Shock Wave dp-13

by Clive Cussler

“Rest assured,” replied the South African, “the diamond cartel will meet all commitments. The demand for diamonds worldwide is rising ever higher, and our profits are expected to soar for the first ten years of the new century. There is no doubt that we can carry our share of the monetary burden.”

  “I thank the gentleman from South Africa for his report of confidence,” said the chairman.

  “So where does Dorsett Consolidated go from here?” asked the sheik.

  “Legally,” replied the chairman, “the entire business passes into the hands of Dorsett’s two grandsons.”

  “How old are they?”

  “A few months this side of seven years old.”

  “That young?”

  “I didn’t know any of his daughters were married,” said the Indian real-estate developer.

  “They weren’t,” said the chairman flatly. “Maeve Dorsett bore twins out of wedlock. The father comes from a wealthy family of sheep ranchers. My sources say that he is an intelligent and reasonable man. He has already been named to act as guardian and administer assets of the estate.”

  The Dutchman stared down the table at the chairman. “Who has been named to handle the boys’ corporate affairs?”

  “A name you’re all well familiar with.” The chairman paused and smiled sardonically. “Until the grandchildren come of age, the day-to-day business activities of Dorsett Consolidated and its subsidiary divisions will be managed by the Strouser family of diamond merchants.”

  “There’s retribution for you,” said the American elder statesman.

  “What plans are in place should the diamond market collapse on its own? We can’t control prices forever.”

  “I’ll answer that,” said the South African. “When we can no longer maintain a grip on diamond prices, we turn from natural stones excavated by expensive mining operations to those produced in a laboratory.”

  “Are fakes as good?” asked the British publisher.

  “Chemical laboratories are currently producing cultured emeralds, rubies and sapphires with the same physical, chemical and optical properties as stones mined from the ground. They are so perfect that trained gemologists have difficulty detecting any distinction. The same is true with laboratory-created diamonds.”

  “Can they be sold without disclosure?” asked the chairman.

  “No need to deceive. Just as we educated the public into believing diamonds were the only stone to own, so can cultured stones be advertised and promoted as the most practical to buy. The only basic difference is that one took millions of years for nature to create, the other fifty hours in a laboratory. The new wave of the future, if you will.”

  The room went silent for a moment as each man considered the potential profits. Then the chairman smiled and nodded. “It would seem, gentlemen, that no matter which way the pendulum swings, our future earnings are secure.”

  March 20, 2000

  Washington, D.C.

  Pitt had been lucky, as every nurse on the floor of the hospital in Hobart, Tasmania, never ceased telling him. After a bout of peritonitis from the perforated colon, and the removal of the bullet from his pelvic girdle, where if had made a nice dent in the bone, he began to feel as if he had rejoined the living. When his lung reinflated and he could breathe freely, he ate like a starving lumberjack.

  Giordino and Sandecker hung around until they were assured by the medical staff that Pitt was on the road to recovery, a fact attested to by his requests, or rather demands, for something to drink that wasn’t fruit juice or milk. Demands that were mostly ignored.

  The admiral and Giordino then escorted Maeve’s boys to Melbourne, to their father, who had flown in from his family’s sheep station in the outback for Maeve’s funeral. A big man, Aussie to the core, with a university degree in animal husbandry, he promised Sandecker and Giordino to raise the boys in good surroundings. Though he trusted Strouser & Sons’ business judgments in their management of Dorsett Consolidated Mining, he wisely retained attorneys to watch over the twins’ best interests. Satisfied the boys were in good hands and that Pitt would soon be ready to return home, the admiral and Giordino flew back to Washington, where Sandecker received a tumultuous welcome and a round of ceremonial banquets as the man who fought a one-sided battle to save Honolulu from a tragic disaster.

  Any thoughts the President or Wilber Hutton might have had of replacing him at NUMA quickly died. Word around the capital city was that the admiral would be at the helm of his beloved National Underwater & Marine Agency long after the current administration left the White House.

  The doctor walked into the room and found Pitt standing at the window, gazing longingly down at the Derwent River flowing through the heart of Hobart. “You’re supposed to be in bed,” said the doctor in his Australian twang, pronouncing bed like byd.

  Pitt gave him a hard look. “I’ve laid on a mattress a three-toed sloth wouldn’t sleep on for five days. I’ve served my time. Now I’m out of here.”

  The doctor smiled slyly. “You have no clothes, you know. The rags you were wearing when they brought you in were thrown out in the trash.”

  “Then I’ll walk out of here in my bathrobe and this stupid hospital gown. Whoever invented these things, by the way, should have them stuffed up his anal canal until the strings in the back come out his ears.”

  “I can see arguing with you is wasting my other patients’ time.” The doctor shrugged. “It’s a bleeding wonder your body still functions. I’ve seldom seen so many scars on one man. Go if you must. I’ll see the nurse finds you some decent street clothes so you won’t be arrested for impersonating an American tourist.”

  No NUMA jet this trip. Pitt flew commercial on United Airlines. As he shuffled onto the aircraft, still stiff and with a grinding ache in his side, the flight attendants, women except for one man, stared at him in open curiosity, watching him search the overhead numbers for his seat.

