Deep Six

by Clive Cussler

  "That is President Antonov's concern, not mine or my grandmother's. We fulfilled our part of the bargain. By allowing a KGB man in here, you jeopardized the entire project."

  "I swear I had nothing to do with Suvorov's breakout."

  "Your story," Bougainville said coldly. "I choose to believe his presence was planned, likely on President Antonov's orders. Certainly by now Suvorov has informed his superiors and every Soviet agent in the States is converging on us. We will have to move the facility."

  That was the final shattering blow. Lugovoy looked as if he was about to gag. "Impossible!" he howled like an injured dog.

  "Absolutely no way can we move the President and all this equipment to another site and still meet your ridiculous deadline."

  Bougainville glared at Lugovoy through narrow slits of eyes.

  When he spoke again, his voice was rock calm. "Not to worry, Doctor. No upheaval is necessary."

  WHEN PITT WALKED INTO His NUMA OFFICE, he found Hiram Yaeger asleep on the couch. With his sloppy clothes, long knotted hair and heard, the computer expert looked like a derelict wino. Pitt reached down and gently shook him by the shoulder. An eyelin slowly raised, then Yaeger stirred, grunted and pushed himself to a sitting position.

  "Hard night?" Pitt inquired.

  Yaeger scratched his head with both hands and yawned. "You have any Celestial Seasonings Red Zinger Tea?"

  "Only yesterday's warmed-over coffee."

  Yaeger clicked his lips sourly. "The caffeine will kill you."

  "Caffeine, pollution, booze, women-what's the difference?"

  "By the way, I got it."

  "Got what?"

  "I nailed it, your cagey shipping company."

  "Jesus!" Pitt said, coming alive. "Where?"

  "Right in our own backyard," Yaeger said with a great grin.

  "New York."

  "How did you do it?"

  "Your bunch about Korean involvement was the key, but not the answer. I attacked it from that angle, probing all the shipping and export lines that were based in Korea or sailed under their registry.

  There were over fifty of them, but none led to the trail of banks we checked earlier. With nowhere else to go, I let the computer fly on its own. My ego is shattered. It proved a better sleuth than I am.

  The kicker was in the name. Not Korean, but French."

  "French."

  "Based in the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan, their fleet of legitimate ships flies the flag of the Somali Republic. How does that grab you?"

  "Go on."

  "A first-rate company, no rust-bucket operation, rated lily-white by Fortune, Forbes and Dun and Bradstreet. So damned pure that their annual report comes accompanied with harp music. Scratch the surface deep enough though, and you find more phony front men and dummy subsidiary companies than gays in San Francisco. Documentary ship fraud, bogus insurance claims, chartering phantom ships with nonexistent cargoes, substitution of worthless cargoes for ones of great value. And always beyond the jurisdiction of the private outfits and governments they screw."

  "What's their name?"

  "Bougainville Maritime," answered Yaeger. "Ever heard of it?"

  "Min Koryo Bougainville-the'Steel Lotus'?" said Pitt, impressed.

  "Who hasn't? She's right up there with the celebrity British and Greek shipping tycoons."

  "She is your Korean connection."

  "Your data are conclusive? No chance of error?"

  "Solid stuff," Yaeger replied adamantly. "Take my word for it.

  Everything triple-checks. Once I tuned in on Bougainville as the source, it became a simple chore of working backwards. It all came together; bank accounts, letters of credit-you wouldn't believe how the banks turn their backs on these frauds. The old broad reminds me of one of those East Indian statues with twenty arms, sitting there with a holy look on her face while the hands are making obscene gestures."

  "You did it," Pitt said enthusiastically. "You actually pinned Sosan Trading, the San Marino and the Pilottown on the Bougainvihe shipping empire."

  "Like a stake through the heart."

  "How far back did you go?"

  "I can give you the old girl's biography almost to when she spit out the tit. A tough old bird. Started from scratch and a lot of guts after World War Two. Slowly anded old tramp ships to her fleet, crewed by Koreans who were glad to work for a bowl of rice and pennies a day.

  With practically no overhead, she cut-rate her freight costs and built a thriving business. About twenty-five years ago, when her grandson joined the company, things really took off. A slippery customer, that one. Keeps in the background. Except for school records, his data file is almost blank. Min Koryo Bougainviue built the foundation for maritime crime that spanned thirty nations. When her grandson-Lee Tong is his name-came along, he honed and smoothed the piracy and fraud part of the organization to a fine art. I had the whole mess printed out. There's a hard copy on your desk."

  Pitt turned and for the first time noticed a five-inch-thick sheaf of computer printout paper on his desk. He sat down and briefly scanned the notched pages. The incredible reach of the Bougainvilles was mind-boggling. The only criminal activity they appeared to shy away from was prostitution. nodded. "A super job, After several minutes he looked up and Hiram," he said sincerely. "Thank you."

