“Maneuvering reports four hours at a two-thirds bell,” Mills said after receiving the response in his headset.
Four hours. It wasn’t much, and Keane suspected even that estimation was a bit optimistic. He could imagine the wiry engineer officer, Howard, in the maneuvering room, five compartments aft, rubbing his chin as he studied the electrical panel, trying to justify the overly liberal approximation he had just calculated in his head. Howard was a never-say-die type who loved his boat, knew every inch of her, and did not think there was anything her propulsion plant could not handle. He had personally overseen the tear-down and reassembly of nearly every one of the dozens of systems that kept the three-hundred-foot submarine at sea and on patrol for two-month stretches. From propulsion to ballast control, from hydraulics to electrical, from air banks to sanitation – the seasoned engineer knew them all like they were his own children. In his mind, the Wolffish was indestructible, and he had come close to fisticuffs on more than one occasion with anyone who challenged that notion – including Keane.
“The patrol craft have turned towards us now, Captain,” Mills reported. “All three ships are converging on our position. They’ll be dropping on us in seconds!”
Ficarelli used a parallel ruler to draw a straight line from the Wolffish’s current position in the shallows to the region of deeper water to the northwest, then he looked up at Keane.
“It’s a long haul, skipper,” the XO said simply. Then he moved his finger to a spot near the mark representing the Wolffish. “There’s a sandy bottom here. It’s a gentle slope, if this chart is correct.”
“Assuming our dead reckoning trace is, too, XO.”
Ficarelli nodded dismally. “Right, sir.”
It was a simple statement, but it clearly communicated to Keane that he and his XO were of the same mind. The Wolffish was too far in to make a dash for deep water. There was only one chance, and it depended on the accuracy of an old chart and the mathematical estimate of the submarine’s true position.
“Helm, all stop,” Keane ordered sharply, then called down the open hatch. “Diving officer, bottom the boat. Maintain a zero bubble. All hands brace for impact.”
CHAPTER VII
The three depth-charge laden warships steamed abreast at full speed, separated by two hundred meter intervals, the destroyer Yokaze in the center.
“Depth setting fifty meters!” A voice squawked over the bridge speaker. “Ready racks! Ready throwers!”
Nagata knew the voice was that of his ASW lieutenant. The officer would be hovering over the tactical plotting table, receiving the final bearings to the submarine and estimating the enemy’s course and speed in anticipation of losing contact with the sub as the Yokaze drove over it. In that last hundred or so meters, the submarine might make a last ditch effort to evade. It was the ASW officer’s job to balance the uncertainty against the known factors to determine the precise moment to release the destroyer’s fury on the depths below.
It seemed an interminable wait before the order finally came.
“Fire!”
On the fantail, two cylindrical depth charges rolled off of the angled racks and plunged into the destroyer’s frothing wake. At the same time, the mortar-like throwers on each beam erupted in jets of flame, each lobbing a single depth charge high into the air to come down into the sea with a dash of spray. Ten seconds later, another spread of explosive-packed charges were dropped into the sea.
Off Yokaze’s beams, Nagata saw splashes astern of Kiku and Enoki, as the smaller escorts followed suit, each releasing their own depth charges. It was a wide pattern, and while other captains might have considered it wasteful, Nagata did not want to give the enemy any chance of getting lucky. He wanted to strike panic into the hearts of the American crew on this first drop, rather than take the time to refine the enemy’s position through several coordinated runs of echo-ranging. There would be time for that later, if the barrels of death now hurtling into the darkness did not crack open the enemy sub, or bring it to the surface.
A succession of rumbles filled the air. Nagata felt the rail tremble beneath his fingers. Astern, the ocean began to churn as if a sleeping volcano were awakening on the ocean floor. Then another rumble, as the keel felt the pressure waves from the second salvo. The surface churned violently in a dozen distinct places, providing only a meager indication of the massive energy released in the detonations far below.
