Surface With Daring

by Douglas Reeman

  Ruthven saw some girls below his room moving blue counters across the water towards France. He felt a chill up his spine. The Airborne, the Red Berets were on their way. He heard the girl put a fresh cup of coffee beside him, knew she was watching the chart. Not seeing the counters, but only the small metal flag with the name Goliath painted on it.

  He said, ‘Thank you, Walter. Keep me informed.’

  The reply was quick and dry. ‘I expect you’ll know before I do, sir.’

  Ruthven turned in his chair and looked at her. Neat and trim in her uniform, but so easy to imagine as Seaton must have seen her and held her.

  Ruthven had not expected her to ask to be here. He had offered her leave, or duties elsewhere, but she had insisted. Now, he would not insult her by commiserating or offering false hopes. She was above that, as she had proved ten times over when she had worked with Trevor.

  The girl seated herself on Ruthven’s small leather settee, pushing off her shoes and tucking her legs up beside her without even knowing what she had done.

  She did not wish to talk, and she knew that Ruthven would not demand it of her.

  All she needed to do was watch the little flag. And pray.

  18

  With Daring

  THE SOUND OF the periscope hissing from its well seemed deafening.

  Seaton checked its rise and watched the water becoming clearer, changing to shark-blue before it broke surface. He held his breath, forcing his contracting muscles to relax, loosening his grip on the periscope when before he had been holding it with all his strength.

  The entrance to the inlet was less than half a mile wide, and each side was marked with steep rocks, against which the current made a lively necklace of spray. He saw a wide band of wet rock too, which showed how the tide had dropped in the last hour.

  He moved the periscope very carefully. It was a grim looking place. Hills beyond the shoreline, a few trees, and some abandoned houses right at the water’s edge.

  He said, ‘It’s like a bloody scrapyard.’

  It had been his custom to tell the others what he could see. His eyes were all they had, and it helped to keep him calm as well. In the strengthening light he could see some of the chaos left by repeated air-raids. The abandoned houses were roofless, and the place was pitted with craters, strewn with buckled girders and smashed masonry.

  On one hillside he also saw evidence of what the raids had cost. Scorched grass and bushes which marked the path of a crashing bomber. Further along the same hill he saw another aircraft lying on its back, the wings torn off and scattered down on the foreshore.

  ‘Let her fall off to starboard, Alec.’ He tensed, watching the stern of a half-submerged wreck as XE 16 crept past it. ‘Steady as you go.’

  It had probably been a small coaster, commandeered by the Germans for patrol work.

  Flotsam and trailing wire grated against the hull. It was like a place of the dead. Nothing moved at the water’s edge, not even a dog. But he saw several concrete pill-boxes dotted about the hillsides, and imagined a dozing sentry peering down at the tiny periscope.

  Without looking at his watch he knew that the Airborne must have started their attack. Eight miles away, but it could have been a thousand for all the signs of activity here.

  ‘Hello, Goliath. This is Dodo.’ Allenby sounded unusually clipped. ‘I am approaching sunken U-boat. There seem to be booms at either end of it. Jerry has used the gaps for tipping his rubbish.’

  Niven took the handset. ‘This is Goliath.’ He glanced at Seaton for confirmation before asking, ‘Hello, Dodo. What do you intend?’

  There was a roar of static and then Allenby replied, ‘I think the bloody thing’s blocking the entrance. I shall have to go over it.’

  Seaton glanced swiftly from the periscope to the depth gauge. Allenby would have to surface to do that. Of all the bloody bad luck. The one thing nobody had considered. And it made instant sense. Now, when it was too late. The rocket parts were brought to the waterside by road and then ferried into the pen on barges. It doubled the chances of getting through without being damaged by bombing, it also did away with the risk of attack from the sea. The Germans did not need an entrance for vessels of any sort from seaward.

  Allenby spoke again, his voice calm and unemotional. ‘Just took another peep and have sighted the target. Not surprised they’ve been unable to smash it.’ There was a long pause, and then, ‘Getting ready now. Wish me luck. Over and out.’

  Seaton crouched, his fingers on the hoist button, counting seconds. Now.

