Submariner (2008)

by Fullerton, Alexander

  175 degrees it was. Setting out on the one-night return trip with approximately twelve miles between oneself and Unsung, and she according to the orders steering 185: about twelve miles between them,plus the ten-degree rate of further separation. Good enough if Melhuish had recovered his commandos and was pushing it along. The importance of Unsung completing her pickup on schedule was that if for instance that team didn’t make it until say 0400, with moonrise about 0430 and sunrise half an hour after, there wouldn’t be a lot of time to spare, and you could bet there would be A/S forces off this coast tonight. He left Danvers with the watch, and went on down. Blue watch on now,Tubby Hart again in charge in the control room. Mike told him, ‘You and your party did a needle job up there, Second.’

  ‘Turned out all right, sir, didn’t it. An’ seems they done that airfield a fair treat!’

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘What they’re saying, sir.’

  ‘Well, is it.’ He went on through to the wardroom, thinking about the signal he had to send Shrimp now, and wondering whether the convoy had got through, or was getting through. According to Lazenby there’d been surprisingly little signal traffic. He asked McLeod, ‘What about the damaged one?’

  ‘Nasty-looking head-wound. Bullet or shrapnel, Cox’n isn’t sure, but he must have done himself further damage on the casing. He was mobile, apparently, didn’t want them carrying him.’

  ‘But paddling?’

  ‘I know, sir. Amazing. Marine Newton. Cox’n’s got him in the POs’ mess. Gant’s there too, sir.’

  ‘Right.’ Looking at Jarvis, who was smoking on his bunk. ‘You all right, Sub?’

  ‘Right as rain, sir, except for a few bruises.’

  ‘You did a good job.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. Damn shame, the Major –’

  ‘Yes.’ He went for’ard, to the Leading Hands’ and POs’ mess, which had been evacuated by its usual inhabitants. Marine Newton was unconscious on the after thwartships bunk with his head parcelled in bandages, not much face visible, and a blanket over him; Cox’n in attendance, also Colour-Sergeant Gant and the two corporals.

  ‘Been able to do anything for him, Cox’n?’

  There was a general shifting around, letting him in from the gangway. Swathely, who as cox’n was keeper of the boat’s medical stores and had done a course of doctoring, was saying, ‘Did like for other wounds – cleaned it, then this new stuff. But I don’t know … Be in about sunset, will we, sir?’

  ‘Better than that – afternoon or first dog, I hope. Battery’s low, unfortunately. I’ll ask for an ambulance to meet us. I’ve a signal to make to S.10 before we dive – and that’s something else, Gant, they’ll be wanting to know how it went at Comiso – short answer, success or failure?’

  ‘As near success as in your right mind you’d hope for, sir. Except for losing the Major.’

  ‘Was he shot, or –’

  ‘Yeah.’ A nod. ‘He –’

  ‘But hold on – aircraft destroyed – rough idea how many, what kind?’

  ‘Better ’n we ever done, sir. 88s, mostly – couple o’ dozen, could be – 87s too. Maybe a third of what there was – and a field generator blown up – the Major done that right at the start, put the lights out for us. Then a fuel store – my aunt, didn’t it go up!’

  ‘Object of the operation achieved, might say?’

  ‘Could say we wrecked the field, sir.’

  ‘What I will say, then. Congratulations!’

  Although no one seemed to be smiling much. On account of Ormrod, he supposed. Gant adding at that moment, ‘Fact is, sir, it was Major Ormrod’s plan, start to finish, he’d worked it up to really something. It and us, to put it square and honest.’

  ‘Well – he’d have been proud of you, too. Tell me though – the disengagement, early hours Monday – did the RAF come up to scratch?’

  ‘We had ’em dropping shit on us an hour or more. Good old ruckus, and they timed it right. Yeah, took the pressure off of us, like he’d wanted.’

  ‘We didn’t hear any going over, but they were taking a roundabout route, weren’t they – so one didn’t know. He’d have been glad that came off.’ To Swathely – change of subject – ‘Breakfast after we’ve dived, Cox’n – all right?’

