The sinking of Kong Gustav and the crippling of Viktor turn a distant warning into an immediate test of George Krause’s command: whether to leave the convoy’s protective position and go back to ships already under attack. The loss cannot be undone, and the rescue is already under way, but Krause turns back when he learns Viktor has been hit. The episode ends with Kong Gustav gone, Viktor powerless and under tow, and Keeling circling the damaged ships against the possibility of another attack.

Warning and the decision to return

The alarm begins with two white rockets astern of the convoy. Krause understands them as a likely sign of a torpedoing, though he briefly allows for the possibility of a false alarm. Viktor is somewhere near the trouble. With the corvettes’ fuel limited, he cannot send either of them back in Keeling’s place, and must decide whether to turn around himself.

The practical case for continuing forward is substantial. By the time Keeling could return, night would be falling, and the ship would have to make up the distance to the convoy again. A U-boat may already have done its damage; Krause has little depth-charge ammunition left with which to avenge the attack. Cadena and Viktor are at the scene and could pick up survivors before Keeling arrived. Yet steaming on ahead while the convoy’s crews faced danger astern would carry its own cost. Krause cannot contact Viktor over the telephone circuit, and the silence leaves him without a direct account of what is happening.

The Commodore’s signal resolves the choice: Cadena reports that Viktor has been hit. Krause orders a turn back, directs Keeling onto the reciprocal course, and puts all engines to flank speed. His decision does not promise that he can save the damaged ship or reach the attack in time to prevent further loss. It commits Keeling to go where the immediate danger and the need for support now are.

The scene astern

As Keeling approaches, a look-out reports a close object off the starboard bow. It is not a periscope but a fragment of a ship’s lifeboat, only three or four feet of shattered bow almost awash. A man lies face-up on it, arms spread, alive and trying to raise his head. Keeling’s bow wave washes over his face; then the fragment passes down the ship’s side. The glimpse makes the consequences of the attack physical and immediate, but the available account does not identify the man or establish which ship he came from.

A report from Viktor then reaches Krause over the T.B.S. Cadena is alongside and taking Viktor in tow. The damage is severe: the engine room is flooded, all power is lost, and the crew has improvised a jury-battery circuit to restore the radio telephone. Krause sees Cadena and orders Keeling to circle the pair at half a mile, rather than simply pass them. The turn makes Keeling a moving guard around the rescue and the crippled ship.

Viktor’s damage and Kong Gustav’s loss

Viktor’s crew is fighting flooding beyond the engine room as well. Its bulkheads are holding reasonably well and being shored up, but other compartments have leaks that the crew is also trying to contain. The ship has a five-degree list to starboard and is down by the stern. Although hand steering will allow some control, its engines cannot move it under its own power; the tow is therefore essential to bringing it away from the scene.

The human losses are already considerable. Cadena has taken a hundred of Viktor’s surplus men aboard, while thirty men were lost in the engine room. These details distinguish the ship’s continued survival from an undamaged escape: Viktor remains afloat and sufficiently controllable to be towed, but only after catastrophic flooding and deaths among its crew.

The account of Kong Gustav comes from Viktor’s captain, relayed to Krause. Kong Gustav was hit just before Viktor, probably by three torpedoes fired in a close-range spread. She sank in less than five minutes. Cadena rescued Kong Gustav’s captain and some of her crew; Viktor’s men, in turn, were taken off their own ship as it sank into its damaged condition. The sequence places the two ships’ fates close together while keeping the evidence distinct: the three torpedoes are the captain’s assessment, whereas the rapid sinking and Cadena’s rescue are reported outcomes.

Escort, rescue, and continuing danger

Viktor’s captain sends word of a farewell in case he does not see Krause again. Krause answers that he expects to see him in Londonderry, a statement of confidence made against a very real possibility that the tow or the damage may not hold. The towing hawser is then paid out and is about to take the strain. The exchange gives the rescue a human edge without resolving its outcome: Viktor has not yet reached safety, and its crew has reason to doubt that it will.

Keeling continues to circle Cadena and Viktor as darkness settles, with sonar searching underwater and radar scanning the surface. Krause calculates the danger in the geometry of the patrol: a circle one mile across is more than three miles around, taking Keeling twenty minutes to complete. A U-boat two miles away could cover that distance in twenty minutes at six knots, come within half a mile, and fire before Keeling returned to the same point. Circling cannot guarantee protection, but it is the best available cover for the two ships while Cadena takes Viktor in tow.

The episode’s violence is sharpened by the limits of detection and response. Viktor reports that ASDIC did not hear the torpedo shots because there was substantial interference. Keeling’s search after the attack is active, but it cannot recover the warning that was missed or reverse Kong Gustav’s sinking. Nor can Krause spare the damaged ships the protection of a full reserve of escorts: destroyers are precious, and the convoy still needs guarding. The return is therefore both an act of aid and a tactical compromise, with Keeling trying to cover the rescue while remaining alert to the submarine that may still be nearby.