The President gazed forlornly at the lacquered tabletop for several moments. At last he said, 'Just pray that they carry that vile abhorrence safely past our shores."
"And if they make it?"
"Then we sit helplessly by and watch two brave men die."
The icy water jabbed Pitt back to consciousness. The first minute, eyes blinking back the bright daylight, his mind tried to fathom his condition, to make sense out of why he was floating in a cold, dirty river. Then the pain began to bloom and his head felt like the receiving end of a carpenter's nail.
He felt a vibration in the water, heard a muffled popping sound, and soon a Coast Guard patrol boat slid out of the rising sun and idled in his direction. Two men in wet suits dropped over the side and expertly fitted Pitt into a hoist rig. The signal was given and he was gently hauled on board.
"A bit early in the morning for a swim," said a huge bear of a man with his arm in a sling. "Or are you practicing for the English Channel?"
Pitt looked around and saw the shattered glass and shredded wood on the boat's bridge. "Where did you come from? The battle of Midway?"
The bear grinned and replied, "We were headed for our dock when we were ordered back to pick you out of the drink. I'm Kiebel. Oscar Kiebel, commander of what was once the cleanest boat on the Inland Waterway."
"Dirk Pitt. I'm with NUMA."
Kiebel's eyes narrowed. "How did you come to be on the battleship?"
Pitt looked up at the boat's broken rigging. "I believe I owe you a new radio aerial."
"That was you?"
"Sorry about the hit and run, but there was no time to fill out an accident report."
Kiebel motioned toward a doorway. "Better come inside and get a bandage on your head. It looks as though you took a nasty crack."
It was then that Pitt saw a great pall of smoke rising around a bend in the Potomac. "The Iowa," he said. "What of the Iowa?"
"She blew herself up."
Pitt leaned heavily against the railing.
Kiebel gently put his good arm around Pitt as one of his men brought up a blanket. "Better take it easy and lie down. A doctor will be waiting when we dock."
"It doesn't matter," Pitt said. "Not anymore."
Kiebel steered him into the pilothouse and found Pitt a steaming cup of coffee. "Sorry there's no booze on board. Regulations and all that. A bit early for a shot anyway." Then he turned and spoke through an open doorway to his communications officer. "What's the latest on that helicopter?"
"She's over Chesapeake Bay, sir."
Pitt looked up. "What helicopter is that?"
"Why, one of yours," Kiebel said. "Damnedest thing. A shell from the Iowa's final salvo came down in a parachute and this idiot in a NUMA chopper nabbed it on the fly."
"Thank God!" Pitt said as the full implication hit him. "A radio. I need to borrow your radio."
Kiebel hesitated. He could read the urgency in Pitt's eyes. "Allowing civilians to use military communications gear is hardly kosher…. 55
Pitt held up a hand and cut him off. The feeling was returning to his cold-numbed skin and he sensed something pressing into his stomach under the shirt. His face went blank as he removed a small packet and stared at it speculatively.
"Now where in hell did that come from?"
Steiger warily regarded the temperature gauge as the needle crept toward the red.
The Atlantic coastline was still sixty miles away, and the last thing he wanted was a seized turbine bearing.
The call light on the radio blinked on and the admiral pressed the "transmit" button. "This is Sandecker. Go ahead."
"I'm ready for those scrambled eggs," Pitt said, his voice crackling over the head phones.
"Dirk!" Sandecker blurted. "Are you all right?"
"A trifle shopworn but still kicking."
"The other warhead?" Steiger asked anxiously.
"Disarmed," Pitt answered.
"And the Quick Death agent?"
Pitt's tone betrayed no uncertainty.
"Flushed down the drain."
Pitt could be only reasonably sure Hiram Lusana had disposed of the bomblets in the river, but he was not about to suggest to Steiger and the admiral that it was possible their efforts had been in vain.
Sandecker briefed Pitt on the grappling of the parachute and explained that the outlook was grim. Pitt listened without interrupting. When the admiral had finished, Pitt posed only one question.
"How long can you stay in the air?"
"I can stretch the fuel for another two, maybe two and a half hours," replied Steiger. "My immediate problem is the engines. They're running rough and getting hot under the collar."
