Austin turned to the right and saw a thin black line running from the surface toward the bottom. “I see it. Notice anything funny?”
“Yeah,” Zavala said as they cruised by. “No rocks under the buoy.”
“Bet you a bottle of Cuervo that all the other warnings are phony, too.”
“I’ll take the bottle but not the bet. Someone wants to keep people out of here.”
“That’s obvious. How’s this buggy handling?”
“Getting into a little backwash from the water swishing out of the lagoon, but it’s still easier than driving on the Beltway,” Zavala said, referring to the highway that separates Washington from the rest of the country geographically and politically. “She handles like an—uh-oh.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Sonar is picking up multiple targets. Lots of them. About fifty yards dead ahead.”
Austin had been lulled into complacency by the tranquillity of the trip. In his imagination he pictured a line of underwater guards waiting in ambush.
“Divers?”
“Sonar hits are too small. Little or no movement.”
Austin strained his eyes in an attempt to pierce the gauzy blue.
Thinking ahead, he said, “What’s the Brogan’s top speed if we have to get out of here in a hurry?”
“Seven knots, pedal to the metal. She was made more for vertical travel than horizontal, and we’re carrying a couple of hundred extra pounds of beef.”
“I’ll join Weight Watchers when we get back,” Austin said. “Move in real slow, but be prepared to make a dash for it.”
They crawled ahead at half speed. Within moments dozens of dark objects materialized, stretching from the surface to the bottom and rolling off both directions in a great wall.
Fish.
“Looks like a net,” Austin advised. “Stop before we get snagged.”
The Brogan slowed to a complete halt and hovered in place.
Austin ducked his head in reflex as a streamlined silhouette glided in from above and behind him. The shark was only there for an instant, long enough for Austin to see its round white eye and to estimate the hungry predator’s length at more than six feet. Its toothy jaws opened then clamped shut to grab half a struggling fish in one bite before disappearing from sight with a flick of its high tail fin.
Zavala had seen the same thing. “Kurt, are you okay?” he shouted.
Austin laughed. “Yeah. Don’t worry. That guy doesn’t want a tough old human to chew on when he’s got a whole seafood buffet.”
“Glad to hear you say that, because he invited some of his friends for dinner.”
Several more sharks swooped in, grabbed a bite, then, wary of the sub, quickly left. It was less a wild feeding frenzy than a gathering of discriminating gourmands picking from the choicest items on the menu. Hundreds of fish were caught in the fine mesh. They came in all sizes, shapes, and species. Some, still alive, were making fruitless attempts to free themselves, only to attract the attention of the sharks. Others had only their heads left, and bones marked the remains of many more.
“No one has been tending the net,” Austin said.
“Maybe someone hung it here to keep nosy guys like us out.”
“I don’t think so,” Austin said after a moment’s reflection. “That net is made of monofilament. You could cut your way through it with a nail clipper. No electrical wiring, so it doesn’t seem to have an alarm signal attached.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Let’s think about it. Whatever’s in that lagoon killed a pod of whales. The locals would begin asking questions if they started seeing hundreds of dead fish. The folks who bring you Baja Tortillas don’t like attention. So they stick the net here to keep the fish out and any dead ones in.”
“Makes sense,” Zavala agreed. “What next?”
“Keep on going.”
Zavala’s fingers danced over the computer screen that controlled the sub’s functions. Two mechanical arms on the front of the Brogan unfolded and extended like a telescope to within inches of the net. The claws at the end of each arm grabbed the mesh and tore it open like an actor parting a curtain. Pieces of fish in various states of decomposition drifted off in every direction.
The job accomplished, Zavala brought the metal arms back to their rest position and increased throttle. With Austin still on the sub’s back, they plunged through the hole and into the lagoon. The thirty-foot visibility was cut in half by thousands of tiny particles of seaweed that had washed into the cove to be shredded by the razor-sharp rocks. The sub slowed to a walk, Zavala feeling his way like a blind man with a white cane. They didn’t see the huge object until they were almost on top of it. Again the sub came to a stop.
