Skydancer

by Geoffrey Archer

  The key slid stiffly into the lock, and the door sprang open. Inside was a maroon overnight bag.

  Alec selected a cubicle at the far end of the row in the gents’. He flushed the lavatory in case anyone was listening, then sat on the seat.

  The case had a zip-fastener which he undid slowly, covering the sound by clearing his throat.

  Inside were a shirt, a pair of pyjamas, a washbag and shaving kit, and a large brown envelope. What the hell . . .?

  With shaking hands he slit open the envelope and emptied out a British passport in the name of W.J. Allenby. He opened it and saw that the photograph inside was of himself.

  There was a British Airways ticket issued in the same name, for a flight to West Berlin leaving Heathrow at three-fifteen that afternoon.

  Berlin! The handover was to be in Berlin! Oh God! He would be entirely at their mercy there! A sense of dread began to overwhelm him.

  A typewritten list of instructions told him to travel to Heathrow airport on the underground immediately. He must make no attempt to inform anyone where he was going. When he reached Berlin he should take a taxi to Friedrichstrasse, and cross over into the East. He would be expected.

  Oh God, oh God, oh God! Suppose they held him there until they checked the Skydancer plans? Suppose they decided the blueprints were fakes? They’d kill him, wouldn’t they? Torture him first perhaps?

  Anderson gulped. He had to control himself, get a grip!

  He opened the passport again. It looked a perfect forgery. There was money in the envelope too, pounds sterling and West German marks. There was even an underground ticket to the airport. They had thought of everything.

  The man in the anorak watched Anderson come out of the gents’ toilets, and walk towards the underground station. He watched him pause by a tube-map to check his route. His own instructions had been very strict, to follow at a good distance at all times. Anderson must never guess that he was being watched. Any moment, though, things could get very tricky.

  He flashed a pass, and followed Anderson through the barrier towards the escalators, keeping fifty yards behind. Right behind Anderson, he noticed a man in a dark blue overcoat glance over his shoulder and look around with professional thoroughness. Anderson had collected a minder, though he did not know it yet. The next part would be a matter of luck.

  A thundering in the tunnel as he reached the bottom of the escalator told him that luck was on Anderson’s side that day. He walked as fast as he dared, but was well behind the two men, who were already on the platform as the train came in.

  The doors hissed open and shut again. Shit! He had blown it! From inside the carriage the figure in the blue coat looked out with ice-cold eyes. The edge of his mouth turned up slightly in a mocking smile.

  The MI5 man cursed. John Black was not going to be happy.

  When the signaller came hurrying to his cabin, clutching a sheet from his note-pad, Commander Carrington breathed a sigh of relief. They had spent the weekend idling in the depths, successfully avoiding their Soviet shadow, and waiting with growing impatience for orders to proceed with the missile launch.

  The signal received on the VLF circuit from England consisted of just three words in code. Carrington dismissed the signaller, then spun the combination lock on the wall-safe and opened it to pull out his manual for codes of the day.

  It took just a minute to translate the message, and he stared at it in surprise. This was not what he expected. What he had hoped for was a command giving the time and place of launch and the co-ordinates of the target area. Instead Northwood was instructing him to push his satellite terminal above the waves to receive a lengthy message from HQ. Carrington cursed. This could give away his position to the Russians.

  By using burst-transmissions at predetermined times, large amounts of data could be transmitted in a few seconds, but even that could be long enough for a Soviet radar satellite over the Atlantic to pick up a minute reflection from their mast, and to report back the location of the sighting to Moscow and to any Soviet ships in the vicinity.

  Carrington looked at his watch. They would have to close with the surface and push their antenna above it in just fifteen minutes.

  In the control room, he checked with the navigator and the sonar operator to make sure the Retribution would be well away from other shipping when the satellite link-up took place. Then he ordered the long, trailing VLF aerial to be wound in, to prevent it fouling the propeller when they were just below the surface.

