“Right full rudder. Steer course zero eight five. Come on in, Dicky. I am turning to starboard.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
Long seconds again now, watching whether the rat would run into the other terrier’s jaws or would just evade them, listening to the sonar bearings, deciding on whether the present course was the most suitable. Dodge was still turning to starboard. Time to turn to port again yet?
“Steady on course zero eight five.”
“Torpedoes fired!” said the talker.
One second for thought. The U-boat’s stern was pointing straight at Keeling’s port beam; the U-boat’s bows were pointing, as far as he could tell, somewhat away from Dodge’s bows. Dodge was distant, Keeling was near. The U-boat must be aware of Keeling’s proximity; it was probable she did not know of Dodge’s approach. Foil blade pressed against foil blade; one second—one tenth of a second—for thought. Keeling must be the target.
“Right full rudder. Steer course one seven zero.”
Not quite a right-angle turn. The torpedoes would be aimed to cross nearly ahead of Keeling’s present position; allow for the advance and Keeling would be as nearly parallel to the tracks as he could judge.
“All engines ahead flank speed!”
“Torpedoes approaching!” said the talker.
“Make your report the way you’ve been taught,” snapped Krause at the talker. “Repeat.”
“Sonar reports torpedoes approaching,” stammered the talker.
It was absolutely essential for the talkers to report in due form. Otherwise confusion was certain.
“Steady on course one seven zero,” said the helmsman.
“Very well.”
“Engine room answers all engines ahead flank, sir.”
“Very well.”
Time to spare for the T.B.S. now, which was demanding his attention.
“Torpedoes fired at you, sir!” said the Canadian voice, urgent, distressed. “I see you’ve turned.”
“Yes.”
“Good luck, sir.”
Good luck to the man who might be dead in ten seconds’ time. Good luck to the ship which might be a sinking wreck or pillar of fire. He had taken the best action, laying his ship parallel to the torpedo tracks. With the call for flank speed the churning of Keeling’s propellers, working furiously against the inertia of the ship, might perhaps have some effect on deflecting a torpedo coming right at them, especially as it would be set for a shallow run against a destroyer. In any case the propellers’ quickening beat would kick Keeling a few yards farther away from the firing point than she would otherwise have been, and every yard, every foot, counted. Inches might make the difference between life and death; not that life or death mattered, but success or failure did.
“Sonar reports echoes confused, sir,” said the talker.
“Very well.”
“Torpedo to starboard!”
“After lookout reports—”
“Torpedo to port!”
Lookouts were shouting and talkers talking. One leap to the starboard wing of the bridge. There was the indescribably menacing track along Keeling’s side, not ten yards away, straight along it. Luckily it was a torpedo of the old-fashioned type with none of the rumored homing devices that the Germans were supposed to be putting into production.
“T’other one went over there, sir,” said the port lookout, pointing vaguely.
“How far?”
“Good two hundred feet, sir.”
“Very well.”
Back into the pilothouse.
“All engines ahead standard speed. Left full rudder. Steer course zero eight five.”
It was forty seconds since the alarm had been given. Forty of those long seconds, and during this time he had been neglectful. He had not watched Dodge to see the effect of her run-in. She had come farther round still. Her turning circle was remarkably small. She was handier than Viktor, and considerably handier than Keeling. Those tiny ships, fantastically uncomfortable to live in, were good antisubmarine craft all the same, even though a single torpedo would blow them to pieces. She was coming round again—it must be remarkably pleasant to handle a ship that could turn inside a U-boat’s turning circle.
It was time to head round towards the most likely point of interception.
“Left standard rudder. Steer course zero two zero.”
His turn away and even his momentary increase in speed had considerably enlarged his distance.
“Dicky to George. We’ve got him right ahead of us. We’ll be firing any minute now.”
“Very well.”
“Glad he missed you, sir. Very glad.”
“Thank you.”
“We’re returning to starboard again.”
“Very well.”
Krause turned to the helmsman.
“Left standard rudder. Steer course three three zero.”
The convoy was unpleasantly near. It would not be long before sonar would start complaining about interference. This new enemy was a dangerous man, free with his torpedoes. He would have to be watched very closely indeed if he was like that, giving him as little opportunity as possible for a beam shot, and that meant considerable precaution in maneuvering round him. At the same time he now had two torpedoes the fewer—he was ten per cent less deadly to the convoy than he had been. Doenitz might take him to task—if he lived to return to L’Orient—for those two wasted fish. He might ask why he had not fired a full spread; he might ask why he had fired at all at a shallow-draft fighting vessel with full power of maneuver and on the alert. The question as to whether or not it was profitable to use torpedoes against escort craft was a difficult one for the Germans to answer. It was foolish, a foolish waste of time, and yet attractive, to think of luring the U-boat into wasting all its torpedoes in that fashion. The sub would not fire eighteen more torpedoes and miss every time. He must be delirious to give it a thought. Over-tired, perhaps.
“Dicky to George. Firing now.”
“Very well. I’ll come in. Right standard rudder. Steer course one one zero.”
