The Pillars of Hercules (Timeline 10/27/62 Book 3)

by James Philip

  ‘Administration members don’t as a rule care to have their every word overheard,’ the spymaster had observed.

  Edward Heath didn’t care if the Americans were spying on the delegation. The last two great military powers on the planet were on the verge of a war that would inevitably, sooner or later, go nuclear. One more mistake, a single stupid misunderstanding or miscalculation might set the World set ablaze again.

  “Tell our hosts that their agenda is acceptable to us in every respect, Tom.”

  The Foreign Secretary frowned. “Prime Minister, I...”

  Edward Heath’s face was dark and his eyes hard with impatience.

  Chapter 34

  Tuesday 10th December 1963

  Lisbon Portela Airport

  Lieutenant-Commander Peter Christopher stepped off the bus onto the tarmac and gazed across the rainy, windswept aerodrome. He might have been standing on the apron of Brize Norton; there were so many Royal Air Force and Fleet Air Arm aircraft and helicopters dispersed around the airfield. Even as he watched there was a whining roar of engines and a Comet 4 slapped down on the runway a quarter of a mile away.

  “This way! This way!” Sir Richard Templar, the British Ambassador, fussed with growing urgency as he tried to marshal the newcomers into a reception line. In despair he looked to the tall young naval officer who was, unnervingly, the absolute spitting image of his father at his age.

  Peter Christopher turned to his bearded companion, a stocky hard-faced leading rate with mischievous eyes and arms like chords of teak.

  “Sort out these fellows,” he grunted, forcing a smile for the sake of the harassed diplomat.

  Leading Electrical Artificer Jack Griffin folded his arms and glared at the other men spilling from the ancient bus.

  “You heard what the officer said!” He bellowed menacingly. “Form up in a line! Mind your spacing! And shut your traps until the dignitary has got back into his car! Any questions?”

  Nobody had any questions.

  Only five of the twenty men on the ‘airport detail’ were survivors from HMS Talavera, the rest were new recruits who’d got off a plane from England the previous day. The new recruits were the ones in the brand new uniforms. Talavera’s survivors, Peter Christopher included, were decked out in borrowed, ill-fitting rigs and all of them still showed the bumps, bruises and bandages of the desperate battle to save their ship.

  “Who the Devil is this in aid of, Sir Richard?” HMS Talavera’s former Electronic Warfare Officer asked wearily. He’d had two nights nightmare-ridden sleep since he’d been sent ashore in Oporto. Nobody would tell him what the Navy planned to do with him; trying to get information about Talavera and the disposition of the surviving members of his Division was a waste of time, and he resented kicking his heels on a wet aerodrome when all he really wanted to do was to get back to sea. He’d overheard loose talk about the Hermes Battle Group and the RAF giving ‘Franco’s boys what for’ but otherwise he hadn’t a clue what else was going on in the World.

  “The Prime Minister of Portugal wishes to meet with and shake the hands of several of the heroes of the Battle of Cape Finisterre,” the older man replied with a forced calm. “What he particularly wants, I suspect, is to have his picture taken shaking the hand of the son of the man who has recently been made Supreme Commander of British Forces in the Mediterranean. Had Prime Minister Salazar declined to assist HMS Talavera and HMS Devonshire by opening Portuguese waters to the Royal Navy,” he hesitated, throwing a look over his shoulder at the transports, bombers, jet fighters and helicopters parked and moving around the airfield, “and assisted in your rescue to the absolute limit of his available resources, you wouldn’t be standing here now. HMG requires you to comport yourself in the best traditions of the Service.”

  Peter’s expression became one of bemusement.

  What was the Ambassador talking about?

  “My father is no longer C-in-C Pacific Fleet, sir?”

  “Goodness, you really have been all at sea!”

  The younger man didn’t think this was a particularly sympathetic or helpful comment and his irritation was barely contained when he spoke.

  “Yes, sir. I have been ‘all at sea’ lately.”

