Nimitz Class (1997)

by Patrick Robinson

  He showed Bill the narrow dredged channel which curved out of the inner basin and then swung right through the otherwise shallow waters of the bay past the twin headlands of Roa and Foulney islands and out into the buffeting chop of the Irish Sea, beyond Hilpsford Point. “Literally hundreds of new submarines have followed that route out to the Atlantic,” he said. “And in World War II, a hell of a lot of them never came back. This shipyard, and the men who work in it, represent the soul of the Royal Navy’s submarine service. Generations of skills, often taken too much for granted by various British governments.”

  “I sure liked Unseen,” said Bill. “She had a great feel to her, sleek, quiet, and solid. I’m really looking forward to this.”

  “So’m I,” replied the admiral. “She’s as quiet as any boat in the world, and she handles extremely well. We’ll be all right.”

  At 1600 hours sharp they took off for Inveraray, clattering over the gray, melancholy streets of Barrow, where life for the engineers and ship wrights was so uncertain in these days of canceled orders and abandoned Navy building programs.

  Down below, out of the starboard window, Bill Baldridge could see the docks, and he craned to see the submarine that would take him through the Bosporus. But the cloud cover was too low.

  On the flight back, the dreary landscape soon slipped away behind them, but there remained a feeling of despondency between the two men as they reflected on the hard lives of people in a shipbuilding town like Barrow. Only the welcoming sight of the former Miss Laura MacLean waving from the lawn as they flew up the loch and turned in to land cast a near-depression from Bill’s shoulders.

  “You been waiting long out there?” he asked her.

  “No. Just a few minutes. That helicopter always leaves Barrow at four o’clock when Dad’s on board. That means you’ll be home just after five, and that’s what it is. Did you have a good day?”

  “We had a great day, and the admiral’s home for tea. Can’t beat that.”

  Laura gazed at Bill. She had never seen him in uniform, and he did, she thought, cut a commanding figure. So why had no one landed him?

  “Laura?” he asked, “why are you staring like that?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. I’ve never seen you in uniform before. I was just getting used to how official you look.”

  “Oh, I’m official all right,” he chuckled. “Right here on the business of the U.S. Government. And dressed for the part—stiff collar and battle honors.”

  “You have those, too?”

  “Nothing won in the field of conflict,” he said. “But I’ve had a few private moments.”

  “He’s a rascal,” thought Laura, “but he’s nice.”

  They watched the chopper climb away over the loch for its short journey back to Faslane. Lady MacLean called out from the doorway that tea was ready in the drawing room, so would everyone come in. “And Iain…keep those bloody dogs outside, will you?”

  The evening, it emerged, was already planned. They were going up to the village pub, the George, in Inveraray for supper. “Sweaters and no ties,” said Lady MacLean. “They’ll give you a good Aberdeen steak, Bill…good even by the standards of an American rancher.”

  “But you don’t know what his standards are, Mum,” said Laura.

  “Neither,” said Mum, “do you.”

  There was something knowing in that remark. Bill picked it up, and so did Laura. They did not look at each other. But their thoughts were intertwined. And they both knew that, too, without looking anywhere.

  The admiral sipped his tea, read his paper, grunted but once. “Damn U.S. stock market. Goes up fifty or sixty points one day, then falls back fifty or sixty points the next. Been doing it for two weeks. Needn’t have opened at all. Save everyone a lot of trouble.”

  They left for the George at seven o’clock, Laura driving the Range Rover up to the village and past the church. Admiral MacLean ordered a minor detour, and pointed out the town jetty, showing Bill where his old submarine mooring had been. “We used to stop out there overnight, and then come into the pub for a few drinks when we were exercising in the loch,” he said. “This is a very strange little village for a submariner, because the first thing you see is a rowing boat containing His Grace the Duke of Argyll and his ghillie. He calls on visiting submarines in his capacity as Admiral of the Western Isles.

  “It used to be quite a ceremony. We’d pipe the duke aboard and give him a dram of whisky, and he’d tell us what was happening locally. He once told me his wife was the constable of Scotland. I suppose that might apply to any wife of any duke of Argyll. It’d be rather amusing if one of ’em married a chorus girl, don’t you think?”

  The George itself had a beamed low ceiling and was almost empty. The steaks were excellent, and a couple of bottles of red wine were perfectly good. Bill insisted on paying, and said the President of the United States would be furious if he encroached upon the MacLean hospitality for one more evening. His last evening. Tomorrow he must begin his journey to Russia.

  Back at Inveraray Court

  , Lady MacLean took charge. “I’m taking my husband to bed immediately,” she said, laughing. “Barrow today, Edinburgh yesterday, eight here for dinner on Sunday night. Fishing all day on the Tay on Saturday. Golf at Turnberry last Friday. He’ll be too tired for the Bosporus. Night, you two. I expect you’ll find a way to amuse yourselves for another hour.”

