Force of Arms

breaker — on the day they were to leave. Others said nothing about it, the tension of their impending goodbyes having inhibited rather than released sexual passion. And the older members of the Reagan’s gold crew said little, for most of them were married and had children, and trying to make time for lovemaking on the day the Sea Wolf was about to slip out of Bangor was like trying to arrange a kid’s birthday party. In the end, it defeated you, and so they hugged a lot, knowing they would have to wait until their six months of duty were complete and it was time for them to return to base and hand the Reagan over to the blue crew for the next six months.

The skipper, Commander Robert Brentwood, to all outward appearances was the cool, “let-go-aft” voice of reason as the sub slipped out toward Hood Canal and one of the degaussing stations that would wipe out its magnetic signature should enemy subs be lurking beyond the two-hundred-mile limit, trying to get a fix on the craft through comparing her signature to those in a threat library of “sound prints.”

Officially the Reagan was not on patrol, but unofficially she was to make her way to the China station in the Gulf of Bo Hai because General Douglas “George C. Scott” Freeman did not believe the Chinese, who had agreed to a cease-fire, would keep their word. The only thing he was sure about was that the PLA’s predominantly brown-water, or coastal, navy was going for blue or deep water capability, having bought another four CIS attack diesel submarines from the old Soviet Union’s Baltic fleet.

A diesel sub could fire ship-to-ship missiles or ICBMs for that matter. Robert Brentwood, or “Bing” as he was called affectionately by his crew, had been one of those for whom the good-bye had to be a kiss on the cheek, his English wife, Rosemary, seven months pregnant, just recently moved from Holy Loch in Scotland to Bangor. The Holy Loch base had been closed down, a victim of congressional cutbacks, and so Rosemary now found herself in Bremerton, a U.S. naval town in northwestern Washington that served the Bangor base. Robert, age forty-three, was worried about the baby, and about Rosemary settling in at the American base, penetrating American English, and fitting in with the wives whose status was as carefully graded according to their husbands’ rank as was the English class structure.

Rosemary too underwent the natural anxiety of being a new wife settling into a new country. There was another fear of which neither spoke: the exceptionally large REM dose of radiation that Robert and some of his crewmen had received in action earlier in the war when they had been victims of a leak in the “coffee grinder”—the reactor. Some had fared worse than others, a few having to have sick leave since, and it only added more anxiety to Rosemary, who was already worried enough about the baby due in the coming months. The sonograms of the baby, using the same technique as a sub does to detect the shape and position of another ship, did not reveal any obvious physical deformity, but there was always the risk of some other complication, which, as a new mother, she was naturally apprehensive about. Life, as Robert had pointed out, was full of hazard, especially with the possibility of another outbreak of hostilities with China, but they had decided on having at least two children. As he’d said good- bye to her he’d joked, “Remember now, you’re an English teacher used to Shakespeare and standard BBC English, but you’ll have to learn the lingo.”

‘Try me,” she’d said.

“All right — you say ‘boot,’ we say—”

“Trunk,” she answered.

“Okay, you say ‘mudguard.’ “

“You call it a fender.”

“Very good,” Robert said.

“Yes, but what about the supermarket?”

“Just look at the pictures,” he responded.

She had smiled, slipping her arms into his. “I’ll miss you.”

“What — going shopping? Any of the other wives’ll help you.”

“It’s not that,” Rosemary answered. “I’ll miss you wherever I am.”

“Morning, sir.” It was Rolston, the Reagan’s XO, snapping off a salute.

Robert let go of Rosemary’s hand, returning the salute. It was a small thing, but his almost intuitive reaction reminded her about that part of his life he could never really share with her and that therefore separated them.

“I mean,” she said again, “I’ll miss you everywhere. Night and day.”

It was unusual for Rosemary to be so insecure. In England, in her Shakespeare class, she ruled otherwise rowdy sixth formers with a firm hand and a resilience that had deserted her upon her arrival in the United States. Robert knew what it was like — that is, what was beneath it all. Earlier in the war, before he’d left Holy Loch on a six-month war patrol, he, like some other submarine captains, had been listed by the enemy for “special treatment”—for assassination. It was different now and more worrisome because the Gong An Bu, the secret arm of China’s Public Security Bureau, had been after captains and their executive officers. Two XOs were already dead, found shot through the base of the skull — Chinese execution style. It was a calculated attack upon the morale of the submarine crews, many of whom were engaged in shepherding the vital convoy resupply to General Douglas Freeman’s divisions in China. Of course they had the FBI and CIA investigating the assassinations, but as more than one godfather had reiterated, “The lesson of our age is that you can kill anyone.” They had tried to get Robert on his and Rosemary’s honeymoon in Scotland, but there the CID and MI5 had joined forces and turned the tables on the would-be assassins. Rosemary tried to change the subject “Oh well, you might get to see your brother David over there. Say hello from me.”

“Unlikely,” Robert Brentwood said. “He’s with Freeman’s ground troops. Don’t be afraid to use the gun,” Robert told her.

“Afraid? I’m terrified.”

“But I’ve shown you how to use it.”

“Oh, is that supposed to reassure me?”

“Look, hon, the base security is tighter than a drum. Ditto the family housing. Anyone would have to be bonkers to try to break in.”

“You don’t think there aren’t people who are bonkers?”

“C’mon, you know what I mean.”

“I’m sorry, Robbie, I feel as heavy as a tank — I guess it’s the ‘prepartum’ blues or something.”

“Take a swig of that Scotch your father sent.”

“Uh-uh,” she said, adopting a schoolmarmish tone. “Not with the baby.”

“Very well,” he said as he might answer the officer of the deck. “Carry on.”

“Bye, darling,” she said, hugging him tightly. “Sorry I can’t get any closer with Junior here.”

“This suits me fine. Take care, sweetheart.”

In the tradition of subs sailing from Bangor, the families of the crewmen piled into trucks and cars to race further along the sound where they would get one last glimpse of the men. Then the men disappeared, and duty took over in the litany of the dive.

“Officer of the Deck — last man down. Hatch secured.”

Rolston took up his position as officer of the deck. “Last man down. Hatch secured, aye. Captain, the ship is rigged for dive. Current depth one three zero fathoms. Checks with the chart. Request permission to submerge the ship.”

“Very well, Officer of the Deck,” Brentwood said. “Submerge the ship.”

“Submerge the ship, aye, sir.” Rolston turned toward the diving console. “Diving Officer, submerge the ship.”

“Submerge the ship, aye, sir. Dive. Two blasts on the dive alarm. Dive, dive.” The sound of the alarm followed, loud enough for the crew in the combat control center to hear but not powerful enough to pass through the hull.

“All vents are shut,” a seaman informed the OOD.

“Vents shut, aye.” A seaman was reading off the depth. “Sixty-two… sixty-four…” A chief of the boat was watching the angle of the dive, its trim and speed. “Officer of the Deck, conditions normal on the dive.”

“Very well, Diving Officer,” Rolston confirmed, turning to Brentwood. “Captain, at one fifty feet, trim satisfactory.”

“Very well,” Brentwood answered. “Steer four hundred feet ahead standard.”

Rolston turned to die helmsman. “Helm, all ahead standard. Diving Officer, make the depth four hundred