Follet looked down at the lights in the valley, but none was moving. ‘They’re not following us,’ he said. ‘They wouldn’t chase us in the dark without lights.’
Warren felt squeezed and empty. It was the first time anyone had shot at him with intent to kill. He lifted trembling hands, then looked towards the other vehicle. ‘I didn’t see Ben,’ he said.
There was the crunch of boots on gravel and Tozier appeared at his side window, his face blood-smeared. ‘Ben won’t be coming,’ he said quietly. ‘He bought it.’
‘It was his own goddam fault,’ said Follet in a high voice.
‘Yes,’ agreed Warren sadly. ‘It was his own fault. You’re sure, Andy?’
‘I’m sure,’ said Tozier with finality. He looked back at the valley. ‘We’d better go. I want to be over the Iraqi border before Ahmed wakes up to what’s really happened.’
He walked away and Warren heard a door slam. The two vehicles moved off slowly.
Dan Parker ran his hand lovingly along the smooth flank of the torpedo. It came away sticky with thin oil. ‘The old Mark XI,’ he said. ‘I never really expected to see one o’ these again.’
‘You’d better make it work,’ said Eastman. ‘These things cost a lot of dough.’
‘It’ll cost a lot more before I’m finished,’ said Parker equably. ‘I’ll be needin’ some equipment.’ He looked around the bare shed. ‘There’s room enough here.’
‘What will you need?’ asked Jeanette Delorme,
‘Some machine tools to start with; a lathe, a small milling machine—universal type for preference—an’ a drill press. An’ a hell of a lot o’ small tools, spanners an’ suchlike—I’ll make a list o’ those.’
‘Get it from him now, Jack,’ she said. ‘Give him everything he wants. I’m going home.’
‘What about me?’ asked Eastman.
‘Take a taxi,’ she said, and walked out.
Abbot smiled at Eastman. ‘She’s the boss all right. I can see that straight away.’
‘I can do without any cracks from you,’ said Eastman unsmilingly. He turned to Parker. ‘Anything else?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Parker, who was studying the business end of the torpedo. ‘This is a warhead; I hope there’s nothin’ in it.’
‘It was ordered empty.’
‘That’s a relief. Old TNT is bloody unreliable stuff. But this is no good anyway.’
‘What the hell…?’
‘Take it easy,’ said Parker. ‘No harm done. But if you want a practice run to prove the thing out I’ll need a practice head as well as this one. If you shot off this fish now it would sink at the end of the run, an’ you wouldn’t want that. A practice head has a flotation chamber to keep the torpedo from sinkin’ an’ a Holmes light so you can find it. You’ll be able to get a practice head from the same place you got this.’ He slapped the side of the torpedo. ‘Wherever that is.’
‘Okay, you’ll get your practice head. Anything else?’
‘The batteries, o’ course. They’re pretty important, aren’t they? I’ll put those on the list, too—types an’ quantities. They’ll set you back a packet.’ He studied the torpedo. ‘I’ll be wantin’ to run her in here, so we’d better have some way o’ clampin’ her down. Two concrete pillars wi’ proper clamps.’ He looked up. ‘These things develop a hell of a torque an’ we don’t want her jumpin’ all over the bloody shed.’ He slapped the side of his game leg. ‘That’s what busted me out o’ the Navy.’
Abbot paced out the length of the torpedo. ‘It’s bigger than I thought. I didn’t realize they were as big as this.’
‘Twenty-one-inch-diameter,’ said Parker. ‘Twenty-twofeet, five-an’-four-fifths-inches long. Weight in war trim—thirty-six-hundred an’ thirty-one pounds.’ He slapped the warhead. ‘An’ she packs a hell of a punch—seven hundred an’ eighteen pounds o’ TNT in here.’
‘We can pack over seven hundred pounds in there?’ asked Eastman alertly.
Parker shook his head. ‘Five hundred I said an’ five hundred I meant. I’m goin’ to put some batteries in the head. Have you thought how you’re goin’ to launch her?’
‘You’re the expert,’ said Eastman. ‘You tell me.’
‘There are three ways. From a tube underwater, like from a submarine; from a tube above water, like from a destroyer; from an aeroplane. I wouldn’t recommend the last—not if you’re carrying valuables. It’s apt to bugger the guidance system.’
‘Okay,’ said Eastman. ‘Airplanes are out. What about the other ways?’
‘I don’t suppose you can lay your hands on a destroyer,’ said Parker meditatively. ‘An’ torpedo tubes look a bit out o’ place anywhere else, if you get my meanin’. I think your best bet is underwater launchin’; it’s nice an’ inconspicuous. But that means a ship wi’ a bit o’ draught to it.’
Eastman nodded. ‘I like your thinking—it makes sense.’
‘You should be able to get a submarine-type tube from the same place you got this fish. I can jury-rig air bottles for the launchin’.’
‘You’ll get your tube,’ promised Eastman.
Parker yawned. ‘I’m tired,’ he said. ‘I’ll make out your list tomorrow.’
