Paul Spriggs frowned. He’d attended the pre-patrol briefing in the Northwood headquarters of Flag Officer Submarines, along with the captain and the first lieutenant; that briefing had certainly put them playing ‘blue’ (NATO) first, but by midweek they were due to switch to ‘orange’ (enemy). There’d been no mention of their going ‘unlisted’. That meant some sort of secret mission, usually intelligence gathering deep inside Soviet waters.
‘Will you be briefing us on that, sir?’ he asked edgily.
Hitchens felt his face begin to flush. They were staring at him.
‘Yes, WEO. In due course,’ he answered curtly.
He stepped into the sound room adjoining the control room. Cordell, the tactics and sonar officer, was listening intently on headphones. Three ratings sat at panels controlling glowing green video displays. Here, the myriad sounds of the deep detected by hydrophones spread round the bulbous bows were translated into vertical patterns and gradations of light, unintelligible to the uninitiated. One of the ratings stood up from his seat and crossed to a cabinet to change the laser disc on which every sound detected was recorded in digital code.
‘Got a hiccup with sonar 2026, sir.’
Lieutenant Sebastian Cordell had removed his headphones.
‘Processor’s gone barmy. The CPO’s going to change a board, see if that cures it.’
The 2026 was the processor for the second sonar array, a yellow plastic tube over a hundred metres long, filled with hydrophones, towed a thousand metres behind the submarine. The computer for analysing the sounds it detected was highly sophisticated, and had developed a fault.
‘How’s that fisherman doing? Still tracking it?’
The possibility of the trawl net slipping like a sheath over the nose of the boat haunted Hitchens.
‘We think she’s passing clear astern, sir. Shouldn’t be any risk of fouling now.’
‘Thank God. You’ll keep me informed on the 2026? I want a report on it.’
‘Of course, sir.’
People seemed to be staring at him. He’d keep moving; didn’t want them reading his face to see what he was thinking.
He passed back through the control room, heading aft, telling the officer of the watch he was making his rounds.
He sensed a conspiracy around him. Of silence. They knew about Sara!
They’d heard gossip ashore. Must’ve done. In the pubs. Perhaps some had even heard that sod of a chief petty officer boasting about how he’d screwed the captain’s wife!
How would he have described it? Bonking? Poking?
Anger made his head swim. He put out a hand to steady himself as he made his way to the tunnel that crossed the top of the reactor to the machinery spaces beyond.
When the penny had dropped just a week ago, it was like a blow to the stomach. He’d taken Simon, home for the weekend, shopping in Plymouth for construction kits to take back to school.
Strolling down Market Avenue, Philip had vaguely recognized CPO Terry from years before. He’d remembered the face, but not the name — until Simon called out, ‘Hi Reg!’ He’d sounded so pleased. The CPO had grinned at Simon, then glanced uncomfortably at Philip.
Surprised the boy should know Terry, it had been a minute or two before he’d asked about it.
‘Just someone I know…’ had been Simon’s reply.
He’d felt panicky, suddenly aware how little he knew about his son’s life. The boy was away at boarding school for most of the year, and when he was home for the holidays, Philip was more often than not away at sea. But why should he know Reg Terry?
He’d pressed him to say where they’d met.
‘At home. He used to come and see us sometimes, me and Mummy.’
A door had suddenly opened into a world he knew nothing about.
Philip reached the airlock and turned the bar-bell handle that withdrew the heavy bolts securing the outer door. He was almost exactly in the middle of the submarine, forty metres from the dome of the bow-sonar, forty more from the end of the cowl that housed the silent propulsor at the stern.
He closed the outer door behind him and opened the inner one. He was now standing on top of the reactor. Beneath his feet the controlled uranium reaction generated enough power to serve a town of 50,000 people, the potential of the nuclear radiation to destroy his body cells held back by thick lead shielding.
There was no sound from the thousands of gallons of water being boiled into high-pressure steam below him. Millions of pounds had been spent on research into silencing the powerful pumps that circulated the cooling water through the reactor core, pumps whose reliability was essential to the life of the submarine.
He passed through into caverns packed with the machinery that drove his boat and generated the megawatts needed for its electrical systems.
Those who saw Philip greeted him smartly. The work of the men ‘back aft’, essential to the silent operation of the boat, was not considered as ‘macho’ as that of the weapon crews ‘forrard’. Philip was conscious some COs tended to ignore the mechanical end of the boat, which was physically separated from the forward section by the reactor compartment. They may not like him, but he wouldn’t be guilty of that.
Did these men know about Sara? What if they did? He must act normally, show no sign of weakness. His authority mustn’t be questioned.
In the officers’ quarters forward, Lieutenant Commander Paul Spriggs had returned to the cramped cabin he shared with the wiry first lieutenant, Lieutenant Commander Tim Pike. The first lieutenant was second in command — the executive officer and ‘general manager’ of the boat.
‘Tim, at the ops briefing at Northwood…,’ Spriggs began.
‘Mmmm?’ Pike put down the nuclear propulsion manual he’d been studying for forthcoming promotion exams. ‘What of it?’
‘They said “free play”, didn’t they? Defined areas of sea, but we can do whatever we like within them?’
‘Well, they didn’t say we couldn’t. But it’s supposed to be a fast transit up to the Lofotens.’
‘Yea, but if the opportunity’s there, it’s okay. That’s what I said to the old man, but the silly sod jumped down my throat.’
‘What? Our own dear warm-hearted Captain? You astonish me.’
‘He was really narked. Then he went stomping off on an inspection.’
‘Must be that time of the month. Mind you, they could have said something different to him afterwards. He had another session with FOSM later.’
‘Did he? I didn’t know. That fits what he said, that we’re going unlisted.’
‘Unlisted?’ Pike frowned.
‘You didn’t know either?’
‘He… er, hasn’t seen fit to brief me yet.’
‘Bloody hell, Tim! You’re his second-in-command!’
Pike smoothed the ginger stubble he called a beard, his pale grey eyes betraying the wounded pride that came from being deputy to a man who trusted no one.
‘I’m sure he’ll tell us “in due course”, Paul.’
‘ “At the right time”, you mean.’
‘ “When we need to know”.’
‘You’ve been reading the rule book again!’
Pike shrugged. ‘I’ve been through this before with Hitchens. Made an issue of it once. Wasn’t worth it. He went out of his way to be bloody to me for weeks afterwards.’
‘You don’t surprise me. But tell me: you’ve worked with him longer than I have — how do you rate him as a skipper?’
‘He knows his stuff. And he’s the one with the most gold stripes. That’s what matters when the chips are down. If I had a run-in with him, the men with scrambled egg on their hats would back him up to the hilt. They’d drop me like a lump of shit!’