He was praying.
ping ... ping ... ping
Thrashing overhead.
“Captain,” Charlie gasped. “Captain!”
“Any other bright ideas, Harrison?”
“The next time a charge goes off close aboard, release another bubble. A really big one.”
The captain glowered at him, more sad than angry. Then he nodded. “Torpedo room, load tube one with garbage and stand by.”
Kane had not only adopted his suggestion but was taking it even further.
“Tube one ready, Captain,” the telephone talker said.
“Very well. Manifold, stand by to put a big bubble in the number one tank, and leave the—”
WHAAAMMM
WHAAAMMM
“Vent open—!”
click-WHAAAMMM
“Now, Tomkins!” the captain roared in the quake. “Do it!”
“Aye, aye!”
“Fire one!”
The bubble from the ballast tank shot to the surface as a geyser. A flurry of trash, fired from the torpedo tube, reached the surface moments later and spread across the water.
“All stop,” the captain said.
The screws stopped. The boat began to slow. The planesmen grunted at the wheels, fighting to maintain trim as she hove-to.
The decoy had failed.
Now they were playing dead.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
POSSUM
ping ............ ping ............ ping
The S-55 hung dead in the water, completely silent.
Taking water and trimmed heavy, she was slowly sinking.
Charlie’s ears rang, deafeningly loud, in the aftermath of the explosions. Dust had gotten into his lungs. He had to cough, but he held it back. The longer he waited, the worse it got.
Rusty waved at the captain. He made his trembling hand level and slowly lowered it. He held up one finger, then nine, and then circled his index finger and thumb to make a zero.
Their depth was 190 feet, and they were still sinking.
The hull groaned loudly under the pressure.
Charlie looked at the creaking bulkheads. Frankie’s scarred old pressure hull was the only thing preventing them all from being crushed by the vast amount of water surrounding them.
Even after a hellish depth charging, that was a sobering fact. At 190 feet, water pressure reached 5.75 atmospheres, exerting a force of eighty-five pounds per square inch. The boat had been tested to ninety pounds, but that had been back when she was in prime condition.
The seconds ticked. The boat drifted down. The captain signaled the planesmen to put full rise on the planes. As the S-55 became heavier, she began to tilt even farther. The men held on as the slippery deck angled sharply under their feet.
ping ............ ping ............ pi—
The enemy sonar cut out. The thrash of their screws faded into the distance.
Through the haze of red dust, Charlie saw the captain turn toward Marsh. The soundman held up two fingers and waved. The two destroyers were leaving. He raised one hand, as if about to make a karate chop, and then angled it. Northwest. Back to Rabaul.
The ruse had worked. The battle was over. Charlie leaned against the plotting table. He couldn’t stop shaking. During the depth charging, he’d been calm and able to think clearly. He’d suppressed all the horror and stress, but now the fight was over, it caught up to him.
By now, the urge to cough was so strong, he felt like he was asphyxiating.
“All compartments, secure from battle stations,” the captain said.
Charlie coughed explosively, took a deep breath, and coughed again.
“Secure from depth charge. Secure from silent running. Get those pumps working. Report leaks.” The captain heard no response and wheeled. “Grimes?”
The telephone talker nodded dumbly at his station. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah.” He stared at the sound-powered phone hanging around his neck, as if unsure why it was there.
“Belay that order. Grimes, report to your berth and get some rest. Chief, see that he gets there. Reynolds, relay the order personally, and get me a replacement to man his station.”
“Aye, aye.”
“Motor room,” the captain said. “Engage the motors. All ahead one-third.”
The motors cranked the propellers. The boat accelerated through the water. With the aid of speed, she began to level out and gain some buoyancy, though she was still heavy.
“Helm, all ahead full,” the captain said. “Manifold, blow emergency.” Then he shot a smile at Reynolds.
Reynolds returned it. “Payback’s a bitch.”
“Marsh, any ships on the move up there?” The captain frowned. “Marsh?”