  ‘Good and ready for it by then, sir, speaking personal.’ A glance down at his patient. ‘Be comfier for this lad once we’re under.’ A nod to Gant: ‘Heads down until lunch then, eh?’

  Mike went back aft, looking forward to getting his own down before long. After breakfast, yes – go deep, sleep like a dog, with any luck dream of Abbie … In the wardroom, McLeod had fallen asleep over his thriller and Jarvis was flat out, snarling rhythmically. Mike sat down with a signal-pad and pencil to note down items to be conveyed to Shrimp by W/T. Ursa’s diving position at five,and her ETA Malta – before sunset anyway. Comiso airfield reported wrecked, fuel store and numerous Ju 87s and 88s destroyed. Major Ormrod and Marine Denneker killed,remainder on board including Marine Newton unconscious with head wound,hospitalisation urgent on arrival.

  That would about do it, he thought. Abbie would be happy too – he’d promised her no longer than a week, and it would have been five days. In fact he’d told her a week thinking that with luck they’d do it in five days, but in the knowledge that if Ormrod and his team didn’t make the first RV there’d have been another in the same place twenty-four hours later; and the seven-day forecast would have covered that.

  It was pretty good, in fact, to be on the way back to her, having concluded this business that had had to be seen to first, and which incidentally had been his last patrol – he was clear of all that now – that was it, clear of just about everything except Abbie and the way he and she felt about each other.

  Goofing at his notes, realising it wasn’t a feeling he’d had before.

  ‘Uh?’

  ‘Sorry, sir – clumsy – woke you –’

  ‘Wasn’t actually asleep. Putting this together for Shrimp. Our ETA plus glad tidings of Comiso.’

  ‘The buzz was right then, sir, they made a job of it?’

  ‘Did indeed. Except for losing Ormrod. Successful action attributed incidentally by Colour-Sergeant Gant entirely to his – Ormrod’s – planning and leadership.’

  ‘Decent of him.’

  ‘Yes. Epitaph, might say.’

  Abbie was still in his head, though. Get back to her in a minute, with luck. He’d heard McLeod say he only hoped it had gone well for the convoy, adding after a moment, ‘Might get in half an hour’s bunk-time before my watch.’

  ‘Good idea. Shake me before you go up.’

  He’d been sound asleep but the dream had been of Ann. He didn’t remember much about it except that she’d been making plans for his return, which he’d found exciting, and now of course embarrassing. Well – dreams … He turned out immediately for fear of dropping off again: time now 0415, moonrise 0435 – whether or not cloud-cover let any of it through – and anyway he was going to dive on the watch at 0500. On the watch again in preference to sending the hands to diving stations or breaking eardrums with the klaxon when those poor bastards were getting their first sleep in four days. Which sounded impossible – he guessed they’d surely have cat-napped in their hide. Also they’d had Benzedrine. Although actually, he thought, it was astonishing what they’d achieved and come out of – most of them …

  Three-quarters dark in the wardroom now, with the gangway curtain drawn and no white lights, only one red bulb in the lamp above the table, for the sake of one’s night vision. Which admittedly he’d be setting back now by visiting the wireless office – where Telegraphist Martin, the younger of Lazenby’s two operators, confirmed that the signal to S.10 had been acknowledged. Less good was that nothing had come in. He’d hoped Shrimp might have had news to give him of the convoy, and that Melhuish, to whom he’d repeated his own signal (as well as to Vice-Admiral Malta,Commander-in-Chief Mediterranean, and Admiralty) might have come up with something. Such as whe
re he was, his damned ETA – even how Flood’s commandos had done at Gela. But with not a peep out of her, one could only assume that he was where he was supposed to be – twelve-plus miles west or west-northwest, and like Ursa diving before first light.

  Sooner, maybe. Might not stay up and risk the moon. The battery was lower than one would have liked it to be at the start of a day’s dive; but then, another half-hour’s charging wouldn’t make much difference. With the urgency of getting Marine Newton into hospital and surgeons’ hands he’d have liked to have been able to go deep and crack on at something like full speed – which of course was out of the question; even four or five knots might bleed her dry.

