A big shoal of fish tore for the shelter of the reef, and above it, like a tenacious carrier attack squadron, hung grey noddy birds, sooty terns, startlingly white love terns and white tropic birds. Majestic and deadly, echelons of broad-spanned frigate birds crash-dived the mass to snatch a tasty morsel. The sunlight flickered, flashed, reflected off the wheeling birds and the churned-up sea; it turned to pale pink and rose against the two islets; and then blurred into a breath-taking gauze of reds, violets, yeliows, greens and blues as the seaspray separated out the colours of the spectrum. Delicate as a water-colour, the tiny twin islands of Big Capitaine and Little Capitaine-our rendezvous-point with Willowtrack- stood out against the spume-filled mist.
I drew back from the exquisite scene in the periscope. Peace was at the radar repeater. Its eerie green glow reflected his face as the electronic sweep revolved. Anything yet?' he asked.
No, sir. Nothing yet. Plenty of land echoes.'
Report any moving target immediately.'
Aye aye, sir.'
Peace glanced briefly into the eyepiece.
No sign yet of Willowtrack,' he said. ' But-' glancing at his watch= we are ahead.'
He went on, Let's get some fresh air. Down periscope!' A flick of the periscope jockey's hand on the hydraulic oil control and the steel tube slid out of sight.
Stand by to surface!'
Like a spring released, men went into action.
All vents shut, sir, ready to surface,' reported the diving officer.
The surface alarm-klaxon sounded three times.
Peace said, Blow all ballast.'
Surface, surface, surface!' said the loudspeakers.
Peace checked the control-room barometer after the lowpressure blower had taken a suction on the ship. Open the hatch!'
The rating spun the handles of the locking dogs and opened the vault-like cover. Peace, as was his prerogative, was first out. I waited for the bridge personnel before I squeezed out. The fresh air on the trade was moist. salty, satisfying, after the sterile dryness of Devastation's interior, but with it was the fishy, deep-water smell which a submarine gathers after long submersion.
Here was the full beauty of Big Capitaine and Little Capitaine: both were miniature replicas of a hundred other islands in Limuria. Flanked by yeliow and rose coral, the lagoon of each islet stood out like a green gem set in the deeper circle of the blue sea. The illusion of a ring setting which sprang into my mind was enhanced by the platinumwhite reflection of the sun glancing off the restless water as it surged and plunged through the pass between the two islets. Limuria's daylight dreams; night-time and the trades breathe 83 with a curious rise and fall through the palms and scrub thickets and in the distance is always the sea, eternally burnishing the coral for the next day's loveliness. Peace called out, Take a look there, John.'
He pointed at the hull. The forward bank of stabilizers, like projecting bollards, were twisted aside.
Devil-fish. There, too.'
Paint was stripped raw to the hull. A ragged fringe, curled and blackened along ^the casing, marked where the monster had lain.
Peace added, He took a bit of Devastation for a souvenir, too.'
About six feet of bridge handrail was missing.
' What do you really think it was?' I asked.
He shrugged. ' Devil-fish-that's good enough, I suppose.'
Finding it difficult to shake off my uneasiness, I said, '
These are coelacanth waters. God knows what else they conceal.'
He looked round the gentle scene and then his eyes moved to the south, from which Willowtrack would come.
From what I've heard about Tyler,' I said, it would have been better to have told him everything.'
' No,' retorted Peace. More than enough people know. Look at the leak. Look at the intruder-and this business of my funeral.'
Are you going to tell Tyler straight from the shoulder that from St Brandon onwards his part of the mission is accomplished?'
Peace looked uncomfortable. ' I'll play it by ear when we meet.'
The metallic voice of the speaker cut in. ' Bridge-Control!
Possible radar contact bearing one-six-zero degrees!'
Peace snapped the knob of the bridge command speaker.
Control-Bridge. Keep and log ranges. Any sonar contact?'
None, sir,' came the answer. The reef's in the way.'
We searched the quadrant of sea with our binoculars, but it was obstructed by the blowing spray.
Contact now bears one-seven-zero true, moving right..
' It must be Willowtrack,' said Peace, coming round the point.'
Contact not evaluated,' droned the radar-man. Approximate course two-seven-five degrees. Approximate speed sixteen knots.'
Control-Bridge,' said Peace. Report immediately you evaluate contact.'
Range twelve thousand yards, closing'
Bridge-Control-sonar reports, probably a submarine.'
The radar-man said, ` Contact closing rapidly, course now three-five-zero degrees..
Sonar reports contact evaluated as submarine.'
She's up!' exclaimed Peters. He became formal. BridgeControl-submarine, range eight thousand yards and steady.'
Contact now bears two-two-zero true,' droned the radarman. A long black shape came into sight round the reef, riding low, her sail half awash, and the identification numbers painted out.
The bridge speaker said, Message coming in, sir' `
Send it up,' ordered Peace.
He glanced at it. Brickbat Zero One! That's Willowtrack all right.' He turned the slip over and scrawled a combination of code letters for transmission.
The sub rounded the point and then, as if reassured, she shook the sea clear of her casing and came swiftly across the anchorage. A churn of white at her stern, and she anchored. Within minutes, the rubber dinghy was in the water and
Peace and I were being rowed across to Willowtrack. Halfway, I looked back. 'Never had the Bay of the Two Capitaines seen such an array of naval power. The two lean black shapes offset the fairy colours of the breaking spray.
A capless figure in faded sea-going khaki looked down from
Willowtrack's paint-scuffed bridge. Despite the cigar clamped in the corner of his mouth, it was easy to see in those strong features where the command lay. There was about him that inherent air of anticipation, of intuition, which stamps a great sub skipper. This was the famous Revs Tyler.
You Devastation?'
The question was rhetorical, but a menace underlay it, had we not been.
Aye,' called Peace. ' No reception committee, I see.'
Tyler leaned over and grinned lopsidedly, the cigar in his teeth. I could see the ripple of muscle at the base of his neck. We got everything pointed at you,' he said. There was no laughter in the long-drawn vowels.
It was the sort of finger-on the trigger attitude which Peace respected. It was reflected in his voice as he called back, I was all ready to pull the plug if you didn't add up.'
Revs tugged the cigar from his mouth and gestured widely round the bay. Right on the nose with the navigation we've split this dump in two. Now come on in.'
Tyler had a new cigar in his mouth when we reached the bridge. His handshake was like iron. ' Glad to have you aboard,' he said. ' Glad to get a breath of fresh air, too thirty-six days submerged. Nearest we got to the surface was periscope depth for the White House messages. And-' he indicated the cigar-' whatever the General Dynamics guys say, they can't make a cigar taste the same below as in the open air.' He took a large breath of the fresh, cool air. '
Boy, if anyone sleeps better than me tonight, he's drunk.'
I wondered after what we had to tell him. Still, I knew how he felt. Submarine air is like drinking stilled water aseptic, safe. Even the cook aboard a nuclear sub falls under the whip of pure air restrictions and cannot use lard, for instance, because it gives off acrolein, which is an eye irritant. No aerosol sprays, either-because of the gas they contain.