by Rick Chesler
Will our boat be waiting for us at the wharf?
He wasn’t sure how he was going to deal with the boat. If it was a ferry with a lot of passengers he might be able to board it and mingle. But if it was a small boat…
He forced his mind to stay on task with his follow. If he lost them now it could all be a moot point. They wound through a semi-treed area with some open grassland on either side of the road until the ocean was visible in the distance, a spate of buildings partially blocking the views.
Some drivers had their headlights on for safety although it was daytime, and Shah flipped his on, knowing it would change the appearance of his vehicle in rear view mirrors. He hung back three cars, doing the posted speed limit. He kept watch on the van’s windows for any signs of struggle coming from within — what if Nay and Dante were desperate and tried to fight their way out? — but he saw none.
The female British accent of his GPS unit announced that he should make a right turn ahead.
The van made the turn. Shah hung back, well aware that turning after a target vehicle brought high risk of detection. He checked the GPS map and saw that another road up ahead intersected with the one the van turned onto in about a mile. He decided it was worth the risk and passed the turn, then sped to the next right. He took it and cruised a little over the speed limit until he reached the road leading to the wharf. He stopped at an intersection, farm properties on both sides of the road. He waited to make sure he hadn’t somehow come out ahead of the van, and then turned left onto the road.
Another mile ahead he caught up with the van. Beyond it he saw shimmering water, fishing boats in their slips.
Where were they going? He couldn’t follow the van too much longer without being an obvious tail. After one more block Shah turned off onto a side street and parked. He observed the van from inside his vehicle until he was sure it was parking in the wharf lot. Then he exited and started to toward the wharf on foot.
He approached from a block over, walking at a normal pace. Small clapboard houses lined the street. At the waterfront there was a mild cluster of activity — fishermen unloading the day’s catch, a row of shops and pubs, some industrial activity — loading and unloading of large containers. The tang of salt air filled his nostrils while the call of gulls assailed his ears. Shah turned to his left and saw that one of the two pubs had an outdoor seating area with a few old salts out there smoking pipes and playing cards at a small table. He ambled up to the place and swung open the wooden gate that led to the patio. He took a seat at a small table by himself, behind the men playing cards so that they shielded him somewhat from the van’s view.
He observed two Hofstad men exit the van. One walked out along one of the wooden docks while the other proceeded to a storefront along the wharf, maybe six down from the pub where Shah sat. Everyone else remained inside the van.
Shah watched as the man on the dock reached a power boat he judged to be about twenty-five feet in length, with twin 250 horsepower outboard motors. The man ducked into the boat’s cabin for a few seconds, then emerged and started the engines. Meanwhile, the other terrorist had entered a scuba diving shop.
A waitress emerged and asked Shah if she could get him anything. He ordered a pint of La Trappe beer without taking his eyes off the van. The server left and then the door to the van slid open. He watched as Naomi, Jasmijn and Dante piled out, surrounded closely by the other three Hofstad men. Shah noticed that they no longer wore the security guard outfits, but had donned commercial fishing gear — rubber aprons with hip boots and knitted caps.
Shah chugged half his beer in one gulp and left a bill to cover it on the table. No sooner had he set down his glass than the Hofstad agent emerged from the dive shop wheeling a cart full of scuba gear, headed for the boat at the dock.
Shah eyed the vessel again. The operative there was untying lines, preparing for departure. The boat was much too small for him to have any hopes of boarding undetected. He wished he knew the purpose of this trip. What were they scuba diving for? He looked around the wharf. He could wait here until they returned.
But what if only the Hofstad members came back?
Then he saw an old man of the sea type step off a fishing boat that was smaller than the one Hofstad was using. Shah a glanced over to the dock, where Jasmijn, Dante and Naomi were now walking the plank, it appeared to Shah, out along the dock out to the boat, with Hofstad men in front of and behind them. He got up and left the pub through the front gate.
