Shadow Hunter (37 page)

‘Talk us through it, Algy.'

The TAS officer pointed to the symbols on the screen.

‘All surface contacts. We've lost touch with the
Victor III.
That's the main shipping lane into the inlet. Most of it's civil, freighters and fishing vessels probably going up river to Murmansk. But there's at least one military vessel identified. A naval supply ship. She'll be astern of us when we turn east. She's listed in the NISUMS.'

These were the Naval Intelligence Summaries carried on board every submarine.

‘She's based at Severomorsk. Going home, I presume.'

‘Mmm. If I was Phil Hitchens, I think I'd have found a comfy spot somewhere underneath that one. They'd never hear him with all that racket going on.'

Andrew agreed.

‘And we need to keep ahead of her?'

Biddle nodded. When
Truculent
reached the target area, they had to be waiting.

Andrew pulled Biddle to one side, out of earshot of the others.

‘Look, we've been ordered to stop him by any means possible. If we don't get close enough in time to use the underwater telephone, or if he takes no notice, then it'll have to be a torpedo.'

Biddle winced.

‘You've got the new ones on board here, haven't you? The Hammerfish?' Andrew asked.

‘That's right. We're still doing trials. They're supposed to be very clever, but their reliability's not proven yet.'

‘Tell me what they can do.'

Biddle led him to the firing display next to the AI consoles.

‘They're like Tigerfish, in that they're controlled from the submarine by wire. Guided either by the boat's sonar or by the torpedo's. But there are two big differences. First, they're much faster. Seventy-five knots they can do! And second they have a high-frequency, high-definition sonar that turns on two-hundred metres from the target.'

‘What's the point of that?'

‘Gives us a precise outline of the target, on this display here. It means the weapon operator has a couple of seconds to choose the precise spot where the torpedo will strike. Soviet subs are well protected, but if you can hit the right place on the hull . . .'

‘Clever. Very clever. And that could be just what we need. Not to ensure we
destroy
the
Truculent,
but to ensure that we don't!'

Andrew's face brightened at the discovery.

Biddle looked at him doubtfully. It was the one aspect of the torpedo's performance they'd been unable to cover in training.

* * *

There was hardly room for three men in the first lieutenant's cabin. Paul Spriggs hauled himself onto the top bunk to make room for the MEO Peter Claypole.

All Lieutenant Commanders, they were the three most senior men on board after the captain.

Tim Pike told them he no longer considered Commander Hitchens to be in a balanced or responsible state of mind. He listed his reasons; the secretiveness, the overreactions to crises, and the unorthodox communications orders. There were now physical signs the captain was under abnormal stress; he was taking sleeping pills and there had been evidence that morning of vomiting and bowel problems.

‘D'you think any of us is qualified to make a judgement?
We're engine drivers, not bloody doctors!' Claypole growled.

Pike was startled at encountering resistance from the engineer. After his brush with the captain the previous day, he'd expected support from him.

‘If we suspect the captain's condition is a threat to safety, then we're bloody well entitled to our opinions,' insisted Spriggs.

‘Oh yes. Opinions are all right. It's the next step that's the problem.'

‘What're you proposing, Tim?'

Pike looked flustered as he answered.

‘Since we left Devonport, there isn't a man on board who hasn't begun to wonder if the captain's gone off his head. You know that, Peter, as well as I do.'

‘Aye. Wondering's one thing. Doing something about it's another.'

‘Are you saying we should ignore these warning signs?' Spriggs interjected, his voiced tinged with exasperation.

‘I'm saying we should be damned careful! There's precious little precedent for first lieutenants relieving their captains of command. It's not popular with the Admiralty Board. In a court-martial, even this little meeting could be seen as conspiracy to mutiny.'

‘It might also be seen as senior officers using their brains to avoid a disaster!' Pike countered angrily.

‘What disaster?' Claypole demanded.

Pike looked at his cabin-mate for support.

