‘Target’s altered course, sir,’ called Lieutenant Algy Colqhoun. ‘He’s heading for the shelf north of Ostrov Chernyy.’
‘Christ!’ breathed Andrew. ‘The moment of truth! He’s going to bloody give them the mine!’
‘I’ll proceed with the firing sequence?’ Biddle suggested.
‘Yes, but hold the final order,’ Andrew told him.
‘Open bow caps!’ the WEO ordered the weapons compartment crew below.
Andrew looked hard at the Al plot. Truculent was five miles ahead. Too far for the underwater telephone.
‘That Victor’s after us, Peter. Eight miles astern. We’ve not fooled her with our decoy. All we’ve done is given her something loud enough to track.’
‘Dump the decoy!’ Biddle shouted, swinging himself into the bandstand. ‘Let it swim right here!’
He glanced rapidly at the plot.
‘Starboard ten. Steer zero-nine-zero. Standby to fire!’
They were turning away from the decoy, weaving, almost certain the Soviet boat wouldn’t detect them.
So, Philip was going to do it — betray his country — hand over technology that could be ten years ahead of anything the Soviets had.
A Hammerfish torpedo would take just four minutes to reach the Truculent. There was a chance, just a chance he could use it to stop the mine-laying and still let the hundred men on board survive.
‘Get the bloody thing into the water!’ he barked to Biddle.
The CO gave the order.
‘Fire!’
From the nose of the submarine the Hammerfish shot forward, propelled by its miniature gas turbine. Trailing behind, a thin wire linked it to the submarine.
The weapons controller had his eyes glued to his screen. The target was at the centre; a green symbol approaching it from below was the torpedo. Guidance was from the submarine’s bow sonar to start with, but shortly the weapon’s own sensors would begin to track the target.
Andrew hovered at his shoulder.
‘When the range is down to two-hundred metres, and the high-definition sonar goes active, we’re going to have to move bloody fast,’ Andrew warned. ‘If we get it wrong, all the men in that boat are dead.’
The operator swallowed hard, hand hovering over the joystick that would guide the torpedo on its last few metres of flight.
‘Torpedo! Torpedo! Torpedo! Torpedo bearing red one-five-zero! True bearing two-nine-five!’
‘Shit!’ Pike hissed.
‘Starboard thirty! Steer two-nine-five! Ready the mines!’ Philip bellowed.
‘Only one mine ready in the tube, sir!’ Spriggs called.
The control room heeled over as the submarine turned on its tail to face the threat.
‘Fire a decoy!’
Forward of the control room a rating slipped a Bandfish decoy into a launch tube and tugged at the lever that propelled it into the sea. The cylinder of electronics hovered in the water emitting a high intensity signal to lure the torpedo.
‘Course two-nine-five, sir,’ Cavendish called as the boat settled onto the new heading.
‘Are we tracking the bastard who’s firing at us?’
‘Bit confused, sir. Thought it was the Victor Three, but the transients of the bow caps and torpedo launch came from a different bearing.’
‘Lay the mine!’
The forward weapons compartment reverberated to the thunder of compressed air, blasting the Moray mine out of the torpedo tube. It began to sink towards the sea-bed one hundred metres below.
‘Torpedo’s gone active, sir!’
‘Give me a firing solution, sonar, for Christ’s sake!’ Philip screamed, clinging to the bandstand.
‘Torpedo’s sonar’s classified as a fucking Hammerfish, sir!’ came a yell of astonishment from the sound room.
Philip froze.
‘Oh, my God! What have I done?’
‘Three hundred yards to the target, sir!’ announced the weapons operator. ‘The passive system’s swamped by decoy noise, but the active’s burning through it!’
‘Just heard the target launch something from a tube, sir!’ yelled the sound room.
‘Two hundred yards! High-definition sonar now active, sir.’
‘Make it look down! Below the bows,’ Andrew hissed in the operator’s ear. ‘Track what’s just come from the tube!’
‘If it’s a torpedo it’ll be gone, sir,’ the rating grumbled.
‘It’s a mine! Just try and track it,’ Andrew ordered.
The weapon controller dived the Hammerfish towards the sea-bed. He’d never done this before.
‘Got it, sir. Small object, dropping.’
‘Spot on! Just one? Sound room! Anything from the other tubes?’
‘Nothing detected, sir!’
‘Fifty yards, sir. Do we hit the mine?’
‘Yes. Blow the fucker to pieces!’
Inside Truculent, the double explosion boomed with a terrifying resonance. The blast wave lifted the bows and tossed the boat sideways.
In the control room ratings and officers crashed to the deck. Paul Spriggs gashed his forehead as he fell, blood trickling into his eye.
Tim Pike grabbed the edge of the bandstand and pulled himself to his feet.
‘Oh, God! Oh, God!’
Eyes closed, the captain was gibbering meaninglessly, his mind a tortured jumble.
The moment had come.
‘I have command!’ Pike shouted. ‘Damage reports!’
Peter Claypole pressed the key on the ship control panel that linked him with the manoeuvring room, aft. He listened, then reassured the first lieutenant.
‘No problems with propulsion.’
‘Casualties in the weapons compartment!’ called Spriggs, pressing a handkerchief to his forehead. ‘I’m going down there.’
‘Starboard twenty. Steer zero-one-zero! Revolutions for maximum speed,’ Pike ordered. ‘Nick, give me a safe depth.’
‘Two hundred metres for five miles. Then come up to one twenty.’
‘Ten down. Keep two hundred metres. TAS, what are the contacts doing?’
‘Closing,’ Cordell replied. ‘Nearest at four miles, now classified as Trafalgar class. Closest Victor’s disappeared. Guess it must’ve been a decoy. Lost track of the other Victor. We’ve a firing solution on the Trafalgar.’
‘You must be joking! What the hell was he doing firing at us, anyway? And where the fuck’s the C.O.?’
The bandstand was empty. Hitchens had gone.
‘Hugo,’ Pike shouted, spotting the radio officer. ‘Find the captain. He’s not well. Get him back to his cabin and stay with him. Get a steward to help if you need to.’
Even four miles away the double detonation of the torpedo and the mine was heard through the hull.
‘Bloody well done!’ Andrew clapped the weapons operator on the shoulder.
He turned to a grinning Peter Biddle.
‘Let’s hope Pike’s got the message by now. What’s the Truc doing, TAS?’
‘Moving. Fast. Heading north, thirty knots.’
‘We do the same? Right?’ Biddle checked.
‘Right. And keep close. When we’re clear of danger I’m going to have a few words with Phil Hitchens on the underwater telephone.’
The operations room of the Soviet Northern Fleet was electrified.