A Twist of Sand

by Geoffrey Jenkins

  Astonishment robbed me of speech. I gestured feebly at the Flag Officer (S). He nodded curtly.

  "Not that she won't go into service," went on the evenly moderated voice. "She's quite lethal you know."

  OF all the gross understatements, that surely took the biscuit, I thought. It made Trout and her like seem like things used in the Napoleonic wars.

  "What do you know about hydrogen peroxide, Lieutenant-Commander?"

  A flippant reply about ladies' hairdressers rose to my lips, but died without utterance at the abstracted face before me.

  "Only what I learned at school, and that I've almost forgotten," I replied.

  "The Germans arc using it to propel yet another experimental type," he said coolly. I wondered if the effects of the depth-charging and the long flight were really making me rather addle-headed. Hydrogen peroxide!

  "We have good reason to believe that they are using hydrogen peroxide as a main fuel, and then feeding it through a complicated system of burners, mixed with oil fuel, and driving U-boat turbines."

  "Air and speed?" I asked wryly.

  "Not quite," he smiled back. "But damn nearly. Without boring you with what few technicalities we know, I can say that this type — we just call it HP on our files — is faster than the Type XXI. The air problem is almost solved, for she can remain submerged —"

  "But the air to burn the fuel…"

  "In the hydrogen peroxide," he said. "She doesn't need a snort for her engines, but there are a maze of technical problems to be beaten (I should say) before she becomes really operational. Although she might be fundamentally sound, she might still be too complicated to build more than a few. I doubt whether they could mass-produce them with any degree of success for some years. And then there's the R.A.F. bombing to take into account also."

  "I feel that I would have the same chance against one of these hellish things as I would taking H.M.S. Victory to sea against the Scharnhorst" I said grimly.

  The Flag Officer (S) tightened his compressed lips.

  "They aren't invincible," he said with a grate in his voice. "You don't know what they have coming to them in the Western Approaches."

  I suppose his cold rage was more terrifying than any bombast or bluster. Here was a man who weighed up the facts. He was interested in facts only. The weight of one fact against the other. Death and counter-death. An icy level of cold command, I thought, wondering why I as a mere submarine commander ever had cause to feel the isolation of command.

  "Why are you telling me this?" I asked the Intelligence Chief.

  "I haven't finished telling you," he rebuked me gently. In his prim voice he went on, "As you see, the Type XXI is lethal, but suffers from the conventional maladies which have beset submarines since their inception. In truth, I would call it more of a submersible in the strict sense than a submarine. To my mind submarine means a permanent ability to operate under water. The surface is only incidental to it."

  My mind reeled. When I thought of the ordinary things which surrounded Trout, the need for intensive training and engineering skills in her operation compared with these dreadful weapons, I could have wept.

  "The U-boat which I really fear is the one I want to tell you about," he said.

  Fear and terror take many forms. All my life I have been used to associating them with violence, actions, events, turbulent emotions. But that calm, didactic voice speaking of fear as if he had been discussing the merits of a long-dead Greek play struck a chord of horror in my heart which I have seldom known before or since. And I am not a man easily frightened; death had been near to me too many times for me to shudder at the thought of a sudden rending of flesh, or suffocation by salt water.

  A hush fell over the room. Both men, unconsciously, gave full drama to the pause. I remember the incidental noises still — the faint hoot of 9 car, and the muted drone of a squadron of high-flying bombers overhead. Neither moved. The one was lost in the technical problem, the other pondering his next words to put it plainly to a seafaring man. And why, in God's name, send for me in the Mediterranean to tell me all this? This was stuff for the Cabinet and the Prime Minister, and certainly not for very many others less elevated.

  "Air and speed," he said, and there was a note of tiredness in his voice which heightened my feeling of fear. Fear of something gigantic, unknown, prescient of the thing that was to warp my whole future.

  "Even the German High Command won't believe that they have, in fact, solved it — absolutely."

  "Absolutely?" I said stupidly.

