A Twist of Sand

"Dive!" I ordered curtly.  "Action stations."

The atmosphere in the control room was plain to me even as I clipped the hatch above me and received the familiar dollop of water as Trout slid under. John was meticulously correct and formal, and God help anyone under him who erred. But I could tell from young Devenish, the sub's, face, that the officers considered their skipper had gone round the bend -- perhaps even now he was going up the creek by this apparently ridiculous order for action stations after a couple of hours of fooling around which would have caused any would-be officer to be sacked from his training course. The crew, battle-hardened, were alert and on the job, every man where he should be. If the officers thought I was crazy, heaven alone knows what the crew thought. Blast them all, I thought savagely, it isn't for them to think. I'm doing the thinking, and I'm carrying a burden of responsibility which may well decide the fate of the entire war at sea. They just have to sweat it out.

"What's the sounding?" I asked briefly.

"Fifteen fathoms -- a shade more, sir."

"Steer three-five-oh," I ordered.

The helmsman spun his wheel and Trout swung her deadly snout towards the spot where I knew NP I must enter that fearful channel.

"Depth, eighty feet. Lay her gently on the bottom."

The planesman manipulated expertly.

"Torpedo settings for eight and ten feet," I continued. "All tubes to the ready."

"Down periscope." I had taken one last quick look round. The shallow settings on the torpedo were tricky, but I was working on the assumption that NP I would come in on the surface. I gave the plot for the attack and the fruit machine went into action. In my mind's eye I saw the whole situation. The old thrill of the chase and the consummation of the attack swept over me. The bastard, I thought without rancour.

"Course for a ninety-degree track?"

"Three-four-five degrees, sir."

Well, my rough estimate of three-five-oh had been near enough; good enough with a spread on the torpedoes.

Trout planed down to the hard, sandy bottom of the Skeleton Coast. There was a faint bump. The one and only time, I said to myself, that I hope to touch the sand of the Skeleton Coast. Trout lay with her nose, fanged now and waiting the venomous thrust of compressed air to lash its deadly cargo into life, pointing exactly where NP I must cross her path. The range was easy, and all we had to do was to wait. NP I would be a sitting duck -- and she couldn't come in there at twenty knots, even if everything I had been told was true,

"Stop both," I ordered. "Silent routine." I gestured to John. "Tell them over the loudspeaker that I want absolute silence. Absolute. Do you understand? Their lives depend on it."

"Aye, aye, sir," he replied, but his glance was a mixture of curiosity and compassion. I know what he's bloody well thinking, I told myself. The skipper's imagining all this. He's fighting the old battles all over again. He knows the drill so well, you can't fault him. But the sea's empty and there isn't a whisper on the hydrophones. He's playing possum with his thoughts on some remote African beach; he's told no one where we are. They'll let him down lightly when this gets out because of his war record. But he's crazy; he is still in command.

I saw it all on his face.

A deathly hush settled over Trout after the impersonal crackle of John's voice over the loudspeaker. All pumps and all machines were still, and not a man said a word. ()ne could almost hear the crunch of the hard sand under Trout.

Bissett's voice came muffled.

"Hydrophone operator reports no transmissions, sir," said John. His voice was almost a whisper.

"Unless there is something to report, tell him to keep quiet," I said. Blohm and Voss alone knows what listening apparatus NP I has. I couldn't afford to take one slightest chance.

I stood by the periscope, its clipped-up handles making it look vaguely like a spaniel with its ears tied back above its head. The operators stood by their unmoving dials, and in the immobile engine-room I could see Macfadden gazing, apparently with the vacancy of a lunatic, at the dead telegraphs. Mac was very much on the job, however, and I couldn't have hoped for a better engineer -- or a more stable man under attack. Trout lay under the sea like the puff-adders lie in the desert sand -- immobile, asleep, coiled, but quick as a dart when trodden on amid their dun surroundings. So Trout lay -- waiting, listening for that strange bubbling, thumping noise which I construed to be NP I's engines.