  “Forgive me,” Sir Richard Templar apologised, instantly realising that in his anxiety he’d been unforgivably crass. “Your esteemed father, Sir Julian, has been appointed the new Commander-in-Chief of all British and Commonwealth Forces in the Mediterranean Theatre of Operations. His command includes everything from the Atlantic approaches to the Straits of Gibraltar to Cyprus and the miscellaneous enclaves we still hold in the Middle East.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know. You said ‘Sir’ Julian?”

  “He was knighted for his role in Operation Manna by Her Majesty shortly before he departed to take up his new command at Malta.”

  “Oh, I see.”

  “According to the telegram I got from the Foreign Office,” Sir Richard continued, “Her Majesty was pleased to make Sir Julian a baronet, the first such since the October War. There was some confusion in Cheltenham initially, I gather, because Her Majesty also administered an accolade...”

  Peter Christopher was staring at the older man now.

  “Her Majesty dubbed Sir Julian’s shoulders with the flat of a sword,” the older man explained, exasperated at the ignorance of the younger generation. “That’s a knightly thing. A baronetcy is the only hereditary honour in Her Majesty’s gift which is not a peerage. It is superior to any knighthood except that of membership of the Order of the Garter.”

  “So my father has been knighted,” Peter Christopher checked, quizzically, “but even though he’s now ‘Sir Julian’, he’s not really a knight?”

  “He’s perfectly entitled to the appellation ‘Sir’!” Exclaimed the British Ambassador in exasperation. “As will you be if you survive your father!”

  “Oh, I see.”

  Sir Richard Templar shut his eyes for a moment.

  “Good, I’m glad we sorted that out,” he groaned.

  Two big black – rather elderly – cars were approaching.

  Peter Christopher had decided the greying, stooped Ambassador was giving him a very odd look.

  “What is it, sir?”

  “Nothing. Nothing. I knew your father when he was your age. It is uncanny, the family resemblance, I mean. Uncanny...” Sir Richard stumbled away to greet António de Oliveira Salazar, the Dictator of Portugal.

  Salazar impressed Peter Christopher as a mild-mannered, softly spoken man with a somewhat reluctant smile. He seemed far too harmless to be one of the two surviving pre-World War II dictators. He looked a little younger than his seventy-four years, but still somewhat tired and grey.

  “I trust you are recovered from your injuries, Commander Christopher?” The old man asked solicitously, in lightly accented English.

  “Very nearly, sir. The Royal Navy will be eternally in your country’s debt for everything that you’ve done for us in the last few days, sir.” Peter Christopher could imagine Sir Richard Templar almost swooning with relief. Just because he was one of the new ‘technical’ officers in the Navy it didn’t mean he didn’t know how to comport himself in public. For all that he’d joined the Navy to play with its ludicrously expensive ‘toys’ it didn’t mean he wasn’t aware of, and enthralled by the traditions of the Senior Service. He belonged to a band of brother that traced its spiritual lineage back to the coterie of captains who’d gathered around Admiral Lord Nelson’s table before the Battle of Trafalgar. To Peter Christopher the Royal Navy was the living embodiment of everything that was best in his nation; and he was fiercely, indefatigably proud of it. He knew what was expected of him and he played his part in the morning’s small drama as if to the manner born. “My men,” a flick of the eyes momentarily to his left where the parade line stood, “the Royal Navy and my country are in the debt of the Portuguese people, sir.” A respectful nod. “And to you, sir!”

  “In these times it is importa
nt for nations to know who they may call their friends,” António de Oliveira Salazar declared, evidently more than satisfied with what he’d just heard.

  Two flash bulbs exploded and Peter politely, respectfully without being overly deferential, invited the old man to review ‘your honour guard, sir.’

  Ten minutes later he gave the order for the honour guard to stand easy as he watched the dignitaries drive off into the mist.

  “The bus will take your men back to the Consul’s office down on the waterfront,” Sir Richard Templar explained, mopping his brow with a white handkerchief. “The Naval Attaché has set up shop down there. If you’re lucky he should have your orders by now.”