The soundman didn’t look so well either. He shook his head. “No contacts, Captain.”
“Very well. Planes, take us up to forty-five feet.”
Damage reports poured into the control room. A long list of electrical failures, mechanical breakdowns, and seawater leaks. Another hatch gasket blown in the engine room. Forward compartments had no lighting. The main gyrocompass was out of action, as was the electrical steering. The engine exhaust valve leaked. The starboard engine air compressor was dying.
Rusty slowly pulled himself up to his feet. “I’ll start organizing the repairs, Captain.”
“Very well. I’ll get an auxiliaryman on this broke-dick scope so we can see what the hell is up there.” He looked at the clock, which had shattered. He rubbed the face of his wristwatch and brought it close to his eye in the dim red light. “It’s 0130. We’ve got five hours of darkness to get it done, so let’s get on it. Harrison, when we surface, you’ll take first watch.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“In the meantime, I want you to—”
“Splice the mainbrace, aye, Captain,” Rusty said. “Come on, Charlie. I’ll go with you. I’m going to need a belt before I deal with this disaster.”
Brownish water spilled into the control room from the aft passageway, bringing with it strong odors of brine and oil. The current, thick with struggling cockroaches and bits of trash, flowed over their feet. When the watertight engine room door opened after the captain declared, “Secure from depth charge,” the water had poured out of the room in a rush.
Charlie gaped at the alarming amount of water.
“We’d better get to the surface fast,” Rusty said, “or we ain’t getting there.”
Charlie and Rusty entered the aft passageway and stood aside as an auxiliaryman splashed past with his tools to fix the jammed periscope.
They proceeded a little farther and stopped. Rusty swept the area with his flashlight. “Swell. Just swell. Look at this mess.”
The staterooms had collapsed, the wreckage piled in several inches of brackish water. The shock of the blasts had broken the pins that held up the wood frames and walls. The lockers had blown out; their uniforms and personal possessions had been flung across the room. Cockroaches scuttled up the walls to escape the deluge. Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire had somehow gotten stuck to the corking on the bulkhead, presiding over the mess like Ozymandias.
“The captain’s right,” Rusty said. “Fuck this fucking boat.”
“Looks like we’ll be sleeping in the conning tower for a while,” Charlie said. His eyes widened. “Check that out. There, look.”
“It can’t be. Are you kidding me?”
They picked their way through the wreckage. Rusty stumbled with a curse. He shined his flashlight on a bulge in the bulkhead. Shorn of corking, the dull metal glinted in the light beam.
“I’ll be damned,” the engineering officer said. He ran his hand gently along the dent. “Gives you some respect for the amount of force unleashed by those bombs, doesn’t it?”
Charlie gulped. It was a miracle they were still alive. “It gives me a little more respect for Frankie, that’s for sure.”
“I take back what I said, Frankie,” Rusty said. “You’re a tough old broad. Okay,
Charlie, let’s go get that drink. This calls for a toast that we’re actually somehow still breathing.”
The boat surfaced. All night, the auxiliarymen feverishly attacked the repairs while a bucket brigade wearily bailed water out of the boat and the pumps worked overtime to empty the overloaded bilges. Charlie handed out the depth charge medicine, stood watch, and spent the rest of the night and morning doing the tedious work of splicing wire and rewinding the starboard motor. One of the mains topped up the battery while the other propelled the boat down the channel that separated the islands of New Britain and New Ireland.
By morning, the boat still needed a lot of work, but she could dive. She did so after the lookouts spotted a plane bearing down from the north. The battery powered the electric motors, which engaged the propellers. The S-55 made way at three knots until she reached the Solomon Sea.
They were still deep in enemy territory, but the way home was open sea now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
THE BLOODHOUND
Charlie patrolled the boat during his two-hour, below-the-deck first dog watch. He listened for dripping water. He smelled for smoke and any odors beyond the usual diesel stink. He felt the air currents for proper ventilation. He made sure valves were secured or open as needed, bilges dry, and trim tank gauges within the acceptable range.
