“It does tend to make one gun-shy, knowing Qin Shang can and has bought off half the city,” said Pitt.
“The guy has more tentacles than ten squids joined together at birth,” added Giordino.
“Unlike the Russians, who paid paltry sums for secret information during the cold war,” said Sandecker, “Qin Shang thinks nothing of paying out millions of dollars to buy people and information.”
“Backed by the Chinese government,” said Pitt, “his cash reserves are bottomless.”
Giordino sat on a bench seat facing Sandecker. “What magic have you conjured up, Admiral?”
“Magic?”
“I've been around you too long to know you're not the kind to sit back and take contempt and ridicule. Something is cooking in your Machiavellian mind.”
Pitt grinned. “I suspect the admiral and I are running on the same wavelength. We're not about to let NUMA be shut out of hanging Qin Shang from the nearest tree.”
Sandecker's lips curled in a taut smile as he swung the boat in a wide arc to avoid a sailboat that was tacking upriver. “I hate it when I'm second-guessed by the hired help.”
“Sungari?” asked Pitt.
Sandecker nodded. “I've kept Rudi Gunn and the Marine Denizen on station a few miles below Qin Shang Maritime's port facility in the Atchafalaya River. I'd like you two rogues to fly down and join him. Then wait for the United States to show up.”
“Where is she now?” asked Giordino.
“The last report put her two hundred miles off the coast of Costa Rica.”
“That should put her at the dock at Sungari in three days,” remarked Pitt.
“You were right about a crew coming on board to take her through the Panama Canal.”
“Did they remain on board?”
Sandecker shook his head. “After transit through the Canal, they disembarked. The United States is continuing toward Louisiana under remote control.”
“A 'robo ship,' ” Giordino muttered thoughtfully. “Hard to believe a ship the size of the United States is cruising the seas with no one on board.”
“The Navy has been developing the 'robo ship' concept for ten years,” explained Sandecker. “Ship designers and engineers have already built an arsenal ship that is basically a floating missile pad able to launch as many as five hundred missiles by remote control from another ship, an aircraft or a facility thousands of miles away, a radical departure from present aircraft carriers that require a five-thousand-man crew. It's the newest concept from the Navy since the nuclear ballistic missile submarine. Totally contained warships and bomber aircraft are not far behind.”
“Whatever Qin Shang has in mind for the United States,” said Giordino, “it's not as a missile platform. Dirk and I searched it from engine room to wheelhouse. There are no missile launchers.”
“I read your report,” said Sandecker. “You also found no indication that it would be used to smuggle illegal immigrants.”
“That's true,” acknowledged Pitt. “When Shang's operations are examined at first glance they appear to be conceived by a genius with a flair for sorcery, but tear away the veneer and you find a logical exercise. He has a valid function for the ship, you can bet on it.”
Sandecker pulled the throttle lever another notch and increased the speed of the whaleboat. “So we're no closer to a solution than we were two weeks ago.”
“Except for my personal theory that Shang intends to scuttle her,” said Pitt.
Sandecker looked dubious. “Why scuttle a perfectly good ocean liner after he spent millions refitting her?”
“I don't have an answer,” Pitt admitted.
“That's what I want you to find out. Take care of your immediate affairs and sign out a NUMA jet to fly yourselves to Morgan City. I'll call Rudi and tell him you're coming.”
“Now that we're working without an endorsement from the INS and other investigative agencies, how far can we go with this thing?” Pitt asked.
“Do whatever it takes without getting yourselves killed,” responded Sandecker firmly. “I'll be responsible and answer for your actions once Monroe and Harper get wise that we haven't stumbled off into the fog and gone home like good little boys.”
Pitt studied Sandecker. “Why are you doing this, Admiral? Why are you jeopardizing your job as head of NUMA to stop Qin Shang?”
The admiral stared back at Pitt astutely. “You and Al were going to go behind my back and keep dogging Qin Shang anyway. Am I right?”
Giordino shrugged. “Yes, I guess you are.”
