Текст книги "Deep Six"

Автор книги: Clive Cussler

Соавторы: Clive Cussler
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33

“So that’s Dirk Pitt,” Min Koryo said. She sat in her wheelchair peering over a breakfast tray at a large TV screen in her office wall.

Lee Tong sat beside her watching the videotape of the Hoki Jamokianchored over the presidential yacht. “What puzzles me,” he said quietly, “is how he discovered the wreck so quickly. It’s as though he knew exactly where to search.”

Min Koryo set her chin in frail hands and bowed her graying head, eyes locked on the screen, the thin blue veins in her temples pulsing in concentration. Her face slowly tightened in anger. She looked like an Egyptian mummy whose skin had somehow bleached white and remained smooth.

“Pitt and NUMA.” She hissed in exasperation. “What are those wily bastards up to? First the San Marinoand Pilottownpublicity hoax, and now this.”

“It can only be coincidence,” Lee Tong suggested. “There is no direct link between the freighters and the yacht.”

“Better an informer.” Her voice cut like a whip. “We’ve been sold out.”

“Not a valid conclusion, aunumi,” said Lee Tong, amused at her sudden outburst. “Only you and I knew the facts. Everyone else is dead.”

“Nothing is ever immune to failure. Only fools think they’re perfect.”

Lee Tong was in no mood for his grandmother’s Oriental philosophy. “Do not concern yourself unnecessarily,” he said acidly. “A government investigating team would have eventually stumbled onto the yacht anyway. We could not make the President’s transfer in broad daylight without running the danger of being seen and stopped. And since the yacht wasn’t reported after sunrise, simple mathematics suggested that it was still somewhere on or below the river between Washington and Chesapeake Bay.”

“A conclusion Mr. Pitt apparently had no trouble arriving at.”

“It changes nothing,” said Lee Tong. “Time is still on our side. Once Lugovoy is satisfied at his results, all that remains for us is to oversee the gold shipment. After that, President Antonov can have the President. But we keep Margolin, Larimer and Moran for insurance and future bargaining power. Trust me, aunumi,the tricky part is past. The Bougainville corporate fortress is secure.”

“Maybe so, but the hounds are getting too close.”

“We’re matching ourselves against highly trained and intelligent people who possess the finest technology in the world. They may come within reach, but they’ll never fully grasp our involvement.”

Mollified somewhat, Min Koryo sighed and sipped at her ever present teacup. “Have you talked to Lugovoy in the past eight hours?”

“Yes. He claims he’s encountered no setbacks and can complete the project in five more days.”

“Five days,” she said pensively. “I think it is time we made the final arrangements with Antonov for payment. Has our ship arrived?”

“The Venicedocked at Odessa two days ago.”

“Who is ship’s master?”

“Captain James Mangyai, a trusted employee of the company,” Lee Tong answered.

Min Koryo nodded approvingly. “And a good seaman. He hired on with me almost twenty years ago.”

“He has his orders to cast off and set sail the minute the last crate of gold is loaded aboard.”

“Good. Now we’ll see what kind of stalling tactics Antonov will try. To begin with, he’ll no doubt demand to hold up payment until Lugovoy’s experiment is a proven success. This we will not do. In the meantime, he’ll have an army of KGB agents combing the American countryside, looking for the President and our laboratory facilities.”

“No Russian or American will figure out where we have Lugovoy and his staff hidden,” Lee Tong said firmly.

“They found the yacht,” Min Koryo reminded him.

Before Lee Tong could reply, the video screen turned to snow as the tape played out. He set the control for rewind. “Do you wish to view it again?” he asked.

“Yes, I want to examine the diving crew more closely.”

When the recorder automatically switched off, Lee Tong pressed the “play” button and the picture returned to life.

Min Koryo watched it impassively for a minute and then said, “What is the latest status report on the wreck site?”

“A NUMA salvage crew is bringing up the bodies and preparing to raise the yacht.”

“Who is the man with the red beard talking with Pitt?”

Lee Tong enlarged the scene until both men filled the screen. “That’s Admiral James Sandecker, Director of NUMA.”

“Your man was not seen filming Pitt’s movements?”

“No, he’s one of the best in the business. An ex-FBI agent. He was contracted for the job through one of our subsidiary corporations and told that Pitt is suspected of selling NUMA equipment to outside sources.”

“What do we know about Pitt?”

“I have a complete dossier flying in from Washington. It should be here within the hour.”

Min Koryo’s mouth tightened as she moved closer to the TV. “How could he know so much? NUMA is an oceanographic agency. They don’t employ secret agents. Why is he coming after us?”

“It’ll pay us to find out.”