“Group turn,” Nagata commanded, with a nod to the communications officer who stood ready with his signalmen. “Signal Kiku and Enoki. Regain contact. Prepare for another run.”
As the flags ran up the masts, the three ships turned in tight arcs until they were facing the same water they had just disturbed. Following the lead of the Yokaze, the ships slowed considerably, allowing the white-uniformed sailors to re-arm the depth charge projectors and the probing sound beams to once again establish contact with the enemy. The sonar speaker was cross-circuited to the bridge, allowing Nagata to hear each pulse and return. The lower-pitched reflections off the sandy bottom three hundred feet below sounded so distant. Nagata considered that it was a suitable sound to represent such a vast, watery chasm. It always reminded him of the time as a boy, when his family had vacationed in the green mountains near Minakami, when he had stood at the edge of a canyon and had heard his own voice come back to him. It had sounded so remote, so feeble, so sad, like the brilliant light of a long dead star shining in the heavens – awesome to behold, yet only a memory.
“Contact, Captain,” the ASW officer’s voice intoned over the speaker. “Bearing three five zero relative. Range five hundred meters. Two degree return width! Contact appears to be stationary.”
“Left rudder,” Nagata leaned over to speak into the voice pipe. “Helmsman, come left ten degrees. Communications officer, signal the other ships to keep station.”
On Nagata’s order, the three ships surged forward. Like a pack of wolves converging on a helpless animal, they rushed toward the stalled submarine, their transducers pinging the depths at an increased frequency for better accuracy. It somehow seemed unfair, to pounce on a helpless enemy so, but Nagata did not need to strain his mind to remember the handiwork of these undersea devils. He had witnessed many nightmarish scenes in the past three years. Troop transports torpedoed into lifeless hulks from which blood ran from the scuppers to streak the ship’s sides red. Lifeboats adrift on the open seas and full of sunburnt scarecrows that had once been merchant sailors. Sampans and fishing craft machine-gunned into flotsam. These were the deeds of the merciless American submarines, who preferred sinking helpless merchantmen to honorable battle against warships. He knew all too well the devastation that had been enacted by those men below who now felt the ravage of his depth charges, and he could not find pity for them. This was war, after all. It was not the age of sail in which ships squared off to pound each other until one surrendered. It was modern war, and in modern war, speed and surprise was the key. Take your enemy off his guard. Strike him when and where he least expects it, and where he is most vulnerable. The ability to adapt quickly with new tactics and technology was the key to winning such a war. Nagata, and other frontline officers like him, understood this truth. It seemed the high command in Tokyo did not.
“Bridge, ASW officer,” the speaker beside him squawked. “The sonar return is very faint now. I believe the enemy sub has settled to the bottom. It is possible our first spread sank it, Captain!”
“Do you see oil on the surface, Lieutenant?” Nagata scolded. “Do you see flotsam? If not, then she is not sunk. She is playing an old trick, and we will not fall for it!” Nagata looked at the water ahead one last time just to be sure, but there were no distinctive bubbles, or even the aroma of diesel fumes to indicate the enemy hull had burst. “Continue with the attack! Another full spread this time! Maximum depth setting.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Again, the contact on the enemy was lost as it moved out of the sonar beam, and less than a minute later came
the order.
“Fire!”
Twelve more depth charges were spread across the sea to sink into the darkness below at two meters per second. The salvos were nearly dropped on top of each other since the location of the metal submarine lying on the sandy bottom was fairly certain. The black depths turned white in an instant as the shockwave of the explosions instantaneously propagated through the dense medium.
As he watched and waited, Nagata contemplated the horror the enemy submariners were about to endure, a horror almost beyond the imagination. He had once attended an ASW course at the specialist school in Yokosuka, during which one instructor had described the death of a submarine crew when the hull failed, based on the water pressures at crush depth. It was a race between concussion from the shock wave, incineration from the diesel effect, and vivisection from flesh slicing streams of water. The more advanced the warfare, the more terrifying the experience.
Perhaps the days of the samurai were better, Nagata considered.
