“Starboard twenty.”
“Starboard twenty, sir.” Light flashed on the wheel’s spokes as Creagh spun it. The rhythmic thrashing of the Italian’s screws had begun to fade. The best the destroyer captain could have done would have been to centre his pattern of depthcharges at the point where he’d passed over them; to do better, he should have crossed the submarine’s track just a little way ahead of her. Italian depthcharge patterns consisted sometimes of nine charges, but more usually of five, arranged in a diamond formation. A destroyer made the diamond by first dropping a charge from her stern rack—to make the lower point of the pattern—and simultaneously firing a charge out on each side from the throwers. Because of the ship’s forward motion these two were flung ahead as well as outward, and fell to make the diamond’s outer points; just as they hit the water the ship would drop another from her stem, midway between them and filling in the centre of the pattern. Then, a short way on, the final charge would roll out of the stern rack.
Ruck pushed himself off the ladder, where he’d been reclining.
“Midships. Steer—”
Exploding depthcharges interrupted him. One on its own first, somewhere overhead; then two more. Those two had been a bit closer. Now the fourth and fifth.
“Wheel’s amidships, sir.”
“Starboard twenty.”
The ship’s head was on about 180 degrees, due south, but he was taking her on round. He added, having thought about it, “Two-fifty feet.”
“Two hundred and fifty, sir.”
Spiralling downward to the right …
Newton reported—he had the headset on his ears again—”HE fading on green one hundred. No contact, sir.”
“Where’s the other?”
“Turbine HE on red eight-oh, sir.”
Paul leaned against the end of the chart table. Shaw, in the wardroom, was reading a copy of Good Morning. It was a paper produced by the Daily Mirror and issued gratis to submarines; the copies were numbered instead of dated, and the contents included photos and items about submariners on leave, or getting married, and general entertainment more than news. An important ingredient was the “Jane” strip cartoon: accent on strip.
“Red two-oh—in contact, sir. Red two-four—two-eight—”
“All right.”
The other one, roughly astern now as Ultra circled, would take its turn to attack this time, while the previous attacker held the contact. When a destroyer passed over it lost contact, but when a pair worked together like this there was always one to hold it.
“Midships.” Ruck padded across to glance over Creagh’s shoulder. “Steer three-one-oh.”
“Steer three-one-oh, sir. Wheel’s amidships, sir.”
“Two-fifty feet, sir.”Wykeham was still working at the trim, though, pumping water ballast out of her midships trim-tank to allow for the increased depth, the extra weight it gave her. He was passing his orders, over the electric telegraph just above the planesmen’s heads, to a torpe-doman squatting in a cramped, damp space in the bilges of the torpedo-stowage compartment up for’ard. Each time the pump was started it made a noise that would be detectable on asdics: in fact an expert listener might be able to guess from that sound that the target submarine was changing depth.
With luck, the Italian operators up there might not be all that clever or experienced.
“One in contact red two-oh, sir. One astern—attacking, sir …”
McClure nudged Paul’s arm. Just for a game of noughts and crosses … This was the trouble—having nothing at all to do except stand around and listen, wait … He took the pencil, and put a cross in the middle.
“Starboard fifteen.”
“Starboard fifteen, sir. Fifteen of starboard wheel on, sir …”
Screws approaching; then churning over. One Italian, eighty yards overhead … “Group up, full ahead together!”
Accelerating away from the patch of sea in which, in about half a minute, charges would be bursting. Ultra trembled as her motors speeded and her screws thrust her forward.
Maybe you didn’t need to volunteer, to become the one Everard out of three …
“Steer three-six-oh.”
“Three-six-oh, sir …”
The sea erupted, thundering—above them and astern. Shock-waves pummelling the hull were like the buffeting of a rough sea. Echoes fading: and the last charge of that pattern was the closest.
“Group down. Slow ahead together.”
