The Navigating Officer made for the chartroom.
Barratt had an open mind about the extent to which the submarine might have been damaged. While he had reservations about survivors’ reports, particularly where night action was concerned, he was influenced by Corrigan’s evidence that it had last been seen heading down-moon. That meant towards the coast, and that was why Barratt was taking Restless in that direction.
Other considerations influenced him: if the submarine could still dive, as he thought likely, it would get away from the scene of the sinking with its evidence of a massacre, and hunt for its next target. Unescorted ships kept close to the coast; Cape Delgado was a focal point for shipping; once off it a change of course was necessary; what better place for targets than its approaches?
Looking at the chart to decide on his course of action he had noted that the boundary between Tanganyika and Mozambique was the Rovuma River, its mouth some twenty miles north of Cape Delgado. If the submarine could not dive, the coast south of the Rovuma River was not only neutral territory but so studded with small islands, bays and inlets as to be an almost ideal hiding place.
That thought triggered another: the German cruiser Konigsberg, when evading pursuit by British cruisers in the 1914-18 War, had holed up in the Rufigi River south of Dar-es-Salaam, only to be found and destroyed there later by HMS Hampshire. Perhaps, thought Barratt, the Rovuma
River could be to the Japanese submarine what the Rufigi had been to the German cruiser.
His thoughts were interrupted by the arrival in the chart-room of the Coxswain. Behind him at the door stood a young man with tousled hair, bloodshot eyes and scratches on his face and arms. The deeply tanned, muscular body seemed too large for the white shorts and vest he wore. ‘Leading Seaman Corrigan, USNR, sir,’ announced the Coxswain. ‘The doctor says he’s in pretty good shape but needs a rest.’
Barratt said, ‘Come in, Corrigan. Glad to hear you’re all right. I won’t keep you long, but your answers to one or two questions may be very important.’ The Captain nodded towards the Chief Petty Officer. ‘You may carry on, Coxswain.’
The ten minute chat with Corrigan put a question mark over Barratt’s belief that the submarine could still dive. When he explained to the American why it was unlikely that the conning-tower itself had been damaged, Corrigan disagreed with a good deal more vigour than was customary between officers and ratings in the Royal Navy.
‘Got a picture of a submarine here?’ he challenged. ‘I’ll show you right where that shell went in.’ As an afterthought he added, ‘sir.’
Barratt took from the shelf a copy oi Jane’s Fighting Ships, found the section dealing with the Imperial Japanese Navy, turned the pages until he came to those dealing with submarines. ‘Here’s an “I” class built just before the War.’ He pointed to it.
Corrigan looked at the photograph closely, took a pencil from the chart-table. ‘The shell went in right here.’ He indicated the point of entry with the pencil. ‘Dead in line with the space between the two periscopes. And that’s where the conning-tower is.’
Barratt was taken aback. ‘You’ve served in submarines, then?’
‘No, sir. But we were shown over a couple when we did our gunnery course. And we had blown-up diagrams of enemy submarines. For points of aim, you know.’
Barratt frowned. ‘You’re not telling me you aimed to hit the conning-tower?’
Corrigan’s scratched face broke into a grin. ‘No, sir. It was a dark night with flashes of lightning and there was just the two of us. Me and Smitty Fredericks and he was wounded. I just aimed in the general direction of the midships superstructure. I guess it was a dead lucky hit.’ He shook his head in disbelief of what had happened. ‘But later, when I was about thirty feet from the submarine, in bright moonlight, I saw right good where that shell went in. Take it from me, Captain, that Jap can’t dive.’
Barratt was thoughtful, looking at the photograph in Jane’s and then at the chart. At last he said, ‘If you’re right, Corrigan, we have a sporting chance of finding him.’
‘I’d like to be around when you do, sir.’
The Captain nodded sympathetically. ‘I can understand that.’
He went on to question the American about the machinegunning, and the direction in which the submarine had headed as it left the scene.
Having confirmed what he’d told the First Lieutenant, Corrigan added, ‘You know why those…’ He hesitated on the edge of obscenity. ‘Why they killed my buddies, sir — I’ll tell you. It was because they knew they’d been hit real bad. That submarine couldn’t dive. If that news got out their number was up. That’s why they killed like they were goddam butchers.’
‘Thank you, Corrigan. What you’ve told me is most helpful.’ He looked at the young man with quizzical eyes. ‘What was your job before the war?’
‘Lifeguard, sir. On the beach at Sandport, Massachusetts.’ The Captain smiled. ‘That explains a lot.’ When the American had gone, Barratt put Jane's Fighting Ships back in the rack. ‘Did you hear that, Pilot?’ he asked Dodds who was working at the chart-table.
‘I heard most of it, sir.’
‘He seems pretty sure the Jap can’t dive.’
Dodds looked up from the pad on which he’d been making notes. ‘Yes, he does,’ he said in an offhand way, adding, ‘I’ve got those ETAs ready, sir.’
Soon after Corrigan left the chartroom Barratt sent for the First Lieutenant. ‘I need you for a council of war,’ he said when Sandy Hamilton arrived. ‘Captain (D)’s signal orders us to remain in the area and search the immediate coastline.’ Barratt straightened up from the chart-table and stretched his arms. ‘I intend to interpret that fairly liberally. Two Catalinas on routine AM patrol are taking off about now. They’ll be showing up in a few hours’ time. The Pamanzi chap first because he hasn’t got so far to come. Right. Now for the ETAs, Pilot.’
The Navigating Officer checked his notes. ‘For the submarine, ETA Cape Delgado at twelve knots will be 0630, at sixteen knots 0330. No allowance for current, and…’he tapped nervously on the chart-table with the fingers of one hand, ‘… I’ve assumed that he left the sinking position at 2130, and that at twelve knots he’ll have had to dive at dawn…’
‘Which is now,’ put in the First Lieutenant. ‘The sun was beginning to poke its rim above the horizon when I left the bridge a few minutes ago.’
‘He’s likely to have dived,’ said the Captain. ‘Unless he can’t — in which case he won’t be there. He’ll have gone inshore to hole up. What’s our ETA Cape Delgado?’
‘0835 at twenty knots, sir.’
‘I see.’ Barratt pinched the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger, cleared his throat and bent over the chart-table. ‘So the Jap is well ahead of us at either speed, and we…’ He nodded at some indivulged thought. After a brief silence he said, ‘If this submarine can dive I think we can more or less forget him until his next sinking. I’m going to assume that he can’t, that Corrigan’s right. As far as I’m concerned it’s more a gut feeling than anything else. Probably because I want to believe that he can’t dive. If he’s stuck on the surface he’ll try to hide. That’ll give us a sporting chance. Where he can go, we can. Our draughts are much the same.’ He coughed, took out a handkerchief, wiped his mouth. ‘We’ll start at the Rovuma River mouth. It’s about twenty miles north of Cape Delgado. When we’ve checked it thoroughly we’ll work south. He won’t be north of the river. Too risky. Tanganyika is British territory. If he has to hide he’ll stick to the Mozambique coast. Somewhere between where Fort N sank and the Rovuma River. Perhaps in the Rovuma.’ Barratt turned from the chart-table. ‘What d’you chaps think?’