“They won’t be able to tell, sir.” Flanagan looked at the plane overhead. “Those bastards in the exploder shop are getting cute. Chief in the Afterbody Shop, the torpedo shop on the tender, he tipped me off that the exploder shop on the Base was putting a little drop of clear shellac on some, not all, of the exploder studs that fasten the exploder to the warhead. Not much shellac, not enough to notice it when you backed out the studs but enough to see it if you’re looking for it.
“They keep a little notebook, mark down which studs they shellacked on which exploder. That way, if you noticed a little flake or two of shellac when you backed out the stud and if you made a mistake, put some shellac around every stud or if you didn’t see it at all, they’d have you.
“What I did was to get a can of the same kind of shellac. And a notebook. When we remodified the exploders we went by our own book so each exploder would be exactly the same as it was when we got it. I’d bet some good money they won’t know we fucked with their damned exploders, sir.”
A lean destroyer closed on the Eelfish from the starboard side, a signal light on its bridge blinking furiously.
“They’re saying they’ll lead us in, sir,” Bill Brosmer said to Bob Lee, who had the OOD watch. He raised a signal gun he had brought to the bridge as the Eelfish neared port.
“You want to receipt affirmative and say thank you, sir?”
“Make an affirmative reply and say thank you,” Lee said. He turned to Captain Brannon. “Sir, the destroyer will lead us in to the harbor.”
“Very well,” Brannon said. “Tell the destroyer we’ll take up position five hundred yards astern.” The destroyer’s signal lamp blinked in reply and Brannon watched as the graceful ship swung ahead of the Eelfish and took up position, slowing its speed to accommodate to the Eelfish. Deep in the harbor another signal lamp began blinking.
“The Pelius is making a signal to us, Mr. Lee,” Brosmer said.
“Tell him to go ahead,” Lee said. Brosmer raised his signal gun and cradled its rifle butt in his shoulder. His index finger clicked the trigger signal on the lamp. The signalman on the submarine tender answered in a blur of light flashes.
“He’s telling us to moor alongside the outboard submarine, starboard side to, sir,” Brosmer said.
“Acknowledge,” Lee said. Ahead of them the destroyer signal lamp began to repeat the message.
“What the hell,” Brosmer growled. “Doesn’t that bastard think we can read code?”
“They don’t know we’ve got you on the bridge, Bill,” Mike Brannon said genially. “Acknowledge and tell them thank you. This is no day to be getting picky.” He turned to Bob Lee.
“Let’s set the maneuvering watch. All hands not on watch or working will muster topside in clean dungarees, shined shoes, and clean white hats. Tell Chief Flanagan to get his line handlers organized.”
Chief Flanagan lined up two ranks of off-duty crewmen on the afterdeck and put Chief Pharmacist’s Mate Wharton in charge. He took the line-handling party to the foredeck.
“I want two men for each line,” he said. “For those of you who haven’t done this before remember one thing. Don’t try to catch the monkey fist on the end of the heaving line they’ll throw you from the other submarine. That monkey fist is loaded with lead and you’ll break your hands. Let the monkey fist fall and grab the heaving line, and haul in the mooring-line eye and put it over the cleats. That’s all you got to do. Then you gather up the heaving lines and coil them up nice and neat. Now stand by your line-handling stations.” He turned to the bridge.
“Off-duty crew in formation on the after deck, Bridge. Standing at ease. Line-handling party is stationed.”
“Very well,” Lee said.
Flanagan turned to look at the bulk of the U.S.S. Pelius. There were four submarines alongside the tender, and on the outboard submarine Flanagan could see groups of men standing beside coils of mooring line. A submarine on war patrol carries no mooring lines, no anchor, and no anchor chain. The possibility that depth charges might tear open the mooring line lockers and that the line might foul the submarine’s propellers, the danger that depth charges might knock the anchor loose and that it would roar out with its 630-foot length of chain and thus immobilize the submarine under water were too great to risk. Nor did submarines on war patrol keep their bronze-wire lifelines, which were usually strung on posts along the edges of the deck. Those might rattle under water and give away the submarine’s position. Only the heavy stanchions that had a special fixture on their tops to accommodate the spud of a 50-caliber machine gun were left in place, and those stanchions were braced and welded to make sure they couldn’t rattle.
The Eelfish eased in toward the outboard submarine in the nest next to the Pelius, Captain Mike Brannon watching carefully as Lieutenant Robert E. Lee, his voice crisp as he issued orders to the helm and the maneuvering room for changes of speed, maneuvered the submarine toward its berth. As the bow of the Eelfish passed the forward deck gun of the submarine it was to moor alongside, Lee raised his voice.
“Rudder amidships. All back one-third. Pass mooring lines aboard.” The heavy lead-loaded monkey fists on the ends of the heaving lines whipped across the Eelfish deck, and the line handlers hauled in the mooring-line eyes and slipped them over the cleats.
“All stop! Double up all mooring lines.” Lee turned to Captain Brannon. “Ship is moored, sir.”
“Nice landing, Bob,” Brannon said. “You’ve got a really good feel for the ship.” Lee grinned like a little boy. “Bridge! Permission to take the gangway aboard?” Flanagan’s voice came from the afterdeck.
“Permission granted,” Brannon said. He walked back to the cigaret deck and dropped down to the deck as a short, heavyset officer, his Captain’s eagles gleaming on his shirt-collar tabs, put one foot on the gangway. “Permission to come aboard, Captain?”
“Welcome aboard, sir,” Brannon responded. He waited as the Captain and his staff crossed the gangway, saluting the American flag, which hung from its staff at the ship’s stern, and John Olsen, who was standing at the gangway.
“I’m Sam Rivers,” the Captain said to Brannon. “Operations Officer for Admiral Christie. The Admiral is coming aboard in a few minutes. Let me extend my congratulations for a fine patrol, sir.”
“Thank you, sir,” Brannon said. He turned as Admiral
Christie came bounding down the gangway, his hand extended to Mike Brannon.
“Damned fine patrol, Mike!” the Admiral cried. “Damned fine, two Fubukis, wow! Good shooting!”
“Thank you, sir,” Brannon said. “I just wish we could have got them before they got the Mako.”
The Admiral’s smiling face became grave. He put his arm around Brannon’s heavy shoulders and walked him up the deck away from the group of Staff officers.
“You did everything you could, Mike. It wasn’t your fault, not in any way. You followed your orders, your patrol orders, the way every officer in this Navy has to follow his orders. You made all possible speed to come to the Mako when they told you they had a convoy and invited you to share in the action. We all know that.” He stopped and removed his arm and turned to face Brannon.
“I want you to know this, Mike. I cried when I read your contact report, the part about the Mako transmitting the Twenty-third Psalm as the ship was sinking into the Philippine Trench, out of control. My God, what brave men! And how terrible it must have been for you, to have to stand and hear that message and not be able to do anything. I cried, Mike. I did.”