Текст книги "The Silent Sea (2010)"

Автор книги: Clive Cussler

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The Silent Sea

Chapter ELEVEN

THE SUMMONS HAD BEEN A SINGLE WORD, COME. Despite its terseness, Major Jorge Espinoza read a great deal into the message and none of it was good. It took nearly twelve hours to arrange transport from the northern border to his father's estate in the grassy pampas a hundred miles west of Buenos Aires. He had flown the last leg himself in his Turbine Legend, a prop plane that looked like the legendary Spitfire and had nearly the same performance. Lieutenant Jimenez, his burns heavily bandaged, had ridden in the rear seat.

When his father was given command of the Ninth Brigade, he had used family money to build them a new command center and barracks at the estate. The old runway a mile from the main house had been expanded and paved to accommodate a fully loaded C-130. The apron was also expanded for helicopter landing pads, and a huge metal hangar was erected.

The camp itself was so far from the big house that even mortar practice didn't disturb the General, his new, young wife, and their two children. It had housing for the thousand men who belonged to the elite unit, with support facilities for all their needs. Next to the parade ground was an obstacle course and a state-of-the-art fitness center.

With its wide-open grassy planes, dense forests, and two separate river systems, the huge cattle estate was perfect for keeping the men in top operational preparedness.

The nearby village of Salto was growing from a sleepy little farming community to a bustling town of people more than willing to take care of the soldiers' off-duty needs.

Espinoza typically buzzed the main house when he made his approach to the airfield. His half brothers loved his aircraft and begged him for rides incessantly. But not today. He wanted to attract as little attention to himself as possible as he soared over the estate, where the spring rains were turning the grassland green and lustrous.

The debacle in the rain forest would be a career ender for any other soldier, and it still might be for him. As both son and subordinate, he had let the General down. Nine men had died under his command, and then Raul had finally stumbled into the border crossing he had reported that the four men with him in the chopper were gone and six more border guards were dead and their boats destroyed. They had also lost two expensive helicopters, with a third damaged.

But the worst of all for son and soldier was the fact that he had failed. That was the truly unpardonable sin. They had let the Americans steal back the satellite fragment from right under their noses. He recalled the bloody face of the American driving the pickup loaded with his wounded comrades. Despite the mask of gore, Espinoza knew every feature the shape of the eyes, the strength of the jaw, the almost arrogant nose. He would recognize this man no matter where they met again or how many years would elapse.

He lined up the nimble plane on the runway and dropped the gear. A four-engine C-130 was parked next to the big hangar. Its rear cargo ramp was down, and he could just make out a small forklift trundling up through the rear door. Espinoza wasn't aware of any future Ninth Brigade deployments, and he was almost certain that after his meeting with the General he would no longer be part of the elite force's future.

The plane bumped once when it hit the asphalt and then settled lightly. It was such a delight to fly that every landing was a disappointment the trip was over. He taxied to the apron where his father kept his plane, a Learjet capable of getting him anywhere in South America in just a couple of hours.

While the General came from a military family, Espinoza's late mother had been born into a clan whose wealth stretched back to the very founding of the country. There were office towers in BA and vineyards out west, five different cattle farms, an iron mine, and a virtual stranglehold on the country's cell-phone system. All this was run by his uncles and cousins.

Jorge had enjoyed the benefits of such wealth, the best schools and expensive toys like the Turbine, but he'd never been attracted to its creation. He had wanted to serve in the military as soon as he understood that the uniform his father wore to work every day was a symbol of his nation's greatness.

He had worked with single-minded determination to make his childhood dream of being a soldier a reality, and now, at thirty-seven years, he was at what he considered the peak of his career. With the next promotion would come a desk job, something he looked upon with dread. He had operational control over Argentina's most lethal commandos. At least for another few minutes. The humiliation was like an ember burning in the pit of his stomach.

A Mercedes ML500 SUV painted in a matte jungle camouflage was waiting for him and Jimenez. Inside was plush leather and burnished wood. It was his stepmother's idea of roughing it.

