deck the struggling figures were thrown into stark relief by the flares. Above their heads a white plume vented from the funnel and then a series of tremors rumbled beneath their feet and the ship suddenly fell back on an even keel.
    The surface of the sea, tossing up towards them with the curl and hiss of breaking crests, was much nearer as the
Matthew Flinders
began to settle in the water.
    The Bosun had the after end of the boat swung out and was exhorting