Black Gold

by Paul Kenyon

  "Is this the place?" the Baroness whispered.

  "Just around the side of the cove. It's the place Ian was so afraid of. Haunted by fairies, he said. And it's the same place the Japanese are going Beastie hunting. It all fits."

  They felt their way in the dark down the sheer face of the crag, careful not to dislodge pebbles. The water of the loch glittered blackly below, reflecting a sickly yellow moon. The Baroness and Fiona were nearly invisible in their form-fitting black jerseys and tights.

  "How did you find out about the Japanese?"

  "From SIP. They keep an eye on everything that goes on around here. The Japanese have been putting together all their sonar findings. They think there's the entrance to an underwater cave here. They've had echoes of something big — fifty feet or more — swimming in and out of the cove."

  "Why are they going after it at night?"

  "They think it's nocturnal. Some kind of a plesiosaur that somehow survived the Mesozoic era. The description fits — long, smooth body, fins, long neck with a little head at the end of it."

  The Baroness tossed her head. "I hope they don't catch it. I hate to think of a creature a hundred million years old ending up in the Yokohama aquarium."

  They reached the bottom of the crags. There was nothing that could be called a beach, just a narrow strip of tumbled rocks, some of them as big as a bus. They picked their way around the rocks at the water's edge. The Baroness suddenly froze.

  She put a warning hand on Fiona's arm. They both crouched in the shelter of a boulder.

  The kelpies were rising out of the water.

  Slowly they emerged, as black and glistening as seals, great glittering horsefly eyes that reflected the moonlight merman's feet. They were the stuff of Scottish legend — seal maidens, the web-footed bean shith, the malevolent water sprites who haunted shallow places. It was easy to see why the local people avoided this part of Crombie Loch.

  Only these kelpies were men in wet suits. They hauled themselves up on the rocks and unslung their air tanks. They pushed their face masks up and unwrapped the long plastic packages. Those were no fairy wands they took out. They were very modern, very wicked, submachine guns.

  The kelpies conferred briefly, then set out in opposite directions along the beach. Guards. They were here to keep people from seeing something that was going on in the cove tonight.

  One of them was heading straight toward their hiding place.

  He was going to stumble on them before his mate was more than a few yards off. It had to be swift and it had to be silent.

  The Baroness and Fiona looked at one another and grinned. They ducked their heads.

  The kelpie stepped around the rock. Two heads bobbed up, one red-haired, the other black. Two of the most ravishing faces he'd ever seen were smiling supernaturally at him. Four languid arms reached out. His reflexes were good, but it all was happening so fast that it seemed instantaneous. A slim white finger was suddenly inserted into the trigger guard of his gun, nestled against his own finger, keeping him from firing in reflex. Another hand grasped the barrel of the gun and, with a quick yank, took it from him. A second pair of arms was embracing him, turning him in the embrace, and the woman was falling over backward, behind the rocks, taking him with her.

  The Baroness winced at the crushing weight that was flattening her breasts, digging into her belly. His damned utility belt was sharp and hard. He was on his back, thrashing about. She put her strong fingers around his neck and squeezed. Fiona put the submachine gun down gently, without a sound, and grabbed him by the wrists.

  She looked down into his face while the Baroness strangled him. "The spell is broken, peerie sprite."

  His face turned black and he went limp. Fiona, still holding his wrists, pulled him off the Baroness. The Baroness got up and peeked around the rock.

  The other man was about sixty feet away now, his weapon at the ready. He was a good guard. He kept looking around every few paces.

  The Baroness put her lips against Fiona's ear. "We can't get across that space before he turns around."

  Fiona gestured toward the dead man's submachine gun.

  "No," the Baroness whispered. "There may be others."

  "What are we going to do?"

  The Baroness yawned. "I don't know about you, but I'm going to wash out some lingerie."

  She peeled off her jersey and removed her bra. There was a little tidal pool there, in the lee of the boulder they were hiding behind. She knelt at the water's edge and began to rinse out her bra.