“Move in closer,” she ordered.

Lee Tong again enlarged the image, moving past Sandecker’s shoulder until it seemed as though Pitt was talking to the camera. Then he froze the picture.

Min Koryo placed a pair of square-lensed glasses over her narrow nose and stared at the weathered but handsome face that stared back. Her dark eyes flashed briefly. “Goodbye, Mr. Pitt.”

Then she reached over and pushed the “off’ switch, and the screen went black.

The smoke from Suvorov’s cigarette hung heavily in the air of the dining room as he and Lugovoy shared a bottle of 1966 Croft Vintage Port. Suvorov looked at the red liquid in his glass and scowled.

“All these Mongolians ever serve us is beer and wine. What I wouldn’t give for a bottle of good vodka.”

Lugovoy selected a cigar out of a box that was held by one of the Korean waiters. “You have no culture, Suvorov. This happens to be an excellent port.”

“American decadence has not rubbed off on me,” Suvorov said arrogantly.

“Call it what you will, but you rarely see Americans defecting to Russia because of ourdisciplined lifestyle,” Lugovoy retorted sarcastically.

“You’re beginning to talk like them, drink like them; next you’ll want to murder and rape in the streets like them. At least I know where my loyalties lie.”

Lugovoy studied the cigar thoughtfully. “So do I. What I accomplish here will have grave effects on our nation’s policy toward the United States. It is of far greater importance than your KGB’s petty theft of industrial secrets.”

Suvorov appeared too mellowed by the wine to respond angrily to the psychologist’s remarks. “Your actions will be reported to our superiors.”

“I’ve told you endlessly. This project is underwritten by President Antonov himself.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Lugovoy lit the cigar and blew a puff of smoke toward the ceiling. “Your opinion is irrelevant.”

“We must find a means to contact the outside.” Suvorov’s voice rose.

“You’re crazy,” Lugovoy said seriously. “I’m telling you, no! I’m ordering you not to interfere. Can’t you use your eyes, your brain? Look around you. All this was in preparation for years. Every detail has been carefully planned to carry out this operation. Without Madame Bougainville’s organization, none of this would have been possible.”

“We are her prisoners,” Suvorov protested.

“What’s the difference, so long as our government benefits?”

“We should be masters of the situation,” Suvorov insisted. “We must get the President out of here and into the hands of our own people so he can be interrogated. The secrets you can pry from his mind are beyond comprehension.”

Lugovoy shook his head in exasperation. He did not know what else to say. Trying to reason with a mind scored by patriotic fervor was like trying to teach calculus to a drunk. He knew that when it was all over Suvorov would write up a report depicting him as unreliable and a potential threat to Soviet security. Yet he laughed inwardly. If the experiment succeeded, President Antonov might be of a mood to name him Hero of the Soviet Union.

He stood up, stretched and yawned. “I think I’ll catch a few hours’ sleep. We’ll begin programming the President’s responses first thing in the morning.”

“What time is it now?” Suvorov inquired dully. “I’ve lost all track of day and night in this tomb.”

“Five minutes to midnight.”

Suvorov yawned and sprawled on a couch. “You go ahead to bed. I’m going to have another drink. A good Russian never leaves the room before the bottle is empty.”

“Good night,” said Lugovoy. He turned and entered the hallway.

Suvorov waved halfheartedly and pretended he was on the verge of dozing off. But he studied the second hand of his watch for three minutes. Then he rose swiftly, crossed the room and noiselessly made his way down the hallway to where it made a ninety-degree turn toward the sealed elevator. He stopped and pressed his body to the wall and glanced around the edge of the corner.

Lugovoy was standing there patiently smoking his cigar. In less than ten seconds the elevator door silently opened and Lugovoy stepped inside. The time was exactly twelve o’clock. Every twelve hours, Suvorov noted, the project’s psychologist escaped the laboratory, returning twenty to thirty minutes later.

He left and walked past the monitoring room. Two of the staff members were intently examining the President’s brain rhythms and life signs. One of them looked up at Suvorov and nodded, smiling slightly.

“Going smoothly?” Suvorov asked, making conversation.

“Like a prima ballerina’s debut,” answered the technician.

Suvorov entered and looked up at the TV monitors. “What’s happening with the others?” he inquired, nodding toward the images of Margolin, Larimer and Moran in their sealed cocoons.

“Sedated and fed heavy liquid concentrations of protein and carbohydrates intravenously.”

“Until it’s their time for programming,” Suvorov added.

“Can’t say. You’ll have to ask Dr. Lugovoy that question.”

Suvorov watched one of the screens as an attendant in a laboratory coat lifted a panel on Senator Larimer’s cocoon and inserted a hypodermic needle into one arm.

