‘Good luck, Hamilton. And remember◦– you’re on your own.’
Rapier left Hong Kong via the easterly channel. As Taikoo shipyard passed on the starboard side, Hamilton could see the destroyer Scout in dry-dock having her venerable old bottom scraped. The gunboat Moth was also ashore being refitted, and he wondered how the Navy would cope with a Japanese attack with one-third of the Station’s largest ships out of commission. Dismissing the problem from his mind, he guided the submarine through the narrows at the eastern end of the channel and altered course to the southeast towards Lam Tong Island.
Two motor torpedo boats from the 2nd Flotilla swept up from the south as Rapier came level with Pottinger Peak and their ensigns dipped in salute as they thundered past at forty knots. Lieutenant Commander Gandy, the flotilla commander, waved a cheery farewell from the spray-soaked bridge of the leading MTB and Hamilton returned the greeting. Rapier’s bows rose and fell sharply as the submarine pushed into the currents of the South China Sea and, having passed clear of Lam Tong, Hamilton altered course to the south◦– to mislead any shore watchers in the pay of the Japanese.
‘Stand down Harbor Stations, Number One.’
Mannon leaned over the conning tower coaming. ‘Sea Duty men below! Secure for’ard hatch.’
He waited for Morgan to dismiss the men on the fo’c’sle and then flipped the lid of the voice-pipe. ‘Take over lower steering. Course 1-7-5.’
‘Control Room, aye, aye, sir. On lower steering. Course 1-7-5.’
‘On lower steering, sir.’ He reported to Hamilton. ‘Fore hatch shut and clipped. Hands fallen out to passage routine.’
Hamilton acknowledged Mannon’s report with a nod and stared east as the peaks of Victoria Island shimmered in the heat haze. Despite the approach of winter the weather was unreasonably warm. Day temperatures should have dropped to a mean seventy degrees by now but when Rapier had left the Colony was still sweltering in a humid eighty-three. The latest Met report was forecasting an approaching cold front later in the day, but Hamilton had very little faith in the weather experts with their little charts and multi-colored inks. The China Seas were notoriously treacherous. Sudden squalls could appear from nowhere and vanish as quickly as they had come; and miniature storms of surprising ferocity could shut down visibility and lash a ship with gale-driven rain out of an almost clear blue sky. Rapier was lucky that the typhoon season was over.
‘Stand by to dive, Number One. Diving in two minutes.’ Mannon passed the preliminary order to the control room and waited while the duty signalman and the two look-outs swung into the upper hatch and clambered down the steel ladder.
‘Bridge clear, sir. Ready to dive.’
‘Thank you, Number One. Get below and stand by.’ Diving on the klaxon was restricted to emergencies and the submarine service did not officially acknowledge the term ‘crash dive’. Hamilton was in no hurry. The men had had more than their share of emergency dives during their last spell of duty in the Med. He had little doubt that diving on the klaxon would become part of their standard routine again in the very near future but, for the moment, he was content to let the crew take it easy. He moved to the voice pipe.
‘Take her down to periscope depth, Number One.’
‘Periscope depth aye aye, sir.’
Hamilton heard the metallic clang of the vents thrusting open as the hydraulic power came on, followed by the thundering roar of the sea flooding into the empty ballast tanks. Abaft, in the engine room, Chief ERA Bates acknowledged the order from the control room and passed the executive command to the motor room.
‘Out clutches◦– secure for diving.’
‘Clutches out, Chief.’ Yarden confirmed. ‘Engines stopped.’
‘Switches on. Group up◦– half-ahead both.’ The urgent throb of the diesels faded away and Bates felt the deck plating vibrate as the motors came on. He reached for the telephone link to the control room. ‘Engines off, sir. Motors running. Clutches out and secured for diving.’ Hamilton closed the upper hatch, fastened the clips, and slid down into the brightly-lit nerve center of the submarine. The monotonous chant of the reports, orders, and acknowledgements echoed quietly inside the crowded apartment.
‘Upper hatch shut and clipped.’
‘Permission to close lower hatch, sir?’
‘Granted.’ Hamilton glanced at the big dials of the depth gauges facing the two coxswains. The red pointer needles fingered towards the twenty-feet calibration. ‘Level at thirty, Number One. Maintain course and speed.’
Petty Officer Arnold leaned back in his seat and watched the needle swing down. As it touched the thirty feet mark he reversed the big steel-rimmed diving wheel and brought the for’ard planes into the horizontal position. Rapier’s bows levelled off as the submarine gently came out of the dive.
‘Fore ’planes amidships, sir!’
As Arnold made his report, Ernie Blood eased the controls of the aft hydroplanes and deliberately balanced the submarine’s buoyancy as he coaxed it to the required depth.
‘Aft ’planes amidships, sir. Thirty feet. Trimmed and level.’
‘Up periscope!’
Bush moved the telemotor pump controls of the periscope mechanism and the bronze column sighed up from the womb with a soft hiss. Pulling down the steering handles, Hamilton pushed his face into the rubber cup of the binocular eye-pieces and waited for the water to clear from the upper lens. After the soft glare of the tungsten lamps in the control room, the strong sunlight made him blink, but it was only a slight discomfort and it quickly passed. Swinging the ’scope through a full circle, he carried out a preliminary routine sweep of the surface to ensure that there was no shipping in the immediate vicinity of the submerged submarine and then, flicking the sky-search lever with his thumb, he tilted the big search lens upwards to scan the sky.
A few wisps of cirrus cloud hung over the southern horizon but the remainder of the sky was clear; although Hamilton noticed a strange bronze sheen to seaward that contrasted with the brilliant blue over Hong Kong itself. A small float-plane, probably a Fair Sea Fox, droned slowly towards the peaks of Victoria Island trailing a large drogue, and he watched a speckle of tiny brown splashes of smoke bursting around it as the Colony’s anti-aircraft defenses put in some much needed live ammunition practice.
Moving the lens a few degrees to port, he stared in the direction of the Ninepin Islands group and watched a large trading junk tacking northwards to round the eastern coast of the New Territories towards the Chinese mainland. Suddenly, and without warning, he snapped the steering handles upwards and stepped back.
‘Down periscope! Flood Q! Sixty feet. Attack team close up.’
The bronze column sank softly into the heavily greased well in the deck with a sigh of hydraulic power and Venables, the ‘outside’ ERA, quickly spun the valve wheel to open the vents to the quick-diving tank in the bows.
‘Planes to dive!’
Despite the unexpectedness of the commands, there was no panic. Arnold angled the bow planes into a steep dive and watched the depth gauge like a hawk, as Ernie Blood juggled with the aft hydroplane controls.
‘Faster!’ Hamilton snapped.
‘Full ahead both!’ Although Mannon was in the process of moving from his diving station alongside the skipper to his attack team position at the venting panel, he found time to pass the order back to the motor room and wait for the acknowledgement from the chief ERA. Rapier needed the extra thrust from her propellers to get her down to the required depth more quickly.