But then, on the other hand, a contact had been made. It was possible--it might even just be called likely--that a U-boat might be killed. The killing of a U-boat would be a substantial success in itself. And the consequences might be more important still. If that U-boat were allowed to depart unharmed, she could surface, and by her radio she could inform German U-boat headquarters of the presence of shipping at this point in the Atlantic-- shipping that could only be Allied shipping, that could only be targets for U-boat torpedoes. That was the least the U-boat might do; she might surface, and, making use of her surface speed, twice that of the convoy, she might keep the latter under observation, determine its speed and base course, and call up--if German headquarters had not already issued such orders--a wolf-pack of colleagues to intercept and to launch a mass attack. If she were destroyed, nothing of this could happen; if she were even kept down for an hour or two while the convoy made good its escape, the business of finding the convoy again would be made much more difficult for the Germans, much more prolonged, possibly made too difficult altogether.
“Still making contact, sir,” squawked the telephone.
It was twenty-four seconds since Krause had arrived on the bridge, fifteen seconds since he had been confronted with the complex problem in its entirety. It was fortunate that during hours on the bridge, during hours solitary in his cabin, Krause had thought deeply about similar problems. No possible amount of thinking could envisage every circumstance; the present case--the exact bearing of the contact, the current fuel situation, the position of the convoy, the time of day--added up to one out of thousands of possible situations. And there were other factors that Krause had envisaged as well, he was an American officer whom the chances of war had tossed into the command of an Allied convoy. A freak of seniority had put under the orders of him, who had never heard a shot fired in anger, a group of hard-bitten young captains of other nations with experience of thirty months of war. That introduced a number of factors of enormous importance but not susceptible of exact calculation like a fuel-so consumption problem--not even as calculable as the chances of effecting a kill after making a contact. What would the captain of the James think of him if he refused permission to attack? What would the seamen in the convoy think of him if other U-boats got in through the screen so dangerously attenuated by that permission? When the reports started to come in would one government querulously complain to another that he had been too rash? Or too cautious? Would officers of one navy shake their heads pityingly, and officers of another navy try half-heartedly to defend him? Gossip flies rapidly in an armed service; seamen can talk even in wartime until their complaints reach the ears of congressmen or members of parliament. Allied goodwill depended to some extent on his decision; and upon Allied goodwill depended ultimate victory and the freedom of the world. Krause had envisaged these aspects of his problem, too, but in the present case they could not affect his decision. They merely made his decision more important, merely added to the burden of responsibility that rested on his shoulders.
“Permission granted,” he said.
“Aye aye, sir,” said the telephone.
The telephone squawked again instantly.
“Eagle to George,” it said. “Request permission to assist Harry.”
Eagle was the Polish destroyer Viktor, on Keeling’s port beam between her and the James, and the voice was that of the young British officer who rode in her to transmit T.B.S. messages.
“Permission granted,” said Krause.
“Aye aye, sir.”
Krause saw the Viktor wheel about as soon as the words were spoken; her bows met a roller in a fountain of spray, and she heaved up her stern as she soared over it, still turning, working up speed to join the James. Viktor and James were a team that had already achieved a “probable sinking” in a previous convoy. James had the new sound range-recorder and had developed a system of coaching Viktor in to make the kill. The two ships were buddies; Krause had known from the moment the contact had been reported to him that if he detached one it would be better to detach both, to make a kill more likely.
It was now fifty-nine seconds since the summons to Krause in his cabin; it had taken not quite a minute to reach an important decision and to transmit the orders translating that decision into action. Now it was necessary to dispose his two remaining escort ships, Keeling and H.M.C.S. Dodge, out on his starboard quarter, to the best advantage; to attempt with two ships to screen thirty-seven. The convoy covered three square miles of sea, an immense target for any torpedo fired “into the brown,” and such a torpedo could be fired advantageously from any point of a semi-circle forty miles in circumference. The best attempt to cover that semi-circle with two ships would be a poor compromise, but the best attempt must still be made. Krause spoke into the telephone again.
“George to Dicky.”
“Sir!” squawked the telephone back to him instantly. Dodge must have been expecting orders.
“Take station three miles ahead of the leading ship of the starboard column of the convoy.”
Krause spoke with the measured tones necessary for the transmission of verbal orders; it called attention to the unmusical quality of his voice.
“Three miles ahead of the leading ship of the starboard column,” said the telephone back to him. “Aye aye, sir.”
That was a Canadian voice, with a pitch and a rhythm more natural than the British. No chance of misunderstanding there. Krause looked at the repeater and then turned to the officer of the deck.
“Course zero-zero-five, Mr Carling.”
“Aye aye, sir,” answered Carling, and then to the quartermaster, “Left standard rudder. Steer course zero-zero-five.”
“Left standard rudder,” repeated the helmsman, turning the wheel. “Course zero-zero-five.”
