The escape hatch was a very snug fit for two of us outfitted as we were. Since time was at a premium, we had to crash down to fifty feet. Jimmy was a blower, pinch the nose and blow all the way down. Me, I just opened my mouth and yawned. We hit fifty feet in just a few seconds, popped the upper hatch, and squeezed out onto the after deck. I immediately pressed the hatch closed, and in less than two minutes, Jack joined us.
The water was cold against my face, but otherwise my suit kept me snug and dry. The water was remarkably clear. I could easily see the keel of the Whiskey off to port. I motioned for Jack and Jimmy to get the hawser. They swam forward, opened the hatch, cut the stays and hauled the end of the hawser out on the deck. I attached a lift bag, set the float level, and we pulled the rest out of the bin, attaching a total of four bags.
I felt a real urgency. I had no idea when the Whiskey would suddenly start up again, but I hoped I would get some kind of clue a minute or so before it happened. Right then, the rumbling of its diesels created an all-encompassing shroud of sound. There wasn't a lot of clearance between the screw tops and the surface. With the water clarity we really had to be careful the Whiskey Bridge watch didn't spot us. The fact was, had they really looked, they couldn't have missed us, bright orange suits and all — but they were concentrating on the trawler.
In two minutes, we had draped the hawser in a figure-eight three times around both screws and shafts. We dumped the air from the bags, and sent them to the bottom. I signaled Jimmy and Jack, and they grabbed the long bitter end of the hawser and swam down to the Whiskey's port engine intake. I was standing off about five yards from the side of the Whiskey, while they pulled the hawser end toward the opening. It turned out that the opening was blocked by a welded grate. As Jimmy turned around to signal the condition to me, the diesel engines suddenly went from idle to full throttle.
In a split second Jimmy was pulled against the grate, pinned as surely as if had been glued to the Whiskey's flank. He flailed his arms, and I could see him strain to pull away from the intake. His suit was sufficiently loose that he could move inside the suit, but his suit's ass was welded to the grate.
We had seconds before the Whiskey would put significant turns on the shafts, wrap the hawser tighter than you know what, and who the hell knew what would happen then. I had no time to think. With a powerful dolphin kick, I pushed myself toward Jimmy. I reached out and punched his suit fill valve to put extra air into his suit, and then disconnected the hose. The extra air caused him to rise, stretching the suit material where it was sucked to the grate. I grabbed my leg knife and sliced through two of the three straps holding his tanks. I pulled his regulator from his mouth and handed him my spare. The extra air in his suit caused his feet to rise. The only thing keeping his fins from being blown off was the holding action of his three-way ankle straps. He shrugged the final tank strap off his right shoulder and pushed his tanks away, letting them drop out of sight.
I had seconds left. I jabbed my blade through Jimmy's suit at his waist, releasing a large bubble of air and then sliced rapidly down and across as I rolled him to his right. His lower suit filled with thirty-five degree water, causing his eyes to open with shock as the cold surged across his abdomen, pulling his testicles up into his body. I continued slicing as rapidly as I could, until thirty seconds later, Jimmy ripped free, leaving a ragged patch of heavy black neoprene sealing the grate. His suit was flooded from the waist down, making him heavy. I grabbed a handful of Unisuit, pulled him up, and removed my regulator from my mouth. I shoved it inside the hole in his suit and pressed the button. Air rushed into the upper part of Jimmy's suit. When the downward pull stopped, I put the regulator back into my mouth, grabbed a gulp of air, and signaled Jack to help me. We pulled away, making a wide berth around the screws.
Just as we passed by the propellers, the Whiskey set backing turns on the port and forward on the starboard. It was a slow-motion dance of hawser and bronze. Within seconds the hawser wrapped itself tightly around both shafts, jerking them to a stop. I could hear screaming metal right through the sub's hull. We didn't stop to sightsee, however. Jimmy was rapidly approaching hypothermia. We had only a few minutes to get him back to warmth, or we would lose him.
We swam over to the exit hatch of the Can; I could hear shouts and loud clanging from inside the Whiskey. I signaled Jack to secure the hawser hatch, which he accomplished in less than a minute. I banged three times sharply on the can with the metal tip of my knife handle — our prearranged signal for the Halibut to drop to 130 feet at the deck. Inside the Can, the guys opened the locking wheel as I felt the sub begin to drop.
As we descended I looked up at the Whiskey's stern. Motion caught my eye. I signaled Jack to give Jimmy his spare regulator, indicated that he get Jimmy into the Can immediately, and turned to see a diver exiting from one of the Whiskey's after torpedo tubes. I grabbed one of my bang sticks and pushed away from the dropping sub. As I did so, another diver emerged from the tube. Their attention was clearly directed at the hawser mess around the propellers, and I don't think they saw me initially, although it would have been pretty difficult not to see the shadow of the sinking Halibut.
I swam toward the preoccupied pair, wasting no time with preliminary howdy-dos. Coming from below as I was, I had the disadvantage, since they naturally looked down from their prone positions. That's how one of them saw me approaching with my bang-stick extended in front of me with both hands.
If one of these guys reported back to the Whiskey skipper, we were shit out of luck. In that case I had no doubt they would hunt us, overwhelm us, and send us to the bottom. That meant somehow I had to disable both divers and send them to the bottom. An injured or dead diver on the surface would tell the tale as surely as a face-to-face report to their wily skipper.
The diver who spotted me was about five yards from his companion. He signaled frantically, but the other guy was intently studying the mass around the screws. His first indication that I was there was when he heard the small explosion of my bang stick. It worked like this: When I got within striking distance of the diver who saw me, he obviously was intent in getting to me, maybe to pull my mask off or rip out my regulator. I couldn't tell for sure, but he had pulled his knife out and was waving it before him as I approached. I don't think he understood the nature of my bang-stick — essentially a short-barreled, 45 cal. zip gun without a trigger. It's fired by pressure against the end of the barrel. Its two-foot length kept me just outside his knife reach, and he was unable to push the stick away before I jammed it against his stomach. The resulting damage totally disabled him. I dropped the bang-stick, and with one sweep of my own knife, I disgorged the air from his BC. He dropped, trailing a cloud of black blood. I suspect he was dead before he passed 150 feet.