  In the navigation centre next to the control room, he checked the time with the atomic clock whose accuracy ensured that the submarine and HQ could synchronise their actions perfectly. He made a small adjustment to his own watch.

  ‘Right, officer of the watch! Bring her up to periscope depth,’ he ordered when the moment came.

  At the engineering control panel, hands reached up to open valves. Pumps began to hum and hiss as the buoyancy was adjusted to keep the boat just below the surface.

  ‘Periscope depth, sir!’ the coxswain reported.

  ‘Up periscope!’ Carrington called, and the shiny tube slid upwards from the floor of the control room.

  He pressed his eyes to the rubber cups, gripped the focusing handles, and carefully scanned the horizon.

  There was a light swell, but not another vessel to be seen anywhere.

  The periscope hissed back into the floor.

  Carrington watched the second-hand.

  ‘Up satcom!’ he ordered. There were thirty seconds to go to their deadline.

  Just two minutes later the antenna was lowered again and Carrington instructed the officer of the watch to return the submarine to the depths and to head away from the area, back towards the sector from where they expected to launch the missile.

  The radio operator ripped the long sheet of paper from the teleprinter. The message was in full code.

  ‘For your eyes only, sir.’

  Back in his cabin, Carrington set to work again with his code books. This time he knew it would take him a good quarter of an hour.

  But within minutes he realised he was translating the most staggering message he had ever received.

  ‘Regret to inform you that enemy agent is aboard your boat. Lieutenant Robert Simpson must be put under close arrest immediately . . .’

  So it began. Carrington stared in disbelief at the words and ripped a page of the code-book in his eagerness to translate the full signal.

  At last it was done. It revealed that Simpson had telephoned England and talked about the secret visit to Retribution by the Aldermaston scientists, information which had subsequently found its way into the hands of Soviet intelligence. It was incredible!

  ‘God almighty!’ It felt like a personal blow. A member of his crew! It was like being told one of his family was a spy.

  Also in the signal were included the orders for the test firing. It was to be that afternoon, in three hours’ time. They would have to get a move on to reach the firing zone by then.

  Carrington returned to the control room grim-faced. He took the officer of the watch and the navigator to one side, and told them of the launch plans. He made them responsible for seeing that the submarine was in the right place at the right time. Then he asked his executive officer to come with him to his cabin.

  With the door closed firmly behind him, Carrington gestured for his deputy to sit down.

  ‘What I’m going to say will stun you!’ he announced quietly.

  Since the signal had been marked for his eyes only, he paraphrased its contents.

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ Lt Commander Mike Smith exploded after listening open-mouthed. ‘I could kill him, with my bare hands!’

  ‘That’s just the point, Mike. That’s just what mustn’t happen. But if it becomes known on board that Simpson is a spy, someone else might try to do that.’

  ‘Unbelievable!’ Smith exclaimed, shaking his head. ‘Simpson? He’s just a kid, hardly the stuff spies are made of. I suppose there can be n
o doubt? I assume they know what they’re talking about in London?’

  ‘We’ll have to pull him in here and ask him. But it’d be better if you and I did it on our own. If we get the Chief to form an arrest squad, then word of it’ll get round in no time. Let’s try to keep it quiet. We’d better find out where Simpson is.’

  That was not difficult. The supply officer was sitting in his cabin, checking his dry stores manifest.

  ‘Lieutenant Simpson,’ the executive officer began formally. ‘The captain would like to see you immediately.’

  Simpson frowned in surprise. He would normally expect to be addressed by his first name. Something was wrong.

  ‘Right, sir,’ he answered, rising to his feet. ‘I’ll come along then.’

  He preceded Mike Smith down the short corridor to the captain’s cabin. Carrington’s face looked gaunt and drawn as Simpson walked in. Smith closed the door behind them and stood next to it.

  ‘Lieutenant Simpson,’ Carrington spoke softly, ‘the Commander-in-Chief has instructed me to place you under arrest. You are to face charges under the Official Secrets Act and under Queen’s Regulations, and I am to caution you that anything you say may be used in evidence against you.’