“The instant Dirk played the cowardly lion and timidly submitted to Monroe's demand that you go to a safe house, I knew damned well you were going to jump ship. I'm only bowing to the inevitable.”
Pitt had long ago become a shrewd judge of Sandecker's character. “Not you, Admiral. You never bow to anything or anybody.”
The fire in Sandecker's eyes blazed for a moment, then j smoldered. “If you must know, those spooks around the table pissed me off so bad that I'm counting on both of you and Rudi Gunn and every resource at NUMA to take out Qin Shang before they do.”
“We're up against some pretty heavy competition,” said Pitt.
“Maybe,” said Sandecker, his eyes becoming urgent, commanding. “But Qin Shang Maritime operates on water, and that's where we have the advantage.”
After the meeting broke up, Harper escorted Julia to his office and closed the door. When she was seated he came around and sat down behind his desk. “Julia, I have a tough assignment for you. Strictly on a volunteer basis. I'm not sure you're quite up to it just yet.”
Julia's interest was piqued. “It won't hurt to give me a rundown.”
Harper handed her a file folder. She opened it and examined a photograph of a woman her own age who was facing the camera with a blank expression on her face. Except for a scar on her chin, she and Julia could have passed for sisters. “Her name is Lin Wan Chu. She grew up on a farm in Jiangsu Province and ran away when her father wanted her to marry a man old enough to be her grandfather. After finding work in the kitchen of a restaurant hi the port Qingdao, she eventually became a chef. Two years ago she signed on as a cook with Qin Shang Maritime and has since crewed on a container ship called the Sung Lien Star,”
Julia turned to a dossier on the woman and noted that it came from the CIA. She began reading as Harper sat back silently until she finished. “There is a definite resemblance,” said Julia. “We're the same height and weight. I'm only four months older than Lin Wan Chu.” She kept the file open in her lap and stared across the desk at Harper. “You want me to take her place? Is that the assignment?”
He nodded. “It is.”
“My ID was made on the Indigo Star. Thanks to a double agent on Qin Shang's payroll, his security people have a file on me a mile long.”
“The FBI thinks they have a prime suspect and are maintaining surveillance on him.”
“I don't see how I could take Lin Wan Chu's identity and not be caught,” Julia said solemnly. “Especially during a long voyage.”
“You only have to be Lin Wan Chu for four, maybe five, hours at the most. Just enough time to slip into the ship's routine and hopefully discover how Qin Shang is smuggling his illegal cargo of immigrants onto land.”
“You know for a fact the Sung Lien Star has aliens hidden on board?”
“A CIA undercover agent in Qingdao reported that he observed over a hundred men, women and children with luggage being unloaded from buses in the dead of night who were herded into a warehouse on the dock beside the ship. Two hours later, the Sung Lien Star sailed. At daylight, the agent found the warehouse empty. A hundred-some-odd people had mysteriously disappeared.”
“And he thinks they were smuggled on board the ship?”
“The Star is a large container ship with the capacity to hide a hundred warm bodies, and its destination is the port of Sun-gari in Louisiana. There seems little doubt that she's another one of Qin Shang's illegal-immigrant smuggling vessels.�
��
“They make me this time,” said Julia seriously, “and I'll be shark bait in less time than it takes to tell about it.”
“The risk is not as high as you think,” Harper assured her. “You won't be working alone like you did on the Indigo Star. You'll carry a concealed radio and be monitored every minute. Backup will be no less than a mile away.”
When it came to daring the unknown, Julia was as fearless as any man, more so than most. Her adrenaline was already rising at the thought of walking a tightrope.
“There is one problem,” she said quietly.
“What is that?”
A little grimace twisted the shapely red mouth. “My mother and father taught me gourmet cooking. I've never prepared basic slop in quantity before.”
THE MORNING WAS BRIGHT WITH A HIGH CLEAR SKY FLECKED by small cloud puffs scattered about like popcorn spilled on a blue carpet as Pitt leveled out the little Skyfox flying boat and flew over the terminal buildings and docks of Sungari. He circled and made several passes, skimming less than a hundred feet above the tops of the big cranes that were lifting wooden cargo crates from the holds of the only freighter moored along an otherwise deserted dock. The merchant ship was sandwiched between the dock and a barge with a towboat.