"Sounds like the parachute's canopy is partially blocking the intake chambers."
"I'm open for brilliant ideas. Got any?"
"It so happens I do," Pitt responded. "Keep your ears up. I'll be back in touch two hours from now. In the meantime, dump every ounce you can. Seats, tools, any piece of the ship you can pry loose to lighten your weight. Do whatever has to be done, but claw the air till you hear from me. Pitt out."
He switched off the microphone and turned to Lieutenant Commander Kiebel. "I must get ashore as quickly as possible."
"We'll be dockside in eight minutes."
"I'll need transportation," said Pitt.
"I still don't know how you fit into this mess," said Kiebel. "For all I know, I should place you under arrest."
"This is no time to play vigilante games," snapped Pitt. "Christ, do I have to do everything myself?" He bent over the radio operator. "Patch me in to NUMA headquarters and the Stransky Instrument Company, in that order."
"A little free with my men and equipment, aren't you, mister?"
Pitt didn't doubt for a second that if Kiebel had had two good arms, he'd have mashed him to the deck. "What do I have to do to get your cooperation.
Kiebel fixed his cork-brown eyes on Pitt with a murderous stare; then, slowly, they took on a twinkle as his mouth etched into a smile. "Say 'please."'
Pitt complied, and exactly twelve minutes later he was in a Coast Guard helicopter, racing back to Washington.
67
The two hours came and went with agonizing slowness for Steiger and Sandecker. They had crossed the Delaware shoreline at Slaughter Beach and were now five hundred miles out over the Atlantic. The weather remained relatively calm, and the few thunder clouds obligingly floated free of their flight path.
Everything that wasn't bolted down, and some things that were, had been jettisoned out the cargo door. Sandecker estimated he had dumped in the neighborhood of four hundred pounds. That and the weight loss from the diminishing fuel had kept the protesting engines from overheating as they struggled to keep the overladen Minerva aloft.
Sandecker was lying with his back against the cockpit bulkhead. He had removed every seat except Steiger's. The physical efforts of the past two hours had exhausted him. His lungs heaved and his arms and legs were stiff with muscle fatigue.
"Any word… anything from Pitt?"
Steiger shook his head without taking his eyes off the instruments. "Dead silence," he said. "But then, what can we expect? The man isn't a card-carrying miracle worker."
"I've known him to pull off what others thought impossible."
"I know a pathetic attempt to instill false hope when I hear one." Steiger tilted his head toward the panel clock. "Two hours, eight minutes since the last contact. I guess he's written us off."
Sandecker was too exhausted to argue. As if through a heavy mist, he reached over, pulled a headset down over his ears, and closed his eyes. A gentle peace was settling over him when a loud voice abruptly blasted him to full wakefulness.
"Hey, Baldy, you fly like you screw."
"Giordino!" Steiger rasped.
Sandecker punched the "transmit" button. "AI, where are you calling from?"
"About a half mile back and two hundred feet below you."
Sandecker and Steiger exchanged stun
ned looks.
"You're supposed to be in the hospital," Sandecker said dumbly.
"Pitt arranged my parole."
"Where is Pitt?" Steiger demanded.
"Looking up your ass, Abe," Pitt replied.
"I'm at the controls of Giordino's Catlin M-two hundred."
"You're late," said Steiger.
"Sorry, these things take time. How's your fuel?"
"Sopping the bottom of the tank," answered Steiger. "I might squeeze another eighteen or twenty minutes if I'm lucky."
"A Norwegian cruise liner is standing by sixty miles, bearing two-seven-zero degrees. Her captain has cleared all passengers from the sun deck for your arrival. You should make it — "
"Are you crazy?" Steiger cut in. "Cruise ship, sun deck — what are you ranting about?"
Pitt continued quite unruffled. "As soon as we cut away the projectile, head for the cruise ship. You can't miss her."
"How I'll envy you guys," said Giordino. "Sitting around the poolside deck. sipping mai tais."
"Sipping mai tais!" repeated an awed Steiger. "My God, they're both crazy!"
