Makes fore and aft movement here a bit difficult but you’ve no idea how much more soundly we all sleep at night.’
He closed the after door behind him and opened the for’ard one: we found ourselves in the for’ard torpedo room, a narrow cramped compartment barely long enough to permit torpedoes to be loaded or withdrawn from their tubes. Those tubes, with their heavy-hinged rear doors, were arranged close together in two vertical banks of three. Overhead were the loading rails with heavy chain tackles attached. And that was all. No bunks in here and I didn’t wonder: I wouldn’t have liked to be the one to sleep for’ard of those collision bulkheads.
We began to work our way aft and had reached the mess hall when a sailor came up and said that the captain wanted to see me. I followed him up the wide central stairway into the control room, Dr Benson a few paces behind to show that he wasn’t being too inquisitive. Commander Swanson was waiting for me by the door of the radio room.
‘Morning, Doctor. Slept well?’
‘Fifteen hours. What do you think? And breakfasted even better. What’s up, Commander?’ Something was up, that was for sure: for once, Commander Swanson wasn’t smiling.
‘Message coming through about Drift Station Zebra. Has to be decoded first but that should take minutes only.’ Decoding or not, it seemed to me that Swanson already had a fair idea of the content of that message.
‘When did we surface?’ I asked. A submarine loses radio contact as soon as it submerges.
‘Not since we left the Clyde. We are close on three hundred feet down right now.’
‘This is a radio message that’s coming through?’
‘What else? Times have changed. We still have to surface to transmit but we can receive down to our maximum depth. Somewhere in Connecticut is the world’s largest radio transmitter using an extremely low frequency which can contact us at this depth far more easily than any other radio station can contact a surface ship. While we’re waiting, come and meet the drivers.’
He introduced me to some of his control centre crew – as with Benson it seemed to be a matter of complete indifference to him whether it was officer or enlisted man – finally stopped by an officer sitting just aft of the periscope stand, a youngster who looked as if he should still be in high school. ‘Will Raeburn,’ Swanson said. ‘Normally we pay no attention to him but after we move under the ice he becomes the most important man on the ship. Our navigation officer. Are we lost, Will?’
‘We’re just there, Captain.’ He pointed to a tiny pinpoint of light on the Norwegian Sea chart spread out below the glass on the plotting-table. ‘Gyro and sins are checking to a hair.’
‘Sins?’ I said.
‘You may well look surprised, Dr Carpenter,’ Swanson said. ‘Lieutenant Raeburn here is far too young to have any sins. He is referring to S.I.N.S. – Ship’s Inertial Navigational System – a device once used for guiding intercontinental missiles and now adapted for submarine use, specifically nuclear submarines. No point in my elaborating, Will’s ready to talk your head off about it if he manages to corner you.’ He glanced at the chart position. ‘Are we getting along quickly enough to suit you, Doctor?’
‘I still don’t believe it,’ I said.
‘We cleared the Holy Loch a bit earlier than I expected, before seven,’ Swanson admitted. ‘I had intended to carry out some slow-time dives to adjust trim – but it wasn’t necessary. Even the lack of twelve torpedoes up in the nose didn’t make her as stern-heavy as I’d expected. She’s so damned big that a few tons more or less here or there doesn’t seem to make any difference to her. So we just came haring on up –’
He broke off to accept a signal sheet from a sailor, and read through it slowly, taking his time about it. Then he jerked his head, walked to a quiet corner of the control centre and faced me as I came up to him. He still wasn’t smiling.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Major Halliwell, the commandant of the Drift Station – you said last night he was a very close friend of yours?’
I felt my mouth begin to go dry. I nodded, took the message from him. It read: ‘A further radio message, very broken and difficult to decipher, was received 0945 Greenwich Mean Time from Drift Ice Station Zebra by the British trawler Morning Star, the vessel that picked up the previous broadcast. Message stated that Major Halliwell, Officer Commanding, and three others unnamed critically injured or dead, no indication who or how many of the four are dead. Others, number again unknown, suffering severely from burns and exposure. Some message about food and fuel, atmospheric conditions and weakness in transmission made it quite indecipherable. Understood from very garbled signal that survivors in one hut, unable to move because of weather. Word ‘ice-storm’ clearly picked up. Apparently details of wind speed and temperature but unable to make out.
‘Morning Star several times attempted contact Drift Station Zebra immediately afterwards. No acknowledgment.
‘Morning Star, at request of British Admiralty, has abandoned fishing grounds and is moving closer in to Barrier to act as listening post. Message ends.’
I folded the paper and handed it back to Swanson. He said again: ‘Sorry about this, Carpenter.’
‘Critically injured or dead,’ I said. ‘In a burnt-out station on the ice-cap in winter, what’s the difference?’ My voice fell upon my ears as the voice of another man, a voice flat and lifeless, a voice empty of all emotion. ‘Johnny Halliwell and three of his men. Johnny Halliwell. Not the kind of man you would meet often, Commander. A remarkable man. Left school at fifteen when his parents died to devote himself to the support of a brother eight years younger than himself. He slaved, he scraped, he sacrificed, he devoted many of the best years of his life to doing everything for his young brother, including putting him through a six-year University course. Not till then did he think of himself, not till then did he get married. He leaves a lovely wife and three marvellous kids. Two nieces and a nephew not yet six months old.’
‘Two nieces –’ He broke off and stared at me. ‘Good God, your brother? Your brother?’ He didn’t, for the moment, seem to find anything peculiar in the difference of surname.
I nodded silently. Young Lieutenant Raeburn approached us, an odd expression of anxiety on his face, but Swanson abruptly waved him away without seeming even to glance in his direction. He shook his head slowly and was still shaking it when I said abruptly: ‘He’s tough. He may be one of the survivors. He may live. We must get Drift Station Zebra’s position. We must get it.’
‘Maybe they haven’t got it themselves,’ Swanson said. You could see he was grateful for something to talk about. ‘It is a drifting station, remember. The weather being what it is, it may have been days since they got their last fixes – and for all we know their sextants, chronometers and radio direction finders have been lost in the fire.’
‘They must know what their latest fix was, even although it was a week ago. They must have a fairly accurate idea of the speed and direction of their drift. They’ll be able to provide approximate data. The Morning Star must be told to keep transmitting non-stop with a continuous request for their position. If you surface now, can you contact the Morning Star?’
‘I doubt it. The trawler must be the best part of a thousand miles north of us. His receiver wouldn’t be big enough to pull us in – which is another way of saying that our transmitter is too small.’
‘The