That was Parker, quartermaster third class, aged twenty-two and married and no good. Carling knew that, and was watching the repeater.
“Make eighteen knots, Mr Carling,” said Krause.
“Aye aye, sir,” answered Carling, giving the order.
“Make turns for eighteen knots,” repeated the man at the annunciator.
Keeling: turned in obedience to her helm; the vibration transmitted from the deck up through Krause’s feet quickened, as the ship headed for her new station.
“Engine room answers one eight knots,” announced the hand at the engine-room telegraph. He was new to the ship, a transfer made when they were in Reykjavik, serving his second hitch. Two years back he had been in trouble with the civil authorities for a hit-run automobile offence while on leave. Krause could not remember his name, and must remedy that.
“Steady on course zero-zero-five,” announced Parker; there was the usual flippant note in his voice that annoyed Krause and hinted at his unreliability. Nothing to be done about it at present; only the mental note made.
“Making eighteen by pit, sir,” reported Carling.
“Very well.” That was the pitometer log reading. There were more orders to give.
“Mr Carling, take station three miles ahead of the leading ship of the port column of the convoy.”
“Three miles ahead of the leading ship of the port column of the convoy. Aye aye, sir.”
Krause’s orders had already set Keeling on an economical course towards that station, and now that she was crossing ahead of it would be a good moment to check on the convoy. But he could spare a moment now to put on his coat; until now he had been in his shirt-sleeves with his coat in his hand. He slipped into it; as his arm straightened he dug the telephone talker beside him in the ribs.
“Pardon me,” said Krause.
“Quite all right, sir,” mumbled the telephone talker. Carling had his hand on the lever that sounded the general alarm, and was looking to his captain for orders. “No,” said Krause.
Calling the ship to general quarters would bring every single man on board to his post of duty. No one would sleep and hardly anyone would eat; the ordinary routine of the ship would cease en
tirely. Men grew fatigued and hungry; the fifty-odd jobs about the ship that had to be done sooner or later to keep her efficient would all be left until later because the men who should be doing them would be at their battle stations. It was not a condition that could long be maintained---it was the battle reserve, once more, to be conserved until the crucial moment.
And there was the additional point that some men, many men, tended to become slack about the execution of their duty if special demands were continually made on them without obvious reason. Krause knew this by observation during his years of experience, and he knew it academically, too, through study of the manuals, in the same way as a doctor is familiar with diseases from which he has never suffered himself. Krause had to allow for the weaknesses of the human flesh under his command, and the flightiness of the human mind. Keeling was already in Condition Two, with battle stations largely manned and water-tight integrity--with its concomitant interference with the routine of the ship--strictly maintained. Condition Two meant a strain on the hands, and was bad for the ship, but the length of time during which Condition Two could be endured was measurable in days, compared with the hours that battle stations could be endured.
The fact that James was running down a contact at some distance from the convoy, with Viktor to help her, was not sufficient justification for sounding the general alarm; it was likely that dozens more such contacts would be reported before the convoy reached home. So Krause said “No” in reply to Carling’s unvoiced enquiry. Glance, decision, and reply consumed no more than two or three seconds of time. It would have taken at least several minutes for Krause to have given verbally all the reasons for that decision; it would have taken a minute or two at least for him to assemble them in his mind. But long habit and long experience made the reaching of decisions easy to him, and long thought had familiarized his mind beforehand with the conditions surrounding this particular emergency.
And at the same time his memory made a note of the incident, even though apparently it passed out of his mind as soon as it was disposed of. Carling’s readiness to sound general quarters was an item added to Krause’s mental dossier about Carling. It would affect, to some possibly infinitesimal extent, how much Krause could trust Carling as officer of the deck. It might eventually affect the “fitness report” which in course of time Krause would be making on Carling (assuming both of them lived long enough for that report to be made) with special bearing on the paragraph regarding Carling’s “fitness for command.” A tiny incident, one in thousands that made a complex whole.
Krause picked up his binoculars, hung them round his neck, and trained them towards the convoy. In the crowded pilot-house it was impossible to get a clear sight, and he stepped out on to the port wing of the bridge. The transition was instant and prodigious. The north-east wind, almost from dead ahead on this course, shrieked round him. As he raised the glasses to his eyes his right armpit felt the bitter cold strike into it. He should be wearing his sweater and his greatcoat; he would have been doing so if he had been left undisturbed for a minute longer in his sea-cabin.
They were passing the convoy flagship, an ancient passenger vessel with upper works lofty in comparison with the rest of the convoy. The convoy commodore whose pennant flew in her was an elderly British admiral back from retirement, undertaking a difficult, monotonous, dangerous and inglorious duty of his own free will, as of course he ought to do as long as the opportunity presented itself, even though that meant being under the orders of a young Commander of another nation. His present duty was to keep the ships of the convoy as nearly in order as possible, so as to give the escort every chance of protecting it.