Pitt turned to Giordino, ensconced in the copilot's seat, and nodded toward the plaster cast covering one leg. "You sure you' can work the controls wearing that thing?"
"The only function it won't let me perform," said Giordino, giving the cast a light thump, "is scratching an itch from within."'
"It's yours, then."
Pitt lifted his hands from the control column, climbed out of the seat, and moved back into the Catlin's cargo section. Intense cold whistled in from the open hatch.
A light-skinned man with Nordic features and dressed in multicolored skiing togs was huddled over a long black rectangular object that was mounted on a heavy legged tripod. Dr. Paul Weir was clearly not cut out to scramble around drafty airplanes in the dead of winter.
"We're in position," Pitt said.
"Almost ready," Weir replied through lips that were turning blue. "I'm hooking up the cooling tubes. If we don't have water circulating around the head and power supply, the unit will barbecue its anatomy."
"Somehow I expected a more exotic piece of equipment," said Pitt.
"Large-frame argon lasers are not spawned for science-fiction movies, Mr. Pitt." Dr. Weir went on talking as he made a final check of the wiring connector. "They are designed to emit a coherent beam of light for any number of practical applications."
"Has it the punch to do the job?"
Weir shrugged. "Eighteen watts concentrated in a tiny beam that releases a mere two kilowatts of energy doesn't sound like much, but I promise you it's ample."
"How close do you want us to the projectile?"
"The beam divergence makes it necessary to be as near as possible. Less than fifty feet."
Pitt pressed his mike button. "Al?"
"Come in."
" Close to within forty feet of the projectile."
"At that range we'll be buffeted by turbulence from the copter's rotor."
"Can't be helped."
Weir flicked the laser's main switch.
"Do you read me, Abe?" Pitt asked.
"I'm listening."
"The idea is for Giordino to maneuver close enough so we can sever the shroud lines attached to the projectile with a laser beam."
"So that's the angle," Sandecker said.
"That's the angle, Admiral." Pitt's voice was soft, almost casual. "We're moving into position now. Steady on course. Keep whatever fingers you have free crossed and let's do it."
Giordino eased the controls with the precision of a watchmaker and slipped the Catlin beside and slightly below the Minerva. He began to feel the chopping wind currents on the control surfaces and his hands tightened about the yoke. Back in the cargo section the violent shaking rattled everything that wasn't tied down. Pitt alternated his gaze between the projectile and Weir.
The head physicist from Stransky Instruments bent over the laser head. He showed no signs of fear or anxiety. If anything, he seemed to be enjoying himself.
"I don't see any beam," said Pitt. "Is it working?"
"Sorry to shatter your conceptions," answered Weir, "but the argon laser beam is invisible."
"How can you zero it in?"
"With this thirty-dollar telescopic rifle sight." He patted the round tube, which had been hastily screwed to the laser. "It won't win me the Nobel Prize, but it should suffice."
Pitt lay on his stomach and crawled until his head was past the threshold of the open hatch. The blasting cold tore at his head bandage, causing one end of the gauze to flap like a flag in a hurricane. The projectile was hanging below the helicopter, trailing at a slight angle toward the tail rotor. Staring at it. Pitt found it difficult to believe a universe of agony and death could be crammed into so small a package.
"Closer," Weir shouted. "I need another ten feet."
"Move in ten feet," Pitt said over the microphone.
"Any closer and we can use a pair of scissors," Giordino muttered. If he was tense with anxiety, he didn't show it. His face displayed the expression of one who was half dozing. Only the burning eyes gave any hint of the concentration required for precision flying. The sweat felt like it was exploding inside his cast and the nerve endings in his leg screamed at the irritation.
Pitt could make out something now — a blackening color in the twisted shroud lines above the projectile. The invisible beam had locked in and was melting the nylon strands. How many were there? he wondered; perhaps as many as fifty.
"She's overheating!" Two words and a skipped heartbeat. "Too cold in here with that hatch open," Weir yelled. "The coolant tubes have frozen up."
Weir's eyes returned to the telescopic sight. Pitt could see several lines parting, their charred ends snapping horizontally and lashing out in the airstream. The acrid smell of burning insulation began to invade the cabin.
