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Chemical reaction

So we prepared for diving, and went under. I returned to the battery space. As I crawled in, I thought that the sweet smell was much more perceptible, but said nothing. Buck closed the door on me, and I lay down. The porpoising started again, but to begin with it didn't seem quite as hard to control, and there were periods of two or three minutes when Jack, or Buck, appeared to have got the hang of how to maintain depth without plunging or breaking surface. I fell into fitful dozes again, and lost all sense of time, feeling strangely fuzzy. Once when I came to I wondered if they had forgotten me. The plunging seemed to have re-assumed its earlier pattern and we were porpoising violently. I heard the creaking in the hull as we went deep, and imagined the manilla parting, and us being carried down into the darkness to be crushed by the pressure of water. The fantasy of dying became half a reality as time moved on, and no-one came to open the hatch. I began tossing from side to side, feeling imprisoned in the battery space, unable to signal to the others, for my banging on the hull would not be distinguishable from the now multiple clanking of the towing bar.

Reality had become a strange blend of noise and fantasy, peril and solace, when suddenly the hatch opened. I heard it, but was too bemused, and exhausted, to react. I heard Buck’s voice calling me, but lay there, supine.
'Lefty! Christ, this place is thick with gas! Lefty!'
I heard the fear in his voice, and stirred, giving a moan of consciousness. He took me by the feet and dragged my body towards the wet and dry. As I felt the cleaner air from that compartment wash around me, reality shook itself free from imagination, and I was propped up on the seat in the wet-and-dry. Buck patted my cheeks, and I raised my head fuzzily at him.
'Christ, I thought you'd gone,' he breathed, with a faint shadow of a smile.
The fumes were clearing from my head. I realised we were once again on the surface and noticed that the primus was on; they were brewing tea. The ERA was holding the legs of the stove steady.
'Like some char?' Buck asked.
I nodded, still too dazed to speak. I felt as if I had come back from the dead.

Trailing high explosive

The warmth of the mug between my hands did more to bring me to than the liquid going down my throat. I began to look up and take stock. Why were we on the surface again? I could see through the glass in the conning tower that it was still daylight. Or was it the next day? My sense of time had completely gone. Somehow it didn't seem to matter. What I noticed were the dark rings of weariness round the eyes of the three others. They were visibly sagging, and there was in their expressions the old concern, the same anxiety as before.
'We've got another piece of thinking to do,' Buck announced, bracing himself against the periscope hoist. 'Now there's a list to port. Can't say when it began, no more than with the first charge. But there’s a list.' He paused, as if this declaration had been hard to make. 'We're less than a day from the dropping zone, and if we slip the tow now, we should have enough fuel to get in and do the job, and come out again to rendezvous.'
He had used again, and my thoughts moved slowly among the implications. I took it to mean that we could be free of the big sub now if we wished, and thereby save it from any damage, if the second charge exploded while still attached to X8.
'So the choice is: do we slip the tow now and try to get in and out again; or do we wind this charge out too?'
I looked at him; he looked unhappy, uneasy even. I looked at the others; they were looking at me. It was obvious that they had been turning around these alternatives in their minds for some time - at any rate Buck and Jack. Buck was really asking me: do we risk the chemistry of these charges and go in, knowing that any moment we may be blown sky-high; or do we give up the operation? I didn't know what their views were; I was being asked to react on the spot.

