With the engines still at full ahead, the ammunition ship, ground her way down the length of the abandoned troop ship, ripping and splintering the planking like a crazed chainsaw. Clear of the bow and still at full speed, she sailed on, her stern now completely enveloped in the flames.
Shouting orders at the top of his voice, Hogg split his boarding party into two sections. He sent one group, under the coxswain, forward and he took the rest in a sweep of the after deck.
* * *
‘Eddy’
The two torpedoes belly-flopped into sea, their propellers already turning, churning the surface of the sea to lather, but all was not well, no sooner had the starboard torpedo cleared the boat’s side, then it veered erratically to port. It was crossing their bow as they roared in towards the enemy destroyer.
Simultaneously the destroyer’s ‘X’ and ‘Y’ turrets opened up, close range, accurate fire, cascading water across the entire length of the tiny boat, soaking the men at their guns, obliterating Grant’s view of the rogue torpedo.
Near miss after near miss, denied Grant a sighting of the torpedo. Desperate, he yelled “Half ahead all engines.” The last thing he wanted was to run down his own torpedo. Instantly the bow dropped and the boat lost way, hopefully the torpedoes were well ahead, but he couldn’t be sure, but a new problem had raised its ugly head; the destroyer’s gun layers now had a target moving at a fraction of its former speed.
Grant swore, this was no good, any second one of the enemy’s rounds would find its target, that’s all it would take, one round. He dismissed it from his mind. He could do nothing about that or the rogue torpedo except pray. He would have to take a chance, the torp should be clear and still turning to port.
“Hard astarboard… Full ahead all engines!” The diesels roared, jerking the boat forward. With luck he had slowed the charging E-boat just enough for her to turn in behind the torpedo. The trouble was now he was turning onto the same course as the enemy and would present a juicy beam target to their hungry guns. “Middy get aft, make smoke.”
The Midshipman looked blank, “The smoke maker man! Ignite the smoke maker!”
The youngster turned, jumped down from the tiny bridge and began to claw his way towards the stern. The E-boat, turning through the swell, bucked like a mad horse at a rodeo, successive waves slammed into her side with the clap of thunder.
Grant snatched a look over the port bow, the sudden turn had thrown the enemy gunners and the madly churned water from their exploding shells was now way aft of the beam. At last he could see the destroyer, she was turning towards the surviving torpedo’s track. God alone knew where the rogue one was. They had a few seconds respite as the destroyer’s ‘X’ and ‘Y’ turrets fell silent, obscured from their target by their own superstructure. The silence lasted but seconds, for the enemy’s ‘A’ and ‘B’ turrets swung round changing target from Crosswall- Brown’s to Grant’s boat. They were too late, before they could open fire, the E-boat completed her turn and with her stern towards the enemy, black smoke began to bellow from the smoke maker.
* * *
‘Ethel’
Crosswall- Brown was soaked to the skin, water washing backwards and forwards across his feet, but it all went unnoticed because before him, to his utter amazement, the enemy destroyer was turning, until, beam-on, she presented him with the target of his dreams.
“Stand by tubes,” ‘he yelled ecstatically. He could see the reason for the destroyer’s suicidal action. Grant’s E-boat was rising on the swell, cresting a wave, she was directly ahead of the enemy, for a moment she seemed to hover there, perfectly balanced on the top of the wave, then, like a leviathan, she sank from sight into the cavernous trough. Grant was risking his boat to give him the target he wanted. Drill Three was no joke, that was for sure! It was bloody working
He yelled “Standby,” Then…”Launch!…Launch!…Launch!” Even above the roar of the diesels and the crash of the destroyer’s salvo. He heard the hiss of compressed air from the tubes.
* * *
‘Wagner’
Kapitan Linz rushed out on to the bridge wing, the track of one torpedo was passing the stern, a transient band of ghostly white bubbles. Where was the second torpedo? The renegade E-boat had fired two. His eyes darted across the sea, panic building in his chest like an inflating balloon. Nothing! Mein Gott, the M.T.B.! Had he been concentrating on the wrong boat. He saw it now, the diversion… Fool! He charged across the front of the bridge to the other wing sending two sailors flying. There they were, two tracks running straight and true, one could pass ahead the other astern, or was he mistaken? They seemed to be converging, both would hit. He had to do something, to turn away now would be to take a hit in the stern, the screws! The rudder! Better to lose the bow than the stern. He ran back into the bridge screaming “Hard aport! Hard aport!” He spun round to look aft, the shearing light and heat of the explosion hit him, a split second later and the blast threw him across his bridge.
