Moving to another pipe, he blew and received an immediate response, the depth charge crews still at their posts following the drill session.
“Thompson, get ’em set for one-fifty, and do it fast. We are almost on top of the bastard. Two and two, Sub, two and two.”
“Aye aye, Skipper.”
“Subby, the old lady can’t make full speed. You understand, lad?”
The reply was slightly delayed, but none the less, firm.
”Understood, Skipper. Good luck, Sir.”
‘And to thee, young ‘un.’
Sequoia’s crew were top notch, despite the air of informality and relaxation that so exasperated the ‘real’ Navy men, marking her and her crew as a target for career naval officers ashore.
The Number One was now on the voice pipe, receiving information from Maitland, passing on the relevant parts as the excited young officer brought the trawler down on the unsuspecting submarine.
“Lost signal, Skipper!”
A sure sign that the undersea killer was beneath their keel.
“Very well, Number One.”
Standing by the ship’s horn, Boothroyd calculated all the factors in the equation.
‘Wait.’
The tension on the bridge was extreme.
‘Wait.’
The boy coughed, the strain apparent as he cradled the rifle to him, seeking its comfort and support.
‘Now.’
He pulled the small handle, summoning a single blast of the ship’s horn, spurring the depth charge crews into action. The system also had the advantage of giving the rest of the ship’s company advance warning of what was about to happen.
Thompson, at the rear of the vessel, counted off the first depth charge, watching it roll down the metal frame and drop into the sea beneath the stern.
Not trusting his free counting, so watching his timepiece closely, he counted down, raising his hand on a count of six and dropping it on the nine.
The second depth charge followed suit.
In the water were four type D charges, each containing three hundred pounds of deadly amatol explosives.
On the bridge, Boothroyd decided to stay silent. No use in troubling the boy, and the others all knew that the depth charges were going to be too close at their reduced speed, and would probably mortally wound them too.
The Number One made the only possible comment.
“Brace yourselves!”
“Commander! Splashes in the water, close by!”
Yanninin acted immediately, trying to picture the surface vessel and its movements.
“Emergency speed, steer starboard 20, make depth one hundred.”
It was a good effort, but ultimately, a wasted one.
Three of the charges exploded in as many seconds, the first two causing nothing but boiled water, either side of the 307.
The third charge detonated six feet behind the port propeller, bending the blades. The shockwave rammed the bent shaft back into the stuffing boxes and gears, causing catastrophic damage to the port engine.
Water started to pour in through ruined seals, immediately making the boat rear-heavy.
The secondary shock waves sprung the main air intake valve, adding to the inrush of the sea.
Yanninin knew his ship was dying.
“Blow all tanks, surface, gun action surface.”
His words were punctuated by another huge explosion, this time the charge detonated off the port bow.
The remaining bulbs shattered, plunging the control room into temporary darkness, swiftly dispersed by torches.
The damaged bow cap gave way, not totally, but enough to permit an inrush of water.
The partially drained torpedo tube offered a space for the water to build momentum, the mass striking the welded tube door hard.
The Senior Starshina understood he was watching his doom unfold, the pinpoint high-pressure leaks springing around the failing door weld.
The following shock waves caused the door to fail and the tube was opened to the sea.
None of the torpedo room personnel had any time to do anything but scream as the cold water rushed over them.
In the control room, things went from bad to worse, the first officer virtually trepanned when he smashed into the periscope stand. Yanninin was trying to ignore his broken wrist, snapped in an instant as he had reached out to steady himself and missed.
Others also lay dead and bleeding, victims of the two charges.
Shch307 would not rise, the bow now heavier than the stern.
The depth gauge, functioning as it was designed, steadily altered, showing their accelerating fall into the depths.
The charts indicated a depth of roughly three hundred and thirty metres under their keel, a distance well past the crush depth of their hull.
Calls to the torpedo room were not answered, and the survivors started to understand that their deaths were but a few heartbeats away.
At two-hundred and ninety-eight metres, the damaged hull gave up the struggle.
Thompson was dying. The fourth and nearest shockwave displaced a ready-use depth charge, which rolled into him, crushing him against the ship’s side and almost severing his legs.
Two members of his depth charge gang had already gone to meet their maker, dashed against unforgiving hard surfaces by the blasts. The rest were unconscious.
Sequoia would not long survive her vanquished foe, the leaks so severe in her propeller shaft and engine spaces that Higginbotham had quit the boiler room without permission, saving most of his gang by the skin of their teeth.
The trawler was already down by the stern, and noticeably sinking deeper by the minute.
The boy was nearing the end of his journey, his injuries not obvious, his body broken on the inside. He had been thrown against the wheel, two handles driving hard into him, one catastrophically rupturing his liver, the other his spleen.
“Easy now, boy, easy. We’ll get the doc to thee, and thou’ll be right as rain in no time.”
Boothroyd stroked the boy’s hair, his tears betraying the lies.
“Did we get him, Skipper?”
“Aye, boy, we got him fair and square.”
A cough brought forth a gout of crimson fluid.
“Rest easy, boy. Thy duty’s done.”
Seemingly drifting away, the teenager rallied one final time.
“Tell Mum it didn’t hurt, and tell her I was a good sailor.”
Boothroyd looked up as Higginbotham entered, the engineer’s face betraying the horror of what he had stumbled upon.
“Oh Jesus Christ, George!”
He rushed forward, one hand on the dying child, the other on the man who had been his best friend since memories began.
Holding the boy’s hand tight, the ship’s captain made his pledge.
“That I will, boy, that I will. Now, rest easy, and know that I’s proud of thee.”
“Dad…”
The boy died.
The crew abandoned ship, pulling away in the undamaged boats, putting a little distance between themselves and the rapidly sinking trawler.
Higginbotham had tried, as had others, but all failed. So they obeyed the last order of their Captain, the man who now stood motionless on the port bridge of the Sequoia, sixty feet away.
The crews stopped rowing and watched, no one in the two boats turning away, all rigidly facing front as a mark of respect to their crewmates and their ship.
HMT Sequoia accelerated her descent, the rising water claiming her hull and superstructure in one violent, foaming minute, Captain Boothroyd disappearing from view in a whirl of white.
And then she was gone.
At one hundred and fifty feet, hydrostatic valves started to click, the depth charges doing what they had been asked to do by Thompson.
Eight of thirty charges had been armed and ready for use.