It was surprising to remember that it was dark up there on the surface. Here in the submarine things were the same by day or night, once she was below periscope depth. Up top, after each attack the Italians would be straining their eyes through binoculars and imagining every shadow or hump of water to be a submarine rising helplessly to the surface.
Reassembling the picture now … Sweat on Newton’s goofy face as he slid the earphones on and gave Ruck news of the Italians’ current positions and activities. Ultra meanwhile motoring slowly northward— like a mouse resuming its crawl for safety after each mauling by the cats. Ruck explained to Wykeham quietly, “I’ve let them see us working our way around to north, and I’ll hold this course through one more attack. With any luck the Wops’ll have it in their heads that north is the way we want to run. The attack after next, all things being equal, we’ll try to lose them with a smart about-turn.”
Wykeham nodded. The explanation could only have been for his sake, part of his education.
McClure told Paul, “Your go.”
“Why don’t you get a chess set?”
“Or have a billiard room built on?”
They’d agreed to play five games, and McClure had won the first two. Paul made sure of losing again. He handed the pencil back, and turned away: with Ruck’s qualifying phrase All things being equal ringing in his head.
“Attacking, sir …”
Eyes glancing upwards: which was pointless, but natural. Asdic pings were clearly audible: that hateful fingering on her hull. This attack was coming in from astern again; the other destroyer, holding them in contact, was out on the port bow, northwestward. In that one they’d be preparing for the next attack: hoisting another pair of depthcharges into the throwers, and perhaps resetting the depth on the pistols to try their luck at another level.
Screws thrashing up from astern. Newton’s head nodding to the rhythm as he counted revs. His eyes half-closed, expression dreamy, face gleaming in its coating of sweat.
Coming, coming …
“Stop together. Group up.”
Ruck listened intently, judging his moment as the sound of the enemy propellers rose to about its peak.
“Main motors grouped up, sir!”
“Full ahead together!”
No rudder, this time, no change of course. Just the burst of speed: as if the mouse was pointing at its hole now and wasn’t going to let itself be turned aside.
The first charge was a close one—to port, really quite close, its blast rolling the boat the other way. Cork chips scattered down from the deck-head paintwork … Paul had gone skidding to fetch up hard against the other side of the gangway; CERA Pool had been careless too, forgetting to hold on to something: he’d bounced off the cage which held electrical gear opposite the W/T office. Ruck was holding on, to the ladder. That had been only the first charge of the pattern: it had been closer and obviously set deeper than the previous ones, and there were another four to come—in this helping.
Ruck began, “We’ll be away—”
Three explosions to port, farther off.
He finished, “—from these bastards in a minute or two … Group down, slow ahead together.”
Fourth charge: it was the least dangerous of the pattern. From the Italians’ angle that had been a badly executed attack: only the first depth-charge had been close and the rest had gone wide. The destroyer couldn’t have passed directly overhead; it had sounded as if it had been right up there, but when the propeller-noise was loud you tended to imagine it was closer than per
haps it was. In fact he must have been off beam to port, and overshot a little.
But by so small a margin. Just that small calculation or miscalculation made the difference between killing and not killing—between another square on the flotilla scoreboard being neatly illustrated or crossed off with bare diagonals. But the first charge of that pattern had been a frightener. It was comparative, though, Paul realized: any exploding charge would worry you, until you’d heard closer ones and survived them. Maybe they’d have some much closer than that, before much longer.
“Both motors slow ahead grouped down, sir.”
“Very good.” Ruck emerged from a period of thought; he nodded to himself, confirming the decision before he gave the order.
“One hundred and fifty feet.”
“Hundred and fifty, sir …”
Gambling on charges being set to explode deeper now, as the last lot had been. There was no guarantee of it: he could be taking her up to exactly the depth for which the next pattern was being set. Ultra could be rising gently now into the centre of her own destruction … Decreed by fate how long ago? When she’d been no more than a set of plans delivered to a builders’ yard? And taking that fantasy on further, as each man had received his appointment or draft to her, had fate thrown his card on to the pile of discards too?
