Dravit countered, “Well, then, who do you ken is responsible and what are you going to do about it?”
“Anyone. Everyone. Nothing for now.”
They gave each other confirming looks.
“The pattern seems pretty subtle,” I continued. “The camera, the Japanese police, your accident, the regulators… Why do they keep trying to spring the trap before they can get all of us? Why not wait and stop us once and for all?”
Chamonix cocked an eyebrow. “The right charge in Henry’s ski booby trap could have taken us all out?”
“Yes, including the turncoat,” Dravit interrupted.
“What can he do in Siberia that won’t take him ‘out,’ along with us?”
“Maybe he wants to be in Siberia. Maybe the people he’s working with are there,” Dravit persisted.
That was a possibility I most dreaded.
“Why, then, take the trouble to tamper with the regulators?”
Chamonix had withdrawn enigmatically from the conversation. Evidence of his fine mind burned through occasionally, but too often his thoughts lay concealed behind a dark cloud.
“We’re talking about nine men.”
“I know.”
“All we need is one bloke who can make contact with the wrong people at the right time and you’re bloody well through.”
“I’ve considered that.”
“You run the chance of jeopardizing the sub’s crew, too. That’s another eighty men to figure into the balance.”
“Yes, they’re at risk.”
His face was reddening. “We are open to retribution.”
“We would be anyway.”
Knockout punches were for the movies. Real fights, Dravit knew, were won by steadily pounding your opponent into rubber-legged submission.
“If they capture a single mucking one of you, they won’t be gentle like my maiden aunt. Once they get out of you what they want to know, Vyshinsky will be as good as dead.”
“He’s nearly as good as dead already.”
“Righto, so bloody well don’t go!” He brought both fists down onto the table.
“Enough of this feels right. We’re going. You are right, something’s wrong, but the odds are as good as they’ll ever get.” I had unconsciously laid emphasis on “we’re going.” He wasn’t and that took some weight from his arguments. “Who’s ever going to expect an operation as audacious as this?”
Chamonix looked at Dravit and shrugged. The Englishman opened his mouth, then shut it. Each of them had enough military time to have run into situations like this before. Instances where the commanding officer and his senior people did not agree. There was no point in arguing further.
“The matter is closed,” I pronounced. I, too, had experience, and more in positions of ultimate responsibility. Consensus was always desirable, but I had learned to trust my instincts. Kurganov had hired one man to make the final decisions. Finality was the nature of the work I did, and of the inescapable responsibility I had assumed.
Frazer, were you right this time? At what point would they stop following you?
“Remember one thing: only you, Henry, and I know the complete plan. Our turncoat isn’t sure how hard he has to be trying. I’m going to settle that little question. We’ll brief tonight on the entire mission. Lay out the warning order and everything. We’ll begin phase planning later tomorrow.”
The klaxon sounded and there was a rush of feet in the passageway. The crew were rushing to their diving stations.
That night the troop compartment was cramped and humid.
“Bitte, will this be an aerobic session for us, you know, as schussing moving targets? Or is it to be a learning opportunity, say, for us to discover how many pieces of equipment can be cleverly rigged to malfunction, or perhaps blow up,” Lutjens kicked off with a sweet smile, “sir?” He turned to the others with a hand gesture that invited similar challenges.
The high-living German was apparently a master of the military fine art of the border-line insubordinate question. Always end it with “sir.”
I saw Chief Puckins bridle. If I was any judge, Puckins as the senior enlisted SEAL would soon be giving Lutjens a verbal blowtorching in private.
Dravit and I gave the preliminary briefing. Assignments would be made shortly and each man would be preparing a briefing to be given to the group of his portion of the mission prior to execution. Using a dozen maps, diagrams, and photographs taped to the top of an upturned Ping-Pong table, we took two and a half hours to outline the key points. More would follow, this was just the beginning. Only one or two showed any surprise. By now they had a general sense of the risks, even without knowing the countries involved.