  Yeager nodded toward the printouts. "I wouldn't let that out of my sight if I were you."

  "Any chance of us getting caught?"

  "A foregone conclusion. Our illegal taps have been recorded on the bank's computer log and printed out on a daily form. If a smart supervisor scans the list, he'll wonder why an American oceanographic agency is snooping in his biggest depositor's records. His next step would be to rig the computer's communications line with a tracing device."

  "The bank would most certainly notify old Min Koryo," said Pitt thoughtfully. Then he looked up. "Once they identify NUMA as the tap, can Bougainville's own computer network probe our system to see what we've gleaned from their data banks?"

  "Our network is as vulnerable as any other. They won't learn much, though. Not since I removed the magnetic storage disks."

  "When do you think they'll smoke us out?"

  "i'd be surprised if they haven't pegged us already."

  "Can you stay one jump ahead of them?"

  Yaeger gave Pitt an inquiring stare. "What sneaky plan are you about to uncork?"

  "Go back to your keyboard and screw them up but good. Reenter the network and alter the data, foul up the Bougainville dayto-day operations, erase legitimate bank records, insert absurd instructions into their programs. Let them feel the heat from somebody else for a change."

  "But well lose vital evidence for a federal investigation."

  "So what?" Pitt declared. "It was obtained illegally. It can't be used anyway."

  "Now wait a minute. We can be stepping into big trouble."

  "Worse than that, we might get killed," Pitt said with a faint smile.

  An expression blossomed on Yaeger's face, one that wasn't there before. It was sudden misgiving. The game had ceased to be fun and was taking on darker dimensions. It had never dawned on him that the search could turn ugly and he might be murdered.

  Pitt read the apprehension in Yaeger's eyes. "You can quit now and take a vacation," he said. "I wouldn't blame you."

  Yaeger seemed to waver for a moment. Then he shook his head.

  "No, I'll stick with it. These people should be put away."

  "Come down hard on them. jam the works in all aspects of their shipping company-outside investments, subsidiary businesses, real estate dealings, everything they touch."

  "it's my ass, but I'll do it. just keep the admiral out of my hair for a few more nights."

  "Keep a lookout for any information relating to a ship called the Eagle."

  "The presidential yacht?"

  "Just a ship called the Eagle."

  "Anything else?"

  Pitt nodded grimly. "I'll see that security i
s increased around your computer processing center."

  "Mind if I stay here and use your couch. I've developed this sudden aversion to sleeping alone in my apartment."

  "My office is yours."

  Yaeger stood up and stretched. Then he nodded at the data sheets again. "What are you going to do with it?" Pitt stared down at the first breach ever in the Bougainville criminal structure, The pace of his personal investigation was gaining momentum, pieces falling into his hands to be fitted in the overall picture, jagged edges meshing together. The scope was far beyond anything he'd imagined in the beginning.

  "You know," he said pensively, "I don't have the vaguest idea."

  WHEN SENATOR L,IKRIME:R AWOKE in the rear seat of the limousine, the eastern sky was beginning to turn orange. He slapped at the mosquito whose buzzing had interrupted his sleep. Moran stirred in his corner of the seat, his squinting eyes unfocused, his mind still unaware of his surroundings. Suddenly a door was opened and a bundle of clothes was thrown in Larimer's lap.

  "Put these on," Suvorov ordered brusquely.

  "You never told me who you are," Larimer said, his tongue moving in slow motion.

  "My name is Paul."

  "No surname?"

  "Just Paul."

  "You FBI?"

  "No."

  "CIA?"

  "It doesn't matter," Suvorov said. "Get dressed."

  "When will we arrive in Washington?"

  "Soon," Suvorov lied.

  "Where did you get these clothes? How do you know they'll fit.

  Suvorov was losing his patience with the inquisitive American.

  He shrugged off an impulse to crack the senator in the jaw with the gun.

  "I stole them off a clothesline," he said. "Beggars can't be particular. At least they're washed."

  "I can't wear a stranger's shirt and pants," Larimer protested indignantly.

  "If you wish to return to Washington in the nude, it is no concern of mine."

  Suvorov slammed the door, moved to the driver's side of the car and edged behind the wheel. He drove out of a picturesque residential community called Plantation Estates and cut onto Highway 7. The early-morning traffic was starting to thicken as they crossed over the Ashley River bridge to Highway 26, where he turned north.

  He was grateful that Larimer went silent. Moran was climbing from his semi-conscious state and mumbling incoherently. The headlights reflected off a green sign with white letters: AIRPORT NEXT RIGHT. He took the off ramp and came to the gate of the Charleston Municipal Airport. Across the main landing strip the brightening sky revealed a row of jet fighters belonging to the Air National Guard.

