Arctic Drift Part 58

71

THE UNITED STATES HAS LAUNCHED ARMED IN-CURSIONS into Canada on at least a half dozen occasions. The bloodiest invasion occurred during the Revolutionary War, when General Richard Montgomery marched north from Fort Ticonderoga and captured Montreal, then moved on Quebec City. He was joined by a secondary force that had entered Canada via Maine, led by Benedict Arnold. Attacking Quebec City on December 31, 1775, the Americans briefly captured the city before being beaten back in a fierce battle with the British. A shortage of supplies and reinforcements, as well as the loss of Montgomery during the fight, meant that the Americans had little choice but to break off the foray into Canada.

When hostilities heated up again during the War of 1812, the Americans launched repeated strikes into Canada to fight the British. Most ended in failure. The most notable success occurred in 1813, when Toronto (then York) was sacked and its parliamentary buildings burned to the ground. The victory would prove to haunt the U.S. a year later when the British marched on Washington. Angered by the earlier destructive act, the British returned the favor by taking a torch to the public buildings of the American capital.

With colonial independence achieved in 1783, Canada and the United States quickly grew to be amicable neighbors and allies. Yet the seeds of distrust have never completely vanished. In the 1920s, the U.S. War Department developed strategic plans to invade Canada as part of a hypothetical war with the United Kingdom. "War Plan Red," as it was named, called for land invasions targeting Winnipeg and Quebec, along with a naval a.s.sault on Halifax. Not to be outdone, the Canadians developed "Defence Scheme No. 1," for a counterinvasion of the United States. Albany, Minneapolis, Seattle, and Great Falls, Montana, were targeted for surprise attacks, in hopes that the Canadians could buy time until British reinforcements arrived.

Time and technology had changed the world considerably since the 1920s. Great Britain no longer stood in Canada's defense, and America's military might made for a dominating power imbalance. Though the disappearance of the Narwhal angered the President, it hardly justified an invasion. At least not yet. It would take weeks to organize a ground offensive anyway, should things degrade that far, and he wanted a quick and forceful response in forty-eight hours.

The strike plan agreed to, barring the release of the captives, was simple yet pain-inducing. U.S. Navy warships would be sent in to blockade Vancouver in the west and the Saint Lawrence River in the east, effectively blocking Canada's foreign trade. Stealth bombers would strike first, targeting Canadian fighter air bases at Cold Lake, Alberta, and Bagotville, Quebec. Special Forces teams would also be on standby to secure Canada's major hydroelectric plants, in case of an attempted disruption in exported electric power. A later strike would be used to seize the Melville gas field.

There was little the Canadians could do in response, the Secretary of Defense and his generals had argued. Under threat of continued air strikes, they would have to release the captives and agree to open terms on the Northwest Pa.s.sage. All were in agreement, though, that it would never come to that. The Canadians would be warned of the circ.u.mstances if they didn't comply with the twenty-four-hour deadline. They would have no choice but to acquiesce.

But there was one problem that the Pentagon hawks had failed to consider. The Canadian government had no idea what had become of the Polar Dawn's crew.

72

TRAPPED IN THEIR SINKING IRON COFFIN, THE Polar Dawn's crew would have begged for another twenty-four hours. But their prospect for survival was down to minutes.

Murdock's prediction had so far held true. The barge's number 4 hold had steadily filled with water until spilling over into the number 3 compartment. As the stern sank lower under the weight, the water poured in at a faster rate. In the small forward storage compartment, the deck listed ominously beneath the men's feet as the sound of rushing water drew nearer.

A man appeared at the aft hatch, one of Roman's commandos, breathing heavily from scaling the hold's ladder.

"Captain," he gasped, waving a penlight around the bay until spotting his commander, "the water is now spilling into the number 2 hold."

"Thank you, Corporal," Roman replied. "Why don't you sit down and take a rest. There's no need for further recon."

Roman sought out Murdock and pulled him aside. "When the barge starts to go under," he whispered, "will the hatch covers pop off the holds?"

Murdock shook his head, then gave a hesitant look.

"She'll surely go under before the number 1 hold is flooded. That means there will be an air pocket underneath, which will build in pressure as the barge sinks. There's probably a good chance it will blow the hatch cover, but we might be five hundred feet deep before that happens."

"It's still a chance," Roman said quietly.

"Then what?" Murdock replied. "A man won't last ten minutes in these waters." He shook his head with irritation, then said, "Fine. Go ahead and give the men some hope. I'll let you know when I think this tub is about to go down, and you can a.s.semble the men on the ladder. At least they'll have something to hang on to for the ride to perdition."

At the entry hatch, Bojorquez had listened to the exchange, then resumed his hammering on the locked latch. By now, he knew it was a futile gesture. The tiny hammer was proving worthless against the hardened steel. Hours of pounding had gouged only a small notch in the lock spindle. He was many hours, if not days, away from wearing into the lock mechanism.

