Dust on the Sea (53 page)

A moment later Keith stood beside him on the bridge. “That's about it, Skipper,” he said. “The last radar fix we had on Whitey shows him dead ahead of the convoy about twelve miles out. There should be some action over there in less than an hour.”

“Do we still have radar contact on them?”

“Yes, sure. Why?”

“Because . . . I don't think we ought to dive yet. We'd better stay up as long as we can and see what happens.”

“We might get spotted and driven down by a plane. Besides, you've been up all night, and all day before that. You rate some rest, Skipper.”

“Sleep can wait. If a plane spots us, that might help
Whitefish
by drawing those two escorts in our direction. What I'm really thinking about, though, is that we've got to keep those three transports from
getting to Okinawa. After Whitey attacks, they'll scatter—and it will be up to us to put him back in contact for a second attack.”

“That is, if he'll try a surface end-around with planes up there,” observed Keith, uneasily.

The sun, driving up over the horizon, transmitted little warmth to the frigid group bundled up on
Eel
's bridge, but it did have the effect of burning off the night's overcast and producing a clear blue sky. The visibility in all directions was phenomenal, totally the reverse of the situation of only a few hours before. Fully surfaced,
Eel
now plowed along easily in the moderate sea associated with deeper water. With enough depth for diving beneath her keel, the more familiar circumstances induced a feeling of comfort among her entire complement, only slightly lessened by the fact that any aircraft patrol worthy of the name could pick her up by sight alone at a distance of many miles. But unless the plane were flying extremely close to the water,
Eel
would sight it also in plenty of time to dive. She would not again be caught by any tricks with the plane's radar transmitter power.

If aircraft came out to escort the convoy, which was inevitable because of its importance, they would concentrate ahead of it, where a submarine in attack position would be. On the other hand, if they could be induced to attack the wrong submarine, every depth bomb dropped on
Eel
was one less that could be used on
Whitefish
, one less that could be effective in protecting the convoy.

“Convoy's been on this course one-half hour, Bridge.”

“Did you get a fix on
Whitefish
when she dived? When should she be getting in?”

“We figure the convoy will be running over the
Whitefish
in about fifteen more minutes.”

One of the after lookouts was screaming. Richardson did not need to hear the words clearly to understand what he was saying. “Plane! Starboard quarter!” the man was shouting.

“Clear the bridge!” shouted Richardson. He swung a quick look aft through his binoculars. The plane was still some distance away, but obviously coming directly toward the
Eel
. There would be plenty of time to get her down. He stood aside, allowed the lookouts, the quartermaster, and Keith to precede him, and then Al Dugan, whose watch it now was. Two blasts on the diving alarm. “Take her down!” He straightened up, put his binoculars back to his eyes. The plane, a two-engine bomber, was still coming, still four to five miles away. The main vents were popping. The air was whistling out of them.
Eel
's bow was already settling toward the sea. Richardson stooped under the bridge overhang, felt for the hand rail over the hatch, swung down into the
hole, grabbed the lanyard, and pulled the hatch to. It gave a satisfying click as the latch snapped home, and Cornelli leaped past him to dog it tightly.

“One-five-oh feet,” Rich said. “How does that check with the chart, Keith?”

Leone was in the after part of the conning tower, bent over the chart of the area spread upon the table in the far corner. “One-five-oh looks okay, Captain,” he said. “Not much deeper than that, though, or we'll drive her nose into the mud.”

A deep feeling of weariness pervaded Richardson's body. The cold air on the bridge had been bracing, but inside the submarine the warmth of the interior was instantly stupefying. “Control, make your depth one-five-oh feet,” he repeated. “Ease your angle when you pass one hundred feet.”

He yawned hugely as he spoke. Suddenly it was all he could do to concentrate on giving the necessary orders. The boat was under, her bow was tilted down at a satisfactory angle, and there should be no trace of her left on the surface except the wake of her passage.

“Left full rudder,” he ordered. He would not, at least, blunder blindly into a bomb or depth charge dropped ahead of the diving point.

Eel
had been submerged just ten minutes and had already returned to periscope depth. There was nothing in sight. The plane must have had orders not to waste its time over a submarine diving where it could not possibly attack the all-important convoy. Its instructions would be to proceed ahead of the troopships, against the possibility of a submarine in attack position—against
Whitefish
, in fact. How long had it been since
Whitefish
had dived, anyway? And if successful, when might Whitey's torpedo explosions be heard?

“Any time now,” said Keith.

Richardson was spinning the periscope around. Nothing in sight. Several quick, careful looks, then up a little higher. Still nothing. No plane, no ships, no smoke, just brilliant blue sky and a yellow-brown, mud-colored sea with a small chop: waves about two feet high. Around again, more slowly, several times, dropping the periscope occasionally just beneath the surface in order to break up the continuity of exposure. Still nothing in sight. How long now?

It was only five minutes since he had asked the question, reassured Keith. According to Larry Lasche's plot, something could be happening any minute, but on the other hand, a delay of even ten or fifteen minutes ought not to be surprising. Buck had roused himself—he could not
have had more than an hour or so in his bunk—and had taken over the TDC. It was not running, for he had no information to set into the instrument. Stafford, searching carefully all around on the sonar, concentrating in the estimated direction of the convoy, could hear nothing. The ships were much too far away to hear screws. Blunt also was in the conning tower; nearly the whole of
Eel
's battle stations control party was there. Something must happen.
Whitefish
simply must not fail now.

A distant boom filled the confined space.

“Torpedo explosion,” reported Stafford, unnecessarily.

