The Company of the Dead (59 page)

“That was... interesting,” Steiner ventured after a few moments.

Webster shot him a sidelong glance, but remained silent.

“Why are you doing this, Webster?”

“Why do I do anything?”

“
That
is a question that sends my agents scurrying through the alleys in their overcoats and slouch hats,” Steiner commented wryly.

Webster smiled. A crinkle at the corner of his mouth.

Steiner gave his nails a cursory examination. “I can only imagine what you discussed with your general, prior to his performance.”

Webster narrowed his eye and shook his head with a slow, dismissive air.

“They will be flying non-essential personnel off-ship,” Steiner continued. “I was to be included, but declined to leave. How about you, Mr Webster? Do you plan on being around when the shit hits the fan?”

The provocation was oafish, the cliché stale. Hardly the German’s style. Webster said, “I’ll stick around to hold your hand.”

Steiner chuckled. “That’s a gratifying thought.”

“And what do
you
want, Mr Steiner?”

“I want our panzers to regroup at your installation north of Las Vegas.”

“What installation?”

Steiner gave him a facile smirk. The profile pegged Steiner as deep German intelligence. The request to use Alpha nailed him as one of the few German agents privy to Camelot.

Our panzers
. The rest just stood to reason.

“How many regiments of your tank division are composed of Brandenburg Special Forces?” Webster enquired, gently.

The smirk faded, replaced by a look of cunning recognition. “All of them.”

“Your men in New York should have stayed aboard the
Titanic
.”

“You should have kept a tighter leash on Kennedy.”

Dark urges slithered within him. Webster kept the seethe to a slow burn. He pondered Steiner’s request, broodingly. The presence of German elite armour and the unexpected presence of so many Japanese troops in the region provoked a number of difficult questions. Nevada was but one of the routes that led into the Confederacy and it was an unforgiving path at that. Why this sudden attention on the region by ally and enemy alike? And why was he so certain that it all boiled down to Kennedy?

Webster said, “There’s no installation north of Vegas, at least not any longer. It’s been razed to the ground. So you’re free to use whatever’s left of the site.”

They were pulling up to the communications foyer. Webster killed the motor.

Steiner climbed out of the cart slowly. “I suggest you have a word with your men on the ground. Last thing I heard, your base was still up and running.”

Webster eyed him curiously, but didn’t reply.

Steiner’s expression was sombre. “That was ten minutes ago.”

The convoy of attendant carts eased to a halt and the men poured out. Three of them followed Steiner towards the elevator vestibule. The rest stood a little distance away from Webster’s vehicle.

He gave a meaningful look at the nearest agent, then entered communications with his retinue of five. They had a German tag-along, decked out in maintenance kit, who hung back from the crowd with moderate discretion. Webster tossed him a snarl. The German slipped back further and faded into the scenery.

Communications held a subdued air. All the stations were manned but the usual drone of the radio network was absent. There were intermittent bursts of coded relay but none of the usual white noise. All eyes were on the monitors.

He spied the courier across the room and strode over.

“My dispatches.”

The courier directed him back to one of the operators. He had his head down like the others, tracking a series of green blips across a darkened screen.

“My dispatches,” Webster repeated.

The man glanced up and pointed at a stack of sheets in his out-tray. He returned his attention to the monitor. Webster picked up the sheets and began to rifle through them.

He found the order to burn Alpha, stamped as sent. He said, “I need immediate confirmation on this.”

“No can do, sir,” the operator replied. “We’ve been running silent since 1630 hours.”

“What are you talking about?” Webster growled.

One of his men stepped up. “Admiral Illingworth shut down all off-strat communications following the briefing.”

“Good for him.” Webster leaned forwards over the console. “Nevertheless, son, I need that confirmation,
right now
.”

The operator squirmed in his seat. He glanced at a co-worker for support.

“Better call the chief,” his companion suggested, without looking up from his own screen.

