‘What’s her endurance at ten knots?’
‘About seventy-two hours. She has large fuel tanks. Chose her for that. Among other things.’ Olufsen looked at his watch. His large eyes searched the faces round the table. ‘Any more questions?’
There were none so they went up on deck. The sun had set, twilight was deepening.
Nunn said, ‘When do we see you next?’
‘In Kolhamn tomorrow. I fly over in the morning. To get news for my papers, you know. I may be there a few days.’
‘I’m sure you will,’ said Nunn, and then wished he hadn’t. He wasn’t, he knew, behaving like a professional.
They shook hands with Olufsen before he went up the brow to the quay.
‘Good luck,’ he said. ‘And good hunting.’
Bill Boyd, the competent but irascible lieutenant-commander who presided over the destinies of Bluewhale, saw the radio supervisor making for him with a signal clipboard. ‘What’s it now, Blades? More buggering about?’
Blades handed over the signal. ‘From C-in-C Fleet, sir,’ he said, and grinned. The captain, he knew, was feeling pretty brittle about signals from MOD. At 1400 the day before they’d received one diverting Bluewhale, outward bound on an Arctic surveillance patrol, to a position north of the Shetlands to rendezvous with the assault ship Belligerent for an ASW exercise. This hadn’t pleased Bill Boyd in any way. The Arctic patrol meant Bluewhale would be on her own and he liked being on his own. What was more she’d been bound for the Barents Sea and waters off the Murman coast where units of the USSR’s Northern Fleet would be carrying out late autumn exercises. Bluewhale had orders to monitor these, which was something Boyd enjoyed doing. The Russians didn’t like NATO submarines monitoring them and had ways of making things difficult, which was a challenge and really rather fun. It was a more attractive proposition than stooging round the Shetlands on an ASW exercise under Belligerent’s orders.
Bill Boyd frowned as he read Belligerent’s signal. My Whirlwind has picked up two survivors from yacht sunk approximately twenty miles north of you. Helicopter’s fuel remaining precludes making Lerwick or returning Belligerent with additional load. Stop. Surface now repeat now and stand by to receive survivors from Whirlwind.
He handed the clipboard back to the radio supervisor. ‘Bloody hell,’ he said. ‘You’d think we’re a flipping hospital ship.’ He took the broadcast mike from its rack and pressed the speak-button. ‘This is the captain speaking. We’ve just received a signal from Belligerent ordering us to receive two yacht survivors from her Whirlwind. They, he, she or it, will probably require medical attention.’ He replaced the mike and turned to the officer-of-the watch. ‘Pipe hands to diving stations. I’m going to surface.’
Soon after Bluewhale surfaced the Whirlwind was sighted coming in on her port quarter. The sound of the engine rose as the helicopter grew larger until, nose down, it took station abreast of the casing abaft the fin. Three seamen and a petty officer wearing lifejackets stood by to receive the transferees. The noise of the engine was deafening and beneath the helicopter the down draught from its rotors created a circle of shimmering sea. The petty officer signalled ‘come in’, the Whirlwind crabbed in sideways and hovered over the casing. A line was dropped and a figure wearing an orange lifejacket was winched down and grabbed by the men on the casing. The procedure was repeated and another figure winched down. The survivors were helped along the casing and in through the door in the fin.
The helicopter swung away bound for Belligerent some eighty miles to the east. A signal was made to the assault ship reporting completion of the transfer, whereafter Boyd gave the order to dive. Blades was busy again with an incoming signal from Belligerent: Well done Bluewhale. Proceed with dispatch to rendezvous with Aries in position Lat 67°30’N Long 8.30E. You will receive instructions for transfer of your survivors in due course.
‘That’s bloody helpful, isn’t it?’ said Boyd to his first lieutenant. ‘Who are these characters, Number One?’
‘Frank Brough and George Hamsov, sir. Lecturers from London University.’
‘What sort of shape are they in?’
‘Wet and cold. Suffering a bit from shock. But the LMA says fit otherwise. We’re fixing them up with dry clothing and a hot drink.’
‘Where are you putting them?’
‘In the senior ratings’ mess, sir.’
‘Good. What’s their story?’
‘There were three of them in the yacht. One chap was lost when she capsized in a squall. The Whirlwind picked up the inflatable dinghy on radar while exercising a square search. Sheer chance.’
‘Have you got details of this? Names, addresses, name of yacht, port of registration, etcetera. We’ll have to let MOD know.’
‘Not yet, sir. I thought you’d like to see them first.’
Nobody in Bluewhale knew — nor anyone in Belligerent, save her captain — that Brough and Hamsov had not met with a yachting accident. It was only when he interviewed the survivors in the privacy of his cabin that Bill Boyd learnt the truth: that Brough and his companion had been flown from Lerwick in the Shetlands by a Special Branch helicopter which had dropped a self-inflating life-raft into the sea before winching them down into it. There they had observed conscientiously the instructions to make themselves wet, tired and dishevelled in the half-hour of waiting for rescue by the Whirlwind. Sea seasickness had helped. It was the captain of Belligerent who’d ordered the square search ‘for exercise’ in the area where he knew the life-raft to be. He knew, too, that its occupants were members of the Special Branch.
At about the time the Whirlwind was lifting the two survivors from the North Sea another helicopter landed on Belligerent’s flight deck with three scientists and their equipment. These men, it was understood in Belligerent’s wardroom, had been flown to the Shetlands that morning from the undersea warfare research establishment in Portland. The buzz on the messdecks was that they were to test ASW equipment with Bluewhale and Aries in an exercise due to begin in a day or two. The equipment evidently had a high security classification for it was locked in a storeroom with an armed sentry outside. The scientists, three rather ordinary-looking men, took their meals in the captain’s quarters and were incommunicado as far as the rest of the ship’s company were concerned.
By late afternoon accommodation for visitors in Kolhamn had become something of a problem. The fishing village bustled with new arrivals: Press, TV reporters, and cameramen, a whole gaggle of media representatives jostling with each other for beds, meals and the hire of boats. The hospits could not help them with accommodation. It was full. Krasnov and Gerasov had moved into one of the doublerooms the night before. On the second day two United States ornithologists had flown in from Bodo in the Wideroes inter-island flight. They had taken the remaining doubleroom which had been booked for them by telephone by the Ornithological Society of America, New York. A press and tourist agent from Bodo, a man well known to the manageress of the hospits, had arrived in the same flight as the ornithologists. He had taken the remaining single room. Inga Bodde, the telephone operator, had booked it for him the night before.