'After lookout reports fire in the convoy, sir,' said a talker.He was on his feet again, with hardly time to think of this as retribution for his self-indulgence. There it was; now the rockets were soaring into the night above the flames which he could see; now there was another sharp red glow lighting the upper works of one ship, silhouetting the upper works of another—a torpedo explosion as he watched; the length of the interval told him that this was not a 'spread' bursting as it reached various targets. A U-boat had been deliberately marking down victims one after another.
'Sonar reports contact bearing zero seven seven,' said the talker.
He and Viktor were in touch with one U-boat; at any minute a false move by her captain might mean her destruction. Behind him men were dying in the night, the victims of cold-blooded sharpshooting. He had to choose; it was the most painful moment he had ever known, more painful than when he had heard about Evelyn. He had to leave those men to die.
'Depth charges away,' said the T.B.S.
If he abandoned the present hunt he could not be sure of making contact with the other U-boat; in fact it was most doubtful that he would. And she had done her damage for the present.
'Sonar reports contact confused,' said the talker—that was Viktor's depth charges exploding.
He might save some lives; he might. But in the darkness and confusion of the disordered convoy even that was unlikely, and he would be seriously endangering his ship.
'I am turning away to port,' said Viktor.
'Very well.'
The U-boat which had done the damage would now be harmless for a short space at least while reloading her tubes. It was humiliating, it was infuriating that he should find comfort even for one moment in such a thought. Fighting anger and baffled rage surged up inside him, a yearning to run amok, to hit out wildly. He could feel the tension rising within him. He could lose all patience and see red, but twenty-four years of discipline saved him. He imposed self-control upon himself; Annapolis might have taught him that, or perhaps his much-loved father in his boyhood. He forced himself to think as coldly and as scientifically as ever.
'Sonar reports contact bearing zero six eight.'
'Left smartly to course zero six four. George to Eagle. I am turning to port to intercept.'
Men were dying behind him, men he was supposed to protect. What he had to do was to solve little trigonometrical problems in his head quickly and accurately, and give his orders calmly, and issue his information intelligibly, and anticipate the submerged U-boat's movements as freshly and as rapidly as he had done ever since yesterday. He had to be a machine that did not know emotion; he had to be a machine that did not know fatigue. He had to be a machine uninfluenced by the possibility that Washington and London might think him a failure.
'Sonar reports contact bearing zero six six, range one thousand,' said the talker. 'But it sounds like a pill, sir.'
If it were a pill which way was the U-boat turning? What depth would she take up? He applied himself to those problems while the men in the convoy died. He gave his two hundreth successive helm order.
The darkness was not as impenetrable now. The white wave tops could be seen overside, and even as far ahead as the bow from the wing of the bridge. Day was creeping towards them from the east, an unutterably slow transition from black to gray; gray sky and gray horizon and a slate-gray heaving sea. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. It was not true. The heavens declare the glory of God. These heavens? As Krause noted the coming of the light the well-remembered verses came up into his mind—they had come up in his mind in the old days of Pacific and Caribbean sunrises. Now he thought of them with a bitter, sardonic revulsion of mind. The shattered convoy on the flank; the frozen corpses on the life rafts; the pitiless gray sky; the certainty that this agony was going to endure until he could bear it no longer—it was more than he could bear already. He wanted to throw in his hand, to cast aside all thought of his duty, his duty to God. Then he drew himself back from the temptation.
'George to Eagle. I am holding my course. Keep clear.' His voice was as flat and as precise as ever.
The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. He had nearly said that, too, while he could still square his shoulders and while his aching legs could still carry him to the T.B.S.
'Contact bearing zero six seven, range eleven hundred yards.'
'Very well.'
One more attempt to destroy the hidden enemy. And not one more only; dozens, hundreds if necessary. While Keeling moved in to the attack, while the talker repeated the ranges, there was time to bow his head. Cleanse Thou me from secret faults.
'Stand by for the pattern, Mr. Pond.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
Balked by the U-boat's turn; helm orders to get into position again; orders to Viktor to head her off. Let us not be weary in well doing.
C. S. Forester, The good shepherd (Boston and Toronto: Little, Brown and Company, 1955), 181-184 (Thursday. Morning Watch: 0400-0800).
