The Good Spy

by Jeffrey Layton

  Captain Borodin turned from the hatch and walked back to the sail.

  He thought of the weld.

  God, please make it hold.

  CHAPTER 76

  DAY 15—MONDAY

  Laura and Nick arrived in the Neva’s central command post at half past midnight. Elena remained aboard the Hercules, guarding Ken.

  The control room’s tight quarters bewildered Laura. The compartment overflowed with mechanical equipment, electrical gear, and electronic consoles. The men stared at her.

  Laura was positive that she looked ghastly: wrinkled blouse, no makeup, and her hair limp and stringy. But maybe it was the dark color of her skin.

  The senior warrant officer stood. He smiled and in practiced English said, “Miss Laura, Captain Borodin tell us you help Yuri save Neva.” His posture stiffened. “On behalf of crew, thank you for our lives.” He barked an order in Russian. The central post staffers stood up, snapped to attention, and in unison saluted Laura.

  She almost cried.

  Captain Borodin escorted Laura and Nick to his compact cabin. Sitting on the edge of the bunk, Laura listened as Orlov and Borodin conversed in their native tongue. More annoyingly, she’d yet to speak with Yuri.

  “So far, our radars haven’t picked up any threat,” offered Borodin. He sat behind his desk. A Canadian chart of the Strait of Georgia covered its surface.

  “That’s encouraging,” Nick said. “Maybe they think it was a hoax.” He occupied the lone guest chair.

  “Let’s hope so. We need a break for once.”

  “Yes, we certainly do.”

  Nick and Borodin remained leery of Ken Newman’s aborted warning to the U.S. Coast Guard—hoping they really had evaded catastrophe. If Nick hadn’t shut down the Hercules’s power, Newman could have stirred up the proverbial hornets’ nest: sub tracking and electronic attack aircraft from NAS Whidbey plus more Canadian air assets from CFB Comox. Borodin employed the Neva’s electronic sensors to sniff out any hint of increased air or sea surveillance in the Southern Strait of Georgia. English-speaking crew monitored all U.S. and Canadian Coast Guard and military frequencies. At the first sign of trouble, the boat would submerge.

  “Will the repairs allow you to head north now?” asked Nick as he shifted position in the chair.

  “They should make a huge difference. But first we’ll need to test the patch on the torpedo tube to make sure it’ll hold.”

  “How will you do that?”

  “Take the boat down in stages—twenty meters at a time. I need a hundred meters capability for operational purposes.”

  “Then we head up to that underwater explosives dump area?” Nick said, pointing to a chart on Borodin’s desk.

  “Yes, we’ll follow submerged, tracking the workboat’s propeller.”

  “The underwater racket it makes?” Nick said.

  “That’s right, but you’ll need to keep your speed down. Five knots max. At that rate we should be able to control the Neva without too much trouble.”

  “When do you plan to get under way?”

  “We should have everything wrapped up in a couple of hours.”

  “Good, that should work.” Nick turned toward Laura. “Captain, can you please arrange for Laura to speak with Yuri?”

  “Of course.”

  * * *

  Laura sat at a vacant console near the aft end of the central post. Assorted gauges and displays, all with Cyrillic markings, made up the bulk of the instrument panel. The built-in vertical computer monitor mounted above the console base displayed a gray screen.

  Laura wore a headset with a voice-activated lip mike. Yuri remained in Compartment Six, still sealed up inside the escape trunk. For the last few minutes, they caught up.

  When Yuri first spoke, his cartoon accent startled Laura. He remained on helium.

  “How’s your leg?” Laura asked.

  “About the same.”

  Even with his squeaky voice, Laura noticed something upsetting but she’d held off until now.

  “You’re coughing a lot. What’s wrong?”

  “I’m a bit parched.”

  “Are you ill?”

  “No, I just need some water.”

  “Why don’t you have water?”

  “There’s no way to open up the trunk until decompression is complete.”

  “How long will that be?”

