Operation Destruct

by Christopher Nicole

  “And this message indicates that he was ready to come home.”

  “Far more than that, my dear Jonathan. In the first place, here we have Katorzin, one of the very top Russian marine biologists, putting to sea in a trawler. We have learned that the Ludmilla sailed from Sevastopol three weeks ago, and our message was received six weeks ago. So this was no chance voyage for Katorzin, but a carefully planned venture. In the second place, Katorzin, important as he had made himself, had still achieved only the position of chief assistant to the head of the entire project, Anna Cantelna. Perhaps you have heard the name?”

  “Madam Cantelna received a Nobel Prize four years ago.”

  “Correct. Now there is a really important biologist. Yet it seems quite probable that she was also a member of this unusual expedition; certainly all our efforts over the past month have failed to locate her either in Leningrad or in her own laboratory on the Black Sea coast. So we read Katorzin’s message to mean that he was not merely intending to jump ship at a convenient moment. He was planning to bring the Ludmilla and her cargo, and her crew, and possibly Madam Cantelna as well, into a British port. A British naval dockyard, no less, where there would be no question of their getting out again until we were ready. It would have caused a diplomatic row, certainly, but he must have figured he had information worth some nasty exchanges between Moscow and London, and, of course, although we would have had to repatriate ship and crew in due course, by the time that happened we would have learned whatever there was to learn about it.

  “Now presumably his plan would have been to take over the ship on the night she was nearest the English coast. The middle watch, from midnight to 4 a.m., would have been the best time for him to act, and as a matter of fact, my naval experts tell me that the trawler was about four hours away from Portland when she struck.”

  “Then it seems likely he was attempting to take control, there was a fight, and the ship went off course.”

  “That is possible. Unfortunately, the Ludmilla was apparently steering on a collision course for Guernsey for at least half an hour before she struck. I would say she was deliberately wrecked.”

  “And you want me to find out if Katorzin’s body is among the eleven washed ashore.”

  “That is one thing I do not want you to attempt to find out, Jonathan. There must be absolutely no link between Katorzin and the British Government. Heaven forbid! We were prepared to accept him as a defector who found it necessary to commit piracy in order to get away, but it could become very unpleasant if anyone were even to suggest that a British agent has been responsible for sinking a Russian ship, and with a loss of eleven lives. No, I have here a plane ticket to Guernsey, and a booking at what I am assured is a very comfortable and reasonably cheap guest house, conveniently situated for the beaches on the west coast of the island. You are a tourist, Jonathan. A bit earlier than normal, as you point out, but still a tourist. I want you to be as touristy as you know how, and I want you to indulge in your favorite sport of skin diving. I understand it is a popular pastime in the Channel Islands. One more enthusiastic spear fisherman should make very little difference to the local scene.”

  “It would help if I knew what sort of fish I’m going to spear.”

  “And I wish I could tell you, my dear boy. I only know, or at least I am reasonably certain, that the Ludmilla is no ordinary trawler. I want you to find out just what she is. This, incidentally, brings us to the only difficult part of the operation. As I told you, the Soviet Embassy had to be informed of the, er, catastrophe. Now they cannot possibly suggest there are salvage possibilities, as the ship is at the bottom of the sea. They are, however, flying over a team of investigators, who certainly have divers with them. Luckily, our Russian friends have not yet arrived on the scene, and will hardly do so before Monday, which is one reason for our haste. As they have no reason, so far as we know, to suspect Katorzin of double dealing, very possibly they lack our sense of urgency in the matter. So you should be able to beat them to the punch. You will be in Guernsey by ten-thirty tomorrow morning, and as it will be a Sunday you should have no difficulty in securing the use of a fishing boat for the afternoon.” He threw his cigar over the railing. “I think we could go back to the pub. The evening is becoming quite chilly. Your objective is whatever the Ludmilla was carrying in her hold. I think we may discount any possibility of its being fishing tackle. On the other hand, if, as I feel sure, she was on a scientific mission, it is possible that her equipment may include material of a dangerous nature, whether poisonous or radioactive. So I think I should warn you to take extreme care.”

