The Passion and the Glory

by Christopher Nicole

  *

  ‘Three hundred feet,’ Galt said as Walt regained the bridge.

  Still the ocean above them boomed to the depth charges, and each time the submarine trembled; although she was sinking under power, she was on an even keel: the weight of the water in her stern kept it from rising.

  ‘We need to be a bit lower,’ Walt said. ‘How’s it going, Chief?’

  ‘I reckon we’re holding, sir.’

  ‘As soon as you’re sure, stop engines.’ Walt went forward, into the wardroom, where Surgeon Lieutenant Matthews was bandaging four injured seamen. ‘Problems?’

  ‘Not so far.’ Matthews cocked his head to listen to the creaking of the hull.

  ‘Three twenty-five,’ Galt said.

  ‘How much further do you reckon we need?’

  ‘Three fifty will do it,’ Walt said. He went aft again. He couldn’t tell what was happening in the after torpedo compartment, but the stern wasn’t trying to sink quite so fast.

  ‘Three fifty,’ Galt said.

  ‘Hold her there,’ Walt said. ‘Okay, Chief, stop engines, save for the pumps.’

  Ramos nodded, and Walt returned to the bridge.

  The stopping of the engine was, as always, uncanny and frightening. Not that it was truly quiet. The depth charges continued to explode a hundred feet above them, the hiss of the air being pumped into the after compartment filled the ship, and the groaning of the hull under the enormous pressure outside was disturbing.

  ‘How long, do you reckon?’ Galt asked.

  ‘Until the baddies go away,’ Walt told him.

  Galt gulped.

  ‘I think we should all eat, Mr Mottram,’ Walt said.

  ‘Right away, sir,’ replied the Petty Officer chief cook.

  That occupied them for an hour, but at the end of that time there were still booms and crashes from above them, and the submarine still shuddered to the shock waves. Water was getting in to other places now, but these were trickles and not immediately dangerous. The air was the biggest problem. It was still relatively clean, but no one could tell how long they might have to stay here.

  ‘Don’t talk,’ Walt told his men. ‘Conserve energy and oxygen.’ He sat at his desk, listened to the explosions. The Japanese were certainly looking hard. He grinned, savagely; perhaps an old fashioned trick would work. It was risky, because it would definitely establish their presence — but the enemy seemed perfectly certain of that anyway. And it might just convince the destroyers they had broken up. ‘Chief,’ he said into the intercom. ‘How about releasing a little oil.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Ramos replied.

  Walt grinned at Galt. ‘Could work.’

  The depth charges still exploded, and the submarine shivered. Walt looked at his watch. They had gone into the attack just after ten that morning; it was now three in the afternoon.

  Then there was an enormous explosion. ‘Oh, Jesus Christ,’ Galt muttered.

  Walt stared at him. The noise had been tremendous, and the submarine had trembled … but it had not been a depth charge. In fact there had not been a depth charge for several minutes.

  ‘Something’s gone up,’ he said. ‘Start engines, Chief.’

  The electric motors hummed.

  ‘Take her up, Mr Galt.’

  The submarine started to move upwards, at a fairly acute angle because of the amount of water in her stern. The ascent was tense, because no one could be sure how the additional weight would affect her trim, but they reached periscope depths without mishap. Walt stared at the scene in front of him. ‘That burning carrier has exploded,’ he said. ‘Heck, there’s debris everywhere.’

  ‘What about our cruiser?’

  ‘She’s gone. And another carrier. The others are regaining their planes.’

  ‘Any sign of our aircraft?’

  ‘Not a sausage.’

  ‘You going to have another go?’

  Walt chewed his lip. It was tempting, but the other three carriers were a long way away, and he couldn’t catch them submerged. While it really was necessary to make his ship seaworthy again before risking another depth charging; he hadn’t been given a command to commit suicide. ‘We’ll have to give this one a miss,’ he said. ‘Take her down, Mr Galt. Course is zero nine zero.’

  *

  They steered due east, away from the Japanese fleet. The air was now definitely becoming heavy — too much of their supply had had to be pumped into the aft compartment. Walt found himself growing drowsy; several of his crew had already passed out, and Galt kept rubbing his eyes. At five o’clock he rose to periscope depths again, and found an empty ocean. Even if there were planes about, he had to chance it now.

