Then the Duchess added:

How beastly & ungrateful of me, but it isn't really that-you know-don't you?

"Perfect," Charity said.

Niven sighed.

"Not quite, but I suppose it'll do," he said.

"How about saying something about her engagement ring?" Fleming said.

"Good idea," Montagu added. "She'll be with friends and the ring would be a boasting point."

Then the Duchess added:

Dearest Bill, I'm so thrilled with my ring-scandalously extravagant-you know how I adore diamonds-I simply can't stop looking at it.

"Good," Charity said.

"Okay, let's wrap it up," Montagu said.

"Say the boss has come back a little early or something," Fleming suggested, "and that she has to finish quickly."

"She should try to make some plans to see him," Charity said, "even if they're futile."

Like I do with Doug, Charity thought. Charity thought.

Now, that, that, gentlemen, was my personal thought-and you didn't even have to pay for it. gentlemen, was my personal thought-and you didn't even have to pay for it.

"Easter is coming," Fleming offered.

The Duchess nodded and wrote:

Look, darling, I've got next Sunday & Monday off for Easter. I shall go home for it, of course, but do come too if you possibly can, or, even if you can't get away from London, I'll dash up and we'll have an evening of gaiety. (By the way, Aunt Maria said to bring you to dinner next time I was up, but I think that might wait?) Oh! Here comes the Bloodhound-back sooner than he'd said- Masses of kisses and love-your

PAM.

"Aunt Maria?" Charity said after reading the final passage.

The Duchess nodded.

"Everyone's got an aunt who never had a daughter and lives though the niece vicariously."

"That sounds rather clinical," Charity said, grinning. "Or should I say cynical cynical?"

The Duchess laughed.

"I couldn't say. I just made it up."

"You two are finding much too much humor in this," Niven said with mock disgust.

"You'd like us to stop, David?" the Duchess said, smiling.

"No, no," Montagu put in. "This is going well."

"I would like for us to stop for lunch," Niven said reasonably. "Won't do Major Martin much good if we were to die of starvation in the course of our task here."

"I can always eat," Charity said.

"Indeed," Montagu said. "I think we could all use a bit of a break."

"Then we can move on to the more serious letters," Fleming said.

[FOUR].

38 degrees 13 minutes 14 seconds North Latitude 13 degrees 21 minutes 10 seconds East Longitude Gulf of Palermo, Sicily Aboard the Casabianca Casabianca 2355 4 April 1943 2355 4 April 1943 Dick Canidy, Frank Nola, and Jim "Tubes" Fuller were with Jean L'Herminier, all squeezed in the submarine captain's dimly lit drab-gray office. Each was seated in a metal-framed chair except Tubes, who stood.

"Dick, I'm sorry we could not get a better look at the harbor," L'Herminier said.

"Me, too," Canidy replied. "But we cannot risk going in any closer. One close call is enough."

"Agreed."

There were knowing glances among the men.

Only two days had passed since the Casabianca Casabianca encountered the Kriegsmarine patrol boat, and the memory felt like a fresh wound. encountered the Kriegsmarine patrol boat, and the memory felt like a fresh wound.

It had been just after midnight on their second night en route to Palermo.

The Casabianca Casabianca was preparing to run on the surface, recharging her batteries for the electric motors while covering distance more quickly under the power of her diesel engines. was preparing to run on the surface, recharging her batteries for the electric motors while covering distance more quickly under the power of her diesel engines.

An hour earlier, L'Herminier had made the order for a slower speed and an adjustment in the planes so that the submarine would make an easy angle of ascent.

Now the boat had come to a stop, neutrally buoyant at periscope depth. For the last half hour, he had time and again raised the scope and carefully scanned the immediate area and seen nothing.

"Huh," L'Herminier now said.

"What is it?" his executive officer, a frail-looking, sad-eyed Frenchman a head shorter than the commander, said.

"There's a fishing boat that's dead in the water," L'Herminier said, still looking through the scope.

Nola said, "What could be the chance it's one of mine?"

He looked at Canidy and added hopefully, "We could ask them what they know about Palermo."