  “On the other hand, if the trawler did batter herself to pieces on the rocks, and she was carrying anything calculated to affect fish, I may not have to dive at all.”

  “I’m afraid a personal inspection of the wreck is a prerequisite of the assignment, Jonathan. I gather you are not tremendously keen.”

  “I’m an amateur, Mr. Craufurd. From what you tell me, the Ludmilla lies a fair way out, and there are six-knot tides around the Channel Islands.”

  “I’m afraid she does lie a fair way out. Believe me, Jonathan, I am aware of the difficulties of the situation. It would also pay for you to keep an eye on the human element. As I said, the Russians have a man on the spot. Now of course he is an Embassy official, and as such will be as anxious to keep out of trouble as you will be, and certainly he has no legal right to prevent your diving to the wreck, if you wish to. But undoubtedly this fellow, or perhaps even these fellows, will be interested in your activities, once they commence.”

  “I’ll keep them in mind, as you suggest.”

  “But only in mind, if you please, Jonathan. I must be absolutely specific about this. You are traveling to Guernsey as a private individual. For the reasons I have given you there must be no link between my department and the Ludmilla. If you get yourself into trouble, get yourself out again. And incidentally, no weapons.”

  “You’re out of touch, Mr. Craufurd. When your number is 84, you don’t get issued weapons. So I discover what the Ludmilla carried in her hold, and come home again. I could be back Monday night.”

  “You will stay in Guernsey your full fortnight. I would like you to sound local opinion on the wreck. And, if possible, find out if any of the bodies washed ashore was that of a woman.”

  “Anna Cantelna?”

  “Precisely.”

  “But even if her body hasn’t been recovered, that won’t prove she wasn’t on board, will it? She may be drifting around the English Channel.”

  “I doubt that, Jonathan. As you reminded me there are tremendous tides in the Bay of St. Malo, and my experts tell me that anyone drowned in the Channel Islands always comes ashore in fairly quick time. During your stay in the island, every last person on board that unhappy vessel will be recovered, of that I’m sure.”

  “And Katorzin?”

  Craufurd shrugged. “I imagine his body is already in the morgue. If by chance he is still alive, if for instance he jumped ship at some earlier occasion, he will certainly contact me in due course. If he was on the trawler and is now dead, then our acquaintanceship and his usefulness are both at an end.”

  “And this will be your attitude should I get cramp while crawling about the sea bottom off Guernsey?”

  “My dear boy, you volunteered to join my organization. My talk with you this afternoon has been most enjoyable, and has convinced me that you are a young man with a great future, which you may believe I will do everything in my power to further. But surviving to enjoy that future must be your concern and nobody else’s. Were I to take a personal interest in every one of my operatives I should have gone mad several years ago.”

  “I just like to know where I stand, Mr. Craufurd. There’s one more thing. I’m doing rather well in this tournament, and it, unfortunately, doesn’t end until next Saturday.”

  “Now there is a shame,” Craufurd said. “You will have to lose the remainder of your games by default. It will give our passio
nate young friend something more to talk about. Your flight leaves Gatwick rather early tomorrow morning. I suggest you have a good night’s sleep.”

  Chapter Three

  Jonathan caught the early train to Gatwick, wandered through the huge, empty terminal building, bought himself a cup of coffee and all the Sunday newspapers. Every one carried the story of the wreck of the Ludmilla, although their headlines varied from “ELEVEN DROWNED IN GUERNSEY SEA TRAGEDY” to “GUERNSEY SEA MYSTERY/RUSSIANS FAIL TO EXPLAIN PRESENCE OF TRAWLER IN TERRITORIAL WATERS.”