“What’s he doing?” Suvorov asked, pointing.

The technician looked up. “We have to administer a sedative every eight hours or the subject will regain consciousness.”

“I see,” said Suvorov quietly. Suddenly it all became clear in his mind as the details of his escape plan fell into place. He felt good, better than he had in days. To celebrate, he returned to the dining room and opened another bottle of port. Then he took a small notebook from his pocket and scribbled furiously on its pages.

34

Oscar Lucas parked his car in a VIP slot at the Walter Reed Army Medical School and hurried through a side entrance. He jogged around a maze of corridors, finally stopping at a double door guarded by a Marine sergeant whose face had a Mount Rushmore solemnity about it. The sergeant carefully screened his identification and directed him into the hospital wing where sensitive and highly secret autopsies were held. Lucas quickly found the door marked LABORATORY AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY and entered.

“I hope I haven’t kept you waiting,” he said.

“No, Oscar,” said Alan Mercier. “I only walked in a minute ago myself.”

Lucas nodded and looked around the glass-enclosed room. There were five men besides himself: General Metcalf, Sam Emmett, Martin Brogan, Mercier and a short chesty man with rimless glasses introduced as Colonel Thomas Thornburg, who carried the heavy title of Director of Comparative Forensics and Clinical Pathology.

“Now that everyone is here,” said Colonel Thornburg in a strange alto voice, “I can show you gentlemen our results.”

He went over to a large window and peered at a huge circular machine on the other side of the glass. It looked like a finned turbine attached by a shaft to a generator. Half of the turbine disappeared into the concrete floor. Inside its inner diameter was a cylindrical opening, while just outside lay a corpse on a translucent tray.

“A spatial analyzer probe, or SAP as it’s affectionately called by my staff of researchers who developed it. What it does essentially is explore the body electronically through enhanced X rays while revealing precise moving pictures of every millimeter of tissue and bone.”

“A kind of CAT scanner,” ventured Brogan.

“Their basic function is the same, yes,” answered Thornburg. “But that’s like comparing a propeller aircraft to a supersonic jet. The CAT scanner takes several seconds to display a single cross section of the body. The SAP will deliver twenty-five thousand in less time. The findings are then automatically fed into the computer, which analyzes the cause of death. I’ve oversimplified the process, of course, but that’s a nuts-and-bolts description.”

“I assume your data banks hold nutritional and metabolic disorders associated with all known poisons and infectious diseases?” Emmett asked. “The same information as our computer records at the Bureau?”

Thornburg nodded. “Except that our data are more extensive because we occasionally deal with living tissue.”

“In a pathology lab?” asked Lucas.

“We also examine the living. Quite often we receive field agents from our intelligence agencies – and from our allies too – who have been injected by a poisonous material or artificially infected by a contagious disease and are still alive. With SAP we can analyze the cause and come up with an antidote. We’ve saved a few, but most arrive too late.”

“You can do an entire analysis and determine a cause in a few seconds?” General Metcalf asked incredulously.

“Actually in microseconds,” Thornburg corrected him. “Instead of gutting the corpse and going through an elaborate series of tests, we can now do it in the wink of an eye with one elaborate piece of equipment, which, I might add, cost the taxpayer something in the neighborhood of thirty million dollars.”

“What did you find on the bodies from the river?”

As if cued, Thornburg smiled and patted the shoulder of a technician who was sitting at a massive panel of lights and buttons. “I’ll show you.”

All eyes instinctively turned to the naked body lying on the tray. Slowly it began moving toward the turbine and disappeared into the center cylinder. Then the turbine began to revolve at sixty revolutions a minute. The X-ray guns encircling the corpse fired in sequence as a battery of cameras received the images from a fluorescent screen, enhanced them and fed the results into the computer bank. Before any of the men in the lab control room turned around, the cause of the corpse’s demise flashed out in green letters across the center of a display screen. Most of the wording was in anatomical terminology, giving description of the internal organs, the amount of toxicity present and its chemical code. At the bottom were the words “Conium maculatum.”

“What in hell is Conium maculatum?” wondered Lucas out loud.

“A member of the parsley family,” said Thornburg, “more commonly known as hemlock.”

“Rather an old-fashioned means of execution,” Metcalf remarked.

“Yes, hemlock was very popular during classical times. Best remembered as the drink given to Socrates. Seldom used these days, but still easy to come by and quite lethal. A large enough dose will paralyze the respiratory organs.”

“How was it administered?” Sam Emmett inquired.

“According to SAP, the poison was ingested by this particular victim along with peppermint ice cream.”

“Death for dessert,” Mercier muttered philosophically.

