by Robb White
In the days it had taken to repair her hull and get her out of that mud, Peter had watched her superb crew break into pieces like a china plate dropped on a brick floor.
And Adrian Archer was the man who dropped and broke it.
One of the broken pieces was made up of Mitch, the bosun; Stucky on the 40-millimeter; and, oddly, Sam. These three were the closest to violence and mutiny against the Captain.
More moderate were Sko, the Preacher, and the Professor; but, to Peter, their moderation seemed more dangerous than the evident hatred for Archer shown by Mitch's group. As the boat moved through the dark night, Peter wondered what was going to happen when Sko and the Preacher and the Professor got to the end of the line. They were for giving Archer a chance to show what he could do in a fight before they finally judged him. What was their judgment going to be if Archer failed them and failed the boat?
Then there was the broken piece made up of Jason, Willie, and Skeeter, who would side with Mitch one day and Sko the next. In Mitch's tent these three would plot dark mutiny. In Sko's they would agree to give Archer at least one chance.
Oddest of all the pieces was Goldberg. He sided with neither Mitch nor Sko, although his hatred of Archer was more bare and evident than that of any other man aboard. Goldberg seemed to have set himself the task of protecting the kid, Britches, from Archer's onslaughts.
Murph was a little splinter all by himself, skittering around trying to find where he fitted with all the groups but in the end staying closer to Peter, who realized that he, himself, was a splinter without a place.
Since the night of Archer and the tent and the talk in the moonlight, Archer had treated Peter with absolutely correct senior-to-junior, chain-of-command procedure. He showed Peter no hostility—and no friendship. The only times he spoke to Peter were to give him correctly phrased, by-the-book orders. He never discussed the methods or the progress of the repairs or the problem of getting her out of the mud. He never discussed anything. He simply told Peter what to do and, usually, how to do it.
On this night, for the first time, Peter was really afraid. He had been scared many times before, but never afraid, never apprehensive. He had never thought before that the crew of Slewfoot would not fight the boat to the best of their ability and courage.
But this crew that had fought as one man was now broken into separate little groups of men who might not, when they had to, pool their strength for their own survival.
The days with Archer had been the worst Peter had ever endured. Because the men had not yet been driven to actual insubordination and mutiny against Archer, they took their hatred of him out on each other. Any little thing—a dropped wrench, a lost bolt, a bent nail—would start a fight. Not just an angry outburst but a savage, murderous fight—between friends of long standing.
As Peter stood on the dark bridge beside the Captain the whole miserable thing came down finally to this: the crew of Slewfoot were no longer occupied with sailing her. They were occupied only with their hatred for Adrian Archer.
So, as they cleared the strait and entered enemy water, Peter Brent was afraid. The night was pitch dark, with rain clouds gathering to windward. On the stern Mitch, Stucky, and Sam sat on the depth charges, facing forward so they could see Archer. (He had an annoying way of suddenly appearing right behind a man, and you never knew how long he had been there, or what he had overheard.)
"Who'll know?" Mitch demanded. "We get in a fire fight and somebody turns the thirties or the fifties on him. Who'll know?"
Stucky and Sam were not yet ready to go this far. Mitch called them chicken, but they didn't think it was that, it was only that …
Sam said, "Well, maybe nobody will know. But you'll know, Mitch."
Down in the engine room Sko and Murph were talking it over, Sko chomping slowly on the big cigar. "Anyway you slice it, Murph, it's murder," Sko said.
"All right," Murph yelled angrily. "Isn't what he's doing to us murder? So isn't it better to murder one guy rather than have him murder twelve guys?"
"We're still breathing," Sko said. "And if Mitch doesn't lay off all this yakking I'm going to have to straighten him out."
"That'll be the day," Murph said sarcastically.
"It'll be quite a day," Sko said around the cigar.
Forward of the starboard torpedo racks Goldberg and Britches were standing up. Archer could see them in the darkness, and he had given orders for all hands to stand up at their battle stations.
