At that moment, Pitt's gaze was drawn by the upper head and body of an immense sea creature that rose out of the water off the starboard bow. It appeared to be a giant eel with a round head a good two meters thick. The mouth was partially open and he could see razor-sharp teeth in the shape of rounded fangs. If its undulating body were straightened out, Pitt estimated its length at between thirty and forty meters. It traveled through the water at a speed only slightly slower than the yacht.
"So Basil exists," Pitt muttered to himself in the empty wheelhouse, the words aggravating his burning throat. Basil was no stupid sea serpent, he surmised. The enormous eel was fleeing his scalding habitat in the lagoon and heading for the safety of the open sea.
Once through the channel, Basil rolled forward into the depths, and with a wave of his huge tail, disappeared.
Pitt nodded a goodbye and turned his attention back to the console. The navigational instruments were no longer functioning. He tried sending a Mayday over both the radio and satellite phone, but they were dead. Nothing seemed to function except the big engines that still drove the yacht through the waves. Unable to set the boat on an automatic course, he tied the helm with the bow pointed west toward the southeastern coast of Australia and set the throttle a notch above idle to conserve what little fuel remained. A rescue ship responding to the catastrophe on Gladiator Island was bound to spot the crippled yacht, stop and investigate.
He forced his unsteady legs to carry him back to Maeve, deeply afraid of finding her body in a burned out room. With great trepidation, he stepped over the threshold separating the salon from the wheelhouse. The main salon looked like it had been swept by a blowtorch, The thick, durable fiberglass skin had kept much of the heat from penetrating the bulkheads but the terrible heat had broken through the glass windows. Remarkably, the flammable material on the sofas and chairs, though badly scorched, had not ignited.
He shot a glance at Deirdre. Her once beautiful hair was singed into a blackened mass, her eyes milky and staring, her skin the color of a broiled lobster. Light wisps of smoke rose from her expensive clothes like a low mist. She had the appearance of a doll that had been cast into a furnace for a few seconds before being pulled out. Death had saved her from life within an immovable body.
Uncaring of his pain and injuries, he furiously threw aside the furniture he had heaped over Maeve. She had to be still alive, he thought desperately. She had to be waiting for him in all her pain and despair at once again losing her children. He pulled off the last cushion and stared down with mounting fear. Relief washed over him like a cascade as she lifted her head and smiled.
"Maeve," he rasped, falling forward and taking her in his arms. Only then did he see the large pool of blood that had seeped down between her legs and spread on the deck carpeting. He held her close, her head nestled against his shoulder, his lips brushing her cheeks.
"Your eyebrows," she whispered through a funny little smile.
"What about them?"
"They're all singed off, most of your hair too."
"I can't look dashing and handsome all the time."
"You always do to me." Then her eyes went moist with sadness and concern. "Are my boys safe?"
He nodded. "Al lifted off minutes before the firestorm struck. I should think they're well on their way to a safe shore."
Her face was as pale as moonlight. She looked like a fragile porcelain doll. "I never told you that I loved you."
"I knew," he murmured, fighting to keep from choking up.
"Do you love me too, if only a little bit?"
"I love you with all my soul."
She raised a hand and lightly touched his scorched face. "My huckleberry friend, always waitin' round the bend. Hold me tight. I want to die in your arms."
"You're not going to die," he said, unable to control the fabric of his heart as it tore in pieces. "We're going to live a long life together, cruising the sea while we raise a boatload of kids who swim like fish."
"Two drifters off to see the world," she said in a low whisper.
"There's such a lot of world to see," Pitt said, repeating the words to the song.
"Take me across Moon River, Dirk, carry me across . . ." Her expression almost seemed joyful.
Her eyes fluttered and closed. Her body seemed to wilt like a lovely flower under a frigid blast of cold.
Her face became serene like a peacefully sleeping child's. She was across and waiting on the other shore.
"No!" he cried, his voice like a wounded animal baying in the night.
All life seemed to flow out of Pitt too. He no longer clung to consciousness. He no longer fought the black mist closing in around him. He released his hold on reality and embraced the darkness.
Giordino's plan for a quick, turnaround flight to Gladiator Island was dashed almost from the beginning.
