"And it's nearly six now," Adam said. "That puts us on target around ten. What about dealing with the sub, once we locate it? At very least, I expect we'll need to blow some hatches to get in; and probably it would be best to just destroy it, once we've secured the cargo. I don't think it would serve either government's interests if its existence were to become known."
"We've provided for that," Aoife said. "Magnus had to call in some heavy-duty favors, but one of our contacts with the security forces has lined up some appropriate ordnance - nothing fancy, but it ought to do the job on both counts. Magnus can supply the know-how, of course."
"I did a stint with bomb disposal," Magnus offered, at Peregrine's startled glance. "That was back in my young and foolish days. Now and then, though, the experience does come in handy."
He turned to Adam. "There wasn't time for our man to deliver the goodies here, but he's going to meet us en route - which means we ought to get moving."
Rising, Adam acknowledged this information with a sober nod and began folding up his map.
"I can't thank you enough for all your help," he said, as McLeod signalled Peregrine to join him, already heading for the service porch, and their jackets. ' 'This operation would have been doomed at the outset without your assistance."
"Think nothing of it," Aoife said with a tight smile. "Forewarned is forearmed. If you hadn't been in a position to give us advance notice of the danger on our doorstep, Magnus and I and the rest of our people might have found ourselves with real trouble on our hands."
"I only wish I could have posted the warning sooner," said Adam. "As it is, we've still got a close race to run."
Chapter Twenty-Eight
THE sun was going down beyond the horizon, sparkling the calm surface of the harbor with flakes of copper fire. In the fishing village of Derrybeg, the copper glow was picked up and reflected back from the windows of the houses facing the water. Most of the working boats were still out at sea, leaving the harbor empty except for a handful of small pleasure craft anchored in the shallows. The only large vessel standing in at the dock was a forty-foot converted fishing boat with the name Rose ofTralee picked out in peeling paint across her stern.
Her skipper, one Dennis Plunkett, was lounging in the stern, leaning against the taffrail while he smoked a cigarette - a beefy, big-bellied man in his middle fifties, with a rusty spattering of freckles across his face and the backs of his hands. As he scanned the sky from east to west, pushing his captain's cap back off his forehead, he figured that maybe twenty minutes of daylight remained. Already the sky to the east was dotted with stars, with the full moon shortly to be on the rise.
He glanced down at his watch, then took a final drag on his cigarette and flipped it into the water past the diving platform fixed to the stern, just missing the inflatable dinghy tied there. A light footstep approached from behind, emerging from the cabin, and a tenor voice spoke to his back.
"It's getting late, Skipper. So where's this client of ours got to?'' With a shrug, Plunkett turned to address Liam O'Rourke, the younger of his two crewmen.
"He said he'll be here. After all, this is his party. And it's already half paid for, whether he shows or not."
O'Rourke heaved a sigh and ran a sun-browned hand through his bristle-cut thatch of light brown hair. A former girlfriend once had told him he looked like James Dean, and he had made every conscious effort since to live up to that image. After a moment he sat down on one of the stern lockers.
"I don't know," he said doubtfully. "This whole job begins to smell a little. I'd give a lot to know where Kavanagh's boss came by his information about this wreck we're supposed to be checking out tonight. I mean, you've been running salvage operations in these waters for nearly twenty years, but you tell me this is the first you've ever heard of it."
"It is. That still doesn't mean a rat's arse. What the hell, Liam, you know as well as I do, how cutthroat this business can be. If you get a good lead, you'd bloody well better keep it to yourself, because if you don't, some other shark will try to move in and jump your claim. Why else do you think Kavanagh's boss is planning to show us the way to this wreck of his in person, rather than just giving us the map coordinates? It's because he doesn't want to risk letting us in on the secret any sooner than he has to."
"Must be some secret," said O'Rourke. He chewed his lip thoughtfully. "What kind of wreck is it, anyway? Do you know?"
Plunkett nodded. "Kavanagh had to tell me that much, just so we'd know what kind of gear to bring with us. It's a German U-boat, Second World War."
O'Rourke looked disappointed. "Is that all? Hell, with all the destroyer action that went on around here, dead subs are practically a ha'penny a dozen. But nobody's ever yet found one with any sunken treasure in it."
"No," Plunkett agreed. "Still, there's always a first time."
Before he could say anything more, Seamus Dillon, his first mate, came up from the hold.
"That's everything stowed away, Skipper," he reported. "All the air tanks are recharged, and the cutting gear is packed and ready. Wish we'd had time to get some explosives, though."
At the mention of explosives, Plunkett pulled a face.
"I don't know what you want me to do about that. This job came up at short notice. We'll just have to make do with what we've got."
Dillon gave a rub to his jaw, shadowed with evening stubble.
"Well, I just want you to know it makes me nervous, going down on a dive like this without 'em. I don't suppose you could talk our mysterious client into postponing this operation for a few days?'' he said without much hope.
Plunkett shook his head. "Not from the way Kavanagh was talking. He says tonight."
"After all these years, what's the bloody hurry?" Dillon wondered sourly.
"Kavanagh says his boss might be expecting trouble from a rival party," Plunkett replied, "but my guess is that they want to be in and out of this wreck before the authorities get wind of it and start throwing in legal obstacles."
"Bloody bureaucracy," O'Rourke muttered. "We do all the work, take all the risks. Seems to me it ought to be 'finders-keepers.' '
"Well, it is, if we get there first, and the authorities don't know," Plunkett said with a sly smile. "Assuming, of course, that there's anything worth finding and keeping."
"Assuming, of course," Dillon said drily, "that this whole thing isn't just a front for some gun-running scam."
"That thought had crossed my mind," Plunkett said, "but I don't see how that's any concern of ours, as long as we get paid." He spat over the railing in a gesture of patent indifference.
"As long as they don't blow our brains out, once we've served their purpose," Dillon pointed out.
Plunkett merely grunted.
"I think it's too late to back out now," O'Rourke said, standing up to gaze toward the landward end of the dock. "Would that be your Mr. Kavanagh?"
He pointed toward a grey Mercedes saloon just pulling up, with a driver and two passengers. The first passenger to alight was manifestly Kavanagh himself, the dying light picking out a darkly handsome set of features above a pair of shoulders that would have done credit to a Rugby center forward. As he fetched a large duffel bag from the boot, shouldering it with ease, the second passenger emerged: taller and slighter, a willowy figure with a briefcase who might have been anything from a university professor to a certified accountant. He bent to speak briefly to the driver, then turned to follow Kavanagh toward the dock as the car pulled away.
"I think you can stop worrying," Plunkett said to Dillon. "Unless the driver's coming along, there's only the two of them, and the 'boss' looks to be the executive type."