In response to Jerry Gold’s delicate maneuvering the Eelfish slid through the oily water, closing on the swimmer. As the submarine eased toward the swimmer Flanagan held out the boathook and the man abandoned his wooden crate and swam desperately toward the boathook and grabbed it with both hands. Flanagan, his feet braced against the pressure hull, pulled the man to the side of the ship.
“You savvy English?”
“Yes, sir,” the swimmer’s teeth were chattering with fear.
“Okay,” Flanagan said. “I’m going to give the end of this boathook to that sailor and he’ll pull you aboard. You make one wrong move and that man with the machine gun is going to cut you into two pieces. You understand?”
“Yes, sir,” the swimmer said. He reached out with one hand, his fingers scraping the pressure hull. Flanagan passed the boathook to a seaman on deck and the swimmer, hanging desperately to the end of the boathook, scrambled up on the pressure hull and then to the deck, where he huddled on his knees, his hands clasped in prayer.
“On your feet,” Flanagan ordered as he climbed up on deck and took off his safety line. “I’m going to search you. Gunner, blast this man if he makes a move.” Flanagan ran his hands around the pair of white shorts the man was wearing.
“No weapons on him, sir,” Flanagan called to the bridge.
“Bring the prisoner to the cigaret deck,” Brannon ordered. “Secure the deck party.” The two seamen herded the prisoner down the deck and up to the cigaret deck, where he raised his hands.
“Take the prisoner below,” Brannon said. “Gunner, you guard him. Get Doc to look him over and give him some food and water. I’ll be down later.”
“Jerry,” Brannon said. “Tell Maneuvering I want to secure the battery charge. As soon as the battery is ventilated we’ll go back down. I want a radar sweep every five minutes. Some of the friends of that prisoner might come back to look for him.”
Thirty minutes later the Eelfish slid very gently beneath the sea, sinking almost vertically to 300 feet. Mike Brannon went to the Forward Torpedo Room where LaMark was guarding the prisoner. Doc Wharton was closing up his first-aid kit as Brannon came through the watertight door opening.
“He’s pretty good, sir,” Wharton said. “He’s got some small burns from the fuel oil but nothing to bother with. This oil must not burn as much as the oil did at Pearl. I was in the hospital there, at Aiea, and I saw guys who had been in oil in the harbor who were burned a hell of a lot worse than this guy.”
Brannon nodded his head. He looked at the prisoner, who was standing with his back against a bunk, watching John LaMark, who was fondling his submachine gun.
“You spoke English when you were in the water,” Brannon said to the prisoner. “Will you tell us your name?”
“Yes, sir,” the prisoner said. “My name is John Yamati. I graduated with a master’s degree in engineering from Stanford in nineteen thirty-seven, sir.”
“And went right home to Japan,” Brannon said.
“No, sir. I went home in nineteen forty-one, early in forty-one, sir. My mother had died, and I stayed there to help my father. He’s quite old. I was there when the war broke out. I was put in the Merchant Marine. I was the chief engineer of the ship you sank, sir.”
“What ship was that?” Brannon asked.
“You have a life ring so there is no point in refusing to answer your questions, sir. I was serving on the oil tanker Taka raki, ten thousand tons. You hit our ship with two torpedoes. One did not explode. The other hit us aft, in the boiler rooms. The ship exploded and sank.”
“Where were you?” Brannon asked.
“I was on the bridge, getting some air,” the prisoner said. “I am grateful, very grateful to you for saving me.” He bowed from the waist.
“Well,” Brannon said. “We’ll extend the courtesies of the Geneva Convention to you and probably a lot more. Which is more than your people do for ours.”
“I can give you my word as an officer, sir, that I will obey your orders.” The prisoner bowed again.
“Uh huh,” Brannon said mildly. “I’ll figure out how we’re going to handle you later. Petreshock, we’ll keep the prisoner up here. The Gunner’s Mate has some handcuffs. If the prisoner wants to sleep, let him, but cuff one of his hands to a bunk rail. If he wants to sit up, same thing. I don’t want him made uncomfortable, just safe. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir,” Petreshock said. Brannon nodded and went aft, followed by Olsen and Bob Lee. Brannon stopped in the Control Room where Flanagan was standing.
“Let’s get this thing over with, Chief.”
Fred Nelson had the tools needed to remove the exploder from the torpedo’s warhead laid out on a clean towel on deck in front of the torpedo tubes.
“Been thinkin’ on this, Chief,” Nelson said to Flanagan. “Important thing is to not shear off any of them studs that hold the exploder in the warhead. We’ll have to make damn sure the wrench is square on the stud and solid and take a slow strain to get the stud started out.
“If we can do that we can take out all the studs except those on two corners, diagonal corners. After that we’ll sweat gettin’ the exploder outa the warhead.”
Flanagan nodded his approval. “I’ll take the first half of the studs. You get down under the warhead with me and make sure the wrench is solid on the stud, hold it there while I take a strain.” He turned to Brannon.
“We’ll go ahead now, Captain. Cross your fingers, sir.” He crouched under the warhead. Nelson got down on his knees beside him and carefully fitted the socket head of the wrench into a recessed stud hole in the exploder base plate. Flanagan began to exert a little pressure and then a bit more pressure, and with a sudden, sharp noise, the stud turned.
“Next one,” Flanagan grunted. The two men worked in almost total silence, stopping only when Nelson stopped to mop his sweating face. Nelson fitted the wrench on to one stud after the other, Flanagan’s powerful forearms bulging with the strain of exerting maximum power with a delicate touch. At the halfway point Flanagan paused.
“You want to take the rest of them, Fred?”
“Keep on goin’,” Nelson muttered. “You’ve got the touch now. I might shear off a stud.” Flanagan nodded, wiped his hands on a towel, and began on another stud. After almost forty minutes of concentrated effort he crawled out from under the warhead.
“Only two studs left, Captain. One on each corner, diagonally. Both of them are a little bit loose. We’re ready to try and drop the exploder, sir, soon’s I get my breath.”
“Take all the time you want,” Brannon said. “When you take those last two studs out, how are you going to handle the exploder?”
“One of us will have to get under the warhead and push up against the exploder while the last studs are coming out. Then I’ll screw in the two lifting tools and try to wiggle it free.”
“If you don’t object,” Brannon said, “I’ll get under the warhead and hold the exploder.”
“That thing is heavy, Captain,” Flanagan said. “Must weigh forty, fifty pounds. Maybe more.”
“I know,” Brannon said. He wiped his hands on his shorts.
“Okay, sir,” Flanagan said. “You get down here, on your knees. Put both your hands up against the exploder. Fred, you guide the wrench for me.”
Brannon got onto his knees under the warhead, his head craned upward, his two hands on the exploder.
“No,” Nelson said. “No, sir. Let me place your hands for you. I want you to spread them out so if this thing happens to come free it won’t drop cockeyed and jam. We can’t let it sag at either end.” He positioned Mike Brannon’s hands. Flanagan began to back out one of the two remaining brass studs. He finished and Nelson moved the wrench to the last stud. Brannon heard Flanagan mutter.