“A fantastic tale, to say the least,” observed Avondale.
“If he didn’t look as if he’d seen a graveyard full of ghosts,” said Briscoe, “I’d think the man was a pathological liar.”
Avondale looked at the captain. “Shall we take him at his word, sir?”
Briscoe thought for a moment, then nodded. “Lay on another ten knots, then signal Pacific Fleet Command. Apprise them of the situation and inform them we are altering course to investigate.”
Before action could be taken, a familiar voice came over the bridge speaker system. “Bridge, this is radar.”
“Go ahead, radar,” acknowledged Briscoe.
“Captain, those ships you ordered us to track.”
“Yes, what about them?”
“Well, sir, they’re not moving, but they’re beginning to disappear off the scope.”
“Is your equipment functioning properly?”
“Yes, sir, it is.”
Briscoe’s face clouded in bafflement. “Explain what you mean by ‘disappearing.’”
“Just that, sir,” answered radar officer. “It looks to me as if those ships out there are sinking.”
The Bridlington arrived at the Russian fishing fleet’s last known position and found no ships floating on the surface. Briscoe ordered a search pattern, and after steaming back and forth a large oil slick was spotted, surrounded by a widely scattered sea of flotsam, some of it in localized clusters. The Russian helicopter pilot rushed to a deck railing, gestured at an object in the water and began crying out in anguish.
“Why is he babbling?” Avondale shouted to Rudolph from the bridge wing.
“He’s saying his ship is gone, all his friends are gone, his copilot and observer are gone.”
“What is he pointing at?” asked Briscoe.
Rudolph peered over the side and then looked up. “A flotation vest with Aleksandr Gorchakov stamped on it.”
“I have a floating body,” announced Angus, peering through binoculars. “Make that four bodies. But not for long. There are shark fins circling the water around them.”
“Throw a few shells from the BOFORS at the bloody butchers,” Briscoe ordered. “I want the bodies in one piece so they can be examined. Send out boats to retrieve whatever debris they can find. Somebody, somewhere, is going to want as much evidence as we can collect.”
As the twin forty-millimeter BOFORS guns opened up on the sharks, Avondale turned to Angus. “Damned queer goings on, if you ask me. What do you make of it?”
Angus turned and gave the first officer a slow grin. “It would seem that after being slaughtered for two centuries, the whales finally have their revenge.”
Pitt sat behind the desk in his office for the first time in nearly two months, his eyes distant, his hand toying with a Sea Hawk dive knife he used as a letter opener. He said nothing, waiting for a response from Admiral Sandecker who sat across from him.
He had arrived in Washington early that morning, a Sunday, and gone directly to the empty NUMA headquarters building, where he spent the next six hours writing up a detailed report on his discoveries on Kunghit Island and offering his suggestions on how to deal with the underwater acoustics. The report seemed anticlimactic after the exhausting rigors of the past few days. Now he resigned himself to allowing other men, more qualified men, to deal with the problem and come up with the proper solutions.
He swung around in his chair and gazed out the window at the Potomac River and envisioned Maeve standing on the deck of Ice Hunter, the look of fear and desperation in her face. He felt furious with himself for deserting her. He was certain Deirdre had divulged the kidnapping of Maeve’s children by her father on board Ice Hunter. Maeve had reached out to the only man she could trust, and Pitt had failed to recognize her distress. That part of the story Pitt had left out of his report.
Sandecker closed the report and laid it on Pitt’s desk. “A remarkable bit of fancy footwork. A miracle you weren’t killed.”
“I had help from some very good people,” Pitt said seriously.
“You’ve gone as far as you can go on this thing. I’m ordering you and Giordino to take ten days off. Go home and work on your antique cars.”
“You’ll get no argument from me,” said Pitt, massaging the bruises on his upper arms.
“Judging from your narrow escape, Dorsett and his daughters play tough.”
“All except Maeve,” said Pitt quietly. “She’s the family outcast.”
“You know, I assume, that she is working with NUMA in our biology department along with Roy Van Fleet.”
“On the effects of the ultrasound on sea life, yes, I know.”
Sandecker studied Pitt’s face, examining every line in the weathered yet still youthful-looking features. “Can we trust her? She could be passing along data on our findings to her father.”
Dirk’s green eyes registered no sign of subtlety. “Maeve has nothing in common with her sisters.”
Sensing Pitt’s reluctance to discuss Maeve, Sandecker changed the subject. “Speaking of sisters, did Boudicca Dorsett give you any indication as to why her father intends to shut down his operations in a few weeks?”
“Not a clue.”
Sandecker rolled a cigar around in his fingers pensively. “Because none of Dorsett’s mining properties are on U.S. soil, there is no rapid-fire means to stop future killings.”
“Close one mine out of the four,” said Pitt, “and you drain the sound waves’ killing potency.”
“Short of ordering in a flight of B-1 bombers, which the President won’t do, our hands are tied.”
“There must be an international law that applies to murder on the high seas,” said Pitt.
Sandecker shook his head. “Not one that covers this situation. The lack of an international law-enforcement organization plays in Dorsett’s favor. Gladiator Island belongs only to the family, and it would take a year or more to talk the Russians into closing the mine off Siberia. Same with Chile. As long as Dorsett pays off high-ranking government officials, his mines stay open.”
“There’s the Canadians,” said Pitt. “If given the reins, the Mounties would go in and close the Kunghit Island mine tomorrow, because of Dorsett’s use of illegal immigrants for slave labor.”
“So what’s stopping them from raiding the mine?”
Pitt recalled Inspector Stokes’ words about the bureaucrats and members of Parliament in Dorsett’s wallet. “The same barriers; paid cronies and shrewd lawyers.”
“Money makes money,” Sandecker said heavily. “Dorsett is too well financed and well organized to topple by ordinary methods. The man is an incredible piece of avaricious machinery.”
“Not like you to embrace a defeatist attitude, Admiral. I can’t believe you’re about to forfeit the game to Arthur Dorsett.”
Sandecker’s eyes took on the look of a viper about to strike. “Who said anything about forfeiting the game?”
Pitt enjoyed prodding his boss. He didn’t believe for an instant that Sandecker would walk away from a fight. “What do you intend to do?”
“Since I can’t order an armed invasion of commercial property and possibly kill hundreds of innocent civilians in the process, or drop a Special Forces team from the air to neutralize all Dorsett mining excavations, I’m forced to take the only avenue left open for me.”
“And that is?” Pitt prompted.
“We go public,” Sandecker said without a flicker or change in his expression. “First thing tomorrow I call a press conference and blast Arthur Dorsett as the worst monster unleashed on humanity since Attila the Hun. I’ll reveal the cause of the mass killings and lay the blame on his doorstep. Next I’ll stir up members of Congress to lean on the State Department, who in turn will lean on the governments of Canada, Chile and Russia to close all Dorsett operations on their soil. Then we’ll sit back and see where the chips fall.”