  One attendant, brown hair neatly coiffed, eyes almost as green as Pitt’s and soft with concern, came over to him. “May I show you to your seat, sir?”

  Pitt had spent a solid minute studying himself in a mirror before he caught a cab from the hospital to the airport. If he’d auditioned for a movie role that called for the walking dead, the director would have hired him in an instant the livid red scar across his forehead; the vacant, bloodshot eyes and gaunt, pale face; his movements like a ninety-year-old man with arthritis. His skin was blotched from the burns, his eyebrows were nonexistent, and his once thick, curly black hair looked like a sheep herder had tried styling it in a crewcut.

  “Yes, thank you,” he said more out of embarrassment than appreciation.

  “Are you Mr. Pitt?” she asked as she motioned to an empty seat by the window.

  “At the moment I wish I were someone else, but yes, I’m Pitt.”

  “You’re a lucky man,” she said smiling.

  “So a dozen nurses kept telling me.”

  “No, I mean you have friends who are very concerned about you. The flight crew were told you would be flying with us and were requested to make you as comfortable as possible.”

  How in hell did Sandecker know he’d escaped the hospital, left directly for the airport and purchased a standby ticket to Washington, he wondered.

  As it turned out, the flight attendants had little to do for him. He slept most of the trip, coming awake only to eat, watch a movie with Clint Eastwood playing the role of a grandfather, and drink champagne. He did not even know the plane was approaching Dulles International until the wheels thumped down and woke him up.

  He came off the shuttle bus from the aircraft into the terminal, mildly surprised and disappointed that no one waited to greet him. If Sandecker had alerted the airline’s flight crew, he certainly knew when the plane was scheduled to arrive. Not even Al Giordino was waiting at the curb when he walked haltingly toward a taxi stand. A clear case of out-of-sight, out-of-mind, he told himself as his mood of depression deepened.

  It was eight o’clock in
the evening when he exited the cab, punched his code into the security system of his hangar and walked inside. He turned on the lights that reflected in the mirrored finish and chrome of his collector cars.

  A tall object that nearly touched the ceiling stood in front of him, an object that hadn’t been there when he left.

  For several moments, Pitt stared in rapt fascination at the totem pole. A beautifully carved eagle with spread wings graced the top. Then, in descending order, came a grizzly bear with its cub, a raven, a frog, a wolf, some type of sea creature and a human head at the bottom that remotely resembled Pitt. He read a note that was pinned to the ear of the wolf.

  Please accept this commemorative column in your honor from the Haida people as a token of their appreciation for your efforts in removing the disfigurement on our sacred island. The Dorsett mine has been closed, and soon the animals and plants will reclaim their rightful home. You are now an honored member of the Haida.

  Your friend,

  Mason Broadmoor

  Pitt was deeply moved. To be given a masterwork of such eminent significance was a rare privilege. He felt grateful beyond measure to Broadmoor and his people for their generous gift.

  Then he walked around the totem and felt his heart stop beating. Disbelief clouded his opaline green eyes. Then astonishment was replaced with emptiness followed by sorrow. Directly behind, sitting in the aisle between the classic cars, was the Marvelous Maeve.

  Tired, worn and the worse for wear, but there she sat in all her sea-ravaged glory. Pitt could not imagine how the faithful boat had survived the eruption and had been transported thousands of kilometers to Washington. It was as if someone had performed a miracle. He walked over, and reached out his hand to touch the bow to see if he wasn’t hallucinating.

  Just as his fingertips met the hull’s hard surface, people began emerging from the back of the Pullman railroad car parked along one wall of the hangar, the rear seats of the automobiles and from his upstairs apartment, where they had been hiding. Suddenly, he was surrounded by a crowd of familiar faces shouting “surprise” and “welcome home.”

  Giordino embraced him gently, well aware of Pitt’s injuries. Admiral Sandecker, never one for emotional display, warmly shook Pitt’s hand, turning away as tears welled in his eyes.

  Rudi Gunn was there, along with Hiram Yaeger, and over forty of his other friends and fellow employees at NUMA. His parents were there to greet him too. His father, Senator George Pitt of California, and his mother, Barbara, were shocked at his gaunt appearance, but bravely acted as though he looked healthy and fit. St. Julien Perlmutter was there, directing the food and drink. Congresswoman Loren Smith, his close and intimate friend for ten years, kissed him tenderly, saddened at seeing the dull, world-weary look of pain and exhaustion in his normally glinting eyes.

  Pitt stared at the little boat that had performed so faithfully. He turned without hesitation to Giordino. “How did you ever manage it?”

  Giordino smiled triumphantly. “After the admiral and I flew you to the hospital in Tasmania, I returned to the island with another load of relief supplies. A quick pass over the eastern cliffs revealed that Marvelous Maeve had survived the eruption. I borrowed a couple of Aussie engineers and lowered them into the ravine. They secured the boat to the cable from the helicopter. I hoisted it to the top of the bluffs, where we disassembled the hull and outriggers. The operation took some doing, but the parts we couldn’t load inside the helicopter we attached underneath the fuselage. Then I flew back to Tasmania, where I talked the pilot of a commercial cargo plane that was headed for the States into transporting the beast home. With the help of a team from NUMA, we put it back together barely in time for your arrival.”