A single pillar of water in Dodge’s wake. Just the one shot, yet sufficient to deafen Dodge’s sonar.
“Sonar reports underwater explosion, sir.”
“Very well.”
“Sonar reports indications confused.”
“Very well.”
What had this U-boat captain been doing during his three minutes’ grace between Dodge’s arriving close to him and dropping the charge? Starboard? Port? His own sonar indications had not been very conclusive. And what was the U-boat doing now, with Keeling’s sonar deafened?
“Sonar reports contact bearing zero seven five, range fourteen hundred yards.”
So he had guessed wrong. Round after him.
“Left full rudder. Steer course zero six five. George to Dicky. Contact bearing zero seven five from me, range fourteen hundred yards.”
“Zero seven five. Aye aye, sir. I am turning to starboard.”
Round after him. Round again. Coach Dodge in against him. Jockey into position and drop a single depth charge, resisting the temptation to make it a full pattern. Remember that this fellow might fire a spread at any moment. Keep the flagging mind alert. Think quickly. Forget the weary legs and the aching feet which had not, after all, gone numb. Keep from thinking about the ridiculous and yet penetrating need to get down to the head again. Round and round, ever on the alert for something to happen at any moment.
Something did. Keeling on one run, Dodge on another, had each dropped a charge. Hopeless to expect any results from such a feeble attack.
“After lookout reports sub astern.”
Krause leaped to the wing of the bridge. A gray shape showing there, a quarter of a mile away, bridge and hull in full view. The guns in the after gun mounts began to fire. Wang-o, wang-o.
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“Right full rudder!”
Next moment it was gone, plunging violently below the surface.
“Meet her! Steady as you go!”
“Sonar reports close contact dead ahead.”
“Mr. Nourse!”
“Sub alongside! Sub alongside!”
That was a scream from the port lookout. Almost scraping alongside, not ten feet between them. Krause could have hit her with a rock if he had had a rock to throw. As it was there was nothing to throw. Not a depth charge at the port K gun; the five-inch could not depress so far. Tonk-tonk-tonk went the port forty-millimeter; Krause saw the splashes in the water beyond—it would not depress sufficiently either. Painted on the side of the U-boat’s bridge was a golden-haired angel in flowing white robes riding a white horse and brandishing a sword. The U-boat’s bow submerged again at a sharp angle and the bridge plunged forward into the water again. Bang-bang-bang-bang. Someone had got a fifty-caliber machine gun into action too late.
“Left full rudder!”
Right in Keeling’s wake the U-boat bridge broke surface again in a flurry of spray and vanished instantly, to reappear again and disappear again. The assumption was obvious that one of her bow planes was jammed on rise. It might be an ordinary mechanical failure; it might be that one of those depth charges had by a miracle exploded near enough to damage it.
“Right full rudder!” bellowed Krause, his voice loud enough to be heard from end to end of the ship.
Here was Dodge coming right towards them; in the excitement of finding a sub close alongside he had forgotten all about Dodge, who was coming in to the attack as she had every right to do. The two ships, no more than a cable’s length apart, were wheeling towards each other, heading for a common meeting point where the crash would be tremendous, fatal to both ships probably. Instinctive action, instinctive application of the ordinary rules of the road, saved them. Slowly each ship ceased to swing inwards; for a hair-raising moment inertia carried them on towards each other, and then the kick of the propellers against the turning rudders, the solid wedgelike thrusts of the rudders against the water swung the ships slowly outwards again. Dodge went past Keeling’s port side hardly farther than the sub had been a minute ago. Someone waved airily to Krause from Dodge’s bridge and then passed rapidly by at the combined speed of both ships. Krause found himself shaking a little, but as always there was no time to worry; not if he wanted to get Keeling into position to follow up the attack that Dodge was going to deliver.
“Meet her!” he roared. “Left full rudder!”
He went back into the pilothouse, forcing himself to be calm; it was helpful to be greeted by the talker’s monotonous voice.
“Sonar reports contacts confused.”
Sonar down below was doing its job in an orderly fashion, whether ignorant or not of all the things that were going on topside.
“Meet her! Steady as you go!”
He was judging Dodge’s course by eye, and trying to anticipate the sub’s next move.
“Dicky to George! Dicky to George!”
“George to Dicky. Go ahead.”
“We’ve no contact, sir. Must be too close.”
Yesterday that situation would have called instantly for a full pattern of depth charges; today there was no question of wasting all Dodge’s remaining offensive power on the ten-to-one chance that the sub was near enough within the possible three-hundred-yard circle to receive damage.
“Hold your present course. I’ll cross your stern.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Left standard rudder! Meet her! Steady as you go!”
“Steady on course—” said the helmsman; Krause had no ears for the figures; he was planning to pass across Dodge’s wake sufficiently far from her to give his sonar a chance to pick up an echo from the sub; Dodge would be going twice as fast as the sub, so that was the area to search. With a jammed plane the sub could with care manage to keep submerged by trimming her balast tanks; even below the surface she might manage to clear—
“George! George! Here he is!”
Krause looked forward over the starboard bow at Dodge. There was nothing to see except the little ship steaming along apparently peacefully.
