U.S.S. Seawolf

hope of release. Or they could surrender to the Chinese and feign outrage at being arrested in international waters during the perfectly peaceful conduct of their business.

Surrender or not, he ordered all evidence of the photographs, including the camera and the film-developing material, destroyed and then jettisoned out through the torpedo tubes. The passport of his XO was shredded and went with them.

Judd more or less rejected the possibility of a policy of sealed-in defiance, on the basis that the Chinese at some point would try to smash their way into the submarine, and that would entail a significant battle in which a lot of people would most certainly die, both Americans and Chinese.

One way or another, it was deeply frustrating to be sitting in one of the most powerful combat systems on earth, a nuclear boat with the capability of sinking not only Xiangtan but many of her seaborne colleagues, too. She carried the ADCAP Mk 48 torpedoes for just this sort of task, in case the U.S. went to war during one of her tours of duty.

She also carried the long-range Hughes Tomahawk land-attack missiles with nuclear warheads. One of these things could probably knock down Beijing, never mind Canton. Under pressure they could take out a sizeable chunk of southwest China.

And yet Captain Crocker was powerless, since he was not permitted to start World War III off his own bat.

Nor was he in any position to fight it out with the destroyer, because if Xiangtan was sunk, there were plenty more warships to replace her. And in the end Seawolf would surely go down fighting.

But the last signal from Pearl Harbor had forbidden him to open fire. SUBPAC was playing this one down for the moment, trying to reason with the Chinese Navy, expressing alarm that an American ship should have been apprehended in this way in international waters.

The Chinese were, predictably, stonewalling: “So very sorry about this unfortunate incident. Extremely upset that you should have your ship carrying big thermonuclear weapons of war crashing into our peaceful destroyer, which was testing new engines in the South China Sea.…We have merely answered a request from your Commanding Officer for assistance.…We mean no one harm.…We will help to get your submarine going soon, then we will talk. Very, very sorry.”

Midnight. July 5, 2006.

Office of Southern Fleet Commander.

It had been without question the happiest day of Admiral Zhang Yushu’s eventful life, more joyful than the magical day when he had married Lan, more hopeful than the day they had purchased their lovely summer home on the water, more exciting than the day he had been appointed to the highest possible command in the People’s Liberation Army/Navy.

And now he strode around Admiral Zu Jicai’s large private office, banging his right fist into the palm of his left hand, throwing back his head and laughing, congratulating himself heartily on the great prize he had secured for China: Seawolf and her crew.

Maybe one day the Paramount Ruler would feel obliged to return it to the Americans, but not before Chinese Navy scientists had wrung her dry for every last piece of technology the ship possessed.

“Oh, my friend Jicai,” he exclaimed, “this is a wonderful day for us. A few hours from now, they’ll be here. Is everything ready, the biggest submarine jetty? We have a detention center for half the crew? Put the rest in civilian jail with military guards. Then we go to work on that ship, hah? This is beautiful, just beautiful.”

Zhang was ecstatic, but he appreciated the strong element of luck that had put the submarine into his hands.

However, he was a supreme pragmatist who knew what he knew. And right now he knew he had captive, perhaps for only one month, the last word in world submarine technology. He knew he would have among his prisoners men whose expertise in the field of sonar, radar, computers and weapons was the envy of the world.

There would be, in his power, American engineers and technicians who could demonstrate every working part down to the last, the subtlest detail. He would have nuclear experts, electronics experts, missile experts, modern United States warlords who knew how to hurl a big ICBM farther than anyone in China had ever dreamed. And above all he knew he would have captive the top submarine commanding officer in the U.S. Navy.

What he did not know was that among the captured officers of Seawolf was the only son of the President of the United States of America.

4

0300. Friday, July 7.

Pearl River Delta. Nine miles southeast of the port of Macao.

They changed course from zero-one-three to a more westerly three-three-four two miles off the headland of Zhu Zhou Island at the gateway to the delta, Xiangtan dragging her giant black steel prisoner backwards through the navigation lanes.

Signals from SUBPAC during the past six hours confirmed to Judd Crocker only that the American cavalry would arrive too late. There could be no rescue now. And no one knew what their fate would be after this miserable, slow journey to the port of Canton.

It was raining again outside the hull, and two Chinese Navy tugs came out of the darkness to meet the destroyer they had escorted outward the previous morning. The captains conferred briefly and the tugs took up positions on either side of Seawolf for the long push back up the river to the base.

They could go more quickly now in the dead, flat, near-deserted water, and the Chinese destroyer pushed on immediately, increasing speed to seven knots all along the wide expanse of the Delta, which is 15 miles across in some places west of Hong Kong.

Inside the submarine, Judd Crocker handed over to Linus Clarke a brand-new identity: an American passport, bearing his photograph, issued under the name of Bruce Lucas, born in Houston, Texas, in 1972, son of oil company executive John Lucas and his wife Marie. Bruce’s service papers showed entry to the Naval Academy in 1990, promoted to Lieutenant Commander in 2004. Second tour of duty in Seawolf as Executive Officer. Torpedo specialist. The next-of-kin register listed his parents in the Houston suburb of Beaumont Place as those to be contacted in the event of accident.

Bruce Lucas was also the name that had always been on his U.S. Navy dog tags. The laundryman had been correct.

Well aware that the submarine was in the Delta, Judd Crocker broadcast to the ship’s company, outlining the predicament they were in and assuring them that SUBPAC had the matter well in hand. He explained that both Navy and government policy, under these circumstances, was to negotiate through diplomatic channels.

For obvious reasons they did not want a really hot battle to develop, nor did they want any heroics. The Chinese had no right to the submarine, no right to arrest the crew. However, since the submarine was unable to move, and it did contain weapons of mass destruction, nuclear, not germ, well…the Chinese probably had a case for taking it into custody in their waters while the diplomats argued.

“And that brings me to an extremely important point,” he added. “As many of you probably already know, Lieutenant Commander Linus Clarke, my Executive Officer, is the son of the President of the United States. He has been a career naval officer for all of his college and working life, and it sure was not his fault his dad decided to run for office and won. When that happened, Linus was already on his way up the ladder, a lieutenant on the carrier John C. Stennis. There was never any reason for him to give up his career just because his father was in the White House for five years.

“But nonetheless, the Navy has a procedure for such matters, particularly if we find ourselves in an awkward spot like now, with Lieutenant Commander Clarke in a vulnerable position, and his father somewhat compromised. He thus has a brand-new identity that I would like you all to memorize.

“He is no longer Linus Clarke. He is Lieutenant Commander Bruce Lucas of Houston, Texas. Please commit that to memory. Should we be interrogated, remember not to let either Linus or me or your President down. Our