  Simpson gasped. He shot a glance over his shoulder and saw that the executive officer was holding pen and notebook, ready to take notes.

  ‘Wh . . . what do you mean, sir?’ Simpson stammered. ‘What’s this all about?’

  ‘Does the name Susan Parkinson mean something to you, perhaps?’

  Any colour that was left in Bob Simpson’s face drained away.

  ‘Well . . . yes. Of course.’ A look of pained confusion spread across his youthful features.

  ‘You telephoned her from Miami, I believe.’ Carrington’s voice was cold.

  ‘She . . . she’s my girlfriend, sir. That’s all,’ he answered weakly.

  ‘All? Just your girlfriend? That’s not the impression they have back home.’

  Simpson glanced around nervously and saw the hostility on the executive officer’s face.

  ‘Could you . . . could you explain to me, sir, just what it is I am accused of?’ he asked in a meek voice.

  ‘I am informed by Northwood that you passed information to Miss Parkinson about work being done to the test missile on board this boat, and that the information subsequently arrived in the hands of an enemy power,’ Carrington announced.

  Simpson’s face reddened. But then he frowned.

  ‘Eh? Enemy power, sir? What enemy power?’

  The thin lines to the left of Carrington’s mouth began to twitch. He was fighting to control his anger.

  ‘It’s not my job to try you, Simpson,’ his voice grated. ‘You can fight your corner in court. But from what I’ve been told by Northwood they’ve got the evidence they need. My orders are simply to detain you until we hand you over to the authorities ashore. You will be locked in your cabin twenty-four hours a day. Meals will be brought to you, and you will be allowed to use the heads only under escort. Do you have anything to say?’

  Simpson shook his head. He wanted to tell them that they had got it wrong: he’d not been passing secrets to an enemy. What he had told Susan would not have gone any further. But in view of the mission he had been planning, the less he said the better.

  ‘Prisoner! Stand to attention!’ ordered Lt Commander Smith.

  ‘Simpson was visibly shaking. The room seemed to be spinning in a blur.

  ‘That will be all,’ Carrington snapped.

  The executive officer took him firmly by the arm and led him out. They stopped at an empty cabin and Simpson was guided inside.

  ‘You’ll stay in here for a while. You can go back to your own cabin, after I’ve searched it,’ the Lt Commander told him, and locked the door.

  Simpson’s cabin was no more than eight feet square. Smith looked around it, searching for anything out of the ordinary. The small desk was covered with routine paperwork. On the shelf above were two snapshots: one of a middle-aged couple, Simpson’s parents he presumed; the other of an attractive dark-haired girl, warmly wrapped up in woolly scarf and gloves against the bright chill of an English winter’s day. Written on it in ink were the words ‘Loveyou. Sue’

  ‘So that’s the girlfriend,’ he thought to himself. ‘Not bad! Quite a little Mata Hari!’

  He then went through the lockers under the bunk. From Simpson’s wash kit, he removed the razor and spare blades, but left an aerosol of shaving foam. Scissors and a pen-knife he put with the razor to take away for safe-keeping.

  He could find nothing to connect Simpson with espionage, no diary or personal notebooks, and the volumes on the shelf were all standard textbooks or novels. Nothing subversive amongst them. He was disappointed.

  ‘Right, Simpson, you can go back now,’ he announced after unlocking the door to the spare cabin.

  ‘Thanks very much!’ Simpson grumbled. He was over the initial shock and had begun to resent this treatment. ‘You’re making a big mistake. I’m not a spy.’

  ‘It’s no good telling me that. Save it for the interrogators when you get back to England.’

  Interrogators! The words struck a chill into Simpson’s heart. Those sinister men with their black arts of mind-bending, what would they have done to his girlfriend?

  ‘Do you know what’s happened to her, sir?’ he asked with sudden concern.

  ‘No, I don’t. Now sit here quietly and behave yourself. I’m going to lock you in. You’ll get some food later.’