How is he? Espinoza asked Jes+|s, his father's longtime majordomo, who had driven down to the runway to pick up the young master.

Calm. Jes+|s said, and tapped the vehicle into gear.

Not a good sign.

The track up to the manor house was a dirt road but one so meticulously maintained that the ride was as smooth as the autobahn, and the heavy SUV kicked up just a trace of dust. Overhead a hawk spotted some prey on the ground, tucked its wings, and plummeted earthward.

Maxine Espinoza greeted Jorge at the top of the steps leading to the front door. His stepmother was from Paris, and had once been an employee of their embassy in the Cerrito section of Buenos Aires. His real mother had died three weeks after being violently tossed from a horse when Espinoza was eleven. His father had waited until he was out of military college before considering remarrying, though there had been a string of beautiful women over the years.

She was only a couple of years older than Jorge, and had the old man not met her first he would have dated her in a heartbeat. He didn't begrudge his father a young wife. He had honored Jorge's mother by waiting so long, and by the time Maxine came into their lives it was good to have a woman to blunt some of the General's rough edges, which had grown sharper over the years.

She wore riding clothes that showed bearing two more sons for the General had done no permanent damage to her figure.

You are not hurt? she asked, her Spanish laced with a French accent. He suspected the French women made their second language sexy no matter what it was. Maxine could make Urdu sound like poetry.

No, Maxie, I'm fine.

Raul approached, and she noticed his bandages. She blanched. Mon Dieu, what did those pigs do to you?

They blew up a helicopter I was in, se+|ora. Jimenez spoke to his shoes as if he wasn't comfortable around such wealth or the attention of his commander's wife.

The General is very upset, Maxine said, linking her arms though those of the young officers. The inside of the house was airy and cool, with a painting of Philippe Espinoza wearing the colonel uniform he had sported two decades earlier dominating one wall. He is like a stallion denied the mare. You will find him in the gun room.

Jorge saw three men conversing in one corner of the entry hall. One turned when they entered. He was Asian. In his fifties. He was a man Espinoza didn't recognize. Lieutenant Jimenez made to follow his Major, but Maxine would not relinquish his arm. The General wishes to see him alone.

The gun room was at the back of the house, its floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the yard, with its stream and waterfall. Hunting trophies hung from the walls. The head of a giant boar had the place of honor above the fieldstone fireplace. There were three separate glass-fronted gun cabinets and one locked safe where the General kept his automatic weapons. The floor was Mexican tile covered with Andean rugs.

This was the room where punishment had been meted out when Jorge was growing up, and over the smell of leather furniture and gun oil he detected the scent of his own fear that had lingered over the decades.

General Philippe Espinoza stood just under six feet, with a shaved head and shoulders as broad as a hangman's gallows. His nose had been broken when he was a cadet and never fixed, giving his face a masculine asymmetry that made it difficult to focus on his eyes. Being able to stare down others was just one of the tools he had used to thrive during the dictatorships of the 1970s and '80s.

General Espinoza, Jorge said, coming to attention. Major Jorge Espinoza reporting as ordered.

His father was standing behind his desk, leaning over, as he studied a map. It looked like the Antarctic Peninsula, but Jorge couldn't be sure.

Do you have anything to add to the report I've read? the General asked without looking up. His voice was clipped, abrupt.

The Americans have yet to cross the border, at least not in their RHIB. Patrols have turned up no sign of it on either bank of the river. We suspect they sank it and extracted overland.

Continue.

The helicopter pilot they kidnapped says the team leader was named Juan, another called Miguel. The leader spoke Spanish with a BA accent.

But you are certain they are American?

I saw the man myself. He might speak Spanish like us, but he Espinoza paused, trying to find the right words had that American look.

The senior Espinoza finally looked up. I attended their special School of the Americas, same as Galtieri, only years later. The instructors at Fort Benning all had that look. Go on.

There was one thing I left out of my report. We discovered the wreckage of an old blimp. The Americans found it first, and it looks as though they spent time examining it.

