Samuel Edwards - Neptune

The ordeal ended suddenly after four days of marking time. Porter and Nancy were killing the morning at the swimming pool, where they remained in the shade in a vain attempt to keep cool, when the steward came to them.

‘We leave at once!’ he announced, and escorted them to their suite so they could change.

‘Are we permitted to ask where you’re flying us?’ Porter wanted to know.

The KGB man looked surprised. ‘Singapore, of course. That was our agreement!’

Porter concealed his relief. So far, so good. The Russians had not discovered his deception, and he was not being flown to Vladivostok for intensive interrogation prior to liquidation. There was still a chance he might survive.

A quarter of an hour later the KGB continued to display intensive security precautions. Half a dozen agents surrounded Porter and Nancy as they left the hotel, and a small caravan of three automobiles awaited the party. Other guards were waiting at the airport, where sleepy Papua New Guinea customs and immigration authorities scarcely bothered to look at passports before granting the necessary exit permits.

A strong escort walked with Porter and Nancy across the field to their waiting aircraft, and even after they climbed on board the KGB men who stayed behind continued to stand guard outside.

These elaborate arrangements were enough to convince Porter that Moscow was still taken in by his ruse. But he knew better than to rejoice; as the aeroplane rose, circled the field, and headed westward, he knew that each passing minute brought him closer to the ultimate showdown that, while protecting Project Neptune, made his own situation more dangerous.

The task of lowering the submersible into the water was accomplished with dispatch, and Franklin Richards lost no time inaugurating tests of the craft’s sensitive equipment. The Neptune spent a full morning creeping at a speed of only five knots so the football field could be submerged, and Richards was satisfied when she reached a depth of six hundred feet without incident. Her sonar needed tuning and minor adjustments had to be made in the clarity of the undersea television pictures she sent back to the mother ship, but these were expected technical problems, and the experts dealt with them at their leisure.

The atmosphere on board ship changed abruptly, however, when the voice of Captain Flumphries boomed over the loudspeaker system: ‘Attention all hands and passengers! We are now approaching the target area. All Sound Navigation and Ranging personnel please report to your duty stations without delay.’

Adrienne Howard remained on deck for a time and watched as ultra-sensitive microphones attached to long lines of hair-thin metal alloys were unreeled with painstaking care so they would not foul the propellers. She was no authority on sonar, but found its basic principles easy enough to understand. Underwater vision was limited, but sound travelled farther than it did on the surface, and the microphones, when lowered to a depth of up to three miles, were remarkably accurate in detecting objects below.

The process of feeding out the lines took several hours, with the Neptune cruising at a cautious speed of ten knots. The better part of a year had passed since the last bathyscaphe test had been made, pinpointing the location of the sunken Russian submarine, and it was taken for granted that the vessel’s position might have shifted during that time.

At noon Adrienne paid a brief visit to the bridge, where Captain Humphries, with charts spread out before him, was directing the navigation of the ship. The automatic pilot and other devices had been switched off, and the helmsman at the wheel was in direct charge of the ship’s movements.

The Captain glanced at Adrienne. ‘We’re threading the needle,’ he said, ‘and I prefer my own judgement to that of machines.’

She realized her presence might be a distraction, so she went amidships to the control chamber, where four sonar operators, each wearing a set of earphones, sat before consoles whose needles would show the presence of objects below.

Franklin Richards had stationed himself on a platform behind the quartet, and from his vantage point he could monitor all four of the consoles. The needles stood at ‘o’ as she approached, and he smiled when he saw her.

‘The microphones are just hitting the two-mile level,’ he said, ‘so there won’t be much excitement for another hour or two.’

Scarcely had he spoken when a bell rang, and one of the console needles leaped from ‘o’ to ‘7’ – which was three points below maximum.

‘Strike seven!’ the operator said.

Everyone in the chamber stiffened, and Adrienne felt her pulse throb.

But Richards remained calm. ‘The microphone is dropping through a school of fairly large fish, I suspect. Nothing more serious than that.’

‘How do you know that the Russians don’t have a submarine down there, waiting to disrupt our operation?’

‘I don’t. But all four of the sonar devices would pick it up fast enough, and in no time we’d have a ten rating on every last one of them.’

‘How soon do you estimate we’ll be on target?’

He shrugged. ‘Hitting the bullseye at sea isn’t the same as pinpointing a target on land. The Neptune will criss-cross an area of about forty-eight square miles, and the Zoloto could be sitting on the bottom anywhere within that zone. With luck we could find her at any time, but we might have to spend a day or two making our search.’

‘Strike four!’ another of the operators called.

‘One large fish, probably,’ Richards said. ‘There are a lot of grey-fin sharks in this part of the South China Sea.’

‘Could they interfere?’

Richards became grim. ‘We’ll allow nothing to interfere,’ he said.

A young ensign approached. ‘Miss Howard, Mr Richards,’ he said, speaking in a low tone, ‘Captain Humphries’ compliments. He’ll appreciate it if you’ll join him on the bridge.’

Something in the officer’s voice made Adrienne uneasy, and she could see that Richards looked a trifle disturbed, too. Neither commented, however, as they walked forward.

Captain Humphries was frowning at a report typed on a yellowflimsy. ‘We’re in for possible trouble,’ he said. ‘Our meteorologists say there’s a gale blowing about two hundred and fifty miles south by southwest of us. She may reach typhoon strength, and she’s heading in this general direction.’

‘This isn’t the season for typhoons,’ Adrienne said.

‘Not the normal season, I’ll grant you,’ the Captain said, ‘but they’re always a danger in these waters. This is the beginning of the little rainy spell, so anything can happen. Frank, if we’re going to be in the path of a typhoon you’ll have to haul your submersible out of the sea and stow her in the hold.’

‘How much advance notice can you give me, Charlie? Shave it as thin as you can so we won’t lose time hauling her in and refloating her again.’

Captain Humphries’ voice was dry. ‘Even a storm of gale force will make a hash of your operations, as you well know. We’ll take no risks with your equipment, Frank.’

Both men were silent, and Adrienne stepped in. ‘What are the chances of the storm hitting us, Captain?’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘If I knew that, Miss Howard, I’d be able to work miracles. I’ve asked Clark Field in the Philippines to send out a weather plane to check for us, so we may have a clearer picture after the pilot flies in and out of the storm. And here’s the answer to the question neither of you has asked. If a typhoon does develop and head this way, we may have to sail as much as two to three hundred miles off course.’

Richards was alarmed. ‘That could delay Project Neptune by as long as a week.’