‘The boss said now,’ Eastman pointed out.
‘She’ll have to bloody well wait,’ snapped Parker. ‘I’m too tired to think straight. This is not goin’ to be a quick job an’ another eight hours isn’t goin’ to make any difference.’
‘I’ll tell her that,’ said Eastman ironically.
‘You do that, mate,’ said Parker. ‘Let’s start as we mean to go on, shall we?’ He looked Eastman in the eye. ‘If you want a rush job you can have it—but I won’t guarantee the result. If I can do it my way you get my guarantee.’ He grinned. ‘You wouldn’t want to lose the fish when it’s carryin’ a full load of dope, would you?’
‘No, goddam it!’ Eastman flinched involuntarily at the thought.
‘There you are, then,’ said Parker with a wave of his hand. ‘You push off an’ come back in the morning at about
ten o’clock an’ I’ll have your list all ready. We know where to bed down.’
‘Okay,’ said Eastman. ‘I’ll be back tomorrow.’ He walked away across the shed and up the wooden staircase. At the top he turned. ‘Just one thing: you don’t leave here—either of you. Ali is here to see you don’t. He’s a bad bastard when he’s aroused, so watch it.’
Abbot said, ‘We’ll watch him.’
Eastman grinned genially. ‘That’s not what I said, but you’ve got the idea.’ He opened the door and they heard him speak in a low voice. When he went out the Arab, Ali, came in. He did not descend the stairs but just stood leaning on the rail watching them.
Abbot glanced at Parker. ‘You were pushing him a bit, weren’t you?’
‘Just gettin’ meself a bit of elbow room,’ said Parker. He grinned. ‘I was a petty officer an’ I’ve met that type before. You meet plenty o’ snotty officers in the service who try to run you ragged. But a good craftsman has always got ‘em by the balls an’ the trick is to squeeze just hard enough to let ‘em know it. They get the message in no time at all.’
‘I hope you can make it stick,’ said Abbot. He looked at the torpedo. ‘They got hold of this thing in jig time—I wonder how they were able to lay their hands on it so fast. It strikes me that this is an efficient mob. I think we’ll have to watch how we go very carefully.’ He looked up at the Arab speculatively.
‘I wasn’t kiddin’ when I said I was tired,’ said Parker. ‘An’
I want to get out o’ this bloody monkey suit—it’s killin’ me. Let’s go to bed, for God’s sake!’
Once provided with his list Eastman moved fast. Within two days most of the equipment needed was installed, and while
this was being done the torpedo was removed so that no workman would see it. All that was being done, as far as they were concerned, was the establishment of a small machine-shop.
Then the work began on the torpedo itself. Abbot was astonished at the complexity of it and his respect for Parker increased. Any man who could master such a complicated instrument and treat it with the casual insouciance that Parker did was worthy of a great deal of respect.
They took out the lead-acid batteries—fifty-two of them—and piled them in a corner of the shed. ‘I’ll be needin’ those to test the motor later,’ said Parker. ‘There’s no point in usin’ the expensive ones. But then they’d better be taken out to sea an’ dumped. Any naval man who caught sight o’ those would know what they are, an’ that might give the game away.’
Eastman made a note of it and Abbot privately thought that Parker was entering into the spirit of things a little too wholeheartedly. He said as much when they were alone and Parker grinned. ‘We have to make it look good, don’t we? Every little helps. Eastman is gettin’ quite matey an’ that could be useful.’ Abbot had to agree.
Parker took out the motor for cleaning. ‘It’s in good nick,’ he said, and stroked it almost lovingly. ‘A beautiful job. Ninety-eight horsepower an’ only that big. A really lovely bit of work an’ designed to be blown to hell.’ He shook his head. ‘It’s a bloody funny world we live in.’
He stripped the torpedo meticulously while Abbot did the fetching and carrying and the cleaning of the less important pieces. He demanded—and got—special oils and greases to pack the glands, and expensive wiring for his redesigned circuits, while his new mercury batteries cost a small fortune in themselves. He preached like an evangelist, and the word he preached was ‘perfection.’ ‘Nothing is too good,’ he proclaimed flatly. ‘This is goin’ to be the best torpedo that ever took water.’
And it was very likely so. No service torpedo ever had such undivided and loving attention, and Abbot came to the conelusion that only a prototype fussed over by nervous boffins prior to service tests could be compared with this lone torpedo.
Eastman got the point very early in the game under Parker’s needling attitude. He saw that Parker was really putting up a magnificent effort and he co-operated wholeheartedly to give him everything he needed. And that was not really to be wondered at thought Abbot, when you considered that riding in the warhead would be dope worth $25,000,000.
Parker spent most time on the guidance system, clucking over it like a mother hen over an errant chick. ‘If this thing packs in you’ve lost the lot,’ he said to Eastman.
‘It had better not,’ said Eastman grimly.
‘It won’t,’ said Parker in a steady voice.
‘What does it do?’