A faraway look crossed the General's face. A blimp. You are sure?

Yes, sir. It was the pilot who recognized the type of aircraft.

I recall when I was a young boy a group of Americans flying across the jungle in a blimp. They were treasure hunters, I believe. They went missing back in the late 1940s. Your grandfather met them at a reception in Lima.

They're found now. When the thieves stole our helicopter, they landed near the crash site as if they knew of it. I think they discovered it on their way to the logging camp.

And you say they examined the wreckage?

Judging by the footprints, yes, sir.

Not something disciplined commandos would do?

No, sir. Not at all.

Jorge took it as a good sign that his father sat. The calm exterior which masked his anger was slowly giving way to something else. Your performance in this matter is beyond reprehensible. I would almost say it borders on criminal negligence.

Uh-oh.

However, there are things you aren't privy to at the moment that mitigate the situation somewhat. Plans that are known only at the highest levels of the government. Soon your unit will be sent south, and it wouldn't do to have its most popular officer in custody. And what I put the official report of the incident will depend on how well you perform in an upcoming mission.

General, may I ask where we are to be deployed?

Not yet. A week or so and you will understand.

Jorge straightened. Yes, sir.

Now, go fetch your Captain Jimenez. I think I have something for you to do in the meantime.

The Silent Sea

Chapter TWELVE

WHILE THE OREGON HEADED SOUTH UNDER THE command of Linda Ross, Cabrillo and Hanley flew north on a commercial flight to Houston, where the Corporation kept one of a dozen safe houses in port cities all over the globe. Each was loaded with just about anything a team could need. They considered this one a fairly central place for their search of the airship's crew.

By the time they reached the town-house condominium in a generic development twenty miles from the city center, Eric Stone and Mark Murphy had done the necessary legwork, or finger work, as the case may be, since the two were virtuosos when it came to Internet research.

As Murph liked to boast, I've never met a firewall I couldn't douse.

Unlike some of the other Corporation properties the penthouse in a Dubai high-rise was as opulent as any five-star hotel the Houston safe house was spartan. The furniture looked like it came from catalogs, which it had, and the d+!cor was mostly cheaply framed prints of nature scenes. The only thing that set it apart from the four hundred identical units in the neighborhood was that the walls, floor, and ceiling of one of the bedrooms were lined in inch-thick steel. The door, though it looked normal, was as impenetrable as a bank vault's.

Upon entering, Max made certain that the room hadn't been breached in the three months since it had last been checked. He added batteries to an anti-eavesdropping device kept in storage and swept the entire condo while Juan opened a bottle of tequila and added ice from the bag of sundries they'd picked up at a convenience store on the drive in from the airport. Only when they were assured the place was clean did he connect his laptop to the Internet and place it on the coffee table in the living room.

The early-evening South Texas sun beat through the windows and created a glare on the screen, so Max shut the drapes and helped himself to some of the duty-free liquor. He settled onto the sofa next to Juan with a sigh.

You know, he said, running the chilled glass across his high forehead, after years of using our own jet, first class is a disappointment.

You're getting soft in your dotage.

Bah!

The computer came online. Juan double-checked the security protocols and called up the Oregon. Instantly, a picture of Eric and Mark popped onto the screen. He could tell by the giant video display behind them that they were in Eric's cabin. Stoney was an Annapolis graduate who had come to the Corporation after fulfilling his minimum time in uniform. It wasn't that he disliked the service, but a commander of his who had served in Vietnam with Max thought the bright young officer would better serve his nation by joining up with the Chairman's crew. It was Eric who suggested his friend Mark Murphy join, too. They had gotten to know each other while working on a secret missile program, where Murph was a designer for one of the big defense contractors.

Eric didn't have the look of a Navy veteran. He had soft brown eyes and an almost gentle demeanor. Where Murph cultivated a cyberpunk ethos with an in-your-face style of dress, Eric was more buttoned-down and serious. He wore a white oxford shirt opened at the collar. Mark had on a T-shirt adorned with a cyclopic smiley face. Both looked too excited to stay still.