He forced himself to walk at a normal pace to the old man with the boat, his wallet in hand.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Netherlands, The North Sea
The ride out to the oil rig didn’t take long, but it was unnerving having guns pointed at you in a bouncing boat. The boat driver slowed the craft as they neared the rig, and the leader addressed Jasmijn on the boat’s aft deck.
“Set up your equipment while we are en route to the dive site.” The Dutch terrorist indicated a rack of scuba tanks and a bag of gear, then looked to Jasmijn to see if she would object.
“He’s going with me.” She looked at Dante, who nodded.
The terrorist shook his head. “You will go alone.”
Jasmijn raised her voice. It seemed to come from a place of genuine anger, not merely an act. “I have never before dove alone. I would not be able to collect the required specimens without a dive partner because I’d be too distracted out of concern for my safety.”
“If safety is your concern, you are arguing with the wrong man.” The terror monger dropped his hand down to his holstered pistol.
Jasmijn gave a laugh that she hoped would sound defiant but it just came out sounding anxious. “I suppose you have a point there. Being shot and dumped overboard isn’t very safe, either, I get it. But the fact remains that if you want me to collect the specimens I require to complete my work on the antidote, then I need to dive with someone who has scientific scuba experience, and that’s Dante.”
She thrust an elbow in his direction. Although Dante was a certified diver and in peak physical condition, his experience was not in the line of duty as a former Secret Service agent, but rather recreational only, in tropical places where the drinks on the beach come in coconuts with little umbrellas on them, where the water is warm and the dives are shallow, the only objective to look at the pretty fish swimming over the rainbow coral reefs. He had absolutely no idea what was meant by scientific diving, and he had never done a dive as demanding as an oil rig in the bone-chilling cold of the North Sea.
He nodded confidently and said, “Let’s do this.”
The Hofstad group leader summoned over another of his three henchmen and conferred with him in soft tones for a few moments. Dante saw the man who had come over turn to glance at him once while the other man was talking.
Then the leader said to Jasmijn, “Very well. You and he will dive. We will be following your air bubbles to see where you come up.”
She nodded. “Good. We don’t want a long swim back to the boat in this freezing water. Speaking of which,” she went on, pointing at an exposure suit on deck, “these are dry suits, correct? A wetsuit isn’t going to cut it down there at a hundred feet.”
The leader looked to one of his other men, a young Dutchman in his mid-twenties, for an answer. That man nodded.
“Yes. Put them on. Get going.”
“And you have the transport tank for the specimens like I asked?”
The same man who had assisted with the drysuit question lifted a hinged lid on a compartment and pointed to the bubbling water within. “Oxygenated livewell.”
Jasmijn nodded. They were normally used for fishing to keep bait alive. “That’s good for the trip back to the dock, but then we’ll still need something to keep them alive on the drive back to the lab. At least a cooler full of seawater, preferably with an aerator.”
“I’ll see what I can do.” The man backed away. For a moment it was almost as if there was a regular working atmosphere aboard the bo
at, but that was quickly shattered.
“Enough delays! Collect the specimens!” The Hofstad leader aimed his pistol at Jasmijn. He stood there and leered at her while she stripped her pants off, leaving her jacket on to cover up while she stepped into the drysuit.
Dante put his suit on as well and then they were attaching buoyancy compensators and regulators to tanks, hefting them on, adding weight belts. After adjusting the straps on the gear and doing a check of each other’s equipment, Jasmijn clipped a mesh collecting bag to her belt and announced they were ready.
They stepped over to the rear of the boat onto a platform where they put on their fins. Two of the Hofstad men stood immediately behind them on the boat deck, monitoring their movements. The leader stood back at the wheel, watching from a distance.
Jasmijn pointed to the nearby oil rig. “So we’ll swim to that pillar there and drop down. The anemones we need should be attached to the structure about fifty feet down.”
Dante squinted at the oil rig just before he pulled his mask on. “Do we need to watch out for moving parts down there, like getting sucked into a pipe or something like that?”
Behind him one of the guards laughed softly.
