“No, please, Captain.” She pointed to the chair. “I know enough about you to think that maybe my friend, Caesar, had gotten you down.”
“I don’t know if it’s that so much. Sometimes I have to keep reminding myself — that Caesar’s still a machine. I think I can handle that. It’s that laser system. I punched in the data to fire on those Russian planes.” Snow stroked his chin thoughtfully before looking back at her. “You understand we had to compromise a terrific weapon a little while ago. We should have saved it until the last minute. The Russians will figure out eventually that it was this ship that disabled that recon plane and dumped the others. Submarines don’t normally bring down aircraft, but this one did. I wish I’d saved that laser…”
Carol studied her fingernails for a moment, then murmured, almost as an afterthought, “I wonder how much difference it makes whether they know it now, or a couple of days from now.”
“It’s a matter of how much they know, I suppose. They’re not going to take the chance of losing any others tonight. Once the intelligence people on either side have the slightest inkling of something new, they pick away one bite at a time. Odds and ends fall together after a while. This time we left nothing to the imagination.”
“Captain, you’ve been worrying when there’s really nothing you can do about it.” She paused. “Zapping those planes was just part of what’s getting to you, isn’t it?” Snow stood up as if he was about to leave. She said nothing. “Well, I can’t drink when things seem to be getting to me… and there’s no way I can go for a long walk to get everything out of my system.” Once again the words he might have said to make her an integral part of his crew wouldn’t come to the surface.
She looked up quizzically. “I don’t know Captain Snow well enough to offer the answer you’re looking for, my friend. I’ve got an idea about you… directly… as much as I know about you at this stage.”
“I suppose what you should tell me is to get back to the job I was hired for in the first place and stop grousing about it.” He moved toward the doorway. He had no idea now why he’d bothered… or perhaps he’d somehow made a move.
“No,” she answered, “I’m not going to say anything of the kind, I’m going to say instead that I’m willing to talk to you again if you’re looking for someone other than one of your old submariners. I’m going to be one of your most valued shipmates, too, and you’d better believe that. Do you understand what I mean?” Her eyes held his as if she dared him to disagree.
“I think so.”
“Good. Then we have started understanding each other.
We’ll work together. That’s more important to me than you can understand. Now, Captain, I do have to finish this letter to my mother. Good night.”
“Good night.” Walking back to his stateroom, Snow could not quite imagine whether he felt more in command of his ship, or still at odds with himself.
The object Imperator had almost collided with earlier now began to bear more import. Though the Kremlin was aware of Imperator’s passage through the northern Pacific, the voyage had yet to be announced to the American people. The master plan was to make the announcement as she surfaced on the opposite side of the icepack days later.
Like so many great plans, however, they failed. Imperator had been seen. In the early evening of the fourth day, as a brilliant red sun was tinting the fog banks, the submarine appeared as a great black sea monster to two men in a fragile skin boat.
Their craft, fashioned from walrus skin stretched over a bone-and-wood frame, showed little change through generations of Eskimos. The only departure from tradition as they challenged the frigid arctic waters was the addition of motors. The added power allowed them to extend the range of fishing and hunting areas, But once there, these natives would revert to their ancient ways, paddling by hand into their favorite fishing area or sneaking up on an unsuspecting seal, the motor long since silenced.
Imperator might have passed as a sea monster that evening if the occupants of the skin boat had both been aging Eskimos, The submarine appeared suddenly, immense and threatening as the fog parted, and the monster bore down on them through the floe ice at a tremendous speed. Tons of water rose in a bulge over the submarine’s bow, foaming down into hollow gulleys on either side. The Eskimo was transfixed as he peered at the submarine’s bulky sail more than a thousand feet to the rear. The creature made no sound. There was only the surflike rumble as the parted waters and ice fell back in white foam. It seemed as if this monster had been sent to claim them. The other man, a research scientist taking a moment to fish with a native friend, was the first to react. Though he had seen nothing like Imperator before, he was not superstitious. Dropping the motor back in the water, he yanked repeatedly on the starting cord. Perhaps a healthy, natural fear made him forget to prime it.
The simple act of pulling at the engine was enough for the computer deep inside the submarine. Caesar’s sensors immediately located the tiny craft bobbing on the surface directly ahead, and put Imperator’s rudder over sharply. The sub could not maneuver as rapidly on the surface as in its natural element, but responded quickly enough to ease away from the tiny craft. As she did, the stern began to swing toward the skin boat. Caesar waited only long enough to ensure they would miss before reversing his rudder angle. The stem moved in the opposite direction.
The Eskimo and the scientist remained seated, staring speechlessly as the immense black creature sped silently past them. It was so close that there was no doubt it was man-made. The scientist could project how much of this submarine must be below the surface. It was the size of an aircraft carrier… and there were no markings to identify it. But nothing like this was known to man. It could have passed as a bad dream for the scientist, or an apparition for the Eskimo, if they hadn’t noticed a person appear in the sail just before the fog bank closed around them again. The scientist in the skin boat doubted she saw them, but there was no doubt in his mind that he had seen a woman peering in their direction, as if she knew something was out there, but was unable to perceive it through the fog. Then, it was gone, as rapidly as it had appeared.
Since there had been no markings, there was no way to tell who had built this monstrous craft. It could be dangerous to his country, and the natural suspicion in waters so close to Siberia would be that it was of Russian origin. It was unlikely something like that could be built in America without the people knowing of it.
As they tossed in the deep swell left by the passing of the submarine, the scientist remembered to prime the engine before he pulled the starting cord. The motor roared into life instantly, and they were off at top speed for the Eskimo village where the scientist radioed their sighting to Fairbanks.
Within hours the wire services had picked up the story.
On a submarine located 150 miles north of Prudhoe Bay in the Arctic Ocean, unaware of the media attention about to be focused on Imperator, another lonely captain was saying good night. Abe Danilov neatly folded Anna’s letter after the first reading and lay back on his bunk with one hand under his head.
His good night could not be heard, because his lips never moved. It had been just a whisper from the recesses of his heart. Anna was thousands of miles away, and he toyed with what time it might be at their apartment in Moscow. More than likely the sun was already well into the sky. Natalya probably had arrived to straighten up the apartment and prepare some food for the day, even if Anna would later refuse what was offered. That was more likely at that stage of the disease.