Page 48 of Clive Cussler The Iron Storm (An Isaac Bell Adventure #15)

“Yes,” Churchill called. “What is it?”

“Mr. Churchill, the Admiral Joaquim Lisboa was built to burn coal, but was converted to oil in 1911.”

“Yes, we know. I recalled there is an old Jane’s reference book in here.”

“More importantly, sir, the telegraphs to the Azore Islands are down, both from our end and coming in from North America.”

“Since when?”

“Three weeks, sir. News reached us a week after a storm tore up the cables running into the capital, Ponta Delgada. No news yet on when a cable-laying ship will be able to recover the cables and effect repairs. Until then all communication is via mail service aboard ships calling on the port.”

Churchill and Bell exchanged worried looks. The Englishman ground out his cigar. “Thank you again, Davida. Please give us a minute.”

Marion stated the obvious. “That means there’s no way of knowing if this Rath character is trying to steal the ship and no way to alert the locals.”

“I need to get there,” Bell said, also stating the obvious.

“He has a few days’ head start,” Churchill pointed out.

“We have no idea how he’s getting to the Azores.

He might need to travel overland some distance to reach a ship willing to take him.

It could take a week or more. He seems to favor smuggling routes, which are safe for him but notoriously slow.

And moving forty-five men inconspicuously isn’t all that easy, either. ”

Again Churchill played the spoiler. “He set up a clandestine training facility right under the Germans’ noses. The man is resourceful.”

“I grant you that,” Bell conceded, still thinking on the deviousness of Rath’s plan to goad the Dutch into the war.

Diabolical. “That doesn’t mean I don’t have to try.

I know all the fast liners are either laid up in port or serving as troopships, but there must be a speedy freighter in some English harbor. ”

“What are you going to tell President Wilson?” Churchill asked with nonchalance as he poured the last of the champagne into his flute.

The question came out of left field for Bell and rendered him momentarily speechless. He quickly gathered his wits. “I mean no disrespect, Winston, but I believe that information should remain confidential until I issue my report directly to the President.”

“No disrespect taken. If I am going to divert vital war material for you yet again, I’d like to know what I’m getting in return.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“We have dozens of destroyers lying about, what with the German High Seas Fleet unwilling to have another scrap like Jutland.”

“You’d let me aboard one and send it to the Azores?”

“I’m considering it, but there is a quid pro quo attached, I’m afraid.”

Bell considered his position. On the one hand, Churchill was his only option of getting to the Azores quickly enough to make a difference.

On the other, the Brit was Machiavellian enough to use what was in Bell’s recommendation to some advantage, an advantage Bell couldn’t possibly fathom as of yet.

In the end, he went with his gut. Rath was the enemy here, not Winston Churchill, and no matter what he recommended to Wilson, it was still the President’s call to declare war.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Marion nod imperceptibly. It wasn’t that he needed her approval, but it was reassuring that they were of a like mind.

He said, “I’m going to recommend that the United States enter the war, that we integrate our forces with the seasoned troops already deployed on the front, but under no circumstances are we to place our men under the command of a French or English general.”

Churchill considered the words for a moment. “Just about exactly what I would recommend if I were in your shoes. Let me ask you, why?”

“Simple. A peace deal needs to be negotiated that doesn’t see Europe back at war in another generation, which seems to be the cycle the continent has been on since the Middle Ages.”

Churchill grunted. “And before, I assure you.”

“I believe having the United States at the bargaining table is the best way to make that happen. We aren’t saddled with all the past grievances that would sour an armistice.

We could be the voice of reason in an otherwise highly charged negotiation, one that absolutely must succeed.

I shudder to think of the carnage of the next war if Europe doesn’t agree to a sensible and lasting peace. ”

“Again, you and I are in agreement,” Churchill told him.

Bell looked to Marion. “This means I have to cut our reunion short.”

She gave him a little pout, but nodded in understanding.

Churchill went to his study to set things in motion.

He was no longer the Lord of the Admiralty, but still carried considerable sway, though not with the fleet’s current commander, John Jellicoe.

He made no mention of anarchists when he secured Bell an escort, but told of a spy learning that the Germans wanted to recoup their battleship from its current purgatory.

He didn’t need to explain the significance of such an occurrence.

The main German fleet was bottled up by a blockade maintained by the Royal Navy that only their U-boats could slip past. They were menace enough.

The very thought of a single battleship let loose in the Atlantic would be as devastating to civilian shipping as a whole armada of submarines.

Such a ship could literally change the outcome of the war.

He explained away Bell’s need to travel aboard the destroyer as an extension of his fact-finding tour on behalf of Woodrow Wilson.

Bell wasted, in his estimation, a good chunk of his limited time with Marion composing telegrams for Archie Abbott at Van Dorn’s New York office as well as his contact in the Navy, Franklin Roosevelt.

He wrote a third to Woodrow Wilson with his official endorsement of the United States entering the war, his reasons for it, and his confession that he’d told a ranking member of the British government.

He felt Wilson should know about that sooner rather than later if for no other reason than Bell hadn’t liked being forced to divulge it to Churchill.

He put down his pen and turned from the writing desk to where Marion was propped up against a wall of pillows on the guest room’s four-poster bed. He said, “There, finished.”

She held out a hand, her eyes hooded. “Oh, Mr. Bell, you’re not finished until I say you are.”