Submarine

He felt the bow-down angle coming on as Q took effect and Bowles planed her down.

'Sixty-two feet.'

'Stop flooding Q.'

'Seventy feet, sir.' The cox'n was pulling back on his column, controlling the bubble to prevent a stern break-surface.

'Seventy-five feet, . eighty… eighty-five.'

'Blow Q.'

As the three and a half tons of additional seawater was blown from the emergency diving tank, he saw Bowles easing back on his column. The bubble began moving for'd.

'Stop blowing Q. Vent Q inboard.'

The roar of Q's foul air entering the boat overwhelmed everything, drowning the sonar reports; then came the calm, as the tank emptied. The cox'n, his eyes glued to his inclinometer, was easing back on his column. The silence was broken only by the murmured reports, the background hum of motors, the whisper of the ventilation. Orcus was gliding silently north-east at two hundred feet, the cox'n holding her while Farge nudged the boat ahead with short bursts on slow one.

'187, contact relative bearing red 95, sir.' The Typhoon was abeam and the sound-room had her taped. 'She's diving now.'

'Any other contacts?'

'Two destroyers, following up astern of her, on either quarter, probable Krivaks. Five Natya sweepers ahead, bearing red 40.'

'Our position, pilot?'

'Just entering the channel, sir. Time 1624. Ninety metres of water under us.' Following this monster, Orcus would be safe from the mine menace. Twenty minutes later, sonar reported:

'187, contact bearing red 50, range five thousand yards. Speed confirmed, fifteen knots.'

The Typhoon was drawing ahead and, presumably proceeding at her maximum effective sonar speed, was opening the range. Farge slicked back his black hair, rubbed the palm of his hand across his jaw.

'You can pump now, chief,' he said. 'I'll stay in the Krivaks' wakes until you've got your trim right. Slow ahead together.'

Eight minutes later the trimming officer was satisfied, the boat holding at three hundred feet while Farge grouped up and increased speed to twelve knots in the wake of the Typhoon.

By 1700, losing distance at the rate of three miles each hour, Orcus was already three and a half miles astern. Farge remained tense, hands in pockets, feet astride between the periscopes, watching his attack teams concentrating upon their work. The sound-room was methodically pumping out the data for the overall picture he needed: at a probable depth of four hundred feet the gigantic submarine was proceeding to her war station on a course of 050° at a speed of fifteen knots. With her reactors she could keep this up for months. Orcus, grouped up, with only thirty-seven per cent of battery power remaining, could not follow at this speed for long.

'The Krivaks are breaking away, sir,' reported Tim Prout. 'They're going on ahead and overtaking the sweepers who seem to be slowing down and turning to port.'

Farge eased down to allow the minesweepers to pass over Orcus. They cleared to port, and then he gradually worked up speed again to twelve knots. The Typhoon was on her own now, her escorting Krivaks cracking on ahead.

'Concentrate on the Typhoon,' he ordered. 'Don't lose her.'

Then at 1720 the 187 reported that the contact was drawing across to port. 'Relative bearing red 20, sir,' Sims called from the sound-room.

'She'll be altering to clear the minefield,' Murray said from his chart table.

'We'll have to risk cutting the corner,' Farge murmured. 'And we'll save distance. Port five.'

'Target's settled to her new course,' Prout said. '335°.'

'I'll keep fine on her port quarter, in case she streams a nasty. Steer 335°.'

The large minefield to the eastward was drawing clear astern when the 187 sonar reported that the Typhoon was altering course again and increasing speed. By 1830 she was four miles ahead and gaining with every precious minute which passed.

'Steer 340°,' Farge ordered wearily. 'We'll get in dead astern of her and hang on until as long as the battery holds out.'

He glanced around 'his control-room at the men who were nearing the end of their tether: already mistakes were occurring and his officers were strained to the limit, double-checking. Farge dared not increase to full speed. Orcus had been grouped up now for nearly two hours and he had ordered battery readings every half-hour; at 2000 only twenty-four per cent remained. Farge, sitting in his chair abaft the attack periscope, remained silent, sharing with his men the agony of despair.

The picture was clear enough now: the Typhoon was drawing away and there was nothing more that Orcus could do.

It was a matter of guesswork when the monster would start to disappear from the sonar plots. Her course seemed unlikely to take her to her war station, for she was heading for the centre of Spitzbergen. Somewhere ahead of her must be the two Krivaks but they had vanished from the plots. The best that Farge could do was to signal this miserable state of affairs before he either lost her or ran out of amps.