The operator backed out of his seat and selected one of the handsets that peppered the walls of the com room. His companion, noting the baleful attention of Webster’s murky eye, attempted to describe the task at hand. He pointed to the screen and said, “We’re patched into the navigation frame. Passive radar reception. That’s our first wing, scouts and fighters, deploying now.”

Webster grunted.

“No one’s ever done anything like this before.”

Webster turned to watch the operator at the handset. “Call me old-fashioned,” he said. “I was never one for precedent.” He turned to his agent. “This isn’t happening fast enough.”

The agent slid away, and Webster reverted his attention to the co-worker with the penchant for idle chat. He jotted some numbers on the back of his dispatch. “Can you get me a visual on these coordinates?”

The operator scanned Webster’s scrawl. “Over the horizon. No line of sight.”

Webster retrieved the document swiftly and folded it into his pocket.

The agent returned with the operator in tow.

“Sir, the chief is getting the admiral on the line. That’s the best I can do for you.”

“Thank you.” Webster approached the handset. He paused, turned back to the agent and said, “Secure the other operator.”

The co-worker gave a faint cry of protest that faded to nothing at the agent’s approach. The rest of his team signalled their support by shifting either side to facilitate his departure.

Webster took the phone.

“Please make this fast.” Illingworth’s tone was frostily polite.

“I need a verification from my ground team.”

“What do you need to know?”

“I need to know if something is on fire.”

There was a thoughtful pause on the line, then Illingworth said, “I can spare a scout for reconnoitre. No communications after launch. It’s all direct lines and face to face from here.”

“I’ll send along one of my men.”

“Give me a sec.” Illingworth returned after a few moments. “Okay. Have him report to flight deck three.”

“By the way, I’ve co-opted one of your staff, Peter. He saw too much.”

“How do you sleep at night, Glen?”

“With one eye open.”

Webster rang off. He selected one of his entourage and gave careful instructions. He led his procession from the communication room. He told the German operative to fuck off. He took the radio operator aside and said, “No good deed goes unpunished,” and sent him down to the Eye under escort.

He climbed into the cart, accompanied by the last of his guard, gunned the motor and began the tedious drive back to his cabin. Grey walls flashed past, corridor after corridor of curved metal. Clusters of motorcarts slid by as air crew and sailors attended their posts.

His meal was waiting for him. He left his guard at the door and brought the food inside himself. The porthole admitted the wan glow of looming dusk. He removed the patch. He put on a sweater. He lit a cigar and watched the blue smoke seep into the ceiling vents. He sucked the coating off a pink and spat out the core. He dozed, fitfully.

He was splashing cold water on his face when there was a brisk rap at the cabin door. Stepping over, he jerked it open. The young officer almost spilled into the room. He made an effort to compose himself.

“The raid, sir.” He barely flinched when he saw the ruined aspect of Webster’s unveiled eye. “They’re about to commence their primary run.” He quickly retreated, to wait outside the door.

Webster towelled off and replaced the patch. He cast a glance at the porthole where pinholes of starlight flickered faintly. The sky was a purple bruise. A trio of scouts wheeled in the distance. He followed the officer into the corridor. His guard joined them at the cart.

There was no traffic now. The pilots were on the flight decks or aloft, arrayed at the rendezvous points. The sailors were at their stations and the combat teams were at their gun-mounts. All non-essentials were long gone, evacuated to Flagstaff and points east.

The cart raced down the empty passageway.

Webster asked for a rundown and the officer sketched out the tacticals.

The
Patton
had been able to put ninety scouts—almost two-thirds of her complement—into the air. The stratolite was holding at forty-five thousand feet, pitched above a swift easterly. They could make a ready descent into the jet stream and be back over the Grand Canyon in about an hour. Alternatively, they could climb to sixty-five, sit back and watch the fireworks.

The guard gave a whistle of admiration. The young officer warmed to his subject. Webster sifted through the account.

Different altitudes demanded different strategies. Their current height facilitated a rapid launch sequence. Mass retrieval of returning scouts was practicable, but there was the threat of standard enemy fighters. The best defence was afforded by a dense fighter screen, supported by the
Patton
’s own anti-air turrets. Resembling an aircraft carrier, the stratolite behaved primarily as a platform for the delivery of aircraft. Her metal-plated, multiple-ballonet structure was sturdy enough, but it would only take limited fire. She could tolerate the loss of a third of her ballonets, though, and remain aloft. The helium would never ignite.

