“They haven’t proved themselves yet,” Waldvogel said over the din of the gantry moving into place overhead. “It isn’t fair. I haven’t had time to properly demonstrate what the boats and the guns are capable of. You see that, don’t you? You realize their potential, don’t you? We’ve talked.”
“Talked, yes,” Reubold said. He did a poor job of hiding his pity for the scientist. “Talked here and in Paris,” he glanced out the huge open maw of the pen to the brightness of the sky and the sparkling waters of Cherbourg Harbor, “and out there when you weren’t vomiting. As far as time goes, you’ve had enough, I’m sure Dresser would say. Out there, on the other side of the Channel, our enemies await.” The half-grin again, but this time Reubold’s eyes were filled with concern. “Time the Allies will not give you, nor will our dear admiral, so what doesn’t work on your remarkable boats must be corrected, now.”
Jordan Cole watched the Aldis lamp flash in the distance as Bill Ewing on the 168 boat reported in. The sun had just broken the horizon behind Ewing’s PT boat so that the flashing lamp was difficult to read.
“He hasn’t seen anything at all, Skipper,” Randy DeLong said, standing next to the signaling searchlight on the starboard side of the small bridge. The signalman handling the light flashed END OF MESSAGE and then switched off the light. He waited for additional orders.
The two PT boats had searched the choppy Channel waters for a downed Hurricane pilot for most of the night. The French coastline was clearly visible on the horizon, even in the glare of the rising sun. The sky was barren of clouds. They were two 80-foot boats far from base, within sight of German-occupied territory.
“Okay,” Lieutenant Cole said to his executive officer. “That means we go in.” He nodded at the signalman. “Tell them to keep station off our starboard beam, Barney.” He leaned over the voice tube to the chart house jutting from the instrument panel. “Bob? We’re going in. Pull out your charts and I’ll be right there.” He turned to Ensign DeLong. “Take over, Randy,” he said, moving away from the wheel located on the portside of the bridge. DeLong took the wheel, advanced the three throttles, and checked the flux gate compass and pioneer compass on his left.
The two boats had been easing toward the French coast at just over 10 knots. Now that Cole had made the decision, the speed was increased to 30 knots. DeLong felt the apprehension of every man on board. As he gripped the wheel and looked over the rising bow, he saw the gunners on the 37-mm mount double-checking the gun. The seaman on the 20-mm gun was doing the same. He heard the brush of the twin-50s on the track as the gunners scanned the sky.
They’d been doing this sort of thing for a while. First in the Mediterranean and now in the English Channel. There’d been twelve boats in 142(2) Squadron a year ago — now there were six.
DeLong scanned the compass and then the sea ahead. The skipper stood near the torpedo director stand, training his binoculars on the horizon as the boats sped through the gray-green waters, trailing a frothy, white wake behind them.
Cole had been withdrawn since they’d been ordered to England. He’d barely spoken since they had loaded the boats on the backs of two grimy tankers and begun the voyage, safely embedded in the interior of a large convoy. The PT boats didn’t look right, hauled out of the water and braced and tied down on the decks of the ponderous ships — helpless if the Germans attacked. The boats’ crews were nervous during the trip, concerned about the welfare of the boats and unused to the maze of passageways and bulkheads of the tankers. So they stayed on deck, near their boats, playing cards or sleeping, or checking equipment, and Cole was always present — his quiet, commanding manner enough to reassure the crews that everything was okay. But DeLong knew that it wasn’t okay with the skipper. He was edgy and lost his temper more than normal. It could have been the loss of the other boats. That hit everyone hard. It had been a SNAFU all right; somebody had forgotten to tell them about the E-boats and F-lighters. Somebody at ONI had failed to pass on the information, or didn’t cross a T or dot an I, or something. Nobody knows how these things happen, they just do. It was a mistake. A SNAFU; a lot of good guys dead.
“Going below, Randy,” Cole said, disappearing down the tiny hatchway to the Chart House.
“Okay, Skipper,” DeLong replied. He drew a deep breath, pulling in the scent of the ocean. It was peaceful out here. He felt the thump of the boat’s bow breaking into the Channel waves, heard the muffled roar of the Packard engines, and turned his head slightly to let the salty breeze flow down into the collar of his jacket. One of these days he’d have his own boat. He’d miss the men and the skipper of course — there wasn’t a better crew than the guys of the 155 boat. And there probably wasn’t a better squadron commander than Jordan Cole. But DeLong wanted his own boat.
He put that thought aside, however, as the French coast began to grow on the horizon, and with it the increased knowledge that the enemy would be waiting for them.
Admiral McNamar shook his head. “I’ll say one thing for you, Mike. You’re persistent.”
“It’s about the Southern, sir,” Michael Edland said. “May I join you?”
McNamar motioned to the chair across the table. He’d been enjoying lunch when he’d spotted the lieutenant-commander entering the dining room and making a beeline for his table.
“You know it’s hard to find a decent chicken dinner over here,” McNamar said, stabbing at the remains of a tiny pullet. “The first thing I’m going to do when I get home is get a good chicken dinner with mashed potatoes and gravy.”
“Yes, sir,” Edland said.
McNamar laid his fork next to his plate, placed his elbows on the table, and folded his fingers together. He focused his attention on the sandy-haired man with the deep scar running from his right ear to his nose. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s hear it.”
“After I read the action report of Southern’s encounter with the E-boats, I contacted her XO. He and I knew each other before the war.”
“You fellows in ONI have quite a network, don’t you?” McNamar said drily.
“It doesn’t hurt that I’m on your staff, sir,” Edland countered. “The XO confirmed the points in the report that were in dispute.”
“E-boats traveling at sixty knots or more and mounted with six-inch guns? You’re damned right they were in dispute.”
“Yes, sir. The fire was generally wild. Torpedoes did most of the damage.”
“Their aim was off. What of it? They sank a tanker and shot up some of our ships. I’ll give the little bastards high marks for that.”
“Yes, sir,” Edland continued patiently. “The tanker was torpedoed. Obviously a conventional E-boat weapon. But the hits on the Southern were not the results of a conventional weapon. The rounds appear to have burned through the hull and superstructure of the destroyer escort.”
“Burned? What do you mean, burned? Look, Mike, ordnance is not your bailiwick, right? You’re an intelligence officer, the Office of Naval Intelligence. The blackened area around a hit and the fact that the round is traveling at a high rate of speed is likely to give the impression, and rightly so, of a ‘burned’ area.”