Dashing across the ramp, slipping on patches of seaweed, Cilla called to the crew in the forward cockpit. “That way—below the lighthouse. We need to rescue them—now!”
She held out her hands to Lachlan. “Help me aboard.”
Unthinking, he obeyed and helped her down into the center cockpit.
“Sir?” The coxswain peered over the cabin at Lachlan.
His mind and gut spun him into dizziness, but he nodded. “Aye.” The crew pulled the boat away from the ramp and turned to sea.
“Oh, Lachlan.” She pressed trembling hands over her mouth, her eyes red and her cheeks streaked with tears.
A sinking fishing boat? Lachlan braced himself against the cabin to counteract the dizziness. Was she telling a tale to cover her escape attempt? If so, he’d find out soon enough.
Aye, and she’d know any lie would immediately be exposed.
The lump disintegrated into ash. A lie would profit her nothing. She was too smart to try to deceive him in such a way.
Those red eyes, those tear tracks—they couldn’t have resulted from faking tears the moment she’d spotted Lachlan. She’d been crying for some time. She was telling the truth.
He cleared his swollen throat. “What—what happened?”
“It exploded.” Her hands flew apart and shook. “I saw it. Yardley didn’t believe me, said he’d send a boat from Scapa. That’d take too long.”
“A fishing boat?”
“I was watching it.” Her gaze darted about the motorboat. “Help me. Help me find life rings, something to rescue them.”
“Aye.” A life ring and the boat’s pole were secured to the roof of the forward cabin, where the crewmen could reach them. “Look for blankets in the cabin. I’ll gather lines.”
Cilla gripped the cabin roof and stretched up on her toes. “Can we go any faster?”
“Full speed,” Lachlan yelled. Even the hardiest of fishermen couldn’t last long in the frigid water.
Lachlan shrugged off his greatcoat and scrambled along the narrow deck past the aft cabin to the aft cockpit, where he found lines coiled and ready. He looped them over his arm and returned to the center cockpit.
“I found only one blanket.” Cilla clutched it in her arms, and her face warped. “Thank goodness you came when you did. I—I tried to start that boat, but I couldn’t. How could I? I don’t know how. What was I thinking?”
“You were thinking you wanted to save those men.” His voice roughened. She wasn’t a triple agent. She was loyal, true, helping the Allies.
As she’d stated all along, and he sucked in an icy breath. He’d been wrong, so wrong.
Cilla bunched the blanket below her chin and lowered her head. “This is my fault.”
“Your fault?”
“My messages—what if a U-boat—”
“Wheesht!” He put a finger to his lips and glanced over the cabin to the crew. But what if a U-boat had indeed sunk the fishing boat? The motorboat had no weapons, no asdic to detect a submerged U-boat.
Lachlan gritted his teeth. They could be speeding into a trap. “Send a wireless message to Scapa,” he called to the crewmen. “Tell them to send antisubmarine vessels.”
“Already done, sir.”
“Very good. And send a message to Dunnet Head. We’ll need to transport survivors to the hospital.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
The boat rounded the curve of Dunnet Head and rose on a swell. Scattered wreckage littered the blue seas. Hands stretched up, waved.
