Road traffic had dropped off at dusk, allowing them to cross the road on the run. They'd found themselves without food in another area of lakes and streams. Enough was enough, Edwards had decided. They had to rest again and began fishing to get themselves some food. The next leg of their journey would keep them well clear of inhabited areas.
His rifle and other gear lay next to a rock, covered with his camouflage jacket. Vigdis was with him. She'd hardly left his side all day. Smith and the Marines had found places to relax while their lieutenant did most of the work.
The local bug population was out in force today. His sweater kept most of them off his skin, but his face attracted their share. He tried to ignore them. Quite a few bugs had found their way to the surface of the stream, and the trout were going after them. Every time he saw a ripple, he cast the feathery lure toward it. The rod bent again.
"Got another one!" he hooted. Smith's head came up, shook angrily, and went back down in the bushes fifty yards away.
Edwards had never done this sort of fishing. All his experience were in his father's boat, but the principles were pretty much the same. He let the trout pull against the line, but not too much, just enough to wear him out as Edwards worked the rod up and down, drawing the fish upstream and into the rocks. Suddenly he tripped over a rock and fell into the shallow water, managing, however, to keep his rod-tip high. Struggling to his feet, he stepped back, his fatigue pants black and wet against his legs.
"This is a big one." He turned to see Vigdis laughing. She watched him work the fish in and began moving toward it. A minute later she grabbed the leader and pulled the trout clear of the water.
"Three kilos, this one." She held it up.
At age ten Mike had caught a hundred-pound albacore, but this brown trout looked a lot bigger. He reeled in the line as Vigdis walked toward him. Ten pounds of fish in twenty minutes, he thought. We might just be able to live off the land yet.
The helicopter appeared without warning. There was a westerly wind-it had probably been patrolling the road to the east-and the aircraft was less than a mile away before they heard the stuttering sound of its five-bladed rotor headed right toward them. "Everyone freeze!" Smith yelled. The Marines were in good cover, but Mike and Vigdis were in the open.
"Oh, God," Edwards breathed. He finished reeling his line in. "Take the fish off the hook. Relax."
She looked at him as the helicopter approached, afraid to turn around toward the incoming chopper. Her hands shook as she worked the hook free of the wriggling trout.
"It's going to be all right, Vigdis." He wrapped his arm about her waist and walked slowly away from the stream. Her arm pulled his body close against hers. It came as a greater shock than the Russian chopper. She was stronger than he'd expected, and her arm was a heated path around his back and chest.
The chopper was less than five hundred yards off, bearing directly at them, nose down, the multibarreled gun trained directly at them.
He'd never make it, Edwards saw. His rifle was fifty feet away under his camouflage jacket. If he moved fast enough to get there, they'd know why. His legs were weak beneath him as he watched death approach.
Slowly, carefully, Vigdis moved the hand in which she held the fish. She used two fingers to grab Mike's hand at her waist, moving it up and around until it rested on her left breast. Then she held the fish high above her head. Mike dropped his rod and stooped to get the other trout. Vigdis followed his movements and managed to keep his left hand in place. Mike held up his fish as the Mi-24 attack helicopter hovered fifty yards away. Its rotor tossed up a circle of spray from the surrounding marsh.
"Go away," Mike rasped through his grinning teeth.
"My father loves to fish," the senior lieutenant said, manipulating the flight controls to Hover.
"Shit on the fish," the gunner snapped back. "I want to catch one of those. Look where that young bastard has his hand!"
They probably don't even know what's going on, he thought. Or if they know, they have sense enough not to do anything about it Nice to see that some people are untouched by the madness that's sweeping the world... The pilot looked down at his fuel gauges.
"They look harmless enough. We're down to thirty minutes fuel. Time to return."
The chopper settled at the tail, and for a terrible moment Edwards thought it might be landing. Then it pivoted in midair and moved to the southwest. One of the soldiers riding in the back waved at them. Vidgis waved back. They stood there as it flew off. Their hands came down, and her left arm held his tight against her. Edwards had not realized that Vigdis didn't wear a bra. He was afraid to move his hand, afraid to appear to make an advance. Why had she done that? To help fool the Russians-to reassure him, or herself? That it had in fact worked seemed unimportant. The Marines were still concealed. They stood there quite alone, and his left hand seemed to burn as his mind stumbled over what he ought to do.
Vigdis acted for him. His hand slid away as she turned to him and buried her head against his shoulder. Here I am holding the prettiest girl I ever met in one hand, Edwards thought, and a Goddamned fish in the other. That was easily solved. Edwards dropped the fish, wrapped both arms around her, and held on tight.
"Are you all right?"
She looked up at his face. "I think yes."
There was only one word for what he felt toward the girl in his arms. Edwards knew this wasn't the time, and wasn't the place, but the look and the word remained. He kissed her gently on the cheek. The smile that answered him counted more than all the passionate encounters of his life.
"Excuse me, folks," Sergeant Smith said from a few feet away.
"Yeah." Edwards disengaged himself. "Let's get moving before they decide to come back."
USS CHICAGO
Things were going well. American P-3C Orions and British Nimrods were scouting the route to the icepack. The submarines had been forced to detour east around one suspected Russian submarine, but that was all. Ivan was sending most of his boats south, it seemed, confident that the Norwegian Sea was under his control. Another six hours to the pack.
Chicago was drifting now, finished with her turn at the head of the "freight train" procession of submarines. Her sonar gear searched the black water for the telltale noise of a Russian submarine. They heard nothing but the distant growling of the icepack.
The tracking team plotted the position of the other American submarines. McCafferty was glad to see they had trouble doing so, even with America's best sonar equipment. If they had trouble, so would the Russians. His crew looked to be in good shape. Three days on the beach had counted for a lot. The beer supplied by the Norwegian skipper, plus word on what their Harpoon had done in Chicago's one real engagement, had counted for even more. He'd already briefed the crew on their current mission. The information was accepted quietly, with a couple of jokes about going back home-to the Barents Sea.
"That was Boston, skipper," the XO said. "Now we're the caboose."
McCafferty walked back to examine the chart. Everything looked okay, but he checked everything carefully. With so many submarines running the same course track, the risk of collision was real. A quartermaster ran down the list of the sister subs that had passed Chicago. The skipper was satisfied.