Up Periscope Read online

  Carney nodded his head and put the dispatch in the folder. “That was what I’ve been waiting for. Can you spare a minute, Ken?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Not sleepy?”

  “No, sir.”

  “We’re going ahead with the mission. I’ve just been going over that op plan you made. Did you and Paul agree on it?”

  Ken suddenly remembered the way the word mutiny looked in the dictionary. “Sir, I don’t know exactly how to say this and I guess it isn’t the Navy way, but just before Commander Stevenson got killed, I was on my way to tell him that I wasn’t going to risk my life trying to do things according to that op plan. Maybe that’s mutiny, I don’t know.”

  He stopped and looked straight at Carney. Then he went on. “I’m still not going to do it, sir.”

  “I don’t blame you,” Carney said. “That isn’t mutiny. That’s suicide the way it’s planned. Useless suicide at that.”

  Ken kept looking straight at him. “Are you going into the lagoon, Captain?”

  Carney nodded. “It’s the only way. I don’t like it; it’s dangerous, but it’s the only way I can see to do it.”

  “Me, too,” Ken said.

  Carney handed him the sheaf of papers. “Will you work up another op plan? Base it on our entering the lagoon at twenty-one hundred and leaving at oh four hundred. That gives you seven hours.”

  “That ought to be enough, Skipper.”

  “When you get it roughed out, let’s get together on it, Ken.”

  “Aye, aye, sir. And—thanks.”

  Carney glanced over at him and then smiled. “For what, Ken? For taking you into the middle of a hornets’ nest?”

  “No,” Ken said. “For taking the boat into the lagoon, where, if I get off the island, I can find it when I come back.”

  On the way across to the wardroom he paused. There was still an odor in the air in the boat, still a tinge of staleness. He decided that he could think a lot better if he went topside and breathed some really pure air for a little while.

  He stuck his head in the wardroom and asked Si who had the deck. Si looked at the watch list and told him Pat was up there.

  When Ken got into the control room, where there were open hatches leading up to the bridge, he could hear Malone’s voice singing:

  “Oh, a capital ship for an ocean trip

  Was the Walloping Window-blind… .”

  Ken climbed up into the conning tower.

  “No gale that blew dismayed her crew

  Or troubled the Captains mind… .”

  In the dim light Ken took off one of the silver lieutenant (j.g.) bars on his shirt collar.

  Malone’s voice was louder, clearer:

  “The man at the wheel was taught to feel

  Contempt for the wildest blow… .”

  Ken climbed up to the darkness of the bridge. Malone was leaning against the splinter shield singing into the wind as a working party of electricians made shadowy figures around the radar antenna.

  Malone bellowed:

  “And it often appeared when the weather had cleared,

  That he’d been in his bunk beee—low.”

  Malone saw him and said, “Hiya, ol’ pardner, ol’ pardner. Or did you know that I’m an ol’ slowpoke from Texas?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “I’m not. Help yourself to some air, courtesy of the Emperor of Japan, no less.”

  “Tastes good,” Ken said. “Here.” He held out his hand.

  “Ha,” Malone said, taking the silver bar. “And what might this be now?” He took it over to the dim red chart fight and looked at it. “Did somebody lose this badge of authority, this insignia of the mighty class of lieutenants junior grade?”

  “No,” Ken said, “it’s yours.”

  “Well now, and begosh and begorra, I ’ave no need for the filthy thing. I, sir, am an ensign.”

  “You were an ensign.” He unfolded the ALNAV under the light.

  Malone studied it for a long time, turning the lieutenant’s bar over and over between his fingers. “You didn’t make this up, did you, Ken?”

  “Nope. I heard it come in on the FOX.”

  “Truly?”

  “On my word ”

  Malone looked at the silver bar. “Well, I be damned.” Then, in silence, he took the two gold bars of an ensign off his ragged shirt collar. He looked at them lying in his hand then flipped them into the sea.

  “Lookout,” he called.

  “Lookout, aye, aye.”

