They went all the way to Pearl Harbor on the surface. They had beautiful clear weather each day. Jap ships and subs and planes had been cleared from the entire area so effectively that American submarines did not need to fear being mistaken by their own patrols for Jap subs. They made good time, and the crew and officers alike were happy, in the highest of spirits.

March laughed, one day, as he looked down from the bridge and saw clothes drying on the line, put there by the crew who took the first opportunity to give their things a good sunning.

“This doesn’t look much like war,” he mused. “Very domestic scene, really. And some of the men have been on deck enough to get a little sunburn. Not the usual picture of the submariner, pale and dehydrated, after his long days beneath the waters of the deep.”

But he knew there would be plenty of that life ahead of them. He was happy that this part of the trip was so pleasant. It meant a lot to the crew, who were inclined sometimes to be superstitious, despite all protestations to the contrary. They felt that everything would go well with them since the start of their real patrol had been so auspicious.

The Skipper had opened his orders twelve hours out from San Francisco. They were no great surprise to anyone. They were to go by way of Pearl Harbor to a submarine base in the southwest Pacific, a tiny island where a sub tender nursed its brood of pigboats, fed them oil and torpedoes and supplies before sending them out to break up the Jap shipping lines.

The stop at Pearl Harbor was short, but March enjoyed it, remembering when he and Scoot had left the Plymouth there, heading back for the United States and their training in submarines and airplanes. Much to his surprise there was a letter for him. He had not thought anyone would have a chance to write since learning his San Francisco address. The envelope, a plain one with a typed address, gave him no clue:

It was from Scoot! Dated three weeks before, it said, “In case you come this way you’ll get this. I’m on the carrier Bunker Hill heading for where all of us head when we get out here. Don’t forget to come and save me from those Japs when I holler for you!”

That was all, but it was good. It was just like Scoot and it made March feel fine to read it and to picture again his old friend. He showed the note to Larry when he went back to Kamongo, and told him about Scoot Bailey.

“Sounds like a swell guy,” Larry said. “Why couldn’t he have gone into submarines, too?”

“No—he’s swell, but he’s not right for pigboats,” March said. “Too much of an individualist. He’ll take orders fine, do a swell job, but he’s best when he’s on his own. Flying a fighter plane off a carrier is just exactly right for Scoot.”

“Well, you never can tell—maybe we’ll run into him,” Larry said. “Stranger things have happened in wartime.”

They sailed from Pearl Harbor looking for action, but several days went by without a sign of ship or plane of any kind.

“We’ve got to run into something,” Larry said one day in the wardroom. “I’d hate to show up at the base with all my torpedoes intact, without a single Jap ship accounted for. Why, we’re going through about nine hundred miles of enemy waters and we’ve got to get something on the way.”

“The boys out here have been scaring them into their ratholes,” McFee said. “They don’t come out any more than they have to.”

“But that’s the point,” Larry said. “They’ve got to come out sometime. They’ve got garrisons on a lot of these islands, and garrisons need to be supplied.”

“Well, they’re just letting the garrisons on lots of those islands starve to death,” Stan said.

“Sure, in the Marshalls and a few other places where we’ve got ’em surrounded,” the Skipper said. “But they’re still supplying and reinforcing plenty of places around these parts. They lose some ships every day. I just want them to lose a couple to us, as we’re passing by on our way to more important things.”

“What about Wake Island?” March asked.

“Yes, they’re still supplying Wake,” Larry said. “We’re not too far away from it any more, but we haven’t got it really cut off. But our course isn’t very close to Wake.”

“Couldn’t we just edge over that way and have a look?” March asked.

“Well, now, maybe we could,” Larry said. “Nobody told us just what course to follow out here. When we get a bit further we’ve got to run submerged most of the time anyway. We just laid down the straightest route to our destination. But a little detour wouldn’t do any harm. Lieutenant Anson, carry us over near Wake.”

With a smile, March left the wardroom and went to the navigating desk. There he plotted the course for Wake Island, went up on the conning tower for a shot of the sun to check his course, and gave the new course to the helmsman. Then he went back to the wardroom.

“About six hundred Army-Navy time, courtesy of Whoozis watches,” he announced, “we shall sight Wake Island.”

“Hm, works out very nicely,” Larry said. “Tomorrow morning just after dawn. We can travel on the surface all night and submerge just before the approach.”

Everyone was up and about early the next morning, even those who had been on watch during the night. Breakfast was over and officers and men were at their stations before dawn.

“We may get nothing, of course,” Larry said. “We mustn’t get our hopes up.”

“Okay, Skipper,” McFee said. “We’re just dropping by for a look and if anything’s there we’ll try to take care of it.”

