I had left the noisy below-decks area after a difficult hour in the main saloon, surrounded by many seasick men, and trying to breathe the stuffy, smoke-thick air. I had just discovered that my rank, Lieutenant-Commander (Acting), came with privileges, one of which was that I could take refuge outside on this windy boat deck. It was late at night in a chill November and a stiff wind was blowing from the south-west, but I stood in the dark just outside the door, gratefully breathing the clean, cold air. Few of us on that ship were natural sailors, and the choppy sea had come as a disagreeable surprise. The mal de mer had not as such affected me, but the sights and sounds in the saloon were increasingly difficult to live with. I moved away from the door, feeling my way in the dark, holding on to a handrail. The only light on the deck was from a quarter moon, and that intermittently because thick clouds were racing along with the wind. I supposed that once there might have been seats or deck-chairs here for passengers, but all of them had been removed.