“One destroyer stopped. Right ahead … In contact, sir. The other’s— on red four-oh, sir, closing.” Listening to the underwater world, the deep black night-time water and the hunters in it: narrow head seemingly squeezed in by the headset clamped on it. A forefinger touching each eyelid in turn, delicately removing sweat. “Red four-two, attacking, sir!”
The needle in the only depthgauge that hadn’t been shut off was swinging up past one-seventy. Wykeham using the order instrument, the electric telegraph, to have ballast flooded into the midships trimming tank. The torpedoman in the TSC bilge didn’t have to use the pump for this: he had only to open certain valves to let sea flow in along a pipe known as the trimline.
Hundred and sixty feet. Wykeham reached up again and turned the switch so that the order in the little box became “stop flooding.” The planesmen eased the angles of their hydroplanes to level her as she came to the ordered depth.
“Hundred and fifty feet, sir.”
Ruck nodded, listening to the Italian destroyer, her pounding propellers just audible now, the sound coming from just for’ard of the port beam. After the demonstrations he’d been giving them, that routine of speeding up just as the attacker came over, they might have become well trained enough to aim ahead this time—expecting the submarine to crack on speed, rush into the maelstrom of their depthcharges.
Louder than before. But at this depth, Paul realized, it would be … Newton took the phones off his ears and told Ruck, “Drawing right, sir.”
To pass ahead …
“Group up, full ahead together!”
Power shook her as the note of the motors rose, matching the overhead crescendo of Italian screws.
All eyes on Ruck …
“Stop starboard. Starboard twenty.” “Stop starboard, sir …”
“Starboard twenty.” Creagh flung his wheel round. “Twenty of starboard wheel on, sir!”
With that screw stopped and a lot of rudder, she was already turning fast. Enemy propellers fading over. Dive-angle on the fore planes as Lovesay worked to counter the bow’s tendency to lift as she swung round.
“Steer one-eight-oh.”
Explosions to port—and deep …
“Stop port. Group down.”
Ultra’s bow was swinging through east as more charges burst on the quarter and below her. She was turning her stern to an erupting sea in which the Italians would be expecting her to be suffering agonies at this moment.
“Main motors grouped down, sir.”
“Slow ahead port.”
The last explosion was almost directly astern. Ruck’s hunch about the change of depth had been exactly right. Paul thought, No such thing as fate …
Too soon to count chickens, though.
“Course one-eight-oh, sir.”
“Where are they, Newton?”
“Both astern, sir.” Listening, frowning in concentration, breathing faster than usual; and Ruck watching him, impatient for news. Newton glanced up, blinking. “Both of ‘em’s back there astern, sir, both transmitting. Trying to pick us up again, sir.”
They might even imagine they’d sunk her.
Ruck nodded. Running wet with sweat, Paul saw. The cold prick of it over his own skin too: until this moment, he hadn’t noticed it. Ultra silent, holding her breath as she crept south.
During the next few days’ uneventful dived patrol—Ultra motoring slowly up and down a northeast-southwest patrol-line between ten and fifteen miles from Tripoli by day and moving farther out for the battery-charge at night—Paul found himself thinking quite a lot about that brush with the Italian destroyers.
Ruck had got them out of it: his dodge had worked, and the Italians had been left hunting northward while Ultra escaped south. In fact she’d surfaced again at about 0400, for a final hour’s charging before daylight put her down again.
But what if it hadn’t worked? What if the Italian senior officer had been smart enough to guess that he was being led to think in a certain way? If he’d followed his own ideas instead of the ones Ruck had fed him? If, instead of the last report Both of ‘em’s back there astern, sir, Newton had had to tell him Closing, sir, in contact …
How bad would it have felt, the shock of that disappointment?
Well, Ruck would have tried again. Another ploy, a new sequence of three-dimensional manoeuvres, while attacks continued. And—quote—all things being equal—unquote—he’d eventually have brought the new plan to a similarly climactic stage, the point where he’d again have been making his decisive move.
