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SEA OF SHADOWS 233
trouble.” She moved her finger to a different point on the chart. “This is
where the rabbit comes out of the hat. Because Towers will actually be
way down here, in front of the formation, where they won’t be expecting
her.”
Ensign Cooper furrowed his brow. “It won’t matter what the Germans
are expecting. They’re going to see us. One peep through a periscope,
and they’re going to know that we’re not on the back side of the formation.
The jig will be up long before those subs are within weapons range.”
The chief waved a hand toward the Operations Officer. “Sir?”
Lieutenant Nylander stood up. “Thank you, Chief.” His eyes traveled
from face to face. “Chief McPherson and I have worked this out. The
Germans will not see us, because we’re going to make the ship invisible.”
The Combat Systems Officer waved her pencil around in circles like a
wand. “See? I knew there was some hocus-pocus in here somewhere.
Rabbits out of hats, invisible ships. Maybe we should levitate the Chief
Engineer as a finale.”
“Watch it,” the CHENG snapped.
“Patience,” the captain said. “There is a method to this madness.”
The Combat Systems Officer caught herself before another quip left her
mouth.
“Thank you, sir,” the Operations Officer said. He looked around the
table again. “What’s the best way to hide a cat?” he asked.
“Stick it in the microwave,” the CHENG said softly.
The Combat Systems Officer elbowed him in the ribs.
“Close,” said the Operations Officer. “You put it in a room full of
other cats.”
“The Straits of Hormuz is a major shipping lane, and dozens of oil
tankers go through every day, in both directions. If we want to disappear,
all we have to do is become a tanker.”
“Child’s play,” the Operations Officer said. “We rig deceptive lighting,
so we look like an oil tanker in the dark. We secure the SPY radar and
every other piece of electronics that transmits anything on military
frequency bands. That still leaves us the Furuno radar, for safety of
navigation, but Furunos are carried by two-thirds of the merchant ships in
the world. The Germans will expect a tanker to carry a Furuno, or
something like it.”
The Chief Engineer was nodding now. “We can configure the
engineering plant for turn-count masking. If we run one engine a little
faster that the other one and offset the difference in thrust by angling the
blades of the propellers differently, we’ll get a loud, mushy blade