Jasmijn shook her head. “I’ve dived on this rig before. This one has been slated for decommissioning and so there’s no active drilling anymore. I’m not even sure if there are any people on it,” she said, giving his foot a subtle stamp with her own as she looked over at the rig. “Active ones have a lot of boat traffic and as you can see, there’s none of that.”
“Enough talk!” The leader shouted from the wheel. “Get on with it!”
Jasmijn turned to Dante. She could see in his eyes that he was a little nervous. “We’ll swim on the surface closer to the pillar to conserve air, then we drop down next to it. Ready?”
Dante nodded as he gazed out over the surface of the ocean. At least it was calm, by North Sea standards. Three-to-four foot swells.
Jasmijn nodded in return and the two of them splashed into the water.
TWENTY-NINE
Netherlands, The North Sea
Dante and Jasmijn dropped down into the ocean next to the oil rig’s concrete column. They could see some thirty to forty feet in any direction, the water being clouded by floating microscopic plants and animals called plankton. Dante gripped Jasmijn’s arm to halt their descent.
She opened her eyes wide. What?
He took the underwater slate clipped to the dive vest and wrote on it with the attached pencil.
DO U REALLY NEED ANEMS TO MAKE ANTIDOTE? He’d been wondering this since she brought it up in the lab, but this was the first opportunity he’d had to communicate with her alone.
Jasmijn gave an exaggerated nod that would not be hidden by the gear she wore.
Dante scribbled on the slate again.
SAW LADDER UP TO RIG DURING SWIM OVER. SIDE FACING AWAY FROM BOAT. WE COULD TRY TO HIDE ON RIG, LET THEM THINK WE HAD DIVE ACCIDENT.
They hung suspended in the water while Jasmijn comprehended what he proposed. Then she nodded again. What did they have to lose? There was no doubt that once Hofstad had the working antidote, she would no longer hold any value to them. She harbored no illusions that they would kill her. She took her own slate and wrote on it: OK BUT GET ANEMS FIRST. NOT FAR BELOW.
Dante gave her the diver’s OKAY signal, thumb and forefinger in a circle, and then the pair descended further along the oil rig’s support structures. When they reached a brace system at a depth of sixty feet where multiple struts branched off in various directions, Jasmijn tapped Dante on the shoulder and pointed to one of the flat metal surfaces.
It was covered with white sea anemones, outwardly resembling a bed of flowers. Thick schools of silvery fish swarmed in broad circles around the oil rig pillars.
Jasmijn approached the anemones and deftly pulled one off and dropped it into her bag. She repeated the process a few more times, the uprooted animals dropping to the bottom of her bag in a tangle of silky tentacles.
She signaled to Dante that she was ready to ascend. Their air supply would last longer at shallower depths, although they also needed to avoid detection. The water was not so clear they had to worry about being seen from the boat while they were underwater, but she recalled the Hofstad leader’s words with a chill: We will be following your air bubbles to see where you come up.
She halted Dante and wrote on her slate: OUR BUBBLES?
Dante glanced at it and nodded. He pointed to her air gauge. 2,200 psi. Glanced at his own. 1,800. Figures she has better air consumption, Dante thought, shrugging out of his tank. Women usually do, and she was a much more experienced diver. He wished they could have Liam here, but things were what they were and he would deal with it.
He carefully inflated his buoyancy compensator device (BCD) until it was neutrally buoyant. Then he took a small reel of safety line and used it to tie the vest in place around a steel girder. He loosened the regulator’s purge valve until a steady stream of air bubbles trickled from it and rose toward the surface.
They had to act fast now. It might not take long for the men on the boat to realize that there were two bubble streams far apart, the real one not as constant. But they weren’t experienced divers, so it just might work. Even if they did spot the two streams, they would probably assume they had split up and would hopefully pursue the wrong one first.