His conclusion: Nothing worked properly anymore on this battered old boat, but it worked.
“Just a little farther, old girl,” he said. “We’re going home.”
He passed the crowded mess room and paused to watch the men devour their suppers. They’d worked around the clock for three days to continue repairs to the ailing and cranky boat. Tonight, the weary men finally celebrated their victory. They dined on pork chops that tasted like freezer burn, the last of the fresh food. For the rest of the voyage, they’d be on iron rations, eating out of cans. Johnson played a Benny Goodman record over the loudspeakers. The men hummed along to “Jersey Bounce.” The cook brought out a massive cake; he glowed as the crew cheered the sight of an iced S-55 sinking a troopship on top of it.
Morale soared. Tokyo Rose herself had singled them out as a plague and called them pirates, which made them feel like celebrities; sailors all over the South Pacific listened to Tokyo Rose’s propaganda broadcasts. She’d also proudly confirmed that the S-55 had, in fact, been truly sunk this time, which prompted a big cheer from the men. Several chanted, “If Rosie says it, it must be true!” to much laughter across the room. It was a real celebration.
Charlie heard Braddock bragging to his friends that the boat would get a Presidential Unit Citation for the action at Blanche Bay. The machinist caught him looking and offered up another enigmatic wink.
Charlie barely noticed. A Presidential Unit Citation! Since the battle, he hadn’t thought further ahead than getting back to Brisbane in one piece, but Braddock was right. There might be laurels at the end of this. Possibly even promotions. Certainly, Captain Kane, who before this patrol was looking at being taken out of the game, had put himself into a prime position to be given a new fleet boat. Admiral Lockwood needed fighting skippers, and he had one in Kane. Right now, the men would have followed him to the Sea of Japan.
The war would go on, might go on for years. Last night, Johnson picked up an ALNAV message, stating that the Japanese had landed a fresh division on Guadalcanal. They’d launched a ferocious assault against the ragged Marine entrenchments at Henderson Field. The Marines held on by a thread. The fate of Guadalcanal still hung in the balance.
The Japanese didn’t give up easily. Like Rusty said, they really knew how to fight, and they were more than willing to die for their cause and their emperor. Yes, America needed fighting skippers to win this war. Charlie now knew he wanted to be one.
He arrived in the control room and gave his report to the captain, who stood next to Johnson on the sound gear.
“Very well,” Kane said absentmindedly.
“Nessie, sir?” Charlie asked him.
“Nothing today. Maybe he’s given up.”
For the past two days, the sound gear detected the screws of a distant ship, but repeated looks through the periscope revealed nothing. The night watch observed a winking light in the distant dark, possibly a searchlight. The vexed captain had started calling the mystery contact the Loch Ness monster.
Yesterday, on periscope watch, Rusty detected a glimmer of masts and stacks of a ship on the northern horizon. Johnson heard long-range sonar pinging. The S-55 was being followed.
Today, nothing. Maybe the ship had lost Frankie’s scent and gone somewhere else.
“Let’s hope so,” Charlie said. He wasn’t sure Frankie was up to another fight. “I’ve been checking on the men. They’re in high spirits, Captain.”
“They should be proud.”
The lights turned off. The control room rigged for red.
“Planes, forty-five feet,” Kane said.
Darkness was falling, and it was time to surface for the night.
“Holding at forty-five feet,” Reynolds said. “Our trim is good.”
“Very well.” The captain put on his sou’wester hat. “Up scope.”
He scanned the surface while water splashed on him from the upper bearings. “Our luck is holding, gentlemen. The scope isn’t fogged, and I can actually see.” He shut the handles. “Down scope. Rig to surface.”
Charlie hung his binoculars around his neck and confirmed his lookouts had arrived. For the next two hours, he’d be on the bridge for the second dog watch.