  It didn't happen right away. Then the bra began gradually to stiffen, as though there were starch in it. The fibers, spun from a space-age polymer, engorged themselves with the hydrogen and oxygen atoms that had been left out of their structure. The bra filled out, stretched, and became hard and rigid. It assumed a curved shape from side panel to side panel. The elastic in back, where it hooked together, elongated like a giant rubber band. She twanged it experimentally.

  She was holding a bow. It was a peculiar-looking bow, with ballooning cups on either side of the grip and a pair of irrelevant shoulder straps dangling from one side, but it was a bow nevertheless, with all the necessary balance and power.

  "Have a toothpick," Fiona whispered, and dumped a handful of little plastic cocktail skewers into the water. They floated there, their molecular structure absorbing water molecules.

  In seconds they were three feet long. The pointed tip, a skewer for olives or maraschino cherries, was a full-sized arrowhead, big enough to impale a man. The notched chevron at the other end made a creditable flight — a rigid fin that would do a better job than feathers.

  The Baroness picked an arrow out of the pool and fit it to her bowstring. It rested conveniently in the deep V between the cups of the bra. She raised her head above the rock.

  The sentry in the wet suit was just turning around. She drew back the arrow and let it fly. He jerked his head toward the sound of the twang, starting to bring his gun up.

  He was considerate enough to die without making noise. All of a sudden he was looking at a gigantic cocktail pick sprouting from his chest. He made the slightest of gasps before his lungs filled with blood. He clawed with one hand at his back; the arrow had gone through with tremendous force. Then he tumbled over backward, still holding the submachine gun in one hand.

  The Baroness put her jersey back on over her loose breasts and gathered up her arrows. "Let's go," she said.

  They found an observation point at the head of the cove, in a patch of scrubby vegetation clinging to the bare crag. They looked out over a dark expanse of water, lying sullenly under a heavy sky.

  "Is that something?" Fiona said.

  A silvery patch of rippling water had suddenly appeared, as though there were something large just beneath the surface. They watched it closely, but it gradually disappeared.

  "Some trick of the waves," the Baroness said. "That's what half the monster sightings turn out to be."

  They stayed another hour, shivering in the night air. Then there was a distant sound out over the water.

  The Baroness lifted her head and listened. The sound became more distinct. Engines.

  "Here come the Japanese," she said.

  They watched while the whaleboats came into view. They were the same three she'd seen before, their ruined engines replaced. They were heading straight into the cove.

  The little figures in the boats were busy. What were they doing? In a moment she could see that they were playing out long lengths of netting with cork floats on top and weights along the bottom. Two of the boats stretched the netting across the mouth of the cove and stationed themselves at either end, while the third stayed beyond and centered, its harpoon cannon ready.

  "They don't think those flimsy nets will hold a swimming dinosaur?" Fiona said incredulously.

  "Long enough to shoot it with tranquilizer," the Baroness said. "What are they doing now?"

  The boats at either side were lowering some kind of electronic gear
into the water. She could see a man with earphones on either side, fiddling with instruments.

  "That must be the ultrasonic equipment they were talking about. They think they can make the monster confused and uncomfortable enough to come out to have a look."

  Nothing happened for a long time. Then — had she imagined it? — there was a long silvery patch in the water, gone immediately. She waited. There was an eerie prickling along her spine.

  Even at this distance she could hear the triumphant cries of the Japanese. There was a long, dark, glistening shape breaking the surface. It was about fifty feet long, an eellike thing made obscure by the waves washing over it. A snakelike head rose and turned toward the whale-boats. Then it was rushing at the net, a dark shadow just beneath the surface.

  The Japanese were shouting with excitement. The thing hit the net and reared upward. There were cries of alarm. The harpoon gun went off with a bang. There was a clang of metal.

  The monster disappeared. The Japanese were craning to see where it had gone. All of a sudden there was a shadowy swirling under one of the whaleboats, and it was lifted up out of the water. Little men tumbled over the side. There was the sound of splintering wood, and the whaleboat was gone.