“We will be putting our kayaks ashore, that’s the program. I believe we can pull this off. Anyone who wants to back out now, can. Just remember that if you back out, you don’t get a dime, and you won’t be going anywhere beyond this submarine.
“One more thing. If we fail ashore, this submarine will be next on the list for counterattack. It won’t be hard for Ivan to trace back the thread. If it turns out failure was for the lack of a man’s participation, I don’t really expect that man will outlive us much by staying on this boat. So you see, if any of us goes, we’d all better go.
“Stay-behinds, do I have any takers?”
No one moved. We had advanced so deeply into the maw that movement in any direction was as perilous as movement in any other direction.
“Ja, well, that about does it. I’m giving three-to-one odds we don’t make it,” Lutjens added with forced good humor.
“Just how do you expect to collect on that one?” Alvarez said as everyone cleared the compartment. The Cuban’s mental discipline never waivered.
“W-w-wire his estate,” Kruger replied, flipping a coin high into the air. “His posh grand-duchess aunt, or whatever she is, ought to be able to cover it.”
“B-b-better idea,” he added thoughtfully, “have your estate wire his estate.”
As we drew closer to our destination they showed great care in tending to their personal equipment and developed the habit of daydreaming. Time was drawing short.
I followed the briefing with an extended calisthenics session in the troop compartment. Though the Koreans had added a snorkel, on occasion the sub ran on the surface at night with its vents open and at these times we could get enough fresh air for exercise. There wasn’t room for an orthodox PT session, so each man did his push-ups, sit-ups, and flutter kicks in his rack. Nine men running in place felt as insane as it looked to the crew of the Korean sub.
Then we practiced putting the five disassembled kayaks through the after hatch and assembling them on deck. Each kayak was designed for two paddlers, though it could be paddled by one alone. Each could hold three men comfortably, and in a pinch, four. But after tying on ahkios, skis, and other equipment, we found barely enough room to squeeze in two paddlers.
First we assembled the simple interlocking skeleton halves of Finnish ash. Then the skeleton halves were fitted into the rubberized-fabric skin. Dual inflatable sponsons running the length of the craft provided the locking tension that kept the skin in place. Under some circumstances, the skeleton could be pre-assembled in halves below decks. However, the beams of these kayaks were too broad for the hatches of this submarine.
It was dangerous work in this climate. Everyone above decks was required to wear a safety harness. A man lost overboard at night in waters like these stood little chance of recovery. Yet the harness and the tether lines were awkward, and despite my warnings more than once, I saw men detach their harnesses to get at a particularly obstinate piece of gear.
My stopwatch read ten minutes. Too long. The low-lying fog that enshrouded the decks could only serve as a partial excuse.
Time permitted only one kayak drill. The sub’s captain had said that we would be entering the Soviet radar umbrella very soon. This was one of the last times prior to launch that the sub would run fully surfaced. Since the sub had be
en modified with post-World War II snorkel equipment, it could run on diesel in moderate seas at periscope depth.
I favored this kayak technique over a lockout. One advantage to wet-deck launches was they could begin farther offshore and allow the sub to stay in deeper, safer water. Another advantage was that kayakers were less susceptible to currents and cold-water immersion. On the other hand, submariners like wet-deck launches as much as a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.
Later that evening I drifted up to the conning tower for some fresh air. A freak front of warm air gave the waters approaching the La Pérouse Straits a singular appearance. The sky was clear and the stars bright, but a thin two- or three-foot blanket of fog covered the sea and concealed the deck of the submarine. The conning tower floated above it like a disembodied bandstand. Here and there the underlying ocean boiled through and then disappeared as quickly as it appeared.
Occasionally a small cake of ice appeared in these glimpses of ocean. I wondered idly if in time these cakes would grow or melt.
For no reason I could think of, the expression “a snowball’s chance in hell” came to mind. The expression was all wrong. A snowball had a very good chance—in a frigid hell like this. Whoever first portrayed hell as full of fire and brimstone must have taken the quick tour run by the Chamber of Commerce. Surely he had not been shown some of the more esoteric variations and did not know the true agony of severe cold…the way a frogman did.
