Эдвин Грей - Diving Stations

‘There is one other thing, sir.’

‘Yes?’

‘The Japanese have landed in the Philippines. And I gather that things aren’t going too well for the Americans.’

Hamilton thought of the Repulse and Prince of Wales lying on the bottom of the Gulf of Siam. Things were not exactly going too well for the British either….

‘Captain to the Control Room!’

Hamilton’s eyes opened and he was wide awake in an instant. Swinging his legs off the bunk, he thrust his feet into the waiting slippers, and padded quietly through the hatchway into the dim red glow of the control room. It was Rapier’s fourth night on patrol in the search area and he knew it was probably another false alarm. All they’d seen so far were trading junks and a solitary Dutch coaster en route from Canton to Java.

The draught of cool night air sweeping down through the open conning tower hatches, showed that Rapier was still running on the surface and the low rumble of the diesels provided further confirmation that they had not submerged. He wondered what the cause of the panic was◦– if they’d spotted a possible target Mannon should have taken the submarine under the surface immediately. But he hadn’t.

Villiers, Rapier’s fourth hand, was waiting to make his report as the skipper entered the control room.

‘Asdic contact, sir.’

‘Why the hell haven’t we submerged?’ Hamilton demanded.

‘Not reported to the bridge yet, sir,’ Villiers explained. ‘I was waiting for further information from the Asdic operator. Contact not yet positive.’

‘Good God, man! Don’t you realize you’ve put the entire boat at risk?’ He almost pushed the young sub-lieutenant aside as he reached for the intercom.

‘Diving stations! All hands to diving stations! Stand by to dive.’ As he pulled the cover from the bridge voice pipe, the dimly lit control room was suddenly filled with silent men moving to their positions. ‘Clear the bridge, Number One. Emergency dive!’ Reaching down he pressed the klaxon button. He had given Mannon and the look-outs the routine warning. It was up to them to get below before Rapier vanished beneath the waves.

AHOOA… AHOOA… AHOOA.

O’Brien arrived in the engine room as the first squawk of the klaxon blasted through the hull. He had been peacefully dozing in the wardroom when the skipper was called to the control room, but he was wide awake and at his post before the third and last raucous squawk of the alarm had faded.

‘Shut off for diving! Out clutches◦– switches on. Group up. Full ahead both motors.’ The Irishman peered across the narrow compartment to check that Miller had closed down from the diesels. ‘Shut exhaust valve!’ He reached for the intercom. ‘Shut off for diving, sir. Motors grouped up. Standing by.’

Hamilton acknowledged the report and made a mental note to commend O’Brien for the efficiency of his instantaneous reaction.

‘Take her down, Cox’n. Level at thirty feet.’

‘Open main vents. ’Planes hard a’dive!’

‘Stand by to close lower hatch.’

Rapier was diving fast◦– faster than even her usual emergency routine. If Mannon and the look-outs did not move quickly enough, the conning tower would be under the surface before the upper hatch was secured. And that would mean closing the lower hatch and marooning them on deck.

The first of the look-outs slid down the ladder and landed at the bottom with a thud. Mannon’s voice echoed hollowly from inside the empty cavern of the conning tower.

‘Upper hatch shut and clipped!’

The second look-out came down the ladder followed, moments later, by Mannon himself. He had made it with only seconds to spare and his face bore an expression of faint surprise tinged with excitement as if, bearing in mind his civilian profession – he had just found a significant error in a company’s balance sheet.

‘What’s up, sir?’

‘Asdic contact,’ Hamilton told him briefly. In fact, at that precise moment, he knew no more himself. ‘Villiers didn’t pass on the message to the bridge. I’ll deal with him later.’

‘Don’t be too hard on him, sir. He’s not in the Trade like the rest of us. Don’t forget, we only shipped him as a passenger.’

Hamilton had difficulty in repressing a smile. Mannon seemed to have forgotten that less than eighteen months ago he was working as an accountant in a City office under the shadow of St Paul’s and had never seen the inside of a submarine, except on the cinema screen. And yet now he regarded himself as a fully-fledged professional.

Like most regular officers, Hamilton took a conceited pride in his skill and knowledge. It needed years of training and dedication to produce a naval officer◦– and even more to produce a submariner. Yet in a few brief months, as Mannon had so correctly implied, the young lieutenant was already on equal terms with the regulars. Perhaps it was in the blood. Perhaps that’s what made the true submariner. Not years of training, although that was important, nor hours of dedicated study, although that, too, had its place, but the primitive instinct of the hunter◦– of a man who was prepared to gamble his personal survival against the overwhelming odds against him in the deadly arts of underwater warfare.

‘Positive contact, sir,’ Glover reported from the Asdic scanner. ‘Range three miles, bearing three-zero-zero, course south-west, speed 20 knots.’

‘Attack team stand by. See what you can make of the HE, Glover.’

Although the Asdic echoes gave a more accurate range and bearing than the primitive mechanical ears of the hydro-phones, the electronic gadgetry could not analyze the nature of the contact it indicated. And Hamilton needed more than mere range and direction at this stage of the game. No point in hunting a freighter.

Glover moved the sensitive microphone onto the bearing of the Asdic echoes and turned the amplification up to maximum power. Three miles was stretching his equipment to the limit of its range and he had to strain his ears to interpret the vague sounds in his headphones.

‘I’m getting turbines, sir. I’d say a cruiser and perhaps a couple of destroyers. That’s the best I can do until they get closer.’

‘Up periscope!’

It was a routine Hamilton had carried out many times before and yet, despite his achievements on special missions, success had always eluded him when operating under ordinary patrol conditions. Perhaps this time his luck would turn.

The periscope lens was already set to the Asdic bearing. As it emerged above the surface Hamilton’s trained eyes found the fleeting dark shadows of the ships almost immediately◦– three black masses moving at speed against the night horizon, with bow waves that glistened in the moonlight. By sheer chance Rapier was on the perfect interception course and the range was decreasing to his advantage with every passing minute.

‘Down periscope! Attack Team close up. Bow ends stand by!’ The men who made up the attack team moved obediently to their stations◦– Mannon to the diving panel where he could watch the trim and keep an eye on the two planes men, Alistair Scott at the torpedo director, and O’Brien, hurrying in from the engine room to the chart table to enter up the plot. It was a skilled and experienced team and Hamilton knew they would not let him down. If the attack failed, the only person to blame would be himself.

‘Up periscope.’

He guided the lens a fraction to the left to allow for the movement of the target and brought the leading ship into sharp focus. ‘Start the attack! Range – that Bearing – that Blake, the senior electrical artificer, read the figures from the scale engraved into the brass ring encircling the periscope column and passed them back to Sutton who was standing behind him with a slide rule.