  ‘Take her up, Mr Galt. Surface.’

  Five minutes later he was throwing up the hatch and stumbling on to the conning tower, taking huge gasps of fresh air, allowing the precious oxygen to flow into the ship.

  ‘Now, Chief,’ he said. ‘I want that stern compartment pumped dry and all hands on repair work.’

  The men fell to with a will. Hammers clanged and rivets sparked even before the last of the water had come bubbling out beside the hull.

  ‘Course, sir?’

  ‘North by west, Mr Galt,’ Walt said. ‘Let’s see if we can find those carriers again.’

  By midnight the after compartment was watertight. There was a hell of a mess down there, but Foy and his squad fell to with a will and cleaned it up. With her hull intact and her tubes reloaded, Sea Lion was again ready for action.

  But the ocean was empty, so far as they could see, and dawn brought no joy either. ‘I think the bastards have turned away,’ Walt growled. ‘Alter course west north west, Mr Galt. Steer three zero zero, and let’s see what we can find.’

  The day passed slowly, although they were making to the north west at a good eighteen knots. It wasn’t until after lunch that they saw planes. Walt levelled his glasses. ‘PBY’s,’ he said. ‘They’re still looking.’

  At dusk they saw the American bombers overhead, flying north west.

  ‘I guess they found them,’ Galt said exultantly.

  Sea Lion remained on the surface, her officers searching the horizon. But the Japanese must have withdrawn at great speed following their attack on the American fleet, and they could see nothing. So they searched the sky for some sign of the returning aircraft. The night was bright enough, but of course the planes would not be carrying lights. They could hear the roar of engines though, even above the growl of their own diesels. Then they became aware of a peculiar coughing sound. Closer at hand.

  ‘What the hell … that sounds like someone out of gas,’ Galt said.

  ‘Probably hit,’ Walt said. ‘Find her, boys. Find her.’

  Engines roared again, quite close now, and then died completely.

  ‘There!’ Platt shouted, pointing.

  Walt picked up the flash of white water as the bomber went in. ‘Let’s get over there.’

  Sea Lion eased up to crashed plane just as she disappeared, but they could see the orange glow of a rubber dinghy.

  ‘Ahoy,’ Walt called. He had armed his men on deck, just in case the aircraft turned out to be Japanese.

  ‘Holy Hell,’ a voice came back. ‘You guys for real?’

  ‘Larger than life,’ Walt said, as the dinghy came into the hull.

  ‘Lieutenant Bram.’ The pilot came up to the tower. ‘You are the best sight I have seen in a long time, Commander.’

  ‘Welcome aboard. How many casualties?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘But … you weren’t hit?’

  ‘No, sir. We just ran plumb out of gas.’

  ‘How in hell did you do that?’

  ‘Well, our reccy boys didn’t spot the Japs until this afternoon. By that time they were damn near out of range. But old man Mitscher decided to have a go anyway. We knew some of us wouldn’t make it back.’

  ‘One hell of a lot of us,’ remarked his navigator.

  ‘Jesus,’ Walt commented. Every
service to its own form of heroism, he thought. The idea of flying away from one’s carrier into the darkness knowing one wouldn’t get back was horrific, to him. But then, he supposed Bram and his crew wouldn’t take too kindly to sitting three hundred feet down in the ocean feeling your ship disintegrating about you. ‘So tell me, was it worth it?’

  ‘Worth it?’ Bram shouted. ‘God, yes. We sank one carrier, and sure hit two more. We even hit a battleship.’

  ‘And sent down a couple of tankers as well,’ the navigator put in.

  ‘Then I reckon between us we all had a pretty good couple of days,’ Walt said. ‘I guess you guys would like to be taken home.’

  *

  Hashimoto Kurita read the report and scratched his head. ‘Three carriers sunk, two badly damaged,’ he muttered. ‘Cruisers lost, tankers, destroyers, two hundred and forty-two planes shot down?’ He raised his head to stare at Captain Oshiwa. ‘How can this have happened?’

  Oshiwa said nothing, handed his chief another sheet of paper.