  “From now on let’s have a little respect around here,” Malone told him. “I want you to know that I am, at last, a lieutenant.”

  “That right?” the lookout asked.

  “That is right.”

  “Congratulations, Mr. Malone. You really rate it.”

  “Thanks, boy, thanks.” Pat then turned to Ken. “Feels good, doesn’t it? Real good. I’ve waited a long time.”

  Chapter 2

  “All ahead slow,” Carney said. Then he added, “Just keep steerageway on her, Bill. And stand by for all back emergency.”

  Then he turned to the man on the helm. “If we touch anything going through here were going to back and then spin her right around.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  “Up periscope.”

  The periscope motors whined somewhere below and the shiny, oily shaft slid up through the deck of the conning tower. Carney unfolded the handles and stooped to the eyepiece. He swung the scope from side to side. “Down periscope. Were in the entrance now. The lagoon is dead ahead and there’s land on each side of us. If the Japs have got this lagoon closed off with a net we should be finding it out any minute now. Up periscope.”

  The soundman chanted, “Depth six zero zero … six zero zero…six one zero…six two zero… .”

  “Down periscope. At least we’ve got plenty of water under us,” Carney said. “Dead slow, Bill.”

  “Dead slow, Skipper.”

  “Heads up on the bow and stern planes. If we have to spin her, let’s keep her under the water.”

  At such slow speed there was little noise in the sub.

  “Up periscope. Were in the lagoon now. There’s no moon, but a skyful of stars. Down periscope. Ask Lieutenant Braden if he’s all set.”

  In a moment the talker said, “Lieutenant Braden reports ah set.”

  “Tell him we’re feeling our way into the lagoon now. He’s got about twenty minutes. Up periscope.”

  He left the scope up for about ten seconds. “I can see lights on Midnight Island. Two sets of them. The ones on the northern end are brighter than the one in the center of the island. Report that to Lieutenant Braden, please. Down periscope.” Ken, standing below the inboard end of the escape hatch, listened as the talker reported the lights Carney could see. “Wonder what he sees on the other islands,” he said to Pat Malone.

  As though in answer they heard the periscope motor whine, and in a moment, the talker said, “The captain says he doesn’t see light on any of the other islands.”

  Ken nodded. “I’ll hit Midnight first.”

  Pat looked at his watch. “Three minutes to twelve. You’ve got about fifteen minutes.”

  Ken had on a shirt over the gray swimming suit. He peeled it off and picked up the harness of the Aqua-Lung. Pat held the cylinder up for him as he got the straps over his shoulders and up between his legs. When he had the cross strap in place on his chest he closed the quick-release buckle and reached back for the two hoses which ended in the rubber mouthpiece. Next he put the face mask on, but left it pushed back up on his forehead. “I’ll put the fins on after I get in there.”

  “The captain says no sign of boats in the water,” the talker said.

  Pat picked up a clip-board with Kens check-off list. “‘Lung?” he read.

  Ken put the mouthpiece in, clamping his teeth down on the two little nipples and then shoving the thin rubber flanges up under his lips. Opening the valve of the air tank, he breathed two or three
times, then closed the valve and spat out the mouthpiece. “Lung, OK.”

  “ ‘Mask?” Pat read.

  “Mask, OK.”

  ‘“Watch?”

  Ken glanced at the wrist watch in the watertight case on his arm. It was now two minutes past midnight. “Watch, OK.”

  “Compass?”

  On his other wrist was a compass with bright radium on the dial and needle. “Compass, OK.”

  ‘“Fins?”

  He picked them up. “Fins, OK.”

  “‘Dog tag?”

  He flicked the little aluminum plate with his name, serial number, and blood type stamped on it. “OK.”

  ‘“Knife?”

  The knife was in a sheath on the weight belt.

  Pat turned to the talker. “Ask for a time check, please.” In a moment they could hear a voice saying, “Stand by for zero zero zero seven. Thirty seconds … twenty … ten … five … four … three … two … one … Mark.” His watch was only a second or so off so he left it alone. “Time, OK.”