“Rig ship for diving,” the Skipper said, and the word was passed throughout the boat. One by one the departments reported back to March that everything was ready. The long slim boat slid under the water, the whine of the electric motors replacing the throbbing of the Diesels. As March handled the diving operations, he recalled the days when it had seemed to him such a complicated and difficult task. Now it was a simple straightforward job, especially when carried out by a crew that knew its job.

After about twenty minutes, March turned to Larry. “I think we ought to be able to have a look now,” he said.

“Up periscope,” Larry said, reaching forward to grab the adjusting handles as they rose into position. He adjusted the eyepiece and looked, focussing with the handles. March saw his mouth open slightly in a whispered exclamation.

“Have a look, March,” he said. “I think we’ve raised something.”

March looked and saw the low-lying atolls where the Marines had for so long battled the Japs against great odds. It would do his heart good to kill a few Japs at Wake, entirely apart from the excellence of the idea in general. He located the harbor and then saw two dark blobs in it.

“There’s something there, all right,” he said. “Can’t be sure what they are yet, though.”

“Down ’scope,” Larry said. “We’ll get a little closer and have another look.”

There was almost nothing said as the boat moved silently forward under the water, until Larry ordered the periscope up again. Then he exclaimed aloud at what he saw.

“Three of ’em!” he cried. “Looks as if they just got here themselves, probably came in under cover of darkness. Lighters are just tying up to them to unload.”

“What are they?” March asked. “Can you make out?”

“One’s a troopship,” Larry replied, “loaded to the gunwales! The men’ll go ashore in the lighters. They haven’t even started yet. Must be relief for the garrison—old ones will be going back.”

“Oh, no they won’t,” March said. “Not yet, anyway, because their relief is going to be cut down in number right soon now.”

“Here, March, have a look,” Larry said. “I think one’s a tanker, one an ammunition ship, or a freighter with the supplies.”

March stepped to the periscope and looked carefully.

“Tanker and troopship are certain,” he said. “Can’t be sure about the other, though. How many do you think we can get?”

“Not more than two,” Larry said. “They’ll get planes after us that fast. We’ll have to get away after two, maybe after one. Can’t tell until we’re in the middle of it. But what about all the reefs around here? Can we get in position to fire?”

“If we’re good we can,” March said. “Come on, I’ll show you. I’ve been studying the Wake Island chart, and we know it’s right.”

Larry followed March to the navigation desk, where they both studied the chart of Wake Island.

“We have to go west first,” March said. “Then cut back sharply in a hairpin turn—go in about four hundred yards, turn about thirty degrees to starboard without going forward too much, fire and then back away. Backing will be slow, but we can’t turn her for a couple of hundred yards. Think we can make it?”

“Deep water out here?” Larry asked, pointing to a point about a mile off shore.

“Plenty deep,” March replied.

“Then I think we can do it,” Larry said. “Those ships are worth the chance, anyway. If we’re slow getting the first one, we’ll cut and run.”

“Which one first?” March asked.

“The tanker,” Larry said. “Most important. Planes can’t fly without the gas and oil it carries.”

“Not the troopship?”

“No, too many of the men will be able to swim or get ashore some way,” Larry said. “We could count on about fifty percent casualties there. But the tanker—that’ll be all gone, and maybe set fire to a few other things. Tanker first, then troopship.”

The Skipper gave orders to move the boat to the west around the reefs as March had indicated. March stood close by the soundman, who could tell at every instant just how far they were from the rocky shoals that might trap them.

Slowly the boat moved forward and then, when March gave the word, it turned and moved in toward the island.

“I hope I’m right,” March said to himself. “There’s not very much room here, though if those ships got through, we surely can.”

The sound man picked up reefs to the right and then to the left—nothing ahead, and March breathed more deeply. They went forward for a few moments, still moving slowly.

“About now, March?” Larry asked quietly.

“Yes, this ought to be it,” March replied. He saw Scotty at the soundman’s side, the other crew members standing by their levers and valves. They were all calm and quiet, but with just a touch of excited expectancy in their manner.

The Skipper gave the order for the turn to starboard, for the cutting of motors. Then he called for the periscope. As it rose from its well in the deck he crouched and grabbed it. Then March realized why Larry was a good Skipper. In just about two seconds he had seen everything there was to see. He called out the course settings for the torpedoes, first for two to go into the sides of the tanker, then for two to go into the sides of the transport.

The settings were called back to him, and he called, without a moment’s hesitation—“Fire one! Fire two!” He waited a moment, glancing at his watch. “Fire three! Fire four!”

