A Ravel of Waters

by Geoffery Jenkins

  I stood up and yelled, 'Grohman, pull yourself together! I'm going the way I choose, Trolltunga or no biggest bloody iceberg in the world!'

  Whatever admixture of Scottish, Spanish and Indian blood ran in his veins produced a startling result. 'I warn you, do not take the Trolltunga route!' I wasn't sure any longer about my diagnosis that he was frightened.

  'Get out!' I snapped. 'Keep to your quarters, if you want to be safe. If I find you on the bridge or in any other of the operational areas, I'll put you in irons!'

  He whirled round and almost collided with Tideman coming in with Brockton.

  Brockton said after Grohman had brushed past him, 'That guy looks as if he could frag you, Peter.'

  'I've just axed him.'

  'Make it official, for my part. Put it in the poop sheet.' 'I have already.'

  Then I tossed the Metbrack signal across to Tideman. Brockton read it over his shoulder.

  The reaction from both men startled me. It was as though a shot of adrenalin had passed through their veins. I could almost feel their vibrations.

  'Trolltunga!' Tideman's eyes went very bright. Then, as if seeking to regain control of himself without giving away his feelings, he said casually, 'I had set the computer to our Gough position and Cape destination. Through the automatic pilot it will make the first six alterations for a Great Circle course - all that will have to be changed, in the light of this.'

  Whatever Trolltunga meant to Brockton, the news caught him off-balance. Like Tideman, his cover-up made him over-articulate.

  'Trolltunga, eh? That's the biggest ice baby ever to come out of Antarctica! We located her first in the Weddell Sea from one of the old ESS A satellites way back in 1967, I guess it was. She was born big - a hundred and three kilometres by sixty. That's almost the size of the state of Delaware. And even after all these years of drifting about the Southern Ocean she's still the biggest - fifty-six by twenty-three kilometres, I think it was, the last time we measured her...'

  I stared at him. I'd had my showdown with Grohman. He was bad news. These two were good news; on my side. However, I had finally to penetrate their cover. They had a lot of explaining to do. Ordinary yachting journalists cannot usually handle highly sophisticated electronics and discuss the dimensions and origin of the world's largest iceberg at the drop of a signal, so to speak. Nor do they ordinarily lapse into Navy jargon when their guard is down. And what was Trolltunga to Tideman? Like icebergs, five-sixths of the truth about them was concealed.

  I went on matter of factly, 'Jetwind will follow the same route as Albatros. Briefly, I'm taking her eastnortheast until I cross the fifty-degree south line a little short of forty west. From there on there's a one-knot current in our favour -1 discovered it in Albatros - and we can count on a westerly or southwesterly gale almost continuously. We'll intersect the Trolltunga ice danger zone about six hundred miles southwest of Gough. After Gough it will be a straight run to the finishing tape at the Cape.'

  It was as if what I had just said had erased the strain of his long stint of duty from Tideman's face. He made a great effort to be non-committal.

  'How many days have we scheduled to make Gough?'

  'About six and a half - as of now.'

  'Good, he said, half to himself. 'That's very good, Peter.'

  Brockton said obliquely, using a similar satisfied tone as Tideman, 'By the time you got to the Trolltunga area in Albatros you must have been pretty short on sleep, Peter.'

  I wondered what he was driving at. 'I was.'

  He laughed, a kind of tell-me-all-pal laugh. 'Just the sort of time-lapse when lone sailors get tired enough to hallucinate and see their mother-in-law climbing up the mast, or even spot an imaginary aircraft flying overhead?'

  He had given me the opening I was looking for.

  'Sit down,' I said, 'Both of you have a lot of explaining to do.'

  I picked on Brockton first.

  'Paul’1 said. 'I'm ready to tell you about my hallucinations. In return, you tell me who you really are.'

  'What do you mean?'

  'You know perfectly well what I mean. First, however, I want you both to know that I realize you're on my side. You're no yachting magazine writer, Paul. No journalist could possibly have handled all that sophisticated equipment the way you did.'

  'The America Cup trials...' he started.