  The net was gone, too. Tangled around the Beastie, it disappeared into the depths.

  The Japanese were looking around wildly. Swimming men were struggling to reach the other two boats. There were more shouts. The shadow in the water appeared again, trailing shreds of fishnet. The harpoon cannon fired. Again there was that metallic clang, and then the second whaleboat was being lifted out of the water, overturned, the little figures toppling to flounder in the black water.

  The harpooner worked frantically. Two struggling men helped him load another one of the gigantic syringe darts into the cannon's muzzle, and then he was swinging his sights around, elevating the cannon, as the dark torpedo shape rushed the boat. The cannon banged, and Penelope could see the syringe bounce off the surfacing monster. There was a grating crash as the Beastie hit the side of the boat in a swirl of boiling water. The boat broke in two. The monster disappeared. The loch was filled with debris and struggling, splashing men trying to reach shore.

  Fiona turned to the Baroness, her face white in the moonlight. "What was it?" she whispered.

  The Baroness remembered that clang of metal. "A submarine," she said. "A midget submarine."

  * * *

  The Japanese survivors were swimming for shore. There were about twenty of them. They were spread out across about a hundred feet of water, some of them floundering, hanging onto wreckage, a few strong swimmers almost to the pebbly beach.

  Before they could make it, a line of black heads emerged from the water, close to shore. The swimmers hesitated, then kept paddling. In front of them, the row of men in wet suits stood up, thigh-deep in the water.

  The Baroness had a premonition of what was going to happen next. She started to rise to her feet, reaching for one of the arrows.

  Fiona pulled her down again. "You can't help them," she said. "It's too far."

  The Baroness crouched down again in the vegetation. Fiona was right. She'd let herself be carried away. The arrows couldn't fly as far as bullets, and, to get within range, she'd have had to expose herself for a hundred-yard dash down a bare slope. One of the men in wet suits had turned around to cover the shore, a submachine gun cradled in his arms.

  The rubber-suited men were unhurriedly unwrapping long waterproof packages. They took their time. There was no rush.

  The swimming Japanese had stopped again. They were treading water, uncertain of what to do.

  The bogus kelpies raised their weapons. They were standing in the shallows, legs braced apart to take the weight of their air tanks, picking out individual targets.

  On a signal, they fired. The automatic weapons stammered. Penelope could see the telltale lines of splashes sweeping the surface of the water. There were screams, horrible screams, and the Japanese swimmers were throwing up their hands, flopping like wounded fish, going under. She could hear the killers laughing. They were turning it into a sport. Those bobbing heads in the water weren't much of a challenge, but they were making the job last. A couple of Japanese began desperately swimming further out into the loch. The gunmen let them go, five yards, six. Then two of them, by tacit agreement of the others, sprayed them with bullets. The heads flew apart like rotten melons. There were coarse laughs from the men who'd shot them.

  Others of the Japanese were diving, trying to stay underwater. The gunmen waited patiently until they had to come up. They took turns each time a head burst into view. The bastards were probably making bets.

  The orgy of gunfire ended. The bodies floated on the water. No more heads came up. The gunmen began to pack up their weapons. The man guarding their rear was an exception.

  Out there, beyond the floating bodies, a dark hump broke the surface. It was the submarine again. Penelope could see how it had been taken for a prehistoric creature. There was the long periscope, resembling a neck and a little head, the round torpedo shape, and the fins, like the flippers of a plesiosaur. It rolled a little in the waves, glistening blackly.

  The floating bodies began to jerk to and fro. Some of the skin divers were collecting them, towing them by the feet into a neat group. The twenty dead men were looped together with rope; one of the rubber-suited men swam with the rope's end to the Beastie and tied it to a cleat.

  "They're going to tow the bodies out to sea, I expect," the Baroness said.

