' I'll fetch Adele,' I said.
He listened. No, it's Royal. Navy stuff. I'll manage.'
He sat down at the table behind me and switched on the s m a l l l i g h t. I n a m i n u t e o r t w o t h e M o r s e s t o p p e d. I glanced back at Peace over my shoulder. He was sitting, staring silently at the code groups in front of him. For the next ten minutes my whole attention was occupied with keeping Bellatrix on course. It seemed as if we were running into the outer fringes of the cyclone, judging by the violence of some of the gusts and the mounting sea. In a calmer patch I. turned to speak to Peace, but the words died. He sat staring still at the signal, which he seemed to have decoded, his e x p r e s s i o n s o w i t h d r a w n a n d h a r d t h a t I k n e w w h a t h i s anger would be at disturbing him. Another ten minutes went by. I risked another look. Now he was writing something on a signal pad, laboriously consulting his code-books.
Half an hour must have passed before he spoke. "This should satisfy MKG.' He waved the signal.
What does it say?'
' Washington x you have my personal authorization to con- tinue with Little Bear mission as planned x'
His voice was without inflexion. I glanced keenly at him. '
You don't seem very thrilled about it.'
He shrugged. I don't like being strung on to the end of a radio line for every little action I wish to take.' 158
This is not a little action,' I pointed out. MKG's whole future depends on it.'
He grunted, staring at the racing seas.
' Shall I take it through and wake MKG?'
' What the hell for? It'll keep till morning. It doesn't alter anything, anything at all.' He went to the table and gathered up the signals.
Better let Adele check them over,' I said.
For a moment before he clicked out the light his eyes were full upon me. They were not pale like the DNI's, but the cold deadliness was the same.
' I told you, I am quite capable of handling Royal Navy signals,' he said levelly. He brushed past me and stood staring out into the wild night.
' It's Semittante I'm worried about,' he muttered-and by breakfast it was all Semittante as the vast drama of the VicePresident cracked open after Thornton had interviewed Tyler. MKG, shaved and dressed in some of my clothes, looked grave as he stood with Peace, Trevor-Davis, Adele and myself in the wheelhouse. Trevor-Davis, rested, pursed his lips at the sea, which had worked up during the night into long swells on the heels of the fresh north-easterly gale. The driving overcast ceiling seemed no more than a couple of hundred feet as Bellatrix shouldered her way through the greyness. Adele brought us coffee in the dim light which passed for daybreak. Her eyes were on me, sharing our secret of the night. Andre would not be refused the privilege of steering Bellatrix. It did not need Adele to translate that he was in his seventh heaven.
MKG read the President's message with satisfaction when Peace first handed it to him, but when Thornton came on the air within half an hour, he was silent.
Thornton signalled the Chief of Naval Operations:
Tyler interrogated by me personally x endorse his view Marvin K. Green kidnapped x one of the kidnappers using name Geoffrey Peace bracket presume fake since Peace is dead unbracket French freighter Semittante carry- ing deck cargo purporting to be coconut oil processing plant x it is in fact United States classified experimental missile Little Bear x Semittante cleared Mauritius Feb- ruary 3 present whereabouts unknown x Tyler also asserts that Vice-President intends to be launched to Santa Fe Moon Station One in Little Bear from unspecified point Sea of Limuria on unspecified date but presumed within n e x t f e w d a y s x r e p e a t V i c e – P r e s i d e n t i n t e n d s t o b e launched to Santa Fe Moon Station One in Little Bear 159 missile x Commander British submarine Devastation says he unaware all this x have deployed Seventh Fleet into three HUK groups for grid search entire Sea of Limuria x search impeded general cyclone warning x number radar contacts St Brandon reef and neighbouring islets under investigation eyeball check x
MKG said, ' After that, I feel I need a hooker of rye. If it had not been for this message of the President's to me, I'd call it a day so far as Little Bear is concerned. In the light of it, we must go on, but it sure looks as though we're up the creek.'
Peace's face was bleak. Up the creek, certainly, but with two paddles-Semittante and Bellatrix.' He nodded beyond the streaming windows. ' I have a cyclone, I have a wide, wide sea. The sea has always been my friend.'
Up to now we've gotten along just jim-dandy,' MKG mused, but now I wonder..
Peace said briskly, Perhaps the recall signal has already gone out to the Seventh Fleet from the President.' MKG shrugged. Then where is it?'
Peace said, Adele was dead on her feet last night. There was no regular radio watch.'
He looked keenly at Peace. Then what about the President's signal to me?'
I took it,' Peace replied. It was Royal Navy code. I recognized Bellatrix's call-sign'
Perhaps in view of its importance, Adele could check…'
I checked it myself,' he retorted. There's no need.'
In the middle of this, Adele handed Peace a decoded signaclass="underline"
CIC Seventh Fleet to C-in-C British Limuria Command x top secret x where is yacht Bellatrix? x is Peace alive or dead? x where is Garland?
Before he had finished reading it out to us, the reply had come in:
C-in-C British Limuria Command to CIC Seventh Fleet x top secret x Bellatrix sailed February 1 ex Mahe Gar- land in command x believed destination South Africa via Madagascar x Peace is dead x you were there x Peace read it out triumphantly to MKG. Yoh see, Little Bear is still very much on in the Dm's view, and that means he must also have been in touch with the President,' he said. Otherwise he wouldn't have replied in these terms.'
The DNI'S certainly playing it cool,' was MKG's rejoinder. Bellatrix drove on.
By early afternoon there was more encouragement for us.
Thornton, commanding Blue Force, called in his terriers in the face of impossible weather between St Brandon and Chagos. Looking at our driving overcast-we were 600 miles from Blue Force-I marvelled at the intrepidity of the American fliers in staying in the air for as long as they had. Tyler began recalling his dogs, too, as the cyclone marched inexorably towards him. They did not stand a chance of getting within real striking distance of Bellatrix. Green Force, far away to the south, reported ship contacts south and south-west of Mauritius, but one after another they were getting clearance.
What worried MKG, however, was that news of the massive American search was starting to become public. Mauritius Radio, usually at the fag-end of world news, did not realize yet that it would soon be the focal point of world attention. The midday bulletin, put across with amateur fervour, said: Powerful forces of American carrier-based aircraft swept across the harbour of Port Louis at intervals this morning in a south and south-westerly direction. Vessels entering the harbour report that they have been investigated and interrogated by the aircraft. The United States Consul in Mauritius denies all knowlege of the operation. It is, however, presumed that these squadrons are part of the American Seventh Fleet which is nomally based on the Seychelles, and listeners may well ask themselves, for what purpose is this task force so far from its base..
The radio cut as Bellatrix leaned heavily to leeward. She – came back quickly and rolled her starboard side under. For. a moment the screen wipers churned green sea. Above the growl of the wave-punch came the sound of tearing, splintering. Peace and I reached the wheelhouse door together. The luxury wooden gangplank, lashed to the side, cartwheeled and vanished overboard. The starboard boat, torn from its davits, bumped along the deck until it hit the rail aft, poised for a moment, and then disappeared too. Metal stanchions were left twisted and snapped in its wake.