and shaking with cold, under the command of the bearded Doyle, respectfully sulphurous in his outspoken comments on the weather, they dropped down to the main deck again. By this time Vallery was making no protest at all, not even of the most token kind, against Petersen's help and support. He was too glad of them. He blessed Brooks for his foresight and thoughtfulness, and was touched by the rare delicacy and consideration that prompted the big Norwegian to withdraw his supporting arm whenever they spoke to or passed an isolated group of men.
Inside the port screen door and just for'ard of the galley, Vallery and Nicholls, waiting as the others knocked the clamps off the hatch leading down to the stokers' mess, heard the muffled roar of distant depth-charges-there were four in all-felt the pressure waves strike the hull of the Ulysses. At the first report Vallery had stiffened, head cocked in attention, eyes fixed on infinity, in the immemorial manner of a man whose ears are doing the work for all the senses. Hesitated a moment, shrugged, bent his arm to hook a leg over the hatch coaming. There was nothing he could do.
In the centre of the stokers' mess was another, heavier hatch. This, too, was opened. The ladder led down to the steering position, which, as in most modern warships, was far removed from the bridge, deep in the heart of the ship below the armour-plating. Here, for a couple of minutes, Vallery talked quietly to the quartermaster, while Petersen, working in the confined space just outside, opened the massive hatch-450 Ibs. of steel, actuated by a counter-balancing pulley weight-which gave access to the hold, to the very bottom of the Ulysses, to the Transmitting Station and No. 2 Low Power Room.
A mazing, confusing mystery of a place, this Low Power Room, confusing to the eye and ear. Round every bulkhead, interspersed with scores of switches, breakers and rheostats, were ranged tiered banks of literally hundreds of fuses, baffling to the untrained eye in their myriad complexity. Baffling, too, was the function of a score or more of low-power generators, nerve-drilling in the frenetic dissonance of i their high-pitched hums. Nicholls straightened up at the foot of the ladder and shuddered involuntarily. A bad place, this. How easily could mind and nerves slide over the edge of insanity under the pounding, Insistent clamour of the desynchronised cacophony. Just then there were only two men there-an Electric Artificer and his assistant, bent over the big Sperry master gyro, making some latitude adjustment to the highly complex machinery of the compass. They looked up quickly, tired surprise melting into tired pleasure. Vallery had a few words with them-speech was difficult in that bedlam of sound-then moved over to the door of the T.S.
He had his glove on the door handle when he froze to complete stillness. Another pattern had exploded, much closer this time, two cable lengths distant, at most. Depth-charges, they knew, but only because reason and experience told them: deep down in the heart of an armour-plated ship there is no sense of explosion, no roar of erruption from a detonating depth-charge. Instead, there is a tremendous, metallic clang, peculiarly tinny in calibre, as if some giant with a giant sledge had struck the ship's side and found the armour loose.
The pattern was followed almost immediately by another two explosions, and the Ulysses was still shuddering under the impact of the second when Vallery turned the handle and walked in. The others filed in after the Captain, Petersen closing the door softly behind him. At once the clamour of the electric motors died gratefully away in the hushed silence of the T.S.
The T.S., fighting heart of the ship, lined like the Low Power Room though it was by banks of fuses, was completely dominated by the two huge electronic computing tables occupying almost half the floor space.
These, the vital links between the Fire Control Towers and the turrets, were generally the scene of intense, controlled activity: but the almost total destruction of the towers that morning had made them all but useless, and the undermanned T.S. was strangely quiet. Altogether, there were only eight ratings and an officer manning the tables.
The air in the T.S., a T.S. prominently behung with 'No Smoking' notices, was blue with tobacco smoke hanging in a flat, lazily drifting cloud near the deckhead, a cloud which spiralled thinly down to smouldering cigarette ends. For Nicholls there was something oddly reassuring in these burning cigarettes: in the unnatural bow-taut stillness, in the inhuman immobility of the men, it was the only guarantee of life.
