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"Any guesses?"
"Until all the data is in, the best guess is between ten and twenty kilotons."
"Enough to level Chicago," Nichols murmured.
The President was afraid to ask the next question, and he hesitated. "Could. . . could it have been one of our own nuclear submarines that blew up?"
"The Chief of Naval Operations assures me none of our vessels were within five hundred kilometers of the area."
"A Russian maybe?"
"No," Jordan replied. "I've notified my USSR counterpart, Nikolai Golanov. He swore all Soviet nuclear surface ships and submarines in the Pacific are accounted for, and quite naturally blamed us for the event. Though I'm one hundred percent sure he and his people know better, they won't admit they're in the dark as much as we are."
"I'm not familiar with the name," said the Vice President. "Is he KGB?"
"Golanov is the Directorate of Foreign and State Security for the Politburo," Jordan explained patiently.
"He could be lying," offered Nichols.
Jordan shot him a hard look. "Nikolai and I go back twenty-six years together. We may have danced and shined, but we never lied to one another."
"If we aren't responsible, and neither are the Soviets," mused the President, his voice gone strangely soft, "then who is?"
"At least ten other nations have the bomb," said Nichols. "Any one of them could have run a nuclear bomb test."
"Not likely," answered Jordan. "You can't keep the preparations a secret from Global Bloc and Western intelligence gathering. I suspect we're going to find it was an accident, a nuclear device that was never meant to go off."
The President looked thoughtful for a moment, and then he asked, "Do we know the nationality of the ships in the blast area?"
"All the details aren't in yet, but it appears that three vessels were involved, or at least innocent bystanders. A Norwegian passenger-cargo liner, a Japanese auto carrier, and a British oceanographic ship that was conducting a deep-bottom survey."
"There must have been casualties."
"Photos from our satellite before and after the event show that all three ships vanished and were presumed sunk during or immediately after the blast. Human survivability is very doubtful. If the fireball and shock wave didn't get them, the heavy radiation will in a very short time."
"I take it a rescue mission is planned," said the Vice President.
"Naval units from Guam and Midway have been ordered to the site."
The President stared at the carpet steadily, as if seeing something. "I can't believe the British were secretly conducting a bomb test without notifying us. The Prime Minister would have never gone behind my back."
"Certainly not the Norwegians," said the Vice President firmly.
The President's face made a mystified expression. "Nor the Japanese. There's no evidence they ever built a nuclear bomb."
"The device might have been stolen," suggested Nichols, "and clandestin
ely transported by the unsuspecting Norwegians or Japanese."
Jordan shrugged offhandedly. "I don't think it was stolen. I'm willing to bet a month's pay an investigation will prove it was deliberately being carried to a scheduled destination."
"Which was?"
"One of two California ports."
They all looked at Jordan in cold speculation, the enormity of the whole thing growing in their minds.
"The Divine Star was bound from Kobe to Los Angeles with over seven thousand Murmoto automobiles," Jordan continued. "The Narvik, carrying a hundred and thirty passengers and a mixed cargo of Korean shoes, computers, and kitchen appliances, sailed from Pusan for San Francisco."