And—if that one failed?
In contact, sir, attacking …
The only answer was not to think about it: simply to control the imagination and tell yourself that Ruck had got her out of it that time, and would get her out of it next time too.
There wasn’t any other answer.
CHAPTER EIGHT
A quiet smoke now, he decided: one cigarette and a few minutes’ solitude before turning in. A few minutes in which to forget Falmouth and St Nazaire and think about Fiona … He’d stopped at the guardrail, to look out over the placid harbour with its glimmering reflections of stars: it was a very spring-like night, the air decidedly cool but holding the promise of warmer days and nights to come. It was in your mind, most of it, the way you felt, always had felt, right from childhood, at this time of year. But that wasn’t—as he’d assumed, without giving it any thought—someone’s wireless playing, it was music and voices, laughter, from the E-boat down there alongside. With an unlit cigarette in his mouth, lighter in hand, Jack looked down at the slim, ninety-three-foot-long shape of the German boat, and realized that Sharp had female company aboard her.
He checked the time. Nine-forty. He’d just returned from spending the earlier part of the evening aboard Atherstone, the Hunt-class destroyer in which the naval force commander was living; she’d be one of the escorting warships when the force sailed, in a few days’ time … He’d come back to get an early night—the rigorous commando physical-fitness programme wasn’t geared to late ones. But—nine-forty, and the Wrens were supposed to be tucked up in their Wrenneries by ten. They could only be Wrens, he guessed. Unless Sharp had gone really mad … He slid the cigarette back into his case and pocketed it as he walked aft, towards the plank connecting the two ships.
Whoever the girls were, Sharp ought not to have been entertaining them on board. Security regulations were strict, with good reason, and there were clues in Sauerkraut that might be noticed by people with sharp eyes and inquisitive minds. Which was a description that fitted every woman he’d ever met … Things like small arms and ammunition and other equipment more obviously suited to commando-type operations than anti-su
bmarine work. All right, so the Wrens weren’t likely to be spies, but they were capable of chattering, and the chatter could be heard by the wrong ears. What was more, Sharp did know now where they were going and what for, because on Sunday, yesterday, the naval force commander had briefed all ships’ COs and first lieutenants. Who could be sure that the eccentric Tubby Sharp mightn’t be talkative when in his cups and provided with an audience of girls?
The E-boat’s sentry rose from her dark bridge to challenge him as he crossed the plank. Then, seeing who it was, he upended his rifle and saluted. Jack returned it.
“Party going on?”
“Bit of a one, sir, sounds like.”
“Thought I’d join it.”
“You know your way, sir.”
It was a sort of joke. Knowing that Jack and the rest of the team could have found their way to any square inch of this craft in pitch darkness. Jack climbed into the bridge, and went down inside.
“Hey, look who’s here!”
Light was blinding for a moment: he pushed the door shut behind him. The little wardroom space was crowded: with Sharp, and his Canadian first lieutenant, Dixon, and young Bellamy still with one arm in a sling, and the little Wren who knew Paul, and a blonde a couple of years older. They were all laughing and jabbering at him: Sharp offering him a drink, a cigarette, a space at the table …
He lit the cigarette, then told Sharp—exaggerating, in order to make the point—”I heard this going on from up by the ML berths. Sorry, but I’ve come to tell you to pack it in.”
Cries of dismay from the girls. Hostility from Sharp. Jack showed the blonde the face of his watch. “Don’t you have to be in by ten? Or do you have late passes?”
“No—”
“What were you going to do, run all the way home?”
The blonde, whose name was Maureen, said she hadn’t dreamt it could be that late … Sharp wanted them to have one more for the plank. Jack told him, “You’d only land them in trouble, Tubby.” He asked Bellamy, “Did you bring them down?”
“Yes.” Bellamy added, “Sir.” And—”I didn’t see there could be any harm in just—”
A Share of Honour: The Nicholas Everard World War II Saga Book 4 Page 19