  “Time of return not later than oh four hundred.”

  “Oh four hundred.”

  Pat put the clip-board down. “That’s it.”

  Ken nodded. He was covered with sweat. It was running down the middle of his chest and around the dog tag, and running down the backs of his legs. “Hot in here.”

  Pat glanced at him and said, “Yeah, sure is.”

  Ken felt a little sick in his stomach. There was a lot of cold spit running around his back teeth and it seemed hard to breathe. Also, he was beginning to tremble. First his hands began to shake and then his legs.

  “Five minutes,” Pat said.

  Ken looked at him. Pat’s face, the beard huge and black, was indistinct. It seemed to fade away and then swim back again. “I’m afraid I’m going to be sick,” he said, not opening his teeth.

  Pat pulled a bucket out of a bracket on the bulkhead and put it down on the deck. “Go ahead. It’ll do you good.”

  Ken swallowed hard and held his lips pressed together. He caught one hand with the other and tried to make them stop shaking. At last, he said, “I’m scared.”

  “Who wouldn’t be?” Pat asked cheerfully.

  “I’m so scared I can’t move.”

  He stood there, sick and shaking, and for the first time thought of fear. Up until right now he had never even considered it. But now, so weak with fear that he could barely stand up, so sick with it that he was on the verge of vomiting, he thought about it.

  Right from the time he had held up his hand to volunteer for a “job” back at the UDT school; from the time he had sat in the admiral’s office listening to the myna birds; from the time he and the admiral and Paul Stevenson had talked about Midnight Island—all along he had never once thought that, perhaps, he would be too afraid to do what they wanted him to do. He had never thought that his own fear would suddenly become a greater enemy to him than Stevenson’s plans, the Japanese, the sea.

  Suddenly he went down on his knees and vomited into the bucket. So weak now that he could not even stay upright on his knees, he almost fell before Pat caught him, holding his body up with one hand, his head with the other.

  “Shoot the works, boy,” Pat said.

  Drained at last and empty, Ken sat weakly down on the deck. “That’s the works.”

  Pat shoved the bucket away with his foot. Then he helped Ken back to his feet and over to the scuttlebutt. The water tasted clean and cool to Kens raw throat.

  He remembered now how afraid he had been during the attack which had killed Paul Stevenson. Remembered now the way he had had to hold on to the splinter screen to keep from falling down when the plane was coming in on them back at Eugalin. Remembered swimming in fear in the forward torpedo room waiting for Carney’s order to fire at the destroyer.

  He knew now that he was too scared to go ashore on Midnight Island. There were Japanese there. Carney had let him look through the periscope that afternoon. At one end of the island there were several wood and concrete buildings and a radio mast. In the center there were about twenty of the native houses made of leaves and grass. He had seen, through the periscope, men in the dull, drab uniform of the Japanese Army walking between the buildings.

  Pat went over to the escape hatch and opened the heavy, small, round door. “Time to go.”

  Ken nodded and, picking up the fins, walked over.

  “You’ll be all right,” Pat said.

  Ken said nothing as he climbed up into the escape hatch.

  Before Pat closed the door he looked up into the tiny space. “OK?”

  Ken nodded.

  “When you’re ready, hammer on the wall.”

  He nodded.

  “Good luck, boy,” Pat said. “See you around four in the morning.”

  Ken could only nod again.

  The light in the escape hatch began rapidly to fade. Ken, not breathing at all, watched the steel door swing shut, the light fading and dying. Then, suddenly, there was no fight at all.

  He had never experienced such absolute darkness. It was so black in there that it was like a solid.

  He stood still, listening to the sounds coming from the submarine—the faint sounds of motors and fans, of people moving and talking, of metal striking metal.

  He did not move. The rubber mouthpiece of the AquaLung lay dangling on his chest from the two hoses. The face mask pressed against his forehead, the fins hung in his hands.

