Mike’s face grew serious.
“And when a submarine gets torpedoed, or depth charged, everybody dies, and yes, I’ve given this matter some thought. Remember—there’s a decent chance that we’re all wrong and that there is nothing there. Or there is something there but it has nothing to do with Coral Sea. It could still all be bullshit, and the Commodore is still checking out a couple of things. All we have to go on so far are disconnected hints, just a couple of sniffs that there’s something out there. On top of that, the top brass have dismissed the whole notion. That’s their prerogative, and they didn’t get to be top brass by being wrong all the time. They’ve applied their best professional judgement and decided that it just isn’t so.”
“Their best political judgement, you mean,” Diane said.
“Well, I don’t know that. At the Admiral’s age and station in life I’d guess his professional and political judgement are the same thing. Whatever, it’s their job to call it, and they’ve called it. Captain Aronson and I think differently. He’s willing to take the political risk, so I don’t think it’s unreasonable for Goldsborough and all of us sailors who’ve taken the King’s penny all these many years to go out and take the tactical risk. So we’re going to go out prepared to look, and if need be, fight this guy. If he exists. If, if, if … . It’s the best we can do, Diane.”
She moved over to be close to him, and he put an arm around her.
“Hey, I’m one of the good guys, remember? But promise me that the first hint you get that he’s really there, you’ll blow the whistle long and hard so that you get some help,” she whispered.
“Count on it, although I’m not convinced the higher ups would be predisposed to listen. But I think the Commodore will be sitting on one of his ships inport, and we’ll have a special circuit set up between us so that we can sound the alarm. The main problem is that it’s going to go pretty quick—the sub won’t show himself until the attack geometry is pretty mature, and then we’re all going to be very busy.”
Diane snuggled closer. She suddenly decided that she might not just sit back and wait for this little game to play itself out. But she would have to be very careful about how she approached the problem.
“When’s dinner ready?” she asked, with a smothered yawn.
“Excitement’s overwhelming you, isn’t it; lemme go check.”
twenty minutes later he brought back a tray of fresh shrimp baked in seasoned butter, hot French bread, and a spinach salad made with mandarin oranges and almonds. They ate hungrily, enjoying each other’s company, the submarine pushed back from their thoughts for the time being.
After dinner they cuddled on the couch for another hour, talking and being close. She talked some more about her years as a Navy wife. She admitted expecting a guilty conscience, but in fact she felt better, more complete than she had for years. Neither of them spoke about love, preferring to let it build without the help of words for a while. A final band of showers passed overhead, and they sat in silence with their thoughts as the rain drummed on the deck above. The submarine hovered at the perimeter of both their consciousnesses, like a faint but disturbing sound in a house late at night.
FIFTY-FOUR
USS Goldsborough, Mayport Naval Station, Monday, 5 May; 1530
“Attention on Deck,” said the Exec as Mike walked into the wardroom for the 1530 department head meeting.
“Sit down, gents, sit down,” said Mike. He fixed himself a cup of coffee and joined his officers at the table. It had been a long day. He looked down to the end of the table.
“OK, let’s start with the snipe: how goes it, Engineer?”
The Chief Engineer launched into a fifteen minute report on the status of the main plant repairs, which were actually going fairly well for a change. His men had worked over the weekend opening up the steam systems, and the parts for once had been ready when the actual repair work began.
“So what’s your ETR as of today, assuming no major hiccups?” asked Mike.
“We could have it buttoned back up by tomorrow night,” said the Engineer. “But then SIMA has to x-ray the level one welds, and we have to hydro. Thursday morning to be safe, Captain.”
Mike looked at the Exec before acknowledging this estimate. The Exec looked down at the table. The Department heads were still unaware of the Goldsborough’s secret time bind. Mike wanted to sail Thursday evening, to be out in the opareas and prowling the Coral Sea’s approach track late that night and all day Friday.
