Joan and Laura. The second his ideal (he now admitted this to himself), but for a hundred reasons forever unattainable. The other real, warm flesh and blood, greatly giving, yet somehow soiled by the war that had blemished him too. They also were flotsam among the jetsam of the world, drifting helplessly down the path fate had allotted to them. Just as he was.
Eel dipped gently in the slowly rolling sea, speeding forward into the darkness. Destination: the coast of China, her four diesel engines roaring at flank speed, carrying fate within her bowels. But fate, real enough in so many ways, had little to do with the two torpedoes she had remaining of her original armament.
Deep under the surface of the Yellow Sea, a single shielded light had burned long in an otherwise darkened compartment. Two men had sat hunched in their seats, the corner of the table between them, staring at the chart spread upon it, measuring distances and dimensions with navigator’s dividers, studying every feature. Committing it to memory, as though it had not been before them nearly every night, in one form or another. Conversation was low, sparse, and in quiet tones. It would not be right to awaken those who needed their rest. It was against the unspoken code of the combat submariner to disturb anyone’s sleep except to call him for a watch, or because of some emergency. But this was not the reason for the deep quiet in which Keith and Richardson had conducted their private conference.
Elsewhere in the submarine, the regular ordered bustle of one-third of the crew standing watch prevailed as usual. The men on telephone watch in each torpedo room; the enginerooms with their great, indomitable diesels; the electrician’s mates with their extraordinary, complex, switching cubicles; the cooks in their tiny, efficient galley; the quiet, methodical nerve center in the control room; the silent, ominous conning tower. Here, in the empty wardroom, with the others busy elsewhere or snatching a few hours’ rest in their bunks against the next day’s trials, skipper and exec spoke in lower than normal voices in intuitive recognition that they were planning to force action upon another man, and the eighty men of his crew, whom the fortunes of war had placed temporarily under their control.
Whitey would not run his ship close in to shore. He could be efficient only where he had sufficient depth of water to be comfortable, though no submariner could really be comfortable in the Yellow Sea. But he would not run into shallow water. Yet the coastline of China, particularly in the area around Tsingtao, was virtually all shallow water. And it went without saying that the enemy ships were choosing the shallowest water of all, barely deep enough to avoid running aground in the ageless muck the rivers of China had been carrying down since the beginning of history.
It was up to Richardson to bring the Whitefish into combat, to pass the rapier of action from his own spent hand to that of Whitey Everett, and, in the name of Blunt, cause Whitey to fulfill the mission on which so much depended.
-10-
The United States Ship Eel lay to quietly off Tsingtao. Her diesels were silent, their customary mutter stilled. Less than a mile away to starboard, the bulky outline of land brooded over the placid water. There was no moon. Darkness was complete. The only sense that could really be said to be receiving stimulation was the sense of smell. Reaching across a small stretch of shallow water, permeating everything, was the sweet-sour odor of land. It was the same smell so frequently referred to as “the smell of the sea,” but the seaman knows it as the smell where sea and land join.
Below decks, the highly structured life of a submarine on war patrol in enemy-controlled waters was going on as usual, except for one important difference—an extreme, unnatural quietness. Only the absolutely necessary machinery was running: the ventilation blowers and the air-conditioning sets. In every compartment men went about their routine duties with a special softness about all their movements. Some had removed their shoes. All were walking about very quietly, avoiding all unnecessary noise, speaking to each other in low, somber tones. What work was necessary was performed slowly, carefully. Tools involved were carefully wrapped in rags, so that there would be no inadvertent noise of the striking of steel upon steel to be transmitted through the hull to the water and to unfriendly ears.
It would not be correct to infer that Eel’s crew was at battle stations, for no such signal had been given. In fact, it had been announced that the general alarm would not be rung. If needed, the call to action would be transmitted by telephone to all compartments. Everyone was enjoined to remain in the vicinity of his battle station—not a difficult order to comply with in view of the submarine custom of doing this without orders when action was believed imminent. Even those on watch, required by the ship’s organization to tend certain machinery or remain in certain areas, were, by Keith’s careful design, on their battle stations as well.
