"Which one is your disgruntled employee?" he asked Broadmoor.
Broadmoor nodded toward the door leading into the kitchen. "He's waiting for you outside by the garbage containers. . ."
Pitt stared at the Indian. "How did you arrange that?"
Broadmoor smiled shrewdly. "The Haida have ways of communicating that don't require fiber optics."
Pitt did not question him. Now was not the time. Keeping a wary eye on the guards, he casually walked into the kitchen. None of the cooks or dishwashers looked up as he moved between the ovens and sinks through the rear door and dropped down the steps outside. The big metal garbage containers reeked of stale vegetables in the sharp, crisp air.
He stood there in the cold, not sure what to expect.
A tall figure moved from behind a container and approached him. He was wearing a yellow jumpsuit.
The bottoms of the legs were smeared with mud that had a strange bluish cast to it. A miner's hardhat sat on his head, and his face was covered by what Pitt took for a mask with a breathing filter. He clutched a bundle under one arm. "I understand you're interested in our mining operation," he said quietly.
"Yes. My name is--"
"Names are unimportant. We don't have much time if you are to leave the island with the fishing fleet."
He unfolded a jumpsuit, a respirator mask and a hard hat and handed them to Pitt. "Put these on and follow me."
Pitt said nothing and did as he was told. He did not fear a trap. The security guards could have taken him anytime since he set foot on the dock. He dutifully zipped up the front of the jumpsuit, tightened the chin strap of the hard hat, adjusted the respirator mask over his face and set out after a man he hoped could show him the source behind the violent killings.
Pitt followed the enigmatic mining engineer across a road into a modern prefabricated building that housed a row of elevators that transported the workers to and from the diggings far below. Two larger ones carried the Chinese laborers but the smaller one on the end was for the use of company officials only. The lift machinery was the latest in Otis elevator technology. The elevator moved smoothly, without sound or sensation of dropping.
"How deep do we go?" asked Pitt, his voice muffled by the breathing mask.
"Five hundred meters," replied the miner.
"Why the respirators?"
"When the volcano we're standing in erupted in the distant past, it packed Kunghit Island with pumice rock. The vibration that results from the excavating process can churn up pumice dust, which raises hell with the lungs."
"Is that the only reason?" asked Pitt slyly.
"No," replied the engineer honestly. "I don't want you to see my face. That way, if security gets suspicious, I can pass a lie-detector test, which our chief of security uses with the frequency of a doctor giving urine tests."
"Dapper John Merchant," Pitt said, smiling.
"You know John?"
"We've met."
The older man shrugged and accepted Pitt's claim without comment.
As they neared the bottom of the run, Pitt's ears were struck by a weird humming sound. Before he could ask what it was, the elevator stopped and the doors slid open. He was led through a mineshaft that opened onto an observation platform perched fifty meters above the vast excavation chamber below.
The equipment at the bottom of the pit was not the typical type of machinery one might expect to encounter in a mine. No cars filled with ore pulled over tracks by a small engine; no drills or explosives, no huge earth-moving vehicles. This was a well-financed, carefully designed anal organized operation that was run by computers aided in a small way by human labor. The only obvious mechanization was the huge overhead bridge with the cables and buckets that lifted the diamond-bearing blue rock-clay to the surface and carried it to the buildings where the stones were extracted.
The engineer turned and stared at him through green eyes over the mask. "Mason did not tell me who you are or who you represent. And I don't want to know. He merely said you were trying to trace a sound channel that travels underwater and kills."
"That's true. Untold thousands of various forms of sea life and hundreds of people have already died mysteriously in the open sea and along shorelines."
"You think the sound originates here?"
"I have reason to believe the Kunghit Island mine is only one of four sources."
The engineer nodded knowingly. "Komandorskie in the Bering Sea, Easter Island, Gladiator Island in the Tasman Sea, being the other three."
"You guessed?"
"I know. They all use the same pulsed ultrasound excavation equipment as we do here." The engineer swept his hand over the open pit. "We used to dig shafts, in an attempt to follow the largest concentration of diamonds. Much like miners following a vein of gold. But after Dorsett scientists and engineers perfected a new method of excavating that produced four times the production in one third the time, the old ways were quickly abandoned."
Pitt leaned over the railing and stared at the action across the bottom of the pit. Large robotic vehicles appeared to ram long shafts into the blue clay. Then came an eerie vibration that traveled up Pitt's legs to his body. He gazed questioningly at the engineer.
"The diamond-bearing rock and clay are broken up by high-energy pulsed ultrasound." The engineer paused and pointed to a large concrete structure with no obvious windows. "See that building on the south side of the pit?"
Pitt nodded.
"A nuclear generating plant. It takes an enormous amount of power to produce enough energy at ten to twenty bursts a second to penetrate the rock-hard clay and break it apart."
"The crux of the problem."
"How so?" asked the engineer.
"The sound generated by your equipment radiates into the sea. When it converges with the energy pulses from the other Dorsett mines scattered around the Pacific, its intensity increases to a level that can kill animal life within a large area."