  The younger man didn’t ask what those orders might be. He half-expected to be put on a flight back to England in the next day or so and if that was to be his fate he wasn’t in a hurry to embrace it.

  “You’re all off to the Hermes,” he was told by a middle-aged, sallow-faced Commander. “Weather and the Spanish Air Force permitting, I’ve got you pencilled in for the first Wessex shuttle tomorrow morning. Make sure you and,” he paused to consult a checklist, “LEA Griffin are at the airport at eight tomorrow morning. Don’t be late.”

  “The Happy ‘H’?” Jack Griffin chuckled when he learned his fate.

  “Out of the frying pan in to the fire,” Peter remarked. “They’ve got you down as an ‘Officer’s Steward’ on your papers.”

  Both men laughed.

  The Naval Attaché was handing out new accommodation chits.

  “Hotel Armada de Tagus,” Peter Christopher’s ‘Steward’ muttered, reading his chit. “Sounds like a dive?”

  Peter Christopher didn’t care.

  There were only two things on his personal agenda between now and tomorrow morning: writing a letter to Marija, and catching up on his sleep.

  Much to Jack Griffin’s disappointment the Armada de Tagus was a genteel, old-world sort of rest house that usually catered for retired civil servants and naval officers. It had about it the faded glory of the days when Portugal had been in the first rank of European superpowers. Like Portugal itself, the hotel had seen better times and was quietly falling down, its walls cracked and its paint flaking.

  There were no English language newspapers in the lobby or the lounge so the headlines on the local papers meant nothing to either of the Navy men. Thus, for a little longer they remained blissfully unaware of the Portuguese nation’s horror at the unprovoked ‘carpet bombing of Malta’ by ‘American terror-flyers’.

  In his shabby first floor room Peter flattened the creased portrait of Marija Calleja on the rickety table beneath the grubby window. He stared at the photograph for a long time; his troubles slowly dissipating into the humid atmosphere of the old port city.

  Dear Marija,

  I feel like I have been out of things for an age, although in truth I have only been out of touch for a week or so. I hope that this letter will reach you before you hear what befell the Talavera in the Atlantic last week.

  Suffice to say that although a lot of good men were lost we eventually made it to Oporto. I was knocked about a little but not so badly that the damage isn’t already mending. The ship didn’t get off so lightly and she’s out of commission for a while, so I am to be posted to HMS Hermes. What use a destroyer EWO will be on a twenty-five thousand ton aircraft carrier I have no idea! Never mind, I’d got myself in a fine old lather worrying about being sent back home again and at least that isn’t going to happen quite yet.

  Maybe one fine day the Hermes will sail into the Grand Harbour and we shall finally meet face to face.

  Goodness that will be a thing!

  Suddenly all he wanted to do was sleep.

  I am falling asleep as I write this so I’ll put down my pen for the moment and pick it up again before I go to the airfield tomorrow morning. All being well this letter will get into a diplomatic pouch and reach you without the normal delays.

  Although he put down his pen as he’d said he would; he found himself getting his second wind, and picked it up again before he lost his train of thought.

  Between you and me things were a bit sticky at times in the last week. I didn’t think we’d make it. The ship was so badly knocked about and the seas were so big I thought we were done for. I took to carrying your picture as close to my heart as the inside pockets of my jacket allowed. As you know I’m not one of these fellows who turns metaphysical at the first sign of trouble. My life didn’t keep flashing before my eyes, or any of that nonsense, but thinking of you and feeling that a part of ‘you’ was with me, well, that helped a lot.

  That sounds so lame, he chided himself. Completely unromantic, too. But am I trying to be romantic? Yes, I have all sorts of ‘romantic’ thoughts about Marija; and yet, Marija is more than that to me. So much more. She symbolises the possibility of a future with...hope. I am not courting Marija Elizabeth Calleja. One day perhaps I will, properly; but that is not what I am doing today. Today I am talking to the one person in the World I trust with all my secrets, and with all my fears.

