“Skip Tyler. Any of you fellows know him?”
“I do,” Casimir nodded. “He was a year behind me at Annapolis. Didn’t he get hurt or something?”
“Yeah,” Ryan said. “Lost his leg in an auto accident four years ago. He was up for command of the Los Angeles and a drunk driver clipped him. Now he teaches engineering at the Academy and does a lot of consulting work with Sea Systems Command — technical analysis, looking at their ship designs. He has a doctorate in engineering from MIT, and he knows how to think unconventionally.”
“How about his security clearance?” Greer asked.
“Top secret or better, sir, because of his Crystal City work.”
“Objections, Charlie?”
Davenport frowned. Tyler was not part of the intelligence community. “Is this the guy who did the evaluation of the new Kirov?”
Yes, sir, now that I think about it,” Casimir said. “Him and Saunders over at Sea Systems.”
“That was a nice piece of work. It’s okay with me.”
“When do you want to see him?” Greer asked Ryan.
‘Today, if it’s all right with you, sir. I have to run over to Annapolis anyway, to get something from the house, and — well, do some quick Christmas shopping.”
“Oh? A few dolls?” Davenport asked.
Ryan turned to look the admiral in the eye. “Yes, sir, as a matter of fact. My little girl wants a Skiing Barbie doll and some Jordache doll outfits. Didn’t you ever play Santa, Admiral?”
Davenport saw that Ryan wasn’t going to back off anymore. He wasn’t a subordinate to be browbeaten. Ryan could always walk away. He tried a new tack. “Did they tell you over there that October sailed last Friday?”
“Oh?” They hadn’t. Ryan was caught off guard. “I thought she wasn’t scheduled to sail until this Friday.”
“So did we. Her skipper is Marko Ramius. You heard about him?”
“Only secondhand stuff. The Brits say he’s pretty good.”
“Better than that,” Greer noted. “He’s about the best sub driver they have, a real charger. We had a considerable file on him when I was at DIA. Who’s bird-doggin’ him for you, Charlie?”
“Bremerton was assigned to it. She was out of position doing some ELINT work when Ramius sailed, but she was ordered over. Her skipper’s Bud Wilson. Remember his dad?”
Greer laughed out loud. “Red Wilson? Now there was one spirited submarine driver! His boy any good?”
“So they say. Ramius is about the best the Soviets have, but Wilson’s got a 688 boat. By the end of the week, we’ll be able to start a new book on Red October.” Davenport stood. “We gotta head back, James.” Casimir hurried to get the coats. “I can keep these?”
“I suppose, Charlie. Just don’t go hanging them on the wall, even to throw darts at. And I guess you want to get moving, too, Jack?”
“Yes, sir.”
Greer lifted his phone. “Nancy, Dr. Ryan will need a car and a driver in fifteen minutes. Right.” He set the receiver down and waited for Davenport to leave. “No sense getting you killed out there in the snow. Besides, you’d probably drive on the wrong side of the road after a year in England. Skiing Barbie, Jack?”
“You had all boys, didn’t you, sir? Girls are different.” Ryan grinned. “You’ve never met my little Sally.”
“Daddy’s girl?”
“Yep. God help whoever marries her. Can I leave these photographs with Tyler?”
“I hope you’re right about him, son. Yes, he can hold onto them — if and only if he has a good place to keep them.”
“Understood, sir.”
“When you get back — probably be late, the way the roads are. You’re staying at the Marriott?”
“Yes, sir.”
Greer thought that over. “I’ll probably be working late. Stop by here before you bed down. I may want to go over a few things with you.”
“Will do, sir. Thanks for the car.” Ryan stood.
“Go buy your dolls, son.”