“What is that thing?” Zavala asked.
The cathedral light filtering down from the surface illuminated an enormous structure. It was about three hundred feet wide, Austin estimated, and about thirty feet thick, tapered at the ends like a huge metal lens and resting on four thick metal legs. The legs were hidden by boxlike structures where they sank into the sea.
“It’s either a big metal spider or a sunken UFO,” Austin said in wonder. “In any case, let’s take a closer look.”
At Austin’s direction, Zavala steered the sub off at an angle and cruised along the perimeter as far as they could, then retraced their path and went along the other side. The structure was almost perfectly round except where it butted up close to the undersea cliffs.
“Hey, this is amazing! I’m getting high heat readings.”
“I can feel the heat through my wet suit. Someone has cranked up the BTUs.”
“The instruments indicate that it’s coming from the pillars. Must be conduits as well as supports. Nothing dangerous. Yet.”
“Park this thing while I go in for a closer look.”
The mini dropped lightly to the bottom and rested on its pontoons. Austin unhooked the harness and peeled off with instructions for Zavala to turn on the positioning strobe light in fifteen minutes.
Austin swam toward the disk, then over it. Except for a circular skylight the odd structure was fabricated of metal painted a dull green, which would have been difficult to see from the surface. He dropped down onto the dome itself and peered cautiously through the skylight.
Below was a network of pipes and machines. Men in white frocks walked about the well-lit cavernous space. Austin puzzled over the function of the machines, trying to put what he saw together with the hot water discharges, but came up with nothing. He undid a portable waterproof video camera from his belt and filmed the scene below. Satisfied with his work, he decided to get an overview. He rose off the disk and was panning the camera when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye.
He froze, floating above the structure. The egg-shaped elevator Zavala had described descended from the shimmering surface. It moved along its track and disappeared into a circular hatch that was opening on the roof of the underwater structure closest to the face of the cliff. Austin resumed his camera work only to be interrupted again, this time by Zavala.
“Better get back here pronto! The water temp readings are shooting up.”
There was no mistaking the urgency in Zavala’s voice. “On my way!”
Austin threshed the water with strong kicks of his powerful legs, maintaining a rhythm that ate up the yards. Zavala wasn’t kidding about the heat buildup. Austin was sweating under his wet suit. He vowed never to boil a lobster again.
“Hurry,” Zavala said. “The temp is going off the tracks!”
The Brogan’s silvery beacon blinked in the gloom. Austin reached down and switched on a small strobe that hung from his buoyancy compensator. The Brogan moved in to meet him. The heat had become more intense. Austin grabbed onto the back of the moving sub and snapped his harness buckle in place. With Austin aboard, the Brogan quickly wheeled about and was headed for the mouth of the lagoon, motors whining at top speed. Zavala barked, “Something’s wrong, Kurt! I am detecting al
arms inside the facility.” Moments later, Austin heard a loud, muffled whump. He turned to look over his shoulder just as the facility exploded in a fiery ball. The inferno instantly incinerated every living thing in the enclosed space. Superheated gas shot up pipes into the tortilla factory. Luckily, the factory was empty because it was Sunday. The Brogan wasn’t as fortunate. It was caught by the shock wave and tumbled end over end with Austin desperately clinging on.
Austin felt as if he had been kicked by a giant invisible mule. The harness straps let go, and he was flung forward, arms and legs flailing, in a tangle of air hoses. He cartwheeled for an eternity and might have kept going halfway across the Pacific if he hadn’t slammed into the net strung across the mouth of the lagoon. He hit the mesh with his feet, which was fortunate, because a headfirst impact would have broken his neck. The netting yielded, then snapped back. Austin shot out like a rock in a boy’s slingshot.
Right into the path of the oncoming submersible.