Stepping away from the eyepiece he called, “Down periscope!” and followed it immediately with “Reverse motors!”

As the whine of the motors started and the boat slid backwards in the water, he kept his eyes on his watch, finger in the air as if counting. He lifted his eyes and—thud! The submarine trembled and shook from the explosion of a torpedo against the side of a ship. There was a wild cry throughout the pigboat as the crew whooped with glee, so loud that it almost drowned out the roar of the second torpedo hitting home against the tanker.

Men danced and jigged, but not for a moment did they take their hands from their levers or wheels, or their eyes from the dials they watched.

“You can turn now, Skipper,” March said quietly, and Larry gave the order for the ship to turn and dive deep as it cleared the reefs.

The words were not out of his mouth when another roar sent a tremble through the submarine and another shout arose. It was a short roar because the men stopped to listen for the second torpedo that had been sent against the troopship. But nothing came, and it was Larry who broke the silence.

“A miss, men,” he said. “Only one got through.”

“Well, what can you expect?” Scotty demanded. “After all, the position we were in!”

“Are still in!” Larry exclaimed. “Only a hundred feet! Take her to two-fifty!”

Everybody adjusted his body to the slope of the boat as it slid rapidly down in the water. In a few minutes, they knew, depth charges would be dropped in an attempt to locate them. Certainly planes would be in the air and perhaps fast small boats something like our own PT-boats would be dashing out of the harbor after them.

Larry grabbed the phone from the interphone orderly and spoke into it.

“You heard the blasts,” he said, knowing that men all over the boat would hear him. “Two into a Jap tanker. One into a troopship. Second one there was a dud. You can expect some depth charges, but I think we’ll be down away from them. Later we’ll go up for a look and I’ll tell you what we did.”

March knew that all the men appreciated that. They were tense and excited and they wanted to know exactly what was going on. Their Skipper didn’t keep them waiting long. They were part of this just as much as he was.

They leveled off at two hundred and fifty feet just as they felt the first bumping rattle of a depth charge explosion. But it was far away and hardly bothered them. In two minutes another came a little closer. Everyone gripped the nearest solid support and held on. March said to himself, “You’re going through a depth bombing. This was the one thing they couldn’t simulate at New London. Well, how do you like it?”

And he answered himself, “It’s not so bad.”

He looked around at the men in the crew. They held on and they listened, but they did not look frightened. Larry grinned at him.

“Lousy aim they’ve got,” he said. “They’re not coming very close.”

“What about a little zigzagging?” March asked.

“No, we might zig or zag into something,” Larry said. “They obviously haven’t located us and are just dropping at random. Also, we’re deep enough to be below the explosions. After all, the biggest force of the blow is above the exploding charge. We’ll just keep sliding along the way we’re going. They’ll give up after a while.”

The charges exploded regularly, but not for long. Soon they hardly felt a jar when one went off.

“They think we’re hanging around back there for a look,” Larry said. “They don’t know how safe we play. I’m not going back for my look for two hours. So just keep going.”

They did keep going, and for two hours. By the time they circled around and came back toward the island there were no more depth charges. About a mile away they surfaced quickly and the Skipper took a quick look. Then the ’scope went down and March ordered another dive.

“Sorry you couldn’t have had a look, March,” Larry said, “but I didn’t—”

He was interrupted by a shaking roar that almost spilled him off his feet. March, who had one hand against the bulkhead, grabbed him.

“As I was saying,” Larry went on with a smile, “I didn’t want to keep the ’scope up any longer than I had to. They spotted it pretty fast, didn’t they?”

Another roar was the answer, followed by another and another, and half a dozen more. They were bad shocks, worse than those they had experienced at first, but the sub had got down fast enough to get away from the worst effects.

“What did you see?” March asked between blasts.

“Listen,” Larry said. He took the interphone and gave his news to the whole ship. “Tanker down—only the bow showing, oil-covered water blazing over the entire bay. Total loss for the Nips on that one. Troopship looks half busted in two, but still afloat, though listing badly. No men on her. Plenty of bodies in the water. Lots got ashore, I’m sure, but plenty got burned in the oil trying to make it.”

A loud cheer rose through the ship as Larry handed the phone back to the orderly.

“Well, anyway,” he said. “It was certainly worth four torpedoes!”

As the Kamongo slid down through the dark waters, the depth charges grew less intense. Finally they got away from them entirely, and resumed the course for their southwest Pacific base.

“Don’t let that fool you,” Larry said, as they sat in the wardroom having a cup of coffee. “There weren’t any sound detectors there, so we got away pretty easily. When the destroyers are after you, they follow you—and their depth charges are bigger. This was a setup!”