Vixen 03

by Clive Cussler

  After forty minutes they met in the middle. Mapes's eyes reflected a bewildered look. He held out his hands in a helpless gesture.

  "Nothing."

  "Dammit, Mapes!" Pitt shouted, his voice echoing off the concrete walls. "You must have sold them!"

  "No!" he protested. "They were a bad buy. I miscalculated. Every government I pitched was afraid to be the first to use gas since Vietnam."

  "Okay, four down, four to go," Pitt said, pulling his emotions back under control. "Where do we go from here?"

  Mapes seemed to lose his train of thought for a moment. "The inventory ... we'll check inventory records against sales."

  Mapes used a call phone at the tunnel entrance to alert his office. When he and Pitt got back, the Phalanx Arms accountant had laid out the records on his desk. Mapes flipped through the ledgered pages swiftly. It took him less than ten minutes to find the answer.

  "I was wrong," he said quietly.

  Pitt remained silent, waiting, his hands clasped.

  "The missing gas shells were sold."

  Pitt was still silent, but there was murder in his eyes.

  "A mistake," Mapes said thinly. "The arsenal crew took the shells from the wrong lot number. The original shipping order called for the removal of forty pieces of heavy naval ordnance from Lot Sixteen. I can only assume that the first digit, the one, did not emerge on the shipping crew's carbon copy, and they simply read it as Lot Six."

  "I think it appropriate to say, Mapes, that you run a sloppy ship." Pitt's fingers bit into the flesh of his hands. "What name is on the purchase order?"

  "I'm afraid there were three orders filled during the same month."

  God, Pitt thought, why is it nothing ever comes easy? "I'll take a list of the buyers."

  "I hope you appreciate my position," said Mapes. The clipped business tone was back. "If my customers got wind of the fact I disclosed their arms sales ... I think you understand why this matter must remain confidential."

  "Frankly, Mapes, I'd like to stuff you in one of your own cannon and pull the lanyard. Now give me that list before I yank the Attorney General and Congress down around your ears."

  A faint pallor clouded Mapes's face. He took up a pen and wrote the names of the buyers on a pad. Then he tore off the paper and handed it to Pitt.

  One shell had been ordered by the British Imperial War Museum, in London. Two had gone to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Dayton City Post 9974, Oklahoma. The remaining thirty-seven were purchased by an agent representing the African Army of Revolution. No address was given.

  Pitt slipped the paper into his pocket and rose to his feet. "I'll send a team of men to remove the other gas shells in the tunnel," he said coldly. He detested Mapes, detested everything the fat little death merchant stood for. Pitt couldn't bring himself to leave without one final shot.

  "Mapes?"

  "Yes?"

  A thousand insults swirled in Pitt's mind, but he could not sort out any one in particular. Finally, as Mapes's expectant expression turned to puzzlement, Pitt spoke.

  "How many men did your merchandise kill and maim last year, and the year before that?"

  "I do not concern myself with what others do with my goods," Mapes said offhandedly.

  "If one of those gas shells went off, you'd be responsible for perhaps millions of deaths."

  "Millions, Mr. Pitt?" Mapes's eyes hardened. "To me the term is merely a statistic."

  46

  Steiger set the Spook F-140 jet fighter down lightly on the airstrip at Sheppard Air Force Base, outside Wichita Falls, Texas.

  After checking in with the flight-operations officer, he signed out a car from the base motor pool and drove north across the Red River into Oklahoma. He turned onto State Highway Fifty-three and pulled over to the side of the road; he felt a sudden urge to relieve himself. Though it was a few minutes past one in the afternoon, no car, no sign of life, was visible for miles.

  Steiger could not remember seeing such flat and desolate farm country. The wind-swept landscape was barren except for a distant shed and an abandoned hay rake. It was a depressing sight. If someone had placed a gun in Steiger's hand, he'd have been tempted to shoot himself out of sheer melancholy. He zipped up his fly and returned to the car.

  Soon a water tower appeared beside the arrow-straight road and grew larger through the windshield. Then a small town with precious few trees materialized and he passed a sign welcoming him to Dayton City, Queen City of the Wheat Belt. He pulled into a dingy old gas station that still sported glass tanks above its pumps.

