He crouched on the hull of the Proteus, next to the underwater salvage chief from the Karpaty, a man he had trained with for the past three months, Lev Balan. Beyond them, the hydroplanes and the rudder were being patched. The force of the seawater against their damaged, thin steel skins as the Proteus moved on after being hit by both torpedoes had begun stripping the metal away from the ribbed skeleton of steel beneath. The effect, Ardenyev thought, was like exposing the struts and skeleton of an old biplane, where canvas had been stretched over a wooden frame, and doped. Or one of his old model aeroplanes, the ones that worked on a tightened elastic band. The repairs were crude, but sufficient to prevent further damage, and to make the minimal necessary use of rudder and hydroplanes now possible. The propeller would not be needed, but the evidence of the MIRV torpedo's steel serpents was being removed twenty fathoms down rather than in the submarine pen at Pechenga. The hull around the propeller and even forward of the rudder and hydroplanes was scarred and pocked and buckled by the effect of the whiplash action of the flailing steel cables as they were tightened and enmeshed by the turning of the propeller.
As Ardenyev watched, one length of cable, freed from the prop, drifted down through the light from the arc lamps in slow motion, sliding into the murk beneath the submarine. A slow cloud of silt boiled up, then settled.
"How much longer, Lev?"
"Two, three hours. In another hour we should be able to start attaching the tow lines." Lev Balan was facing him. Within the helmet of the diving suit, his face was vivid with enjoyment and satisfaction. Airlines snaked away behind him, down to the huge portable tanks of air mixture that rested on the ledge near the submarine. "We'll have to come in for a rest before that. Temperature's not comfortable, and my men are tired."
"Okay — you make the decision. Is the docking prop damaged?" Balan shook his head. "What about the ballast tanks?"
"When we get her up to towing depth, we might have to adjust the bags. We" ve repaired one of the tanks, but the others can't be done down here — not if we're sticking to your timetable!" Despite the distortion of the throat-mike; Balan's voice was strong, full of inflection and expression, as if he had learned to adapt his vocal chords to the limitations of underwater communication.
"Okay. Keep up the good work."
"Sorry about your boys."
Ardenyev shrugged helplessly. "Don't they call it operational necessity?"
"Some shits do."
"I'll get the galley operating ready for your men."
Ardenyev registered the drama around him once more. Now that his eyes had adapted completely, the arc lamps threw a glow around the scene, so that figures appeared caught in shafting sunlight, the minute sea life like moths and insects in summer air. He patted Balan on the shoulder, and kicked away back towards the hatch. As he travelled just above the hull with an easy motion of his legs and flippers, a curious sensation of ownership made itself apparent. As if the submarine were, in some part, his own, his prize; and some kind of repayment for the deaths of Kuzin, Nikitin and Shadrin.
When he dropped through the inner hatch again, he passed through the compartments of the huge submarine as a prospective purchaser might have strolled through the rooms of a house that had taken his fancy.
Teplov was waiting for him in the control room. Vanilov was sheepishly awake, and seated at the communications console.
"Message from Murmansk. The admiral wants to talk to you, sir," Teplov informed him. Obscure anger crossed Ardenyev's features.
"Weather and sea state up top?"
"It's no better," Teplov answered, "and then again, it's no worse. Forecast is for a slight increase in wind speed and a consequent slight worsening of sea state. The skipper of the Karpaty is still in favour of waiting the storm out."
"He doesn't have the choice, Viktor. In three hours" time, we'll be on our way home. Very well, let's talk to Murmansk, and endure the admiral's congratulations."
The feeling of possession and ownership had dissipated. The congratulations of the old man in Murmansk would be empty, meaningless. It wasn't about that, not at all. Not praise, not medals, not promotion. Just about the art of the possible, the art of making possible. And he'd done it, and Dolohov's words would make no difference, and would not bring back the dead.
"I see. Thank you, Giles. I'll tell the minister."
Aubrey put down the telephone, nodded to the Foreign Secretary's Private Secretary, and was ushered into the minister's high ceilinged office. Long gold curtains were drawn against the late night, and lamps glowed in the corners of the room and on the Secretary of State's huge mahogany desk. It was a room familiar, yet still evocative, to Aubrey. The Private Secretary, who had been annoyed that Aubrey had paused to take the call from Pyott, and who had also informed him that His Excellency the Soviet Ambassador was waiting in another room — protocol first, last and all the time, Aubrey had remarked to himself, hiding his smile — closed the double doors behind him.
Her Majesty's Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs rose and came forward to take Aubrey's hand. In his features, almost hidden by his tiredness and the strain imposed by events which brought him unpleasantly into collision with the covert realities of the intelligence service, was the omnipresent memory that he had been a junior boy at Aubrey's public school and, though titled and wealthy, had had to fag for the son of a verger who had come from a cathedral preparatory school on a music scholarship. It was as if the politician expected Aubrey, at any moment and with the full effect of surprise, to remind him of the distant past, in company and with the object of humiliation.
"Kenneth. You were delayed?"
"I'm sorry, Minister. I had to take a telephone call from Colonel Pyott. The Nimrod has been picking up signals from the Proteus, as have North Cape Monitoring." The minister looked immediately relieved, and Aubrey was sorry he had chosen an optimistic syntax for what he wished to convey. "Russian signals, I'm afraid," he hurried on. "We can't break the code, but it is evident that the Soviets are in command of the submarine."
"Damnation!" Cunningham offered from the depth of the Chesterfield on which he was sitting. The Foreign Secretary's face dropped into lines of misery.
The PM must be informed at once," he said, returning to his desk. "Find yourself a seat, Kenneth." He waved a hand loosely, and Aubrey perched himself on a Louis Quinze armchair, intricately carved, hideously patterned. Cunningham looked at Aubrey, and shook his head. The Foreign Secretary picked up one of the battery of telephones on his desk, then hesitated before dialling the number. "Is there anything you can suggest, Kenneth? Anything at all?" He put down the receiver, as if to display optimism.
"Minister — I'm sorry that this incident has had to spill over into legitimate diplomacy. I can only recommend that all diplomatic efforts be maintained. There is nothing else we can do. We must press for details, of course, and demand that one of our people in Moscow is in Pechenga when the Proteus docks. He must be allowed immediate access, and there must be every attempt to preserve — by complaint, fuss, bother, noise, whatever you will — to preserve the security of “Leopard”." Aubrey spread his hands on his knees.
"Pechenga?"
"The nearest naval base. Murmansk if you prefer — or wherever?"
"One of your people?"
Cunningham did not reply, but looked towards Aubrey.
"If you wish, Minister," Aubrey answered. "But I would prefer someone rather senior on the embassy staff, and someone legitimate."