I felt resentment rising in me at the thought of giving up, when we had come so far, and porpoised through hundreds of miles of ocean. Now we were within striking distance of our target, and could be free of the big submarine; I had come to feel its presence as a weight, an incubus of which I wished to be rid. At the same time, there was a great weariness in my body, and a longing for safety: perhaps I need not die now after all. Perhaps I might yet meet that girl I dreamed of, and be able to do something wholesome in life. But could I live with myself if I took the easy way now? The answer, I knew, was no. And why not take the risk? After all, the explosion would be so massive that we would never know.
Suddenly my mind was made up. 'I'm for going on,' I told the others. 'There's a chance of doing it, and if the charge does go up, we shan't know.'
They looked at me with some incredulity; for a moment I thought Buck looked embarrassed. I think Jack muttered 'Christ!' under his breath and turned away. I glanced at them again; this hadn't been the answer they were hoping for.
'There's something else, Lefty,’ Buck began. 'Maybe we could get in and do it ... But supposing we get into the fjord, and are approaching the target, and then the charge goes off ... Don't you see? The Germans will know something's afoot, and the whole place will go on alert ... So the other X-craft will be put at risk, and maybe the whole operation will come to nothing - because one explosion gives the game away.’
I hadn't thought of that. I dropped my head; we couldn't, we mustn't jeopardise the whole thing. And a premature explosion would alarm all the Germans in North Norway. The nets around the battleships would be trebled, extra lookouts posted, sorties flown. Our bravado might be responsible for the deaths of other X-craft crews - a total shambles ...
I raised my head again, and saw Buck was still waiting. 'You're right,’ I admitted. ‘We can't take that risk. We'll have to ditch, then ...' I thought Jack gave a sigh of relief; I know the Scotsman did, for he was by my side. Buck looked satisfied, though crestfallen.

So we went through the routine once more, but more swiftly.
'I don't trust the safe setting,' Buck announced, 'so I’ll set her to go off at two hours. That should give plenty of distance between us, about four sea miles.'
I looked up, and was about to ask why so little as four. 'Seanymph’s below now; we’re getting too close to the dropping zone for her to proceed on the surface,' Buck explained.
He turned the timing switch two hours, and then wound out the charge, with Jack's assistance; again the action was stiff, much stiffer towards the end.
'Do you think she's gone, Jack?' asked Buck.
'Think she must have done.'
Buck took the craft under to see. The list to port had disappeared. Jack found a trim, and held the craft steady for a time.
'She feels strange,' he said finally. 'As if she was dragging something.'
We all looked aft at him, and then at each other. Was the charge still with us? Trailing on some wire that the boffins who made the charges hadn't told us about?
Buck had a try on the planes, but couldn't tell whether there was a dragging effect or not.

Taking a look

'Surface!' he ordered.
Once there, and swinging in the swell, he turned to me.
'How d'you feel now, Lefty?'
'Better than I did in the battery space,' I replied.
'Think you could go out, and have a look?’
'A look at what?'
'To see if there's any wire dragging from the port side.'
'I can't get under her, not without a lifeline to my suit...'
'I don't mean dive, not full diving rig. Just put on a rubber suit and take a look from the casing. The swell falling away should show most of the side.'
I thought this over, not convinced that I could give complete reassurance. But here at last was something I could do better than them, for I was used to clambering about on the casing, using my hands; I would have to cling on owing to the force of the swell.
'Right,' I agreed. In a few minutes I was inside a rubber suit sufficient to cover my body, all but my neck and head. I slipped into the wet and dry, and Buck clanged the hatch shut. I waited for the swell to pass over, and opened the upper lid. The fresh air whistled all about me as I raised my head, my trunk. Its invigoration gave me a surge of happiness, after the musty, clammy constriction of the interior of X8. In my exhilaration I jumped out and made straight for the periscope standard, to hold on to it before the next swell washed over the low casing. As I got there, I noticed the main periscope waggling at me, fast. I gave the thumbs up sign, assuming that Buck was asking if I was all right.