Howdy, boys, Juan greeted. How's it going?

We're running hard, boss man, Eric replied. Linda has us up to thirty-eight knots, and with so few countries trading with Argentina there's virtually no ship traffic for us to avoid.

What's your ETA at Wilson/George?

A tick over three days, provided we don't hit ice.

Encounter ice, Max corrected. One encounters ice, one must never hit ice. Bad for the ship.

Thanks for the tip, E.J., Mark said, using the first two initials of the ill-fated Titanic's captain.

So what have you found? Cabrillo asked.

You're not going to believe who those guys were, Eric said excitedly. They were the Ronish brothers. Their family owns Pine Island off Washington State.

Juan blinked in surprise. As a West Coast native, he knew all about Pine Island and its infamous Treasure Pit. It was a story that fascinated him as a boy, as it did all his friends. You're sure?

No doubt, Mark replied. And what do you bet they found a clue in the Teasure Pit that sent them off looking for something hidden in the Amazon rain forest?

Hold on. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Tell it to me from the top.

There were five brothers. One of them Eric glanced down at his notes Donald, was killed, get this, on December seventh, 1941, when they tried to reach the bottom of the pit. Right afterward, the three eldest joined the military. The fifth brother was too young. Nick Ronish became one of the most decorated Marines in Corps history. He took part in three island assaults, including being on the first wave at Iwo Jima. Another brother was a paratrooper in the Eighty-first. Ronald was his name. He went in on D-day, and fought all the way to Berlin. The last one, Kevin, joined the Navy, where he became a spotter on blimps flying patrols off the coast of California

Mark interrupted, adding, A couple of years after the war, they bought a surplus blimp, which Kevin had gotten himself licensed to fly, and they headed off to South America.

Is there any indication that they found anything on Pine Island? Juan asked. I seem to recall a big expedition there in the 1970s.

There was. James Ronish, the surviving brother, was reportedly paid a hundred thousand dollars by Dewayne Sullivan to allow him to excavate on the island. Sullivan was like the Richard Branson of his day. He made a ton of money in oil and spent it on all kinds of crazy adventures, like yachting solo around the world or skydiving from a weather balloon from eighty thousand feet.

In 1978, he set his sights on Pine Island, and spent four months excavating the Treasure Pit. They had a massive pumping capacity and built a coffer dam to prevent water from seeping into it from a nearby lagoon, but they could never drain it properly. Divers did find Donald Ronish's skeletal remains, which were later buried, and they hauled out a lot of debris. But then a worker was killed when they were refueling one of the pumps. He had left it running it spilled gasoline and went up in flames. A day or so later, one of the divers got the bends and had to be airlifted back to shore. That was when Sullivan shut down operations.

That's right, Juan exclaimed. I remember now. He said something like, 'yNo mystery is worth a man's life.'

Eric took a pull off a can of energy drink. That's it exactly. But here's what Mark and I think. After the war, the brothers went back to Pine Island and cracked the pit. There wasn't any treasure there, or maybe enough to buy the blimp, though I can't imagine the Navy asked much for them back then. Anyway, they found something down there that led them to South America a map or carvings.

They crashed before they found it, Murph added.

What about the youngest brother? Max asked. What ever happened to him?

James Ronish was wounded in Korea. Never married, he still lives in the house his parents left him when they moved from the Coast, and he still owns Pine Island. We have his phone number and address.

As well as his financials. Mark glanced down at a piece of paper. As of noon today, he has one thousand two hundred dollars in a savings account. Four hundred in checking, and a credit-card balance of nearly a grand. He's two payments behind on his taxes but current on a mortgage he took out on the house seven years ago.

Doesn't sound like a guy whose family found pirate loot.

Nope. Just an old man marking his calendar until it's time to take a dirt nap, Murph said. We found something in the local newspaper's online database. A contractor in the area reported that he and Ronish were forming a partnership to make another attempt on the pit. This was five years ago. The contractor was going to put up the money and equipment, but then nothing ever came of it.

