A Twist Of Sand

I couldn't see the inner anchorage clearly, but what I saw told its own deadly tale. Here was an anchorage — the only anchorage for a thousand miles, and it lay behind a convolution of sand-bars, completely hidden in calm weather but visible in anything of a breeze, when any sailor worth his sense would shy like a frightened horse at spotting those lines of broken surf. I marvelled at the guts of old Simon Peace at taking a sailing-ship in there; at his courage at winding his way through those broken lines of surf, now snarling as the wind broke the water across their half-concealed fangs; at his tenacity at coming back again and again to chart it. No wonder he had screamed on his deathbed! Sand, bars of sand, every one of them death at the touch of a keel. To take any ship, even under diesel or electric engines, into what appeared a broken holocaust of surf, would require a heart as steady as the three-topped hill away to starboard now. I looked with grim satisfaction at my island, my only landed possession in the world. It was a gift worthy of the old dead sailor: surf on this coast is death, but an anchorage is life. He had shown me where I could find NP I, if she was to be found.

I changed course and cruised across the entrance. No Navy hydrographer could have done a better job than old Simon. The swirl of the tide must have kept it swept clean all these years, and was likely to do so long after I was dead. I checked my original plan and made for the southern side of the entrance where there was deep water. From there, I had planned, I would sink NP I as she entered the channel. Now, however, I changed my plan slightly. Sink NP I I would, but slightly farther away and not block the one safe anchorage on all this wild coast. If only they had given me a couple of mines! I could have mined the channel and simply sat back and watched NP I destroy herself. Or would I? I asked myself now. Would I have blocked the entrance when only her skipper and I knew of the existence of one of the best-guarded maritime secrets in the world? I didn't bother to answer myself. I hadn't the mines anyway.

I manoeuvred Trout into position. I would lie on the seabed until I heard NP I and then sink her quickly. For the first time in days I grinned to myself. I reached for the voice-pipe. NP I might be almost upon us, but she wouldn't find Trout unprepared.

"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,