Someone had once described the frogman’s place in hell to me. The description involved that wizened old man, Charon, whose ferry plied the waters of the Styx carrying new arrivals to hell, or more properly, Hades. The surviving mythology has been vague as to the propulsion of Charon’s craft, and understandably so. Few would grasp its poetic justice. Charon’s ferry wasn’t poled, rowed, sailed, motored, or drawn by some clever pulley arrangement across the inky Styx. Such efficient methods—by above-ground standards—were worthless squanderings of resources in this strange underground world with a surfeit of labor…and time.
No, Charon’s ferry did not trifle with the conventional methods of its above-ground brothers who labored in the light of the sun. Instead, before it, harnessed in buddy pairs that stretched off into the low-lying fog where hot air met cold water, swam combat swimmers doomed to course the ice-water currents of the Styx for eternity.
In the lead traces stroked the swimmers used by Alexander to attack Tyre. Next came Beowulf and Breca, who had each fought bloody swimming battles of epic proportions. They were followed by an assortment of frogmen—French Nageurs de Combat, Italian Incusori, German Kampfschwimmers, British Royal Marines and Clearance Divers, Norwegian Marinejaegers, Japanese Fukuryu, and the older Ninja—all these warriors strained in their harnesses as clouds of vapor steamed from their mouths and nostrils. No pining, graceful Leanders here, but bruising, powerful hulks with the glazed look of the near drowned. Their common sin had been to turn a harmless pastime into a lethal occupation. And so, the punishment was made to fit the crime.
A fiendish joke caused a strange reverse evolution to work on them. They now shared a single physical trait; each had webbed feet. Among the living they had left the land to fight in or below the sea. Now their degeneration was complete and they could never again live normally on land. Their reverse evolution had stopped at this point, however. They could not develop thicker skins, and so the icy water kept them in neck-tensing discomfort just short of numbness. Their swimming would continue as long as there were doomed souls to transport from the world above. Simply, in Charon’s traces there can be no rest or peace.
PART V
CHAPTER 20
The La Pérouse Straits, like the Nemuro Straits, were shared by Japan and Russia. Commander Cho had told me that he suspected that Russian sonar modules dotted the straits. These devices served to detect ships and submarines entering the Sea of Okhotsk.
As we approached the straits, he submerged the sub and shadowed an old merchant steamer closely. The resulting irregular sonar signature, he hoped, would confuse the Soviet sonar men. He banked on the fact that the shallow water of the straits, where such devices were notoriously unreliable, would cause watch standers to ignore confusing signals. Where confusion set in, any explanation, such as shallow water distortion, would be readily accepted. Anyway, the steamer was easily visible and obviously harmless.
Twice after we passed through the straits, the sub’s klaxon sounded, sending the boat’s crew once more to emergency diving stations. We were now snorkeling only at night and chugging along submerged at a feeble six knots. Sometimes during the long submerged periods, the air grew so foul, members of the crew couldn’t keep their cigarettes lit. Condensation within the hull left everything soggy and lifeless.
One evening, Chamonix whisked by me in a passageway. “We’re in Ivan’s backyard now,” the legionnaire pronounced somberly. “No turning back from here on out. God have mercy.”
The night of the launch arrived at last. Mid-March in Siberia—it could have been worse. I had trouble visualizing how.
I kissed Keiko good-bye in the stateroom. Those big liquid black eyes held me immobile for a moment. The distance between us remained. In view of my slim chances of returning, perhaps this was the best way. I closed the stateroom door carefully. Dravit would watch out for her. “Come back,” had been all she said.
I moved down the darkened passageway and took my place below the after hatch with my eight dry-suited men and a detail of Korean sailors. We crouched on our watertight bundles and waited for the signal that would send us topside for the launch. The meager red lights played lightly across pale faces with the faint sheen of tension.
