Alexander Fullerton - Surface!

Late in the evening, as they put the corks back in the bottles, the Captain made a suggestion.

“Let’s climb the mountain tomorrow, shall we?”

Chief groaned. “It’s a hell of a long way up,” he said.

“Sure!” The Captain’s girl-friend approved. “Let’s go up that Ragalla, or whatever they call it. O.K., Jean?”

“Why, yes. It’ll do us all good,” agreed the Wren, looking at Chief. He winced.

Next morning after breakfast they were given a lift in an Army car up to where the slopes steepened towards the wooded mountain, and from that point the climb began. It was not really a climb, but more of a steep uphill walk.

Three-quarters of an hour later, the American girl stumbled: the Captain grabbed her, held her up.

“Wow!” she shrieked. “That was my ankle! Guess I’ll have to take your arm from here on, Arthur boy.”

Chief and Jean kept well ahead after that. The Captain said, “Those two seem to be hitting it off pretty well.”

Sal laughed. “Jean’s in love with the Navy,” she said. “I guess if she married one of you fellers she’d hang the guy over the back of a chair and hop into bed with the uniform.”

She was leaning her weight on him, and she leant with her body half-turned to his. She knew all about her figure, and she liked to see the effect it had on him. She herself was not unmoved.

Chief and Jean were a good thirty yards ahead.

“Honey,” murmured Sal, “I guess we don’t have to get to the top of this darned hill, do we? How about we wait here and let them go ahead?”

The Captain shouted to Chief, “You two go on. Sal’s ankle’s bad. We’ll see you on your way down.”

Stumbling through a short stretch of forest they came to an open space, the forest behind them and a drop of a thousand feet in front.

Sal laid her long body down: the Captain stood for a moment, looking down into the valley.

“Honey,” she said, “I need some comfort for my ankle.”

His week of penance over, Sub joined the others in the afternoon boat ashore: they took the Major to Sweat Bay, and taught him their own game of “submarines”. For this game it was essential to have Tiny in the party, since his size made him an ideal “convoy”. The others split up into two teams, one of which formed the escort for the convoy and the other a wolf-pack of submarines. The convoy had to proceed from one fixed point to another, and was allowed to zigzag or to make emergency turns, which it signalled in the correct manner to its escorts. The submarines submerged ahead or around the convoy and endeavoured to surface underneath it after avoiding the screen of escorts. To claim a sinking it was necessary to strike the target in its belly: a submarine was sunk when an escort managed to tread on it.

The Major proved to be an excellent submarine, having a remarkable endurance under water and a very accurate aim at close quarters. After three or four attacks the convoy begged to be excused, on the grounds that it was waterlogged.

“I’m afraid we’re going to crowd you out rather, in your little wardroom,” remarked the Major.

“Won’t be too bad there,” the Captain told him. “Two of your officers on hammock mattresses on the deck, under the table, and one in the Control Room. You’ll have a bunk, of course, and my officers will have to work ‘hot bunks’. Every bunk full all the time, you see, but one man always on watch. When he comes off watch he turns in to the bunk his relief came out of.”

“I see. Can’t be very pleasant when it’s hot.”

“Oh, you get used to it. But the Petty Officers’ Mess will be a bit crowded, I’m afraid, with your four sergeants. Can’t be helped.”

The party was to consist of the Major, three other officers and four sergeants. Four canoes were to be stowed in the racks where normally the spare torpedoes were kept. Each canoe would be manned by one officer and one sergeant. The three officers and the sergeants were due to arrive next morning, before they sailed.

“Well,” remarked the Captain, “you can keep your job. I’ll stay in my nice safe submarine.”

“Oh, nonsense. My job sounds a lot more dangerous than it is.”

“It’ll be a good subject for a book, after the war.”

“When the war’s over, people won’t want to read about it. Not for a few years, anyway. As a matter of fact, I have tried writing a few things, but the only really good things that I’ve produced have been after a lot of whisky. That’s all right, but it gets better and better until I can’t read what I’ve written. I wouldn’t be surprised if the world had lost a number of literary masterpieces that way.”

They were sailing next day. In the flotilla, people pretended not to notice the soldiers, their equipment, weapons and canoes. It was all very hushed, and nobody knew anything about it. The monkeys were interested, though: from the bow of the Depot Ship a long cable ran to a palm tree on the shore, and in the cool of the evenings the monkeys used to sit on it, swing by their feet and dip their hands in the water. When they saw the canoes being lowered one by one into the submarine’s for’ard hatch, they danced and gibbered more than ever.

Able Seaman Rogers divested himself of his shorts, and stared with considerable disfavour at the canoes which lined the bulkheads of the for’ard Mess. It was not that they took up any more room than the torpedoes which normally occupied the racks, but the mere fact that this was something different and slightly foreign to the normally accepted routine of submarining.

“And where the flippin’ ’ell are we taking these flippin’ punts to?” he asked his messmates. Seeing them there was like being handed a cup of coffee when he’d asked for a cuppo’.

“We’ll know, soon enough,” muttered Parrot. “Don’t make much odds, do it?”

Rogers looked sternly at him. “I like to know what I’m flippin’ well doing,” he said.

“Well,” put in Shadwell, “what about puttin’ something over yer nasty looking be’ind, for a start?”

There was a click and a humming noise as the broadcasting system was switched on from the Control Room. Rogers quickly pulled on a pair of dirty overalls.

“D’you hear there? D’you hear there?” came the Captain’s voice.

“We can ‘ear,” muttered Rogers.

“We have on board a party of military personnel. We are going to land them, in about a week’s time, on a Jap beach. The job they have to do will take them about two days to complete. After that time we’ll pick ‘em up again.

“Now, listen. This is the biggest thing we’ve ever done. I can’t go into details, but I can tell you that it’s absolutely vital. We can only do it properly and come home again if every man in the ship’s company does his job with one hundred per cent efficiency. One slip, and we’ve had it. I’m not doubting the ability of any of you. I’m only telling you that if you’ve ever been on your toes, you’ve got to be now.

“We’re honoured in being given this job. Every one of us. You all know that up to now we’ve been limited as to how far down the Straits we can go. Well, the limit’s off. We’re going through the minefields. We’ll be closer to Singapore than any of His Majesty’s Ships has been since we lost the place. And what our Army friends are going to do down there is going to hurt the bloody Nips more than they’ve been hurt for a long time. That’s all.”

The broadcast switched off, and Rogers buttoned up his trousers.

“Thanks for the bleedin’ honour,” he said.

Number One was standing in the Control Room, looking disgruntled, when Sub dropped off the ladder beside him.