“OK, Engineer,” Mike said. “What I want to do is get underway Thursday evening if we can. That would give us Thursday night to warm up the plant and chase leaks, and then we can do a modified full power run for about an hour Friday, and come back in for the weekend, hopefully with these major steam leaks corrected once and for all. If we have to wait until Friday to go out, we may have to stay out until sometime Saturday, which, I think, everybody’d like to avoid.”
There was a chorus of agreement around the table.
“So what I need is steady effort—I want you to aim for Wednesday night to have the plant lined up and all the systems restored and everything ready for a light-off on Thursday morning. Give everyone a break, get a night’s sleep, and then we’ll do a light-off by the book with everyone fresh. That’ll give us all day to screw around with emergent problems, and still maybe make it underway by dark. Now, Weps, you got the word on this inspection rumor?”
“Yes, Sir. We’re going to do a general groom of all the records and admin this week.”
“Well,” said Mike, “what I really had in mind is a groom of all the actual weapons machinery: the torpedo tubes, flasks, control lines, the depth charges, the five-inch guns—”
“Yes, Sir,” interrupted the Weapons officer. “But these combat systems inspections are usually aimed almost exclusively at the admin.”
“I know, Weps, but the word I’m hearing is that the Commodore wants to change that. He’s going to hit the paperwork as usual, but then take a hard look at the actual gear. He’s making noises about perfect paper programs that mask equipment that’s not so perfect, see?”
The Weapons officer nodded. “OK, yes, Sir, that’s a little different. I’ll have to change my instructions to the Chiefs, then. Any idea of when this might hit?”
“No, although I had the impression that it would be this week. It’s supposed to be a surprise, so you may only have two days, especially if we’re trying to get out of port Thursday evening.”
“Wow. Sir, may I be excused? I have to catch the Chiefs before everybody bails out. It’s almost sixteen hundred.”
“Go to it, mate, although I assume,” Mike said dryly, “since it’s not sixteen-thirty that at least some of your department is still aboard …”
The Weapons officer colored a bit as he got up from the table.
“Yes, Sir, they are and they will be once I put this word out.”
He banged out the wardroom door in search of the Chief Petty officers for sonar, gunnery, fire control, and the underwater weapons battery.
“Wouldn’t want to interfere with the deck apes’ liberty,” muttered the Engineer, whose main hole snipes worked twelve hour days just to stay even, and who resented the fact that the above deck personnel were able to trudge happily over the brow at liberty call every afternoon. The Exec grinned.
“All right,” said Mike, glancing at his watch. They all knew his distaste for wardroom meetings. “Ops, you’re next.”
“Yes, Sir,” said the Operations officer. “If we’re serious about a Thursday night departure, we’ll have to get clearance from the squadron for an out of hours departure—that’s overtime for tugs and port services stuff.”
“I’ll take care of that,” interjected Mike quickly.
He did not want a request like that filtering through normal channels up to Group. He would call the Commodore directly and get permission for the out of hours departure. The operations officer raised his eyebrows, but then continued.
�
�And I’ll need to do a notional movement report, Sir, probably just a modloc fifty miles out for engineering trials.”
“Make it a hundred miles,” said Mike. “If we go full power we’ll run out of a modloc of only fifty miles.”
“Right, Sir, will do. You really think we’ll do full power?”
He glanced sideways at the Engineer with a sincere expression on his face. The Engineer, who was used to this kind of abuse, shook his head.
“Cut off his hot water, Snipe,” offered the Exec.
“One might not be able to tell,” sniffed the operations officer.
Theirs was an entirely friendly feud, except when the engineers dropped the electrical load and zapped some of the operations department’s equipments.
“OK, guys,” said Mike. “The XO’s got a load of paperwork in my in-basket, so if there’s nothing else, let’s get back to it. XO, I need to see you in my cabin.”