"An interesting concept as far as it goes, but a piece is missing."
"You don't find it plausible?"
The engineer shook his head. "By itself, the sound energy produced down below could not kill a sardine three kilometers from here. The ultrasound drilling equipment uses sound pulses with acoustic frequencies of 60.000 to 80,000 hertz, or cycles per second. These frequencies are absorbed by the salts in the sea before they travel very far."
Pitt stared into the eyes of the engineer, trying to read where he was coming from, but other than the eyes and a few strands of graying hair that trailed from under the hard hat, all he could readily see was that the stranger was the same height and a good twenty pounds heavier. "How do I know you're not trying to throw me off the track?"
Pitt could not see the tight smile behind the respirator mask, but he guessed it was there. "Come along," said the engineer. "I'll show you the answer to your dilemma." He stepped back into the elevator, but before he pushed the next button on the panel, he handed Pitt an acoustic-foam helmet. "Take off your hard hat and set this over your head. Make certain it's snug or you'll get a case of vertigo. It contains a transmitter and receiver so we can converse without shouting."
"Where are we headed?" asked Pitt.
"An exploratory tunnel, cut beneath the main pit to survey the heaviest deposit of stones."
The doors opened and they stepped out into a mineshaft carved from the volcanic rock and shored up with heavy timbers. Pitt involuntarily lifted his hands and pressed them against the sides of his head.
Though aft sound was muffled, he felt a strange vibration in his eardrums.
"Do you hear me all right?" asked the engineer.
"I hear you," answered Pitt through the tiny microphone. "But through a humming sound."
"You'll get used to it."
"What is it?"
"Follow me a hundred meters up the shaft and I'll show you your missing piece."
Pitt trailed in the engineer's footsteps until they reached a side shaft, only this one held no shorin
g timbers. The volcanic rock that made up its rounded sides was almost as smooth as if it had been polished by some immense boring tool.
"A Thurston lava tube," Pitt said. "I've seen them on the big island of Hawaii."
"Certain lavas such as those basaltic in composition form thin flows called pahoehoe that run laterally, with smooth surfaces," clarified the engineer. "When the lava cools closer to the surface, the deeper, warmer surge continues until it flows into the open, leaving chambers, or tubes as we call them. It is these pockets of air that are driven to resonate by the pulsed ultrasound from the mining operation above."
"What if I remove the helmet?"
The engineer shrugged. "Go ahead, but you won't enjoy the results."
Pitt lifted the acoustic-foam helmet from his ears. After half a minute he became disoriented and reached out to the wall of the tube to keep from losing his balance. Next came a mushrooming sensation of nausea. The engineer reached over and replaced the helmet on Pitt's head. Then he circled an arm around Pitt's waist to hold him upright.
"Satisfied?" he asked.
Pitt took a long breath as the vertigo and nausea quickly passed. "I had to experience the agony. Now I have a mild idea of what those poor souls suffered before they died."
The engineer led him back to the elevator. "Not a pleasant ordeal. The deeper we excavate, the worse it becomes. The one time I walked in here without protecting my ears, my head ached for a week."
As the elevator rose from the lava tube, Pitt fully recovered except for a ringing in his ears. He knew it all now. He knew the source of the acoustic plague. He knew how it worked to destroy. He knew how to stop it -and was buoyed by the knowledge.
"I understand now. The air chambers in the lava resonate and radiate the high-intensity sound pulses down through rock and into the sea, producing an incredible burst of energy."
"There's your answer." The engineer removed his helmet and ran a hand through a head of thinning gray hair. "The resonance added to the sound intensity creates incredible energy, more than enough to kill."
"Why did you risk your job and maybe your life showing me this?"
The engineer's eyes burned, and he shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his jumpsuit. "I do not like working for people I cannot trust. Men like Arthur Dorsett create trouble and tragedy-if you two should ever meet, you can smell it on him. This whole operation stinks, as do all his other mining operations. These poor Chinese laborers are driven until they drop. They're fed well but paid nothing and forced to slave in the pit eighteen hours a day. Twenty have died in the past twelve months from accidents, because they were too exhausted to react and move out of the way of the equipment. Why the need to dig diamonds twenty-four hours a day when there is a worldwide surplus of the damned stones?
De Beers may head a repugnant monopoly, but you have to give them credit. They hold production down so prices remain high. No, Dorsett has a rotten scheme to harm the market. I'd give a year's pay to know what's going on in his diabolic mind. Someone like you, who understands the horror we're causing here, can now work to stop Dorsett before he kills another hundred innocent souls."
"What's stopping you from blowing the whistle?" asked Pitt.
"Easier said than done. Every one of the scientists and engineers who direct the digging signed ironclad contracts. No performance, no pay. Dorsett's attorneys would throw up a smoke screen so thick you couldn't cut it with a laser if we sued. Just as bad, if the Mounties learned of the carnage among the Chinese laborers, and the cover-up, Dorsett would claim ignorance and make damned certain we'd all stand trial for conspiracy. As it is, we're scheduled to leave the island in four weeks. Our orders are to shut down the mine the week before. Only then are we to be paid off and sent on our way."