  Suddenly fight appeared again, the door swinging open. “You OK?” Pat asked.

  Ken nodded.

  “The Skipper says it’s time to go, Ken.”

  “All right.”

  Then it was dark again.

  He had to go. He couldn’t face Carney and Si and Pat if he didn’t go.

  Then he thought of something. Even as it took shape he felt shame, like hot glue, on his skin.

  He would go out of the escape hatch, swim up to the surface. Then he would just he there in the water and let time pass. At four in the morning he would swim back down again and tell them… Tell them what? he wondered.

  He would have plenty of time to make up a he while he was lying in the water waiting for the time to pass.

  He stooped and put the fins on his feet. Then he pulled the face mask down and made sure it was airtight by breathing in through his nose. He got the mouthpiece in and opened the valve, breathing now from the tank on his back.

  With the butt end of the knife he hammered against the steel wall of the escape hatch.

  Somewhere above him in the pitch blackness he heard something creak and then an avalanche of water crashed down on him. He felt it rising solidly up his body and then close over his head.

  He floated straight up, feeling his way along with his hands. He didn’t know when he finally left the Shark for, at sixty feet down, none of the starlight penetrated.

  But, gradually as he went up, the water became less dark until, when he broke the surface, the night seemed bright.

  Pushing the mask back, he looked up at the sky. He had never in his life seen so many stars. They were stuck to black velvet and shone with a flicking, cold, white light.

  The water was calm and he could feel no wind at all. Spitting out the mouthpiece, he turned and looked toward the island.

  The lights on Midnight seemed close. The ones on the Japanese end were bright and evidently electric, while the light in the center of the island was a soft, low, yellow which brightened and faded as a fire would.

  The vomiting had taken away the sick feeling in his stomach and in the water he could no longer feel his hands and legs shaking.

  In fact, he felt rather good. Free. Until now he had not realized how cramped it was in the submarine. You walked always with your shoulders hunched down and your head lowered to keep from knocking your brains out on the overhead piping. Now, in the water, he could stretch out—he had all the room in the world.

  It was twenty minutes past twelve.

  Slowly he began swimming tow
ard the island. He could still feel his shame like something stuck to him as he swam along awkwardly with the big tank strapped to his back.

  The southern end of the island showed no fight at all. Turning that way, he could soon hear the sea washing on the beach stirring the sand and broken shells.

  He went carefully now, just swimming with his hands until he touched bottom.

  Lying there with only his head above water, he searched the dark trees and the long, curving beach. To the south the sand stretched on and on until it ended in the sea. To the north he could see no houses, nor, from so low, could he see the yellow glow of firelight. He could, however, still see in the sky the reflected glow from the Japanese fights.

  Moving slowly, he crawled out of the water. Then, only an inch or two at a time, he moved across the beach.

  The darkness under the trees felt good to him. Pulling the quick-release buckle, he let the Aqua-Lung down to the sand and stepped out of the fins.

  With one fin he dug a hole near the base of a palm and buried the lung, the fins, mask, and belt. Then he covered and concealed the hole.

  When he was through he stood up and looked toward the glow in the sky from the Japanese fights.

  Now he had on only the wrist watch, the gray swimming suit which covered him from neck to ankles, and his dog tag.

  At least, he thought, it won’t be a fie when I tell them that I got ashore.

  He began sneaking along through the shadows.

  He would, he thought, just look around a little. He wouldn’t, he decided, get into any danger.

  Chapter 3

  A low, smokeless fire was burning on the hard-packed ground. The flame’s yellow glow was like liquid gold falling first on a circle of dark-skinned people and then, fading, falling on the houses built in a row along a wide cleared space.

  Ken had hidden himself behind a palm tree out of range of the light and close enough to the beach for him to be able to see anyone approaching him from behind.

  For a long time he studied the scene around the fire. Each of the natives was sitting on a mat woven out of the fronds of the palms. They sat almost motionless and rarely spoke. When they did it was in voices so low that he could not make out even the language they used.