From within the hull I thought I heard a sound coming, but very faint. The swell washed over the craft, slightly submerging the casing. I was facing aft and working out how best to take a look when the second swell came over the craft.
Suddenly there was a furious yell from behind me. I turned. Buck was standing in the wet-and-dry, his trunk showing, rigid.
'You bloody fool! Why didn't you close the hatch!' Just then a third swell came, and caught Buck as he was shutting the lid. This time the craft went a lot lower, and I found my legs floating away from the casing as the wave passed over it. The X-craft had taken on water, and was sinking under the extra weight, under me; I had forgotten a basic rule; keep the hatch shut at all times when under way, except during entry and exit.
From the quivering transmitted to the periscope standard I could tell he had switched on the main motors, but the casing was already underwater, and sinking. I was being dragged through the water as I clung to the periscope standard, my head just breasting the troughs, and then dipping under it briefly as the swell washed over me. Two or three swells submerged me entirely. Then I sensed the craft was regaining buoyancy, and rising to break surface again. I held on with all my strength, till the casing re-appeared, and X8 was riding the surface again. Now I was able to take a look on both sides of the craft here was no sign of any wire trailing, on either side - as far down as I could see; what the situation was underneath the X-craft I had no real idea.

Almost reluctantly, I went back to the wet-and-dry, and got in between two waves. At the moment of closing the upper hatch, the opening to the control room was swung open and a dripping, angry face glared at me.
'Why didn't you close the hatch after you?' Buck expostulated. Furious looks came from the other two as well.
I mumbled something, knowing it was no excuse.
'I thought for a moment I’d lost you!' Buck added, his tone softening.
'What did you see, Lefty?' Jack asked.
'Both sides clean as a whistle,' I replied. 'As far as I could see.'
'How far was that?'
I tried to describe. But I could only see a little way past the bulge. The charges were gone, but whether the second was still trailing we didn't really know.

One and three quarter hours after winding out the second charge, there was a mighty explosion below and astern of us. We were lifted forwards in a surge of speed, lights went, and a leak started near the periscope; also somewhere in the engine room. The second charge had exploded, and with such force that even Seanymph sustained minor damage. The explosion should have been three and a half miles astern; it could not have been. Had we in fact been trailing a time-bomb all the way since then? Its power was impressive.

The last of X8

It was all over. The X-craft was even more seriously damaged than we at first had thought. Miraculously, the telephone still worked, and so Buck and Jack Oakley were able to assess the consequences. The decision was made to scuttle her, and to take us on board Seanymph again. It was daylight when this happened, but what time of day I no longer recall; indeed I don't think I really knew. We slipped the tow, and the big sub came round, and moved slowly alongside; the four of us jumped from X8 on to the saddle tanks, and were helped on to the casing by sailors standing by. I climbed up to the conning tower, and was told to go below at once. I remember seeing Buck standing at the salute as his command slid below the waves, the seacocks having been opened.

It was wonderful to get back into the warmth of the big submarine; circulation came back to long frozen limbs. We were welcomed inboard by Jack Smart and soon we were sitting down to a mug of hot tea and some real food to eat: I was famished, and happy to be alive. The contrast with my confused imaginings of death only twelve hours or so earlier was bewildering. Seanymph dived as Buck came in, thoughtful, sad to have seen X8 sink beneath the waves, and to find the whole operation so fruitless. But we were all tired, and an exception was made about the bunks rule: we all three turned in, and I remember sleeping very heavily for a long time, waking every now and then, only to drop off again for yet more sleep, warmly conscious of the comfort and safety and familiarity of the big sub once again around me.

Homecoming

It was well into October when we turned into the Firth of Clyde, late one night, in the rain. We drew up, shortly before midnight, offshore from Varbel in the Isle of Bute, the base from which the whole X-craft operation had been master-minded. The seven of us stepped out on the conning tower, climbed down to the casing, and into a waiting motor dinghy. We landed on a wooden jetty, and felt the strange sensation of terra firma underfoot again. We were hurried up to the main building of HMS Varbel, with some mysterious urgency. Then, as we entered, we found the wide hall full of people, cheering us, and smiling gladly to see us returned, showing their admiration at what they thought we had achieved.
I responded to the warmth of their greeting with an embarrassed smile, but Buck looked angry. 'What the hell are you cheering for?' he asked, amid the tumult. And then, as it died away: 'But we didn't do anything!'
The reply was a wave of good-natured disbelieving laughter, and more clapping and cheering. We were shown to our quarters, enormous rooms, with clean sheets, I went to sleep thinking of the inexpressible delight of a hot bath in the morning.

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