‘It keeps her running straight—come what may,’ said Parker. ‘When I quoted you a figure for accuracy o’ three inches in a hundred yards I was allowin’ meself a bit o’ leeway. In the hands of a good mechanic a Mark XI is damned near as accurate as a rifle bullet—say, an inch in a hundred yards. O’ course, the ordinary Mark XI has a short range, so even at maximum the point o’ strike wouldn’t be more than six feet out if she ran well. But this beauty has to run a hell of a long way so I’m aimin’ to beat the record. I’m tryin’ for a half-inch error in a hundred yards. It’s damn’ near impossible but I’m tryin’ for it.’
Eastman went away very happy.
‘You’re putting in a lot of time and sweat on something that’s going to be sabotaged,’ observed Abbot.
Parker shrugged. ‘Every torpedoman gets that feelin’ from time to time. You take a lovely bit o’ mechanism like this an’ you work on it to get a performance that even the designer didn’t dream of. Then you slam it against the side
of a ship an’ blow it to smithereens. That’s sabotage of a kind, isn’t it?’
‘I suppose it is if you look at it that way. But it’s what torpedoes are for.’
Parker nodded. ‘I know this one is goin’ to be sabotaged in the end but we still have sea trials to come an’ she’s got to work.’ He looked at Abbot and said seriously, ‘You know, I haven’t been so bloody happy for a long time. I came out o’ the Navy an’ got a job tinkerin’ wi’ other folk’s cars an’ all the time I missed somethin’, an’ I didn’t know what it was.’ He waved at the stripped-down torpedo. ‘Now I know—I missed these beauties.’
‘Don’t get too carried away,’ advised Abbot. ‘Remember that when it comes to the final push this thing must fail.’
‘It’ll fail,’ said Parker glumly. His face tightened. ‘But it’s goin’ to have one bloody good run first.’ He tapped Abbot on the chest. ‘If you think this thing is easy, Mike, you’re dead wrong. I’m working on the edge o’ the impossible all the time. A Mark XI was never designed to go fifteen miles an’ to get it to travel the distance is goin’ to be tricky. But I’ll do it an’ I’ll enjoy doin’ it because this is the last chance I’ll ever have of handlin’ a torpedo. Now, let’s get down to it.’
Every two bits of metal that could be separated were taken apart, scrutinized carefully and put back together with meticulous care. Piece by piece the whole torpedo was reassembled until the time came when it was clamped down for a bench test and Abbot saw the reason for the clamps. Even running at a quarter power it was evident that it would have run wild in the shed had it not been secured.
Parker professed satisfaction and said to Eastman, ‘What about the tube? I’ve done all I can wi’ the fish.’
‘Okay,’ said Eastman. ‘Come with me.’
He took them a little way up the coast to a small shipyard, and pointed to a worn-out coaster of about 3,000 tons.
‘That’s the ship—the
Orestes;
Greek-owned and registered in Panama.’
Parker looked at her dubiously. ‘Are you goin’ to cross the Atlantic in that?’
‘I am—and so are you,’ said Eastman. ‘She’s done it before and she can do it again; she only has to do it once more and then she’ll be lost at sea.’ He smiled. ‘She’s underinsured and we’re not even going to press too hard for that—we don’t want anybody getting too nosy about what happened to her. If you’re going to install an underwater tube you’ll have to cut a hole in the hull. How are you going to do that?’
‘Let’s have a closer look,’ said Parker, so they went aboard. He spent a lot of time below, up in the bows, then he made a sketch. ‘We’ll make a coffer dam. Get that made up and have it welded to the outside of the hull as marked, then I can cut a hole from the inside an’ install the tube. Once that’s done the thing can be ripped off. You’ll have to find a diver who can keep his mouth shut—it isn’t a normal shipyard job.’
Eastman grinned. ‘We own the shipyard,’ he said softly.
So Parker installed the launching-tube which took another week. He spent a great deal of time measuring and aligned the tube exactly fore and aft. ‘All you have to do is to point the ship accurately,’ he said. ‘That’s it—we’re ready for trials.’
Jeanette Delorme had not been around for some time, and it worried Abbot because he wanted to have her under his eye. As it was, he and Parker were virtually prisoners and cut off from the rest of the organization. He did not know what Warren was doing, nor could he contact Hellier to tell him what was happening. With such a breakdown of communications things could go very wrong.
He said to Eastman, ‘Your boss doesn’t seem to be taking much interest. I haven’t seen her around since that first night.’
‘She doesn’t mix with the working slobs,’ said Eastman. ‘I do the overseeing.’ He fixed Abbot with a sardonic eye. ‘Remember what I told you about her. I’d steer clear if I were you.’
Abbot shrugged. ‘I’m thinking of the money. We’re ready for the trial and I don’t think you are authorised to sign cheques.’
‘Don’t worry about the dough,’ said Eastman with a grin. ‘Worry about the trial. It’s set for tomorrow and she’ll be there—and God help you if it doesn’t work out.’ As an afterthought he said, ‘She’s been over to the States, arranging things at that end.’