“Too close!” said the T.B.S., and at the same time through the earphones came the sound of gunfire, echoed a second later over the air. Dodge was turning rapidly to port. Guns were firing; over the water came the sound of small-caliber machine guns. Round came Dodge. Gray against her gray side was something else, the surfaced U-boat, bow to stern with her, circling as she circled, each ship chasing the other’s tail. As Dodge came broadside on to Krause’s view a great red eye opened in Dodge’s side and winked once at Krause. A pillar of water rose in the sea halfway between them; something black shot out of the base of the pillar, turning end over end with incredible rapidity, rising out of Krause’s sight and roaring overhead with a sound like the fastest subway train ever heard. Dodge had banged off her four-inch at extreme depression and the shell had ricocheted from the surface, luckily bouncing high enough to pass over Keeling. Hard to blame the gunners; with Dodge turning so rapidly and Keeling crossing her stern the situation was changing so rapidly they could not have guessed that Keeling would come in to the line of fire.
Other bangs, other rattles as the ships wheeled. The U-boat captain must have despaired of effecting a repair and come to the surface to fight it out. Close alongside Dodge his men must have run to their guns over the streaming decks as she emerged. And, closer to the surface than Dodge’s gun, her gun would bear on Dodge’s loftier side while Dodge’s gun would not depress sufficiently. And what would that four-inch do to that fragile little ship?
In a moment, it seemed, they had turned the half circle and Dodge’s bow and the U-boat’s stern were presented to Krause’s view; already the U-boat was disappearing behind Dodge on the other side.
“Right full rudder!” said Krause. He had been so fascinated by the sight that he was allowing Keeling to steam straight on away from the fight. “Meet her! Steady as you go!”
“Steady on course—”
“Very well. Captain to gunnery control. Stand by until you have a chance at a clear shot.”
A sudden flare-up forward in Dodge; smoke pouring from her below her bridge. The U-boat had scored one hit at least. The embattled ships were coming round again, and he was going in the opposite direction, hovering on the outskirts like a distracted old lady whose pet dog had engaged in a fight with another dog.
“Gunnery control answers aye aye, sir.”
He must get clear, turn, and come in again. With cool judgment and accurate timing he could break into the battle. He would have to ram, picking the U-boat off Dodge’s side as he might pick off a tick. It would be a tricky thing to do. And he might easily tear the bottom out of Keeling, but it was worth trying, even in the face of that probability. They were turning counterclockwise; best if he came in counterclockwise too. That would give him more chance.
“Left standard rudder! Meet her! Steady as you go!”
Endless seconds as Keeling drew away from the fight. He had allowed himself sufficient distance to time his run-in. Krause watched the increasing distance. He had his glasses to his eyes; as they came round again he could see the figures on the U-boat’s deck; he saw two of them drop suddenly, inert, as bullets hit them.
“Left full rudder!” Long, long seconds as Keeling turned with exasperating slowness.
“Meet her!”
As Krause braced himself to make the run-in the situation changed in a flash. Keyed up and eager, watching through his glasses to time his movement exactly, he saw Dodge’s bow seemingly waver in the smoke that surrounded it. It was ceasing to turn to port. Compton-Clowes was putting his wheel over. The deduction exploded a further series of reaction on Krause’s part.
“Right standard rudder! Captain to gunnery control.
Stand by for target on port beam. Meet her! Steady as you go! Steady!”
Keeling’s turn to starboard presented her whole port side to Dodge and the sub. All five five-inch guns came training round as she turned, and at the same instant the sub with her wheel hard over and taken momentarily by surprise by Dodge’s abrupt alteration of rudder diverged from her. Ten yards—twenty yards—fifty yards of clear water divided the two ships, and before the U-boat could turn back into the sheltering embrace of her enemy the five-inch opened, like a peal of thunder in the next room, shaking Keeling’s hull as a fit of coughing will shake a man’s body. The sea seemed suddenly to pile up around the gray U-boat, the splashes were so close and so continuous around her; it was as if there were a hillock of water there, with the square gray bridge only dimly to be seen in the heart of it like an object in a glass paperweight— and, in the heart of it too, over and over again, a momentary orange glare as a shell burst. Also in the heart of it showed momentarily a vivid red disk, just once. Through the noise of the gunfire and the vibration of the recoil Krause heard a rending crash and felt Keeling undergo a violent shock which made everyone on the bridge stagger; a shock wave like a sudden breath passed into and out of the pilothouse. And before they had steadied themselves the guns fell silent, ending their fire abruptly, so that Krause was conscious of a moment’s unnatural silence, just long enough for him to feel fear lest the main armament had somehow been put out of action. But a glance reassured him. The U-boat was gone. There was nothing in the foaming water over there. The eyepieces of the binoculars which he raised again to his eyes beat against his eyelashes until he forced his hands to quiet themselves. Nothing? Surely there were some things floating there. And something came and went, came and went again; not strange-shaped wave tops but two huge bubbles bursting in succession on the surface.
Greyhound (Movie Tie-In) Page 20