I surfaced after a good look round through the right periscope, which,
as usual, revealed nothing. I had hardly got on the bridge, when a
flash of flame stabbed the night on the starboard beam and a shell
moaned just overhead.
I crash-dived at once, but could not get under before the enemy fired a
second shot at us, which fortunately missed us. As we dived I ordered
the helm hard a starboard, to counteract the expected depth-charge
attack. We must have been a hundred and fifty metres from the first
charge and a little below it, five others followed in rapid succession,
but were further away, and we suffered no damage beyond a couple of
broken lights. The situation was now extremely unpleasant. I did not
dare venture to the surface, and thus missed my 1 a.m. signal from
Headquarters. I wanted a charge badly, and so proceeded at the lowest
possible speed. At regular intervals our enemy dropped one depth-charge
somewhere astern of us, but these reports always seemed the same
distance away.
At dawn I very cautiously came up to periscope depth, and had a look.
To my consternation I discovered our relentless pursuer about 1,500
metres away on the port quarter. In some extraordinary manner he had
tracked us during the night.
I dived and altered course through ninety degrees to south.
At 9 a.m. a tremendous explosion shook the boat from stem to stern,
smashing several lights, and giving her a big inclination up by the
bow.
As I was only at twenty metres I feared the boat would break surface,
and our enemy was evidently very nearly right over us.
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