The next moment, the sea behind the Yokaze erupted.
CHAPTER VIII
Trott opened his eyes to darkness, uncertain where he was, or if he was even alive. It was several long seconds before he realized he was prostrate on the tilted deck. His shirt was damp with a warm substance that, from its aroma, could only be coffee. And he could not move his legs.
A faint light in the overhead emitted enough of a glow to reveal that he was wedged into a corner of the wardroom, against the bulkhead. His legs felt as if they were three times their normal weight. There was no telling the state of the submarine. Not good, he surmised, if the persistent angle on the deck, the hiss of pressurized air, and the sound of trickling water were any indications. He could also hear a faint, repetitive pings that seemed to come from everywhere at once, and he somehow knew these were the enemy sonar pulses, seeking out the Wolffish’s steel hull in the dark abyss.
The deck felt still beneath him, as if the sub no longer moved through the water but sat stationary.
Had she been sunk? Was he the only one left alive?
As if in response to these thoughts, the speaker on the bulkhead squawked to life.
“All compartments, control room, report damage,” said one voice.
“Flooding in the forward torpedo room!” said another, much more agitated than the first.
Rushing feet sounded in the passage outside, followed by the opening of a watertight door. Men shouted to each other in the compartment beyond amidst the din of rushing water and pounding hammers.
“A wedge!” called one voice. “I need a wedge over here! Pass me a damn wedge!”
“Hicks!” said another. “What the hell is taking so long! Shut the fucking isolation valve!”
The clamor abruptly ceased when someone closed the watertight door, and a silence ensued to the extent that Trott could clearly make out the squeak of the dogs on the door as it was sealed shut. Again, the intercom circuit buzzed, some voices calm, some agitated, many speaking over one another.
“Control room, forward engine room. Leak from the main induction piping. Investigating.”
“Control room, maneuvering room. Main bus breaker tripped on over voltage.”
“Control room, after torpedo room. Damage to number eight – “
“Full reports!” a stern voice suddenly broke in above the others. “Give me full reports, damn it! Forward to aft, each compartment report in turn!”
The new voice spoke with authority, and Trott guessed it was the Wolffish’s captain.
It was at that moment that Trott realized why his legs felt so heavy. An unmoving form lay face-down across him. He could not see who it was in the darkness but deduced that it was Greenberg. They had both sat through the first barrage of depth charges. The young radioman had been talking to him at the instant the second barrage tore the sea apart just outside the hull, multiple explosions that rocked the sub in quick succession, shaking it like a baby rattle, shattering light bulbs and starting showers of broken cork insulation. Amid the sound of wrenching steel, Trott had been propelled from his seat at the table to impact with the opposite bulkhead. Presumably, Greenberg had been tossed out of his seat, too, but must have met with some injury.
“Greenberg!” he said, shoving at the limp body. “Wake up! Come on, Greenberg, wake up!”
After getting no response, Trott ran his hands up Greenberg’s back, feeling for any injury. When he got to the radioman’s head, he felt a patch of tousled hair wet with a warm substance where a large welt stood out prominently. There was no telling what Greenberg had come in contact with. Any ship at sea was a virtual minefield of jagged valve stems, pipe hangars, and exposed fastener bolts, any one of which could become a deadly object when a man was thrown against it.
Greenberg had a pulse, though a faint one. Realizing that there was little he could do for the injured man, Trott resolved to seek out help. He struggled free of the sailor’s encumbrance, allowing a few moments for his blood-deprived legs to grow accustomed to the listing deck. Then he groped his way into the darkened passage. It was deserted, and eerily quiet, with closed watertight doors at each end and the stateroom curtains leaning out into the walkway as if to further emphasize the ship’s tilted state. Again, a terrifying feeling came over him that he was the only survivor, a fear that did not diminish until after he had passed through the aft watertight door to find the control room packed with living, breathing crewmen.