The mini’s dome had been ripped off, and Zavala was no longer inside. The sub tumbled at Austin on a collision course. Austin brought his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. He seemed fated to be smashed like a bug on a car windshield when the sub did a little hop that took it over Austin’s head. He felt a painful impact as a pontoon grazed his shoulder. Then he was buffeted by secondary shock waves from multiple explosions that slowed his velocity and tossed him back after the mini-sub. The Brogan had battered its way through the net, and this time there was nothing to stop him.
Instinctively, he swooped his arm out to retrieve his regulator hose, clenched the mouthpiece between his teeth, and took a breathy gulp of air. The regulator was still working. His face mask was a cobweb of fracture lines where one of the hoses had hit the lens. Better the mask than his face! He whipped the useless mask off, assumed a vertical position, and did a complete turn.
He knew he had better get to the surface, but he wasn’t going to do it without Zavala. One more try. He spun slowly around. Without the mask his vision was blurred, but he thought he saw a spot of purple and swam toward it. Zavala was floating a few feet off the bottom. Bubbles were coming from his mouth.
Austin pushed the regulator toward Zavala’s face, not sure if it ever found its mark, because the willpower he had been using to operate on was eaten away by the black angry surf crashing against his brain. He reached down and let the quick-release buckle go on his weight belt and groped for the inflation valve of his buoyancy compensator. He thought he heard another explosion. Then he blacked out completely.
10
TROUT STOOD AT the door of the hut as motionless as a totem pole, watching and listening. He had been at his post for hours, staring into the darkness, his every sense alert to catch any change in the rhythms of the night. He had watched the day wind down and seen the shadows mix with the false dusk created by smoldering cook fires. The last few natives had disappeared into their huts like sullen phantoms, and the village went silent except for the brief muffled cry of a baby. Trout was thinking what an unhealthy place this was. It was as if he and Gamay had stumbled into a plague ward.
The Dutchman had kicked the family out of the hut closest to his and with a sweep of his hand ushered the Trouts through the door like the doorman at the Ritz. Slivers of light filtered through the grass walls into the dim interior. Hardly a breath of fresh air entered the close confines. The floor was dirt, a couple of hammocks were slung from support poles, and the furniture consisted of two crude stools and a cutting board fashioned out of stumps. The stifling heat and primitive accommodations didn’t faze Trout. He was more bothered by the feeling he and Gamay were trapped.
He wrinkled his nose, a gesture he’d picked up from his father, a Cape Cod fisherman. Trout could picture his father walking to the end of the pier in the predawn darkness and sniffing the air like an old hound dog. Most days he’d say, “Finest kind, cap. Let’s go fishing.” But some mornings he would wrinkle his nose and head for the coffee shop without another word. Any doubts about the elder Trout’s olfactory prowess disappeared one beautiful morning when he stayed in port and six fishermen were lost in an unpredicted offshore storm. Things hadn’t smelled right, his father explained later.
Trout had the same feeling although he was far from the sea in the heart of the Venezuelan rain forest. It was simply too quiet. There were no voices, no coughing, nothing to indicate human habitation of any kind. While it was still light Trout had committed every detail of the village to his near-photographic memory. He began to imagine that the population of the village must have silently vanished in the night. He backed away from the doorway and bent over the still form lying in a hammock. Gamay reached up and felt his face with a light touch of her fingers.
“I’m awake,” she said. “Just thinking.”
“About what?”
She sat up and swung her feet onto the floor. “I don’t trust our friend the Flying Dutchman any further than I could throw him. Not that I would touch him. Yech.”
“I agree with your sentiments exactly. I think someone is watching us.” He glanced toward the doorway. “This hut reminds me of a lobster trap. One way in, no way out, except to the cooking pot. I suggest we spend the night on the boat.”
“Much as I hate to leave these five-star accommodations, I’m ready when you are. Question. How do we sneak off with someone watching?”
“Simple, we go out the back door.”
“There wasn’t a back door last time I looked.”
