Sea Lion and Prometheus surrounded by columns of smoke that rolled into the sky, engulfed in flames that licked impartially at both vessels, trading gunfire. And then gradually he heard the roar of the storm as his senses returned to him: explosion after explosion, the blasts of shells exploding against steel, the high-pitched demonic whine of ricochets echoing across the sea. It was unadulterated savagery, with Eskimo and Firedancer reluctant observers of the struggle.
“Yeoman?” Hardy called, trying to suppress the emotion in his voice. “Firedancer to Prometheus, ‘Can you withdraw?’ End message.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Number One,” Hardy said, “she is as much a sitting duck with Prometheus in her as any I’ve seen. We’ll come in off her starboard quarter and give her a brace of torpedoes. Kindly inform Mr. Cole and whoever else is left down there what I plan to do.”
“Yes, sir,” Land said. “She’s listing badly, sir. Sea Lion. Nearly ten degrees, I’d say, and she’s down some at the head.”
“Prometheus?”
“Well down at the head, sir.”
“Captain,” the yeoman of signals said, “reply from Prometheus. ‘We are here for the duration. Shoot straight. Will hold her as long as possible. Prometheus.’”
Hardy was silent for a moment before he spoke. “We shall do as he bids, Number One. Inform the torpedo stations, I will send on to Eskimo to lead off the attack to port.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll have Torps prepare.”
“Number One? Tell those chaps that we’re going in very quickly and we’re going to get rather close. I don’t want them to fire until they see more of Sea Lion than they do the sky.”
“How bloody close is that lunatic going to get, sir?” Baird said after Land delivered the instructions and returned to the bridge.
“‘Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes,’” Cole said, following Baird along the deck to what was left of number-two torpedo station. Firedancer was steaming at full speed, bucking the waves so that each swell threw a cloud of spray over the deck in protest.
“Look at those lovely bastards, sir,” Baird said, nodding at Prometheus, her guns blazing at Sea Lion, the ragged sound of gunfire echoing across the water to Firedancer. “Up to their neck in Nazis and they’re still dishing it out. Coo, they’ve got courage, they have. All we have to do is stand off a couple of dozen yards and throw torpedoes at that big bloody mountain.”
“You know for us to make this work, we’ve got to throw everything but the kitchen sink at them,” Cole said. “We’ve got to do it at one time because we may not have a second chance.”
“That’s a lovely thought, but what the hell does it mean, sir?”
“You take Number One. I’ll take Number Two.”
“Well, you’re daft, man. Meaning no disrespect, sir,” Baird said. “You’ve no idea how these things work. I’ve spent years—”
“Look, Baird, I don’t need your resume. I saw what you did and these aren’t that different from the tubes I trained on. Besides, you can get any of those guys to help you lay the tubes.”
“You won’t know when—”
“I’ll fire when you fire.”
They both heard the roar of incoming shells and dropped to the deck. Caesar, followed by Dora, fired a salvo. The huge shells landed well beyond the speeding destroyer, but now the secondary battery began to fire and geysers sprung up all around Firedancer.
“All right, sir,” Baird said. He spat in the palm of his hand and offered it to Cole. As Cole spat in his palm and took the seaman’s hand in his, Baird said: “Now let’s hope that both of us come out of this with our heads firmly attached to our shoulders.”
“I’m more concerned about getting my nuts cracked,” Cole said, jumping over the edge of the torpedo platform. “Let’s go.” He slid into the cockpit and tested the laying mechanism, traversing it back and forth. The wheel cranked freely. He flipped the switch on the torpedo tubes, from neutral to off and then to on, and was relieved to see that they functioned properly. He didn’t know what the hell he would do if they didn’t — he’d never gotten that far in his training. He heard someone call his name. It was Blessing.
“Beg your pardon, sir, but Torps sent me over in case you ran into any trouble.”
“Very thoughtful of him,” Cole said as Blessing knelt down next to the cockpit. “If I were you, I’d find something a little more substantial to hide behind. This doesn’t look like it’s much more than half an inch.”
“Orders, sir,” Blessing said apologetically. “‘If the torpedo operator is rendered’—”
“Okay,” Cole said. “I get it. Just don’t set your mind on getting my job.”
“Oh no, sir. Never, sir.”
Cole wiped his damp hands along his trousers. He was scared but his nerves seemed to have settled — strange, he thought, to feel fear so completely that it was a part of him, like the simple action of breathing. He felt Firedancer turn quickly to port, rolling heavily on her side, and the only thing he felt now was exhilaration. When I get out of this, he promised himself, I’m going to sign up for destroyers. If I get out of this, the thought repeated itself. Death. Maybe I am a coldhearted son of a bitch. I get scared, shouldn’t that count for something?
“Sir?” Blessing said.
Cole was thankful that Blessing interrupted his thoughts. “Yeah?”
“I think I just pissed myself.”
Cole smiled and turned to the back of the cockpit so that Blessing could see his face. “Boy Seaman, you’re a better man than I am. I did that about an hour ago.”
“Did you really, sir?” Blessing said, brightening at the revelation.
“Yeah,” Cole said. “But let’s just keep that between us seamen. What do you say?”
“Oh yes, sir. Yes, sir. Mum’s the word.”
One of the Oberbootsmanns dragged Kadow’s body into the conning tower and pulled the heavy door shut, spinning the locking wheel.
Mahlberg quickly dismissed all thoughts of his friend’s death and ordered: “Engines, full ahead emergency. Rudder hard to starboard. We’ve got to break her grip on us.”
“Kapitan,” a Stabsbootsmann manning the telephones called out, “forward fire-control reports British destroyer three points off the port quarter preparing a torpedo run.”
“Well, sink her, for God’s sake!” Mahlberg shouted. He calmed himself and lowered his voice. “Inform fire control that they are ordered to concentrate all guns that can brought to bear on that destroyer. Where is the other one?” He waited for the reply.
“Forward fire control reports the other destroyer off the starboard beam at a distance of approximately fifteen kilometers. She appears to be in distress.”
Suddenly Sea Lion lurched forward, shaking with effort as she began to break Prometheus’s hold on her. The sound of tortured metal ripping metal filled the air, the scream of a wounded animal tearing itself free from the jaws of a predator. The noise of constant gunfire and the screeching of metal against metal made it nearly impossible to hear. Mahlberg had to shout his orders and the conning tower crew had to shout their responses so that it seemed the whole world had gone completely mad and demanded that the men in the conning tower join it.