  “And don’t drink all of that expensive port,” muttered the admiral as he clumped up the stairs. “See you tomorrow. Early, Bill. I’m driving you over to the base. They’ve got a man to take you on to the airport.”

  Bill and Laura retired to the study, where the American put a couple of logs on the remains of the fire, and Laura slipped La Bohème onto the CD player. “Nothing too advanced for you, Inquisitor,” she teased. “Don’t they call this the beginner’s opera?”

  “They do. And it is still probably my favorite, although I know I’m supposed to grow out of it.”

  Laura said, “Mine too,” as she poured two glasses of Taylor’s ’47, and handed one to her guest. With Herbert von Karajan’s Berlin Philharmonic in the background, they sat quietly in the big chairs on either side of the fireplace, and sipped the admiral’s vintage port. Pavarotti’s Rodolfo and Mirella Freni’s Mimi completed the musical spell, woven almost a hundred years ago in northern Italy by Giacomo Puccini.

  The time slipped by very quickly. They talked of music, and of Kansas, and of Ben Adnam. Laura shook her head despondently. The Israeli officer she had once loved was now the most wanted man on earth.

  Absentmindedly, she remarked, “And now the two men in this house are planning to go off on some suicidal mission in Turkey…all because of bloody Ben. I don’t want you two to die. And I don’t really want you to go to Russia tomorrow either.”

  “But, Laura,” Bill said, “you have to go back to Edinburgh. And I have to catch Ben’s submarine.”

  Laura stared at him hard for the second time that day. Her green eyes were open wide, and she said again, very firmly, “I still don’t want you to go to Russia tomorrow.”

  Bill Baldridge was silent for a few moments, as the implications slowly sank in. Then he asked her, “Would it make any difference if I told you I’d rather be going to Russia with you, than without you?”

  “Yes,” she said, “it would make a difference. It would turn a situation I already find difficult into one which I would find almost impossible.”

  “Laura, I recognize real danger when I see it. I have taken a few risks in my career, and sitting here discussing the immediate possibility of absconding with the married daughter of a senior British admiral, while I am on official U.S. Navy duty for the President of the United States, is not only beyond all my known limits…it’s way beyond yours as well.”

  They sat and stared together, and while Rodolfo and Mimi made their respective confessions of love just beyond the horizon, Lieutenant Commander Baldridge heard himself saying the words he suspected would hav
e a major bearing on his life. “Laura,” he told her, “I’m leaving the Navy when this mission is completed. At which time I’ll be back in Kansas, a free man answering to no one. Would you like to stay in touch with me until that time, as best we can?”

  “Yes, I would.”

  Laura stood up and brought over the decanter of port, and poured a little into each of their glasses. As she did so, she bent to kiss him for the first time. It was a swift and electrifying moment. Laura stood up and looked down at him. She caught her breath, pushed her hair off her face, and said, “You are a very beautiful man, but for the moment, anyway, I’m staying up here on the moral high ground.”

  They finished their port almost in silence, smiling gently at each other. The iron link which bound them was made. Laura sent Bill to his room while she took the glasses to the kitchen. She retired fifteen minutes later, and all through a largely restless night, she refrained from considering the perilous journey through the mine field of the creaky passage outside her parents’ room, to that of the American Naval officer.

  The following morning the admiral drove Bill away, before Laura was awake. The two men supposed they would meet in Istanbul on September 6. Meanwhile Bill would stay in touch via the Northwood office, to which he was now headed.

  Collection of visas, tickets, and cash took him a few hours to complete during the morning in London. Admiral Elliott had provided a car and driver at the airport, and during the afternoon had proved a fountain of information.

  He had spoken to the Turkish admiral, and informed him that he would like to run an Upholder Class submarine through the Bosporus on the surface for a goodwill visit to a couple of Russian ports.

  No problem there. But the Turk had nearly done a double take when FOSM ventured that the British submarine might like to make the return journey underwater. But he saw no real harm in it for the Turkish nation. Perhaps a collision, for which they would be amply compensated. But not much else to worry him. There would be no nuclear weapons on board, and he would be firming up friendships with both the U.S. and the Royal Navy. Also, he would be glad of whatever information there was, after the mission was completed.

  On one aspect of the mission, FOSM had been adamant. “We do not want you to say anything to anyone. We want to make the transit under completely normal circumstances, to see if it can be done.

  “We will be making the journey back sometime between September 12 and 20—and all I’m really asking is that you do not rush out and depth charge the British boat, if you find her in the normal course of your surveillance.”

  The Turkish admiral had laughed. “No, Peter, we won’t do that! I think it is quite an interesting idea. I will know you are doing it, but no one else will. And if all goes according to your plans, I will certainly improve our Bosporus security. Meanwhile, I will make no extra effort to find you. But I will be very interested to hear from you.”

  Admiral Elliott did not quite believe him. The Turk would almost certainly sharpen up the surveillance, hoping at least to spot the British submarine. He would allow his men to attack and arrest, but he would not depth-charge them. And he would say nothing to anyone in advance. That way, if the British were not caught, the CNS alone would find out what had happened, and then he alone could strut around making “necessary national security improvements.”

