Read Online Dive in the Sun by Douglas Reeman - Free Book Online Page A

spun the spokes again, and craned forward over the compass. ‘She’s not answerin’, Steve!’
    Duncan waited a moment before replying. ‘Bring the cow round to due east again. Then ease ’er off to your course slowly. We’ve got to keep goin’ for a bit, just to put a few miles between us an’ the big bang.’
    The wheel creaked, and Curtis felt his heart beginning to thud painfully against his ribs. Duncan knows, he thought. He knows we’re going to ditch.
    ‘Course steady on oh-nine-oh.’ There was a pause. ‘Oh, sod it! She’s payin’ off again!’
    Curtis forced his eyes open and slowly eased his legs down to the deck.
    ‘Keep trying,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m going to set her down on the bottom shortly. But keep trying for a bit longer.’
    Duncan looked up, his eyes searching. ‘Feelin’ better, Ralph?’
    Curtis nodded vaguely.
    ‘Good. I reckon I was right about this bein’ a crook deal.’
    Curtis stiffened, but the other man shook his head briefly, a small smile breaking through his dirty, stubbled face.
    ‘
We
were all right, Ralph. It was the job which was stupid! I reckon you did real well to get us out like that, and on the surface, too!’ His grin broadened. ‘I thought we was all goin’ at each other’s throats for a bit, eh?’
    Curtis felt a tremor of emotion coursing behind his eyes, and he looked away.
    ‘Sorry about that, Steve. It’s all been playing on my mind a bit.’ He groped for the right words. ‘I’ve never forgotten how young Roberts died. It was my fault. I killed him as surely as if I’d shot him.’ He found that the relief of confiding in someone was almost more than his mind could stand, and he slumped heavily against the useless periscope. ‘And now all this happening.’ He waved one hand around the boat. ‘I don’t mind telling you, we’re in a jam.’
    ‘You mean we’re goin’ to let the old boat go, is that it?’ Duncan eyed him calmly. ‘Reckon it’s all we can do under the circs!’
    A great tidal wave of sound engulfed the hull, a sullen, angry roar, like the crumbling of a distant dam. Together they looked at the clock, while Jervis scrambled through the open door, his eyes wide and enquiring. It was two minutes past six.
    Silently Duncan reached across and gripped Curtis’s hand. ‘Well done, Skipper. You blew the bastard’s bottom off! You got us in, and you got us out!’
    They all shook hands, and Curtis wanted to cry out as each man looked him in the face and smiled. Jervis rubbed his hands across his pale face and looked from one to the other, as if amazed by the calmness of these experienced seamen, while Taylor turned back to the compass, a small secret smile of private satisfaction on his tight-lipped mouth.
    ‘Shall we be able to pick up the towing sub all right?’ Jervis seemed to suddenly come to life.
    Duncan shot a quick glance at Curtis and rubbed his chin slowly. ‘We’ll be makin’ the trip on foot, that is unless we can whip a boat off some damned Eye-tie!’
    Curtis hardly noticed the look of dismay on the boy’s face; he was already reaching for the chart. Of course, that was the answer. Steal a boat and move down the coast by night. They should be able to find some sort of hide-out during the daylight, and if the Allied invasion had got into full swing they ought to be able to contact their own people within a week, maybe less, if all went well. He ran his eyes across the chart, his mind picturing again that quiet fishing village he had seen through the periscope. His finger paused over the markings on the roughened chart. Was that only yesterday? He shook his head wonderingly.
    The towing submarine would wait at the appointed place, and then return to base. Signals would be made, and in due course the dreaded telegrams would be received in four homes. Four homes, separated not only by distance, but by completely different ways of life.
    A small moment of cruel pleasure flickered through his mind as he thought