Ten seconds later there should be another. He looked at his watch. His eyes, accustomed by the periscope to the brilliant sunlight on the surface, had difficulty in focusing on the tiny second hand. Ten seconds must have passed—fifteen seconds at least, now. Thirty seconds. Only a single hit. Perhaps Whitey Everett had conservatively fired only at the leading troopship. Undoubtedly there would be depth charges, if only to keep him submerged below periscope depth while the uninjured ships made their getaway.

Whitefish
was one of the thin-skinned submarines, as
Walrus
had been. There was no definite proof that the “heavy hull” submarines were better able to stand depth charging than the “thin-skinners,” but this was nevertheless generally believed to be the case. So far, Everett had retreated to an inactive portion of the area to inspect for damages after every depth charge attack. A heavy barrage at this point, which the escorts might very likely drop simply as a face-saving measure, whether or not they had any idea of
Whitefish
's location, might have the same effect again.

“Stand by to surface,” croaked Richardson. “Up periscope.” As he swiftly spun the instrument around, he felt the querying glances of the conning tower crew. He went around carefully three times. Nothing in sight. He clicked up the handles of the periscope. It dropped away.

“Ready to surface,” said Keith. Here at least was someone who understood that targets of this importance, so laboriously set up, must not be abandoned.

“Surface the boat!” The sound of air blowing in the ballast tanks, the sudden lifting effect as they expelled water from the flooding holes at their bottoms, were almost like personal reflexes of his own.

“Four main engines on propulsion,” Richardson said.

The bridge was still cascading water from all of its parts. The main induction banged open behind him.
Eel
drove ahead on her battery, thrusting her nearly submerged bulk through the seas and into the teeth of a strong cold breeze, while back aft four mufflers spit white water and groaned as the engines rolled over.

“Lookouts to the bridge!” They came piling up in their foul-weather gear, well protected against the cold and the wet. Rich had not been so provident. His already rumpled khakis had been heavily splattered across the back as he came up the hatch, and the chilled wind was already biting into him.

“Here, Captain,” said Cornelli coming up the hatch, handing him a foul-weather jacket. “Mr. Keith . . . I mean, Mr. Leone, said to give you this.” Gratefully Richardson put it on while Cornelli moved aft to take up his watch station.

Williams and Leone were beside him. “We're running down the bearing of the convoy,” said Richardson. “I'll keep the deck. Buck, you handle the routine. Allow no extra people on the bridge. Keith, you stand by in the conning tower. Pass the word to all hands to look alive. We may have to dive suddenly. Keep a continuous high periscope and radar watch on. The convoy may have split up. It sounds like one ship was hit, and if so, the other two will be getting away from the attack position as fast as they can.”

“Bridge, conn.” This was Stafford's voice. “Sonar has distant depth charging dead ahead.”

“One more thing, Keith,” as his second-in-command swung on to the ladder leading to the conning tower. “I may hold up the dive for a bit, even if we do see a plane.” The puzzled look on Keith's face gave way to comprehension as Richardson went on. “If we weren't down to only two torpedoes, we could end-around ourselves. As it is, the best we can do is try to take some of the heat off of
Whitefish
.”

Dormant in his brain was the thought that if
Eel
should be sighted reasonably near the torpedoed ship before a firm sonar contact had been obtained on
Whitefish
, surface and air escorts, now feverishly looking for the submarine responsible, might assume that
Eel
was the culprit. If, in the meantime, the direction in which the remainder of the convoy had fled could be determined, there might be a chance to put
Whitefish
back into contact for a second attack.

“Bridge, radar contact! A little on the port bow!”

Eel
had been fully surfaced for some minutes, was now pounding along at nearly full speed, throwing spray from under her bows as she plunged into the freshening sea, spattering a continuous pattern of salt droplets on her main deck. The wind, already strong and very cold, was now screeching over the top of the windscreen with the added component of the submarine's velocity in the opposite direction. Several minutes ago the lookouts had been called down from their exposed perches on the sides of the periscope shears and directed to huddle together behind the chariot bridge bulwarks. There they still
maintained vigil over the same arc of sky and sea, each to his own quadrant. Their function, of course, was to guard against approach of an aircraft. It was upon the elevated periscope, nearly nineteen feet above the uppermost tip of the periscope shears, that Richardson was depending for the first sight of the enemy.

“We have two big ships and two little ships on the PPI 'scope. Looks like they're on course about southwest. Range is twelve miles. They're on our starboard bow, Bridge. A couple of miles astern of this outfit and a little nearer—about eleven miles—there's another ship. It looks like it's alone. Plot is showing it as stopped, but we can't be sure yet.” Keith from the conning tower.

“Anything in sight through the periscope?”

“Negative, Bridge—we're checking the bearing carefully. . . . Correction! The periscope sees masts a little on the port bow. That's the single ship!”

Richardson debated the advisability of using one of his last torpedoes to finish off the injured ship, but as
Eel
approached, she was already being abandoned, her listing sides covered with tiny antlike creatures climbing down the steel plates, sliding down ropes into the water. The sea was black around her with round black dots, each one the head of a man struggling for his life. Only three lifeboats could be seen. Perhaps there were a few more life rafts—not many. The periscope could count only five, overloaded, teeming with people, surrounded by more hanging to their sides. The boats were in little better shape. He fought down the revulsion. This was what he had come for. He could not, would not, help. The men were doomed. The winter sea would be pitiless. Another torpedo was not needed.

Richardson decided to drive between the damaged ship and the convoy, abandoning the damaged one in order to track the fleeing convoy remnant from the east. It was a near certainty that after having put sufficient distance between themselves and the scene of the torpedoing they would again change course to the east. Later, he or Whitey might return to give the coup de grace to the damaged transport, if it had not sunk.