A tone chime from the SVTC got Radford’s attention. A digital timer on the monitor counted down to zero and the screen brightened.
Radford cleared his throat and faced the screen. “Hello, Mikhail.”
Grishkov, hunched forward on his elbows, had a sour look on his face as if the cigarette he was smoking tasted bad. “Good day, General.”
Radford said, “It seems we’ve been talking on this thing—”
“I warned you not to take us for fools,” Grishkov erupted. “The K-363 torpedoed that LNG carrier, sank those ships, and almost sank a Norwegian frigate, killed her captain — no, don’t deny it. We know your Captain Scott witnessed the attack because he has been dogging the K-363 ever since she departed Olenya Bay. The Norwegians have lodged a protest with our ambassador in Oslo, and have threatened to take the issue to the UN. Our mistake was to fall for your ruse with the K-480 in the first place. But that’s over now. We have ordered our forces in the Baltic Sea to find and capture Zakayev and his terrorist friends.”
“Aren’t you overlooking something, Admiral?” Radford said frostily.
“What would that be?”
“The Germans, Poles, and Finns, to say nothing of your former republics Estonia and Latvia, which border the Baltic Sea, will want to know what you’re up to when they see all that Russian naval activity.”
“We are already a step ahead of you. Those countries have been informed that we are conducting exercises. Your president will be informed — today — of our intentions and of our displeasure with your actions. He will be told to refrain from any further actions that will interfere with our capture of the K-363, and we expect you to keep our true operations secret from the countries you have mentioned as well as others. Your president will also be informed that if Scott interferes in any way whatsoever, he will be attacked and the K-480 sunk.”
“You can’t threaten us,” Radford said.
“But we are not threatening you, General. We are simply saying that Captain Scott’s and Dr. Thorne’s presence on the K-480 no longer imparts any U.S. authority to a Russian naval vessel. If it comes to it, Scott, Thorne, and even Colonel Abakov will be treated as pirates and, if we capture them along with Zakayev, Litvanov, and his crew, arrested.”
“No one is claiming U.S. control over the K-480. But we have certain rights under international law.”
“I am not an expert on international law, General. But as a sailor I know that the law of the sea states that pirates can be hunted down and brought to trial.”
“Scott is not a pirate. And in case you’ve forgotten, it was you and Admiral Stashinsky who approved his status as an observer on one of your submarines, along with Dr. Thorne and Colonel Abakov.”
“Yes, as observers, not as agents of the United States bent on thwarting Russian plans to deal with terrorists.”
“No one’s thwarting your plans, Mikhail. We can still help you find Zakayev if you’ll let us.”
Grishkov snorted. “Let you help us when what you want is to kill Zakayev before we can capture and question him. Isn’t that so? Isn’t that the reason you commandeered the K-480?”
Radford willed himself to retain his composure. What did Grishkov know and how thin was the ice they were skating on? “I don’t understand what you’re getting at. What reason would we have to kill Zakayev?”
“Because you supported Zakayev and his terrorists in Chechnya. And you are afraid he will tell us all about it when we capture him.”
“Goddamnit, Mikhail, that’s a lie and you know it.”
Grishkov said nothing.
“You have no proof that we’ve ever supported Zakayev.”
“I have proof.”
“What proof? Where is it?”
Grishkov snorted again. He stood and, leaning on his fists, inclined toward the video camera with its wide angle lens, which distorted his face on the monitor.
“Where is it, you ask? I’ll tell you where. Out there in the Baltic Sea with your Captain Scott, hunting for the K-363. He’s all the proof I need.”
The door opened and Radford’s secretary bustled into the office to find him staring at the blank SVTC screen. “General Radford, goodness, you’ll be late for your meeting in Arlington.”
Radford tore himself away to gather his things under her daunting gaze. “Right. I’m leaving now, Phyllis. Please have the audio summaries of my conversation with Admiral Grishkov on my desk when I return.”
She helped him into his coat. “Yes, sir, you’ll have them.”
A bodyguard at the elevator ushered the admiral aboard. The doors hissed closed. The car dropped.
Radford’s stomach fluttered. He glanced at his wrist watch with four time zones displayed. He knew the president had been facing a long day of tough negotiating with the Russians in St. Petersburg. What he was going to hear would only make it worse.
Litvanov, exhausted from conning the K-363 through The Sound behind a Liberian-flagged tanker, planted his elbows on the chart of the Baltic Sea. It had been a heart-stopping passage through shallow water teeming with ships of all sizes, and with Swedish and Danish coastal patrol boats on the lookout for submerged intruders. At one point the K-363 had grounded on an underwater sandbar but worked free before almost being run down by a 200,000-deadweight-ton oil tanker.
Litvanov pushed his filthy cap to the back of his head and, tapping the chart, said heavily, “Here, the southern passage between Bornholm Island and the coast of Poland, is very wide and also deep, over two hundred feet. We have to be careful here, but we should be able to slip into the Baltic without being detected.”
“But what about German and Polish coastal patrols?”
“From Sassnitz east, the Germans leave it to the Poles to patrol the southern Baltic. The Polish Navy has modern frigates and patrol craft as well as submarines and are good at interdicting drug runners and smugglers but not the best when it comes to hunting for submarines. And anyway, all we need is another twenty-four hours. Then, even if every country touching on the Baltic initiated War Plan Red, it will be too late.”
“War Plan Red?”
“Full mobilization to deal with a seaborne threat to the region.”
Zakayev ran a hand over his mouth. “I see. And what about this submarine you think is following us?
Where do you plan to set a trap for him?”
“Here.” Litvanov pointed to an area on the chart east of Bornholm labeled Hazard. “This is an old ordnance dumping ground.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“Who can say. It’s left over from World War II. Tons of chemical weapons and explosives captured from the Nazis that were loaded on ships and then scuttled. Over time the weapons casings have corroded and the poisons have leached into the sea. Now and then a fisherman puts his tackle over the side and snags a bomb and blows himself up. A good place to avoid, but also a good place for us to surprise this Russian skipper, whoever he is. And if he gets blown up by one of our torpedoes, the Bornholm fisherman’s association might think one of their members caught a big one.”
“But why bother with him?” Zakayev said. “He can’t stop us now, it’s too late.”
“Perhaps. But this one is good. Maybe too good. And because he is good it would be a mistake to ignore him. Instead we have to kill him.”
Scott waited for a southbound freighter. Toward midnight a huge container ship, battling high seas, her machinery noisy as a freight train, loomed up out of the rain.
Scott got ready to tuck the K-480 in behind the massive ship and ride her wake into The Sound. A dangerous maneuver to perform in bad weather and close quarters, he had prepared by putting a bubble in the ballast tanks to raise the K-480 and reduce her draft even though it meant her sail would be exposed.