Mike got up, as did everyone else. The Exec accompanied him to his cabin. One of the Division officers was waiting for the Captain, with one of his junior enlisted in tow. The man had a personal problem and wanted to see the Captain. Mike took care of this problem while the Exec and the Division officer waited outside his door. Anybody in the ship could make an appointment with the Captain by putting in a chit that went up through the chain of command, from Chief, Division Officer, Department Head, the Exec, and finally to the Captain. By the rules, the chit had to make it to the Captain the same day it was put in. Sometimes the intervening levels of the command could fix the problem, but sometimes the men really wanted to talk to the Captain, and Mike made sure they had their opportunity to do so. The Exec came. back in and closed the door after the man had left.
“He wouldn’t say what he needed to talk about, Captain, other than it was a personal problem,” began the Exec.
“Yeah, no biggee,” said Mike. “He wanted to work out some advance leave—he and his wife are having problems, and he doesn’t have any leave on the books.”
“That he could have simply asked for,” said the Exec.
“Yeah, but this way he’s got a lot better chance of getting it. He doesn’t want the whole crew to know about his problem, especially since he thinks she’s maybe seeing another guy in the crew.”
“Oh,” said the Exec, suddenly at a loss for words.
“Yeah, well that’s kinda delicate,” said Mike. He failed to notice the strange expression on the Exec’s face.
“Anyway, I haven’t heard from the Commodore as to what the intelligence guys found out. Now: I want to make sure you ride herd on the engineers—I don’t want a panic push, but I need that plant back together for a Thursday morning light-off. Sure as hell, we’ll have some emergent problems, and we’ll need all day to chase them down so we can get underway. Also, you better keep an eye on Weps and make sure they do both sides of that system grooming —any hints of problems, let me know. The Commodore can get us parts, even if he has to cannibalize somebody.”
The Exec was writing furiously.
“Yes, Sir,” he said, without looking up. Mike’s outside phone line rang, and he picked it up.
“Captain,” he said.
“I’ve got another piece of ambiguous news,” the Commodore’s voice began.
“Yes, Sir?” said Mike. The Exec stopped writing in his notebook.
“It seems that my intel guy talked to another guy, who talked to yet another guy who was able to get through to the appropriate office in Washington. The first time, he asked if all the Green Hornet’s pigboats were accounted for. Guy told him wait, put him on hold for five minutes, and then came back with an affirmative. Said he had had to check with the analyst that works Africa, and that the analyst was a pain in the ass, sorry for the delay. But, yes, everybody present and accounted for. Except our guy hears a woman in the background making bullshit noises. So he, being a clever intel weenie, asked by the way who was the girl giving this guy such a hard time. Guy said it was Maryann something or other. So our guy offers him some sympathy, hangs up, waits a little while, and calls back and asks for Maryann. She’s gone to lunch. So he tries again later, this time, he gets a hit. Asks her about the subs. She says, funny, second time today somebody’s asking about these subs. Confirms they’re all accounted for. Our guy asks if there’s anything else. Any additional information. She says no, except that one of them is a different color from all the rest. Says her boss, that’s one Harry Somebody, apparently, said the color is not relevant to their reporting, just whether or not all the worms are in the sandbox.”
“Yes, Sir. And—?”
“Well, our guy is persistent, so he asks her why she cares about the color. And she says she doesn’t except she’s been instructed to report changes. The color is a change. And then the kicker: our guy asks what color is it. She says, well, it’s not a color really, it’s an infrared photo, which really means black and white, with white representing hot and black cold. What’s different, she says, is that one of the subs is showing no heat patterns, while all the others do. And, they weren’t that way on the last set of pictures.”
“Did she offer any explanation?”
“Nope; all she does is note changes, and if her boss doesn’t give a shit—her words—then she’s done her job. But: the guy at Fleet headquarters tells the SurfLant guy who tells my guy that what it means is one of their subs has probably been inactivated, there’s no cooling systems operating or anything going on in the boat, so it shows up on the take as a homogeneous temperature. Of course, he wants to know why the question, but my guy has a little fable prepared and puts him off.”