“Engine room, secure ventilation,” Reynolds said. “All compartments, shut the bulkhead flappers.” He turned to Kane. “Ready to surface in all respects, Captain.”
“Very well. Surface.”
The surfacing alarm sounded.
“Manifold, blow the main ballast tanks,” Reynolds said.
Charlie climbed into the conning tower. Rusty sat up and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes.
“Can you guys keep it down?”
“Sorry, pal, we’re getting set for the watch,” Charlie told him. “Working Navy, here.”
The boat tilted as she rose.
Rusty yawned. “I don’t know what I’m going to do first when we get back to Brisbane. Sleep for a week or get drunk for a week. I’m thinking, get shit-faced until I forget all about this war. What do you think?”
“I think you should go with your gut.”
“What’s the first thing you’re going to do?”
“Mail a letter.”
The engineering officer laughed. “I said you were a go-getter.”
“Twenty-three feet and holding,” Reynolds said.
“Open the hatch,” Kane ordered.
The quartermaster cracked the hatch and pushed it open. Fresh air began to enter the boat through the main induction.
Charlie mounted to the deck and scanned the night with his binoculars. Nothing but a flat, calm sea. “All clear! Lookouts to the bridge.”
Fredericks, Peters, and Billy Ford emerged and took their stations.
The same old routine, repeated all day, day after day, on the boat. It had become as much a part of Charlie as the boat now was. He smelled smoke as the diesel engines fired up, one engaging the propellers while the other recharged the battery.
“I’ll bet there were 2,000 soldiers on that troopship,” Fredericks said.
“Hell, at least,” Peters said.
“They won’t be going to Guadalcanal and shooting any Marines, that’s for sure.”
“Speaking of shooting, one of those bullets came this close to my left ear. I heard the snap.”
“Yeah, you told me. Like ten times.”
“If I’d been wearing a hat, it’d still be floating around up there in Blanche Bay.”
“If your head was any bigger, it’d be up there too.”
Billy Ford added nothing to the exchange. Since he’d missed having a front row view of the battle, he’d fallen into a rare and sullen silence.
With a
charged battery, the S-55 made full on both mains, cruising south across the Solomon Sea. Charlie thought about mailing his letters to Evie. He’d been wrong, though; that wasn’t the first thing he’d do in Brisbane. The first thing he’d do was check to see if he’d gotten one from her. His stomach flipped at the possibility of seeing her feminine handwriting and what it might tell him.
The lookouts wouldn’t shut up about the torpedo attack.
“The lead ship was an ammunition ship,” Fredericks said. “That’s why he exploded.”
“You’re talking about the starboard target?” Peters said. “I thought his boiler went up.”
“No, he had a belly full of ammo. I’m sure of it. There were multiple explosions. The ship blew apart section by section. Didn’t you see that?”
“Well, what happens when the boiler blows up?”
Charlie turned and said, “That’s enough, gentlemen. Save it for—”
BOOM
The sea lit up with a blinding flash. A shell ripped through the air and punched the water a hundred yards off the port-side bow. The water exploded in white spray.
“Holy shit,” Fredericks said. “What was that?”
A beam of light flickered across the water and fixed its glare on the S-55.
“Clear the bridge!” Charlie screamed. “Dive, dive, dive!”
Another flash in the darkness, revealing the bow of a Japanese destroyer. A second geyser erupted from the sea. Water splashed across the main deck.
The men poured down the hatch. The diving alarm honked as Frankie began her rapid slide back into the depths.
The naval gun fired again, a heavy boom that vibrated through the hull. Another splash.
“Destroyer, 4,000 yards,” Charlie said breathlessly, still rattled by the suddenness of the attack. “He was just lying there, hove-to. Waiting for us.”
“Planes, take her down,” the captain said. He ran his hand through his shaggy hair. “Son of a bitch. That skipper must have spent the entire day circling around to come out ahead of us.”
Crash Dive: a novel of the Pacific War Page 12