John Gardner - Win, Lose Or Die

“Hrrumph!” Walmsley said - or something very like it - and went off to meet the next arrival.

President George Herbert Walker Bush, surrounded by his Secret Service men -Joe Israel, Stan Hare and Bruce Trimble and with a small man carrying a briefcase chained to his wrist, had been met at the foot of the companionway by Walmsley.

The President was tall, smiling, greying and very open-faced.

“Captain Bond,” he acknowledged as the Rear-Admiral made the introduction, “I know I’m in good hands. A close friend of mine told me what a help you’d been to him, and I believe we have another friend in common.”

“We probably have, sir.”

“Yes, Felix served under me when I was DC IA. A good man. Hope to see more of you, Bond, but you’ll appreciate the schedule’s tight as a drumskin. Good to meet you.”

The President of the United States had a firm handshake, almost as firm as Mrs. Thatcher’s, and, as he walked away, Sergeant Harvey muttered, “Nor his.”

“Nor his what?” Bond said out of the corner of his mouth.

“Wouldn’t like to be on his defaulters’ parade either.”

“If you were, they’d call it a masthead, Sergeant Harvey.

That’s what the US Navy call defaulters -just as the Royal Navy did a long time ago.

Sir John Walmsley gave Bond another dirty look as he hurried past, again heading for the companionway and the final VIP.

Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev, General Secretary of the CPSU and President of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet was dressed in a camel-hair overcoat that he had not bought at GUM.

He held a grey frit hat, which could have been purchased at Lock’s in Jermyn Street, and wore a broad smile. He was neat, burly, broad-shouldered and relaxed, thanks to all the goodwill that seemed to flow out of him.

Walmsley introduced them, and, to Bond’s surprise, Mr. Gorbachev replied in English, “Captain Bond, it is a great pleasure to meet you.

I hope you mingle with those who look after me in a true spirit of glasnost.” The short man’s handshake was positively bone-crushing and left Bond speechless as the Russian passed on towards his quarters.

“Ho dear, sir,” Harvey whispered. “He hasn’t brought Raisa with him. Hope he’s got an Amex card as well.”

“Be fair, Harvey. The Prez hasn’t brought Barbara, and Mrs. T’s without Denis. It’s reasonable enough.”

Walmsley returned, looking flustered. “Well, at least one of them didn’t seem to know you, Bond.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it, sir.”

“No, well … All senior officers, divisional officers and the Chief Regulating Officer in my day cabin in fifteen minutes.

We’re not using the PA to warn you, so tell me now if you’re happy about arrangements - I mean happy enough to leave this section of the ship for an hour or so.

“I’ll be there, sir. If I’m at all concerned, I’ll let you know, personally, and give you my reasons.

The Rear-Admiral gave a curt nod and left, his long, important strides indicating that he was well pleased with the final transfer of probably the three most powerful people in the world to his ship.

Bond thought this was one hell of a responsibility, and Walmsley should not show any cockiness until it was all safely over.

Petty Officer “Blackie” Blackstone looked at the great turbines whining strongly in the Engine Room of Invincible. When he had first joined the Royal Navy, the Engine Rooms were hot, dirty, sweaty and noisy places. Invincible’s Engine Room was brilliantly clean, and only a few people were actually needed close to the turbines, for they were monitored from a separate room, full of dials, VDUs and switches.

Blackstone was probably the only man on Invincible, outside the Captain, senior officers and security people, who knew what was going on. He did not question how his two “friends” Harry and Bill had got hold of the information, nor did he have any moral qualms about what he was to do. After all, it would get him off the hook, both financially and domestically. In any case, they had told him it was really a Greenpeace operation, timed to cause great embarrassment to the Americans and Russians, also to the British Establishment, and “Blackie” had always had a lot of sympathy for Greenpeace.

He had thought for a long time about the job, but once he weighed the positive and negative sides, he realised there was no real danger.

“Blackie” had gone to a lot of trouble in arranging his shifts.

The first one just after these nobs come aboard, they had told him. Then the second one would require action in the middle of the following forenoon. “Blackie” Blackstone would have access to the turbines on both required shifts. He had seen to that, just as he knew the other men on the watch were content to let him do the physical check on the turbines. Even now, just after the visitors had arrived on board, he was alone in the Engine Room, while a Chief Petty Officer, another Petty Officer, like himself, and a “Killick” - a Leading Seaman, so called because of the anchor-badge he wore: killick being the old slang tem for anchor - lounged their way through the watch, occasionally checking the pressures and speeds of the turbines.

The Second Engineering Officer was, as ever, in the officers’ caboose, just behind the control room. Nobody would require him unless something went terribly wrong. Changes of speed, and other such things could be accomplished at the touch of a button, or a couple of clicks on the small levers which acted as throttles. So the Lieutenant who was the Second Engineering Officer was left to do a little “Egyptian Physical Training” as they called it. In other words, the Lieutenant was sleeping.

Petty Officer Blackstone quietly moved to the far side of Number One Turbine. He pulled a screwdriver from a leather toolkit attached to his belt, and tucked away behind his right hip. He then removed a cylinder, wrapped in Kleenex, from his pocket. The cylinder, which was made of strong wire gauze, had an opening at one end and was rounded at the other. Anyone, from Midshipman to Ordinary Seaman, could have identified the cylinder, as a straightforward filter for the turbine’s oil system.

Blackstone quickly unscrewed the two lugs that held down a small panel, roughly six inches by six, and lifted it on its hinge.

Above the panel the words Filter One were stencilled.

Quietly, he placed the screwdriver on the deck, by his feet, and took an abnormally long pair of tweezers from the toolkit on his belt, at the same time gathering another wod of Kleenex into his left hand.

Gently, Petty Officer Blackstone inserted the tweezers into the open panel of Filter One, extracting the identical heavy, dirty, gauze cylinder from within - though this one was hot and dripping with oil.

He placed it into the wod of Kleenex and put it carefully on the deck, beside the screwdriver.

It would take three minutes for any sign of the change to be registered on the instruments in the control room, and it took less than thirty seconds to slide the new filter into place, and another minute to close the panel and screw the lugs back in place.

Blackstone next returned the screwdriver and tweezers to his toolkit, picked up the bunched Kleenex which held the recently removed filter, and made his way through the bulkhead door, aft and leading to the Engine Room heads.

There he unbolted one of the ports, opened it up and hurled the filter and Kleenex out to be whipped away by the wind. He closed up the round port, washed his hands, clearing away all traces of oil, and returned to the Engine Room, casually walking around all the turbines, taking his time before returning to the Control Room.

“They all still running, Blackie?” the CPO asked with a grin.