"The tube won't take much more," said Weir.
Another half-dozen shroud lines burned free, but the rest remained taut and undamaged. Weir suddenly straightened up and tore off his smoldering gloves.
"God, I'm sorry!" he shouted. "The tube is gone!"
The Quick Death projectile still hung ominously beneath the Minerva.
Thirty seconds dragged by while Pitt lay there, staring at the deadly projectile swinging through the sky. There was no expression on his face, just a peculiar preoccupation. Then he broke the silence.
"We've lost the laser," he announced without elaboration.
"Damn, damn, damn!" Steiger snarled. "Where did our luck go?" His voice was almost savage in bitterness and frustration.
"So now?" Admiral Sandecker asked calmly.
"You break off and put that turkey in a dive," Pitt answered.
"A what?"
"The last card in the deck. Head into a dive. When you build up sufficient g-forces, pull up. Maybe Abe's luck will change and your unwanted passenger will drop free."
"It'll be sticky," said Steiger. "I'll have to do it on instruments. I can't see shit with the canopy covering the windshield."
"We'll stay with you," Giordino said.
"Don't come too close or you'll catch our cold," Steiger replied. He eased the helicopter clear of the chase plane. "Let's pray this baby isn't constipated." Then he pushed the control stick forward.
The Minerva tipped over and down on a seventy-degree angle. Sandecker braced his feet against the base of Steiger's seat and clawed for a handhold. To the men watching in rapt fascination from the Catlin, the helicopter's nose pointed straight at the sea.
"Ease your angle of descent." said Pitt. "The projectile is beginning to trail back toward your tail rotor."
"I read you," said Steiger, his words tense and strained. "It's like jumping off a building with your eyes closed."
"You're looking good," Pitt said reassuringly. "Not too fast. Pass seven g-factors and you lose your rotor blades."
"Wouldn't think of it."
Four thousand feet.
G
iordino did not attempt to match Steiger foot for foot. He lagged behind — ' keeping the Catlin in a shallow banking dive, corkscrewing down behind the Minerva. Dr. Weir, his job finished. groped toward the warmth of the control cabin.
The sharp tilt to the helicopter's cabin floor made Admiral Sandecker feel as though he were standing with his back against a wall. Steiger's eyes danced from the altimeter to the air-speed indicator to the gauge showing the artificial horizon and back again.
Three thousand feet.
Pitt could see that the canopy of the parachute was flapping dangerously near the twirling rotor, but he remained silent. Steiger had enough on his mind, he reasoned, without hearing another dire warning. He watched as the sea rushed up to meet the Minerva.
Steiger began to experience a mounting vibration. The wind noise was picking up as his speed increased. For a fleeting second he considered holding the stick in position and ending the torment. But then, for the first time that day, he thought of his wife and children, and his desire to see them again stoked a fierce determination to live.
"Abe, now!" Pitt's command boomed over his earphone. "Pull out."
Steiger hauled back on the stick.
Two thousand feet.
The Minerva shuddered from the tremendous gravitational drag that attacked every rivet of her structure. She hung poised as the projectile, reacting to the force like a weight at the end of a giant pendulum, arched outward. The surviving shroud lines that had withstood the laser's beam tautened like banjo strings. In twos and threes they began to fray.
Just as the Quick Death projectile looked as though it was going to whip back and smash the helicopter, it tore free and dropped away.
"She's gone!" shouted Pitt.
Steiger was too drained to reply. Fighting the blackness framing his vision from the sudden pull-out, Sandecker struggled to his knees and shook Steiger by the shoulder.
"Make for that cruise ship," he said in a very tired and very relieved voice.
Pitt did not watch the Minerva as it veered off and headed toward safety. He watched the projectile until its blue skin blended against the blue of the rolling water and faded from sight.
Designed for a descent rate of eighteen feet per second, the projectile hurtled past one thousand feet without blowing off its warhead. The detonation mechanism lagged until it was too late. At nearly three hundred sixty feet per second the biological organism, carrying its threat of agony and mass extinction, plunged into the waiting areas of the abysmal sea.
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