  He ducked to the periscope as it rose and said, ‘Steer a point to port.’

  He forgot Jenkyn at his wheel, everything but the sight in his lens. The U-boat pen spanned the end of the inlet like a colossal dam. The towering concrete structure above its original roof linked the hills on either side, and further back, curved and camouflaged like the one on the model was the great protective dome. It was grotesque and sinister, more so because there was no sign of life. But it was all there, with the small jetty close to the pen’s entrance from which the rocket parts were unloaded. The barges, Seaton assumed, were moored by the U-boat slipway deep inside the citadel.

  Seaton said, ‘Tell Oyster, I am in sight of target. He’ll want to know where we are.’

  He concentrated on the scene across either bow. The tangle of broken vehicles and equipment which the Germans had pushed into the water, and which marked the ends of the wrecked submarine better than any buoys.

  He depressed the periscope until the slow-moving lens was partly awash. He had seen a movement at last. It was a soldier, hurrying along a path by the ruined houses, his agitation quite obvious, despite the poor light and the distance he was away.

  Seaton watched him. Of course, at eight miles the soldier would be able to hear the anti-aircraft guns, even the Airborne troops’ mortars. From the submerged X-craft everything was kept silent, lifeless.

  A second soldier had emerged from somewhere. He had a rifle across his shoulder, and seemed to be holding a cup in one hand as he watched the other man striding towards him.

  They had almost met when it happened. The man with the cup pointed wildly across the inlet, the cup smashing in fragments by his feet. The other soldier swung round, and then froze, as if stricken by some terrible disease.

  Seaton knew what had occurred even before he saw it. Slowly at first, then with gathering haste, Allenby’s boat began to surface, the black hull glittering like coal in the early light. He must have seen the soldiers, for even as he crossed over the hidden wreck he began to dive again.

  Seaton lowered the periscope, the picture of the two startled soldiers still firm in his mind. One or both would run to a telephone. Every line would be busy because of the Airborne attack. It was possible that some of the local troops would have to be sent to help stem the intruders from the sky.

  He said, ‘Get ready to surface. I’m going over the wreck.’ To Niven he added, ‘Tell Oyster to stand-off. He stands no chance now. Too far astern.’

  Seaton raised the periscope again. Must be quick. He checked the sloping tangle of rubbish and scrap at either end of the wreck and said sharply, ‘Fifty yards. Stand by to surface.’

  He swung the periscope to port, vaguely aware that his mind was very clear, empty of everything but the approaching mass of concrete. He saw only one soldier. The man was on his knee, the rifle to his shoulder. Seaton saw a brief flash, then heard Drake curse as a bullet cracked against the hull. The soldier had seen the periscope. Seaton pressed the button. He did not want to go in blind.

  ‘Surface!’

  The hull shuddered and took a violent blow on the keel as it collided with part of the wreck. The grating seemed to go on and on, and the noise was joined by at least two more bullets hitting and ricochetting away from the casing.

  ‘Over!’ Seaton wiped his face. ‘Periscope depth again. ‘Lively!’

  There was a hollow boom, which rocked the hull drunkenly from side to side. It did n
ot sound like a depth charge, but it was big enough to worry about.

  Seaton pressed the button, his fingers slipping with sweat. There was smoke drifting from the entrance to the pen, and he felt something like despair as another explosion sent a procession of waves surging out into the daylight.

  ‘Hello, Goliath! This is Dodo. Do you read me? Over.’ A pause. ‘Do you read me, over?’ He sounded desperate.

  Seaton snatched the handset from Niven. ‘This is Goliath. Over.’

  Allenby said, ‘Bastards dropped a couple of explosive charges. I’m right inside the place. Suggest you shove off, old son. I don’t think we’ll be going anywhere.’ Seaton heard someone coughing and retching. ‘Bloody side-cargoes have been released, but my poor old girl is done for.’

  Seaton said urgently, ‘Bale out.’

  The R/T was getting faint. ‘Can’t, old son. Bloody hatches are jammed solid. I expect –’ The sound was cut off completely.

