This was infinitely more dangerous than the attack on the, first ship. All, this one had to do was turn only a little toward us, only thirty or forty degrees, and we would be in a bad way. It would be bow to bow, then, and we would have to expose our own broadside to sheer off.
"A light!" Tom Schultz and the starboard lookout were both shouting, pointing to the first ship. We were broad- side to broadside, just past each other on opposite courses.
There was a light on his deck, about the size of a flashlight, pointed over the side. I looked hard-our torpedoes should have reached there-sure enough, there were their wakes.
Three up to it, one only going on beyond. As I looked I could see some kind of disturbance in the water, as if something were thrashing alongside. Another flashlight joined the. first, and then a clearly visible cloud of steam issued from the forward edge of his stack. A moment later we, heard the whistle.
I cursed aloud. Damn the torpedoes! Damn them and their designers to bloody bell forever! Why couldn't they build an efficient torpedo? Why did we have to carry the thing all the, way into energy waters to prove it wouldn't work! A consuming fury possessed me.
"Jim," I said bitterly into the mike, "we got two hits; good shooting. None of them exploded."
An answering whistle from the other ship, our pres6nt tar- get, and now the situation was critical indeed. I watched him narrowly, suddenly tense. With our ineffective torpedoes, if he should see us, turn toward to Tam us But he didn't. He turned away, presented a perfect target, and we fired everything left in the forward tubes at him. It looked as if all three hit, and at least-one exploded-right under his stack. His steel hull folded up like paper, bow and stern rising high, center going under water, stack still vertical in the middle, rising now out of roiled-up water.
We put our rudder left again, then right and circled by him. I called Jim and Keith up to see and together. the four of us stared at what we had done. He was gone beyond help, no doubt of that, even if help could have reached him. As we looked, the broad V became sharper. The sides rose, became more vertical, they folded up completely together, forecastle to poop deck with the stack crushed between, and sank from sight. The bow half was several feet shorter than the stern half, and the last thing we could see as the wreck took its final dive was the big bronze propeller, framed in the rudder bearings, still spinning slowly.
Seconds later a heavy explosion came resounding through the water.
"What's that?" cried Tom.
"Dunno," muttered Jim. "Maybe it's his boilers letting go when the cold water reached them."
"The boilers should already have been flooded, from where we hit him," I ventured. "Maybe it's some compartment collapsing from the increased pressure."
"Not with all that noise!" Jim looked incredulous. "That was an explosion!"
'Maybe an explosion inward. Ever blow up a paper bag and pop it?" But we were arguing from ignorance, and more important matters needed our attention. A muffed reverberation from somewhere ahead called them to mind. Gunfire.
"That's the other ship!" Jim spoke before anyone else. "He went off to the northeast"
It made sense that he should carry a gun, but under the circumstances it might have been smarter of him not to have fired it. Jim and Keith raced below-again, the former to plot our interception course, the latter to superintend reloading and checking of torpedoes forward.
We made a long run of it, keeping well out of sight of the fleeing ship, closing in only occasionally for a radar check of his latest position, guiding ourselves by the sporadic booming of the gun on his forecastle or stern. The moon having risen higher, it was now even brighter then before, shedding an all-pervading radiance which, to our night-adapted eyes, seemed as bright as day. Since the target had been alerted and would doubtless observe maximum precautions, these two factors combined appeared to rule out any chance of our getting close enough on the surface to make an attack. It would have to be done submerged.
After three hours of chase, having attained a satisfactory position on the fleeing freighter's bow, Walrus quietly slipped beneath the waves. We had obtained a fair solution of the zigzag plan, now much-more, radical than the previous one, and needed only the last-minute refinements. One thin we had decided, however, based on the five bits we had obtained on the two ships previously and the single explosion resulting: We would make sure of him this time. We would shoot four torpedoes, all aimed to hit, and we would hold the- two left forward as well as the four aft in reserve for a quick second salvo if the first also proved a dud.
The night was dark enough to make one thing unnecessary raising and lowering the periscope for frenetic moments of observation., I kept it up, its tip only a few feet above. the waves, and waited for the zigzagging freighter to cross our bow. It was just as Captain Blunt had said, a long time ago: "After you get in front of him, anyone ought to be able to hit the target. The problem is getting in front."
We had gotten in front, and we bided our time until his zigzag threw him right across our bow. We had opened the outer doors on only four torpedo tubes-at the last possible moment, "Shoot!" I said, watching the huge bulk of the ship glide past.
"Fire!" Jim. "One's fired, sir!" Quin. I could feel the torpedo going out. Someone was counting out the seconds. Up to ten. I shifted the periscope cross hair from the target's stack to his forecastle.
"Shoot!" I said again.
"Fire!"
"Two's away, sir!" Periscope wire now on the stern, bisecting the deckhouse there. "Shoot!" The jolt of the third fish crosshair on the stack for the last one. "Shoot!" Four white streaks in the water, only a thousand yards, half a mile, to go. The first one looked like a sure bull's-eye, right under the stack. The white streak of bubbles, clearly visible against the gray-black of the uneasy sea, drew unerringly to the point, got there. I could see the white froth where the side. of the ship intersected it, held my breath for a frozen second, let it out with a sigh. This was exactly the way it had looked during all these many years of training in Long Island Sound or off Pearl Harbor. This would have been scored a bull's-eye all right; the torpedo would have been recorded as passing exactly where aimed, under the target. There was no difference, and I could feel the unreal "time reversed upon itself" sensation, which I had experienced upon entering Pearl Harbor, lying dormant, just under the surface.
"Time for Number Two fish, skipper." Jim spoke quietly, into my ear. I swung the 'scope slightly.
White froth at the bow also. Plus something else. A splash- a small geyser of water and spray rose halfway to the target's deck. Something had exploded, not the warhead, however, or at least only a small fraction of the TNT supposed to be inside it. Seconds later we heard the sound of it, clearly audible in the conning tower. "Puwhuuung"-the same sound we had heard some months before in AREA SEVEN.
"Jim," I said furiously, "make a note in the log. Low-order explosion. Possibly air flask!"
"Aye, aye, sir! Time for the third torpedo, skipper."
This one would be aft. I swung the scope to the right, caught the torpedo wake' going into the rudder and propeller declivity in the counter stern. This time it exploded; there was a flash of light from right out of the water, accompanied by a cloud of white spray, so fine that it resembled steam.