  “You’re a good friend,” said Pitt sincerely. “I can never repay you.”

  “It is I who owe you,” Giordino responded devotedly.

  “I deeply regret that I was unable to attend Maeve’s funeral in Melbourne.”

  “The admiral and I were there along with her boys and the father. Just as you requested, they played ‘Moon River’ as she was lowered into the ground.”

  “Who gave the eulogy?”

  “The admiral delivered the words you wrote,” said Giordino sadly. “There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.”

  “And Rodney York?”

  “We sent York’s logbook and letters to England by courier,” said Giordino. “York’s widow is still living by Falmouth Bay, a sweet little lady in her late seventies. I talked to her by phone after she received the log. There is no expressing how happy she was to learn how York died. She and her family are making plans to bring his remains home.”

  “I’m glad she finally knows the story,” said Pitt.

  “She asked me to thank you for your thoughtfulness.”

  Pitt was saved from misting eyes by Perlmutter, who put a glass of wine in his hand. “You’ll enjoy this, my boy. An excellent chardonnay from Plum Creek Winery in Colorado.”

  The surprise over, the party took off in full swing until after midnight. Friends came and went until Pitt was talked out and fighting to stay awake. Finally, Pitt’s mother insisted her son get some rest. They all bid him a good night, wished him a speedy recovery and began drifting out the door for the drive to their homes.

  “Don’t come to work until you’re fit and able,” counseled Sandecker. “NUMA will struggle along without you.”

  “There is one project I’d like to pursue in about a month,” said Pitt, the old devilish buccaneer gleam briefly flashing in his eyes.

  “What project is that?”

  Pitt grinned. “I’d like to be on Gladiator Island when the water clears in the lagoon.”

  “What do you expect to find?”

  “His name is Basil.”

  Sandecker stared, puzzled. “Who in hell is Basil?”

  “He’s a sea serpent. I figure he’ll return to his breeding ground after the lagoon is free of ash and debris.”

  Sandecker placed a hand on Pitt’s shoulder and gave him a look usually reserved for a child who has claimed to have seen the bogeyman. “Take a nice long rest, and we’ll talk about it.”

  The admiral turned and walked away, shaking his head and mumbling something about no such things as sea monsters as Congresswoman Loren Smith came up to Pitt and held his hand.

  “Would you like me to stay?” she asked him softly.

  Pitt kissed her on the forehead. “Thank you, but I think I’d like to be alone for a while.”

  Sandecker offered to drive Loren to her townhouse, and she gladly accepted, having arrived at Pitt’s welcome-home party in a cab. They sat in reflective silence until the car passed over the bridge into the city.

  “I’ve never seen Dirk so dispirited,” said Loren, her face sad and thoughtful. “I never thought I’d ever live to say it, but the fire has gone out of his eyes.”

  “He’ll mend,” Sandecker assured her. “A couple of weeks of rest, and he’ll be champing at the bit again.”

  “Don’t you think he’s getting a little old to play the daring adventurer?”

  “I can’t think of him sitting behind a desk. He’ll never stop roving the seas, doing what he loves to do.”

  “What drives him?” Loren wondered aloud.

  “Some men are born restless,” Sandecker said philosophically. “To Dirk, every hour has a mystery to be solved, every day a challenge to conquer.”

  Loren looked at the admiral. “You envy him, don’t you?”

  Sandecker nodded. “Of course, and so do you.”

  “Why is that, do you think?”

  “The answer is simple,” Sandecker said wisely. “There’s a little of Dirk Pitt in all of us.”

  After everyone had left and Pitt was standing alone in the hangar amid his collection of mechanical possessions, each of which had in some way touched his past, he walked stiffly to the boat he and Maeve and Giordino had built on the Misery rocks and climbed inside the cockpit. He sat there a long time, silently lost in
his memories.

  He was still sitting there in the Marvelous Maeve when the first rays of the morning sun brushed the rusting roof of the old aircraft hangar he called home.

  Примечания

  1

  Approximately $7 million U.S. at that time, or close to $50 million on today’s market.

  (<< back)

  FB2 document info

  Document ID: efd746d0-e8db-4094-baf4-b8d45e304e91

  Document version: 1

  Document creation date: 2012-04-19

  Created using: doc2fb, FictionBook Editor Release 2.6 software

  Document authors :

  SC

  About

  This file was generated by Lord KiRon's FB2EPUB converter version 1.1.5.0.

  (This book might contain copyrighted material, author of the converter bears no responsibility for it's usage)

  Этот файл создан при помощи конвертера FB2EPUB версии 1.1.5.0 написанного Lord KiRon.

  (Эта книга может содержать материал который защищен авторским правом, автор конвертера не несет ответственности за его использование)

  http://www.fb2epub.net

  https://code.google.com/p/fb2epub/