  I can’t help thinking that what happened to Talavera and the Devonshire was my fault and every time I close my eyes to try to sleep I find myself replaying the seconds before the attacks, asking myself what I did wrong? What else could I have done? Nobody’s said anything. Nobody’s mentioned a Board of Inquiry. But I still feel responsible.

  Earlier today I shook the hand of the Prime Minister of Portugal – a mild-mannered old fellow, not at all what you’d expect of one of Europe’s last surviving pre-war dictators – and pictures were taken for the papers as if I was some kind of hero. Afterwards, I could hardly look anybody in the eye. I’m an electronics enthusiast who joined the Navy to play with the expensive toys on the big ships. There were so many new gadgets and gizmos on HMS Talavera that I thought all my Christmases had come at once! I never expected there to be another war; I honestly never expected to hear or see a gun or a missile fired in anger. No, I imagined I’d get to play with my marvellous toys and occasionally stand a bridge watch or two in heavy weather just so I wouldn’t be a complete disgrace to the family’s seafaring escutcheon. So much for all my plans! I am a fraud. A complete fraud.

  It was so good to have confessed it. If he wasn’t the ‘Fighting Admiral’s’ son they’d have put him on the beach by now. Because of him scores of good men had been killed; because of him the Skyhawks had surprised the two destroyers off Finisterre...

  There was a knock at the door.

  Peter turned over the sheet he was writing.

  It was Jack Griffin.

  “There’s a bloke downstairs who says he from the London Times and the First Sea Lord has given him permission to ‘interview you’, sir.” When Peter Christopher stared at him like a rabbit in the headlights of a speeding lorry, the other man added: “he says you can read the First Sea Lord’s letter if you want...”

  Chapter 35

  Tuesday 10th December 1963

  Flight Briefing Room, Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland

  Edward Heath hadn’t been ready for the ‘shock of the modern’ that awaited the delegation from the United Kingdom Interim Emergency Administration in the ‘summit room’. The hall was some kind of hastily reconfigured briefing facility in which comfortable hard-backed chairs were arranged down each side of a sturdy oak table. At the head of the table was a large television and behind it a camera of the type the Prime Minister had only ever previously seen in a BBC television studio or at the outside broadcast of a major sporting event. One end of the room was a tangle of power cables and the big, multi-lens camera bearing the logo of ‘NBC News’ was attended by a team of three civilians in shirtsleeves.

  “All this technology should make it possible for you to see the President as he speaks,” Lyndon Baines Johnson, the Vice-President of the United States of America explained, evidently very proud of this unambiguous statement of American technological mastery.

  The other members of the UKIEA delegation –
Tom Harding-Grayson, Iain Macleod and Dick White - eyed the ‘technology’ with mistrust and looked to Edward Heath for a lead as to how to react.

  “Most impressive,” Edward Heath decided. “Presumably, this equipment will also record our deliberations?”

  The Vice-President didn’t know the answer to this question so he turned to his staffers.

  “Yes,” he confirmed after a short delay. “Is that a problem, Prime Minister?”

  Edward Heath shook his head.

  The United States Air Force had treated its guests from England with immense solicitude as if the battle for Washington was happening on another continent rather than less than twenty miles away. A light luncheon had been served, stewards had come and gone bearing tea, coffee and biscuits while the delegation waited for the final technical arrangements to be complete.

  “First, I apologise for not being able to greet you at Andrews Field in person, Premier Heath,” Jack Kennedy drawled. The black and while image of the President sitting at a desk in front of a huge flag of the United States of America flickered and juddered briefly before steadying.

  Moments earlier the President’s brother had burst into the room and introductions had only just been concluded before the link to the White House Situation Room was declared ‘live’. The Attorney General was dishevelled and badly shaken after his traumatic journey across the embattled city in a Marine Corps armoured personnel carrier. His convoy had come under heavy fire twice before it escaped downtown Washington.