Greer watched him leave. He liked Ryan. The boy was not afraid to speak his mind. Part of that came from having money and being married to more money. It was a sort of independence that had advantages. Ryan could not be bought, bribed, or bullied. He could always go back to writing history books full time. Ryan had made money on his own in four years as a stockbroker, betting his own money on high-risk issues and scoring big before leaving it all behind — because, he said, he hadn’t wanted to press his luck. Greer didn’t believe that. He thought Jack had been bored — bored with making money. He shook his head. The talent that had enabled him to pick winning stocks Ryan now applied to the CIA. He was rapidly becoming one of Greer’s star analysts, and his British connections made him doubly valuable. Ryan had the ability to sort through a pile of data and come out with the three or four facts that meant something. This was too rare a thing at the CIA. The agency still spent too much of its money collecting data, Greer thought, and hot enough collating it. Analysts had none of the supposed glamour — a Hollywood-generated illusion — of a secret agent in a foreign land. But Jack knew how to analyze reports from such men and data from technical sources. He knew how to make a decision and was not afraid to say what he thought, whether his bosses liked it or not. This sometimes grated the old admiral, but on the whole he liked having subordinates whom he could respect. The CIA had too many people whose only skill was kissing ass.
The U.S. Naval Academy
The loss of his left leg above the knee had not taken away Oliver Wendell Tyler’s roguish good looks or his zest for life. His wife could testify to this. Since leaving the active service four years before, they had added three children to the two they already had and were working on a sixth. Ryan found him sitting at a desk in an empty classroom in Rickover Hall, the U.S. Naval Academy’s science and engineering building. He was grading papers.
“How’s it goin’, Skip?” Ryan leaned against the door frame. His CIA driver was in the hall.
“Hey, Jack! I thought you were in England.” Tyler jumped to his foot — his own phrase — and hobbled over to grab Ryan’s hand. His prosthetic leg ended in a square, rubber-coated band instead of a pseudo-foot. It flexed at the knee, but not by much. Tyler had been a second-squad All American offensive tackle sixteen years before, and the rest of his body was as hard as the aluminum and fiberglass in his left leg. His handshake could make a gorilla wince. “So, what are you doing here?”
“I had to fly over to get some work done and do a little shopping. How’s Jean and your… five?”
“Five and two-thirds.”
“Again? Jean ought to have you fixed.”
“That’s what she said, but I’ve had enough things disconnected.” Tyler laughed. “I guess I’m making up for all those monastic years as a nuc. Come on over and grab a chair.”
Ryan sat on the corner of the desk and opened his briefcase. He handed Tyler a folder.
“Got some pictures I want you to look at.”
“Okay.” Tyler flipped it open. “Whose — a Russian! Big bastard. That’s the basic Typhoon configuration. Lots of modifications, though. Twenty-six missiles instead of twenty. Looks longer. Hull’s flattened out some, too. More beam?”
“Two or three meters’ worth.”
“I heard you were working with the CIA. Can’t talk about that, right?”
“Something like that. And you never saw these pictures, Skip. Understood?”
“Right.” Tyler’s eyes twinkled. “What do you want me not to look at them for?”
Ryan pulled the blowups from the back of the folder. “These doors, bow and stern.”
“Uh-huh.” Tyler set them down side by side. “Pretty big. They’re two meters or so, paired fore and aft. They look symmetrical through the long axis. Not cruise missile tubes, eh?”
“On a boomer? You put something like that on a strategic missile sub?”
“The Russkies are a funny bunch, Jack, and they design things their own way. This is the same bunch that built the Kirov class with a nuclear reactor and an oil-fired steam plant. Hmm… twin screws. The aft doors can’t be for a sonar array. They’d foul the screws.”
“How ‘bout if they trail one screw?”
“They do that with surface ships to conserve fuel, and sometimes with their attack boats. Operating a twin-screw missile boat on one wheel would probably be tricky on this baby. The Typhoon’s supposed to have handling problems, and boats that handle funny tend to be sensitive to power settings. You end up jinking around so much that you have trouble holding course. You notice how the doors converge at the stern?”
“No, I didn’t.”
Tyler looked up. “Damn! I should have realized it right off the bat. It’s a propulsion system. You shouldn’t have caught me marking papers, Jack. It turns your brain to Jell-O.”