  The stories beneath the headlines, however, were remarkably alike as to detail, and added nothing to what Craufurd had told him. The Ludmilla had come racing out of the storm and straight into the reefs off the west coast of Guernsey. She had apparently sunk in a matter of seconds, and carried her crew with her. A rubber dinghy had been found drifting upside down in Perelle Bay, but there had been no survivors. Eleven bodies had been recovered, and a spokesman for the Russian Embassy had said this was the normal crew for such a vessel. There was no suggestion as to why the trawler should have been on such a course. The newspapers in the main presumed she had been observing NATO naval exercises, which might have made sense, had there been a single warship in the area.

  Jonathan folded the newspapers and stacked them on the chair beside him, drank some coffee, and tried to analyze his feelings. Exhilaration, certainly, at being at last in the field, but exhilaration tempered by a degree of nervousness. He was not really disturbed at the thought of anything or anyone he might possibly encounter in Guernsey, not even at the prospect of having to dive into the murky and swift-flowing tidal currents that swirl around the Bay of St. Malo; but he was extremely doubtful as to whether or not he would be capable of adding anything to these sensational but essentially uninformed newspaper reports.

  It was a feeling he knew too well. For all his appearance of personal confidence, he was given to these moments of self-doubt. He traced them back to the day his father had decided that if a young man was to achieve anything in this world, he needed a cohesive education and a coherent home background. Before that moment life had been complete, despite the fact that he had never known his mother. They had moved from the Far East to the Middle East to the Caribbean to South America; there had been the excitement of belonging to the diplomatic service; there had been the intimacy of a man and a boy attempting to find their way through a life which, for the man, had suddenly lost much of its reason. Donald Anders had turned more and more to his work. He was a career diplomat. No doubt one day soon he would become Sir Donald Anders, and be a full ambassador. Meanwhile, his son had had to go to school, and that had meant, for most holidays, two maiden aunts. They had been abundantly kind, but Jonathan had always been aware that he was a constant source of anxiety to two ladies who had never intended to undertake the responsibilities of motherhood.

  School had compounded his uncertainty. His very talents had placed him in the spotlight. A useful half miler as well as a soccer player, he had gained first-team colors in both sports; a retentive memory and the advantage of having lived in so many of the places he found himself reading about had earned him consistently high marks in classical subjects. And always there had been chess.

  He supposed a psychiatrist might have a great deal to say about his addiction to this game. At a chess-board, armed with sixteen pieces of wood to be used as he thought best, he was able to allow his imagination and his perceptiveness full scope while always expecting his opponent to tear his game to shreds with a series of unforeseen moves. And, remarkably, as his ability at the game grew, and with it the confidence that he was going to win more often than he lost, his personal uncertainty away from the chessboard had grown. That he had secured entrance to a university had surprised no one more than himself.

  But university had been a breakthrough in more ways than he had thought possible. It had given him the opportunity to play ever more and ever better chess. It had taught him a sense of values. And it had brought him face to face with the problem of what he was going to do with his life. This was a problem he had not yet solved to his own satisfaction. Presumably, for the immediate future, it had been solved for him, by Harold Indman.

  Indman, as he now knew, was a recruiting officer for the various intelligence departments of Her Majesty’s Government. At the time he had seemed nothing more than a man of some importance in the Civil Service, who had been on a visit to the university and, being interested in chess, had been given the varsity top board as an opponent. Just how he went about his real job, how he secured access to the records of the various students and to the opinions held of them by their tutors, remained a mystery. But he had, apparently, found in Jonathan Anders much of what he required in a prospective recruit, the absence of any deep-rooted family background, a degree of doubt as to what career to follow, an introspective, thoughtful, analytical brain, allied to gifts of physical health and muscular coordination, the whole sheltering beneath a political outlook which accepted that Great Britain still had something of importance to offer the world. Indman had induced a feeling of excitement, a suggestion that one day Jonathan Anders might help to make history instead of merely reading about it. “Of course,” he had said, “you do understand there is rather a long training period, during which you will be on probation. You have to be a hundred per cent at everything we think necessary, and you have to go through several security stages, before we could ever risk using you in the field. Don’t expect, er, to make like James Bond in anything under three years.” That had clinched it. He had not been sure whether or not he wanted to be a spy, but three years had seemed a very long time, and in the meantime there had remained the exhilaration, and a very reasonable salary, and a cover in, for him, most congenial surroundings which allowed him the time to pursue both his studies and his hobby.