"Why not get on a boat and leave now?"
"The thought crossed our minds until the chief superintendent tried exactly that," said the engineer slowly. "According to letters we received from his wife, he never arrived home and was never seen again."
"Dorsett runs a tight ship."
"As tight as any Central American drug operation."
"Why shut down the mine when it still produces?"
"I have no idea. Dorsett set the dates. He obviously has a plan he doesn't intend to share with the hired help."
"How does Dorsett know none of you will talk once you're on the mainland?"
"It's no secret that if one of us talks, we all go to jail."
"And the Chinese laborers?"
He stared at Pitt over the respirator clamped around the lower part of his face, his eyes expressionless. "I have a suspicion they'll be left inside the mine."
"Buried?"
"Knowing Dorsett, he wouldn't bat an eye when he gave the order to his security flunkies."
"Have you ever met the man?" asked Pitt.
"Once was enough. His daughter, The Emasculator, is as bad as he is."
"Boudicca." Pitt smiled thinly. "She's called The Emasculator?"
"Strong as an ox, that one," said the engineer. "I've seen her lift a good-sized man off the ground with one arm."
Before Pitt could ask any more questions, the elevator reached the surface level and stopped in the main lift building. The engineer stepped outside, glancing at a Ford van that drove past. Pitt followed him around the corner of the mess hall and behind the garbage containers.
The engineer nodded at Pitt's jumpsuit. "Your gear belongs to a geologist who's down with the flu. I'll have to return it before he discovers it missing and wonders why."
"Great," Pitt muttered. "I probably contacted his flu germs from the respirator."
"Your Indian friends have returned to their boats." The engineer gestured at the food-storage loading dock. The tractor and trailers were gone. "The van that just passed by the elevator building is a personnel shuttle. It should return in a couple of minutes. Hail the driver and tell him to take you through the tunnel."
Pitt stared at the old engineer dubiously. "You don't think he'll question why I didn't leave with the other Haida?"
The old engineer took a notebook and a pencil from a pocket of his jumpsuit and scribbled a few words. He tore off the sheet of paper, folded it and passed it to Pitt. "Give him this. It will guarantee your safe passage. I have to return to work before Dapper John's muscle boys begin to ask questions."
Pitt shook his hand. "I'm grateful for your help. You took a terrible risk by revealing Dorsett Consolidated secrets to a perfect stranger."
"If I can prevent future deaths of innocent people, any risk on my part will have been well worth it."
"Good luck," said Pitt.
"The same to you." The engineer began to walk away, thought of something and turned back. "One more thing, out of curiosity. I saw the Dorsett gunship take off after a floatplane the other day. It never returned."
"I know," said Pitt. "It ran into a hill and burned."
"You know?"
"I was on the floatplane."
The engineer looked at him queerly. "And Malcolm Stokes?"
Pitt quickly realized that this was the undercover man Stokes had mentioned. "A metal splinter in one lung. But he'll live to enjoy his pension."
"I'm glad. Malcolm is a good man. He has a fine family."
"A wife and five children," said Pitt. "He told me after we crashed."
"Then you got clear only to jump back in the fire."
"Not very bright of me, was it?"
The engineer smiled. "No, I guess it wasn't." Then he turned and headed back into the elevator building, where he disappeared from Pitt's view.
Five minutes later, the van appeared and Pitt waved it to a stop. The driver, in the uniform of a security guard, stared at Pitt suspiciously. "Where did you come from?" he asked.
Pitt handed him the folded note and shrugged wordlessly.
The driver read the note, wadded it up, tossed it on the floor and nodded. "Okay, take a seat. I'll run you as far as the search house at the other end of the tunnel."
/> As the driver closed the door and shifted the van into drive, Pitt took a seat behind him and casually leaned down and picked up the crumpled note. It read:
This Haida fisherman was in the john when his friends unknowingly left him behind. Please see that he gets to the dock before the fishing fleet departs.
C. Cussler
Chief Foreman
The driver stopped the van in front of the security building, where Pitt was explored from head to feet by X ray for the second time that morning. The doctor in charge of anatomical search nodded as he completed a checklist.
"No diamonds on you, big boy," he said, stifling a yawn.
"Who needs them?" Pitt grunted indifferently. "You can't eat stones. They're a curse of the white man.
Indians don't kill each other over diamonds."
"You're late, aren't you? Your tribesmen came through here twenty minutes ago."
"I fell asleep," said Pitt, hurriedly throwing on his clothes. , He took off at a dead run and rushed onto the dock. Fifty meters from the end he came slowly to a stop. Concern and misgiving coursed through him. The Haida fishing fleet was a good five kilometers out in the channel. He was alone with nowhere to go.
A large freighter was unloading the last of its cargo across the dock from the Dorsett yacht. He dodged around the big containers that were hoisted from the cargo holds on wooden skids and tried to lose himself amid the activity while moving toward the gangway in an attempt to board the ship. One hand on the railing and one foot on the first step was as far as he got.