  'Cut it out,' I replied impatiently. 'I don't believe it. You don't act like a reporter and you don't talk like a reporter. You haven't written or filed a single story since you boarded Albatros. Even in Knysna you were much more interested in my so-called hallucinations than in reportage. Now you've given yourself away again. You discuss Trolltunga like an expert. Not many have ever heard of Trolltunga except a few scientists or weather-men. But you're able to give chapter and verse about the world's biggest iceberg. Your detailed knowledge of the Southern Ocean is, to say the least, phenomenal.'

  A journalist has to know his beat.'

  'Rubbish, Paul! Journalists usually have no more than a working knowledge of their subjects. As a group they lack in-depth knowledge. Not you, though.'

  'So what?'

  'You maintain the act fairly well normally but when the pressure mounts you give yourself away. If you want to know, you've something to do with the US Navy.'

  He stood up and held out his hand. 'You win, fellah. I am a Navy man. Commander Paul Brockton. Glad to meet you, Peter.'

  'That makes two naval men, Paul,' said Tideman.

  'Thanks for coming clean, Paul,' I added. 'And now may I ask what is your function in these waters?'

  'What I'm going to tell you is so classified that it could cost a man his life, if he talked.'

  'You have my word.' Tideman nodded his agreement.

  'Ever heard of Lajes?' he asked.

  The name had a familiar ring. Before I could crystallize my thoughts, however, Tideman said, 'The American Atlantic base, on the island of Teceira in the Azores.'

  'Correct.'

  'Where does Lajes connect wtih Jetwind and the Southern Ocean? The Azores are thousands of miles away.'

  'I'll come to that,' answered Brockton. 'Near the main base at Lajes is a village named Agualva. It's so small that 1 guess the hundred men of my command doubled its population overnight. Back at Atlantic Fleet Command HQ in Norfolk, Virginia, my men are rated officially as Naval Securities Group Activities.'

  'Go on.'

  'We operate what is called a high frequency direction finding facility. In plain language, we monitor the movements of Soviet vessels in the Atlantic, subs in particular. We fly regular missions using Orion T-3S way out across the Central Atlantic Ridge and drop sonar buoys. These relay the sound of ships' engines to listeners at the Agualva tracking station. We also use other methods which the Reds would give their eye-teeth to know.'

  'In short, you spy on the Soviet Fleet,' I said.

  He nodded, but Tideman interrupted. 'You're not telling us much that's new, Paul. All this is pretty well known. It's also known that Lajes provides staging and logistic support for the U.S. Sixth Fleet. Lajes was very much in the headlines a while back when a lease agreement with Portugal regarding the base was renewed.'

  Brockton went on, 'It was also in the headlines when the Russians claimed to have discovered the site of the legendary Atlantis not so far from Lajes. You may have seen a guy called Dr Andrei Aksenov on TV announcing the news to the world. We on Lajes itself knew different. The Reds are so determined to find out about our methods that they hatched up the Atlantis story as a cover to spy on Lajes.'

  'Paul - all I can say is that you are a helluva long way from base aboard Jetwind. That's what I am primarily interested in.'

  He dropped his voice, as if fearful he might be overheard. 'Recently, I and about twenty guys from Naval Securities Group Activities set up a secret listening base on Tristan da Cunha.'

  'Now we're getting closer!' I exclaimed.

  'Yeah,' he replied. 'Tristan is only two hundred and thirty nautical
miles from Gough Island - and Jetwind is on her way to Gough.'

  'We'll be there in less than a week if we keep our present speed,' added Tideman.

  'What made your group move to Tristan?' I asked.

  'There was an impressive build-up of Red signals emanating from this area,' replied Brockton thoughtfully. 'We haven't yet been able to pinpoint the source.'

  'You can't fly those big Orions from Tristan,' I said. 'No airfield can take a plane like that anywhere between the Cape and South America.'

  'There is one, but it's a powerful long way away, answered Brockton. 'On Ascension Island. There's a big airfield there which was built during the war.'

  'I'd say Tristan itself is a flight of close on two thousand miles from Ascension,' remarked Tideman.

  'This build-up of signals...' Brockton resumed.

  'Naval signals?' I interrupted.

