North Cape

For-the first time since taking command of the RFK, Larkin cursed the fact that she possessed no more than the i.5-inch salute gun. With a four-inch cannon, or even an antiaircraft gun, he would have merely steamed around the curve, leveled the cannons, and called for a surrender. With the submarine facing away from them and riding on the surface, he could have blown her out of the water if she resisted. He almost hammered the railing in a measure of frustration. How in hell could he bring that damned submarine to terms? A boat party was out of the question… or was it? Ever since Teleman had been shot down, Larkin had been aching for a chance to take some kind of direct.action. Five thousand yards. They could be on that damned submarine before they knew what was happening. If the hatches were closed, as they would be in this chop, a couple of charges of gelignite would take care of that. Lookouts could be dealt with. His mind raced furiously as he fc-rced himself to remain calm. He would need the whaleboat, eight men, carbines, gelignite charges.…

"Mr. Bridges, assemble an armed boat party."

Ten minutes later Larkin sat in the stern sheets of the whaleboat with the tiller under his arm as they pulled away from the almost flush afterdeck. Feeling somewhat like Horatio Hornblower, he had buckled a revolver belt around his waist and stuck a flare pistol in his pocket. On his signal Bridges would bring the RFK around the headland and run down on the submarine. Unless a second flare was fired, his orders were to run the submarine under. Larkin and Bridges both knew that this was absolutely the last resort in case the armed attack by the nine men failed. The battle cruiser bows, cutting into the hull of the submarine, would crumple to the first main bulkhead if that happened. But in any event the submarine would be sitting on the bottom of the fjord. It would then be Bridges' obligation to see that the same thing did not happen to the RFK. Behind him Larkin could hear the coughing of a second whalebc-at starting up. Ten men were in that party and they would continue down the fjord to find Folsom's party and render whatever assistance they could. It was probably a futile effort at best, but at least they had done everything they could. Larkin had sent a message direct to Virginia by satellite relay detailing his plans, but had not waited for a reply. Those short-sighted idiots would probably countermand his decisions.

Larkin took the whaleboat in as close to the narrow beach as he dared before turning paralleL The depth of the fjord made it possible for him to come within twenty yards of the rocky beach. Ahead, the jutting headland that screened the two ships from each other stood out boldly in the weak sunlight. Larkin could have wished for darkness, but he suspected that to wait for the remaining hour of daylight to pass could very well be too late. By the time they rounded the headland and came within a thousand yards of the ship, he judged that the sun would be dipping close enough to the horizon so that darkness would be almost complete within the fjord.

As the whaleboat puttered on with the muted roar of its muffled forty-horsepower engine, Larkin felt his own excitement reflecting back from the armed party. Each sat, staring forward, backs stiff with tension and hands firmly clasped around weapons. The gelignite charges were in two packs resting on the floorboards. One of the sailors had his foot resting on the top of the packs and a cord fastening both together looped around his wrist. Larkin reached down and picked his carbine up and ejected the clip, checked it, and then slammed it home. The sharp snap made the sailors jump. Larkin grinned at them and settled back against the thwart, portraying a relaxation he was far from feeling. He swung the tiller over, turning the bows to pass as close to the headland as possible, and looked back. The sunlight filtering down through the canyon was beginning to wane, but the bows-on silhouette of the RFK was sharply etched against the crack of blue-gray sky.