Sustained enemy action, however, would bring her down.

Above sixty thousand feet it was a different story. Maintaining a scout swarm was hazardous at that altitude. The strat was safe from generic aircraft. Hostile scouts were vulnerable to friendlies and, failing that, anti-aircraft fire due to their diminished manoeuvrability at such heights. Above sixty thousand, the
Patton
was more than just a transport service. She could make deliveries of her own. Standard ordnance, dropped from those heights, redefined the term “devastating”.

Webster considered the German stratolite fleet perched over the Sea of Japan, and said, “This is all theoretical, isn’t it?”

“Mostly.”

“No one has ever attacked a stratolite before, have they?”

The officer bristled. “Director, the japs enjoy air superiority close to the DMZ. Their FS-Zs and Ronins will be watching the desert, the airfields. We’re sending in six squadrons of rocket-armed scouts from on high. They won’t be expecting an attack from above.”

“We’ll find out soon enough, I suppose,” Webster purred.

Operations stank of nicotine. Glowed twilight, radar-screen emerald and battle-alert red. Hummed with expectation. Silent running, darkened ship. Two of the walls to either side of the forwards view port were manned by an array of radio operators. A quorum of senior officers crowded the main radar screen observing the pastiche of readings gathered from advanced reconnaissance. A relief map to its left, layered in shades of sapphire and jade, displayed red circles indicating the last known positions of the two Japanese strats. Crosses marked enemy landing fields at the edge of the DMZ; crimson wedges for recent bandit sightings. The
Patton
was an isolated blue circle on the near edge of the map.

A series of wedges, blue and white, were the scout rocket squadrons and their attendant fighter cover. Webster peered closer and realised that the raised swirls—curved across the map in streaks of cobalt and sky blue—represented the jet streams; shaded for altitude and velocity. There was a horrendous beauty to it all.

He made his way forwards and was intercepted by one of his people.

“Director.” The agent extended a slip of paper. “Recon scout’s back. He couldn’t get clearance to land but we got a message across.”

“How did you manage that?”

“Morse code, encrypted and flashed between the Eye and the scout.”

“Good work.” He examined the note: “Alpha in flames. Two outgoing convoys. Smaller: eastbound, trucks. Larger: northbound, tanks, trucks, horses. German column due south and closing.”

Why northbound?
He’d ordered Kennedy’s men to be shipped west. Tanks meant someone’s long-range recon were involved. They were too far north for Germans, even if they were Brandenburgs. Steiner must have intervened. But how? He searched the deck, scanning for the German, without success.
Horses?

“Find Delegate Steiner. Ask him to meet me in my cabin.”

Admiral Illingworth and Flight Director Paterson held court by the view port. Webster pressed his way towards them. There was motion across the starboard side wall. Chinese whispers along the console till the chief radio operator approached the radar array, addressed the flight director and said, “We’re go.”

Paterson sought Illingworth’s consent before giving the order. He said, “Let’s hear it.”

The operator relayed the command and the speakers sputtered to life.

“
Diving into the clouds for a closer look.
”

“
Roger that, Red Fox 5.
”

“
Wolf leader from Red Fox 4. Nothing out here but empty sky.
”

“For Christ’s sake,” Illingworth bellowed across the room, “filter it. Squadron leaders only.”

There was an agitated buzz among the officers. The speakers hissed and snapped.

“
Red Fox leader from Wolf leader. Thick as soup out here, no cloud-churn, no strat-sign. Take your scouts down to thirty k.
”

The officers focused on the radar composite with hopeful, willing eyes.

Stillness stretched out; a low murmur of prayer and curses.

“
Wolf leader from Red Fox leader. Two jap strats sighted. No scout swarm, no fighter screen. Repeat, no fighter screen. Course and speed to follow.
”