Churchill chewed on his cigar, nodding. “Yes, but at what price, Sir Dudley? We gave up Hood to get at that demon, and now this. What do you make of this new rocket weapon the Germans appear to be using.”
“It’s rather confounding, sir. I can’t say as we’ve heard anything much about it. Bletchley Park seems to have missed something.”
“That they have,” said Churchill. “Well now… Let me put it this way. How many of these rockets can this ship have? If we press her she’s bound to run out, and then we’ll run up on her, take her by the throat, and throttle the life out of her.” He clenched his fist to make the point.
“I’m afraid the Americans suffered rather badly.”
“Yes, but as tragic as this attack was from the American standpoint, it was just the sort of dastardly deed that will enrage them. If Roosevelt allows this to stand, he’s not the man I think he is. This changes everything, gentlemen. I’m convinced the Americans will join us now after this. In this grave hour we’ll stand shoulder to shoulder and let the sinking of this new German ship be the first shot we fire as allies in this war. It was bound to happen sooner or later. The sooner the better, as far as England is concerned. The sooner the better.”
“Right, sir,” said General Dill. “We would welcome full support from the Americans. In fact, the Admiral here tells me that they’ve a considerable naval presence in and around Newfoundland at the moment. Jerry’s picked the wrong time to take a sucker punch at the U.S. Navy. Frankly, I can’t imagine what went through their minds, attacking a neutral country in such a blatant and grievous manner. You’re quite correct, sir. The Americans won’t let this stand. We’ve got word that Roosevelt is pressing on to Newfoundland.”
“Then we won’t be late either,” said Churchill. “I’ll want to get a cypher off to Parliament soon as well. If Roosevelt decides to declare war against Germany, then it’s very likely Japan will throw in on the other side. In that event, I want to be fully prepared to make an immediate declaration of war on Japan. In fact, I think our plan to send Prince of Wales and Repulse on to the Pacific after the conference is right on track.”
“Repulse will need some patching up first,” said Pound. “She’s still seaworthy, and there’s nothing wrong with her guns, but the Germans poked a couple of holes in her side armor that will have to be mended.”
“Yes, and they poked a few into, Furious as well.”
“King George V brushed them off, sir. We’ve nothing to worry about on that account.”
“That’s a comforting thought, Admiral. Because I fully intend to catch and sink this German ship. And if I can fish her captain out of the sea after we’re done with it, I’ll see that he hangs.”
Chapter 26
Fedorov slipped out of his quarters and made his way to the sick bay as fast as he could. Thankfully, there was no line outside the doctor’s office, and no chance Orlov would see him as he edged through the door, relieved to see Zolkin sitting at his desk.
“Yes, Mister Fedorov, how may I help you?”
“How is the Admiral, doctor?”
“Everyone wants to know how the Admiral is. Did you bring flowers? He is doing much better, but I have him sleeping in the next room.”
The navigator shifted uncomfortably, as if hesitating over what he wanted to say. Zolkin gave him a long look, seeing more there than met the eye. Yet he also noticed Fedorov had a bruise mark on his upper cheek, and stood up, walking around to the examination table.
“Over here,” he slapped the table with the palm of his hand, and Fedorov eased himself to a sitting position on the table.
“Where did you get this?” Zolkin nudged his chin to one side, reaching for some antiseptic and a gauze as he did so.
“It was nothing,” Fedorov said quietly.
“Oh, I think it was something more,” said the doctor. “I think it was Chief Orlov’s bad temper, yes?”
Fedorov sighed, nodding a quick affirmative. “You know what’s been happening since the Admiral fell ill,” he said. “The Captain…”
Zolkin gave him a long look, then dabbed the antiseptic on his cheek. “Karpov has been somewhat aggressive, it seems.”
“He’s made a terrible mistake,” said Fedorov, and he told the doctor what had happened on the bridge, how the American planes had simply been flying a transit mission, unarmed. “I tried to warn him—reason with him, but he had me relieved. Then he engaged the American task force as well. I fear there were very many casualties…”
At this Zolkin took pause, his manner more solemn, concern evident on his face. “It looks like the Captain didn’t like his cigar thrown out the window, and threw out the dog after it,” said Zolkin. He was referring to an old Russian tale, from Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, when the character of General Ivolgin claimed he had been berthed with a woman on a long train ride who complained about his cigar and threw it out the window. Ivolgin told his listener that he was so put off that he threw the woman’s dog out after the cigar in reprisal! The story was entirely fabricated, a perfect example of Russian vranyo, and the listener in Dostoevsky’s tale claimed he had read about a similar incident in a Belgian newspaper just days ago. In doing so he broke the time honored forms of vranyo by contradicting the liar, instead of quietly listening, straight faced and concerned.
Doctor Zolkin did not know how much was true and how much was manufactured in Fedorov’s tale, but he stayed in the role of the believing listener, then asked. “What ships did he fire on? Was it serious?”
“An aircraft carrier and several smaller escorts were leading the next convoy out to Iceland. They were not even aware of our presence, sir! He fired a full battery of Moskit-IIs. Didn’t you hear them when they launched?”