The ship’s head was getting a good deal of traffic. No matter how you tried to tough it out, your body always betrayed you.
Gurung came back from a trip down the ladder glistening with sweat. He collapsed on one bundle and I caught the odor of vomit. The boat was caught in a series of slow, hesitating rolls. The wave action and the mental strain had combined to make him seasick.
The Gurkha was hard and steadfast. He never groused, and grousing was to be expected. I often sensed he did not always understand all that was going on around him, and yet that did not seem to bother him. From time to time I’d pull him aside and quiz him. His responses indicated he fully comprehended all of the military aspects of our project. In essence, he functioned on an intuitive level. He sensed where to focus his attention during each evolution and in whom to place his trust. You couldn’t help but admire our steady Nepalese hill man. He was like one of those epic warriors who were always wandering into mythical lands where the earthly rules did not apply. They invariably prevailed by courage and determination alone. Submarines were as far as you could get from the peaks of the Himalayas, and you could tell he was proud of his stoic ability to trudge into the fantastic and unknown.
Chief Puckins gagged. Then the freckled Texan hiccuped. He hiccuped again. And again. And again. Everyone’s eyes were on Puckins.
He hiccuped loudly and something white and round popped from his mouth. As he wiped the front of his face with a towel, the object bounced to the floor. He closed his mouth and with a hiccup another white object became visible. He wiped his mouth again.
“Wass going on?” Alvarez said with a befuddled look. The husky Cuban picked up the white object and examined it hesitantly. You had to be very careful these days. Alvarez was the group’s skeptic.
Soon the passageway was awash with bouncing white objects.
“I told you not to eat those Ping-Pong balls so close to a launch,” Wickersham said reprovingly as he flexed his neck from side to side. “You know this always happens when you mix paddles and Ping-Pong balls at supper. The paddles get frisky and start serving the balls out. I wish you’d stick to pachinko. At least the balls stay in the machine.”
“Aw, perdition (hic). Cut me some slack, Wick.” He made a moue. “Don’t start with me. You know how I get. Ain’t some of these fellas got enough to think about
?”
Gurung, with as much dignity as he could muster, rushed down the ladder to the head again.
I was in a deep depression. It was always the same dark, irritable depression that accompanied me into action. This black mood was upholstered in equal parts of self-doubt and dark recrimination. Was all this the result of my personal madness or was it simply vanity?
This was the deep, very private gloom reserved for leaders. It was the special reserve of those madmen who went out looking for trouble, those idiots who designed nearly attainable missions and executed them themselves. Only a few military leaders experienced this special torment. Others were passively drawn into battle, responding to directives and reacting to threats. Not you. In special operations, the initiative, the organizing, and the execution were often all rolled into one. You sought out trouble spots, generated your own proposals for authorization, and bore the heavy burden of the power of life and death alone.
The mood came before every evolution where I might lose a man. It was like this before every night parachute jump, before every night ship attack, before open boat passages, before assaults up a sheer rock cliff, before every hazardous engagement.
I kneaded my right shoulder. It was throbbing again.
What made me so foolhardy? Who was I to think I could pull this off? Very likely we would all be dead by this time next week.
It was always eerie to be able to see the future in such stark alternatives and be able to set your watch by them. In a week we would all be alive or we would all be dead. Would my name be the last name cursed on one of my own men’s lips? With black humor I wondered if perhaps I had been selected to rid the world of its dangerous, violent, overeager people. People who loved rough sports, danger, and a bizarre camaraderie.
As always, I would persevere and see it through. I was driven to make sense out of nonsense. I was haunted by the need to see that good men were not wasted on mediocre causes and enterprises. I burned with the desire to forcibly turn past experiences in personal pain, discomfort, and courage into something worthy of the price. I would take every ordeal, humiliation, and hardship that we had suffered collectively to end up where we now crouched, and make it worth something. Let something else take that away from us. I would not turn back. They wouldn’t.
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