He looked, in a kind of detached curiosity, at the rating nearest him. A thin, dark-haired man, he was sitting hunched forward, his elbow on the table, the cigarette clipped between his fingers a bare inch from his half-open mouth. The smoke was curling up, lacing its smarting path across vacant, sightless eyes oblivious to the irritation, the ash on the cigarette, itself almost two inches in length, drooping slightly.
Vaguely, Nicholls wondered how long he had been sitting there motionless, utterly motionless... and why?
Expectancy, of course. That was it-expectancy. It was too obvious. Waiting, just waiting. Waiting for what? For the first time it struck Nicholls, struck him with blinding clarity, what it was to wait, to wait with the bowstring of the nerves strung down at inhuman tension, strung down far beyond quivering to the tautened immobility of snapping point, to wait for the torpedo that would send them crashing into oblivion. For the first time he realised why it was that men who could, invariably it seemd, find something com-plainingly humorous in any place and every place never joked about the T.S. A death trap is not funny. The T.S. was twenty feet below water level: for'ard of it was 'B' magazine, aft of it 'A' boiler-room, on either side of it were fuel tanks, and below it was the unprotected bottom, prime target for acoustic mines and torpedoes. They were ringed, surrounded, by the elements, the threat of death, and it needed only a flash, a wandering spark, to trigger off the annihilating reality... And above them, in the one in a thousand chance of survival, was a series of hatches which could all too easily warp and lock solid under the metal-twisting shock of an explosion. Besides, the primary idea was that the hatches, deliberately heavy in construction, should stay shut in the event of damage, to seal off the flooded compartments below. The men in the T.S. knew this.
'Good-evening. Everything all right down here?' Vallery's voice, quiet and calm as ever, sounded unnaturally loud. Startled faces, white and strained, twisted round, eyes opening in astonishment: the depth-charging, Nicholls realised, had masked their approach.
'Wouldn't worry too much about the racket outside,' Vallery went on reassuringly. 'A wandering U-boat, and the Sirrus is after him. You can thank your stars you're here and not in that sub.'
No one else had spoken. Nicholls, watching them, saw their eyes flickering back from Vallery's face to the forbidden cigarettes, understood their discomfort, their embarrassment at being caught red-handed by the Captain.
'Any reports from the main tower, Brierley?' he asked the officer in charge. He seemed unaware of the strain.
'No, sir. Nothing at all. All quiet above.'
'Fine!' Vallery sounded positively cheerful. 'No news is good news.' He brought his hand out from his pocket, proffered his cigarette case to Brierley. 'Smoke? And you, Nicholls?' He took one himself, replaced the case, absently picked up a box of matches lying in front of the nearest gunner and if he noticed the gunner's startled disbelief, the slow beginnings of a smile, the tired shoulders slumping fractionally in a long, soundless sigh of relief, he gave no sign.
The thunderous clanging of more depth-charges drowned the rasping of the hatch, drowned Vallery's harsh, convulsive coughing as the smoke reached his lungs. Only the reddening of the sodden hand-towel betrayed him. As the last vibration died away, he looked up, concern in his eyes.
'Good God! Does it always sound like that down here?'
Brierley smiled faintly. 'More or less, sir. Usually more.'
Vallery looked slowly round the men in the T.S., nodded for'ard. 'B' magazine there, isn't it?'
'Yes, sir.'
'And nice big fuel tanks all around you?'
Brierley nodded. Every eye was on the captain.
'I see. Frankly, I'd rather have my own job-wouldn't have yours for a pension... Nicholls, I think we'll spend a few minutes down here, have our smoke in peace. Besides,', he grinned, 'think of the increased fervour with which we'll count our blessings when we get out of here!'
He stayed five minutes, talking quietly to Brierley and his men.
Finally, he stubbed out his cigarette, took his leave and started for the door.
'Sir.' The voice stopped him on the threshold, the voice of the thin dark gunner whose matches he had borrowed.
'Yes, what is it?'
