Immediately, his orders were relayed to the torpedomen, who sprang to activate the smoke generators. At the same time, in the boiler rooms, the burner batters exchanged the sprayer plates to increase the flow of oil through the burners. Slowly at first, but building rapidly, a huge column of sooty black smoke gushed from the funnels and piled into the clear morning sky. It was joined by the smoke of the other three destroyers, rapidly creating an opaque wall between them and the enemy. The incoming fire began to slacken, and Matt stared aft at the huge cloud they were creating. It seemed to blot out the entire western horizon. Lieutenant Garrett glanced at him when he chuckled quietly. "I always get a hoot out of doing that."
They continued east-southeast under a black pall. The enemy barrage was less accurate, but it didn't stop. The cruisers were in direct radio contact with the spotting planes overhead, correcting their fire. The Allied squadron tried to zigzag subtly, to increase the correction error, but they couldn't deviate much from a straight heading because the enemy was already faster and zigzagging slowed them down. All they could hope for was a squall of their own to hide in, to stretch the chase until dark. Then they might change course unnoticed and lose their pursuers. Matt had little hope of that. It was now only 1100. Whatever fate awaited them, it would certainly unfold before the sun went down.
Lieutenant Rogers's excited voice screamed from Garrett's headphones. "Surface target! Starboard quarter! Four Nip destroyers out of the smoke. God, they're fast!" The ordnance strikers on the platform swung the gun director.
"Gun crews, load!" Garrett shouted into his mouthpiece.
"Fire on the nearest target as soon as you're ready, Mr. Garrett," Matt said, and stepped back to the speaking tube. He looked to see how the other destroyers, in line abreast, were maneuvering. "Conn, starboard ten degrees."
At this speed, Walker's range finder was useless because of vibration, but Garrett estimated the range to target. "Fire up-ladder. Range, nine five-double-oh!" The shouted commands came rapidly and Matt heard the tinny replies of the gun crews leak from Garrett's earphones. He couldn't help but feel a surge of pride in his crew as they went about their duties with calm, well-drilled precision. After the range, bearing, and apparent speed of the target were fed into it, the mechanical fire-control computer reached a solution.
"Surface action starboard. Match pointers!" Garrett instructed the three crews whose weapons would bear. He listened as they reported their readiness and looked at Matt. "The guns are ready, Captain."
"Commence firing."
"Three rounds, salvo fire. Commence firing!" He leaned forward and stabbed the salvo buzzer button. The nerve-racking, jangling raaaa sound was almost instantly overwhelmed by the simultaneous concussion of three 4-inch guns. Even before the first rounds fell, the buzzer sounded again and the second salvo was on the way. Splashes kicked up beyond and astern of the closest enemy destroyer, but seconds later more splashes rose among the ships when their friends opened fire as well. The third salvo seemed to have the range, but it was still behind the enemy.
"They're even faster than I thought! I guess I didn't lead them enough," Garrett said apologetically. He fed corrections into the computer. Somebody got a lucky hit with the first salvo, and the third Japanese destroyer belched black smoke from her curiously raked 'stack and slowed out of line. Men cheered and even Matt felt like pumping his fist. It looked like the hit came from Pope or Encounter. The remaining enemy ships continued the charge. They opened fire from the twin mounts on their foredecks, all three shooting only at the damaged British cruiser.
"They're making for Exeter. Get on them, Mr. Garrett!" To Matt, the enemy strategy was clear. They were trying to get in a few licks on the primary target and slow her down still more. Her escorts would then be forced to leave her or stand and fight. Either way, the result would be the same. Another salvo slammed out from Walker, and this one looked on target, but there were no explosions. Either they were still shooting long, or the shells were passing through the thin-skinned Japanese ships without detonating.
"That's it!" shouted Garrett into his comm. "No change! No change! Rapid fire! Let her have it!" The geysers erupting around the advancing enemy now resembled those that had bracketed Exeter a short time before, if not in size, then surely in volume. The Japanese couldn't know that Exeter's fire control was out, and Matt had to admire the courage of their approach. They began to angle for Exeter's starboard side. Knowing their gunnery was in capable hands, Matt realized his place was in the pilothouse. Without a word of distraction for Garrett, he dropped to the quarterdeck below.
"Captain on the bridge!" somebody shouted.
"As you were. I have the deck, Mr. Flowers. You keep the conn."
"Aye, aye, sir. You have the deck. I have the conn."
"Skipper." PO Riggs spoke up. "Captain Blinn on Pope sends to execute a starboard turn in column and prepare to fire torpedoes." Blinn was senior to both Matt and Captain Atkinson on Mahan and had authority over the three American destroyers.
"Very well, acknowledge. Mr. Flowers, bring us in behind Mahan when she makes her turn."
Ensign Bernard Sandison, the torpedo officer, stood on the starboard bridgewing and adjusted his headset while an ordnance striker fiddled with the connection linking the antiquated torpedo director to the two mounts on the starboard side. As the four destroyers accelerated to block the enemy thrust, his eyes burned when they turned into their own smoke screen.
"Sir," commented Flowers, "Exeter's firing torpedoes." He pointed at the cruiser, now off their port bow. Puffs of smoke drifted aft from her amidships tubes, but the splashes when the weapons hit the water couldn't be distinguished from those of enemy shells. Then, as they looked on, there was a small reddish flash between Exeter's two funnels. A column of black smoke rocketed skyward and a cloud of escaping steam enshrouded her amidships. Except for the racket of the blowers and the wind, there was stunned silence in Walker's pilothouse, broken only by someone's soft, pleading murmur.
"No, oh, no . . . no."
Matt didn't know who said it. It might have been he. Somebody cursed. Exeter's speed dropped to nearly nothing, as if she'd slammed into a wall. Shells rained down and more began to hit as she wallowed on helplessly at barely four knots. The Allied destroyers executed another turn, in column, and ran up Exeter's starboard side, placing themselves between the doomed cruiser and the oncoming enemy ships. Through the thinning haze of the smoke screen, the Japanese cruisers were visible, much closer than before. At the head of the line, smoke and steam spewed from Encounter as her torpedoes leaped into the sea. The two American destroyers ahead followed suit.
"Engage as they bear with the starboard tubes, Mr. Sandison."
"Aye, aye, sir!" he replied, and cried into his microphone: "Torpedo action starboard! In salvo! Fire one, fire three, fire five! Fire seven, fire nine, fire eleven!"
Matt peered around the chart house. The amidships deckhouse was in the way, but he saw the cutoff-looking muzzles of the pair of starboard triple launchers angled out thirty degrees from the side of the ship. As he watched, the first three 21-inch-diameter, 2,215-pound MK-15 torpedoes thumped out, one after another, the sun shining on their burnished metal bodies as they plunged into the sea with enormous concave splashes.