Britches, whispering, was telling Goldberg what he had heard in Mitch's tent. "He said the only way was to get rid of him. You know how I mean?"
"I know how you mean," Goldberg said.
"And Mitch was griping because you wouldn't come in with them," Britches told him. "Mitch said he didn't see how you could take the treatment he's been giving you and not come in with them."
"I'm kind of used to it, Britches," Goldberg said. "They've been picking on me and my folks for several thousand years. You get used to it."
"Do you think Mr. Brent knows what's going on?"
"He knows."
"Who's telling him?" Britches demanded, not liking the idea.
"Nobody's telling him. He just knows."
"Then why doesn't he do something?"
"You can't stop a man from thinking," Goldberg told him. "But if Mitch starts to do anything besides think, Peter'll stop him."
"Do you know … " Britches' voice began to squeak so he stopped and started over again. "Do you know what they do to you for mutiny on the high seas?" he asked, his voice under control, but full of awe.
"They take you out and shoot you," Goldberg said.
He turned then and looked down at Britches and decided that things were pretty cockeyed when a kid only seventeen years old could be eight thousand miles from home fighting a war in the dark.
Willie stuck his head out of the radar shack and said, "Bogey, Captain. Range two thousand, bearing two nine three." As Willie started to go back to the scope Archer turned and said, "When reporting objects on the radar give the range, bearing, number of objects, size of objects, course and speed of objects, and your estimate of purpose, Williams."
"Looks like a little daihatsu to me, going toward New Guinea."
"On what course, Williams?"
Willie wished that Archer understood a little more about how a radar worked. He had picked this tiny bogey out of the snow and didn't think that many radar operators would have seen it at all and here he was getting a bad time from the Captain because he didn't know what the enemy crew had had for chow. "Gosh, Captain," Willie said plaintively, "the blip's so small and moving so slow, I can't figure out all that stuff."
"Then don't report it until you can," Archer said.
"Those little daihatsus can't make more than seven or eight knots," Peter said, working the Is-Was board. "Your closing course is two eight six."
"It's not possible to determine a closing course. Mr. Brent, without knowing the speed of the boat."
"We generally go in around fifteen hundred rpm," Peter said. "Above that makes too much noise. At fifteen hundred the course is two eight six."
Without answering, Archer shoved the throttles forward. Peter watched the tach needles move past 1500 and go on to almost 1900, Slewfoot throwing herself forward now at 35 knots.
"What is my closing course, Mr. Brent?" Archer asked.
Peter turned the Is-Was. "Two eight nine," he said. He knew exactly what Sko was doing—giving that cigar a beating as his engines labored against the mufflers.
"Give me a bearing and depth for torpedoes," Archer commanded.
Peter stared at him in the dark. "Torpedoes? A daihatsu is only about fifty feet long."
"So is the conning tower of a submarine," Archer reminded him coldly.
Peter worked out sets for all four torpedoes, and Archer passed the word to the Preacher and Goldberg.
Goldberg was disgusted. "So now we're killing mosquitoes with a shotgun," he told Britches as they ground the sp
eed, set the depth into the torpedo mechanisms.
Sko came up out of the engine room, the cigar stern in his teeth. Peter could tell from ten feet away that Sko was mad. He stopped abaft the bridge, planted his feet apart, slammed the cigar to an upward tilt, and said, loud and clear, "Somebody's wrecking my engines running 'em so fast with the mufflers on."
Archer turned slowly around from the wheel and faced him. "Your duty station is in the engine room. And, on patrol, you will wear a life jacket and helmet."
Sko stood there a moment longer, the cigar belligerent, then turned and went below. Peter, knowing what he was going to do, turned to watch the three tachometers. Slowly and evenly the revs dropped back until they were at the maximum rpm with the mufflers on.
Archer saw this too and angrily shoved the throttles forward. The tach needles did not move, the sound of the muffled engines did not change, the speed of the boat remained the same.
"Make a note of that, Mr. Brent. Manual control of the engine speed assumed without authority."