  The sound of the lock turning seemed to echo inside the small cabin. Left on his own, Simpson began to panic. ‘Enemy power’? What were they talking about? If only he could talk to Susan!

  Suddenly he began to fear she had told them everything, all about his real reasons for being on board HMS Retribution. That did not involve any enemy power. But what had the captain said? It was his words to Susan on the telephone that they were complaining about. Could she have passed the information to . . . He was wide-eyed with alarm. Surely not . . .

  One thing seemed quite clear; the security men back home would treat him as a spy, a traitor. He had been incautious on the phone, and he had been planning sabotage on the boat. He could get thirty years, he realised – for trying to stop people being killed!

  With dazzling clarity he suddenly knew that returning to the UK was something he could not afford to do.

  Hanging from a hook on the wall was a dark blue canvas bag, standard equipment for every member of the submarine’s crew. Its contents were going to be vital to him in the next few hours.

  ‘Shouldn’t we have someone on guard outside his cabin?’ Smith suggested to the captain.

  ‘It would have to be an officer if we’re going to keep this business away from the crew,’ Carrington answered thoughtfully, ‘and with a missile-firing coming up we won’t have anyone to spare. He can’t get out, can he?’

  ‘Not without breaking the door down.’

  The two men returned to the control room. Preparations for the launch were well under way. The executive officer reverted to his normal duties and began to check that the submarine was on course and on time to meet its deadline. In the navigation centre he ascertained that the twin inertial navigation systems were performing perfectly. At the moment of firing, they would feed into the rocket the precise coordinates of the launch point so that the missile’s computer could calculate the trajectory needed to reach the target with accuracy.

  In the missile chamber he noted with satisfaction that the countdown procedure was moving ahead smoothly. Finally he descended the companionway to the missile control centre, where the Polaris systems officers were running test programmes on the electronic firing panel.

  In due course all these men would have to be told about Robert Simpson, but now was not the moment. There should be no distraction from the work they had in hand.

  Back in the control room he was told that the captain had returned to his cabin and wanted Smith to join him there. He s
et off immediately.

  ‘Simpson’s been hammering on his door. Says he’s got the shits and needs to go to the heads,’ Carrington explained. ‘Bit difficult really; it was the chief steward who heard him. He was a bit puzzled to find the supply officer locked in. I had to explain, but swore him to secrecy. God knows how long we can keep this bottled up! The sooner we get Simpson off the boat the better. Anyway, would you deal with it, Mike? Take him to the heads?’

  The executive officer grimaced at the prospect of having to watch the prisoner relieving himself.

  ‘Of course, sir. I’ll do it now.’

  When he pushed open the door to the supply officer’s cabin, Simpson had his back to him. There seemed to be something odd about his hair. It took Smith a split-second to realise what was wrong, but he was already too late to save himself. The prisoner spun round, his face encased in a gas-mask.

  Simpson’s arm reached out like a ramrod, clutching the aerosol of shaving foam Smith had left in his locker. He jammed his thumb down on the button, and the canister emitted a loud hiss.

  Smith reeled back as the pain shot through his eyes! It was like needles piercing his eyeballs, from behind as well as in front. Instinctively he clawed at his eyes, thinking he could wipe away the foam, but there was none there!

  He gasped at the pain, and the CN gas caught the back of his throat. He began to cough and choke. The muscles of his chest went into spasm. He felt he was going to die!

  Beginning to twitch convulsively, he fought for clean air to sooth the burning of his nose and throat, but Simpson kept his finger firmly pressed on the aerosol button. Smith then tried to hold his breath, but an uncontrollable coughing overtook him. His head began to spin through lack of oxygen, and slowly blackness overtook him.

  Simpson stepped over the body and went out into the corridor.

  Startled by the noise, the chief steward came bustling out of the wardroom. He stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of the officer in the gas-mask, and within seconds he too was reeling backwards in pain and confusion.

  The door to Carrington’s cabin was at the end of the corridor and slightly ajar. Simpson ran for it, slamming the door open with his shoulder.