Understrike Read Free Page A

The Chief waved away any thought of underground enemy action. “Car smash—‘automobile wreck’ the long-winded twits called it. On Route 66 last night. He was on his way to San Diego. That’s our stinkin’ problem.”
    “ San Diego?”
    “ San Diego. Gateway to Mexico. Home of the United States Pacific Fleet.” The Chief turned and rested his fat buttocks against the window-sill. “And next week—in seven days’ time—that is where they will be doin’ the firin’ trails with Playboy .”
    “ Oh!” Mostyn began to realise the implications.
    “ Yes. Bloody oh! Brand spankin’ new atomic submarine, launchin’ platform for the ... the ...” He paused, his mind feeling its way gingerly through a layer of alcohol. “... the ... what’s the name of the blasted weapon?”
    “ The Trepholite .”
    “ The Trephol-bloody-ite. Daft bleedin’ name to give a missile.”
    “ Biggest sea-to-ground-sea-to-air-sea-to-sea bang yet,” murmured Mostyn: a simple statement of fact.
    “ So the damn Yanks say. Believe it when I see it.” The Chief coughed, looked up and added hastily: “Not that I will be able to damn well see it. Can’t possibly get away. Realise that, don’t you?” His voice pleaded for Mostyn’s confirmation of this last remark. The Chief did not like the United States, and those citizens of the United States who were forced into occasional contact with the Chief did not take well to him.
    “ Good gracious, no, sir. You can’t possibly go,” drawled the Second-in-Command, his voice taking on the calm velvet of reassurance. There was a three beats’ silence.
    “ Spot of whisky?” said the Chief, his face settling into a satisfied smirk.
    “ Not at the moment, sir. Thanks all the same.” Mostyn could have used a quart of whisky, but when the Chief was as tricky as this, it was better to keep the brain reasonably agile.
    The Chief had the drinks cupboard—high behind his desk—half open. Mostyn hesitated for about five seconds after refusing the proferred spirits. Then, very quietly, with a sprinkle of grated cheese round the larynx, “I might add, sir, that I cannot go either. Far too much on the boil in Europe.”
    “ Understood, me dear chap.” The Chief was changing his tactics. “Quite understood. Wouldn’t expect to turf you out of London at this time of the year—‘cept for something of Top import. Sure you won’t have a snort?” He was slopping himself a large Chivas Regal.
    “ Quite sure.” Mostyn shut his mouth firmly in a tight smile on the word ‘sure’.
    “ Trouble is,” said the Chief dropping into his swivel chair, and taking a long pull at his drink, “trouble is, who, by all the holy monks of great renown, is going to go?”
    “ Who indeed?” said Mostyn benignly.
    The Chief sighed. “There’s the bleedin’ rub, as the Bard has it. Got to be an experienced operational officer, F05: that’s essential—treaty instructions and all that cock.” There was another short pause. Mostyn felt an aura of danger pass between them. The Chief looked up at him from under those great brows—once the scourge of many a gunroom. “Took the liberty of checkin’ your operational list, old man. Bit thin on the ground, aren’t you?”
    “ Suppose we are, sir. But the new continual surveillance on Cabinet Ministers—since Operation Keelroll —takes a fair slice of my boys... .”
    “ I’m not criticisin’.” The Chief cut in with the right hand raised pontifically and voice spiked with a pipette load of acid. They looked at one another, the space between throbbing a checkmate atmosphere.
    At last Mostyn found himself being stared out. He shifted his gaze back to the blemish on his buffalo-hide. A minute slid by unseen and unheard.
    “ There is just one possibility ...” he began; then, with a sharp and definitive change of mind, continued, “No! No! No! No, that wouldn’t really do.”
    He started to pace up and down: an effete fascimile of his superior. The