Submarine

He had, never seen such congestion in any main-line terminus: the queues of trains were crawling like caterpillars into the station. As his own train began slowly to creep forwards, he watched the packed crowds jostling good-humouredly along the Euston platforms. Lugging their bursting suitcases, thousands of children, pale-faced and tearful, labels tied around their necks, milled in confusion while distraught women shepherded them towards the barriers. When a roving inspector elbowed his way past the carriage door, the man ahead of Farge asked what it was all about.

'They're beating the gun, coming home,' the man said. 'The Russians have had enough, mate. Haven't you heard?'

It was 0640 by the time Farge reached the queues for the phone-boxes. The only hope for finding change was in the buffet where tired staff were doling out plastic cups of coffee. When finally Farge pushed into the phone-booth, the automatic tape blandly mocked that the lines were choked. In exasperation he fought his way down to the ticket office of the Metropolitan line: he would ring through on arrival at Northwood.

The platform was packed and he had to wait twenty minutes before the Amersham train appeared. He stood until Wembley Park, his pusser's grip between his feet. It was strange to observe the new Britain, self-conscious in its wartime garb. Farge was hemmed in by uniforms, some of which he had not seen before, light-blue, green… volunteer services, nuclear defence wardens.

After Wembley, he found a seat. The rows of suburban houses flicked by the windows, many of the gardens scarred by nuclear shelters and fresh earthworks: the human animal was contriving to conserve its species by digging holes to survive the terror from the skies. Farge tried to relax before what was most certainly going to be an eventful day.

Though Farge had been Jake Rackham's Number One in Osiris it was unusual for a more junior CO to be summoned before the FOSM. Rackham was half-way through his term as Flag Officer, a hat he wore in addition to that of COMSUBEASTLANT. Rackham, a live wire, had been one of the second-generation 'bomber' cos. Polaris and Trident cos did not normally progress to the top job in the Navy, but Rackham had early been earmarked as a high flier: he might even make First Sea Lord, the appointment never yet attained by a submariner.

Farge could not understand why Orcus had been ordered to Vickers at Barrow. True, Faslane had been knocked about by missiles on the same day as Plymouth, but old Orcus was not yet due for docking or refit — admittedly, she now had minor hull damage, but her orders to proceed to Barrow had been received before he had sent off his damage report caused by the exploding fleet replenishment ship… so what was going on? Had he blotted his copybook? Was he being appointed to a nuke after all? He had, after all, done his nuke perisher — the cos' Qualifying Course — after surviving the Icarus incident, and FOSM'S appointer had at the time hinted that if Farge succeeded in the perisher and was promoted to commander, he would, as the most experienced of the candidates, be getting one of the Swiftsures — the nuclear hunter-killers which, because of their success, were now being produced as fast as the yards could build them.

But, in the event, his appointment to Orcus had been wrapped up as a compliment, that Lieutenant-Commander Farge was the obvious choice. Farge had spent his service life in O-boats and was the best qualified among the four perishers to operate a boat as old as Orcus on wartime patrols. Orcus, with her mixed Mark 8 and 23 torpedo outfit was obsolescent, but would have to compete in the gaps against Soviet fleet submarines, the Charlies and Victors, and the patrol-boats, the Tangos. So it was that, only two days after the hilarious end-of-perisher party, Farge had found himself taking over Orcus. His cherished ambition to command a nuclear fleet submarine had been thwarted: Safari, the only boat with a vacancy, had gone to Janner Coombes, the second of the Navy's upper-yardmen to command a submarine. Not only was Coombes ex-lower deck, but he had not even volunteered for submarines; press-ganged as an ordinary seaman into submarines, he had worked his way up to the wardroom with meteoric speed. A commander now (he was three years older than Farge) Janner Coombes was a flambuoyant character: a showman, a type Farge instinctively disliked — and not only because of the time when their personal lives had clashed.