'If the submarine was in Soviet waters,' Ambassador Morris said deliberately, 'it was there by navigational error, or some mechanical breakdown with the steering gear or something like that.' He was a heavy man, sitting with his hands along the arms of his small fragile chair, his head lowered as if prepared to charge. It had said in one of the news reports I'd seen that he'd had a nephew on board the submarine, but that in any case his personal feeling was that if the entire Soviet fleet were to be blasted out of the oceans it would express the attitude of the United States with accuracy. 'If it was there within the twelve-mile limit, the Soviets should have warned the crew in the normal way, by dropping depth charges and sonar buoys. It could have been done, it should have been done, and it was not done.'

The PM said at once, leaning forward in her chair, 'That is why I regard it as an act of war. But unfortunately we have not only to put our own personal feelings into the background, Mr Ambassador, but to do all we can to damp down public concern to the minimum.' She leaned back again, resting a slim hand on the arm of her chair. 'It won't be easy.'

The foreign secretary looked at the ambassador. 'You don't think there's even the slightest chance of your president simply saying that unless the Soviets come across with an immediate and generous apology he'll call off the summit meeting?'

'I would like to think so. I do not, however, think so.'

'There's not the slightest chance,' someone said impatiently, 'that they'd apologize anyway. They've denied any blame and they'll go on denying it.'

'Are your people still trying to locate the submarine?'

'Yes. So are NATO investigators. But those waters are within the Arctic Circle and it's midwinter, with rough seas running.'

'Mr Ambassador, if the vessel could be found, would it be possible for divers to see whether it was an explosion on board, as the Soviets claim, or an armed attack that sent it down?'