It will take you so long to go through the canal that I might be in Pearl Harbor nearly its soon as you.'
Stocker's wife hugged his arm to her. 'Isn't that wonderful, Rich?' she said. 'I'll be leaving too in just a few days. Ever since you got the Walrus, Stocker's been just itching for his chance.'
Deep in her eyes a shadow belied her cheery voice. Two people this much in love shouldn't have to face war, I thought.
But of course it was no different for them than it was for everyone in Walrus' crew, except that our time was at hand.
A main engine roared into life, throwing a cloud of water and smoke out of the exhaust port and under the dock opposite. Two or three people standing nearby hastily backed clear of the spray. Then an engine on the other side thundered Its defiance.
I saluted gravely as Smathers and Blunt stepped over the gangway. As I did so two more engines simultaneously bellowed their sixteen-cylinder starting song.
Hugh was now up on the bridge. 'Single up,' he shouted.
Our four lines were swiftly reduced from three strands to one each as the bights were taken aboard. The skippers of the other two boats stepped up on the gangway, briefly reached out to shake hands with me. 'Good hunting, Rich, good luck.' They drew back.
'Take in the gangway!' shouted Hugh.
Stocker and the two other skippers, disdaining to wait for the regular dock crew, grasped the gangway themselves and dragged it away from the ship.
I turned and mounted to the bridge.
'The ship is ready to get under way, Captain,' said Hugh.
'Very well,' acknowledging his salute. 'Take her out on time.' It was then within a minute of 2:30 P.M. As Hugh waited, I spoke quietly to Jim.
'Have you had the ship searched for stowaways?'
'Nobody I know would be wanting to make this trip with us, Captain. Anyway, I had Kohler go through the ship. We have no unauthorized people aboard, sir.'
I nodded. It was hardly conceivable that anyone would, want to stow away, but it had happened to a Mare Island boat several weeks ago.
'Take in Two and Three!' Hugh was shouting to the men forward and aft of the bridge. 'Stand by to answer bells,' he said to the conning tower. A moment later, 'Take in Four!'
Number Four line came snaking in. 'Starboard back two thirds! Left full rudder!'
We slowly began to gather sternway. Hugh stood on the side of the bridge looking carefully at the dock and our motion alongside of it and at the Number One line taut to the cleat at its head.
'Slack One,' Hugh said to Quin, standing with the ubiquitous telephone headset under the overhang of the bridge.
Quin spoke into the mouthpiece. Number One line sagged.
'Take in One,' said Hugh. Quin spoke again. Number One line came aboard.
Adams reached for a toggle handle nearby, tugged on it A piercing foghorn blast roared out from beneath the bridge.
He held the toggle for several seconds then released it; the foghorn stopped abruptly.
A shrill whistle. Rubinoffski standing in the after part of the cigarette deck had a policeman's whistle clenched in his teeth. The colors, which had been flying from the flagstaff on our stern, were taken down by one of our men who had been standing there waiting for the signal. Likewise, up forward the Union Jack was taken down and furled.
Simultaneously, Rubinoffski reached down beside him, grasped a short flagstaff with a flag rolled around it, jammed, it into a socket at the end of the cigarette deck bulwark, unrolled it to the breeze.
Walrus backed nicely out into the Thames River, twisted to align herself with the channel, and started downstream. We were on our way to war at last; down the familiar, often traveled river; through the railroad bridge and the highway bridge which, side by side, had to open simultaneously for us; past the Electric Boat Company where Walrus had been con- ceived and born, and where the hulls of her sisters were taking shape; past the baroque old Griswold Hotel with its green-stained shutters and Victorian facade; past Southwest Ledge and New London Light; through the Race-that narrow channel between the eastern and western parts of Long Island Sound; past Cerebus Shoal buoy. Finally, late in the afternoon, with Montauk Point abeam to starboard, we set our course due south.
The manner in which we would make the southward passage from New London had been a matter of considerable thought and discussion. For the sake of a fast passage we would run all the way on the surface, except for occasional short dives for drills and once a day to check our computed trim. The big worry was the Possibility of encountering a German submarine on patrol off our East Coast. We were a new ship, in transit, more vulnerable than any surface vessel.
A submarine has so little buoyancy reserve on the surface- none at all submerged, of course-that it can never hope to survive a torpedo hit. But the main thing was that we were new, untried, and inexperienced; true, we had trained faith- fully, but any German we might meet would have the inestimable advantage of weeks of constant alertness off a hostile shore, perhaps the knowledge that he had already been tried in the crucible of war, certainly the superior position of being at leisure on a station through which we would have to pass hurriedly.
For maximum concealment at night the ship was kept completely blacked out topside. Our running lights had not only been turned out but entirely disconnected, their glass lenses removed. The exterior of the ship was a dull black all over, including the once-bright brass capstans and other stray bits of shiny metal which, by the slightest reflection from moon or stars, might betray us. The only light permitted top- side was a tiny red one in the gyro compass repeater for the Officer of the Deck, and the dim glow, also red, which came out of the open hatch at his feet.
Our topside watch consisted of four lookouts, one assigned to each of four sectors around the ship; the Quartermaster of the Watch, who normally stood on the after part of the bridge; and, of course, the Officer of the Deck. An six bridge watchers were equipped with binoculars. Instructions to all six were to use them constantly and to maintain the utmost vigilance for low-lying, dark hulls and suspicious streaks in the water which might be made by torpedoes. Of course we zigzagged, and, knowing that the best defense of a lone ship on the high seas is speed, we held our four sixteen- cylinder Winton diesel engines at maximum sustained power.
Only a few hours away from the safety and comfort of New London, everything now seemed entirely unreal. It was hard to believe that we had progressed so quickly from safety into mortal danger.
The first Might out was uneventful, but I could not sleep.
Ceaselessly I roamed the ship from forward torpedo room to after torpedo room, telling people off watch to be sure to get plenty of rest against the time when they would be needed, assuring myself that all was well with those who actually were on watch. Jim, I saw, was doing likewise. Evidently he could not sleep either, and by the time morning came we had succeeded in exhausting ourselves. It was a good thing the German submarine happened not to choose our first night at sea, or the day following, to make his attempt upon us.
Having had access to some of the reports of German — sub- marine exploits m the Atlantic, we were well aware of the danger they presented. They had been built for service in the narrower ocean, had a shorter cruising- range requirement, and were consequently smaller than our boats, lay lower in the water, and were harder to see. The German Type-7 boat, apparently their favorite for the transocean patrols, was hard- ly half the size of Walrus. But it had nearly equal speed and packed an equally lethal wallop, torpedo for torpedo-though, of course, less than half the total war load we could carry.
It was no doubt one of these which attacked us in the early morning of our third night out of New London. We were still running south, zigzagging and making full speed.
Tom Schultz had the watch on the bridge and I had just stepped below for a few minutes. It wag a dark night, without a moon. We were in the Gulf Stream and the weather was clear, still, warm, and muggy, with myriads of stars studding a pitch-black sky. A moderately heavy sea was running from astern and what wind there was also from the north.
The four exhaust plumes, two from either side, appeared to rise almost straight up, and the moist, incenselike odor of diesel fumes pervaded the bridge. The motion of the ship was gentle, a slight pitch and an occasional deep roll as a quartering sea came in.
