“Stay especially alert for aircraft coming in low to the water,” Richardson had emphasized. There was no use to caution the lookouts about planes diving out of the sun. Until the past hour, there had been no sun. It was also unnecessary to stress to the lookouts — as all OODs had — that there was plenty of recent cause for the Japanese to be angry at any U.S. submarine they might come upon. Hopefully, they might still be willing to believe a single sub was responsible for the sinkings in the Yellow Sea, and without doubt upon finding one they would bring it under the heaviest attack they could muster. Cornelli, quartermaster of the watch, had responsibility for the after section of the sky and horizon, backing up the two lookouts assigned the port and starboard quarter. Dugan himself served that same function in the forward sector. Cornelli was also responsible for regular inspection of all six pairs of binoculars on the bridge, and for providing new dry lens paper to take the place of the wadded-up hunks of wet tissue which, after a few minutes of use, were no longer able to keep the binocular lenses clear.
It was late afternoon. The sun was low in the southwest, would be setting in another hour or so. Back aft, the feeble sputters of a single engine exhaust, constantly drowned as the sea rose above it, were a reminder that the battery was fully charged and the propellers turning over at minimum speed. It was a reminder also that, beneath them, the people inside the submarine were warm and dry. Even the men in the operating engineroom, though they might be glad for a heavy jacket, would have no difficulty avoiding the blast of cold air coming in. They could have a sandwich or a cup or coffee anytime. In the meantime, Dugan was cold, hungry, and wet.
Eel was rising and falling slowly, alternately bow and stern, rolling slightly — not much. This was because of the large free surface effect of her only partly emptied ballast tanks. American submarines in the old days were considered to be unstable in this condition, and somehow the idea had persisted, but Dugan had never found it to be so. His only worries were the weather: the cold and freezing, the ice crunching about on the slatted bridge deck which made footing uncertain. Because of the cold he and his bridge crew moved more slowly, were more apt to slip or stumble, or interfere with each other. The railings around the hatch were slippery with frozen moisture. Getting six men below with bulky, frozen clothing would inevitably take longer than the eight seconds they had established as a standard in the sunny Hawaiian training areas. An occasional larger-than-usual sea would frequently come entirely over the bridge windscreen, drenching everyone. Were they forced to dive into such a sea, it was just possible the ship might go down more rapidly than usual, while at the same time the bridge personnel would be that much slower in getting below. This was one of the reasons why they had been brought down from their daylight perches on the periscope shears. All were no doubt very much aware of the problem, and their concern must have been increased by reflection upon the accident which had left Richardson and Oregon on the bridge a week ago.
It had been decided that the next time an airplane was sighted it would be the signal for Eel to submerge and remain submerged as if she really were intent upon evasion. Otherwise the Japanese might realize she was acting out of character and suspect she was decoying them. So far as Al Dugan and his bridge watch squad were concerned, this could not happen too soon.
The deeps of the ocean are always inviting to a submariner. It is only the surface of the sea that is sometimes harsh.
Heavy winds from the north had finally, only within the hour, blown away the leaden overcast. Visibility was excellent, the sky a brilliant blue in all directions without hint of a cloud. The sun, a low cheerless orb to the southwest, now approaching the horizon, had not been able to penetrate the intense cold. Even its usual radiant warmth had hardly been noticeable to Al Dugan’s benumbed cheeks. With visibility like this, any aircraft should be spotted long before it came close enough to catch the Eel on the surface with a bomb or depth charge.
On the other hand, the Japanese must be aware of this also. They would come in close to the water, as low as they dared to fly, having started their attack runs from beyond the visible horizon. Perhaps this was what was going on, for no aircraft had been seen for several hours. In this event, of course, or at night, when visibility was reduced, the airplanes would come in on radar. Eel had had a new radar-signal-detection apparatus installed during the previous refit at Pearl Harbor, and this gadget, known as the APR, had already been useful to warn them of radar surveillance. More than once during the past two days it had enabled them to be safely submerged when the Japanese aircraft arrived. Were an aircraft to make a radar approach from over the horizon, the man on watch at the APR would be the first person in the ship to become aware of it. Dugan felt a measure of confidence as he ceaselessly searched the air above the horizon through his dampened binoculars. He would see the Japanese aircraft before it came, or get warning of it from the APR set in the control room. He was tired of waiting, wished the enemy would come. It would be a favor.
“Bridge!” It was the bridge speaker on the underside of the bridge overhang. “Bridge, APR signal! Strength one!”
A steady signal at strength three, according to ComSubPac, was the time to dive. “Strength one” meant only that an aircraft radar was in the vicinity, probably many miles away. Al pushed the “press to talk” button alongside the bridge speaker twice by way of acknowledgment.
“Bridge! APR signal coming in and out. Maximum strength one. Looks like an aircraft radar searching back and forth.”
Dugan again pressed the bridge speaker button twice, using the heel of his mittened hand, for his fingers felt too numb to function.
There was a patrol plane in the air, probably carrying on a routine search in the Yellow Sea. The fluctuations in strength resulted from variations in the plane’s own heading as it patrolled back and forth on its search line. If it ever remained steady, particularly if it gradually increased in strength while remaining steady, this would be definite indication that the plane had detected the submarine — a steel mass in a watery one — and was beginning a run in. Even before it reached strength three, in this case, Dugan silently promised himself, he would pull the plug.
“Lookouts, look alive now!” he sang out. “There’s a plane in the area looking for us. He’s pretty far away, but he might come closer!” Everyone on the bridge was already well aware of the situation, he knew, for they also had heard the report from the man on watch at the radar detector set.
Long seconds crawled by in slow procession. Finally Dugan pushed the button again. “Control, bridge. What’s with that APR contact?”
“Still the same, Bridge. Getting stronger and weaker. Maximum strength one.”
A bell tinkled in Dugan’s mind. “Coming in and out,” the man had said. One of the stratagems the Japanese had used, he remembered, as had U.S. aircraft in the Atlantic war, was to vary the strength of the radar beam to give the impression of searching while actually homing on a firm contact.