On the bridge the silence was oppressive. There was almost a crowd there, for in addition to the regular watch, consisting of Buck Williams, Scott, four lookouts, and Ensign Johnny Cargill, assistant OOD, there were also the executive officer, the captain, and the wolfpack commander. All kept their binoculars ceaselessly to their eyes, and each, had he been asked, would have confessed nervousness over the excruciatingly loud hum of the few pieces of machinery still running. Surely this could be heard many yards away, perhaps as far as several hundred yards! It could awake a trained ear to the fact that the unusual silhouette floating so quietly in the shallows was actually the upper part of a nearly submerged submarine, full of tense, foreign-looking men.
Eel had been trimmed so that her main deck was virtually at the water’s edge. Anyone approaching from a little distance would see only the submarine’s bridge, dominated by the closely spaced periscope supports and, lower down, apparently standing in the water, two bulky structures from each of which protruded a stubby, evil-looking gun barrel. The submarine’s main deck, 300 feet of it lying flat on the water, would not be visible until one came right upon it. The only evidence of its presence would be a strange continuity of flatness superimposed on the gently undulating, uneasy sea.
Two vitally important objects had been achieved by flooding down. First was a great reduction in silhouette, a change in the entire outward configuration of the ship. The second was that should Eel unexpectedly drift upon a mud flat, it would be a simple matter, by blowing tanks, to decrease her draft as much as six feet aft and ten feet forward, thus freeing her of the bottom and permitting her to be driven immediately into deeper water without even the necessity of starting engines. The instant power of her batteries, always available, was something no surface ship could match.
It was 1 o’clock in the morning of a moonless night, and the Yellow Sea was overcast with its customary haze. Eel had surfaced close in to shore and crammed a rapid charge into her batteries. Then, with every sense alert, the fathometer taking occasional “single ping” soundings of the bottom, she had slowly moved in to shallow water. Conversation on the bridge was desultory, in low voices clipped short, as though someone might hear them from the shore if they talked too loudly or too long.
“This is the third night in a row we’ve been here. I wonder what’s holding up those transports?”
“Maybe the Kwantung Army is slower embarking its troops than ComSubPac figures. They must be bringing a lot of equipment with them.”
“Maybe they know we’re here. Maybe they mean to wait till we have to leave station.”
“Then they’ll have a long wait, Commodore. The second message said to remain here until further orders, or until the ships come out. Before we left Pearl, Admiral Small told us this was the main reason for the wolfpack. It’s up to us to stop them, no matter how long we have to stay. If we need to, we can stretch our provisions for another month.”
Blunt, Leone, and Richardson had congregated by themselves around the starboard TBT, were leaning their elbows on the bridge bulwarks, holding their binoculars to their eyes, speaking softly so their voices would not carry to the others on the bridge. Williams and Scott, sensing their exclusion, had taken the other corner, near the port T
BT. The lookouts, several feet above on their platforms, were likewise out of earshot.
“Dammit, Rich, I shouldn’t have let you shoot off all your fish the way you did. Those two you have left aft aren’t enough for this sort of a donnybrook!”
“When he briefed us, the admiral didn’t know when the Kwantung Army would move these divisions, or even if they would at all. This is the first word about them he’s sent us, and we’re the only U.S. forces within five hundred miles. There’s twelve torpedoes between us and the Whitefish, and he expects us to make good use of them.” Richardson’s reply was direct because the whole topic had already been covered in detail.
“A week ago the radio skeds had a message saying the Sawfish and Piper were en route to patrol stations off Iwo Jima,” said Keith, “and the Pike and Whale are off Okinawa. They’re the nearest boats.”