  Danvers, down from the bridge, said there was no hint of moon yet. Fair amount of cloud. He thought at a pinch it might be OK to stay up until five-fifteen or even the half-hour.

  ‘Won’t be pinching anything, Pilot. These chaps have wrecked an airfield, Wops must know they’ll have come in by submarine and survivors picked up by now. Whatever anti-submarine forces they have handy they’d have been daft not to have deployed in this direction.’

  ‘Take your point, sir. Just fold the old tent and silently creep away.’

  ‘That’s the obvious thing. Accent on “silently”.’ He’d been on his way up to the bridge, but didn’t stay up there long; the darkness didn’t look or feel long-lasting, after five. He made a last binocular-sweep all round, said to McLeod ‘Let’s get out of this’, and came on down, leaving him to dive her. Time then 0509. Breakfast followed, consisting of Manoel Island ham and powdered egg on toast, with double rations for passengers; Ursa steady as a rock at forty feet with both motors at half-ahead grouped down, the log recording speed-through-the-water of four and a half knots – which he decided he’d now increase to five, and if the battery looked like giving up the ghost he’d surface with all due precautions wherever they happened to be, go over to generator power – nine knots, or near it – and radio for air and/or surface escort. With the island’s air-defence situation pretty much in hand these days, they’d surely spare a sweeper and maybe a couple of Spits to get a man into hospital who might die if they didn’t, might not if they did. He’d called McLeod through from the control room to explain this to him, and they were discussing it when the first depth-charge erupted.

  First of a pattern of five. Some distance off, but not all that far. Starboard bow, somewhere. Mike had said with his mouth full, ‘Those weren’t intended for us’, and McLeod said on his way back into the control room, ‘Unsung getting it in the neck, no doubt.’

  All it could be; but it would mean she was a good few miles off-station. Mike was on his feet,following more slowly,entering the control room as the last of the batch exploded – standard pattern from Wop destroyers being either five or nine, and that had been the fifth, all right: one waited for more but for the time being that seemed to be it. Fraser the HSD having come to the same conclusion sliding the asdic headset back over his ears and yellowish head, and after a minute or so searching around telling Mike, ‘HE between two hundred and two-three-oh degrees, sir. Destroyer HE, fair way off …’

  19

  Still at watch diving and for the moment staying there, despite an instinct to go to diving stations. With, after all, some Wop A/S vessel or vessels sowing the waters with bloody dynamite. Maybe a fair way off but going by the sound of it close enough to one’s route as planned – if one stuck to that route, staying deep or deepish and – OK, diverting around the problem area but then getting back on to the southerly track, and for obvious reasons making no larger a diversion than was essential – reasons including the state of the box.

  Fraser said, ‘HE moving right to left, sir, bearing one-nine-seven, one-nine-six, range 3250 yards. Second lot – geared turbines too but lower revs and bearing nearer two-one-oh, sir …’

  Picture filling out, but not usefully. In general terms, bearings around 200 degrees and distance one and a half miles. Confusing, though, no clear pattern to their movements. And no transmissions. Just listening, presumably; start again when they picked up Unsung’s HE. He told McLeod, ‘Slow both motors.’ Giving the order time to reach the motor room and be acted on, begin to take effect. Thinking about Unsung being bloody miles from where she should have been and that however much trouble she might be in, his own primary responsibility was to keep Ursa clear of her and it. Despite having some natural interest in what one would be steering clear of.

  ‘Thirty feet, Number One. Easy does it.’

  Meaning for Christ’s sake let’s not rush it, risk any loss of control – breaking surface, showing periscope or standards a Cant might happen to spot, maybe lose sight of in the next second but still have spotted, know a second submarine was in the offing. If it was Melhuish who was being hunted, not a ‘non-sub’ contact – wreck, rock, school of fish, whatever.

  Unlikely. But even if their target was not Unsung, no reason there shouldn’t be a Cant or two up there – Wop having thought they’d made contact in the first light of day, and lost no time in whistling-up support.

  If Melhuish had hung on for too long before diving – been spotted in that time?

  ‘Port ten. Steer one-five-five.’