  The skin divers were swimming well clear of the submarine now. It sank beneath the waves, heading straight out into the loch, dragging the grizzly floating bundle of tangled limbs behind it. A moment later the bodies, too, were gone, and there was nothing to be seen but a silvery wake, already fading.

  One by one, the rubbery heads with their cyclops masks dipped under the waves and disappeared. They were heading back toward whatever underwater installation they and the submarine had come from — most likely a submerged cave nearby. The Baroness watched them go with a mounting sense of frustration.

  The lone guard was about ready to pack it up and call it quits, too. He zipped his gun into its waterproof case and started walking into the loch. There were still a couple of his buddies above water, getting ready to dive.

  "One of them!" the Baroness said. "That's all I want! One of the bastards!"

  She scrambled to her feet and ran like a gazelle down the slope. Only her momentum kept her from tumbling down. The stiffened bra was in her left hand; with her right, she was reaching for one of the plastic arrows.

  The man in the water must have heard her feet kicking up gravel. He half-turned toward the beach. His face was a shimmering circle of glass with a yellow moon reflected in it. One could imagine the startled eyes behind the glass. He was hip-deep, swaying to balance the weight of his air tanks, opening his gun case and trying to get the gun out.

  The Baroness dropped to one knee, the rigid bra held crosswise, the arrow resting in the cleft between the two plastic breasts. She pulled the strap and snapped it. The arrow flew, an avenging messenger.

  His hands scrabbled at the arrow in his chest. His gun splashed into the water. He staggered backward and lost his balance.

  She already had fitted another arrow to the bra strap. There was another target — one last rubber head sticking up out of the water. She snapped off a shot without aiming. The plastic skewer pierced the round shape like a toothpick through an olive.

  Fiona was standing beside her. "You didn't get one of the bastards," she said. "You got two."

  The Baroness surveyed her victims with grim satisfaction. They were floating just under the surface, grizzly canapes with the long shafts sticking up into the air.

  "So much for kelpies," she said. "What do you suppose they thought they were seeing before they died?"

  Fiona looked the Baroness over — a figure of night in her pitch-dark costume, the inky hair wild above a ravishing otherworld face, the stra
nge bow in her hand like a magic charm.

  "The Dubh Sith," she said. "The Black Fairy."

  * * *

  The prime minister looked around at all the anxious faces. He gave the coded cablegram to the home secretary, who read it and passed it on.

  "The Leviathan's gone down with all hands," he said.

  Lord Cornston sat there, looking small and old and shrunken, the silver-headed cane resting between his knees. "A million tons of oil, gone," he said in a shaking voice. "They wanted its market value. They want the market value of all our oil."

  "They shan't get it," the prime minister said decisively. "The Royal Navy is on patrol in the North Sea. We have security men aboard all the rigs. Nothing can slip through."

  "We're taking a dreadful gamble," the home secretary said.

  "Give them what they ask for," Lord Cornston said in a quavering voice. "We can adjust. The world market can find a new level. But if the oil's gone, it's gone forever."

  The prime minister looked at him with pity. Who would have believed it: Cornston a broken man. "We can't give in," he said as gently as possible. "Not an inch."

  "That's all right, sir," the Anglia chairman said to Lord Cornston. "They won't take our oil away from us. Those wells are at the bottom of the ocean. There's absolutely no way in the world they can get at them."

  Chapter 12

  "They're waiting for us downstairs," Tony said impatiently. He hovered over her, a double-barrel 20-gauge shotgun under his arm, glancing at his watch.

  "I'll be ready in a minute, darling," the Baroness said. She continued stuffing the items on her dressing table into the many pockets of her shooting jacket.

  "You won't need all that muck," he said, gesturing at the array of cosmetics. "We're going to shoot birds, not pose for pictures."

  "A girl never can tell what she's going to run into out on the moors," Penelope said calmly. She put an eyebrow pencil into one of the voluminous side pockets.

  He picked up a can of hair spray and turned it over in his hand. "Net Worth," he read. "I say, that's a picture of you on the label."