  'Aye,' he said, grimly. 'Naval signals. NAVWAG has 'em all on tape ...'

  'What's NAVWAG?' I queried.

  'Navy Underwater Sound Reference Laboratory. To try and track the origin of the signals, the Navy fitted an Orion with special electronic gear — everything the latest, the most top secret. We filled her up with gas until it ran out of her wing tips. Every man aboard was a specialist -twelve of them. It constituted a top secret maximum range search, acoustic intelligence. And when I say maximum range, I mean maximum range. The Orion could stay airborne for eighteen hours, maybe even a little more. I myself spoke to the pilot. Captain Bill Werner, as the plane passed over Tristan. He gave me the okay - no problems. The Orion kept going. It entered the Southern Ocean Air-Launched Acoustical Reconnaissance Zone SSI...'

  'What in hell's that?' I demanded.

  Brockton was speaking fast and became agitated. 'That's the secret zone where we suspected a Red concentration. Werner ran into bad weather but he wasn't worried. An Orion is built to stand up to that sort of thing.'

  As if to emphasize what he was saying, Jetwind gave a sudden pitch. I heard the crash of tons of water sluice along her deck.

  'Then?'

  'The plane's last position was about six hundred nautical miles southsouthwest of Gough, about eight hundred and fifty from Tristan.'

  Brockton paused. The only sound was Jetwind shrugging off the waves.

  I knew what was coming.

  "The Orion vanished.'

  ' Just like that?' Tideman asked.

  Brockton held my eyes.

  'No, it wasn't just like that. We happen to have a taped in-flight recording of the Orion's last moments.' 'Was there a Mayday signal?'

  'No Mayday. No time for it. I guess a missile got her.' There was a long silence. Brockton leaned towards me. It was an accusing pose. 'Missile?' I repeated. 'I'm asking you, Peter.' 'How should I know?'

  He replied, choosing his words carefully, 'It's almost a month ago - doesn't that mean anything to you, Peter?'

  'Should it? I was at sea in Albatros. I wasn't in touch with the daily news.'

  'This story didn't reach the newspapers,' he said grimly, 'Never will, while Group Securities has any say.'

  'Why ask me, then?'

  'The time, the place, the distance - they're all right,' 'I don't follow.' But I did.

  'Just before Werner went in, he had located a target with his Searchwater radar, Searchwater is newer than tomorrow's dawn. Werner went down to look. Very low, under the cloud. He made a visual sighting. He reported a yacht, moving fast, under full sail.'

  Tideman was staring at me now.

  'So what? Some of the yachts in the Cape-Uruguay race returned from South America via Gough.'

  'It wasn't an ordinary yacht, Peter. I've studied Werner's last words until I know 'em by heart. This is what he said: "They're not ordinary sails . .. they're sails with slits in 'em... looks like a kinda Venetian blind the wrong way up"..,'

  The seas reverberated along Jetwind's hull.

  'Well, Peter? There's only one boat afloat that tallies with that description - Albatros.’

  There was another long silence. Jetwind's hull was starting to creak. I averted my eyes from Brockton'saccusing stare to the ship's speed repeater. The needle was nudging twenty knots.

  'Albatros?’ Brockton prompted.

  I didn't reply directly. 'Did the pilot say what conditions were like?'

  'Yeah, like I said, I know every word Werner said: "The whole ocean's like a vast Shivering Liz pudding made of icebergs - it's all steaming with mist and fog."'

  Still I stalled. 'Shivering Liz?'

  'It's a Navy phrase,' Brockton explained, still searching my face. 'Sort of gelatine pudding.'

  'That's not a bad description,' I conceded. 'That's the way it was, Paul. All Shivering Liz.'

  'I didn't ask about weather conditions,' he said.

  'I saw the plane go in,' I answered. He gave a satisfied little sigh. 'Yet the weather and sea conditions are important to my story, Paul. It was like a dream, like the sort of hallucination you keep quizzing me about. I thought I was hallucinating. There couldn't be a plane, not there, I told myself at the time. It was thousands of miles from anywhere. There was ice all around. Mist. The sea was steaming. I couldn't distinguish what was ice and what was perhaps dream.'