  He almost drew his schoolmaster's gown about him. "Blohm and Voss have their assembly yard at Wesermunde," he said without expression in his voice. "One of their top engineers there is a man called Werner. He designed a U-boat which can do twenty-two knots under water, is silent, and doesn't need to come to the surface. She can fire acoustic torpedoes from about fifty metres almost parallel to a convoy, and she will outrun the ordinary escort group ships in the North Atlantic — submerged. Only a destroyer is faster."

  "Impossible," I said.

  "Thank God, that is what the German High Command also say — still. But Werner is a man of parts. He is not only a practical engineer with the greatest appreciation of what is needed; he is also somewhat — more than somewhat, if I might interpose Runyon in this conversation — of a scientist. Do you know anything about nuclear physics?"

  For the only time the cold mask behind the desk relaxed. "Give him a chance, George."

  "Not only from Werner's little goings-on, but a lot else which I won't burden you with, I believe that the Germans have solved the problem of propulsion — whether by sea or in the air — by what I call, if I may coin the phrase, nuclear propulsion. I suppose only a handful of men in this or any other country have heard of using the energy generated in splitting atoms for propulsion. It is enormous. And Werner has designed an engine using steam and nuclear power. He shoved it into a U-boat, a huge U-boat of about three thousand tons. The atomic radiation needs a lot of shielding. It's so revolutionary and so in advance of anything we or anyone else have ever thought, that the German High Command simply doesn't believe it. But don't think Blohm and Voss don't. To prove their point, they have built — a lot of it at their own expense — an experimental U-boat with these fantastic abilities. The High Command still thought it a crackpot idea, fraught with all kinds of difficulties and dangers — as well it might. But Blohm and Voss prevailed to the extent that they persuaded the High Command to let NP I — nuclear propulsion Number I — go operational on the longest route in the world, with Hans Tutte" — he smiled

  "you'll have heard of him — in command. NP I has all the answers, as our American friends would say."

  The fear and foreboding which those grim words sent down my spine grew when the man behind the desk got up and crossed to a huge wall map.

  He jabbed his finger at a spot in the South Atlantic; "On 29th November the Dunedin Star, carrying tanks and war supplies to the Middle East, reported a mysterious underwater occurrence. Her captain beached her here on the coast of South West Africa. Total loss. Hell of a to-do about the passengers. The South African Air Force did some fine, if damn foolhardy things to try and get them out. Overland expeditions, drama in the desert and all that. But all I am interested in is — was it NP I which sank her? I have the details of the attack here. Nothing — except a muffled crash which tore a huge hole in her. No sign of an attacker. I think NP I sank the Dunedin Star. That was over three months ago."

  The D.N.I, interrupted. "I might add that this voyage of NP is a proving voyage. If she comes home with a bag as full as I think she will get, the Germans will concentrate everything on building scores of her type for the North Atlantic. Their virtues — on paper at least — are innumerable — high operational speed for indefinite periods; no need to surface; stealth of attack…"

  "There is nothing she doesn't have!" I broke in. The futility of British submarines, their wearisome little technical faults and the simple problem of oper
ating them without straining their conventional machinery — it seemed to me like comparing a turbine with a lawn-mower.

  "No," said the schoolmasterly voice. "There you are wrong. There is one thing they certainly do not have. That is, radar anything like as good as ours. Their FuMB counter-radar really isn't up to much. Our V.H.F. is years ahead of theirs. So is our underwater radio reception and asdic. When our ships in the Western Approaches have these installed…"

  He trailed off at the stern eye of my senior and shrugged. "In for a penny, in for a pound. He knows more now than anyone else; it won't harm him to know about the radar also. Besides, we'll install it in Trout in order to give him the best chance."

  His matter-of-fact words struck a new chord of fear in me. Trout? What had she to do with it? Were they going to send me out against this futuristic submarine in poor little Trout? I still remember the prolonging of the minutes; somewhere down below there was a slight screech of rubber on the road as a driver braked carelessly; from the Thames came the mournful siren of a tug. The Flag Officer (S) stood with his face half turned to the great wall map. He and the Director of Naval Intelligence both realised that the cat was out of the bag.