Canidy raised an eyebrow.

"Right," he said skeptically. "That'd be nice. But it's some long shot."

Two minutes later, L'Herminier added, "This is not good."

"What?" Nola said.

"A German patrol boat is coming alongside it," L'Herminier said.

The distinct profile of the Kriegsmarine fast-attack S-boat was unmistakable.

The advanced vessel was built in slightly different design variants, but all were essentially similar watercraft, all about a hundred feet long. It was their massive engines that earned them their name Schnellboot Schnellboot-the literal translation being "fast boat." One variant packed three Daimler-Benz twenty-cylinder, two-thousand-horsepower diesel engines that pushed the heavy wooden-hulled vessel almost forty-five knots.

The primary purpose of the S-boat was the rapid delivery of torpedoes on target. It would lie in wait in the dark, locate an enemy sub or ship-then hit and run. It carried 53.3cm torpedoes. Because of its methods, it rarely carried more "fish" than the ones in its tubes. The very nature of a fast attack-and a faster departure-did not allow time for the reloading of the tubes. And the extra weight of the extra fish affected the agility of the craft.

S-boats carried other weapons on board-among them light machine guns, 4cm Bofors, highly efficient and effective four-barrel, 2cm Flaks-and these were for defending the boat.

L'Herminier recognized that this S-boat certainly was not operating in a fast-attack mode. He also saw that it did not appear to being using its deck guns defensively on this fishing boat.

The crew of the hulking patrol boat clearly had an aggressive stance.

"Looks to be a harassment stop," L'Herminier said.

He stepped back from the scope and looked at Nola.

"Can you tell if this fishing boat is one of yours?" he asked quietly.

Nola placed his face up to the periscope. It took him some moments to get his bearings, then to dial in the scope. When he finally did, he did not like what he saw.

It was a mostly moonless night but clear, and the sky full of brilliant stars cast a soft light on the water, putting the two boats on the surface in silhouette.

Nola had a reasonably unobstructed view of both vessels, their bows pointed more or less in the direction of the sub. He could see that the fishing boat, at about fifty feet in length, was not unlike the Stefania Stefania. The German patrol boat, sitting a couple meters off her port side, was about twice its length.

On the fishing boat, there were ten men standing on the port gunnel-most likely, the entire crew-looking up to face the sailors on the S-boat.

"I cannot tell," Nola said, his voice quavering. "But it very easily could be mine, or one of someone I know."

Suddenly, he saw the night erupt in flames. It was the muzzle flash from the S-boat's light machine guns laying a line of fire from bow to stern.

The fisherman were cut down where they stood, some falling into the boat, others into the sea. Dead.

"Great Holy Mother of God!" Frank Nola exclaimed, then turned away from the periscope.

L'Herminier grabbed the scope handles, stuck his eyes to the viewing glass-then immediately retracted the periscope.

"Dive! Dive!" the sub commander called. "Flood all tanks!"

"Dive!" the sad-eyed XO repeated to the helmsman. "All tanks flooded!"

"No!" Francisco Nola shouted to L'Herminier. "You must torpedo those bastards!"

L'Herminier turned to Canidy.

"Get him the hell out of here, Major!"

Canidy had never heard L'Herminier use that tone of voice.

But he recognized that L'Herminier was, in fact, right.

Canidy took Nola by the sleeve of his jacket and attempted to gently push him toward the compartment hatch.

"Let's go, Frank."

Nola tried to hold his ground.

"Now, goddammit!" Canidy said, and much more forcefully used his body to push Nola.

Nola stared shuffling toward the hatch.

"They just gunned them down in cold blood." He began crying. "We must do something."

They reached the hatch as the angle of the deck began to change.

"We can't, Frank," Canidy said, looking back over his shoulder at L'Herminier. "If we do, then our mission is compromised."

L'Herminier, still with a stern face, returned the look with a nod.

"Give me a depth of one hundred meters," L'Herminier then ordered his XO. "Then steer a course of zero-one-zero degrees. Full speed, if we can get it."

"Depth of one hundred meters," the executive officer repeated, "course of one-zero. Full speed."