Dust on the Sea (46 page)

Eel
was rising and falling slowly, alternately bow and stern, rolling slightly—not much. This was because of the large free surface effect of her only partly emptied ballast tanks. American submarines in the old days were considered to be unstable in this condition, and somehow
the idea had persisted, but Dugan had never found it to be so. His only worries were the weather: the cold and freezing, the ice crunching about on the slatted bridge deck which made footing uncertain. Because of the cold he and his bridge crew moved more slowly, were more apt to slip or stumble, or interfere with each other. The railings around the hatch were slippery with frozen moisture. Getting six men below with bulky, frozen clothing would inevitably take longer than the eight seconds they had established as a standard in the sunny Hawaiian training areas. An occasional larger-than-usual sea would frequently come entirely over the bridge windscreen, drenching everyone. Were they forced to dive into such a sea, it was just possible the ship might go down more rapidly than usual, while at the same time the bridge personnel would be that much slower in getting below. This was one of the reasons why they had been brought down from their daylight perches on the periscope shears. All were no doubt very much aware of the problem, and their concern must have been increased by reflection upon the accident which had left Richardson and Oregon on the bridge a week ago.

It had been decided that the next time an airplane was sighted it would be the signal for
Eel
to submerge and remain submerged as if she really were intent upon evasion. Otherwise the Japanese might realize she was acting out of character and suspect she was decoying them. So far as Al Dugan and his bridge watch squad were concerned, this could not happen too soon.

The deeps of the ocean are always inviting to a submariner. It is only the surface of the sea that is sometimes harsh.

Heavy winds from the north had finally, only within the hour, blown away the leaden overcast. Visibility was excellent, the sky a brilliant blue in all directions without hint of a cloud. The sun, a low cheerless orb to the southwest, now approaching the horizon, had not been able to penetrate the intense cold. Even its usual radiant warmth had hardly been noticeable to Al Dugan's benumbed cheeks. With visibility like this, any aircraft should be spotted long before it came close enough to catch the
Eel
on the surface with a bomb or depth charge.

On the other hand, the Japanese must be aware of this also. They would come in close to the water, as low as they dared to fly, having started their attack runs from beyond the visible horizon. Perhaps this was what was going on, for no aircraft had been seen for several hours. In this event, of course, or at night, when visibility was reduced, the airplanes would come in on radar.
Eel
had had a new radar-signal-detection apparatus installed during the previous refit at Pearl Harbor,
and this gadget, known as the APR, had already been useful to warn them of radar surveillance. More than once during the past two days it had enabled them to be safely submerged when the Japanese aircraft arrived. Were an aircraft to make a radar approach from over the horizon, the man on watch at the APR would be the first person in the ship to become aware of it. Dugan felt a measure of confidence as he ceaselessly searched the air above the horizon through his dampened binoculars. He would see the Japanese aircraft before it came, or get warning of it from the APR set in the control room. He was tired of waiting, wished the enemy would come. It would be a favor.

“Bridge!” It was the bridge speaker on the underside of the bridge overhang. “Bridge, APR signal! Strength one!”

A steady signal at strength three, according to ComSubPac, was the time to dive. “Strength one” meant only that an aircraft radar was in the vicinity, probably many miles away. Al pushed the “press to talk” button alongside the bridge speaker twice by way of acknowledgment.

“Bridge! APR signal coming in and out. Maximum strength one. Looks like an aircraft radar searching back and forth.”

Dugan again pressed the bridge speaker button twice, using the heel of his mittened hand, for his fingers felt too numb to function.

There was a patrol plane in the air, probably carrying on a routine search in the Yellow Sea. The fluctuations in strength resulted from variations in the plane's own heading as it patrolled back and forth on its search line. If it ever remained steady, particularly if it gradually increased in strength while remaining steady, this would be definite indication that the plane had detected the submarine—a steel mass in a watery one—and was beginning a run in. Even before it reached strength three, in this case, Dugan silently promised himself, he would pull the plug.

“Lookouts, look alive now!” he sang out. “There's a plane in the area looking for us. He's pretty far away, but he might come closer!” Everyone on the bridge was already well aware of the situation, he knew, for they also had heard the report from the man on watch at the radar detector set.

Long seconds crawled by in slow procession. Finally Dugan pushed the button again. “Control, bridge. What's with that APR contact?”

“Still the same, Bridge. Getting stronger and weaker. Maximum strength one.”

A bell tinkled in Dugan's mind. “Coming in and out,” the man had said. One of the stratagems the Japanese had used, he remembered, as
had U.S. aircraft in the Atlantic war, was to vary the strength of the radar beam to give the impression of searching while actually homing on a firm contact.

“Control, bridge. Ask Mr. Leone to take a look at that contact.”

Keith's voice came back almost immediately through the speaker. “Bridge, control. Al, I'm here on the set. Just got here. It looks like two radars to me, both on the same frequency and both of them are cutting in and out rather rapidly.”

“Control, bridge,” said Dugan into the speaker, “does it look like they're on another contact?”

“That's what it looks like, Al,” said Keith from below, his voice distinctly recognizable despite the bridge speaker's less than optimum reproduction quality. “But so far as we know, we're the only thing out here. Better stay on your toes up there. Maybe they're playing games with us.”

“Double-sharp lookout, all hands!” shouted Dugan, carefully wiping up his binocular lenses again and swinging a careful search through the entire forward section of the horizon. The two forward lookouts would be doing the same, he knew, as would Cornelli and the two after lookouts in the other direction.

“Bridge, control,” Keith again. “Definitely two radars. Both patrolling, but they're getting fainter now. APR strength one-half.”

Dugan pushed the speaker button twice in relief and at the same time mild disappointment. If they had only steadied up for a while, he thought, we could be submerging where it's warm and comfortable. As he let go of the button the second time he realized he had momentarily cut off another transmission from Keith.