Between whacks, he looked over at his fellow captives. Cold, hungry, and downcast, they stood a.s.sembled, many staring at him with hopeful desperation. Surprisingly, there was little trace of panic in the air. Their emotions frozen like the cold steel of the barge, the captive men calmly accepted their pending fate.

73

THE NARWHAL'S TENDER WAS PERILOUSLY OVERLOADED. Designed to hold twelve men, the boat easily accommodated the fourteen crewmen who had evacuated the ship. But the extra weight was just enough to alter her sailing characteristics in a rough sea. With choppy waves slapping at her sides, it was only a short time before a layer of icy water began sloshing around the footwells.

Stenseth had taken hold of the tiller after a laborious effort to start the frozen motor. With a pair of ten-gallon cans of gasoline, they had just enough fuel to reach King William Island. But Stenseth already had an uneasy feeling, realizing that they would have to march in the footsteps of Franklin's doomed crew if they were to reach safety at Gjoa Haven.

Leery of swamping the boat, the captain motored slowly through the whitecapped seas. Fog still hung heavy over the water, but he could detect a faint lightening of the billows as the brief Arctic night showed signs of pa.s.sing. He refrained from turning directly east toward King William Island, holding to his word to make a brief search for Pitt and Giordino. With next to no visibility, he knew the odds of locating the submersible were long. To make matters worse, there was no GPS unit in the tender. Relying on a compa.s.s distorted by their nearness to the magnetic north pole, Stenseth dead reckoned their way back to the site of the shipwreck.

The helmsman estimated that they had collided with the icebreaker some six miles northwest of the wreck site. Guessing at the current and their own speed, Stenseth piloted the boat southeast for twenty minutes, then cut the motor. Dahlgren and the others shouted out Pitt's name through the fog, but the only sound they heard in reply was the slap of the waves against the tender's hull.

Stenseth restarted the motor and cruised to the southeast for ten minutes, then cut the motor again. Repeated shouts through the fog went unanswered. Stenseth motored on, repeating the process once more. When the last round of shouts fell empty, he addressed the crew.

"We can't afford to run out of fuel. Our best bet is to run east to King William Island and try and locate some help. Once the weather clears, the submersible can be found easily. And I can tell you that Pitt and Giordino are probably a lot more comfortable in that sub than we are."

The crew nodded in agreement. Respect ran high for Pitt and Giordino, but their own situation was far from harmless. Getting under way once more, they ran due east until the outboard motor sputtered to a halt, having sucked dry the first can of gas. Stenseth switched fuel lines to the second can and was about to restart the motor when the helmsman suddenly cried out.

"Wait! "

Stenseth turned to the man seated nearby. "I think I heard something," he said to the captain, this time in a whisper.

The entire boat fell deathly quiet, each man afraid to breathe, as all ears were trained to the night air. Several seconds pa.s.sed before they heard it as one. A faint tinging sound in the distance, almost like the chime of a bell.

"That's Pitt and Giordino," Dahlgren shouted. "Has to be. They're tapping out an SOS on the Bloodhound 's hull."

Stenseth looked at him with skepticism. Dahlgren had to be wrong. They had moved too far from the submersible's last-known position. But what else could be signaling through the bleak Arctic night?

Stenseth engaged the outboard motor and sailed the tender in an ever-widening series of circles, cutting the throttle at periodic intervals to try to detect which direction the sound was coming from. He finally noted a rising pitch emanating from the east and turned in that direction. The captain motored slowly but anxiously, fearful that the tapping might cease before he had determined a true bearing. The fog blew in thick wisps while the morning dawn still struggled to appear. As close as they might be, he knew it would be all too easy to lose the submersible if it fell silent.

Fortunately, the clanging went on. The rapping only grew louder, audible even over the rumble of the outboard. Changing course with slight shifts to the tiller, Stenseth zeroed in on the sound until it echoed in his ears. Cruising blindly through a dark bank of fog, he suddenly cut the throttle as a huge black shape rose up in front of them.

The barge seemed to have lost its mammoth scale since Stenseth had last seen it, being towed by the icebreaker. Then he saw why. The barge was sinking by the stern, with nearly half of its length already submerged. The bow rose at a rakish angle, reminiscent of the last minutes of the Narwhal. Having just witnessed his own ship's demise, he knew the barge was down to its last minutes, if not seconds.

Stenseth and the crew reacted with disappointment at their discovery. Their hopes had been pinned on finding Pitt and Giordino. But their disillusionment quickly turned to horror when they realized that the barge was about to go under.

And that the tapping sound came from someone locked aboard.

74

DAHLGREN PLAYED A FLASHLIGHT BEAM ACROSS the exposed deck of the barge, searching for an entry point, but found only fixed bulkheads ahead of the forward hold.

"Take us around to the starboard side, Captain," he requested.