Ghostboat Read Online Free PDF

information on this one.
     
    Walters led the way back to his office in the records division, his face alight with excitement.
    Cook and Frank walked behind him, Frank carrying copies of the photographs. Cook wanted to know if they should tell SubPac to call off the dogs.
    “No,” said Frank, “let them stew. Maybe they’ll come up with the same information, and maybe they can tell us why. Has to be an explanation for it. They’ve probably got a few of the unconverted old types left and they just don’t want anybody to know.”  
    Cook grinned. “Or maybe we sold this one to the Brazilian Navy.”
    Walters barked back over his shoulder, “I think I know that sub.” He said no more, just picked up his pace. Frank hurried to keep up.
    “You know, you qualify as a spry old man.”
    Walters grinned back over his shoulder and did a Cagney two-step.
    His office was larger than Frank’s, larger and far more cluttered. The shelves were lined with dusty old naval volumes. Walters rummaged through them and invited Cook and Frank to sit down. He pulled out a thick book and thumbed through it on the desk. He flipped pages quickly, muttering to himself until his searching finger slammed down on something.
    “Here, look at this,” he croaked.
    Frank got up and came around the desk.
    “Number Two eighty-four. The USS Candlefish, reported sunk around latitude thirty off the coast of Japan—11 December 1944.”
    “Sunk?”
    “Yes. And with no explanation. Nothing that would jell. I remember that damned thing. There were a couple like that on the Pacific patrols. December of   ‘44, yessir.”
    “Thirty years ago?” said Cook in disbelief.
    Frank stared at the photographs in his hand. “Hell. She looks like new.”
    Walters chuckled. “This is gonna cost you boys some time,” he said. “Can’t just file a report and forget it Gonna have to account for it. Ha!”
    Cook made a face. Frank was lost in thought. Something else had occurred to him. Latitude 30. That rang a bell.
     
    At nine o’clock that morning, Cook and Frank were in the main coffee lounge, bent over trays of ham and eggs, coffee and toast, when Cook spotted a figure ambling past the other minor Pentagon officers stuck for Saturday duty.
    “Diminsky,” announced Cook, and Frank turned to see a short, graying admiral. He too was in uniform, and he didn’t look very happy about it. Rear Admiral Lobell Diminsky was the Assistant Chief of the NIS, and wasn’t even happy about that. He would rather be Chief Chief, and one day probably would make it—as soon as the civilians could be shoved aside.
    “Boys.” He smiled briefly.
    They acknowledged the greeting, and Frank asked him how the golf was going. Diminsky gave him a hard look. “I got pulled off the second tee by the Secretary of State. I had to bloody fly back here, yet.”
    “No sense of priorities,” clucked Frank.
    “No sense of timing!” barked Diminsky. He hailed a passing busboy and ordered coffee. Then he eyed Cook’s half-finished eggs and toast. Cook caught him looking and very generously pushed the tray toward the admiral. Diminsky grinned at him and nibbled at the toast.
    “Next time order rye,” he offered.
    “He didn’t know you were coming,” said Frank.
    “I gather we’ve got ourselves a submarine that nobody’s seen for thirty years. Right?”
    “Yessir,” said Frank.
    “Bring me up to date.”
    “ComSubPac firmly denies that it’s one of the current fleet boats. It appears to be the USS Cartdlefish, sunk in the Rampo Depth, around latitude thirty in December of 1944. How she got where she is, nobody is even venturing a guess. We ordered DIC to scramble three tugs and some of their people to go, out for a look. They may even attempt to board her.”
    “What about the Jap freighter? The Secretary was very concerned about their position.”
    “We’ve ordered DIC to send out a crew to calm them down and take their report. We’re assuring them the sub meant no