"I'll make a note," Peter said.
Archer turned to the radar shack. "Have you had a recognition signal from the bogey?"
"No sir, and I don't expect to get one," Willie told him.
Archer turned to the intercom and said, "Man your battle stations. All hands will wear life jackets and steel helmets. Life jacket ties will be two-blocked. All shirt sleeves will be rolled down and buttoned."
In the darkness the men moved around, picking up life jackets and helmets and putting them on. All except Goldberg. He put on the helmet, cocking it as much as you can cock a steel bucket, but he had not even brought his life jacket on deck.
Archer called down, "Goldberg, report to the bridge."
"Why get eaten out for a life jacket?" Britches whispered to Goldberg. "Put it on before he reams you."
Goldberg just grinned at Britches and climbed up to the bridge. "You send for me?" he asked, his voice as belligerent as Sko's cigar.
"I ordered you to put on your life jacket," Archer told him.
This interested Peter, and he stood beside Archer and watched Goldberg. Once before, Goldberg had been told—by Jonesy—to put on his life jacket and Goldberg had said, "Skipper, if it's okay with you I don't want to wear a life jacket." Jonesy had let it drop.
Archer did not. When Goldberg just stood there in silence, Archer said coldly, "Well?"
"I don't wear life jackets," Goldberg said.
Now, Peter thought, this is the time to let this thing drop; leave it alone.
Archer said, "I order you to put on your life jacket."
Goldberg said, as though telling a bedtime story, "One time in The Slot I helped pick up the crew of a boat that had been sunk. They were all alive, for a while. But the sharks had eaten them right up to the life jackets so they didn't live long and they didn't want to live at all. Since then I don't wear life jackets."
"As long as you're in the Navy and under my command you will wear a life jacket when at your battle station."
"As long as I'm on this boat," Goldberg said quietly and with no anger, "and it's afloat, I don't need a life jacket. When the boat goes down and I'm in the water, I'm not in the Navy any more. I'm just a guy named Goldberg, and I don't want those sharks eating half of me and leaving the rest to die. I want 'em to take it all, right now."
Goldberg turned and climbed off the bridge and went forward to his torpedo racks. Britches whispered, "What'd he do to you?"
"He's not going to do anything."
"Are you going to put it on?"
Goldberg shook his head, his skull sliding back and forth inside the helmet.
"Put Goldberg on report for direct disobedience of orders," Archer told Peter.
Peter looked at him in the dark and wondered what sort of man he was to be fiddling around with petty details while the boat was closing fast on a target that might start shooting anytime now. "Let's get on with the war," he said quietly, turning and going aft to the radar shack. He studied the scope for a moment and asked, "What's it look like to you, Willie?"
"Just one of those little barges sneaking in the way they do. Why doesn't he go ahead and sink it and get on with the patrol?"
"He is," Peter said.
By the time he got back to the bridge the word had passed from one end of the boat to the other that Goldberg was going to be court-martialed for refusing to put on a life jacket. And, for the first time, all hands now knew why Goldberg had always refused to wear one.
When Sko, in the engine room, heard it he climbed angrily off the tractor seat, grabbed a life jacket, and went up through the forward hatch. He marched over to Goldberg and shoved the jacket at him. "Put this on, you big ape. Why get your neck in a noose over a little thing like this?"
"It's headed for a noose anyway, so what difference does it make?" Goldberg asked.
"Put it on, Gerry," Sko said.
Goldberg laughed at him in the dark. "Go spit in that fancy tin hat."
Sko left the jacket on the racks and went below.
Peter said quietly, "Barge. Dead ahead."
Archer looked forward and saw the dark outline of the little daihatsu with the unmistakable long, sweeping line from bow to stern. She was putting along at about 7 knots and was now about three hundred yards away.
"Open fire?" Peter asked.
"I don't fire on an unidentified object," Archer said. "That may be one of our own ships, Mr. Brent."
"What are you going to do, run up alongside and ask them who they are?" Peter asked, his irritation showing.