  “About a day and a half to go.”

  “Another day and a half—without water—and you’ve already been in there a day. That’s awful. There has to be a way to get water inside that chamber.”

  “It’s okay. I’ll be fine.”

  “But you’ll become seriously dehydrated—especially when you start breathing pure oxygen, and that’s not okay.”

  “I can make it.”

  “Tell me how that escape trunk is constructed.”

  Knowing Laura would not drop the subject, Yuri described the basic layout. Laura asked, “Those gas supply lines, you have both air and oxygen, is that right?”

  “Yes, plus diluent—a blend of oxygen and helium.”

  “But right now you’re just using one line, right?”

  “Yes, the diluent. Just what do you have in mind?”

  CHAPTER 77

  “What’s the schedule?” Elena asked.

  “They’re going to make the first test dive in half an hour.”

  Nick and Elena sat at the mess table in the galley.

  “When’s she coming back?” Elena inquired.

  “Soon. Captain Borodin said he’d make sure she departs before they submerge.”

  “What’s she doing?”

  “Trying to get freshwater to Kirov. He’s still locked up inside the escape chamber.”

  Elena processed the news. “They have to be lovers.”

  “I guess, but who knows? They’re both a bit odd if you ask me.”

  “The odd couple—yes, I do agree with that.”

  She broached a subject that both had avoided until now.

  “How do you want to take care of them?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Elena removed a newspaper from the tabletop, exposing the Beretta.

  Nick cringed. “We can’t do that.”

  “They’re security risks.”

  “Her husband—yes, I agree. But not Laura.”

  “She knows too much—the chief said she has to go.”

  “She’s off limits, Elena.”

  “It’s a mistake.”

  “I don’t care. She walks—you got that?”

  Elena said, “All right, we’ll do it your way. But she’ll be here soon. How do we get rid of him with her aboard? Even though she’s divorcing him, she’ll never stand for that.”

  “I’ll take care of it—you just back me up.”

  * * *

  The left side of Ken Newman’s head throbbed. He couldn’t remember much of the evening. He’d been talking with the Coast Guard and then nothing. Hog-tied and dumped onto the deck in Captain Miller’s cabin, Ken had unwillingly exchanged positions with Nick Orlov but with a twist. The rank sock stuffed in his mouth and secured with duct tape would gag a rat.

  * * *

  “Yuri, we’re ready to try it now. Are you set?”

  “Yes, go ahead.”

  Laura turned to the sailor at her side and motioned with her right wrist. They both stood at the base of the aft escape trunk in Compartment Six.

  The rating turned the valve handle mounted on top of a compressed air tank. The valve connected to a high-pressure rubber hose coiled in multiple loops at the base of the tank. The opposite end of the approximate one-inch-diameter hose snaked up the side of the escape trunk ladder and ran along the exterior surface of the trunk, where it terminated at another valve. The ball valve connected to a pipe stub that penetrated the chamber’s steel sidewall. The stub coupled with another valve inside the chamber.

  Laura heard a hiss as air surged into the hose. The hose stiffened under the strain.

&nbs
p; Laura pressed the intercom mike. “Yuri, the line is charged. Try the valve now.”

  “Okay.”

  Yuri kneeled next to the compressed air port. He held one of his rubber boots in his right hand. He cut it away from the ankle of his dive suit. He poised the boot opening next to the valve discharge and cranked the handle with his left hand.

  Nothing.

  He turned the valve farther and compressed air bled into the chamber. He turned it again; more hissing followed by a gurgling for just a second or two. Water spurted from the valve opening and flowed into the boot.

  Yuri couldn’t wait. He dropped to his knees and slurped like a dog.

  * * *

  “Captain, I’m picking up military air communications now,” said the technician sitting at the central post’s communications console.

  “From where?” asked Captain Borodin.

  “From the Whidbey Island naval base—two aircraft. They’ve just gone airborne.”

  “Orions?”

  “Unknown. I heard the controller clear a flight of two for a runway launch.”