“That’s right, Commodore, and that makes four new patrol stations ComSubPac has to fill. That could be why he never sent a replacement for Chicolar.” It was perhaps unnecessary to bring up the lost submarine again, but Blunt must be headed off before he suddenly reversed his previous approval of Richardson’s scheme.
He wondered whether the latest message also might have been originated by Joan—most likely by the entire team of which Mrs. Elliott and Cordelia Wood were also a part. The essential data must have been translated from intercepted Japanese messages. He also puzzled why the transports intended to exit Tsingtao during darkness; this was directly contrary to the habit of years. Ordinarily Japanese convoys sortied from harbor during daylight, when any submarines blockading the port would have to be submerged and could be immobilized by aircraft and antisub craft. The only explanation must be that this particular convoy, because of its enormous value, intended to change the pattern. Obviously it wished to get well clear of the harbor before dawn, before a ubiquitous Chinese coast watcher could report it. At top speed, the Yellow Sea could be crossed in less than twenty-four hours, involving a single daylight period. A high-speed run, begun an hour before daybreak, would bring the ships to the sheltered coast of Korea shortly after nightfall. Only one day would be spent exposed to submarines submerged in the middle of the sea; with any luck at all, none would have been able to position themselves in their path.
Unfortunately, there had been no information as to which direction the ships would go once they left Tsingtao. Rich and Keith had theorized that they would turn sharply left and proceed to the northeast along the coast of the Shantung Peninsula. At dawn, they argued, the Japanese would turn east or even southeast. Remaining close to the shore line would render them immune to radar detection from any submarine patrolling off the harbor entrance and thus prevent, or reduce, the opportunity for such a sub to position itself along their daylight track later on.
But there was no assurance this was correct. The convoy might head directly east upon clearing the harbor—this was, after all, the quickest way across the Yellow Sea. If so, they would be detected by Whitey Everett’s surface search radar as soon as the ships were clear from land return. From his patrol station seven miles out, Whitey would have the option of making a night surface attack or following them from ahead to attack submerged after daybreak.
Eel’s inshore position had been chosen because she was virtually out of torpedoes. Unable directly to damage the enemy, she could at least track them, so stationing herself that the large troop ships, drawing twenty-five feet or more, would have to pass to seaward of her. With land only a mile away, no enemy radar could detect Eel against the clutter. The convoy’s escorts logically would patrol on its seaward side during this initial phase of the passage.
Eel’s presence very close to shore would be least anticipated by the enemy, and at the same time safest from detection. But Richardson could not help noticing his own quickened pulse, and he knew his must not be the only one. A submarine’s sole protection—her entire capability of surviving in enemy waters—was her ability to dive when detected or attacked. This he had given up. More, he had argued the wolfpack commander into reluctant acquiescence. Were his calculations to be wrong, were his estimate of enemy intentions and capabilities incorrect, Eel might be caught on the surface with no way out except a running gun battle while she dashed for deep water.
This was the reason for preparing the forty-millimeter guns for action, and for the warning given to the rest of the ship’s company. The bridge twenty-millimeters and fifty-caliber machine guns also had been rousted out of their stowages and mounted. Ammunition for all guns had been brought up and placed in readiness near each.
Below, ammunition for both five-inch guns had been taken out of the magazines and laid out on deck in the crew’s dinette and in the control room under the gun access trunk. The two men detailed to the fifty-caliber machine gun from the forward torpedo room hatch were standing by, probably sitting on a bunk immediately beneath the lower trunk hatch. A third man with a telephone plugged into a phone jack inside the trunk—its wire led upward past the lower hatch—would be waiting with them. On orders from the bridge, all three would enter the trunk, pull up the loop of the telephone wire, and shut the lower hatch. On further orders they would fling open the top hatch and open fire in any ordered direction except astern. They had, however, been rigorously briefed that they were not to open the hatch until direct orders had been received from the bridge, which would not be given if an immediate dash toward deeper water was contemplated. In Eel’s present condition, even with bow planes rigged out and given a slight upward inclination, there was still entirely too much chance that a burst of speed might drive the submarine’s bow under.