Beyond the convoy flagship the rest of the convoy spread itself in irregular lines; Krause swept his binoculars round to examine them. The lines were certainly irregular, but not nearly as irregular as they had been when he had examined them at the end of the night, in the first light of dawn. Then the third column from starboard had been revealed in two halves, with the last three ships--five ships in that column, four in each of the others --trailing far astern, out of the formation altogether. Now the gap had been nearly closed. Presumably No. 3 ship, the Norwegian Kong Gustav, had experienced an engine-room defect during the night and had fallen astern; in the radio silence and the blackout that were so strictly-enforced, and with flag signals invisible in the darkness, she had been unable to inform the others of her plight, and had fallen farther and farther astern, with the ships following her conforming to her movements. Apparently the defect had been made good and Kong Gustav and her two followers were slowly crawling up into position again. The Southland, immediately astern of Kong Gustav - Krause had checked the name on his list soon after dawn --was smoking badly, perhaps in the effort to steam an extra half-knot to regain station, and several other ships were making more smoke than they should. Luckily, with the wind from ahead, and blowing hard, the smoke was lying low and dispersing rapidly. In calmer conditions the convoy would have been surmounted by a pillar of cloud visible fifty miles away. The Commodore had a signal-hoist flying--almost for certain it was the signal so frequently displayed in every navy--”Make less smoke.”
But conditions in the convoy could generally be described as good, with only three ships badly out of station and only a certain amount of smoke being made. There was time for a rapid glance round the Keeling; significant it was that Krause’s first care had been for the convoy and only his second care had been for his own ship. He lowered his binoculars and turned to look forward, the wind hitting him in the face as he did so, and, along with the wind, a few drops of spray hurled aft from the heaving bows. Aloft, the “bed-spring” of the radar antenna was making its methodical gyrations, turning round and round while the mast, with the rolling and pitching, was outlining cones, apex downward, of every conceivable dimension. The look-outs were at their posts, seven of them, all bundled-up in their arctic clothing, their eyes at the binoculars in the rests in front of them, traversing slowly to left and to right and back again, each sweeping his own special sector, but with each having to pause every few seconds to wipe from the object-glasses the spray flying back from the bows. Krause gave the look-outs a moment’s inspection; Carling, with his mind preoccupied with the duty of taking the ship to her new station, would not be giving them a glance at present. They seemed to be doing their work conscientiously; sometimes--unbelievable though it might be--look-outs were found wanting in that respect, tiring of a monotonous job despite frequent relief. It was a duty that had to be carried out with the utmost pains and method, without an instant’s interruption; a U-boat would never expose more than a foot or two of periscope above the surface of the sea, and never for more than half a minute at most; search had to be constant and regular to give any chance, not speaking of probability, of the transient appearance being detected. A second’s glimpse of a periscope could decide the fate of the convoy. There was even the chance that the sight of torpedo wakes streaking towards the ship and instantly reported might at least save the Keeling.
This was as long as he dared stay out on the wing of the bridge; half his force was heading towards battle out there to port-- Viktor had “peeled off” to join James some time ago--and he must be at the T.B.S. to exert control if necessary. Young Hart was approaching the port pelorus to take the bearings for Carling in his task of taking up station. Krause gave him a nod and went back into the wheel-house. The comparative warmth of it reminded him that in that brief time outside, without sweater or P-jacket, he had been chilled through. He stepped to the telephone; it was bleating and gurgling. He was overhearing the conversations between the British officers in James and Viktor.
“Bearing three-six-oh,” said one English voice.
“Can’t you get the range, old boy?” said another.
“No, damn it. Contact’s too indistinct. Haven’t you picked it up yet?”
“Not yet. We’ve swept that sector twice.”
“Come ahead slowly.”
From where Krause sto
od James was indistinguishable in the murk of the near horizon. She was only a little ship and her upper-works were not lofty. Viktor was bigger and higher and nearer; he could still see her, but she was already vague. With visibility so poor and the ships separating rapidly he would not have her in sight much longer although she would be prominent enough on the radar screen. Carling’s voice suddenly made itself audible; he may have been speaking before but Krause, concentrating on the T.B.S., had not listened to him, as what he was saying had no bearing on the problem in hand.
“Right standard rudder. Steer course zero-seven-nine,” said Carling.
“Right standard rudder. Course zero-seven-nine,” repeated Parker.
Keeling was at her new station now, or near it, evidently. She swung round, turning her stern almost directly towards Viktor. The distance between the two ships would now be widening more rapidly than before. Keeling rolled deeply to starboard, unexpectedly; feet slipped on the pilot-house deck, hands grabbed for security. Her turn had brought her into the hollow of the next roller without the opportunity to lift to it. She lay over for a long second, levelled herself abruptly, and equally abruptly lay over to port as the roller passed under her keel, so that feet slipped in the opposite direction and Carling came sliding down upon Krause.