  “Training mission, patrol, what?”

  “Unknown, sir. They’re climbing to altitude. The controller vectored them on a northerly heading. Radar should pick ’em up soon if they’re coming our way.”

  Borodin grabbed a microphone from the overhead and activated the Talk switch. “Bridge, command.”

  “Command, bridge,” replied the watch officer from the observation well on top of the sail.

  “Sasha, the Americans may be sending aircraft. Get the deck crew below, close the forward hatch, and clear the bridge for immediate dive.”

  “What about the equipment on deck?”

  “Isn’t it clear yet?”

  “There’s one pump left plus hoses. Everything else has been transferred to the workboat.”

  “Dump it all overboard—but be careful. I don’t want that govnó banging into my hull.”

  “I understand, sir.”

  “Release the moorings to the workboat and radio Orlov that he should head north according to the plan.”

  “What about that woman? She’s still aboard, isn’t she?”

  “Chyort!”

  Borodin forgot about Yuri’s accomplice in Compartment Six.

  A radar watcher at a nearby console called out, “Captain, I’m picking up something.”

  Like most submarines, the Neva was equipped with surface search radar. Because it conducted espionage operations, it also had been fitted with aircraft search radar.

  The air watch technician continued, “I’m tracking a pair of possible hostiles on a heading of three five five degrees, four hundred knots, sixty-three kilometers out.”

  Borodin keyed the microphone. “Bridge, stand by.” He turned to face the radar tech. “What’s the projected course?”

  “Straight for Point Roberts!”

  “Chërt voz’mí!”

  * * *

  The Hercules plodded northward at four knots on autopilot. Nick Orlov and Elena Krestyanova stood outside the wheelhouse on the starboard bridge wing. Ken remained locked up below.

  Nick and Elena peered eastward into the pre-dawn sky, tracking the running lights of two jet aircraft patrolling offshore of Point Roberts.

  Although miles away, the deep-throated roar of the low-flying EA-18G Growlers resonated across the waterway with the intensity of a summer thunderstorm.

  “They’re sure noisy,” commented Elena.

  “Yeah,” agreed Nick as he peered through binoculars.

  “What do you think they’re doing?”

  “Waking up everyone on Point Roberts—that’s for sure.”

  Elena laughed and asked, “Can you see anything?”

  “Just the nav lights.”

  “That must be why the Neva submerged so quickly.”

  “No doubt.”

  Orlov had been astounded at how rapidly the Neva submerged. He’d received an abrupt radio message ordering him to retrieve the fenders and mooring lines, and head northward—nothing more.

  Several minutes after the Neva disappeared, the electronic attack jets from NAS Whidbey roared across the Southern Strait of Georgia at a thousand feet.

  “Do you think they spotted it?” Elena asked.

  “I don’t think so. Otherwise they’d be all over us.”

  “Yeah.”

  Elena watched the distant flashing lights. “It must have been Newman’s radio call.”

  “Probably.”

  * * *

  Like a shark tracking its prey, the Neva followed two hundred meters behind the Hercules. It cruised silently some seventy meters below the sea surface.

  Captain Borodin plopped into his leather-lined chair in the central command post. He retrieved his mug from the gimbaled holder. While he sipped the lukewarm tea, he glanced at an overhead computer monitor displaying the Neva’s position on a digital chart.

  Borodin expected a cascade of calamities: leaks, erratic helm and depth control, and a deaf sonar system. But so far, the repairs held.

  The welded breach door on tube five remained watertight. And although 60 percent of the passive sonar sensors had died, the remaining hydrophones heard just fine now that the hull was off the bottom.

  Borodin settled farther into the chair. He returned the mug to its holder. Although thankful that the starboard reactor continued to function without a glitch, he still worried.

