Craig Thomas
Sea Leopard
For Mike, agent and friend
and in memoriam
ANTHEA JOSEPH
a kind and courageous lady
Principal Characters
Kenneth de Vere AUBREY: Deputy Director, British Intelligence (SIS)
Patrick HYDE: a field agent of SIS
Ethan CLARK, USN: on liaison to the Admiralty
QUIN: an eminent electronic engineer
Tricia QUIN: his daughter
Col. Giles PYOTT, RA: a member of the NATO StratAn Committee
Comm. Richard LLOYD, RN: captain of the submarine HMS Proteus
Lt. Comm. John THURSTON, RN: first lieutenant, HMS Proteus
Sir Richard CUNNINGHAM: Director of British Intelligence
Peter SHELLEY: assistant to the Deputy Director, SIS
Sqn. Ldr. Alan EASTOE, RAF: Nimrod pilot
Valery ARDENYEV, Red Navy: O/C Underwater Special Ops. Unit
DOLOHOV: admiral of the Red Banner Northern Fleet
Tamas PETRUNIN: KGB Resident, Soviet embassy in London
Viktor TEPLOV: petty officer to Ardenyev" s unit
INTER OFFICE MEMO
from: Head of Project L
to: Mead of Research
ref: "LEOPARD"
I quite realise the pressure you must be under from the Board to achieve results. You may, when you report to them, inform them of the following —
The broad effect of "Leopard" is already working. We have progressed to the point where we can prevent an enemy sonar signal registering the presence of a vessel using "Leopard", and we can also, after nullifying that signal with the equipment, return to the enemy a false echo as if from the sea bed below the submarine.
The remaining problems are related to the variable quality of the false signal. I am confident the improvements can be made.
Commodore D. N. Blackshaw, R.H.,
Senior Projects Officer,
Royal Navy (Projects),
Old Admiralty Building,
Whitehall,
LONDON.
Dear Commodore,
In considering your urgent request to the company to accelerate the final stages of development of the field prototype of our "Leopard" project, I am advised by the project head, Dr. A. J. Quin, that it is possible to shorten the time prior to full sea trials, only by a matter of a few days. I respect the urgency of the matter, and understand the kind of mission on which "Leopard" would be of inestimable value, but I am afraid that is the best we can do.
Yours sincerely,
R. M. Bennett,
Deputy Chairman.
LEOPARD 42
MOST SECRET
FROM: Peter Shelley
TO: Kenneth Aubrey,
Deputy Director, SIS
You requested a copy of the accompanying report on the sea trials of the LEOPARD anti-detection equipment as soon as possible, together with a summary in layman" s terms.
As you know, a specially equipped Nimrod and a Sea King helicopter were used in the sea trials with HMS Proteus. They could not effectively detect or pinpoint the submarine, on any single occasion.
The full report is complex and highly technical, as well as being liberally sprinkled with service jargon! However, I have discussed it with the Director of Technical Services Section, and he has summarised the sea trials in the following terms —
1. No problems were encountered with the hull sensors;
2. The "noise generator" unit effectively cancelled all external acoustic emissions, and dealt successfully with all attempts to detect the submarine using sonar;
3. In shallower waters, the unit" s delayed response system effectively transmitted a sonar echo which accurately simulated a "seabed" response— in other words, the vessels seeking out HMS Proteus only registered the seabed and not the submarine. She was effectively "invisible", as expected.
DEFENCE DEPARTMENT (NAVY)
UNITED STATES NAVAL INTELLIGENCE
US (Intelligence) Form TAL 1
Our Ref Deputy Director
Your Ref Capt. E. V. Clark, USN
page 2 of 2
so I don't have to tell you how much of a threat to the British, to ourselves and to the whole of NATO the new Soviet sonar buoy carpet in the Barents Sea represents. Unless it is fully mapped, and therefore neutralised as a threat, the Soviet Navy can close the Barents Sea at any time, and that would mean the loss of NATO't northern flank without a shot being fired.
For the reasons I have outlined, it was decided that the Navy Department ask the British Royal Navy to investigate and chart this new sonar carpet, codenamed CHESSBOARD, using the submarine Proteus. with the new LEOPARD equipment. The submarine, if your reports on her sea trials are accurate, should remain undetected throughout the time she is in the area of the Barents Sea.
Your brief is liaison and observation, both for the Navy Department and for NATO. Don't overstep your mission orders, but get back to this office immediate and direct through the embassy if anything happens you don't like. Neither the Director nor myself are really happy about risking this LEOPARD equipment, if it't as good as they say. But, we don't have much choice.
Adml. J. K. Vandenburg, USN.
Deputy Director,
US Navy Intelligence.
TAPE TRANSCRIPTIONS
FILE REF SIS/26S54/3A— PH/Aubrey
TAPE NO B/163487/82/4/2S
DATE
REFERS QUIN — DISAPPEARANCE
…Continued
furthermore, none of his personal effects appear to have been removed from the flat. There was still mail behind the door, dating back more than three weeks. There have been no subsequent sightings.
In conclusion, I think the bird has flown. On the other hand, I don't believe it was his decision. There was no pre-planning. Coupled with the information regarding the 'trade Mission" arrivals and departures at the Soviet embassy during the relevant period. I am certain that Quin was snatched and is now in Moscow.
I am inclined to believe that his daughter is with him, Since Birmingham Special Branch haven't had a peep from her since the time of Quin't disappearance.
I have ordered the continuance of 24-hour surveillance on the flat Quin occupied in Bracknell and on his estranged wife't home in Sutton Coldfield.
Patrick Hyde
Part One
A Game At Chess
Chapter One: BAIT
The office of Tamas Petrunin, Trade Attaché at the Soviet embassy in London, looked out upon Kensington Palace Gardens, across the lawns of the embassy grounds. The straight lines of bare plane trees marked the boundary between himself and the western city he both despised and coveted. A fierce early spring wind searched for, and found, the remains of last autumn’s leaves, and hurried them along the road and beneath the wrought-iron gates into the drive of the embassy, finally scattering them like burnt secret messages and papers over the gravel and the grass. The sky was unrelievedly grey, and had been threatening rain all morning. Tamas Petrunin had leisure to reflect, as he listened angrily to the tape cassette from the duty room and its recorded conversation, that London irritated him particularly at that time of year. There was no snow. Wind, and rain — an umbrella threatening to turn inside out carried by an old man passing the gate, unceremoniously jostled by the wind — wind and rain, but little snow. Only sleet in the evening air sometimes, turning instantly to slush in the gutters, like a promise broken. In Moscow, there would be inches of snow, and everyone rotund and animalised in fur coats and hats.