“Close and seal the breech!” Statz ordered, although he was the one that was responsible for the action. He made the order out loud so that his gun crew understood where they were in the sequence of preparing the gun to fire. He pushed the lever home, sealing the breech, stepped back on his narrow platform, and raised both arms.
The gun director saw the signal he had been waiting for, checked the gauges to make sure that there was enough air pressure on the recoil cylinders, and turned the Bakelite knob that activated the Ready switch from Safe to Ready.
Statz looked at the gun director for confirmation. The gun director mouthed, three-oh. Statz shot him a disgusted look. Thirty seconds. What a miserable performance. If they came up against Nelson or KG V they had better improve on that.
He glanced around the crowded interior to make sure that his crew was at their proper stations. Now he waited to hear the three quick rings of the fire bell. When he heard that signal, they’d be on the devil’s shovel.
Kadow took the receiver and listened. He turned to Mahlberg. “Hydrophone reports the enemy vessel has turned to port and is attempting to cross our bow.”
Mahlberg smiled broadly. “How accommodating of them. Confirm that with radar. Send out the range and bearing to Frey. Tell him to ready his monsters.”
Tea was brought to the bridge and passed around. Kye was too heavy and made a man constipated if he drank too much of it, but the rich thick chocolate did have a way of driving out the cold. The officers and men spoke in hushed tones; orders were passed and acknowledged calmly, but under the calmness was the sharp edge of expectation. The enemy was out there.
The watch had been changed in the mastheads, the heavily clad seamen carefully climbing down the icy ladders, their replacements ringing in to the bridge to acknowledge the change and that the line still worked. Far below the mastheads the torpedo men of the exposed mounts huddled round the black-box heaters in the Oerlikon tubs. There was no reason for the Oerlikon crews, or any antiaircraft gunners, to be at their action stations so they remained below, ready to serve with the supply parties.
The gun crews of the main batteries — A, B, X, and Y Turrets — waited patiently in their damp, cold caverns. Moisture oozed from the bulkheads, decks, hatches, and pipes — from every piece of machinery aboard Nottingham; it was driven out of her rust-streaked gray skin by the unremitting cold and deep into the bones of her crew. If a seaman were lucky, or fast, or had rank enough, he could sling his hammock under a hot-air louver and dare a man to touch it.
Trunburrow could have used the presence of a hot-air louver and the glowing comfort of a Horse’s Neck as the burning liquid slid down his throat and radiated into his numb limbs. But the hot-air louvers were deep in the bowels of the ship and he preferred to be where he could see the sky — even if it were a never-changing lifeless gray. And he did not drink. So he kept watch on the bridge with the captain and the others as Nottingham patiently shadowed whoever was out there.
“Number One, have we not heard from the Flow?” Prader said irritably.
Trunburrow fought back the urge to be just as disagreeable by saying, Did anyone present you with a message? Do you think that we might have received one and kept it from you? But he did not. “No, sir,” he simply said.
“Well, we can’t take on that monster on our own. Even Nottingham must have a bit of help now and again.”
“Yes, sir.”
“She is a wonder of English engineering, wouldn’t you say, Number One?”
“Indeed, sir.”
“We are most fortunate, all of us, I mean, to be aboard Nottingham. We’ve our machinery and training so that we can well handle anything that comes our way. Am I right, Number One?”
“Yes, sir.” Oh, shut up, you silly old fool!
“That is what modern naval warfare is all about. Machinery, I mean. Technology. It is unerring. When I walk about her, Nottingham of course, I am continually amazed at the care and forethought given to her design. Remarkable.”
“Indeed, sir. I’ve noted it as well.”
“Radar and whatnot? Technology is the ultimate weapon. Have you given attention to the new arms of the warrior?”
The masthead telephone rang as Trunburrow said: “Yes, sir.” He wished vehemently that the old windbag would wander off and become engaged with examining the whatnot that he so adored. He picked up the telephone and said: “Bridge.” He knew before the lookout spoke, he sensed what was coming through the telephone lines, as sure if it were a jolt of electricity, that it was a catastrophe.
“Foremast! Enemy vessel red thirty, range ten miles. Enemy vessel red thirty, range ten miles!”
Trunburrow dropped the receiver, grabbed his binoculars, and looked to port. He heard a commotion behind him, shouting, questions, and he felt others join him. The masthead was twenty feet above the bridge and the lookout had been very professional in his report — stating the information twice over as he had been trained to do. He had told Trunburrow, in an almost conversational tone, that death was in view just ten miles away.
It came into the narrow field of his binoculars, an indistinct gray mountain trailing a thin smudge of smoke behind it. Trunburrow watched it approach and was struck by the thought that the world that existed between that monster and him was, unaccountably, calm. Then he realized in terror that everything he felt, saw, and thought had happened in a matter of seconds.
Then huge clouds of black smoke erupted from the distant ship.
Chapter 16
Admiral Sir Joshua Bimble entered the conference room with his secretary, an extraordinary brilliant man named Hawthorne, just in time to hear Captain Harland say: “All hell’s broken loose in the Denmark Strait.” At the sight of Bimble, Harland’s face reddened and he and the other officers on the admiral’s staff quickly took their seats around the table.
Bimble turned his attention to Captain Macready, who immediately took this signal correctly, because Bimble seldom wasted words when a glance would suffice, to bring the admiral up to date.
“At 0900 Greenwich mean time H.M.S.Nottingham, operating with H.M.S. Harrogate in the Denmark Strait, made contact with an unidentified target traveling south-southwest. Said target” — Macready littered his briefings with legal terms as if they strengthened the value of his reports — “was identified as a capital ship with two destroyers acting as escorts.”
Harland was surprised to see Bimble’s right eyebrow rise slightly; the old bastard seldom exhibited any reaction to any news that he received during the morning conference. The ancient badger was impressed.
“Nottingham closed to within twenty-five miles of the target and confirmed that it was a German battleship with a destroyer escort.”
“Not Tirpitz?” Bimble said in a monotone.
“No, sir,” Commander Elwes, his chief of intelligence, commented. “Bismarck’s twin sister hasn’t moved.”
“Who is she?” Harland wondered out loud, wanting his voice to be heard as worthy of note.