‘Paul and I have been closer to it than you, Peter. You've only had the one row with him. For me, the friction's been there the whole trip. You ask “what disaster?” I don't know.
Why
don't I know? Because the bugger hasn't told me what his orders are. But . . .'

He hesitated. Hitchens had told him not to pass on what he'd said. Pike decided he had to.

‘We're going close to the Soviet submarine bases, and Hitchens is saying there may be some action. What he means, Peter, is he may take us to war!'

Claypole scratched pensively at his bushy black beard.

Pike went on, ‘He told me he's already got his rules of
engagement. He's not waiting for any more orders from CINCFLEET. It's for him to decide if we go in fighting. Now, if he orders the firing of a salvo of Harpoons, or the launch of a pair of Mk 24s, would you be happy to pull the trigger?'

‘Well, put like that . . . But it's still only surmise,' Claypole cautioned. ‘It's not enough if you're thinking of pushing him out of the bandstand now.'

‘But if he orders weapons to be readied, then you'll back me?'

‘In those circs you've got the right to see the orders, the rules of engagement and the target listings. Yes. If he won't show them to you, then I'm right behind you.'

‘And you, Paul?'

‘Oh, yes. I'll be with you.'

Pike expelled a deep sigh of relief.

‘Let's hope we're imagining all this,' he concluded.

The three men went their separate ways, Claypole to the propulsion section aft, Spriggs forward to check the arsenal of missiles, mines and torpedoes, and Pike to the control room, where Lieutenant Cordell met him.

‘We're heading for the Kola Inlet, sir. Captain's orders. Tucked ourselves under the
Boris Bubnov,
bound for Severomorsk. Plenty of broadband noise from her. Should make us invisible. I sodding well hope so.'

Tim Pike stepped past into the control room.

Hitchens stood in the bandstand; with his chiselled features and ramrod straight back, he looked like a figure from an heroic painting.

The image made Pike shudder; a captain clinging to the bridge of his ship – as it sank beneath him.

THE KAMOV KA-32
helicopter flew slowly along the line of jetties. Astashenkov, sitting beside the pilot, was struggling to differentiate one submarine from another. There were six of the broad-beamed 7000-tonners in harbour.

Then the pilot saw the orange armbands of the ground controller, on the fourth pier along. The machine circled once, feeling for the wind direction, before setting down gently, within a few metres of the companion way from the pier to the submarine.

The pilot saluted, and Astashenkov stepped down onto the concrete, clutching his cap to prevent it blowing away in the downdraught.

The Captain 2nd Rank who welcomed him on board the boat was well known to the Vice-Admiral. He'd been executive officer on Astashenkov's last command – a strategic missile submarine.

The commander of the newly commissioned
PLA
saluted, then offered his hand.

‘You're most welcome, Comrade Vice-Admiral,' he shouted above the whine of the helicopter.

Astashenkov glanced admiringly at the rounded black hull with its coating of rubber to deaden sonar reflections. The submarine had a fat pod mounted atop the rudder, containing a towed sonar array, and was the newest in what NATO knew as the
Sierra
class.

‘You're ready to sail?'

‘We'll shut the hatches as we go below.'

Astashenkov took a last, quick look at the Bolshaya Litsa submarine base, his home port in younger days. He could be seeing it for the last time.

The piers for the big, nuclear-powered attack submarines were on the eastern shore of the fjord. Cut into the cliffs behind the quay that linked the piers were caverns for stores, spares and weapons.

To his right beyond the cliffs, the bleak granite rose two hundred metres in contours smoothed by the arctic ice of an earlier age.

A cutting wind came in off the sea, and Astashenkov shivered. Time to go, before the phones started buzzing between Bolshaya Litsa and the Severomorsk headquarters.

Astashenkov had been on board the
Ametyst
at her commissioning the previous year, but was again impressed by the size and comfort of her interior. Captain 2nd Rank Yury Makhov had a spacious day-cabin as well as his sleeping quarters. Fixed to the wall in the day-room was a photograph of President Nikolai Savkin. Feliks pointed to it.

