Submarine! (24 page)

And on her third run
Tang
sank ten ships, for a total of fifteen. O'Kane still seemed to be possessed of a fierce driving urge to sink more Japanese ships, his mission of vengeance not yet accomplished, his search for perfection not yet satisfied. By the time
Tang's
third patrol was completed, however, the lure of the chase seemed uppermost in O'Kane's mind, and the desire for revenge, and the dedication of all victims to the old
Wahoo
, was no longer the primary motivation. In other words,
Tang
was now working for herself.

While she sank only two ships on her fourth patrol, this was the toughest one to date, for
Tang
was bothered with excellent anti-submarine forces and poor torpedo performance. Shades of poor old Mush Morton! But the trouble was not so serious as
Wahoo
had experienced, and effective results were achieved in spite of it.

On August 11, O'Kane had selected a spot off the coast of Honshu known as Miki Saki for a submerged patrol. It soon became evident that he had correctly gauged a hot spot, for a modern gunboat, which he described as “loaded with depth charges,” cruised in the area, while a nondescript motorboat wandered about with six lookouts keeping a sharp watch. All day was spent in avoiding these two characters, but at about 1500 the motorboat, by great good luck, sighted the periscope of the questing submarine, and tailed her from then on.

Not good, this, but
Tang
is not one to give up just because a little boat latches on to her. Surfacing and giving him a quick going over would not be advisable because of the gunboat
which had been sighted earlier and the possible presence of planes. Apparently the motorboat is not positive about its contact, for no heavier anti-sub forces come out to help, so
Tang
nonchalantly keeps patrolling the area, although this little fellow is annoying.

Shortly before 1700 smoke is sighted.
Tang
starts the approach, and the smoke resolves itself into two heavily laden ships, escorted by the gunboat, and another escort. Both ships are running as close to the beach as they dare, and
Tang
goes right on in after them, followed by the ubiquitous motor-boat. The approach develops normally, and it is not long before O'Kane finds himself just where he wants to be, broad on the leading target's beam, ready to shoot. Just then there is an excited report from the sound man:

“Fast screws, Captain! Bearing two one five!” The sound man has been obeying the standing order for torpedo approaches to search continually all around unless specifically directed otherwise. These screws are on the port quarter; the targets are on the port bow, coming up on the firing point.

O'Kane spins the periscope around for a quick look. Damn that motorboat anyway! He has evidently warned the gunboat, and that worthy is now charging down on
Tang
with a bone in his teeth and a look of fury suffusing his sleek hull. A minute and a half to get here. There is time—barely—to fire the fish.

Tang's
periscope turns back to the enemy. The situation has suddenly changed dramatically, for the worst! There may be just enough time to shoot the torpedoes, but, oh-h-h-h, are we going to catch it! Dick O'Kane is a marvel of concentration. Although the tension has suddenly leaped up to a terrific pitch he calmly goes through all the many motions associated with firing torpedoes. But his voice is clipped, short, and sharp. He expects every man to get it the first time, and no repeats.

“Standby forward!”

“Final setup!”

“Bearing.—
mark!”

“Set!” From the TDC operator.

“Fire!” Three torpedoes, properly spaced, are fired at the leading ship.

“Shift targets! Second ship! Bearing—
Mark!”

“Three four one!”

“Set!”

“FIRE!” Even before the second fish of this three-torpedo salvo is on its way, O'Kane turns back to the gunboat, JUST in time to see him charge across the stern at full speed. Evidently he had misjudged the sub's direction of motion, which is a lucky break. Another minute free, at least. In the meantime, as soon as the last torpedo is fired, the word is passed through the ship: “Rig for depth charge!”

Back goes the periscope toward the targets. Many a man would have pulled his down in this juncture, but not O'Kane. He simply
must
see these targets sink! “Take her down!” he orders, but he keeps the scope up.

“Come on! Come
on!”
He has only a few seconds left to see the hit—he must see it—WHANG! Right in the middle. It must have caught his old-style boilers, for the ship virtually disintegrates. Dick has time to see the explosion, and the ship breaking into two pieces, before the periscope goes under as
Tang
seeks the shelter of the depths.

