The Weak Link


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 Lieutenant-Commander Bentley was crouched behind his binnacle. His stare was fixed with unblinking intensity on the stem of the leading cruiser. Both big ships were racing at them side by side—even if they had had time to swerve apart in the few seconds which had elapsed since Wind Rode had burst from the smoke, it is doubtful if they would have bothered; who would expect a lone destroyer to close the range of three cruisers and a destroyer flotilla?
 The same terrible instinct of judgment which stood behind him in the boxing-ring told Bentley in advance what the cruiser would do. His rangefinder eyes balanced its speed and direction, his right hand flicked up above his head, he whipped his hand down and his voice rang out in the ominous silence;
 “Fire!”
 
 
 
 
 
 J E MACDONNELL 7: THE WEAK LINK
 By J E Macdonnell
 First published by Horwitz Publications in 1959
 ©1959, 2022 by J E Macdonnell
 First electronic edition: February 2023
 Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
 You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by means (electronic, digital, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
 This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book
 Published by Arrangement with the Author’s Estate
 Series Editor: Janet Whitehead
 Text © Piccadilly Publishing
 Visit www.piccadillypublishing.org to read more about our books.
 
 
 Table of Contents
 Chapter One
 Chapter Two
 Chapter Three
 Chapter Four
 Chapter Five
 Chapter Six
 About the Author
 
 
 Chapter One
 
 
 LIKE THE HOT potato under the mare’s tail, the incident was trivial in itself, but the results it sparked aboard H.M.A. Destroyer Wind Rode were not.
 As reported earlier in these chronicles of Lieutenant-Commander Peter Bentley and his old but spunky destroyer, Sub-Lieutenant Hanson was a long, thin man with a long, thin nose, and even with rather long, thin hair. This last appurtenance was sandy in colour, a shade which could be identified at any time by the few straggly strands of it that poked down below the edge of his cap.
 He had a solemn, anxious face and wistful eyes like a questioning spaniel. His solemnity and anxiety were definitely caused by his lack of sea experience and seamanship knowledge; the reason for his spaniel look was not so obvious. It will be easiest to charge his mother with that responsibility.
 Lieutenant-Commander Bentley knew that appearances are sometimes deceptive, and now and again when he had nothing better to do, and he gazed at his sub-lieutenant, Bentley found himself hoping that the old saw was true in this case. So far little had happened to turn his hope into conviction.
 Hanson had not yet committed any serious breaches, because in the order of things naval he was almost constantly under experienced supervision. Also in the order of things naval was the fact that a captain must be constantly planning ahead to allow for every possible contingency: so that Peter Bentley sometimes wondered how Sub-Lieutenant Hanson would conduct himself if ever it came about that he were in command of the ship, alone on the bridge, with his experienced supervision down in the wardroom or in the first-lieutenant’s cabin.
 At the moment it seemed unlikely that Bentley would have his wonderings enlightened. Wind Rode was steaming across a peaceful sea, on her own—though, as the sea which bore her long low length was named The Mediterranean, it was perfectly possible that she might not be alone for long.
 However, at this moment of a humid afternoon, she was alone. And with no specific duty to perform. She had been ordered to sea by the senior officer of her destroyer flotilla to carry out a routine sweep, the object of her orders being to nose around and see what she could see in the way of enemy movements, trusting to her speed to get her out of trouble if she should be so unfortunate as to sight any of his cruisers or battleships.
 Her other object was to engage and sink any enemy craft of her own weight—but she did not need senior-officer orders for that.
 The whole ship was a scene of quiet efficiency and contentment. The flat, polished Mediterranean, gleaming like bronze under the cloud-filtered rays of the afternoon sun came steadily on to meet Wind Rode’s sharp stem, parted and shone suddenly white, and slid with casual indifference out again from under her stern.
 For a mile or so back, the road of the destroyer’s passage marked the face of the sea; then the vast breathing swell smoothed out this insignificant scar, and the empty sea stretched far back to the even weld of sky and water.
 A seaman in overalls stepped carefully over the foot-high coaming leading from the fo’c’sle mess-deck, a bucket of dirty scrubbing water in his right hand. He stood a moment on the steel upper-deck near the port sea boat, breathing appreciatively.
 The sweat glistened in globules on his brown face. He looked up at the brown haze streaming flat from the funnel-lip, noted that it was carried over his head, and walked to the nearby guard-rail. He swung the solid, heavy bucket up and pitched its contents into the sea.
 For a moment he watched, idly, the brown stain drifting down the ship’s side, tossed and shredded by the toppling bow-wave—there was nothing else on all the sea to look at. Then he blew his nose over the side, wiped it with his bare brown forearm, and, whistling monotonously, stepped back into the humid half-light whence he’d come.
 Further forrard, and above the