“Of the Coast Guard crewmen we identified,” Thornburg continued, “eight took the hemlock with the ice cream, four with coffee, and one with a diet soft drink.”

“SAP could tell all that from bodies immersed in water for five days?” asked Lucas.

“Decay starts immediately at death,” explained Thornburg, “and travels outward from the intestines and other organs containing body bacteria. The process develops rapidly in the presence of air. But when the body is underwater, where the oxygen content is low, decay proceeds very slowly. The preservation factor that worked in our favor was the confinement of the bodies. A drowning victim, for example, will float to the surface after a few days as the decomposition gases begin to expand, thereby hastening decay from air exposure. The bodies you brought in, however, had been totally submerged until an hour before we began the autopsies.”

“The chef was a busy man,” noted Metcalf.

Lucas shook his head. “Not the chef, but the dining-room steward. He’s the only crewman unaccounted for.”

“An impostor,” said Brogan. “The real steward was probably murdered and his corpse hidden.”

“What about the others?” queried Emmett.

“The Asians?”

“Were they poisoned too?”

“Yes, but in a different manner. They were all shot.”

“Shot, poisoned, which is it?”

“They were killed by fragmenting darts loaded with a highly lethal venom that comes from the dorsal spines of the stonefish.”

“No amateurs, these guys,” commented Emmett.

Thornburg nodded in agreement. “The method was very professional, especially the means of penetration. I removed a similar dart two years ago from a Soviet agent brought in by Mr. Brogan’s people. As I recall, the poison was injected by a bio-inoculator.”

“I’m not familiar with it,” said Lucas.

“An electrically operated handgun,” said Brogan, giving Thornburg an icy stare. “Totally silent, used on occasion by our resident agents.”

“A little loose with your arsenal, aren’t you, Martin?” Mercier goaded him good-naturedly.

“The unit in question was probably stolen from the manufacturer,” Brogan said defensively.

“Has an ID been made on any of the Asian bodies?” Lucas asked.

“They have no records in FBI files,” admitted Emmett.

“Nor with the CIA and Interpol,” Brogan added. “None of the intelligence services of friendly Asian countries have anything on them either.”

Mercier stared idly at the corpse moving out from the interior of the spatial analyzer probe. “It appears, gentlemen, that every time we open a door we walk into an empty room.”

35

“What kind of monsters are we dealing with?” Douglas Oates growled after listening to General Metcalf’s report on the autopsies. His face wore a chalky pallor and his voice was cold with fury. “Twenty-one murders. And for what purpose? Where is the motive? Is the President dead or alive? If this is a grand extortion scheme, why haven’t we received a ransom demand?”

Metcalf, Dan Fawcett and Secretary of Defense Jesse Simmons sat in silence in front of Oates’s desk.

“We can’t sit on this thing much longer,” Oates continued. “Any minute now the news media will become suspicious and stampede into an investigation. Already they’re grousing because no presidential interviews have been granted. Press Secretary Thompson has run out of excuses.”

“Why not have the President face the press?” Fawcett suggested.

Oates looked dubious. “That actor – what’s his name – Sutton? He would never get away with it.”

“Not up close on a podium under a battery of lights, but in a setting under shadows at a distance of a hundred feet… Well, it might work.”

“You got something in mind?” Oates asked.

“We stage a photo opportunity to enhance the President’s image. It’s done all the time.”

“Like Carter playing softball and Reagan chopping wood,” said Oates thoughtfully. “I think I see a down-home scene on the President’s farm.”

“Complete with crowing roosters and bleating sheep,” allowed Fawcett.

“And Vice President Margolin? Our double for him can’t be faked in shadows at a hundred feet.”

“A few references by Sutton and a friendly wave by the double at a distance should suffice,” Fawcett answered, becoming more enthusiastic over his brainstorm.

Simmons gazed steadily at Fawcett. “How soon can you have everyone ready?”

“First thing in the morning. Dawn, as a matter of fact. Reporters are night owls. They hang around waiting for late news to break. They’re not at their best before sunup.”

Oates looked at Metcalf and Simmons. “Well, what do you think?”

“We’ve got to throw the reporters a bone before they become bored and start snooping,” answered Simmons. “I vote yes.”

Metcalf nodded. “The only stalling tactic we’ve got.”

Fawcett came to his feet and peered at his watch. “If I leave for Andrews Air Force Base now, I should arrive at the farm in four hours. Plenty of time to arrange the details with Thompson and make an announcement to the press corps.”

Fawcett’s hand froze on the doorknob as Oates’s voice cut across the room like a bayonet.

“Don’t bungle it, Dan. For God’s sake, don’t bungle it.”