  Jenkyn muttered, ‘Wot a way to go!’

  Seaton looked at Drake. ‘We’re going in. Might be able to do something.’

  A glance at the clock. It had been only minutes, and felt like an eternity.

  Another quick look through the periscope. It was amazing they had got this far. The entrance to the pen was towering across their approach, and inside he could see a launch idling beside one of the ramps, some faces peering outboard into the water. The explosions had probably been demolition charges which had just happened to be nearby. They were all it needed to turn Allenby’s boat into a tomb.

  Something moved at the edge of his lens and he said, ‘They’re going to shut the gates!’ He saw a steel framework of crisscrossing girders moving very slowly from one side of the entrance.

  It was all quite clear what he must do. He snapped, ‘Surface!’ Then he was at the hatch, loosening the clips as he shouted, ‘Cover me, Richard!’

  Like an ungainly porpoise, and as if she were aware of the urgency required, XE 16 surged noisily to the surface, her snoutlike stem cutting through oil and filth and making the moored launch stagger violently, hurling the occupants into the bilges.

  Seaton was through the hatch, his mind registering nothing but the coldness of the Sten in his fingers, the damp misery of the air around him.

  He heard cries from the launch and saw them running towards the bulwark again, pointing at the surfaced midget and then ducking as he fired a burst directly at them. One man dropped over the side and vanished, the others stayed hidden.

  Niven had struggled through the hatch to join him. ‘Here, sir, take a grenade!’

  Together they dragged out the pins and flung them into the open launch. Then they fell prone to the deck, their eardrums all but splitting as the grenades exploded together. Splinters punched holes through the launch, hissed into the water and scythed across the concrete like hail on a tin roof.

  As the smoke rolled away towards the inlet, Seaton heard someone screaming. A tortured, inhuman sound which stopped suddenly, as if cut off by a soundproof door.

  XE 16 had stopped at last, rocking defiantly above her reflection as if trying to decide what to do next.

  Niven said breathlessly, ‘I can hear artillery!’ He laughed, and looked incredibly young. ‘Good old Airborne!’ He swung round, firing from the hip, as a shadow dodged round a doorway and tried to reach some steel stairs.

  The gates across the entrance had stopped moving, and as the running man slipped and then pitched headlong down the stairs, Seaton guessed he had been the one working the mechanism.

  Somewhere a long way off he heard a klaxon shrieking insanely. The alarm, but it was too late now.

  Seaton shouted, Try and call up Allenby again!’

  He reached out to seize a trailing wire from the ramp and wound it loosely round a bollard. He heard Niven yelling at Drake through the hatch, his voice hollow inside the control room. Allenby and his crew were right here. Probably feet away. He dare not drop the charges until he was certain nothing could be done to save them.

  It was deathly quiet. Seaton crouched on one knee and trained the gun towards the stairs and to another opening by the slipway. He made sure the spare magazines were within reach and tried to remember what the instructor had said about faults and stoppages.

  Niven dragged his head from the hatch. ‘Got him, sir! They heard the firing and thought the Jerries had caught us!’

  Seaton said, ‘Keep your eyes peeled. We shall have company in a minute. They probably imagine there are more of us.’ Then he asked, ‘What do you think, Richard? You’re the diver.’

  Niven said, ‘I’d risk being killed. Especially in their case. I’d plant a few grenades under the W & D hatch. That should shift it. They might be safe from the explosion in the control room.’ He fired a long burst into the shadows and said, ‘Blast! Nothing there!’ As he jammed in a fresh magazine and cocked the gun he added, ‘Even without escape gear they should be able to get out once the hull is flooded. It’s only a few feet deep here. We could help.’ He pivoted round. ‘God, what’s that?’

  Machine-guns were chattering beyond the entrance, and they both stared with surprise as Winters’ boat probed through the opening, sparks flying from her hull as she was pursued by bullets.

  Seaton said, ‘And I ordered him to –’ He gripped Niven’s arm. ‘Get down and tell Number One what to do.’

  He watched the third X-craft draw abeam and Winters’ head and shoulders thrusting through the after hatch, a Sten already aimed and ready.