“I wouldn’t know a Moskit from a mosquito, Mister Fedorov. Everything this ship fires off sounds the same to me, and it’s all for killing one thing or another, so I pay no attention to it.”
“It’s not an exercise any more, Doctor. We’re not on maneuvers. Men died out there this morning, a great many I fear.”
Zolkin nodded, quiet for a moment before he said: “That’s the business of a warship. We spend billions of rubles to build them, pack them with men, missiles, guns and torpedoes, then put on these nice pressed uniforms and hats to make us feel better about the dirty business we’re up to. In the end, we are a shark, nothing more. This ship is a great white shark, and she has very sharp teeth. Do not be surprised, then, if it ends up doing exactly what a shark would do when the men commanding this ship become sharks themselves.”
Fedorov looked down, still upset. “Does the Admiral know?”
“He should never have stood that last night watch,” said Zolkin. “I suspect that, even when he was in his cabin, he was too busy reading your book to find time to sleep. The man was exhausted, and at his age he will not have the stamina to function as he should without sleep. At least I was able to see that he stayed here all day and got some much needed rest.”
“What happened to him?” Fedorov’s eyes were searching, worried.
“BPV. Benign Positional Vertigo. It will not be serious, and it will pass. Particles in the fluid of his inner ear went one way, the ship went the other. Throw in fatigue and stress and he had a case of sudden vertigo. It is not serious. Another day and I will have him back on his feet—but I want him to rest.” He held up a finger.
“I understand, sir…But doctor.”
“Yes, I knew there would be a ‘but doctor’… what is it Mister Fedorov?”
“The engagement today…The men are saying we have sunk an American carrier! They laugh and joke about it, as if we were on maneuvers. But this attack could have consequences we cannot even imagine now. It will enrage the Americans, just as the Japanese attack on them at Pearl Harbor roused them to anger, and look what happened? They built thirty aircraft carriers, another hundred smaller escort carriers, ten battleships, seventy cruisers, over 800 destroyers and escorts and 200 submarines, not to mention over 400,000 planes!
“You know your history well, Mister Fedorov.” The Doctor finished up with a little antiseptic ointment on his cheek. “I think it would be wise if you stay clear of Mister Orlov for a while. As for the Admiral, I'll have a little chat with him.”
“We need more than a little chat, Doctor. I'm afraid the Captain has his mind set on something involving the Atlantic Charter conference. It’s just a few days from now, and as soon as the ship's engines are certified for high-speed rotations again he will hasten on his way, and he will strike at anything in his path.”
Zolkin nodded gravely. ”What exactly is in his path?”
“At the moment, another US surface action group. The battleship Mississippi, two cruisers, five destroyers, and four transports. And behind them there will be much the same escorting their president to Argentia Bay. He will engage these ships if he spots them. We’re jamming all their radar frequencies now. They can’t see us, and he’ll shoot down any plane that comes near us. We can fire at five times their range and hit them before they even know we are here. It’s not warfare, doctor, it’s murder. Our only weakness is the fact that we have a limited weapons inventory, and I'm afraid that when our missiles begin to run low…”
The Doctor knew what Fedorov was angling toward. He scratched his chin, his head to one side as he thought. “I understand,” he said. “I'll do what I can, Mister Fedorov.”
“Thank you, sir. Anything you can do to get the Admiral back on his feet might help.”
Zolkin smiled. “That's what doctors are for. The admirals and captains and generals send men out to fight, and we doctors, we try to put them back together again when they fall apart. In the meantime, I suggest you get some sleep as well. The Chief Engineer was in here an hour ago. It may comfort you to know that I told him to take his time working on the engines. In fact I was rather insistent.” He winked at Fedorov again, removing in one gesture some of the loneliness and isolation the young navigator had carried on his shoulders for days now.
“Now then,” said the Doctor. “Sleep! Doctor’s orders! I will summon you to sick bay at 1800 hours for your prescription.”
“What prescription, sir?”
Zolkin just smiled, and Fedorov knew he had found an ally.
~ ~ ~
On the bridge the excited flush of victory was well savored. Karpov ordered the KA-226 to scout out toward the position of the American task force and send back live video, and this time he trusted what he saw. The scene was still shrouded with smoke and burning oil, though the sole remaining American destroyer had limped away to the south, her decks laden with every man she could pull out of the sea. All too many were left there, either dead before they hit the water, or dead within the hour. O’Brien lingered as long as she could, but after CV Wasp leaned over and finally began to sink, her skipper felt it would do no good to the survivors if another attack came in and blew his own ship apart. He sped south, back towards the Mississippi in TF 16, which was hurrying north to render any assistance possible.
The four troop and cargo transports were immediately ordered to turn about and return to Argentia Bay. Two destroyers went with them, the remaining three hastening north at full speed to pick up the last of the survivors. Behind them came the heart of the task force, cruisers Quincy and Wichita, and the battleship Mississippi. But at 16:00 hours a signal came in ordering the ships to hold position, then turn about and steam for Argentia Bay as well. Apparently the Admirals wanted to get all their eggs in one basket, count them well, and then hatch some plan of attack against this lethal, unseen German raider.