Juan thought for a second, sipping from his tequila. I'm getting the feeling that whenever Mr. Ronish is short on funds, he opens up his island for exploration.

Sounds about right, Eric replied. I can track down the contractor to find out what happened to give him cold feet.

Murph leaned closer to the webcam. I'll hack into his bank again and see what kind of money trouble Ronish had when the deal was announced.

I'm nixing both ideas, the Chairman told them. Neither really matters because we're not doing anything with the Treasure Pit.

Murph and Eric looked like a couple of kids who had their puppy taken away from them.

Juan continued, We're here to tell him that we found his brothers' remains and likely have a journal one of them wrote after the crash. No one had had time yet to read the condom-wrapped papers. They were still in Cabrillo's luggage.

You can't be serious, Mark whined. This could lead to a significant discovery. Pierre Devereaux was one of the most successful privateers in history. His treasure has got to be someplace.

Max grunted, Most likely at the bottom of the ocean where his ship sank.

Au contraire, mon fr+?re, Mark countered. There were survivors when his ship sank in the Caribbean. They had just come from rounding Cape Horn and said they were carrying no cargo. They said Devereaux spent time off our western coast with a handful of men, but when he returned to his ship he was alone.

Or it's all crap to keep the legend alive.

Come on, Max, where's your sense of whimsy? Eric asked.

Hanley cocked a thick eyebrow at the odd choice of word. Whimsy?

You know what I mean. Didn't you ever dream of finding pirate treasure when you were a kid?

Two tours in 'Nam pretty much crushed any whimsy I might have had.

Sorry, fellas, Juan said with finality. No pirate treasure for us. We're just going to deliver the papers and tell Mr. Ronish where his brothers died.

All right, they said in hangdog unison, making Cabrillo smile.

Let me find a pen to write down his address, and Max and I will get ourselves up to Washington.

Don't forget to bring garlic and a wooden stake, Eric said.

What are you talking about?

Ronish lives outside of Forks. That's the town where the Twilight books take place.

Huh?

It's a series of romantic novels about a teenage girl in love with a vampire.

How would I possibly know that? Cabrillo asked. And, more telling, why do you?

Eric looked sheepish while Max roared with laughter.

BECAUSE THERE WAS NO real urgency to reach Forks, Washington, it didn't take much for Max to convince Cabrillo to enjoy an overnight layover in Vegas. Had he wanted, Juan could have made a nice living as a professional poker player, so he had no problem taking money from the amateurs at the table with him. Hanley didn't do as well at the craps table, but both agreed it had been a welcome diversion.

In the city of Port Angeles, on the Juan de Fuca Strait, they rented a Ford Explorer for the hour-long drive around the spectacular Olympic Mountains to Forks.

The place was typical small-town America a cluster of businesses clinging to Route 101 backed by houses in various states of disrepair. Timber was the main industry in the region, and with the market so soft it was clear that Forks was suffering. A number of storefronts were vacant with leasing signs taped to the glass. The few people walking the streets moved with little purpose. Their shoulders were hunched from more than the cold wind blowing off the nearby North Pacific.

The darkening sky was filled with bruised clouds that threatened to open up at any moment.

In the center of town, Max nodded his head at a hotel as they neared. Should we check in first or head straight to Ronish's?

I don't know how talkative this guy's going to be, and I don't know if the desk in a place like that stays open too late. So let's check in and then get to his house.

Man, this sure ain't Caesars.

Twenty minutes later they approached a dirt track off Bogachiel Way, six miles from town. Pine forests soared overhead, and the trunks were so tightly packed that they couldn't see lights from the house until they were almost upon it.

As Eric had said, James Ronish had never married, and it showed. The one-story house hadn't seen fresh paint in a decade or more. The roof had been repaired with off-color shingles, and the front lawn looked like a junkyard. There were several skeletonized cars, an askew satellite dish as big as a kiddy wading pool, and various bins of mechanical junk. The doors to the detached garage were open, and inside was just as bad. Workbenches were littered with unidentifiable flotsam, and the only way to reach them was by narrow paths through even more clutter.