He could not count how many there were. The dancing beams of the battle lanterns never seemed to remain still for any length of time, but they sporadically illuminated sweat-streaked backs in the outboards and down in the wells, where men presumably searched for damage or made repairs. When Trott had finally collected his bearings, he noticed three officers conversing by the glass-covered chart table. One was the gray-haired lieutenant who had acknowledged Trott earlier. The lieutenant wrote notes in grease pencil on the glass while a sailor wearing a phone headset relayed information from the various compartments. The sub’s control room acted like the nerve center of a giant sea creature. Injuries were transmitted to the brain that the proper resources could be sent to repair the damaged area.
The sailor with the headset announced, “Forward torpedo room reports the flooding has stopped, Captain.”
“Very well,” replied one of the other officers. This was the same man Trott had earlier seen giving commands from the Wolffish’s bridge as he had been plucked from the water. The captain had a round face, intelligent-looking, and outlined by a sweep of jet black hair. He nodded to the third officer, the shorter of the three, who instantly grabbed up a flashlight and headed down the forward passage, brushing past Trott as he ducked through the door.
At that moment, a random flash of a battle lantern momentarily blinded Trott. When he could finally see again, he discovered the captain standing before him, extending a hand.
“I’m Keane, the skipper of this boat,” he said with a distracted but sincere expression. The silver leaf insignia of a navy commander glimmered on his collar. “They tell me your name is Trott?”
“Yes, sir. Lieutenant Frank Trott, VB-22, USS Antietam.”
“Welcome aboard, Frank. I’m sorry you’ve gone from the frying pan to the fire, but those Japs up there are pretty persistent. They don’t want to let you go.” A sailor loaded down with tools passed nearby, and Keane paused momentarily to exchange brief words with him. After the sailor had moved on, Keane turned his attention back to Trott. “Are you alright? You’re not injured, are you?”
Trott shook his head, but realized that, outwardly, he must appear quite shaken.
“First time on a submarine?” Keane said it more as a statement than a question and did not wait for an answer. “A depth charging is one tough introduction.”
“You can say that again, Captain.”
Keane smiled. “Don’t worry, Frank. You’ll get through it. The tough thing about being down here, is not knowing what’s going on up there.” He jabbed a finger at the
overhead, as if to point through the submarine’s steel skin and hundreds of feet of water to the Japanese warships prowling on the surface. “No one likes to be kept in the dark, and it can sure rattle your nerves when you’ve got nothing to do, so I’ll fill you in on our situation.” Keane momentarily turned away from Trott to listen to a report coming over the speaker from one of the other compartments. Apparently satisfied with what he had heard, Keane continued. “I’m not going to lie to you, Frank. We’re in a tight spot. We’re sitting on the bottom, at two hundred and eighty-eight feet.” He pointed to a large circular gauge on the bulkhead. “The Japs have at least three ships up there, possibly more, and aircraft. Those Japs know we’re here. They know they’ve got the upper hand, and they’re not going anywhere anytime soon. It’s a waiting game from here on out.”
The pinging outside the hull seemed to be getting louder, or was it Trott’s imagination? It resounded inside his throbbing head as if his skull were a church’s belfry. He then noticed a sailor standing at a large wheel-like control. The man stared at the gauges in front of him, as if waiting for them to move, his free hand fingering a cross dangling from a chain around his neck.
“Everyone has their own way of dealing with it,” Keane said, after following Trott’s curious gaze. “I imagine it’s very much like one of those long flights in your plane, on your way to bomb a target.”
Obviously, Keane was trying to give him something familiar to latch onto, something to get him through the interminable wait. Sure, it took guts to fly a Helldiver through enemy flak, even more to land a shot-up plane on the pitching deck of an aircraft carrier. But, when he was strapped into his cockpit, as hair-raising as things often got, Trott was usually too busy to think about it.
A groan shuddered through the hull as the submarine’s steel girders and ribs adjusted to the massive pressure of the sea. The sound was extremely unnerving to Trott, but no one else seemed to notice it.
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