Two more explosions are heard. One of the members of the control party is assiduously logging the times and characteristics of all explosions—proper evaluation of results requires that some record be kept—and these are later identified as the fourth and fifth torpedoes striking into the second freighter. But the log of the attack merely lists two explosions, ten seconds apart, which “sounded like torpedoes.”

But this is by no means all for this merry afternoon. The Jap gunboat has quickly realized his mistake and has reversed course. Sound carefully keeps on him, and soon his bearing is steady. His screws slow down—he is listening and probing with his echo-ranging gear. The high-pitched ping of his sound gear coming in over
Tang's
receiver—
Peep
—
peep
—
peeeeeeep
—
peeeep
—searches relentlessly this way and that, growing louder when he is on the bearing, diminishing when he is off.

There is a loud-speaker mounted near the sound console, but it is not used. The frenetic bleeps of the enemy apparatus are audible throughout the conning tower from the operator's earphones. Since contact has been so recently lost, it does not take long to regain it, and soon the horrid
“Peep, peep, peep!”
noise is coming in regularly. It won't be long now!

“Screws have speeded up!” suddenly reports Sound.

All at once it becomes obvious to everyone that the interval between successive pings has decreased. The sound man's report—“Shifting to short scale!”—is totally unnecessary. As the enemy approaches, the time necessary for an echo to return from the submerged submarine of course decreases, its length determining the range. But as it decreases, it then becomes possible to send out more
peeps
, and thus get more echoes. The gunboat's shifting to a more frequent ranging interval indicates that he has an excellent contact and that he is coming in for the attack.

“Standby! He's starting a run!” The word is whispered over the ship's sound-powered telephones, as though the use of full voice might help the enemy in locating the sub.

Tang
has not been idle in the short time since the firing of the torpedoes. Preparations for receiving a beating are more or less standard among the submarine force, and it took less than a minute for the well-drilled crew to rig ship for depth charge attack.

The effect upon the various members of the crew would be revealing, were there any way to detect it. Some men secretly pray, as they go about their tasks. Others feel a sort of masochistic pleasure, secure in their own private fatalistic concepts of life and death. All essay a nervous little smile, and watch furtively to see how the others are taking it.

Up in the conning tower, Dick O'Kane has not been idle either. Evasion, like attack, is the skipper's responsibility in a submarine. He has been twisting and turning, presenting the smallest possible target to the probing fingers of the enemy sound gear. At the same time he has been endeavoring to move away from the coast of Honshu, out to sea, where
Tang
will have deeper water and more room to maneuver.

But try as he may, the enemy gunboat has far too good a contact to be shaken so easily. The menacing propellers come ever closer, and their beat is speeded up gradually as the attack is developed. Tang has received depth charges before, but never from such a deliberate fellow.

Closer and closer come the malevolent screws, and the bleat of the echo-ranging signals are one continuous
“Peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep,”
until it seems that the mind must reel. Beads of sweat roll down the forehead and cheeks of the concentrating sound man, curving into the corners of his mouth, and occasionally his nervous tongue licks at the salty taste thus produced. Murray Frazee once wipes off his forehead and the back of his neck, but Sound shakes his head uneasily, and the exec lets it go.

“Coming on the range now!” The report is muttered as though in meditation. “Coming on the range . . .
He's dropped the first one!”
The sound man has caught the splash of the depth charge dropping into the water.

“How fast do Jap depth charges sink?” The question hangs pregnantly in mid-air. Frazee tries to remember his destroyer days: about ten feet a second—200 feet—that's as deep as we can go—twenty seconds—hope he hasn't got the depth set right . . .

“He's dropped six of them!”
The report sounds oddly loud in the confined conning tower, and O'Kane realizes with a start of sympathy that this operator—his best—has been on duty for two strenuous hours without once removing his earphones.

“Ten seconds more, Captain!” Frazee tries to assume the disinterested voice of an observer at a target practice.