“Must be a slow business day,” observed Giordino from the copilot's seat.
“One ship offloading cargo at a port facility built to handle an entire fleet,” said Pitt.
“Qin Shang Maritime Limited's profit-and-loss ledger must be awash in red ink.”
“What do you make of the barge?” asked Pitt.
“Looks like trash day. The crew appears to be throwing plastic sacks over the side into the barge.”
“See any signs of security?”
“The place sits in the middle of a swamp,” said Giordino staring down into the surrounding marshlands. “The only duty for security guards would be to shoo off itinerant alligators, which I hear are hunted around these parts.”
“A big business,” Pitt said. “Their skins are used for shoes, boots and purses. Hopefully, laws will be passed to restrict the alligator killing long before they become an endangered species.”
“That tugboat and garbage barge are beginning to pull away from the hull of the freighter. Make a swing over them when they get into open water.”
“Not tugboat, you mean towboat.”
“A misnomer. Why call them towboats when they push instead of pull barges through inland waterways?”
“A collection of connecting barges is called a tow, hence, towboat.”
“They should be called pushboats,” Giordino grumbled.
“I'll take your suggestion up at the next river pilot's annual high-water ball. Maybe they'll give you a free pass on a ferryboat.”
“I already get one of those every time I buy ten gallons of gas.”
“Coming around.” Pitt tilted the control column slightly, banking the Lockheed Skyfox two-seater jet aircraft and leveling out for a few hundred yards before flying over the five-story-high towboat with its square bow burrowed against the stern of a single barge. A man stepped from the towboat's wheelhouse and furiously motioned the aircraft away. As the Skyfox skimmed over the towboat, Giordino caught a quick glimpse of a dirty, unfriendly look on a face that harbored suspicions.
“The captain acts paranoid about prying eyes.” “Maybe we should drop him a note asking directions to Ireland,” Pitt said facetiously as he banked the Skyfox for another pass. Formerly a military jet trainer, the aircraft was purchased by NUMA and modified for water landings with a waterproof hull and retractable floats. With twin jet engines mounted on the fuselage behind the wings and cockpit, the Skyfox was often used by NUMA personnel when one of their larger executive jets was not required, and because it could land and take off from water, it was especially useful for offshore transportation.
This time Pitt came in no more than thirty feet over the towboat's funnel and electronic gear, which sprouted from the roof of the wheelhouse. As they flashed past the boat and over the barge, Giordino spotted a pair of men throwing themselves prone amid the trash bags in an effort to make themselves indiscernible.
“I've got two men carrying automatic rifles who made a bad job of trying to look invisible,” Giordino announced as calmly as if he was calling guests to dinner. “Methinks there is skulduggery afoot.”
“We've seen all we're going to see,” said Pitt. “Time to meet up with Rudi and the Marine Denizen.” He made a sweeping turn and set the Skyfox on a course down the Atcha-falaya River toward Sweet Bay Lake. The research ship soon came into view, and he lowered the flaps and dropped the floats in preparation for landing. He flared the aircraft, allowing it gently to kiss the calm water and throw up a light sheet of spray from the floats. Then Pitt taxied alongside the research ship and killed the engines.
Giordino raised the canopy and waved up to Rudi Gunn and Captain Frank Stewart, who were standing at the railing. Stew-art turned and shouted an order. The boom from the ship's crane swung around until it was hovering over the Skyfox. The cable was lowered and Giordino attached the hook and lines to the lifting rings on the top of the aircraft's wings and fuselage before catching guy ropes from the crew. A signal was given and the crane's engine shifted into gear and hoisted up the Skyfox. Water fell in cascades from the hull and floats as the Coast Guard crew manning the guy ropes pulled the aircraft into the proper attitude. Once clearance was achieved, the crane swung the aircraft over the side and lowered it onto a landing pad on the stern deck next to the ship's helicopter. Pitt and Giordino climbed from the cockpit and shook hands with Gunn and Stewart.