  "Surely…" I gasped.

  The cold eyes never looked colder, and his voice sounded like backwash on sharp shingle.

  "Your orders are to take H.M.S. Trout and sink NP I."

  I looked from one to the other hopelessly. The Trout I A piddling little "T "class submarine against a 3,000 ton non-surfacing, super-efficient U-boat which was so good that even its creator could not believe it was true! Here was the straight, unswerving road to suicide!

  I said flippantly, for after all they had signed my death warrant as certainly as they stood before me:

  "Just tell me where to find her, sir."

  The note in my voice certainly jarred on both of them. The icy eyes flickered only for a moment. His next words dumfounded me, even if I was capable of feeling little else but bitter, hurt anger.

  "I don't know. You will have absolute discretion. The whole South Atlantic is yours."

  I turned hopelessly to the Intelligence man.

  "Surely, sir, you must have some reports about where she is based? You can't tuck a huge submarine away like that without a trace. What about some unfrequented harbour along the South West African coast? The Germans there are well disposed towards the Nazis. Perhaps…"

  He was smiling, sadly. "My dear boy," he murmured. "A submarine like that doesn't need a regular operational base. I estimate that she can travel about fifteen months without refuelling. She can carry all her own stores. She only needs to go home when she's shot off all her torpedoes. She carries plenty of them, too."

  His words felt like the final body blow to a boxer. Neither of them said any more. I suppose several minutes must have passed.

  Then I said feebly: "Briefly, then, I must take Trout to the millions of square miles of the South Atlantic, find and sink a U-boat capable of doing eighteen or more knots submerged, no base, no silhouette. Am I correct, sir?"

  The icy eyes remained ice. "That is correct."

  Their minds were made up and there was little I could do about it — except make my will.

  "I am bringing H.M.S. Trout to Gibraltar. The new radar will be fitted there. It is not to fall into enemy hands, do you see, Peace? It will be fitted with special demolition charges. If you are in any immediate danger from the enemy, you will blow it up. If necessary, you will blow up Trout also."

  They were certainly making sure of my death.

  "And if I catch up with NP I, what are my orders, sir?" I asked.

  "You will sink her with torpedoes. You will bring home positive proof that she is sunk. There must be no half-measures."

  The quiet voice joined in our conversation. "Once she is sunk, and does not return to Bremen after a period which the German High Command thinks appropriate, I feel certain they won't go ahead with building others. Remember, they are not even half sold on the idea. This mass of complex, highly dangerous nuclear machinery doesn't appeal to the men who know ordinary U-boats. But if NP I comes home with a string of sinkings and a world cruise behind her, they'll go for it." He glanced at his watch. "I feel all I can wish you is good luck."

  He looked at me in his gentle way, and then averted his head sharply. He knew he was looking at a dead man. "But," he said crisply, "remember that radar. You can pick him up at thirty miles. It's the only Achilles heel I know he has."

  He turned and walked out.

  The Flag Officer (S) had seated himself again. "I'll see you get all the necessary charts, stores and so on. I shall have you flown out to Gibraltar, and from there you will go to 'Freetown and then to the Cape. Your plans are your own after that. You can have a clear run ashore for a month before you go to Gibraltar. Haven't you got some relative who is ill somewhere?"

  "Yes sir," I replied. "My old grandfather had a stroke at his place near Tiverton. I would like to see him before he dies. He hasn't got much of a chance according to the local medico."

  "Leave your telephone number, then," he said briskly.

  He hesitated for a moment. "You may be wondering why I did not turn this job over to a hunting group of the North Atlantic boys."

  I grinned wryly. "I don't wonder at anything any more, sir."