  An elderly man in mechanic's coveralls emerged from a grease pit and shuffled up to the passenger window. "Can I help ya?"

  "I'm looking for VFW Post Ninety-nine seventy-four," said Steiger.

  "If yer speakin' at the luncheon, yer late," admonished the old man.

  "I'm here on other business," Steiger said, smiling.

  The Oklahoman was unimpressed. He took an oily rag from his pocket and wiped his equally oily hands. "Go to the stop sign in 66

  the middle of town and turn left. Ya can't miss it."

  Steiger followed the instructions and pulled into the gravel parking lot of a building strikingly modern compared to others in the town. Several cars were leaving the area, trailing clouds of red dust behind their bumpers. The luncheon was over, Steiger surmised. He entered and stood for a moment at the edge of a large room with a hardwood floor. The dishes on several tables still bore the wreckage of fried chicken. A group of three men noticed his presence and waved. A tall, gangly individual about fifty years of age and at least six feet five inches tall separated from the rest and sauntered over to Steiger. He had a ruddy face and short-clipped shiny hair parted down the middle. He offered his hand.

  "Good afternoon, Colonel. What brings you to Dayton City?"

  "I'm looking for the post commander, a Mr. Billy Lovell."

  "I'm Billy Lovell. What can I do for you?"

  "How do you do," said Steiger politely. "My name is Steiger, Abe Steiger. I've come from Washington on a rather urgent matter."

  Lovell stared at Steiger, his eyes friendly but speculative. "You're putting me on, Colonel. I suppose you're going to tell me a top-secret Russian spy satellite came down in a field somewhere near town."

  Steiger gave a casual tilt of his head. "Nothing that dramatic. I'm looking for a couple of naval shells your post purchased from Phalanx Arms."

  "Oh, them two duds?"

  "Duds?"

  "Yeah, we were going to blow 'em up during the Veterans Day picnic. Set 'em on an old tractor and popped away all afternoon, but they didn't go off. We tried to get Phalanx to replace 'em." Lovell shook his head sadly. "They refused. Claimed all sales was final."

  A chilling thought passed through Steiger's mind. "Perhaps they're not the self-detonating type of ordnance."

  "Nope." Lovell shook his head. "Phalanx guaranteed they was live battleship shells."

  "Do you still have them?"

  "Sure, right outside. You passed 'em coming in."

  Lovell led Steiger outside. The two shells bordered the entrance to the post. They were painted white, and welded to their sides were chains that stretched along the walkway.

  Steiger sucked in his breath. The tips of the shells were rounded. They were two of the missing gas shells. His knees suddenly turned to rubber, and he had to sit down on the steps. Lovell stared questioningly at Steiger's dazed expression.

  "Somethin' wrong?"

  "You shot at these things?" Steiger asked incredulously.

  "Pumped close to a hundred rounds at 'em. Nicked the heads some, but that's all."

  "It's a miracle . . ." Steiger murmured.

  "A what?"

  "Those are not explosive shells," Steiger explained. "They're gas shells. Their firing mechanisms will not self-activate until the parachutes are released. Your bullets had no effect because unlike ordinary explosive projectiles, they had not been preset to detonate."

  "Whooee!" gasped
Lovell. "You mean them things has poison gas in 'em?"

  Steiger merely nodded.

  "My Gawd, we might have wiped out half the county."

  "And then some," Steiger muttered under his breath. He rose from the steps. "I'd like to borrow your John and a telephone, in that order."

  "Sure, you come along. The John is down the hall to your left and there's a phone in my office." Lovell stopped and his eyes turned canny. "If we give you them shells . . . well, I was wonderin' . . ."

  "I promise you and your post will receive ten sixteen-inch shells in prime explosive condition, enough to give your next Veterans Day picnic a super bang."

  Lovell grinned from ear to ear. "You're on, Colonel."

  In the rest room Steiger ran cold water over his face. The eyes that stared back in the mirror were red and tired, but they also radiated hope. He had successfully tracked down two of the Quick Death warheads. He could only pray that Pitt was as fortunate.

  Steiger picked up the phone in Lovell's office and asked the operator to put through a collect long-distance call.