The whole forward end of the warship lifted out of the water. The released energy of five hundred pounds of Amatol shook the huge destroyer as if it were a toy, a mere model. A second later she fell back into the sea a shattered wreck.
* * *
‘Ethel’
“Yes! Yes!… Yes!” screamed the Midshipman, water streaming from his oilskin as he leapt up and down like a possessed seal.
They were turning away, fast to port, away from the stricken destroyer, leaning away from the tight curve they sliced through the water at thirty knots.
On the beam a huge fireball was rising into the air above the enemy’s fo’c’s’le. Somehow, miraculously, her guns were still firing. Aft of the M.T.B. towering columns of water shot into the sky exactly where they had been only seconds before. The deck beneath his feet began shuddering under the strain of the fast turn.
Crosswall-Brown could clearly see the damage on the enemy boat, her entire fore-end had gone. Through the gaping hole he could see smoke-blackened watertight doors, electric cables and trunking hanging obscenely down into the water like the entrails of some huge beast. The bridge was still intact and the flicker of orange from her guns, told their own tale. Fatally damaged she may be, but by God, she was as dangerous as a wounded Goliath.
* * *
Kapitan Linz staggered to his feet, scrambled across to the shattered glass of the bridge screen. His hat flew from his head in the sudden gust of air rushing in to replace the huge fireball soaring into the air above his beloved ‘Wagner’. Black smoke dispersed briefly, to reveal the colossal damage. What was left of the fo’c’s’le bulged upwards in a hideous curve, at its summit one of the capstans hung over the hole where the bow had once been. “Stop both engines, Ankar! Phone down tell them to make smoke. We’re a verdammt sitting duck.”
* * *
Grant snatched a look aft, the enemy destroyer was completely obscured in clouds of thick oily smoke. He’d seen the massive explosion, at least one of Crosswall-Brown’s fish had scored a direct hit. He searched the horizon for the M.T.B., she should be somewhere astern. Pray to God she was unharmed. The wind had risen unnoticed and the resulting swell could easily obscure the low profile of a patrol boat. “Lookout!”
“Sir!”
“Can you see the ‘Dirty-Four?” He could hear the pleading in his own voice.
“Yes, sir… There…” he pointed a gloved hand towards the port quarter.
“Signalman, get up there with the lookout see if your Aldis will reach. Make to 34. ‘Engage enemy convoy from the west.”
“Middy, Starboard wheel steer north… We’ll come at them from ahead.”
* * *
Linz fit of smoke-induced coughing abated sufficiently for him to speak into the handset. The, fitful gusting wind had completely shrouded the ‘Wagner’ in her own smoke screen. Of the enemy, he could see nothing, but clung to the hope that it meant they could not see him either. They would not want to waste t
orpedoes on a half-mile stretch of smoke or enter it and face his guns at point blank range.
“Slow astern… let’s see if we can take some weight off those forward bulkheads, before they collapse completely under the weight of water.”
Tony Molloy, Spain, 1st July, 2003
I hope you have enjoyed reading Book 1 of what is now part of the longest book ever written in the English language. I know, from my reviews on Kindle, that a lot of you do enjoy the series. I mean to cover the whole of WW2 with my good friends from Special Force Orca and hope you will join me on my journey.
June 2014
Below is a list of the books so far. You can find them all at
amazon.com: anthony molloy: Books, or on my website at anthonymolloy.weebly.com.
Both of which you can access through twitter. com/MolloyAnthony.
1 ON THE EDGE OF DARKNESS
2 DEAD RECKONING
3 STANDING INTO DANGER
4 ON FORTUNE’S SIDE
5 LONG DAYS NIGHT
6 TO CATCH A RAT
7 MOST IMMEDIATE
8 BY NIGHT’S DARK SHADOW
9 NOTICE FOR STEAM
10 BY THOUGHT AND BY DEED
11 CONQUEROR OF THE OCEANS
12 RING ON MAIN ENGINES
13 REJOIN WITH ALL SPEED
On the Edge of Darkness Page 25