"I am going to close until I identify," Archer said.
"I've seen and sunk a lot of these daihatsus. If you don't jump them first they can get pretty rambunctious," Peter told him.
Mitch and Stucky were standing by the Bofors, ready to fire, as the barge got bigger and bigger. They were so close now they could hear the low, slow sound of the barge's engine. They couldn't make out anyone aboard, but they knew that behind those low, sweeping sides the enemy was waiting.
"What's the matter with him?" Mitch asked crossly. "Is he going to write up another court-martial before we sink that critter?"
Archer called down to Willie, "Anything on the IFF?"
"Nothing," Willie said.
"Nothing, sir!" Archer reminded him.
"Listen, Adrian," Peter said, looking at the barge now less than a hundred yards away, "out here you shoot first and ask questions later. You'd better open … "
The barge opened first. Suddenly, from stem to stern, the long side began to flicker with the muzzle blasts of rifle and machine guns. The water ahead of them was suddenly pocked with little white splashes and then they got the range and Peter could hear the bullets hitting the boat, ripping into the plywood and pinging off the racks and the gun mounts.
"Open fire! Open fire!" Archer yelled.
Then, before Peter could stop him the fool yanked Slewfoot around, putting her broadside to the barge.
Every gun that could aim at the barge opened up so that Slewfoot, too, seemed to be on fire. The brass empties and clips poured out, the cannon shells made an odd, hollow clang as they hit the deck.
Peter heard somebody say in a high, surprised voice, "I'm hit. Goldberg, I'm hit." Then he saw the kid fall over against the torpedo rack.
A deck gun was blazing from the barge now, the muzzle blast a big yellow ball of fire.
Jason was raking the deck, swinging the .50s slowly back and forth and giving it to them in short bursts so the barrels of his guns wouldn't melt.
Stucky was slamming the 40-millimeter shells into her right at the waterline, each one tearing a piece out of the wooden barge.
Sko was waiting for the signal to take the mufflers off and move. It didn't come.
Willie heard a bullet hit close beside him. Splinters of plywood rained down on him and the radar and then bits of metal. He heard something arcing and fusing and was looking up when the lights went out.
The barge was going down. St
raight down, neither bow- nor stern-heavy—just sinking straight down, ripped apart all along the waterline by the Bofors and 20.
The rifle and machine-gun fire dribbled to a stop, but the deck gun got off one more round before she sank.
This last shell came straight over the water at point-blank range and struck Slewfoot astern, entering her about two feet above the waterline and ten feet forward of the transom.
Fortunately for Skeeter and the Professor they were both at the forward end of the engine room when the shell came in. Sko, of course, was in his tractor seat above the center engine.
The thin plywood hull of Slewfoot did not offer the exploding mechanism in the nose of the shell enough resistance to trigger it, but when it struck the steel casing of the reduction-gear boxes it exploded. The concussion knocked out the lights, slammed Skeeter and the Professor to the deck, and swept Sko out of his seat and down between the No. 1 and No. 2 engines.
It did more than that. It shattered both the V-drives of the outboard engines and destroyed the reduction-gear boxes.
At the time, the engines were turning over at 1500 rpm, but when the load was suddenly removed, with no way for all that power to be transferred into the shafts and propellers, the engines ran wild. All three of them began revving up, the sound they made changing into a scream.
Sko, Skeeter, and the Professor, still dazed and hurt, fought their way up in the darkness to the controls and, one by one, shut down the engines.
Sko knew it was too late, for as the engines slowed and stopped, he could hear the grinding of the ruined main bearings.
Then it was silent down there.
Slewfoot lay dead in the water, wallowing and hurt, as the rain closed in on her.
2
For a long moment the only sound on Slewfoot was the beating of the rain; no one moved or talked, they just stood where they were, every one of them waiting, staring aft at the place where the gasoline tanks were. Waiting for the blinding, jarring, destroying flash. But as Slewfoot wallowed in the moving sea and the rain fell from the black sky and there was no flash, the men began slowly to move.