When Richter walked back into the mess, the change in his demeanour was obvious to both Steve Barber and Dmitri Pavlov.
‘What?’ Barber asked.
‘I think I’ve worked it out, but I’m waiting for a geologist to talk to me, just to confirm that I’m not tilting at windmills. My boss should be jacking that up any time now.’
‘Well don’t keep it to yourself,’ Barber said. ‘What the hell’s going on?’
‘Right now it’s just a theory, but it does seem to make sense. Does the term "oceanic system" mean anything to you?’
‘You mean something like the Gulf Stream, or maybe the Sargasso Sea? Something like that?’
Richter shook his head.
‘No. Those are both natural phenomena. What I’m talking about is something very unnatural indeed. How about "Status-6?" Does that ring any bells? Or how about "Kanyon", but spelt with a letter "K" instead of a letter "C?" That’s a codename your people dreamed up.’
For a few seconds Barber just stared at him. Then he said two words, very slowly.
‘Oh, shit.’
Dmitri Pavlov switched his gaze rapidly back and forth between the two men, hearing what they were saying, but clearly not understanding the significance.
‘You mean that fucking doomsday weapon they kind of announced a while ago?’ Barber said. ‘The camera right behind the general at the conference or whatever it was that just happened to take a photograph of him staring at a set of plans that showed the weapon? That thing?’
‘Got it in one,’ Richter said.
‘We couldn’t decide if it was for real or just some hoax they’d cooked up.’
‘Our intelligence people looked at it as well. They couldn’t think of a single reason why it wouldn’t work, and as far as we can tell there’s nothing about its construction and operation that’s beyond present Russian capabilities. So on balance, we’ve always assumed it’s a genuine threat.’
‘What are you two talking about?’ Pavlov asked.
‘In 2015,’ Richter replied, ‘the first details emerged of a Russian doomsday weapon known as the Status-6 Oceanic Multipurpose System, a nicely innocuous name to describe something with the power to either wipe out a harbour city using a multi-megaton warhead, or use an oceanic detonation to create a tsunami, a massive wave, that would inundate an entire coastal region, like the American eastern or western seaboards. It was thought to be a doomsday weapon, a device that would only be used against the West when all other methods had failed, and because the aggressor nation would clearly be Russia, America and her allies would be entirely justified in retaliating with overwhelming force, launching every nuclear weapon they possessed at Russia. Both sides would lose, permanently, which is why we never expected to see the deployment of such a device.’
‘I’ve read about it,’ Pavlov said, nodding, ‘but I don’t know much about it. In Russia, they call it Poseidon.’
‘I think you’re wrong about this,’ Barber said. ‘I know our relations with Moscow are pretty cool at the moment, but there would be no reason for them to launch an attack using the Status-6 weapon or anything like it, because they know what our response would be.’
Richter nodded.
‘I agree,’ he said, ‘and I didn’t say that they would be launching such an attack.’
Both Barber and Pavlov looked puzzled.
‘Then why did you mention it?’ the CIA agent demanded.
‘Because I think that what they’re trying to do is initiate the collapse of the western flank of the Cumbre Vieja volcano into the Atlantic Ocean.’
‘Hang on,’ Steve Barber said. ‘About twenty minutes ago you gave us a whole bunch of really good reasons why that couldn’t happen, about how even a real big nuke wouldn’t be powerful enough to trigger an eruption in any volcano.’
Richter nodded.
‘I had a long conversation on my mobile with a professional volcanologist who told me exactly the same thing,’ he said. ‘And as far as I know he’s right.’
‘Then how the fuck—’ Barber started, but Richter immediately held up his hand to stop him saying anything else.
‘I think what the Russians have done is apply a bit of lateral thinking. Let me take you through it, both of you, and if you come up with a different idea, let me be the first to know. In the recorded conversations Dmitri obtained at the dacha I heard a couple references to Status-6 and to some kind of an oceanic system, but I didn’t put the two things together. But in this context, the expression "oceanic system" can only mean the Status-6 weapon. Then there were the remarks about wiping out America as a world power and the kind of clincher was that statement that didn’t make sense to any of us, when that man said something like "we can even offer to help." We thought that was just some kind of ironic comment, but I think that man meant exactly what he said, that Russia would be able to offer to help, and that statement would only make sense if America was going to be hit by some kind of natural disaster, not by any kind of conventional attack orchestrated by Moscow.
‘If we take it as a fact that not even the Status-6 multi-megaton warhead would be powerful enough to trigger another eruption on La Palma, then the only thing that makes sense is if they’d worked out another way to achieve that same result, the collapse of the western flank of the island.’
Richter’s mobile rang, and he glanced at the screen before answering the call.
‘It’s my boss, again. With any luck this call should answer the question.’
There was still a fair amount of noise in the mess from scientists and members of the ship’s company eating and drinking and talking, and to obtain a modicum of privacy and more importantly to make sure that he would clearly hear whatever was said to him, Richter again stepped out of the mess to take the call.
‘Are you having a party or something, Richter?’ Simpson asked. ‘What’s all that racket?’
‘No party. It’s just a bunch of people in the mess on board the ship. Have you found a geologist?’