Right out of Better Homes and Scrapyards, Juan quipped.

Five will get you ten his curtains are dish towels.

Cabrillo parked the SUV next to Ronish's battered pickup. The wind made the trees creak, and their needled tops whisper. The storm couldn't be more than a few minutes away. Juan grabbed the condom-wrapped papers from the center console. As much as he wanted to read them, he didn't feel it appropriate. He could only hope that Ronish would share their contents.

A blue flicker showed through a large picture window that was caked with dust. Ronish was watching television, and as they neared the front door they could hear it was a game show.

Juan pulled open a creaky screen door and knocked. After a few seconds of nothing happening, he rapped on the door a little harder. Another twenty seconds went by before a light snapped on over the door and it opened a crack.

What do you want? James Ronish asked sourly.

From what Juan could see, he was a big man, heavy in the gut, with thinning gray hair and suspicious eyes. He leaned against an aluminum cane. Below his nose was a clear plastic oxygen canula with tubing that lead to an O2 concentrator the size of a microwave oven.

Mr. Ronish, my name is Juan Cabrillo. This is Max Hanley.

So?

Friendly sort, Juan thought. He wasn't sure what he'd expected, but he supposed Mark was right. Ronish appeared to be an old man marking his calendar until he died.

I'm not sure how to tell you this, so I'll just come out and say it.

Juan didn't pause but Ronish interrupted anyway. Don't care, he said, and made to close the door.

Mr. Ronish, we found the Flying Dutchman. Well, the wreckage anyway.

Color drained from Ronish's face everywhere but from his gin-blossom nose. My brothers? he asked.

We found a set of remains in the pilot's seat.

That would have been Kevin, the old man said quietly. Then he seemed to rouse himself, and his guard was up in an instant. What's it to you?

Max and Juan shared a glance, as if to say this wasn't going as they'd planned.

Well, sir

If you're here about Pine Island you can just forget it.

You don't understand. We were just in South America. We work for Juan had planned to use the United Nations as a cover, but he suspected that would make a guy like Ronish all the more suspicious a mining company doing survey work, and we discovered the crash site. It took a little research to realize what we'd found.

Just then, the rain started. Icy needles that pounded through the pine canopy and impacted the ground almost like hail. Ronish's porch didn't have a roof, so he reluctantly opened the door for the two men to enter his house.

It smelled of old newspapers and food on the verge of spoiling. The appliances in the kitchen next to the entry were at least forty years old, and the floor had the matte finish of ancient linoleum. The living-room furniture was a mousy brown that matched the threadbare carpet. Magazines were stacked atop tables and along the yellowed walls. There were fifteen or twenty portable oxygen bottles stacked near the front door. The exposed fluorescent bulb in the kitchen gave off an electric whine that to Cabrillo was as obnoxious as nails on a chalkboard.

The only other illumination was from a floor lamp next to the chair where Ronish watched television. Juan would have sworn it had a five-watt bulb.

So you found 'em, eh? Ronish didn't sound as though he much cared.

Yes. They came down in northern Argentina.

That's strange. When they left, they said they were gonna search along the coast.

Do you know exactly what they were looking for? Max spoke for the first time.

I do. And it's none of your business.

An uncomfortable silence stretched for several seconds. This was not the feel-good moment Juan had been hoping for. There was nothing about James Ronish's reaction that was going to cosmically balance what had happened to Jerry Pulaski.

Well, Mr. Ronish Juan held out the bundle they'd taken from the downed blimp we found this in the wreckage and thought it may be important. We just wanted to give it to you and maybe bring you a little closure over your brothers' fate.

I'll tell you what, Ronish said, anger tightened the wrinkles around his eyes. If it weren't for those three, Don would still be alive, and I wouldn't have had damned-fool ideas about romance and adventure when I volunteered for Korea. Do you know what it's like to have the Chinese blow your leg off?