  Hashimoto read again. ‘Tokyo bombed? By B-29 superfortresses? But that is impossible. Where did they come from?’

  ‘China, sir,’ Oshiwa said. ‘There is a third report, as yet unconfirmed, that resistance has ceased on Saipan.’

  ‘Saipan? But there were thirty thousand men there?’

  ‘They are all dead, or prisoners.’

  Hashimoto got up, walked to the window, looked down at the inner garden of the house he had taken as his headquarters. Manila contained many houses built in the old Spanish colonial style, and not all of them had been destroyed when the city had fallen to the Japanese assault in 1942. This was one of the pleasantest, a square building in weathered stone surrounding a peaceful garden where oleanders gave bright colours to the quiet green of the grass.

  Joan sat there, sunning herself. His victory trophy. But also the tangible evidence of the crimes he had committed in this war. Were he ever brought to justice. He had never supposed that possible, even if a few battles were lost, and the perimeter forced in to a certain extent. He had never anticipated that the Americans would fight with such fury, and would work for victory with such fury either. He had sailed and fought with the American navy in the First World War — with Lew McGann, in fact. The two men had become close friends, and he had been best man at Lew’s marriage to that beautiful girl May Gerrard. It had, indeed, been the memory of May Gerrard that had led him to appropriate her daughter, who looked so startlingly like her.

  He had not been over impressed by the American fighting ability in that war, however bravely Lew had performed. And, like all Japanese, he had been angered by the way the Americans had manipulated the Washington Naval Conference of 1922 to suit their ends. But those ends had again been limited. The Americans had shown an utter reluctance to contemplate total war, with no holds barred. That had inspired contempt of them as much as hatred. Even Yamamoto had been certain that, like the Russians in 1905, they could be forced to make peace after a few defeats, not because they had been mortally wounded, but because their leaders lacked the will, or the courage, to demand sufficient sacrifices from their people — without understanding that people who are never called upon for sacrifices will soon wish new leaders. The Russian willingness to make peace in 1905 with their military and naval honour unavenged could be seen as leading directly to the revolution of 1917. It had been tempting to foresee a similar sequence of events in America.

  Instead of which these people had gone to war with an anger, and a determination, which only a few nations — the British on more than one occasion, including this very war, the Romans against Carthage — had ever before revealed. A determination which could not be withstood. And which might well lead them to Tokyo itself.

  Oshiwa was still in the room. Hashimoto turned to look at him. ‘Is there more?’

  The captain bowed. ‘Admiral Nagumo has committed seppuku.’

  Hashimoto snorted. ‘He is certainly a failure. Well, I will tell you this, Oshiwa. I will not commit seppuku. Not as long as there is one Japanese fighting anywhere in the world. But I think we had better arrange for our return to Tokyo. We will do no good remaining here. Here is where the Americans will be coming next.’

  *

  ‘Hell, Walt, I sure have to hand it to you,’ Captain Phillips said, shaking Walt’s hand. ‘To all of you guys. What a victory. How I wish to God I could’ve been there.’

  ‘I wish I’d got that carrier,’ Walt said.

  ‘Heck, Albacore and Cavalla got one each. And the fly boys got another. We didn’t want to hog the whole show. Now you have to replenish and get back there just as quickly as you can. It’s the Philippines, next.’

  ‘Will do,’ Walt said. ‘Say … any news from Pearl?’

  ‘You mean about that dame you got entangled with? No, not a thing. But there’s a letter.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Walt said, trying to conceal his excitement. He supposed no official news had to be good news; if there was some kind of spicy murder trial coming off in Honolulu the word would surely have filtered out to Majura.

  He found himself a secluded corner of the newly built Officers’ Club, opened the letter. Linda was very loving, but very careful; she had also taken the censors into consideration. Thus she was ‘horrified’ to learn that the police had actually flown out to Majura to interview him; she hadn’t told him herself about Jordan’s death because she hadn’t wanted to bother him when he was fighting a war. Yes, there had been some ‘unpleasantness with the police’ but that was over now, Jordan was buried, and she was a widow. She had opted to remain in Honolulu for the time being, and hoped that he would call when next he was in Pearl. They had, she said, so much to talk about in these new circumstances.