“We watched through binoculars,” said Stewart. “If you had circled Sungari any lower you could have rented a headset and cassette and taken a self-guided tour of the place.”
“See anything interesting from the air?” asked Gunn.
“Odd that you should mention that,” said Giordino. “I do believe we just might have viewed something we weren't supposed to.”
“Then you've seen more than we have,” muttered Stewart.
Pitt gazed at a pelican that folded its wings and dove cleanly into the water, emerging with a small fish in its scooplike beak.
“The admiral told us that you failed to find any openings in the landfill casings under the docks before their security snatched your AUV.”
“Not so much as a crack,” admitted Gunn. “If Qin Shang is planning on smuggling illegal aliens through Sungari, it isn't from a ship through underground tunnels to the warehouse terminals.”
“You warned us they could be cagey,” said Stewart. “And, we found out the hard way. Now NUMA is out an expensive piece of equipment and we don't dare ask for it back.”
Gunn said bleakly, “We've accomplished nothing. All we've done for the last forty-eight hours is stare at empty docks and vacant buildings.”
Pitt placed a hand on Gunn's shoulder. “Cheer up, Rudi. While we stand here feeling sorry for ourselves for acting deaf, dumb and blind, a boatload of illegal immigrants from China was offloaded at Sungari and are now on their way inland to a staging center.”
Gunn stared into Pitt's eyes, startled, and saw them twinkle. “So tell us what you saw.”
“The towboat and barges that left Sungari a short time ago,” replied Pitt. “Al observed a couple of men on board the barges who were carrying weapons. When we passed over them they tried to hide.”
“Nothing shady about a towboat crew carrying arms,” said Stewart. “It's a fairly common practice if they're transporting valuable cargo.”
“Valuable?” Pitt said, laughing. “The cargo was trash and garbage thrown off the ship that had accumulated after a long voyage across the sea. Armed men weren't on the barge to protect trash, they were there to keep their human cargo from escaping.”
“How could you know that?” asked Gunn.
“A process of elimination.” Pitt began to feel good. He was on a roll. “At the present time, the only way in and out of Sun
gari is by ocean ships and riverboats. The ships smuggle in the immigrants, but there is no way to secretly transport them to a staging area for dispersion around the country. And you've proven they're not herded from the ships through hidden passages under the docks and warehouses. So they must be carried inland by barges.”
“Not possible,” stated Stewart flat out. “Customs and immigration agents come on board the minute the ship docks and search it from bow to stern. All cargo must be offloaded and stored in the warehouses for inspection. Every bag of trash is examined. So how do Qin Shang's people deceive the inspectors?”
“I believe the illegal immigrants are secretly housed in an underwater craft beneath the hull of the merchant ship that transported them from China. After the ship comes into port, the submerged craft is somehow transferred under the barge tied alongside to receive the trash and garbage. While this is going on, the customs and immigration agents do their job but find no evidence of illegal immigrants. Then, moving to a landfill up the Atchafalaya River to dispose of the trash, they make a stop at some out-of-the-way place to disembark the aliens.”
Gunn looked like a blind man whose sight had suddenly been restored by a faith healer in a revivalist tent. “You figured that out by simply flying over a garbage barge?”
“A theory at best,” Pitt said modestly.
“But a theory that can easily be verified,” pointed out Stewart.
“Then we're wasting time talking,” said Gunn excitedly. “We put a launch over the side and follow the towboat. You and Al can keep an eye on them from the air.”
“Worst thing we could do,” cut in Giordino. “We've already put them on guard by buzzing the barge. The towboat captain will know if he's being tailed. I vote we lay low temporarily and play inconspicuous.”
“Al's right,” said Pitt. “The smugglers are not dumb. They have calculated every option. Their uncanny intelligence sources in Washington may have already given the Sungari security force photographs of everyone on board the Marine Denizen. It's best we take our time and keep any scouting expedition as discreet as possible.”
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