  Should the reactor falter from the fouled seawater cooling system, the Neva would not be able to maintain powered flight for long. The backup batteries would provide about an hour of propulsion. But when they petered out, Captain Borodin would be faced with the ultimate dilemma—should that event transpire during daylight hours. Surfacing deep inside hostile waters to transfer the crew to the Hercules would place the Neva on full view to whoever might be nearby.

  Alternatively, Borodin could allow the Neva to settle back onto the seabed in shallow water and wait for nightfall. The ballast tanks would then be charged with compressed air from the full storage flasks and the submarine would pop to the surface—maybe.

  Captain Borodin planned for both prospects, knowing that each was fraught with its own unique set of hazards.

  He considered Yuri. What would happen to his friend—the Neva’s redeemer—if the crew were forced to abandon ship before he completed his decompression?

  Borodin closed his eyes, not by choice but by need. In just five minutes, he was snoring.

  CHAPTER 78

  The Hercules crept northward for several hours, the autopilot in command. The tedious drone of the diesel seeped through the deck boards, numbing Ken Newman.

  The cabin remained blacked out when the pair entered. Lying facedown, all Ken could see in the diffuse light were shoes—a pair of men’s sneakers and sleek women’s running shoes.

  Ken was now up and moving. The two Russians herded him aft through the main cabin.

  His wrists remained bound behind his back, the sock still crammed inside his mouth. And they’d just blindfolded him. The male gripped Ken’s left bicep. The female followed; perfume marked her.

  Neither of his captors spoke.

  Outside on the main deck, the night air chilled Ken. They steered him to an exterior stairway adjacent to the portside cabin superstructure, where the male ordered him to step up.

  Ken stood on a grated metal landing, still sightless. The male released his grip and stepped away. The female’s scent told him she remained nearby.

  Now what?

  Ken heard a metallic scraping sound behind his back.

  What’s that?

  He felt something at his feet.

  Horror struck in a lightning flash.

  No, this can’t be happening!

  Ken raised his right foot and blasted it backward.

  * * *

  Nick squatted behind Ken to lash a line from the anchor chain to Ken’s ankles, when the boot heel slammed into his crotch. The jolt to his testicles sent him reeling.
<
br />   * * *

  Ken rushed blindly forward, homing in on the scent. He pinned Elena against a bulkhead and head-butted her, inflicting a nasty whack to her forehead.

  The blow partially dislodged Ken’s blindfold, allowing a quick look with his right eye. Elena collapsed to her hands and knees. Nick lay on his side groaning.

  Ken looked for something to sever his bindings.

  Shit!

  He ran into the cabin.

  * * *

  Elena got back on her feet; blood dribbled from a tear to her left brow. She eyed Nick. Still on his right side, he had pulled his legs into the fetal position.

  He’s useless!

  Elena reached into her coat pocket and pulled out the suppressed Beretta.

  * * *

  In the galley, with his hands still bound behind his back, Ken grabbed the carving knife from a countertop receptacle. He shoved his spine against the mess table and sawed the rope. Finally, the rope parted. Ken reached up, pulled down the rest of the blindfold, and then yanked out the gag.

  A nine-millimeter round passed an inch from his head; it splattered into a locker door. Ken dove to the deck as another bullet followed. As he slithered around a corner, he caught a glimpse of the blonde advancing across the cabin. He scrambled into the companionway and charged up the stairs to the pilothouse.

  * * *

  Elena entered the companionway and looked upward. Amber radiance from wheelhouse lighting diffused into the passage.

  * * *

  Ken surveyed the wheelhouse, searching for anything to use as a weapon.

  Shit!

  He heard the telltale creaking of deck boards as the executioner crept up the stairs.

  With no options left, Ken grabbed a pair of lifejackets from a nearby rack. He rushed through the doorway of the starboard bridge wing and leaped overboard.

  CHAPTER 79

  “You sound better,” Laura said. She sat at the escape trunk’s control panel, watching Yuri. A closed circuit television camera inside the chamber broadcast his image to a monitor.

  “I feel much better now . . . how did you think of that?”

  “Piece of cake.”

  “What?”