Karpov studied the footage, watching the movements of the three destroyers closely, then assured himself that they were there only to rescue the fallen. Before long they, too, turned and steamed south leaving only the still burning flotsam on the oily sea. The men on the bridge gathered round the video monitor, their eyes alight at first, until the helo zoomed in on the floating bodies of sailors adrift in the wreckage. They saw the arm of one man raise up, as if he was trying desperately to call back one of the destroyers. Then exhausted or stricken by the cold, he slipped from the spar of a mast he had been clinging to, and was taken by the sea.
There is an unwritten law among men who go to sea that binds each one in a silent kinship. The essence of it is that they live or die at the whim of a force greater than any man can sound or fathom, and that a man alone in the water was every man among them in his place.
Watching that last man slip beneath smoky green-gray waves and die took the fire and light of battle out of the eyes of the young mishman on the bridge. It was a perceptible shift in the tone of the emotion they shared, and a sullen silence came over them, perhaps as each one realized now that they had made a mortal enemy of the two single powers that mutually ruled these seas, and that from this point forward, their lot was to fight for their very survival, or to die like the men they had seen on the video screen. And slowly, one by one, they drifted away, back to their posts, keeping the last of their thoughts to themselves the way a man keeps the review of each day he lives in the quiet minutes before sleep takes him. Orlov noticed it, felt it as well, yet his only way of understanding it was to channel the emotion into derisive anger.
“Those stupid bastards,” he said. “What did they think they were doing launching those planes at us? What did they think we were supposed to do, sit here and let them come in on us and put our balls in the sea? No. They got what they damn well deserved, and I hope to god they learned from it.”
The men glanced his way warily as he spoke, but no one said anything, the echo of Fedorov’s warning still in their minds. It was not as Orlov had told it, they knew. The Americans had no intention of attacking. They were unarmed. They had no idea Kirov was even there, and not one of them ever laid eyes on the enemy that had struck them down; butchered them with weapons and capabilities they could not begin to comprehend. Somewhere in that train of thought was a ripening seed of guilt, and each man sat with it, dealt with it in his own way.
For Karpov, it was his to retreat to the silence of command. With Orlov at his side, no one questioned him. So his mind was already leaping past any notion of recrimination and on to the next evolution of his maneuver to the south. Yes, he would have to explain his actions to the Admiral, but he could claim, and justifiably so, that the Americans had struck the first blow in launching those planes, just as Orlov had said.
Why was the engine room taking so long on the reactor cooling problem, he wondered? The ship had been making no more than ten knots throughout the whole engagement. He wanted to put on speed, and cruise south to get into the most favorable position for the confrontation he knew was only a matter of days and nautical miles ahead of them now. What was done, was done. He would live with it and waste no time brooding over his fallen enemy.
Karpov knew he had taken a risk here. It was a feeling that had come to him many times before when he had finally set his schemes and plans in motion against a potential rival, because he knew he might fail. The Americans were just another rung on the ladder he saw himself climbing, that was all. Tomorrow was another day, and anything could happen. A man could never be too careful, or too daring, he thought. Which would it be for him?
He had been
careful most of his life. Careful planning, patience and a lot of quiet suffering had brought him to this place. Now he had finally done something daring, and he felt strangely light headed as he looked at the battle damage assessment feed. This must be something akin to what Orlov felt just after he punched a man in the face, he thought. It was a heady, self-satisfied feeling of power. Somehow it quenched the smell of shame that had dogged him all these many years, and it made him feel just a little bigger than he was before.
Now he focused his thoughts on his munitions inventory, and turned to Samsonov, asking him for an update.
“Sir, we have fired a total of 12 Moskit-IIs, 28 remain in inventory. We have fired 16 S-300 SAMS, leaving a total of 48. We have fired 32 Klinok/Gauntlet SAMs, and 96 remain. Our Gatling guns have expended 5% of available rounds. Our forward 100 millimeter cannon has expended six of one thousand rounds. The 152 millimeter batteries and torpedoes are at full load, as are the auxiliary ship-to-ship missiles.”
The Captain rubbed his hands together. Aside from his Moskit anti-ship missiles, and the S-300s his inventory was near full, and not one of the better 152mm deck guns had come into play as yet. He also had two more SSM missile systems aboard, with ten missiles each.
“Did we receive additional missiles for the MOS-III Starfires? And what about the cruise missiles?”
“No sir, neither of those weapon systems were scheduled for test firing, and so they were not replenished. But we still have our standard load of ten missiles for each of those two systems.”
Karpov thought about this in silence. Adding in those last two weapons, he now had a total of 48 missiles capable of targeting and hurting an enemy ship. His two primary air defense systems were still well provisioned, but he would have to be economical in using his ship killers in the days ahead. There was one other point he wanted to check.
“And what about our special warheads?”
Samsonov looked at him. “I’m sorry sir, that information is not on my board. Only the Admiral is aware of our status for special warheads on deployment.”
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