  "In a future war," he said, standing looking out across the pale scene, "the submarine will be licked by the submarine. That's a radical theory which no one — not even the Prime Minister — would accept to-day. The hunter becomes the hunted. Stealth will steal up upon stealth, and destroy him by stealth. You are the first of the new hunters," he said without facing me. "You will see more of what I mean when you have time to think over what a nuclear submarine means in terms of future sea wars. You will report back personally to me. There will be no signals if you encounter or sink her, understand? Trout will have a free rein anywhere in any port of the free world. You must come back and report to me — personally. You have the honour of being the first of the new hunters."

  I had heard that he was a man who seldom spoke, and never revealed his mind.

  "Or the last of the old hunters," I replied.

  He wheeled round and gazed at me, and the Rockall of his eyes softened.

  "You believe in your heart that I am sending you to your death, don't you, Peace?" he asked.

  "Yes, sir, I do," I replied levelly. "And there are sixty-five others in Trout who are going to their deaths. Not one of them is afraid to die, but there are no odds in this case. The certainty of death in a submarine is not a pleasant thought."

  "If you feel that way, I shall not wish you the submariner's usual au revoir. Good-bye," he said and held out his hand.

  I shook it perfunctorily.

  When I reached the door, he said softly: "If you are thinking of getting drunk tonight, Lieutenant-Commander, do. There will be an Intelligence man by your side every moment until you sail from Gibraltar. He'll save you from yourself — or knock you down if you say a word too many."

  VI

  South of North

  "luff! luff! luff! Get the sails off her, you sons-of-bitches! By the mark four! God, only four under her and it's coming up from south-west! See that over there, Mister Mate? No, not there — 326 degrees? Yes? Looks like porridge, but they're breakers. Clan Alpine. Alecto was there the year before too. No, you can't see it ordinarily, and Clan Alpine didn't either. Of course we're going in! No damn you, we had a good sight of the sun at Ponta da Marca and I reckon by now I can smell the Clan Alpine. Three hills. Magnificent bearing. Here — look at the chart. Don't be damn stupid, this is my own chart; the Germans think they know the coast, but this is my own and not even the Admiralty knows. Captain Williams! Bah, that chartman! I know Captain Williams. Farilhao Point… must make southing tonight or else we'll beat against the inshore current all day to-morrow… "

  For hours the old man had been rambling. I sat by the bedside of my grandfather, old Captain Peace, who was indeed making his last
landfall the hard way. Doctor Chelvers had told me when I arrived from London the previous night that by rights the old captain should have been dead days ago. Coronary thrombosis, not a stroke. But he was fighting it out to the last, although he had made his number to Lloyds.

  I sat in the quiet room and listened to the old sailorman's phrases of the sea, in sharp contrast to the lovely Exe Valley, where everything was of that tender young green which one sees nowhere in the world except England, and nowhere lovelier in England than the Exe Valley.

  Doctor Chelvers had said that morning that it might only be a matter of hours before old Captain Peace died, or it might be days. I looked at the weather-beaten face against the pillows, and thought of Trout and what was waiting for her. No peaceful sick-bed at the last for me! A sharp rattle from a depth-charge, or more likely the quiet, lethal whisper of a torpedo screw in the hydrophone operator's ears coming nearer… nearer… nearer…

  London had been a failure. I had taken my chief's advice and tried to get drunk. I had given it up in disgust. Somewhere in the club had been that Intelligence man, but I never saw him. I had rung Wendy with the firm intention of spending one last night with her. Half-way there the air raid sirens went and the mood of depression became so strong that I never got as far as her flat. The thought of the sheer hopelessness of it all overwhelmed me. The absolute secrecy was a further burden. The prospects if the Germans made use of their frightful new weapon in the Atlantic, as they were bound to when NP I. returned from her successful cruise, were appalling. I decided to get out of London and see old Captain Peace before he died. The sight of the old sailor dying so manfully, with a flood of nautical phrases and oaths on his lips, affected me more even than unburdening my secret would have done. The old captain had been delirious off and on since my arrival the previous night. Now the salt of a sea life blew like spindrift through the sickroom.