“. . . maybe up to their regular stunt, Al. They've already spotted us six times out here. They must know where to look for us.”

Dugan was about to reach for the speaker button to make another acknowledgment, had been leaning on the bridge windbreak with his binoculars over the edge, staring dead ahead at the horizon, when suddenly he noticed something. A tiny discontinuity, a thin dark line seemingly on the horizon, which suddenly disappeared. Instantly he knew what it was. “Clear the bridge!” he bellowed. He reached for the diving alarm, pressed it twice with his entire mittened hand, heard the reassuring sound of the diving alarm reproduced over the ship's general announcing system. “Dive! Dive!” he shouted into the bridge speaker.

He stood aside to permit the heavily bundled lookouts and quartermaster to get down the hatch. As they did so, he heard Cornelli screaming, “Aircraft! Coming in from astern!”

Two planes! One ahead and one astern. They
had
been working a game! They had been coordinating their attacks! One coming in from ahead, and now one coming in from astern. Both flying low to the water. How far away were they? How quick could the submarine dive? The lookouts were clear. Cornelli, waiting, jumped into the yawning hatch. His bulky, heavily clothed figure completely filled the hole.

Dugan had not heard the vents opening or the diesel engine shut off, but he was aware of the main induction slamming home behind him. A sea traveled up over
Eel
's bow, broke over the forward forty-millimeter platform, boiled up over the windscreen. She wasn't diving yet—couldn't be—but she was half-submerged anyway with this sea coming aboard. Water was pouring down the hatch all over Cornelli, who had less than a second before found the ladder and was descending as rapidly as he could. No time to waste. Dugan simply leaped onto Cornelli's back, knocking him down the ladder, falling down himself, grabbing the braided copper hatch lanyard in his hand as he descended. The wire rope slipped through his hands, but he expected this, felt the toggle slam into his wrist. His feet touched only a single rung of the ladder as his weight on the lanyard pulled the hatch down with him. A deluge of water was pouring into the ship through the hatch. It stopped sharply as the hatch slammed home. He held down hard on the lanyard, almost in a sitting position, while Cornelli picked himself up, crowded past him, scrambled partway up the rungs of the ladder, and spun the dogging hand wheel shut.

“Hatch secured!” shouted Cornelli, through chattering lips.

There was half an inch of cold water sloshing around on the conning tower deck plates. No matter, it would quickly drain through into the bilges. “Take her down fast!” shouted Dugan. “Two aircraft making a run on us!” He released the lanyard, took two quick steps to the control room hatch, was gladdened to see Keith standing beneath him. The executive officer had evidently moved over from the radar detector and was now superintending the diving operation. He had himself grabbed the bow plane control wheel and was holding it on full dive. The lookout who would normally have taken the bow plane was standing beside him hastily pulling off his wet parka. Another lookout had the stern planes, was moving them to full dive as Dugan watched.

Dugan scrambled down the ladder to the control room, whispered hoarsely to Keith, “Two planes coming in, one ahead and one dead astern. They're right on the water and coming in fast. Get her down as fast as you can!”

“Right,” said Keith. “I'll take the dive for now. You rig for depth charge. Get the watertight doors shut!”

Without answering, Dugan reached for the announcing system microphone, “All hands rig ship for depth charge!” he said into it urgently. “Shut all watertight doors! Two planes coming in for attack!” Approximately twenty seconds had passed since the diving alarm had sounded.

Richardson had joined the tense group in the control room, had heard the last few words of the colloquy between Leone and Dugan. “How far away would you say they were, Al?” he asked.

“Two or three miles, maybe a little more for the one I saw,” responded Dugan. “I didn't see the other one, but I guess it was about the same. Cornelli saw it just as I sounded the diving alarm. They were making a coordinated attack on us.”

“Down on the deck like that they probably aren't going more than a hundred eighty knots That's three miles a minute,” said Richardson. “About half a minute more before they get here.”

Dugan was feverishly divesting himself of his foul-weather gear, pulled the parka over his head, threw it on the chart table over the gyro compass in the center of the control room. A river of water ran from it over the linoleum top of the table, dripped to the deck beneath.

“What's the depth of water here, Keith?” asked Richardson.

“No more than two hundred fifty feet, Skipper,” answered Keith, not taking his eyes away from the diving control panel. “We're under now. Depth five-oh feet.”

“Go on over to a fifteen-degree down angle, Keith. We've got to get as deep as we can as quick as we can. Al, see that the sound heads are rigged in. We may hit bottom with this steep angle.”

“Aye!” said Dugan as he reached again for the announcing microphone. “Rig in the sound heads,” he ordered. “Forward torpedo room, bear a hand! Rig in the sound heads immediately. We may hit bottom. Report by telephone when they are rigged in.”

Instead of easing off on the stern planes to level the ship after her initial dive, as was the ordinary procedure, the stern planesman under Keith's direction grimly held the stern planes in the “full dive” position.
Eel
's deck continued to tilt down even more.

“All ahead emergency!” barked Richardson, vectoring his voice up the hatch to the conning tower. They could feel the increased bite of the electric motors as the electrician's mates opened their rheostats wide.

“We'll lose the bubble in the small-angle indicators, Captain,” said Dugan. “It goes out at ten degrees.”

“Let it,” said Rich. “Shift to the large-angle indicators. Pass the word to all hands to rig ship for steep angle. The planes will figure to catch us within a few seconds after we've completely submerged, and they'll expect that we won't be very deep by that time. We've got to get just as deep as we can—left full rudder!” He explained the order tersely. “Got to get off the track. Coming in from ahead and astern that way means they're geared to drop their eggs right on line and ahead of our diving point. Can't help it if it slows up our dive a little.”