The band was playing Satchmo’s “What a Wonderful World,” and since it was Stoke’s favorite song, Fancha wasn’t too surprised when her husband, who hated to dance, asked her out on the floor.
“You know what?” she whispered, her head pressed against his chest.
“No, what?” he said, kissing the top of her head.
“I’m glad we came on this cruise, baby. And, just think, day after tomorrow we’ll be in Montego Bay.”
“It’s going to be great, honey. Just like I said. I’m glad it makes you happy.”
“And I say to myself… what a wonderful world,” she sang, looking up at him with love and happiness in her eyes.
S toke showed her back to the table and then excused himself to go to the john. There was perceptible motion now, but luckily Fancha had had a few glasses of champagne before dinner and probably just thought she was a little woozy. He said he’d be right back and he’d damn sure better not find her dancing with another man.
Instead of the head, Stoke went up one flight of stairs to the purser’s desk. They had newspapers posted and weather faxes regularly. He’d checked the charts yesterday but not today. He looked at this one and it didn’t look good. At that moment he could actually feel the big boat listing to starboard before beginning the long roll back.
“Looks like we got a little tropical depression due south of Haiti,” Stoke said to the uniformed guy on duty.
“Yes, sir. Captain’s keeping a close eye on it.”
“Moving north-northwest, according the last report. Right in our path.”
“Well, maybe, maybe not. Nothing more unpredictable than a tropical storm.”
“How about women?”
“Excuse me?”
“Never mind. This boat has bilge keels? Active fin stabilizers?”
“I couldn’t say, sir,” the man said, rolling his eyes. “I’m the assistant purser.”
“Right. You and your purse have a good evening.”
“And you as well, sir. I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about.”
“You are? Well, that’s good. That makes me feel a whole lot more comfortable.”
Stoke walked away, storm clouds gathering outside. And inside his mind.
A board the Nevskiy, the captain’s war-game order came: “Torpedo attack! Prepare tubes one and two!”
The XO, Ivanov-Pavlov, passed along the order to the torpedo section in the sub’s forward-most compartment. Each of the sub’s ten watertight compartments had three or four decks, except the one housing the OK-650B nuclear reactor and the torpedoes. Senior Lieutenant Dobrov, aged thirty, was the commander of the torpedo combat unit and it was he and the warrant officer responsible for loading who would direct the practice launch operation. The torpedo compartment was located just forward of the CCP.
The compartment was large, nearly the size of a basketball court. It contained four 533mm-caliber and two 650mm-caliber forward torpedo tubes, plus the torpedo and missile magazine. The eighteen torpedoes were stacked in three rows and suspended over the crew’s heads like giant cigars. The weapons themselves were conveyed along a hydraulic tracking system to the tubes in the boat’s bow. Most of these “warshot” torpedoes had warheads of between 200 and 300 kilograms of high explosives.
There were five crew members and two engineers in the compartment, all under the immediate command of Warrant Officer Lohmatov. It was he who supervised the laborious loading of the two “Fat” antiship torpedoes. Thirty feet long and weighing over two tons, each torpedo was moved slowly along its tracking into position in front of tubes one and two.
Were this a live fire exercise instead of merely a drill, the target in Nevskiy ’s crosshairs would be an American aircraft carrier or heavy cruiser, not a cruise ship full of sunburned, rum-drenched tourists on holiday.
Senior Lieutenant Dobrov was still calculating the attack coordinates of the American cruise ship as the huge torpedoes slid into their firing tubes. The tubes’ inner doors were both closed.
There was nothing to do now but wait for the order from the CCP to arm the two fish and simulate the firing sequence. Senior Lieutenant Dobrov stayed at the fire control panel. He knew his wait could be anywhere from five minutes to thirty depending on Captain Lyachin’s sense of strategic considerations far beyond Dobrov’s area of responsibility.
A bout an hour before daybreak, Fancha climbed out of her berth and tried to make her way across their cabin to the bathroom. In the dim light, Stoke could see she had her hand clamped over her mouth and was making gagging noises and trying to make it to the head before she threw up.
It had not been a fun night. Fancha’s lighthearted mood had been dropping as steadily as the barometer ever since they’d left the restaurant for a stroll around the deck. The wind had freshened considerably. There were whitecaps and Stoke estimated about ten-foot seas. He’d been keeping a weather eye on the barometer for the last six hours. It had been dropping precipitously.
A tropical storm was forming just north of Jamaica, moving northwest at fourteen miles per hour. He knew they were in for a very rough ride. Just how rough it would get he had no idea.
He saw her reach for the door to the head at the exact moment the ship got slammed by a rogue wave on the port side. Fancha flew across the small cabin just as the mirrored closet door swung open and cracked her forehead with its edge. She uttered a small whimper of pain and then collapsed in the corner and got sick all over her brand-new silk nightgown.
Stoke leaped out of his berth and went to her. She tried furiously to push him away. Blood was trickling down her forehead and into one eye. Stoke examined it and knew she was going to need stitches. Tears were rolling down her cheeks and she was whimpering softly. He staggered into the head and came back with two damp hand towels, one for the wound, one to try and clean her up a little.
“Baby, I’m so sorry, let me just try to-”
“Just leave me alone, Stokely Jones. I’m sick and I banged my head. I told you I didn’t want to come on this damn boat. And now look at me.”
“Honey, look, it’s a storm. It happens all the time. This boat is built for this kind of weather. Now let me look at that cut. I think you might need stitches. I’ll go to sick bay and get the doctor, okay?”
“Whatever you say. It’s your honeymoon.”
It was useless. She was relatively safe here on the floor, holding on to the foot of the berth. He got a pillow and put it behind her head, then draped a blanket over her. Her distress was making him rethink the whole idea of the surprise honeymoon, and guilt reared its ugly head.
“I’ll be right back, baby. The doctor will stitch you up and give you something to calm… something to help you sleep. Okay? I love you.”
Angry silence.
Stoke climbed three flights of the main staircase to the promenade deck and pushed through the door. The wind was howling, and he felt a stinging rain on his face. He leaned into the blow and crossed the wet deck to the ship’s rail. Enjoying the sting, the salt air, and the heaving sea, he paused a moment to savor it all. Then he saw something out there in the blackness. Something that made him doubt his sanity.
Something glimpsed in a trough between two ten-foot waves that made him dash like a madman back to the cabin and his new bride, huddled on the floor. He ran past the purser’s desk, and, seeing the guy he’d spoken to earlier, stopped suddenly. There were five thousand souls aboard and he couldn’t just “Pick up that phone and get the captain. Now! This is an emergency!”
“I’m sorry, but passengers-”
Stoke flashed the CIA badge Harry Brock had given him for situations just like this. The guy blanched, picked up the phone, spoke briefly, and handed the phone across the counter. Stoke somehow managed to convey urgency but speak calmly.
“Captain, you need to sound the ship’s alarm. Now. All passengers and crew need to don life jackets and muster at their stations. No time to explain. The problem is off your starboard bow at ninety degrees. It’s either a torpedo wake or the wake of a submarine periscope headed directly for you at high speed. Collision course
… Yes, Captain, evasive action, right now.”