  ‘One-five-five, sir.’ Smithers, Red watch helmsman, acknowledging and winding the new course on – southeast instead of south. Hart, Mike noticed, was on after ’planes, although he should have handed over to Swathely at the start of this watch. Swathely no doubt attending to his patient. Walburton was on fore ’planes, what should have been Hart’s place. Gauges creeping towards thirty-two feet,and hydroplane indicators more or less horizontal, Mike crouching to meet the ’scope’s head as it emerged from its well, and get his eyes to it, adjusting the lenses’ width-apart as he straightened with it and started a swift preliminary search in that sector referred to a minute ago by Fraser – and circling on round, before switching into air-search. Full daylight now, brilliant in the east, pale sky cloud-littered, jumpy seascape patched with the clouds’ long shadows.

  ‘Dip …’

  Brass tube slithering down a few feet and then back up again, maybe by its brief disappearance having weakened some imaginary Cant pilot’s belief in the periscope’s ‘feather’ he might have thought he’d seen – if he existed, up there in the new day’s glitter and scattering of cloud. Might well do, sooner or later, but as of that moment clear all round – sea and sky, no hint of any enemy activity at all even just seconds before the boom and reverberation and this time sight of what was to develop into a second pattern of five. Then, an area of sea swelling, lifting into a white-capped mound of darkish then all-white foam, upper part scattering white but the bulk already subsiding; he was training left for the explosions of charges numbers two, three and four (centre of the diamond pattern) producing similar effects over that wider area in which Unsung might be, or have been, might now be reeling – or even – well, if so, whose extraordinary cock-up? But then, he should have been dipping this periscope again, wasn’t doing so only because his attention was held by those eruptions – charges that must have been shallow-set, incidentally – this last one collapsing into itself, presenting him with a destroyer-shape in miniature and on its beam-ends several cables’ lengths beyond it; heeling hard, wheel obviously hard over. He’d muttered to himself ‘Thar she blows’, and seen the second, identical shape there – roughly bow-on – of which the one under helm had just cleared his view. Another thing taking one by surprise was that the range had closed dramatically and unexpectedly – he’d been heading more directly for them than he’d intended, on courses almost reciprocal to the outcome of their manoeuvrings.

  Slowing, that one. Might even have stopped engines. Disappearance of white splodge under her forefoot indicative of this. Small destroyer or torpedo-boat – in fact, a Partenope. Both of them Partenopes. That one stopping as for instance one might on sighting evidence of a kill. Bubbles, or one large bubble, flotsam, bodies, oil. The next thing might be a lowering of boats – if that was what was happen
ing, what had happened. Might not be, only in the circumstances – Melhuish, etcetera – one was rather specially conscious of such a possibility. He pushed the ’scope’s handles up, leant back from it, and Ellery sent it down.

  ‘Forty feet, Number One. Starboard ten, steer one-eight-oh. Half ahead both motors.’

  ‘Forty feet, sir …’

  And so forth – acknowledgements of orders stemming from a notion hitherto unpremeditated but inspired by that little ship’s suddenly losing way and stopping; linking that to the by no means rare experience of A/S vessels taking it in turns to hold a contact while the other runs in to drop charges, purpose being to minimise the incidence of lost contact, a tactic last seen as recently as two or three weeks ago on the Palermo billet, and obviously the game they were playing here with Unsung. Were, or had been playing. He thought it had to be. Get in there oneself, therefore, while they worked up towards their next attack, or maybe the one after. If Melhuish’s luck held out that long – or had held out this long, even. Then, intervention of third party – a beam shot from a few hundred yards, one torpedo, ninety-degree track if possible, one Partenope a sitting duck and Unsung consequently off the hook.

  McLeod, never all that slow on the uptake, asked him quietly, ‘Diving stations, sir?’

  Danvers had recorded in his navigator’s notebook,0556 Diving Stations: Course due south, motors half ahead grouped down, depth 40 feet. On Mike’s orders he’d passed the diving stations order quietly through the forward compartments while Cottenham as Spare Hand had done the same from engine room to after ends – the aim being to let sleeping commandos sleep on, as most of them were doing.