With the book clutched under his left elbow, Nelson followed Admiral Kirkham up through a bewildering series of corridors and companionways to an armored gallery high on the conning tower of the battleship. He stayed close to his host as suggested by the latter.

The Englishman's eyes widened at the spectacle that greeted him. From where he stood he had a view of the entire immense foredeck with its huge rocket launchers and tier upon tier of lesser weapons. Like a great steel monster it cut through the dark waters at incredible speed.

"Take these," said Kirkham, thrusting a pair of binoculars with complex attachments into his hand. "They're infra-red. You'll see the Midway off to starboard. Her night fighters are taking off now."

Without asking for explanations, Nelson stuck the book under his right armpit and handled the heavy binoculars awkwardly with his one good hand. Once he had them focussed he forgot their awkwardness and weight.

Through their lenses, which displayed the night as if it were daylight, and brought the horizon close, he saw the amazing sight no man of his era could ever have witnessed.

A mighty flat-decked vessel with a huge superstructure stood into the wind as Admiral Kirkham had predicted. From her deck, a small machine rose, dipped below the level of her towering square bow and then rose through the air with incredible speed. Another, another and another appeared, to vanish in the clouded heavens above.

"A lot of good they'll do," someone muttered close beside him. "The yellowbellies won't send over bombers and trying to stop their guided missiles with planes is like trying to stop a leak with tissue paper."

Nelson smiled faintly to himself. Though they were talking of weapons he had yet to understand, he understood the simile. He was glad he had not compared "iron men in wooden ships" to "wooden men in ships of steel," a paraphrase that had been on the tip of his tongue. These seamen were worthy of any navy in history—girding themselves to fight on, although their doom had been already sealed by some devilish mechanism devised by man to come.

He became aware that Kirkham was issuing rapid orders, that men were moving quietly about jobs they well knew from long practise. And though this monster under his feet was not a ship at all as he knew it, he yet rejoiced in the sense of discipline, of command, of power. Somehow he felt at home, almost as 

 Prev. P 9/13 next