He hauled on the big lever at the rear, pulled it clear, and swung back the heavy circular door. He shone his kam up the gleaming inside length of the tube, then straightened. "Clean as a whistle and dry as a bone."

"That's not the way he was taught to report it," Hansen said sorrowfully. "I don't know what the young officers are cornmg to these days. Right, George, number 4."

Mills grinned, secured the rear door on number 3, and crossed to number 4. He lifted the test-cock handle and said, "Oh-oh."

"What is it?" Hansen asked.

"Water," Mills said tersely.

"Is there much? Let's see."

"Just a trickle."

"Is that bad?" I asked.

"It happens," Hansen said briefly. He joggled the handle up and down and another spoonful of water appeared. "You can get a slightly imperfect bow cap, and if you go deep enough to build up sufficient outside pressure you can get a trickle of water coming in. Probably what has happened in this case. If the bow cap was open, friend, at this depth the water would come out of that spout like a bullet. But no chances, no chances." He reached for the microphone again. "Number four bow cap still green? We have a little water here."

"Still green."

Hansen looked down at Mills. "How's it coming?"

"Not so much now."

"Control center," Hansen said into the microphone. 'Check the trim chit, just to make sure."

There was a pause, then the box crackled again.

"Captain speaking. All tubes showing 'empty.' Signed by Lieutenant Hansen and the foreman engineer."

"Thank you, sir." Hansen switched off and grinned. "Lieutenant Hansen's word is good enough for me any day. How's it now?"

"Stopped."

Mills tugged the heavy lever. It moved an inch or two, then struck. "Pretty stiff," he commented.

"You torpedomen never heard of anything called lubricating oil?" Hansen demanded. "Weight, George, weight."

Mills applied more weight. The lever moved another couple of inches. Mills scowled, shifted his feet to get maximum leverage, and heaved just as Hansen shouted, "No! Stop! For God's sake, stop!"

He was too late. He was a lifetime too late. The lever snapped clear, the heavy circular rear door smashed open as violently as if it had been struck by some gigantic battering ram, and a roaring torrent of water burst into the for'ard torpedo room. The sheer size, the enormous power and frightening speed of that almost horizontally traveling column of water was staggering. It was like a giant hose pipe, like one of the outlet pipes of the Boulder Dam. It caught up Lieutenant Mills, already badly injured by the flailing sweep of that heavy door, and swept him back across the torpedo room to smash heavily against the after bulkhead; for a moment he half stood there, pinned by the power of that huge jet, then slid down limply to the deck.

"Blow all main ballast!" Hansen shouted into the microphone. He was hanging on a rear-torpedo door to keep from being carried away, and, even above the thunderous roar of the waters, his voice carried clearly. "Emergency. Blow all main ballast. Number 4 tube open to the sea. Blow all main ballast!" He released his grip and staggered across the deck, trying to keep his balance in the madly swirling already footdeep water. "Get out of here, for God's sake."

He should have saved his energy and breath. I was already on my way out of there. I had Mills under the arms and was trying to drag him over the high sill of the for'ard collision bulkhead and I was making no headway at all. The proper trim of a submarine is a delicate thing at the best of times, and even after those few seconds, the nose of the «Dolphin», heavy with the tons of water that had already poured in, was beginning to cant sharply downward. Trying to drag Mills and at the same time keep my balance on that sloping deck with knee-high water boiling around me was more than I could do: but suddenly Hansen had Mills by the feet, and I stumbled off balance, tripped over the high sill, and fell backward into the confined space between the two collison bulkheads, dragging Mills after me.

Hansen was still on the other side of the bulkhead. I could hear him cursing steadily, monotonously, and as if he meant it as he struggled to unhook the heavy door from its standing catch. Because of the steep downward pitch of the Dolphin's deck, he had to lean all his weight against the massive steel door to free the catch, and with his insecure footing among the swirling waters on that sloping, slippery deck, he was obviously having the devil's own time trying to release it. I let Mills go, jumped over the sill, flung my shoulder against the door, and with the suddenly added pressure, the latch clicked free. The heavy door at once swung half shut, carrying us along with it and knocking us both off our feet into the battering-ram path of that torrent still gqshing from number 4 tube. Coughing and spluttering, we scrambled upright again, crossed the sill, and, hanging on to a latch handle apiece, tried to drag the door shut.

Twice we tried and twice we failed. The water boiled in through the tube, and its level was now almost Jipping the top of the sill. With every second that passed, the downward angle of the «Dolphin» increased, and with every extra degree of steepness the task of pulling that door uphill against the steadily increasing gravity became more and more difficult.

The water began to spill over the sill onto our feet.

Hansen grinned at me. At least I thought for a moment he was grinning, but the white teeth were clamped tightly together and there was no amusement at all in his eyes. He shouted above the roar of the water: "It's now or never."

A well-taken point. It was indeed now or never. At a signal from Hansen, we flung our combined weights on to those latch handles, each with one hand to a latch while the other braced against the bulkhead to give maximum leverage. We got the door to within four inches. It swung open. We tried again. Still four inches, and I knew that all our strength had gone into that one.

"Can you hold it for a moment?" I shouted.

He nodded. I shifted both hands to the lower corner latch, dropped to the deck, braced my feet against the sill, and straightened both legs in one convulsive jerk. The door crashed shut, Hansen jammed his latch home, I did the same with mine, and we were safe. For the moment we were safe.

I left Hansen to secure the remaining latches and started knocking those of the after collision-bulkhead door. I'd only got as far as the first one when the others started falling off by themselves. Petty officer Bowen and his men, on the other side of that door, needed no telling that we wanted out of there just as fast as possible. The door was pulled open and my eardrums popped with the abrupt fall in air pressure. I could hear the steady echoing roar of air blasting into the ballast tanks under high pressure. I hoisted Mills by the shoulders, strong, competent hands lifted him out and over the sill, and a couple of seconds later Hansen and I were beside him.

"In God's name!" Bowen said to Hansen. "What's gone wrong?"

"Number 4 tube open to the sea."

"Jesus!"

"Secure that door," Hansen ordered. "But good." He left at a dead run, clawing his way up the sharply sloping deck of the torpedo storage room. I took a look at Lieutenant Mills — one short look was all I needed — and followed after Hansen. Only I didn't run. Running wasn't going to help anybody now.

The roar of compressed air filled the ship, the ballast tanks were rapidly emptying, but still the «Dolphin» continued on its deadly dive, arrowing down for the dark depths of the Arctic. Not even the massive compressed-air banks of the submarine could hope to cope so soon with the effects of the scores of tons of sea water that had already flooded into the for'ard torpedo room: I wondered bleakly if they would ever be able to cope at all. As I walked along the wardroom passage, using the hand rail to haul myself up that crazily canted deck, I could feel the entire submarine shudder beneath my feet. No doubt about what that was: Swanson had the great turbines turning over at maximum revolutions, the big bronze propellers threshing madly in reverse, trying to bite deep into the water to slow up the diving submarine.