The Good Shepherd

by C.S. Forester

The sudden alteration of bearing of the contact could mean nothing else than that the U-boat captain, finding himself headed off once more, finding the two vessels rushing together, had put his helm hard over again, turning straight for his antagonist, aiming to surprise him by passing on opposite courses and making the danger moment as brief as possible. That “Range close” meant three hundred yards or so—the smallest range at which sonar could function. The U-boat might at this very time be passing right under the destroyer, right under Krause’s very feet. The depth charges rumbling down off the racks, sinking ponderously through the opaque sea, might then be too late, would explode harmlessly astern of the U-boat. But the U-boat might still be just forward of Keeling, heading aft, and in that case the depth charges would burst all about her if the depth setting were anything like correct, and would smash her fragile hull. Yet she might not be passing directly below; she might be a hundred yards to port or to starboard. The double bark of the K guns at that moment told how further depth charges were being flung out on either side of the ship in anticipation of this possibility. They might catch her. One of the four depth charges dropped might burst close enough. It was like firing a sawed-off shot-gun into a pitch-dark room to try to hit a dodging man inside. It was as brutal.