  The letter was a masterpiece, he thought. She did not deny she was his mistress, assumed that with Jordan’s fortuitous death they would now be able to forward their own plans and be married. Well, wasn’t that what he wanted more than anything else in the world? Even if she hadn’t mentioned the thousand dollar cheque, or anything else to do with money. It would have been crazy for her to have done so.

  He had a drink, and felt relaxation slowly seeping through his body. The crisis of O’Malley’s death was over and done with. Linda was his woman, and would stay his woman, no matter what she might have done, or wanted to do. That was the only thing that mattered, now.

  He returned to the ship, where everything was a bustle of activity as the running repairs they had made at sea were assessed and improved as necessary, and the fresh food and ammunition were brought on board, went down to his cabin, and wrote Linda another letter. He told her of the Battle of the Philippine Sea, and of his love for her, and how he longed to hear from her, and even more, to hold her in his arms. Now at last he felt he could tear up the letter to Clive. But he couldn’t find it.

  ‘Letter, sir?’ asked Gunning, the sailor who acted as wardroom steward. ‘Why, sir, I mailed it.’

  ‘Mailed it?’

  ‘I was collecting mail from all the guys, sir, and I came in here … you weren’t here, but there was this letter to your brother on your desk, so … I mailed it with the others.’ He looked anxious. ‘Did I do wrong, sir?’

  Walt grinned at him. ‘No, sailor, you didn’t do wrong.’ A letter to a dead man, he thought. Presumably it would come back. Equally presumably, it would at some stage be opened by a censor. But the case against Linda O’Malley, if there ever had been one, was closed. His letter, indeed, had totally exonerated her from any share in her husband’s death. And would a navy censor, learning that it was Walter McGann who had actually struck O’Malley, wish to re-open the whole affair to the detriment of the Navy? He didn’t think so. The letter to Clive would never be a problem.

  *

  ‘Listen,’ Clive said.

  Noise seeped across the jungle. They had heard it from time to time before, but now it was continuous, an angry growling.

  ‘What is it?’ Stefanie asked.

  ‘Guns. Bombs. S
hells. Vehicles. There’s one hell of a battle going on just along the coast.’

  She squeezed his arm. ‘Oh, Clive. I’m so afraid.’

  ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of, Steffi. Those are our people down there, fighting for us.’

  But she was afraid. That night she hardly slept, spent most of the hours of darkness perched on the edge of their ledge looking to the east: now it was even possible to see the flashes against the sky. ‘How far away, do you think?’ she asked, when he joined her.

  ‘Still some distance. Could be as much as a hundred miles. There’s a lot of artillery involved.’

  Next morning they heard the sound of motor transport much closer at hand. Clive knew where to look now, and soon picked up the trucks on the track leading east from the plantation. ‘Hell’s bells,’ he said. ‘There are a lot of them.’ He counted twelve trucks, and even some gun carriers. ‘I suppose they’re retreating from Manokwari.’

  ‘To where?’ Stefanie asked.

  ‘God knows.’

  He continued to study them as they bounced over the uneven ground, realised that they were stopping — at the plantation. ‘Oh, damnation,’ he said. ‘They’re thinking of making a stand here.’

  ‘Will they come up the mountain?’

  ‘There’s no reason for them to. But … how’re we off for food?’

  ‘There isn’t any.’

  There was no way of storing food, and for over a year now they had lived simply from day to day.

  ‘Hm,’ he said, ‘I’d better get down to the fish trap right away.’

  ‘Clive … for God’s sake be careful.’

  ‘And you,’ he told her. ‘I expect to find you here when I get back.’

  He made his way down the slope and into the trees. He was totally confident in his surroundings now, certain that even if the Japanese did come towards the beach he could remain concealed from them. But they would be too busy setting up their defences in and around the plantation, he was sure.

  He reached the beach without difficulty, found three fish in the trap, stowed them in his haversack and began the climb back. He had not regained the cliff top when he heard a shot. Instantly he froze, against a tree, waiting and listening. The bullet had not been aimed at him, he knew. And it need not have been aimed at Stefanie, either. The Japanese were probably just trigger happy.