I could sympathize with Jim's exuberance. I had felt the same way after my qualification approach and in fact still did whenever I had a chance to shoot a torpedo.
"There! It's crossed the track. It's a hit! Right under the M. O. T.!" Recollecting himself-, Jim barked, "Secure from battle stations! Stand by to surface!"
This was Tom's cue to swing into action. He gave several low-voiced rapid orders, then turned to Jim and announced: "Ship is ready to surface, sir!"
Jim reached forward to the vicinity of the ladder to the conning tower, grasped the diving alarm handle and jerked it three times. Three raucous blasts resounded through the boat.
"Blow safety!" ordered Tom. Air whistled into the tanks was shut off at his signal. The bow planesman at Tom's direction ran his bow plane up to the "full rise" position.
S-l6 tilted slightly up by the bow and the depth-gauge needles began to drop.
At the first note of the surface alarm Rubinoffski swung his lanky legs up the ladder into the conning tower. Larto turned his rheostats, increased the speed of the motors. An intermit- tent, low-pitched hiss of air-back aft in the engine room they were turning over the engines, clearing any water out. Jim was going around and around with the periscope, at last.
"Eye-ports awash!" The call came down from Rubinoffski.
You could feel the surge toward the surface suddenly stop as S-16 broached. The little glass portholes in the conning tower, other than our periscopes the only means of seeing out of the ship, let a stream of light into the tiny compartment as they popped out of the water. The reflected rays danced in the open. hatch and glittered on the steel rungs of the ladder below.
Jim left the periscope, motioning to Keith to lower it, and leaped for the ladder, climbing rapidly up. Surfacing is not quite as critical an evolution as diving, but during the period that the boat is barely awash all hands must stand fast to their stations. Only the skipper and the Quartermaster go to the bridge, and the ship remains ready for instant diving.
"Eighteen feet, sir, holding steady," Tom Schultz passed the word up the hatch.
"Crack the hatch!" I could hear Jim's command to Rubinoffski.
The Quartermaster grasped the handle of the hatch, turned it rapidly several times. I heard the familiar whistling sound as the slightly increased air pressure in the submarine commenced to vent out.
"Put the low-pressure pump on the main drain-shut the Kingstons. Line up ballast tanks for pumping! The routine orders from Tom were a backdrop to the sudden rush of air past me as Jim ordered the bridge hatch flung open. In a moment came the calclass="underline" "Lookouts to the bridge."
The two planesmen, no longer needed at the bow and stern planes, had hastily donned submarine jackets upon surfacing, buttoning them, over the binoculars which they had also slung about their necks. Now they raced up the ladder to join Jim.
In a little more than a minute the submerged routine had been terminated and surface condition established; S-16 plowed through the choppy waters of the Sound along the track which Jim's torpedo had taken, and as the engines were started, a frozen blast of air poured into the control room from the now-open passage to the bridge. When Jim sent for Keith to take over the bridge watch, I followed him up, the vague feeling of uneasiness which had grown during the previous hour still permeating me.
The Quartermaster was just receiving the tail end of a semaphore message from Falcon when I arrived topside. "HIT TEN YARDS FORWARD MOT X, TORPEDO IN SIGHT BT."
Jim was delighted. He slapped Keith on the back. "What do you think of that, hey? I knew that was a hit the minute I let her go! That old Falcon out there is sunk colder than hell. I guess that's all, hey? I guess that showed the Board, — turn her around and head for the barn."
Keith seemed as happy over the successful shot as Jim, but at the latter's last words I could sense his question. It was hard to tell whether Jim meant it as a command or was merely expressing his feelings.
"Easy, old man," I said. "The rules don't let you go back to port until Falcon picks up your fish."
"Ah, hell, skipper," Jim grinned unabashed, "they're practically alongside of it already. Let's at least start back."
It was true. The Falcon had turned as soon as the torpedo passed under her and had followed its wake. S-16, not having changed course since firing, had been proceeding all this time in the same direction, gradually increasing her speed as her ballast tanks went dry. Up ahead the Falcon still had the two flag hoists signifying "torpedo in sight' at her yardarm, and several ship lengths ahead of her we could see the splashes as the torpedo, its exercise head having blown dry, expended its last few ounces of fuel and air before coming to a stop.
I knew what Keith was thinking. Our squadron orders required that the Torpedo Officer of the firing submarine see the torpedo out of the water before departing the area. Later, after our return to New London, Keith would likewise have to inspect the torpedo with the Falcon's Torpedo Officer and sign the torpedo record book.
"We'd better stick around just a bit longer, Jim," I said easily. "Might as well do it right, you know. Besides, don't forget the Board down there is watching everything you do.
They might not agree with your shoving off so soon."
Jim shot me a startled look for a split second, then relaxed with a short laugh.
"Guess you're right at that." Then he turned to Keith.
"Close on in to the Falcon until you can see them hoist the fish out of the water."
"Aye, aye, sir," answered Keith, taking the measure of the Falcon through his binoculars.
Strangely enough, I had begun to notice that not once on this day's operations had Jim called me "Captain" or used the word "Sir" in our conversations. A little friendly colloquialism is not unexpected in submarines, and it was not anything definite that one could lay a finger on. It was, however, almost always customary to call one's skipper, "Sir" or "Captain."
Nobody else in the ship used titles in normal address, nor was it customary for the skipper to do so in speaking to officers or crew. It was noticeable also that apparently by tacit under- standing both Keith and Tom had on this day, contrary to their normal habit, used the word "Sir" in official conversation with Jim. Perhaps I was imagining things, but I could not quite decide whether Jim's omission had any significance.
It was now nearing noon. We had been under way since shortly after eight o'clock. The day, instead of warming with the sun, had turned even more chilly during our short sub- mergence. I buttoned the top button on my coat and turned the collar up to protect my ears. A few moments ago I had been too hot and had been perspiring. Now I was shivering.
Jim and Keith, too, had already buttoned themselves up. They had put their hands in their pockets and were shielding them- selves as well as they could from the biting wind whistling over the bridge. Occasionally several health problems resulted from the rapid changes of temperature and pressure experienced by submariners, but they certainly made for a maximum of discomfort all the time, I reflected, as I sought the leeward side of the periscope standards.
Falcon now slowed down and we gained on her rapidly.
We could see the torpedo, its yellow head bobbing in the water a few yards on her port beam. Keith gave the order to decrease our speed.
Men were leaning over Falcon's rail with pieces of line in their hands, one man in particular with a grapnel or hook on the end of a pole. Her long hoisting boom on the afterdeck was swung over to the port side, and you could see that hooking the torpedo would be a mighty tricky business, even with the relatively small sea that was running. With no way on, Falcon rolled mightily; every time she rolled to port the end of the boom splashed in the water. In calmer days they would have put a man on the boom, or even lowered him to pass a line through the ring on the nose of the torpedo. Today it would have been suicide.