  He had not seen Indman for eighteen months. Only eighteen months. Of course, Craufurd had been perfectly straightforward and perfectly plausible. This was an observation assignment; his job was to keep his eyes and his ears open for a fortnight, to see what he could learn from and about the wreck of the Ludmilla, to report back to Craufurd when he returned to England. He was going simply because the department was strained for staff. So Craufurd had said. But clearly there was more to it than that. He suspected he was being given another practical examination, in a field where his failure could not greatly affect British security, but where, he was sure, there was something to be learned, were he capable of finding it. Were he ever going to be of any use to the department. Knowing this, of course, gave him a certain advantage. It was like looking at a set position on a chessboard rather than actually playing a game; in a set position one knew there was a series of moves which would win the game. But knowing the moves were there, and finding them, particularly with a time limit, was not always the same thing. He looked at his watch. The flight was overdue.

  “Hi!”

  A pretty blonde girl stood above him. She was tall, slim, and had long golden hair. She did not look any older than he did. Dark glasses protruded from her breast pocket and a Polaroid camera swung from her shoulder. She was smiling at him, but the hazel eyes, set wide apart above an upturned nose, were too solemn.

  Jonathan stood up. “Hi!”

  “I hope you won’t think me fresh,” the girl said. “But I wonder if I could have a look at one of your newspapers.”

  “Help yourself,” Jonathan invited. “American?”

  “Don’t sound so disapproving,” she said. “English?”

  “I’m sorry. I was thinking aloud. One doesn’t expect to meet an American tourist going to Guernsey at this time of the year. You are going to Guernsey?”

  She sat down. “American tourists get around, nowadays, Mr. . . .?”

  “Anders. Jon Anders.”

  “I’m Helen Bridges. I guess you were reading about that shipwreck. Wasn’t it terrible?”

  “It sounds pretty grim. I believe Guernsey is a mass of newspapermen.”

&
nbsp; “I guess it would be. Don’t tell me you’re a journalist?”

  “I’m an out-of-season tourist. Like you.”

  “We always tour out of season. The travel man told us the water would be cold, but it seems you get some pretty good weather in Guernsey, in the spring. And the flowers are something. It’s full of history, you know, Guernsey. It was occupied by the Germans during the last World War. Isn’t that something? The guidebook says there are quite literally hundreds of underground bunkers and fortifications. The whole island is honey-combed. The whole island. Gee. It’s only eight miles long.”

  “By five wide,” Jonathan said. “I’ve been there before.”

  “Have you? Then you know all about it. But I find that German business fascinating. They sure meant to fight for those islands, didn’t they? I mean, they had a whole division of front-line troops stuck there, just waiting for our boys to land. But they never did.”

  “They visited Normandy instead.”

  “That’s right. Say, if you’ve been there, maybe you could tell me what these Channel Islands are. I mean really. They’re British, but they’re not. How’s that?”

  “They’re bailiwicks.”

  “Oh, sure. That takes me a long way.”

  “Well, actually, to say they’re personal possessions of the English crown would be the best way to sum it up. You know, they belonged to William the Conqueror before 1066. They’re the only remaining part of the old Duchy of Normandy. So any self-respecting Guernseyman will tell you that England belongs to Guernsey, and not the other way around. And since then, all the various changes in the British political system have rather passed the Channel Islands by. In Sark the system is still feudal. In Guernsey there is an elected parliament, but no party system. There’s no industrial trouble either, virtually. The atmosphere is really very relaxed.”