"We're getting… transient noises, sir. Kind of like a rumble, far off. It sounds kind of… "
"Yes?"
"Sir, it sounds like gunfire. Heavy gunfire, like artillery or something. I think someone is shooting at someone else."
Which made sense. If the PRC had declared war on Taiwan, one of their first targets would most likely be the ROC garrison on tiny Kinmen.
"Thank you, Queenie."
"I'm also getting what might be a number of surface contacts. Too confused yet to make out anything certain. There are a lot of bottom echoes, sir."
"Great work, son. Stay on it. If you hear them goddamn sneeze, tell me."
"Aye aye, sir."
Garrett returned to the control room, where several sets of eyes followed his movements. He couldn't tell whether those looks expressed fear, respect, or hostility after they'd seen Neimeyer dragged from the sonar shack. At this point it scarcely mattered. It was vital that Neimeyer not make any noises loud enough or persistent enough to carry past Seawolf's hull and into the surrounding ocean, and vital, too, that he not panic and possibly hurt someone, or accidentally engage some piece of machinery that would tip off the enemy.
Walking over to the chart tables, he joined Lieutenant Simms, studying the high-resolution map of Kinmen and Liehyu. Seawolf was now passing the gap between the two islands, traveling slowly west. The fact that Queensly had picked up the sounds of surface vessels and gunfire here suggested that the sounds were being funneled through the narrow strait from the north, from the far side of Kinmen.
An invasion of Kinmen by the PRC? Or simply a close-in shore bombardment?
COB joined them a few moments later.
"How is he, COB?"
"He's doin' okay, sir. The doc is giving him something to sedate him."
"Thanks, COB. Have Ritthouser keep me informed."
"Already told him that, sir."
"Outstanding."
He was sorry about Neimeyer, but there'd been no alternative. The safety of the boat and of the entire crew had to take precedence over any one man.
He thought about Captain Lawless, alone on the weather bridge.
In silence, then, Seawolf drifted slowly west.
Now, again, came the waiting. Some wit with undeniable military experience had once remarked that life in the wartime military was ninety-nine percent boredom, one percent stark terror. On board a submarine that was even truer, with hours spent stalking the enemy, or listening for him, or hiding. Once the order was given to fire, there were a few minutes of high-riding excitement, as torpedoes flashed through the water… but then the noise and excitement were gone, replaced once more by tedious waiting, by listening, by slow, gentle, and above all quiet maneuverings. Somewhere out there at least three more submarine skippers were ordering their sonar crews to comb the ocean for Seawolf, to pick out any scrap of noise she might make, to close on her for the kill.
Toynbee appeared at his side. "Skipper?" the sonar chief whispered. "Master Four-two and Sierra One-eight-six pulled a sprint and came up close to the wreck of Master Four-one. They're passing astern of us now."
"And the ghost?"
"If he's there, he's still out there to the south." Garrett nodded. Not much longer before this was settled, one way or another.
Jorghensen suggested calling the patrol boat the "Runcible Spoon," and somehow the name stuck. Morton wondered, though, who was the owl and who the pussycat.
With the engines fired up and Chief Bohanski at the wheel, they'd maneuvered the little craft in close to the shore. The Second Squad SEALs and the rest of the Chinese commandos had waded out to meet her, bringing along the wounded and the two bodies of the commandos killed at Tong'an. In minutes they were motoring away from the shore, steering for the middle of the strait.
The seven prisoners, all of them fully clothed now, had been secured hand and foot with plastic ties the SEALs carried with them for prisoner handling. Zhu had argued that the captives should be killed — a necessary combat expedient in a desperate situation, but Morton wasn't ready to go that route yet.
"Damn it, Zhu," he'd said, furious. "There are alternatives to murder."
At his orders, the prisoners were hauled below deck to the boat's tiny mess area and lounge, where they now took up all of the furniture and most of the available deck space. Under other circumstances he might have killed the combatants — American Special Forces operatives were prepared to kill civilians when it was absolutely necessary to preserve a mission — but things hadn't reached that point yet. The desperate, terrified expressions in the eyes of the prisoners, military and civilian, had been enough to convince him they wouldn't have much trouble from the captives…not for the moment, anyway.
Her diesel engine chugging fitfully and belching smoke from the water exhaust aft, the Runcible Spoon steered for the center of the channel, then turned east. Dead ahead, smoke rose in black pillars from the fires burning on the island of Kinmen.
Artillery rumbled and boomed from Xiamen.
"They do it again," Zhu explained, pointing to the island. "When Mao try to take Kinmen before, he put big guns on Xiamen… called Amoy by West. Fire half-million shells at Kinmen."
"A hell of a bombardment. It's amazing that little island is still above water."
"Yes. Just so. Someone calculate all those shells something like ten percent of all artillery shells in PRC inventory then. But Kinmen hold."
"Do you think it will hold this time?" Morton asked.
"It will. It must." There was a moment's hesitation, a darkness behind the eyes, a hint of deep pain. "I from Kinmen. I have wife and three children there. Also mother, father, sister, other relatives."
He'd been angry with Zhu for suggesting that the prisoners be summarily killed, even though he understood the hard, cold, rationale behind it. Zhu's expression, though, reminded him that the most bitter of wars were civil wars… and that over five decades of hatred between Taiwan and the mainland had left some very deep scars indeed.
What must it be like for Zhu to be here, he wondered, relatively safe aboard the captured patrol boat, while his family tried to survive that holocaust of fire and steel on the eastern horizon? He understood now why Zhu had elected to return instead of staying with Tse. He wondered if the other Taiwanese aboard had similar motives.
How long could the PLA be held at bay?
"We're updating Sierra One-eight-six to Master Four-three," Toynbee said softly. He pointed at the chart between them. "And we're calling a new sonar contact Sierra One-eight-seven, due south, range forty thousand. About here."
"The second ghost?"
"Yes, sir. He sprinted for just a few minutes, long enough for us to nail him by his tonals. Then he went quiet again. Vanished."
"What about Masters Four-two and Four-three?"
Toynbee grinned, a crooked showing of teeth. "That's the good news, sir. They kept going right on past us. We lost 'em in our baffles, but a few minutes later Queenie picked 'em both up on the starboard array. It looks like they're moving into the channel between these two islands." He looked up at Garrett, respect softening his weathered features. "Damn it all, Skipper! You planned it that way! You suckered 'em!"