“Yes, Sir. I guess that’s not much help, then,” said Mike.
The Commodore grunted in exasperation.
“Then again,” he said, “it just might be. Those guys know we have satellites; their Russian ‘advisors’ probably even have the surveillance time-on-top for them. Now suppose you wanted to sail a sub, but didn’t want the satellites to know—what would you do?”
Mike thought for a moment, and then it hit him. “Build a decoy.”
“Right on, Michael. Make it out of wood and sheets of aluminum, get the topside shape right, put it on a long raft or a barge, paint it, float it out to the pier, and park it. Satellite comes over, counts six Foxtrots in the nest, everything’s OK.”
“Except because it’s a fake, the whole thing heats up in the desert sun evenly, so it displays no coloration patterns in the infrared spectrum,” Mike said.
The Exec was sitting forward on the bunk bed, obviously dying to know what was going on.
“Right again,” said the Commodore, softly. “I think one of their sewerpipes is AWOL.”
“Jesus, Commodore,” said Mike. “Shouldn’t we maybe tell somebody now? I mean this is another indicator that we might be right.”
The Commodore was silent for a long moment.
“No, I don’t think so, Mike. Not yet. I mean, think about it: officially, the Navy intelligence world has spoken—all the subs are there. If we asked a question like that, we’re effectively calling them on their position, and we’d have the entire intel world snapping their bras at us. Like every other aspect of this drill, we’re speculating. An impartial observer could even say that we’re vigorously making every data point fit the curve. The other intel guy could be right —a sub that’s been inactivated, and maybe even sealed up, would also look like that. Like I said, it remains ambiguous. You and I might be convinced, but you didn’t hear all of what the Admiral had to say after our little meeting the other night. He was, to say the least, vehemently opposed to going any further with this. He questioned your judgement in general once we laid out the idea of who this might be, and my judgement for entertaining the notion. Well, now it’s my judgement that we can’t broach it again until we have at least one oil soaked, squirming Libyan on deck, and even then, they’re not going to want to hear it.”
It was Mike’s turn to be silent. The Commodore filled in the silence.
“We have
to keep the objective in sight, Mike, and that’s to disrupt what you and I think is a possible terrorist attack on the Coral Sea. Given the rest of the Navy’s not unreasonable verdict on the subject, our only chance, if there is a real threat out there, is to get Goldy to sea so that she can be in the right place at the right time. If we’re all wet, we get a sea trial out of it and nobody’s embarrassed. If we’re right, well, we’ll have to play that eventuality as it comes. Or you will, to be more precise about it. I may be wrong, but I think this is still the best way to go. I’ll make sure there’s no follow-up questions about our little probe. I think the intelligence bureaucracy is so big and so convoluted that nobody will notice, but we took a chance with that question. You guys going to be ready?”
Mike gave him a debrief of the engineering status, and also asked him to clear an out of hours departure on Thursday. He told him about their efforts to groom all the weapons systems without alerting the crew, and about the fictitious inspection.
“I can throw a little gas on that fire, if you want,” said the Commodore. “I can also get you parts if something comes up broke.”
“Yes, Sir, I think both efforts are in order. Maybe through the Chiefs circuit.”
“Yeah, I’ll turn on a couple of my guys to drop a hint at the Chiefs’ Club. It’ll get back to your guys. And my material chief will be primed to get you parts if they’re a problem.”
“Thanks, Commodore.”
The Commodore hung up, and Mike debriefed the Exec.
“Wow,” said the Exec. “I gotta tell you, Captain, I’m beginning to think we may be getting in over our heads.”
Mike was reminded of Diane’s words Saturday night.
“Well, XO, we said we were bored with Mayport routine. Here comes a chance, maybe, to go out and take somebody on. We’re supposed to be able to do that, you know.”
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