  Pitt was asleep on a couch in his NUMA office when his secretary, Zerri Pochinsky, leaned over and gently shook him awake.

  Her long fawn-colored hair hung down, framing a face that was warm and pretty and full of merry admiration.

  "You've got a visitor and two calls," she said in a soft Southern drawl.

  Pitt pushed aside the cobwebs and sat up. "The calls?" he said.

  "Congresswoman Smith," Zerri answered with a trace of acidity, "and Colonel Steiger on long distance."

  "And the visitor?"

  "Says his name is Sam Jackson. He doesn't have an appointment but he insists that it's important."

  Pitt began to pull his sleep-fogged mind to even keel. "I'll take Steiger's call first. Tell Loren I'll call her back, and send in Jackson as soon as I'm off the phone."

  Zerri nodded. "The colonel is on line three."

  He walked unsteadily to the desk and punched one of the blinking buttons. "Abe?"

  "Greetings from sunny Oklahoma."

  "How'd it go?"

  "Paydirt," said Steiger. "Scratch two warheads."

  "Nice work," Pitt said, smiling for the first time in days. "Any problems?"

  "None. I'll stand by until a crew arrives to pick them up."

  "I've got a NUMA Catlin loaded with a forklift sitting at Dulles. Where can they set down?"

  "One second."

  67

  Pitt could hear muffled voices as Steiger conversed with someone at the other end of the line.

  "Okay," Steiger said. "The post commander says there is a small private airfield about eight hundred yards long a mile south of town."

  "Twice what a Catlin requires," Pitt said.

  "Any luck at your end?"

  "The curator at the British Imperial War Museum said the shell they purchased from Phalanx for a World War Two naval exhibit is definitely armor piercing."

  "Leaving the African Army of Revolution holding the other two QD warheads."

  "Thereby hangs a tale," Pitt said.

  "What earthly purpose are heavy naval shells in the African jungle?"

  "Our riddle for the day," said Pitt, rubbing his reddened eyes. "At least we're temporarily blessed with the fact that they're no longer in our backyard."

  "Where do we go from here?" asked Steiger. "We can't very well tell a pack of terrorists they've got to give back the most horrendous weapon of all time."

  "The first item on the agenda," said Pitt, "is to pinpoint the warheads.

  On that score Admiral Sandecker has persuaded an old Navy buddy at the National Security Agency to do some digging."

  "Sounds touchy. Those guys are no dummies. They might ask some embarrassing questions."

  "Not likely," said Pitt confidently. "The admiral came up with a classic cover story. I almost bought it myself."

  47

  It was a difficult choice. Dale Jarvis wavered between the Dutch apple pie and the calorie-laden lemon meringue. Throwing diet to the winds, he took both and set them on his tray along with a cup of tea. Then he paid the girl at the computer register and sat at a table along one wall of the spacious cafeteria in the NSA headquarters complex at Fort Meade, Maryland.

  "One of these days you're going to bust your gut." Jarvis paused and looked up into the solemn face of Jack Ravenfoot, head of the agency's domestic division. Ravenfoot was all muscle and bone, the only full-blooded Cheyenne in Washington who had a Phi Beta Kappa key from Yale and held the retired rank of commodore.

  "I'd rather consume fattening, savory goodies than that salted buffalo jerky and boiled prairie gopher you call food."

  Ravenfoot stared up at the ceiling. "Come to think of it, I haven't had prairie gopher-good prairie gopher, that is-since the victory celebra-tion after Little Big Horn."

  "You guys really know how to stick it to a paleface where it hurts," Jarvis said, grinning. "Pull up a chair."

  Ravenfoot remained standing. "No thanks. I've got a meeting in five minutes. While I've got you, John Gossard, in the Africa Section, mentioned that you had a handle on some far-out project dealing with battleships."

  Jarvis slowly chewed a piece of the apple pie. "Battleship, singular. What's on your mind?"

  "An old friend from my Navy days, James Sandecker-"

  "The director of NUMA?" Jarvis said, interrupting.

  "The same. He asked me to track down a particular load of old sixteen-inch naval shells."

  "And you thought of me."

