antenna of a radio transmitter to give us a message. He's doing all that — and risking his neck — because he believes that freedom is a beautiful thing, Captain. Now, are we — sitting here in this air-conditioned rinky-dink with a rare steak, corn-oysters and blueberry pie on the menu tonight — are we going to let that kid call us up and get no reply?'
'We'll maybe lose the periscope,' said the Captain.
'Give it a whirl,' said Schlegel.
Don't let me leave you with the idea that I personally was joining Schlegel's clamour for a chance to wriggle under the keel of that iceberg. Let that kid in the car keep right on driving if he's nervous.
'One more home-team try,' said the Captain to his Executive, but no one gave the college cheer.
'Five knots is all I want.'
The screws began to turn. As water flowed along the hull the deck lurched and slowly came level. I saw the Captain tell the Exec something and I guessed he was sending him off for the sealed orders before mating the attempt to get through. That Captain didn't trust anyone. That was wise of him.
I heard the pen scrape again. 'More head room, skipper.'
He made a sound to show that he was unimpressed with the extra couple of feet clearance. But his eyes were on the sonar and the lagoon beyond the floe, 'Close sill watertight doors and bulkheads.'
I heard the metal thump closed and the locks tightened. A few of the crewmen exchanged blank stares. The phone rang. The Captain took it. He listened to the Exec for a moment. And then he looked at Schlegel. 'OK, Charlie. Then let's do that thing.' He replaced the phone. 'Here we go, Colonel,' he said, to Schlegel. Schlegel gave him a smile no thicker than a razor blade.
There was another soft scraping noise on the hull. We heard it clearly because everyone was holding their breath. The ship wriggled as the contact slewed one side of the hull and turned us a degree or two. The revolutions thrashed a little as the prop lost its hold and then gripped the water and went back to normal. Again the same thing happened, but suddenly we lurched forward and the pen scratched a near-vertical line that represented fifty feet or more. The pen came down again, but only made fifteen feet, and then was a steady corrugation on the polar pack no more than tea feet deep.
'Can't see that damned lagoon, Colonel.'
'If we don't pick up a suitable break in the ice inside thirty minutes I'm going to ask you to put a couple of fish into the underside of that polar pack.'
'That doesn't sound healthy,' said the Captain. 'We'd be only three ship-lengths away.'
'Ever hear of Polaris subs, Captain?' Schlegel asked.
The Captain said nothing.
'I don't know what kind of money that fleet of pi^-boats costs, but you don't think they built those contraptions without finding out how to knock a hole in the ice, do you?'
'We've got thirty minutes yet,' said the Captain.
'Right,' said Schlegel, and he threw a finger at the Captain. 'Cool your kids off a little, huh?'
'Attention all hands. This is the Captain. We're under the polar pack. Resume normal activity but keep the juke box off.'
We found a suitably large polynya — which is the proper name for a lagoon in the ice — and, with careful attention to the sonar, the Captain began surfacing procedures.
We were all in the electronics room with the operators that were assigned to this watch. 'I've got every permutation of message he can send on call in my head,' said Schlegel.
'Maybe he won't call,' said Ferdy.
'We'll give him two hours and then we'll send the negative contact.'
'Will the Captain hold her on the surface for two hours?'
'He'll do what I tell him,' said Schlegel, with one of his special scowl-like smiles. 'Anyway, it'll take his deck party an hour or more to paint the sail white.'
'That won't prevent us being picked up on the radar or mad,' said Ferdy.
'Do me a favour and don't tell that Captain,' said Schlegel harshly. 'He's scared gutless already.'
'He probably knows the radar chain better than you do. Colonel,' said Ferdy.
'That's-why the Colonel's not scared,' I added.
'You guys!' said Schlegel in disgust.
The radio call came through on time. It was coded in Norwegian, but any Russian monitoring crew would have to be unusually stupid to believe that there were a couple of Norwegian fishing trawlers out there in the deep freeze.
'Bring number four net,' came through in morse as clear as a bell and was followed by four five-figure cipher groups.
Schlegel looked over the operator's shoulder as he deciphered and stabbed a group in the code book. He said, 'Send that code for 'market steady on today's catches — no change expected tomorrow'. And then wait for them to close.'
Our operator released the key after the signature and there was the bleat of an acknowledgment. Schlegel smiled.
When we were back in the lounge Ferdy sank into an armchair, but Schlegel fiddled with the writing-desk light over the doctor's one-man bridge game. 'Our boy made it,' Schlegel said.
'Our boy with the suitcase radio set came in five by five. A powerful signal, and clear enough to compare with the Northern Fleet operational transmitter,' I said.
Schlegel bared his teeth in a way that most people do only for the dentist. I was beginning to recognize it as a sign that he was on the defensive. 'It was an official transmitter,' he admitted. 'Confirming the rendezvous with the helicopter.'
I stared at him. It seemed a lot of words for such a simple message, and why wasn't it in high speed morse. 'A Russian transmitter?' I said. 'So we are going bare-arse into a lagoon of their choosing?'
'You don't like the idea of it?'
'With a Russkie egg-beater overhead? They could come down with a feather and tickle us to death.'
Schlegel nodded agreement and then studied the doc's bridge game. Schlegel looked at all the hands and then checked the dealer. He didn't cheat the cards; he just liked to know where they all were. Without looking up he said, 'No sweat for the sub, Patrick. Save all your prayers for us. The sub won't be there: it will arrive early, deposit us and then make itself scarce until we bleep it up. For all we know the RV won't be a lagoon. We'll have to make it on foot.'
'Make it on foot?' I said. 'Across that big vanilla-flavoured ice-cream sundae? Are you out of your mind?'
'You'll do as you're told,' said Schlegel in the same voice he'd used on the Captain.
'Or what? You'll tell weight-watchers anonymous about my extra cinnamon toast?'
'Ferdy!' said Schlegel.
Ferdy had been watching the exchange with interest but now he got to his feet hurriedly, murmured goodnights, and departed.
When we were alone Schlegel moved round the lounge, switching lights on and off, and testing the fans.
'You don't think Rear-Admiral Remoziva will deliver?'
'I've been fed a rich diet of fairy stories all the way through this business,' I complained. 'But based upon the kind of lies I've heard, what I know, and a couple of far-out guesses, I'd say there isn't a chance in hell.'
'Suppose I said I agree.' He looked round anxiously to be sure we were not overheard. 'Suppose I told you that that radio signal obliges us to continue with the pick-up, even if we were certain that it's phoney? What would you say to that?'
'I'd need a book of diagrams.'
'And that's what I can't give you.' He Ian Ms open hand down his face, tugging at the corners of his mouth as if afraid he might give way to an hysterical bout of merriment. 'I can only tell you that if we all get gunned down out there tomorrow, and there's no Remoziva, it will still be worth while.'
'Not to me, it won't.' I said. 'Stay perplexed, feller,' he said, 'because if the Russkies pull something fancy out there tomorrow, it won't matter if they take you alive.'
I smiled. I was trying to master that grim smile of Schlegel's. I am never too proud to learn, and I had a lot of uses for a smile like that.