  He saw Seaton and grinned. ‘Came to join the party!’

  ‘We’re going to get the others out if we can.’

  Seaton looked up as boots hammered overhead, echoing and re-echoing along one of the catwalks which obviously led to the rocket launching chamber.

  He called, ‘Tell your diver to come up. We should be safe enough if we cover the stairs and that opening. You could hold an army from here. They’ll not want to use anything heavy under their precious rocket.’

  A bullet slammed past Seaton’s head and splintered into concrete. A longe-range shot from the outside. He peered astern and saw bobbing figures scurrying along the water’s edge. It must be a fine old rumpus at their H.Q., he thought.

  Niven appeared again. ‘I got through, sir.’ His chin lifted defiantly. ‘I told Number One, and he said for me to do it.’

  He knelt down and retrieved his Sten gun. ‘Just as well. The set’s packed up completely.’

  They looked up as more shouts echoed along the roof, and then several shots were fired from out of the darkness. A man, or men, had got into one of the air shafts and had gained advantage from height and shadow.

  Winters threw up his Sten and raked the metal shaft from end to end, the holes appearing as if by magic as Niven joined with his gun. They heard a brief cry and the sound of a body slithering down the shaft. Then nothing.

  Then the water seemed to light up, and for a terrible second Seaton imagined that one of Allenby’s charges had exploded prematurely.

  He watched the vivid orange flash fade as quickly as it had appeared, to be replaced instantly by a great bubbling froth of released air.

  ‘They’ve done it!’

  Niven and the diver called Driscoll plunged into the filthy water without pausing even to kick off their boots.

  A burst of tracer ripped across and through one corner of the entrance. Winters, who had been peering into the water, was hurled headlong across his casing, blood spurting from his chest and stomach. His body was smoking and torn open by the tracer, and as he choked and gurgled, his heels drumming on the steel as if to ward off his agony, another burst tore across his boat and threw him into the water. He floated away, the blood trailing behind him.

  Seaton cupped his hands. ‘Keep down! Your skipper has bought it!’ Another few feet and the burst would have done for them both.

  He dare not watch Niven and Driscoll for fear of a sudden attack along the slipway. But he heard them floundering and splashing, and then Allenby�
��s unmistakable voice as he managed to gasp, ‘My Number One’s dead. Martin’s in a bad way, too.’

  Martin was the diver. A quiet-spoken man. Quiet even when Allenby made fun of his diving ability.

  Seaton felt them dragging themselves aboard, their bodies stinking of oil. He heard someone sobbing and knew it was the diver. Quiet as always.

  Allenby put a wet hand on his shoulder as he groped for the hatch. ‘Thanks, old son. I’ll not forget.’

  Seaton said, ‘Tell them to release the side-cargoes. Pass the word to Oyster, too.’

  He wiped his forehead with his hand and took a firmer grip on the gun. They thought only one would get in. And we all made it. Trenoweth would be a proud man.

  Niven grabbed Driscoll by the wrists and hauled him on to the casing.

  Seaton said, ‘Well done. Now we’re getting out.’

  He had felt the hull quiver, more so because she was surfaced, as the two side-cargoes were allowed to fall clear.

  Six charges in all. Enough to knock down St Paul’s.

  ‘Someone on the catwalk!’ Niven raised his gun and then gasped, ‘Jammed!’

  Seaton peered up at the shadows and saw something move. He fired a long blast, seeing the sparks fly, wondering why the hidden man had not fired first.

  Something clattered and bounced on the other X-craft, and Niven yelled, ‘Grenade!’

  The explosion was deafening, and it was only then that Seaton understood what had happened. The grenade had bounced through XE 26’s open hatch and had burst inside the control room. With a hissing roar, a tongue of fire mushroomed almost to the roof of the pen, while splinters cracked through the flames and sparks with the sound of a rivet gun.

  Driscoll, who had been about to step aboard, was spun round in his tracks, blood spurting down his chest to mingle with the water on his battledress.

  Niven looked away, retching helplessly. Driscoll, the one who had taken the letter to Drake, had no face.