  "Battleships mounted sixteen-inch guns," said Ravenfoot. "I should know. I was executive officer aboard the New Jersey during the Vietnam orgy"

  "Any idea what Sandecker wants them for?" asked Jarvis.

  "He claims a team of his scientists want to drop them on Pacific coral formations."

  Jarvis halted between bites. "He what?"

  "They're conducting seismological tests. It seems armor-piercing shells dropped from a plane at two thousand feet on coral make a rumble nearly identical to an earthquake!"

  "I should think ground explosives would achieve the same purpose."

  Ravenfoot shrugged. "I can't argue the point. I'm no seismologist."

  Jarvis dug into the lemon meringue. "I see nothing of interest to the evaluation section or, for that matter, a sinister design to the admiral's request. Where does Sandecker figure these special shells are stored?"

  "The AAR has them."

  Jarvis took a sip of his coffee and patted his mouth with a napkin. "Why deal with the AAR when old naval ordnance can be picked up at most any surplus-arms dealer?"

  "An experimental type developed near the end of the Korean war and never fired in anger. Sandecker says they work far better than the standard projectile." Ravenfoot leaned on the backrest of a chair. "I checked with Gossard on the AAR involvement. He thinks Sandecker is mistaken. The guerrillas need those shells like a high jumper needs gallstones-his exact words. It's his guess that the shells NUMA wants are rusting in a naval depot somewhere.

  "And if the AAR actually possessed the shells, how would Sandecker deal with them?"

  "Make them a trade, I suppose, or buy the shells at an inflated price. After all, it's only taxpayer money."

  Jarvis sat back and poked his fork at the meringue. He wasn't hungry anymore. "I'd like to talk to Sandecker. Do you mind?"

  "Be my guest. You'd probably do better working through his special-projects director, though. He's the guy who's heading up the search."

  "What's his name?"

  "Dirk Pitt."

  "The fellow who raised the Titanic a few months back?"

  "The same." Ravenfoot held up his wristwatch and noted the time. "I have to run along. If you get a lead on those shells, I'd appreciate a call. Jim Sandecker is an old friend. I still owe him a favor or two."

  "Count on it."

  Jarvis sat for several minutes after Ravenfoot left, poking his fork idly at the pie. Then he rose and walked back to his office,
lost 68

  in thought.

  Barbara Gore knew the instant her boss stepped through the door that his intuition was working overtime. She had seen that haunted look of deep concentration too many times not to recognize it. Without waiting to be asked, she picked up her pad and pencil and followed Jarvis into his private office. Then she sat down, crossed her magnificent legs, and waited patiently.

  He stayed on his feet and stared at the wall. Then he turned slowly and his eyes came back in focus. "Call Gossard and set up a meeting with his Africa Section staff, and tell him I'd like another look at the Operation Wild Rose folder."

  "You've changed your mind? There may be something to it after all?" He didn't answer immediately. "Maybe, just maybe."

  "Anything else?"

  "Yes, ask the ID department to send up whatever they have on Admiral James Sandecker and a Dirk Pitt." "Aren't they with NUMA?" Jarvis nodded.

  Barbara gave him a questioning look. "Surely you don't think there is a connection."

  "Too early to tell," said Jarvis thoughtfully. "You might say that I'm picking up loose threads to see if they run to the same spool."

  48

  Frederick Daggat and Felicia Collins were waiting in the limousine when Loren came through the portico of the Capitol. They watched as she gracefully skipped down the steps, her cinnamon curls trailing in a light breeze. She wore a persimmon pantsuit with double-buttoned blazer and vest. A long gray silk scarf curled around her neck. Her briefcase was covered with the same material as the suit.

  Daggat's chauffeur opened the door for her. She slipped beside Felicia as Daggat gallantly took one of the jump seats. "You look lovely, Loren," Daggat said familiarly-too familiarly. "It was obvious the minds of my male colleagues were elsewhere when you stood up on the House floor in that outfit."

  "Being a woman has its advantages during debate," she said coolly. "You look stylish, Felicia."

  A strange look flashed over Felicia's face. The last thing she expected from Loren was a compliment. She smoothed the skirt of her creamy white jersey dress and avoided Loren's eyes.