  Following the directions given over the phone, he skirted the airport searching for a narrow cutoff. He found it and drove over a dirt road until he came to a pole holding a wind sock that hung limp in the dank atmosphere.

  He stopped and got out, checked his watch and waited. Less than two minutes later the steady beat of a helicopter's rotor could be heard approaching from behind a row of trees. The blinking navigation lights popped into view and a teardrop blue-and-white shape hovered for a few moments and then sat down beside the limousine.

  The door behind the pilot's seat swung outward and a man in white coveralls stepped to the ground and walked up to the limousine.

  "You Suvorov?" he asked.

  "I'm Paul Suvorov."

  "okay, let's get the baggage inside before we attract unwanted attention."

  Together they led Larimer and Moran into the passenger compartment of the copter and belted them in. Suvorov noted that the letters on the side of the fuselage read SUMTER AIRBORNE AMBULANCE.

  "This thing going to the capital?" asked Larimer with a spark of his old haughtiness.

  "Sir, it'll take you anyplace you want," said the pilot agreeably.

  Suvorov eased into the empty co-pilot's seat and buckled the harness. "I wasn't told our destination," he said.

  "Russia, eventually," the pilot said with a smile that was anything but humorous. "First thing is to find where you came from."

  "Came from?"

  "My orders are to fly you around the back country until you identify the facility in which you and those two windbags in the back have spent the last eight days. When we accomplish that mission, I'm to fly you to another departure area."

  "All right," said Suvorov. "I'll do my best."

  The pilot didn't offer his name and Suvorov knew better than to ask. The man was undoubtedly one of the estimated five thousand Soviet-paid "charges" stationed around the United States, experts in specialized occupations, all waiting for a call instructing them to surface, a call that might never come.

  The helicopter rose fifty feet in the air and then banked off toward Charleston Bay. "Okay, which way?" asked the pilot.

  "I can't be sure. It was dark and I was lost."

  "Can you give me a landmark?"

  "About five miles from Charleston; I crossed a river."

  "From what direction?"

  "West, yes, the dawn was breaking ahead of me."

  "Must be Stono River."

  "Stono, that's it."

  "Then you were traveling on State Highway 700."

  "I turned onto it about half an hour before the bridge," The sun had heaved itself above the horizon and was filtering through the blue summer haze that hung over Charleston. The helicopter climbed to nine hundred feet and flew southwestward until the highway unreeled beyond the cockpit windows. The pilot pointed downward and Suvorov nodded.

  They followed the outbound traffic as the South Carolina coastal plain spread beneath them. Here and there a few cultivated fields lay enclosed on all sides by forests of long-leafed pines. They passed over a farmer standing in a tobacco field who waved his hat at them.

  "See anything familiar?" the pilot asked.

  Suvorov shook his head helplessly. "The road I turned off of might be anywhere."

  "What direction were you facing when you met the highway?"

  "I made a left turn so I must have been heading south."

  "This area is called Wadmalaw Island. I'll start a circular search pattern. Let me know if you spot something."

  An hour slipped by, and then two. The scene below transformed into a maze of creeks and small rivers snaking through bottomland and swamps. One road looked the same as another from the air.

  Thin ribbons of reddish-brown dirt or potholed asphalt slicing through dense overgrowth like lines on the palm of a hand. Suvorov became more confused as time wore on, and the pilot lost his patience.

  "We'll have to knock off the search," he said, "or I won't have enough fuel to make Savannah."

  'Savannah is in the state of Georgia," Suvorov said, as though reciting in a school class.

  The pilot smiled. "Yeah, you got it."

  "Our departure point for the Soviet Union?"

  "Only a fuel stop." Then the pilot clammed up.

  Suvorov saw it was impossible to draw any information out of the man, so he turned his attention back to the ground.

  Suddenly he pointed excitedly over the instrument panel.

  "There!" he shouted above the engine's roar. "The small intersection to the left."

  "Recognize it?"

  "I think so. Drop lower. I want to read the sign on that shabby building sitting on the corner."

  The pilot obliged and lowered the helicopter until it hovered thirty feet over the bisecting roadways. "Is that what you want?"

  he asked. "'Glover Culpepper-gas and groceries "We're close," said Suvorov. "Fly up the road that leads toward that river to the north."

  "The Intracoastal Waterway."

  "A canal?"

  "A shallow canal that provines an almost continuous inshore water passage from the North Atlantic States to Florida and the Gulf of Mexico. Used mostly by small pleasure boats and tugs."

  The helicopter beat over the tops of trees, whipping leaves and bending branches with the wash from its rotor blades. Suddenly, at the edge of a wine marshy cre
ek, the road ended. Suvorov stared through the windshield.