On The Beach

"There are only two of them," she said. "I could help-keep on nibbling at them while you're away. If we could get them out this winter and dig the ground over, I could plant it in the spring and we'd have vegetables all next summer." She paused. "Peas and beans," she said. "And a vegetable marrow. I'd make marrow jam."

"Good idea," he said. He looked the trees up and down. "They're not very big," he said. "It'd be better for the pine if they came out."

"Another thing I want to do," she said, "is to put in a flowering gum tree, here, I think that'd look lovely in the summer."

"Takes about five years to come into bloom," he said.

"Never mind. A gum tree there would be just lovely, up against the blue of the sea. We could see it from our bedroom window."

He paused, considering the brilliance of the scarlet flowers all over the big tree against the deep blue sea, in the brilliant sunlight. "It'd certainly be quite a sensation when it was in bloom," he said. "Where would you put it? Here?"

"A bit more over this way, here," she said. "When it got big we could take down this holly thing and have a seat in the shade, here." She paused. "I went to Wilson's nurseries while you were away," she said. "He's got some lovely little flowering gum trees there, only ten and sixpence each. Do you think we could put in one of those this autumn?"

"They're a bit delicate," he said. "I think the thing to do would be to put in two fairly close to each other, so that you'd have one if the other died. Then take out one of them in a couple of years' time."

"The trouble is, one never does it," she observed.

They went on happily planning their garden for the next ten years, and the morning passed very quickly.

When Moira and Dwight came back from church they were still at it. They were called into consultation on the layout of the kitchen garden. Presently Peter and Mary went into the house, the former to get drinks and the latter to get the lunch.

The girl glanced at the American. "Someone's crazy," she said quietly. "Is it me or them?"

"Why do you say that?"

"They won't be here in six months' time. I won't be here. You won't be here. They won't want any vegetables next year."

Dwight stood in silence for a moment, looking out at the blue sea, the long curve of the shore. "So what?" he said at last. "Maybe they don't believe it. Maybe they think that they can take it all with them and have it where they're going to, someplace. I wouldn't know." He paused. "The thing is, they just kind of like to plan a garden. Don't you go and spoil it for them, telling them they're crazy."

"I wouldn't do that." She stood in silence for a minute. "None of us. really believe it's ever going to happen-not to us," she said at last. "Everybody's crazy on that point, one way or another."

"You're very right," he said emphatically.

Drinks came, and put a closure on the conversation, and then lunch. After lunch Mary turned the men out into the garden, thinking them to be infectious, while she washed the dishes with Moira. Seated in deck chairs with a cup of coffee, Peter asked his captain, "Have you heard anything about our next job, sir?"

The American cocked his eye at him. "Not a thing. Have you?"

"Not really. Something was said at that conference with P.S.O. that made me wonder if anything was in the wind."

"What was it that was said?"

"Something about fitting us with new directional wireless of some kind. Have you heard anything?"

Dwight shook his head. "We've got plenty of radio."

"This is for taking a bearing-accurately. Perhaps when we're submerged to periscope depth. We can't do that, can we?"

"Not with our existing equipment. What do they want us to do that for?"

"I don't know. It wasn't on the agenda. It was just one of the back-room boys speaking out of turn."

"They want us to track down radio signals?"

"Honestly, I don't know, sir. How it came up was that they asked if the radiation detector could be moved to the forward periscope so that this thing could be put on the aft periscope. John Osborne said he was pretty sure it could, but he'd take it up with you."

"That's right. It can go on the forward periscope. I thought they wanted to fit two."

"I don't think so, sir. I think they want to fit this other gadget in its place on the aft one."

The American stared at the smoke rising from his cigarette. Then he said, "Seattle."

"What's that, sir?"

"Seattle. There were radio signals coming from someplace near Seattle. Do you know if they're still coming through?"

Peter shook his head, amazed. "I didn't know anything about that. Do you mean that somebody's still operating a transmitter?"

The captain shrugged his shoulders. "Could be. If so, it's somebody that doesn't know how to send. Sometimes they make a group, sometimes a word is clear. Most times it's just a jumble, like a child might make, playing at radio stations."

"Does this go on all the time?"