  Meantime Admiral MacLean and Lieutenant Commander Jeremy Shaw would make the treacherous north-south transit under almost identical circumstances to those likely undertaken by Commander Adnam. The biggest danger would be, as it had been for him, that they might crash and drown in the dark, fast-flowing, narrow waters.

  It was also decided that Lieutenant Commander Baldridge should enter Russia the same way the Mossad thought Adnam had. A regular British Airways flight to Istanbul, and then by ship up the Black Sea to Odessa and Sevastopol.

  It was possible to fly direct from London to Kiev, the Ukrainian city which lies 450 miles to the north of the Crimean Peninsula. But travel from there to Sevastopol was difficult, because the great, secretive Russian Navy port had been virtually a closed city for so long. Old securities, endless delays, irregular transportation, few flights, except military, made it a traveler’s nightmare. Better for Bill to arrive quietly by boat, with the correct papers, and be met by Admiral Rankov’s staff.

  Bill stayed overnight at a hotel on the edge of London airport and made the flight to Istanbul the following morning, arriving in the ancient capital of the old Ottoman empire at six in the evening. The traffic was heavy as his taxi made its way through the old Sultanahmet area of the city to his hotel, which was situated in an old mansion block between the Blue Mosque and the waters of the Sea of Marmara.

  He debated calling Laura at Inveraray Court

  , which now seemed about a million miles away, but decided against it in case her mother answered.

  The telephone in his room was ringing loudly as Baldridge entered his room. “Well, it’s not Laura,” he thought glumly. “She has no idea where I am.” He was right. It was not Laura. It was Major Ted Lynch of the CIA, who was in Istanbul and wanted to come over right away. There were things to discuss, he said.

  Bill liked the beefy ex-Ranger officer, and was delighted he was in the city, particularly since Major Lynch was the kind of guy who would know precisely what and where to eat and drink. He told the CIA man to come right over to the hotel on Amiral Tafdil Sokak.

  Big Ted showed up within fifteen minutes, kept his cab waiting outside, and summoned Bill to the lobby. They shook hands and Bill was hustled into the taxi, which made a U-turn and swung back west, weaving through the crowded streets toward Kumkapi, the packed waterfront area of Istanbul, with literally dozens of excellent fish restaurants sprawled along the shore.

  On hot August nights, the place gave the appearance of an immense street party, and the haunting beat of Middle Eastern music filled the air. The smell of a million spices mingled with the aromas of grilled fish, hot, frying peppers, and night-black Turkish coffee.

  Bill noted the throngs of handsome couples: suave men and beautiful, expensively dressed women. Cabs hooted endlessly as they deposited their fares outside packed restaurants.

  Ted Lynch had booked a table on an outside terrace, and ordered drinks as they were seated, two glasses of the ferociously strong aniseed raki, which he, like the Turks, would cut with water, half-and-half.

  Bill still sucked in his breath as he took his first sip of the diluted Turkish firewater. “Christ!” he said. “You could start up the Concorde with this stuff.”

  The CIA man chuckled and said, “I thought we’d sit here and chat for an hour or so, and then eat at around nine o’clock. The waiter will be here in a minute and I’ll order us some Turkish meze, and then some fish, which is wonderful here. I expect you know, Turkey is supposed to have the French cuisine of the East.”

  “Not the kind of regular intelligence they throw around in Kansas,” said Bill, grinning. “Nor, since you mention it, in Maryland. But I’m with you—let’s jump right into the old meze—what the hell is it, by the way?”

  “Big selection of hors d’oeuvres—things like borek, kabak dolmasi, patlican tava, and yaprak dolmasi. You’re gonna love it.”

  “You got me,” said Bill. “Bring on the belly dancers. I’m going native for the night.” And he took a true sportsman’s swig of his raki, which almost pulverized his gullet.

  Ted Lynch laughed. He was suddenly serious and said, “Bill, I don’t actually give a rat’s ass whether we knocked over the Ayatollah’s submarines or not last Saturday. I haven’t asked, but like everyone else I’ve guessed. Those Kilos were a goddamned nuisance at best, and a serious threat to the security of the Gulf at worst. So screw ’em.

  “But I’m obliged to say, the more I conduct this investigation, the less I think Iran did it.”

  “You don’t?”

  “Uh-uh. There’s not a whisper, anywhere. Zepeda’s back in there again this week, heading for Tehran on a train, right now as we
sit here. He left Istanbul last night, crossed into Iran at the border station, Razi. Then ran on down into Tabriz and then Tehran. He speaks Arabic, which gets him by, and he has so many contacts.

  “But he says there is not a hint that the Ayatollahs had anything whatsoever to do with loss of the Jefferson. There is also not a hint of money being moved. If they’re covering something up, they’re doing a hell of a job. Jeff says he would be amazed if they were involved.”