‘I'm acting on the direct instructions of the President,' he declared in answer to Makhov's unspoken question. ‘But without the knowledge of the Commander-in-Chief, Admiral Belikov.'

‘I see.'

The captain's pale face seemed to grow paler still.

‘There is a British submarine attempting to penetrate the waters of the Rodina. We are to intercept and destroy it.'

‘We've all been aware of the search going on. Never known so many aircraft operating at one time. I was beginning to wonder why we'd been left out,' Makhov answered.

Astashenkov decided not to tell him there was still a ban on submarines putting to sea. If Makhov knew of the risk that British mines had already been laid outside the harbour, he'd have the right to refuse to sail.

Nikolai Savkin's telephone call earlier that morning had almost caused Feliks to renege on the pledge he'd made him in Moscow the previous weekend. Savkin told him the nation needed a military confrontation with the West.
Sending a submarine to sea to confront the British intruder was the only way it could be made to happen.

He'd not been specific. He didn't need to be. They both knew of the danger from mines.

The implication of the President's request was clear; a Soviet submarine and the men on board were to be sacrificed, if need be, to secure the unity of the USSR.

Feliks knew he could never order one of his own commanders on a suicide mission. He could never live with his conscience.

There was only one way he could fulfil his pledge to Savkin – take the submarine to sea himself.

‘Have you given the order to cast off?'

‘It's being done at this moment, Comrade Vice-Admiral. Er . . , you said the Northern Fleet Commander Admiral Belikov doesn't know of our mission? He cannot fail to know within a very few minutes. Our departure from the dock will be reported.'

‘I know. Do you trust me, Captain?'

‘Of course, Admiral.'

‘Then you mustn't ask political questions. I'm forbidden to tell you why we're acting alone. The situation in Moscow is tense; the Politburo threatens to tear itself apart. What we're doing is for Nikolai Savkin and may help save our country from chaos.'

His sombre words silenced Makhov.

‘I understand. What are my instructions?'

‘The
Truculent
was detected earlier this morning by a helicopter crew. The boat had a mast up, west of Nemetskiy Point. We believe, from our intelligence sources, that the captain of the British boat was receiving final orders to launch a provocative attack. To sink one of our major warships or submarines!

‘The West wants to exploit the political crisis in Moscow, you see. A surprise attack from an unidentified aggressor. Something the West can deny responsibility for; they reckon it could shake the confidence of the Soviet people in their leaders and in us, their military protectors.'

Makhov's jaw gaped open. Astashenkov's bland
delivery of the ‘facts' had done nothing to conceal the impact of what he was saying.

‘That's madness. It's unbelievable.'

‘I'm not lying,' Astashenkov lied. ‘If the
Truculent
is successful in her mission, it could be a disaster for the Soviet Union. We've got to stop her. And we have to do it alone. No communication with headquarters. Nothing that can ever be traced. We too must be totally “deniable”.'

‘I understand, I think. But where do we look? We need to know what the aircraft have found out. They may be tracking the boat by now.'

‘Can you listen in to their radio transmissions? Before we dive?'

‘Their stuff's all encrypted. We don't carry the right decoder.'

‘Then it's up to us, isn't it?'

They both felt a slight jolt as the submarine nudged itself away from the pier. Normally tugs would assist a boat as large at the
Ametyst,
but not today. The 40,000 horsepower produced by her twin, pressurized-water nuclear reactors would need careful control to prevent damage as she eased her way out of the dock.

The Zapadnaya Litsa Fjord emerges into the sea twenty miles west of the main Kola Inlet. Within a mile of the shore, the waters of the Barents Sea plunge 250 metres to a sea-bed of black mud.

‘We'll dive when we've passed Ostrov Kuvshin,' Makhov announced. This was an island at the mouth of the fjord. ‘Then we can unreel the array. It's noisy when we do it, so let's hope the English boat isn't close already. D'you have any idea of her exact target?'

‘No. It could be any of the naval bases. All we can do is patrol between here and Ostrov Chernyy. Sixty kilometres of sea. She has to cross our path if she's to complete her mission.