  'Bill Werner's Orion wasn't downed by a dream,' he retorted.

  For a moment I relived that morning on the edge of sanity - that morning of the Shivering Liz ocean.

  'The Orion was starting to circle - he must have spotted Albatros. Then a vapour trail sprang up out of the sea, from somewhere amongst the bergs. I remember how the missile's vapour trail ducked and weaved and then homed in on the plane. It hit a starboard inboard engine.'

  Brockton nodded and repeated from the tape,' "Captain! Captain! There! Starboard! Coming up out of the sea!"' Hammering the point home, he asked, 'And then?'

  'There was nothing.'

  'Nothing? You must have seen the plane crash.'

  'As I said before, I thought I was hallucinating. The

  plane, the missile - everything - was swallowed up by the mist and the bergs. I saw nothing, heard nothing.'

  'You must have heard the noise of the crash or the explosion of the missile.'

  'I repeat, there was no sound. The gale must have blown it away.'

  'You didn't search for survivors?' 'You don't put a yacht about in that kind of sea to look for a figment of your imagination.' 'Albatros kept going?'

  'I was clear of the thick ice by afternoon. At the time I thought it was my mind which had begun to clear. Yes, I kept going - hard.'

  Tideman interrupted, with a curious intonation in his question. 'Where did all this take place, Peter?'

  'I don't know. I hadn't had a position sight for days because of the storm. Night and day merged. I managed to obtain a radio fix from Gough a couple of days after the incident.'

  Brockton persisted. 'Why didn't you report the Orion affair?'

  'To whom? How did I know whose plane it was when I didn't even know whether I'd seen one? Imagine if I had radioed a report like that. The isolation has sent him round the bend, they'd have said. Rightly, under the circumstances.'

  Brockton jumped up. 'If only you had! We would have picked up the message on Tristan - we were monitoring every wavelength! We could have nailed the bastard who did it! Now it's too late! Where did that missile come from, Peter?’

  'Everything was shadowy and insubstantial,' I replied. 'I'm still not sure whether I saw it happen or not.'

  'It happened all right,' Brockton retorted. 'That lost Orion and her crew were not a shadow.'

  'Why,' I asked, 'if the Orion was in fact shot down by a Red missile, should there be any Russian naval interest in those waters - the area Jetwind is now heading for? It's utterly and totally unfrequented. The last ship recorded before Albatros was a British survey vessel which visited the South Sandwich Islands sixteen years earlier. And the South Sandwich group is a hell of a way south from where the Orion crashed’

  Brockton's reaction surprised me. He rounde
d on Tideman. There was steel in his voice. 'John, you've done a hell of a lot of close listening. You haven't spoken much. I said earlier, a man could die for what he has heard in this cabin today. I don't buy your Royal Navy Adventure School story. The Royal Navy doesn't send its officers and men on pleasure cruises on yachts round the world just for them to catch a suntan. By your own admission, you've been three times round the Horn. You've also got some tough cookies here with you in Jetwind. You're not aboard Jetwind simply in order to sky-shoot your reputation as a sailor. What's the name of your game?'

  Chapter 18

  Tideman reached into a pocket and threw on the desk what looked like a metal-cased slide-rule.

  'As you say, Paul, men could die for what they heard in this cabin today.'

  He leaned forward and fiddled with the instrument. The brass casing snapped open on a spring. A steel blade nearly the length of a man's hand shot out. Tideman clinched the brass casing between his fingers. Now it doubled as a handle for a hellish weapon. He smiled at me, a microwave smile that had no warmth in it.

  'Like your plane crash, it makes no sound,' he said.

  He addressed Brockton. 'Sound, or the lack of sound, is the name of my game. A yacht makes no sound. It hasn't any engines to be picked up by a sonar buoy, or by any other electronic marvel you drop from an Orion. Even with every latest listening gadget you can't hear a yacht off Cape Horn from under the water.'

  Brockton said, 'I think I get it.'

  'I don't,' I interjected sharply.

  Tideman gestured at Brockton. 'We're in the same game. Our approach is different. Paul uses the latest sophisticated electronic techniques; I use man's oldest friend, the sail.'

  'Tracking ... what?'