Time was passing extraordinarily slowly, thought Richardson, for the third day in a row and the tenth time this particular night. As 2 o’clock approached, another fruitless vigil was becoming increasingly probable. Blunt had gone below. He, at least, was now sleeping regularly. Strange; his hypertension had been replaced by the opposite: almost a lethargy. After a while Richardson had sent Keith down also to try to get some rest. Morning twilight would begin about 6 o’clock. It was approximately an hour’s run at high speed to seaward to reach water deep enough for diving. To allow a little margin, it had been decided to move out at 4:30, shortly after the change of the watch section.
If Japanese ships came out of harbor and turned up the coast line, as appeared their most likely course, it would be Eel’s duty to provide sufficient information to permit Whitefish to parallel the Japanese ships from off shore, in deep water. When they turned to the east or southeast, as ultimately they would have to do, Whitefish would have been positioned to the best possible advantage for a submerged attack at daylight.
It had taken a great deal of persuasion to cause Captain Blunt to believe that he had given the final approval and the implementing order. Much effort had been expended in planting the idea and disposing of all others. The clinching argument, as it turned out, concerned the idea that Eel, with only two torpedoes remaining, both of them aft, might possibly be directed to return to base. In view of this, Richardson suggested, Blunt might consider shifting over to the Whitefish. As wolfpack commander, with primary responsibility for the blockade of Tsingtao, he would of course wish to remain on the scene. The idea agitated Blunt, as Rich knew it would, and he vehemently refused to consider it. He also refused to entertain the proposal which Buck Williams, by prearrangement, then put forward: that the two submarines rendezvous and transfer some of Whitefish’s torpedoes to Eel. The maneuver would of course require opening deck hatches, rigging booms, laboriously hoisting torpedoes out of Whitefish, dropping them in the water and then hoisting them aboard Eel. As Buck pointed out, the operation had been carried out innumerable times in peacetime exercises, and both Whitefish and Eel had the necessary equipment.
But it had never been done under wartime conditions, for a boat caught by aircraft with hatches open would be unable to submerge. Blunt had vetoed it on this ground, and also—Richardson had to admit this argument had some validity—that to deprive Whitey Ever
ett of some of his ten torpedoes remaining would leave him also with empty torpedo tubes should he need to defend himself against antisubmarine craft.
The impasse had the effect of submerging the primary issue under two others of lesser substance. By the time the manner of Eel’s employment came under discussion, Blunt interposed little further objection. After that it was only a matter of preventing him from again dwelling on his flagship’s apparently vulnerable position.
“Permission to come on the bridge to relieve a lookout?” Every fifteen minutes one of the lookouts was relieved to go below to warm himself, drink a cup of coffee, and do a stint as a control-room messenger. This meant it must now be fifteen minutes after two.
For the past forty-five seconds Rich had been staring through his binoculars at the shadowy promontory which marked the entrance to the bay of Tsingtao. He opened his eyes wider, tried to will his pupils to expand even farther. Something had excited his interest in the shadows to the west. He tried all the tricks he had practiced since his first night watch, years ago, on the bridge of the Octopus: looking above the shadowy outline of the land, looking below it, swinging his glasses gently back and forth so as to notice any unusual discontinuity.
“Buck,” he said, “take a look over here on the starboard bow, just to the left of that point of land!” The point of land to which he referred was nearly invisible—it was the near side of the entrance to the bay—but for three days of periscope observation close in, and night surface operations closer yet, it had been one of their principal points of reference.
“I’m looking at it, Captain,” said Williams. “What do you see?”
“Don’t know. Nothing, maybe.”
“Me too. It’s awful dark over there.” Abruptly Williams thrust his head beneath the bridge overhang, extended it over the hatch to the conning tower. He spoke in a low, carrying tone, suited to the muted situation into which they had placed themselves. “Radar, take a real good check at the harbor entrance. Do you see anything moving?”
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