‘Yes, but before you listen to him, you can listen to me. First, one of the Royal Navy’s submarines has been tasked as you suggested. The problem is that the Navy doesn’t actually know where the submarine is at the moment, only more or less which bit of ocean it might be found in, so they can’t guarantee it’ll be in position in time, so your insurance policy is in the post, you might say. And I didn’t realize that submarine communications were only one way, to the boat but not from the boat, except in an emergency, which of course this is. The Navy can ask the boat to get close enough to the surface to receive high-speed transmissions, and even to send an acknowledgment, but it can only do that if the crew are certain there are no surface ships in the vicinity. If it can’t do that, you’ll only know if it hasn’t made it to the position because the target will simply steam straight past. If it does get there in time, you’ll need to work out a way of letting the crew know if you’ve managed to disarm the weapon. If you haven’t done your bit or you can’t confirm that you have, then there’ll be a sodding great bang and the Russians will be down one ship. Do you know what the target is yet?’
‘No,’ Richter replied. ‘What I think I know is what it isn’t. I’m pretty sure it won’t be a Russian sub, because the American satellites track those pretty much continuously and they’re already running a check just to make sure none of them are in the area. So it’ll be a surface vessel of some sort, and probably a fairly big one to handle a weapon of that size. I mean, not a trawler, so at something at least the size of a small cargo vessel. That’s why I asked you to run a check on shipping movements, but I presume you’ve had nothing back yet.’
‘You presume correctly, but the request is being dealt with, according to some jobsworth I rang about ten minutes ago. Right, I have a geologist waiting on the other line. Before you even start talking to him, you might like to know that I asked him the same question that you asked the volcanologist, and he gave me exactly the same answer, so this might just be some kind of a pipedream you’ve come up with. His name is Baldwin, and I’m switching you now.’
There were a couple of clicks in the earpiece of Richter’s mobile, and then another voice muttered something almost inaudible.
‘Mr Baldwin?’ Richter asked.
‘It’s Dr Baldwin, actually,’ the man replied, sounding somewhat testy. ‘I gather you have a question about the geology of the Canary Islands.’
‘Not the Canary Islands,’ Richter replied, ‘because I know they’re basically the tops of submerged volcanoes, but I am interested in one island in the group in particular, and that’s La Palma. And particularly in the geology of Cumbre Vieja.’
‘You might do better if you talk to a volcanologist,’ Baldwin suggested, ‘though I gather from your superior that you already have.’
‘I did, but I finally worked out that I was asking him the wrong question.’
‘So nothing to do with nuclear weapons and volcanoes?’
‘Directly, no, but indirectly, yes. I fully accept that you cannot get a volcano to erupt simply by dropping a nuclear weapon on it or somehow getting one inside the cone or the magma chamber and exploding it there. What I want to know now is the overall geography of the southern part of La Palma. I’ve seen aerial photographs of the volcanic area of Cumbre Vieja, and I know it’s basically a line of volcanoes that form the spine of the southern part of the island, and they have erupted numerous times in recorded history, since about the end of the fifteenth century.’
‘Correct,’ Baldwin agreed. ‘The first eruption we really know anything much about was in 1470, but the probability is that there have been eruptions there going back millions of years, ever since the islands first emerged from the Atlantic Ocean. And you’re right about the geology, at least in general terms. So what exactly do you want to know?’
‘From what I’ve found out,’ Richter said, getting to the point, ‘there have been eight eruption events that we know about at different locations on the southern half of La Palma, the 1470 eruption being right at the northern end of Cumbre Vieja, and the last activity taking place at the southern tip of the island in 1971. Does that mean that there’s a huge magma chamber underneath the entire southern part of the island, or is it more likely that there are a number of smaller magma chambers?’
‘Almost certainly there’s only one chamber, though as I said, I’m a geologist, not a volcanologist. Volcanoes are huge structures, and in my opinion the activity we’ve seen over the last half a millennium or so on La Palma is consistent with a single magma chamber that allows eruptions to take place through a number of different vents on the southern half of the island.’
That was more or less what Richter had expected.
‘What about the undersea geology?’ he asked. ‘What’s the shape of the seamount below the waterline? And is it surrounded by fissures or is it a completely solid structure?’
‘I’m not that familiar with the Canaries, but I do remember seeing a kind of schematic diagram, a three-dimensional relief map if you like, of the island and basically once you get beyond the beaches, the terrain slopes down almost vertically for about a thousand metres, maybe even deeper, before the slope decreases and merges with the ocean floor. And because the island is volcanic in origin, there are lots of creases and fissures marking the sides of the seamount. That is my recollection of what the map showed, but you might want to check what I’ve said with someone more familiar with that region. Is there anything else?’
‘No, I think that’s all I need to know,’ Richter said. ‘Thank you for your time, Dr Baldwin.’
‘Anything else you need, Richter?’ Simpson asked when he came back on the line.
‘Not from the scientific community, but we need the shipping information pretty damn sharpish so we can identify the target vessel. So you might like to light a fire under whoever’s supposed to be providing it, and we still need to sort out the details of the intercept. Means and method, that kind of thing, but that all depends upon exactly what the target is. I’ll get the Yanks to run checks as well and Steve Barber – he’s the CIA rep here on the ship – will need to start the wheels turning at Langley and wherever else we’re going to need assets, so I’ll get on with that right now.’
Richter walked back into the lounge, sat down at the table opposite Steve Barber, Dmitri Pavlov sitting at the end, and told the two men what he’d worked out. And then he told Barber what he would need the Americans to do if they were going to stop the Russian operation.
‘Hell of a lot of variables in that, Paul,’ Barber said, when he’d finished. ‘I’ll make some calls, but it’d be a real good idea if you could bring Carole-Anne into the loop as well. She’s better connected with the Company wheels than I am.’