“WHAM! . . . WHAM! . . . WHAM! . . . WHAM! . . . WHAM! . . . WHAM! The shock is beyond all expectation, beyond reason. With a scream of agony, the sound man jerks off his earphones and stands up trembling before his instrument. The poor fellow had forgotten to turn down his gain control before the charges went off, and is really in severe pain. Dick O'Kane clutches the steel hoist cable of the periscope
to keep from falling down, and with his free hand supports the shuddering sound man, who has been flung off his balance by the succeeding blows. Several cigarette receptacles are flung to the furiously vibrating deck plates of the tiny compartment. The explosions resound throughout the ship like pile-driver blows. The atmosphere is filled with a strumming many-pitched roar, produced by the sudden vibration induced in the bulkheads and all the pipes and fittings. Occasionally a piece gives way with a peculiarly explosive noise of relief which only adds to the discordant uproar.

Several men are knocked off their feet by the intensity of the barrage. The air within
Tang's
tough steel hull is filled with flying bits of dust and specks of paint, plus larger items such as sections of cork insulation and other material not firmly nailed down.

Frazee and O'Kane look at each other with dismay. This birdie certainly has the range all right. Wonder how much of this kind of pounding good old
Tang
can stand. So far, not much serious damage, but there's no telling when one of these blockbusters will be a bull's-eye.

Regaining control over his jumping reflexes and somehow quieting the ringing in his ears to at least bearable level, the sound man returns to his listening equipment, and immediately picks up the gunboat's screws on
Tang's
port bow, where he is heard to slow down, apparently waiting for possible results to his first attack, and no doubt planning another.

The Captain speaks to the conning tower telephone talker. “Check and report all compartments!” The crisp command goes out to all the eight other watertight compartments of the ship, and the reports come back immediately, indicating that the men in each have already taken stock of their situation. So far all is reassuring, although no one in the ship can recollect ever having received a barrage as close as this one before.

O'Kane's mind is a boiling mass of ideas for evasion; so is Murray Frazee's, and the two hold hurried counsel. It is
probable that the enemy will try to box
Tang
, in shallow water, against the not-too-distant coast of Honshu.

By this time it is deathly quiet again, even the prolonged swishing noise produced by the depth charges having died down and the querulous “Peep . . . peep . . . peep” can again be heard by the people in the conning tower. O'Kane would like to take a sounding, but dares not, since the signal of his depth finder would furnish the Jap with precisely the information he is seeking—the location of
Tang
. But after a moment's thought Dick has the answer for that one. The operator of the depth-finding equipment receives instructions to take one sounding in the middle of each depth charge barrage, and to leave the gear turned off otherwise. The scheme is instantly obvious to all, for naturally the Jap sound man will not expect to hear anything while the depth charges are going off-while
Tang's
operator, knowing when to expect the return echo, can probably catch it through the terrific uproar of the explosions. A neat dodge, and one requiring considerable skill.

“He's turning this way!” The sound man in the conning tower diagnoses the maneuver heralding the arrival of a second attack, the one which Dick O'Kane has been waiting for, during which he will put into effect the evasive maneuver he has planned.

“Here he comes! Shifting to short scale! Screws speeding up!”

“Right full rudder! All ahead full!” Until this moment Tang has been creeping along at evasive speed, which is as slow as she can go and, of course, running as noiselessly as possible, which can only be accomplished effectively while at creeping speed. This full-speed business will surely be detected over the Jap sound gear, though the enemy's own speed will make this more difficult. But O'Kane is figuring on completely outwitting him. Tang turns quickly and heads straight for the Jap gunboat. Perhaps Dick has remembered something which Mush Morton did one time, in a similar situation when brought to bay by a Nipponese destroyer—
only difference now is that
Tang
has had no opportunity to get any torpedoes ready forward. And Dick's plan proves to be a modification of the one Morton had used in
Wahoo
, for
Tang
rockets along, figuratively laying her ears back alongside her head, and runs at full speed directly beneath the on-rushing Jap.