Dante breathed from Jasmijn’s “octopus,” or spare regulator mouthpiece, designed with a longer hose to be an emergency regulator in an out-of-air situation. Thus tethered to her side, they swam upward at an angle toward the ladder Dante had spotted on the far side of the rig. They kicked through a maze of steel support beams encrusted with marine growth, the water growing lighter around them and more turbulent as they rose. They were extra vigilant to avoid becoming entangled in the myriad snags of monofilament fishing line, since Hofstad had seen to it that they not be allowed to carry dive knives, normally be worn for that purpose.
After a few minutes they could see the large pillars marking the far edge of the oil platform. Dante checked their remaining air: 1,000 psi. Enough to get to the ladder, but there wouldn’t be much in reserve should something go wrong. He also worried that the ladder might not extend all the way to the waterline. If it was designed for boarding by boats only, it might be too high above the water for them to reach.
But it was time to find out. They passed between two massive support pillars at a depth of about ten feet, and looked up. They could see the watery, distorted shape of the oil platform above, beckoning. If they could get up there, they might be able to hide, to summon help.
Swimming to the far side of one of the pillars so that it would hide them from the boat, Dante and Jasmijn surfaced at the oil rig.
THIRTY
Netherlands, The North Sea
Stephen Shah eased up on the throttle of the small fishing boat he had paid an exorbitant fee to borrow. He was sure that the handful of gold Krugerrands he’d given to the old man at the dock were worth more than the boat if he didn’t bring it back. But it seemed seaworthy and it had gotten him this far. The pair of binoculars tucked under the steering console were also a huge bonus.
He lifted the optics to his eyes and peered at the Hofstad boat from perhaps a quarter-mile away. One of the terrorists sat at the boat’s wheel while a second was reloading what Shah recognized as a sub-machine gun. That man stood over Naomi, who sat on the stern deck, back to the rail. Her arms were by her sides but he couldn’t tell whether they had been bound. The other three of the terrorists stood on the boat’s rail, watching the water intently.
Shah felt a surge of blind panic. Had Dante and Jasmijn been killed and tossed over the side? Or had they been thrown overboard while tied together? But then he scoped the scuba tanks on deck and forced himself to stay calm. They must be diving. Why, he hadn’t the foggiest notion. To retrieve something for Hofstad? They were close to the oil rig.
Perhaps Hofstad was forcing them to sabotage the ri
g somehow — plant explosives on it?
He scanned the water in the direction the men were looking but couldn’t see anything. He supposed they might be looking for or watching their air bubbles. He searched the surrounding water through the binoculars but still saw nothing. He didn’t ‘like the situation. Jasmijn seemed to be the safest of the three of them, since she had the specialized knowledge to create the antidote. But Nay and Dante, although they were posing as scientific colleagues, were basically assistants— temp help — and Shah wondered if, after whatever objective they had for this dive was achieved, Hofstad wouldn’t kill them off out here.
Almost subconsciously his hand dropped down to the Browning 9mm tucked into his waistband beneath his now untucked shirt. If he could only get close enough to the Hofstad boat, he might be able to neutralize them. But first he would have to find a way to bring his boat to them. If he were to speed over to them they would most likely gun him down.
He looked around the old boat, at the pile of nets and buoys on the deck, at the VHF marine radio on the console, at the battered old outboard motor mounted on the transom.
His eyes lingered there, then flicked back to the radio, then to the Hofstad boat. He found the switch to raise the motor and lifted its lower half out of the water. He then removed the cowling to expose its innards, as though he was working on it. He wiped some grease from the motor on his hands and smudged his forehead. Then he found the sparkplugs and removed one of them, pocketing it.
Shah walked back over to the console and picked up the radio. He verified it was set to the distress channel, then spoke in English while he keyed the transmitter.
“Attention, attention! Fishing boat requires assistance. Calling white boat near oil rig: can you help me? Motor won’t start. Think I just need a jump start. Please help, over.”
A couple of minutes passed during which Shah refrained from using the binoculars in case he himself was now being watched. Then the radio crackled to life in Dutch-accented English.