“Message from FuMO, Kapitan,” Kadow said. “The enemy continues to shadow us. No change in course.”
“I suppose he thinks that we will oblige him by allowing him to tag along. Very well,” Mahlberg said. He turned to First Artillery Officer Frey, who stood expectantly at his shoulder. “Frey, I’ll give you thirty minutes to destroy that British ship. She’d better be a smoking heap when we break off action or I’ll send you back to Wit in a cutter. Understood?”
“Yes, sir, but I won’t need thirty minutes.”
“Don’t be arrogant, Frey,” Mahlberg cautioned. “Just sink the bastard.” He turned to Kadow. “Execute zigzag pattern, Piper.”
For an instant Kadow looked at Mahlberg in confusion. A zigzag pattern? In this narrow strait? There probably wasn’t an English submarine for five hundred miles. But Kadow quickly recovered himself and passed on the orders to Matrosenhauptgefreiter Rechberg. Thank God that the best quartermaster aboard Sea Lion was at his station — Kadow would not want anyone else at the helm. He noticed Mahlberg watching him, smiling.
“Perplexing, yes?” the Kapitan zur See said.
“A bit, Kapitan, but I know that you have good reason for every order that you give.”
“Yes, Kadow,” Mahlberg said. “That is why I wear the piston rings,” he added, using the slang for the gold braid encircling his cuffs.
Trunburrow relayed the reports to Captain Prader as the parts of the ship prepared themselves for action. It was more than duty to confirm that A Turret or X Turret was ready. Or that the medical officer had taken over the wardroom and turned it into a makeshift hospital because the sick bay was much too small and exposed — it was a primal chant, each report elevating the blood’s heat as the men readied themselves emotionally, and physically, for combat.
Trunburrow would not have thought of that or accepted the idea if it were proposed by anyone aboard or off the ship. He was without humor, artistic creativity, or any quality except the ability to focus on the task at hand with an intensity that, had it been examined by the medical officer driving his assistants — poultice mixers, the crew called them, to ready the wardroom — the M.O. might have shown real concern.
But the intensity was not examined by the M.O. or considered by the captain, who thought it merely a sign of dedication, and rightly so — that’s what made a good number one. The captain, whose own dedication extended only as far as the machinery and workings of his vessel were concerned, misread that quality of his number one.
Trunburrow was a coward and the intensity was his own desperate attempt to muzzle the fear that churned within him.
The W.T. telephone on the bridge rang. Trunburrow answered it.
“Bridge, Trunburrow.” He listened carefully, his eyebrows creeping together in concern. “Right.” He hung up the receiver. “Radar reports, sir,” he said as Prader glanced over his shoulder. “Targets have undertaken a zigzag pattern.” He was pleased to see that Prader was as surprised as he was when he got the news.
“Out here? Do they know something that we don’t know?” Prader walked to the port side of the bridge in thought. “Have W.T. contact the Flow. Find out if we have any submarines out here. I shall be very unhappy if I’m sunk by one of our own blokes. Alert the mastheads. We’ll match the pattern as well. Navs? How close are we off the ice pack now?”
Nottingham’s navigator, a chubby man with thinning hair, said, “Ten miles or a bit less, sir. Perhaps we should move off a mile or two.”
“And put ourselves closer to that secret ship? I’d rather not, Navs. We’ll speed up and cross his bow when he comes into the starboard tack of his pattern.”
Trunburrow looked at Prader. Now it was Number One’s turn to be surprised. “Cross his bow, sir?”
“Oh, don’t be such an old woman about it, Number One. We’ll get ahead and swing around to his port side. We’ve got him on radar, haven’t we? Better than the best set of eyes in the masthead. At least fog doesn’t stop radar.”
“B” Turret, Bruno, was Herbert Statz’s domain. Kuhn’s death was never far from Gun Commander Statz’s thoughts, but when the alarm bugle sounded and he and his gun crews donned flash hoods and gauntlets and the garish white antiflash paint that protected their faces from the intense heat of the powder flash, every thought ceased.
He positioned himself at the after turret hatch under the turret mantle and counted noses as the crew for Number One Gun disappeared into Bruno. Then he followed them and behind him he could hear the men who filled the control compartment: the telephone operator, ranger officer, sight-setter, rate officer, gun layer, gun trainer, local director sighter, and the officer of the quarters, who coordinated all of their efforts.
Statz was at home in the compartment of Number One Gun, the thick outside bulkhead protecting him from shell fire, the longitudinal flashtight bulkhead on the other side of the gun offering at least a little protection if Number Two Gun exploded. Beneath the deck on which he stood were the upper and lower shell rooms, the upper and lower powder rooms, and all of the hoppers, machinery, hoists, roller conveyors, cylinders, shields, and tanks, as well as two hundred men responsible for turning the twelve-hundred-ton turret or training the one-hundred-ton guns.
They were out of sight and Statz did not care about them unless they failed to give him shells or powder.
Statz glanced up at the gun director seated in his narrow perch, a vast array of dials and switches in front of him. It was strangely silent in the cramped quarters of Number One Gun. There was almost no room for the men who served the gun, who fed her and cleaned her, and kept her in action. That was as it should be — she was the most important occupant of the room.
Suddenly a load bell sounded, shattering the silence.
“Prepare to load!” Statz shouted as the gun elevated to five degrees off the horizontal for loading. He activated the gas ejector, clearing the gun tube of any debris, and opened the breech. He inspected the bore and depressed the bore-clear switch. In the shell powder rooms, and high above him in the fire director’s station, other sailors would know that Number One Gun of Bruno was ready to receive her first meal. As the signal went out he checked the mushroom stem hole and inserted the primer that would actually activate the powder. He signaled the spanning tray operator by quickly throwing a finger in his direction.
The spanning tray operator, a new man named Steiner who still seemed to remain unsure of himself despite his training and thus made Statz unsure of him, extended the spanning tray efficiently. Statz studied the man’s performance — he might yet prove to be a good gunner.
Statz heard the low rumble of the 2,700-pound projectile coming up the shell hoist. The hoist door opened and the shell slid onto the spanning tray. Statz noted the color of the shelclass="underline" yellow, High Explosive. He expected Armor Piercing but let the gods up in the heaven of Fire Direction determine which lightning bolt to throw.
The shell was rammed into the breech until the locking ring fit snugly in the barrel and the ram was returned. The powder hoist door was opened in the longitudinal bulkhead and three bags of black powder rolled onto the spanning tray. They looked like big marshmallows, silk-wrapped bundles of destruction that propelled the shell on its way. The rammer pushed them into the gun and Statz signaled the hoist operator for the next three. They followed the first three bags into the breech of Number One Gun and the ram was retracted. The hoist door was closed and the spanning tray retracted.