“Guess you’ve never heard of Yankee ingenuity,” Trout said smugly. “If you would stand watch I’ll put my cleverness to work.” He slipped a hunting knife from its belt sheath and went to the back of the hut. Kneeling, he slipped the eight-inch blade through the thatch and began to saw. The rustle and snap were barely audible, but to be on the safe side he timed his sawing to the cry of an unknown forest creature that made a noise like a rat-tail file on metal. Within minutes he had cut a rectangular opening about two feet square in the rear wall. He went to the front of the hut and guided Gamay by the arm to the newly created exit. She stuck her head through to make sure it was safe, then was out in an instant. Paul’s basketball player body slithered out a second later.
They stood side-by-side behind the hut listening to the symphony of insect buzzes and bird calls. Earlier Gamay had noticed a path that went from behind the huts to the river. They could see the faint outline of hard-packed earth. Gamay led the way, and before long the huts were behind them and their nostrils picked up the river odor of damp rot. The path led to the gardens they had seen from the river in daylight. They walked along the boggy edge of the river and after a few minutes saw the skeletal outline of the airboat’s propeller housing. They stopped in case Dieter had someone watching the boat. Paul threw a pebble into the water. The plop failed to draw anyone out of hiding.
They went aboard and readied the boat to leave at the first sign of dawn. Trout tucked a life preserver under his head and stretched out on the deck. Gamay climbed onto the seat and took her turn at the watch. Paul soon dozed off. At first he slept fitfully because of the heat and insects. His exhaustion caught up with him, and eventually he slipped into a deep sleep. In his slumber he heard Gamay calling his name as if from far away. Light was coming through his eyelids. He blinked and saw Gamay, still on her perch, her face grotesque in a flickering yellow glow.
Three dugout canoes were pulled up alongside the airboat. The canoes carried fierce-looking Indians armed with razor-sharp spears and machetes. The raw flames from the blazing torches they held in their free hands illuminated the garish red paint on their bronze bodies and faces. Black bangs came down to where their eyebrows would have been if they hadn’t been plucked clean. The Indians were clad in loincloths except for one who wore a New York Yankees cap on his head. Trout eyed the shotgun the man cradled in his arms. One more reason to hate the Yankees, he thought.
Trout grinned and said, “Hi.” The granite expressions remained unchanged. The
man with the shotgun motioned for the Trouts to get off the boat. They climbed onto the shore where the Indians clustered around them. The Yankees fan jerked the shotgun again in the direction of the village. With the Trouts in the middle, the torchlight procession started up the slope.
“Sorry, Paul,” Gamay whispered. “They just came out of nowhere.”
“Not your fault. I thought any threat would come from land.”
“Me, too. What was the deal with the smile?”
“I couldn’t think of anything else to do.”
“I guess Dieter is smarter than we thought he was,” Gamay said begrudgingly.
“I don’t think so. Look.”
As they approached the clearing in front of the huts, they saw Dieter. He was looking very pale and frightened in the torchlight and for good reason. More Indians surrounded him, their spear points inches from his ample belly. Sweat dripped off his face, but he couldn’t get to it because his hands were in the air. As if he didn’t have enough to worry about, two white men had their handguns leveled at his heart. They were dressed identically in cotton pants, long-sleeved T-shirts, and high-topped leather boots. Both wore what looked like wide leather linesman’s belts with metal clips attached. One was a hulking slovenly type who badly needed a shave. The other was short and slim and had the dark, flat eyes of a cobra. The boss Indian handed him the Colt. The hard eyes studied the Trouts for an instant, then flicked back to the Dutchman.
“Here are your couriers, Dieter,” the man said with a French accent. “Do you still deny that you tried to double-cross me?”
Dieter began to sweat even more profusely, the perspiration coming off his face like a waterfall. “I swear to God I never saw them before this morning, Victor. They simply showed up here and said Ramirez sent them to tell me about the dead Indian and to warn trouble was brewing.” A sly look came into his yellow eyes. “I didn’t believe them. I put them in the hut where I could keep an eye on them.”
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