After using the Agusta's state-of-the-art satellite communications system to brief Sandecker on board the Glomar Explorer in Hawaii, he contacted air-and-sea rescue units in both Australia and New Zealand and became the first person to announce the disaster to the outside world. During the remainder of the flight to Hobart, he was continually besieged with requests from high-level government officials and reporters from the news media for accounts of the eruption and assessment of the damage.
Upon approaching the capital city of Tasmania, Giordino flew along the steep foothills bordering Hoban, whose commercial district was located on the west bank of the Derwent River. Locating the airport, he called the tower. The flight controllers directed him to set down in a military staging area half a kilometer from the main terminal. He was stunned to see a huge crowd of people milling about the area as he hovered over the landing site.
Once he shut down the engine and opened the passenger door, everything was accomplished in an orderly manner. Immigration officials came on board and arranged for his entry into Australia without a passport. Social services authorities took custody of Maeve's young sons, assuring Giordino that as soon as their father was located, they would be placed in his care.
Then as Giordino finally set foot on the ground, half starved and exhausted almost beyond redemption, he was attacked by an army of reporters shoving microphones under his nose, aiming TV cameras at his face and shouting questions about the eruption.
The only question he answered with a smile on his face was to confirm that Arthur Dorsett was one of the first casualties of the holocaust.
Finally, breaking free of the reporters and reaching the office of the airport's security police, Giordino called the head of the U.S. consulate, who reluctantly agreed to pay for the refueling of the helicopter, but only for humanitarian purposes. His return flight to Gladiator Island was again delayed when Australia's Director of Disaster Relief asked if Giordino would help out by airlifting food and medical supplies back to the island in the Agusta. Giordino graciously gave his consent and then impatiently paced the asphalt around the helicopter while it was refueled and passenger seats were removed to make more room before the needed provisions were loaded on board. He was thankful when one of the relief workers sent him a bag full of cheese sandwiches and several bottles of beer.
To Giordino's surprise, a car drove up and the driver notified him of Sandecker's imminent arrival. He stared at the driver as if the man were crazy. Only four hours had passed since he'd reported to Sandecker in Hawaii.
The confusion cleared away as a U.S. Navy F-22A supersonic two-place fighter lined up on the runway and touched down. Giordino watched as the sleek craft, capable of Mach 3 + speeds, taxied over to where he had parked the helicopter. The canopy slid back, and Sandecker, wearing a flight suit, climbed out onto a wing. Without waiting for a ladder, he jumped onto the asphalt.
He strode straightway over to the startled Giordino and locked him in a bear hug. "Albert, you don't know how glad I am to see you."
"I wish there were more of us here to greet you," Giordino said sadly.
"Useless to stand here consoling ourselves."
Sandecker's face was tired and lined. "Let's find Dirk."
"Don't you want to change first?"
"I'll shed this Star Wars suit while we're in flight. The Navy can have it back when I get around to returning it."
Less than five minutes later, with two metric tons of badly needed supplies tied down in the passenger/cargo compartment, they were airborne and heading over the Tasman Sea toward the smoldering remains of Gladiator Island.
Relief ships of the Australian and New Zealand navies were immediately ordered to the island with relief sup plies and medical personnel. Any commercial ship within two hundred nautical miles was diverted to offer any assistance possible at the disaster scene. Astoundingly, the loss of life was not nearly as high as first suspected from the immense destruction. Most of the Chinese laborers had escaped from the path of the firestorm and, lava flows. Half the mine supervisors survived, but of Arthur Dorsett's eighty-man security force, only seven badly burned men were found alive. Later autopsies showed that most of the dead suffocated from inhaling the ash.
By late afternoon, the eruption had substantially diminished in force. Bursts of magma still flowed from the volcanoes' fissures, but had dwindled to small streams. Both volcanoes were mere shadows of their former bulk. Scaggs had nearly disappeared, leaving only a wide, ugly crater. Winkleman remained as a massive mound less than a third of its former height.
The canopy of ash still hovered over the volcanoes as Giordino and Sandecker dropped toward the devastated island. Most of the western side of the landmass looked as if a giant wire scraper had scoured it down to bedrock. The lagoon was a swamp choked with debris and floating pumice. Little remained of Dorsett Consolidated's mining operations. What wasn't buried under ash protruded like ruins from a civilization dead for a thousand years. The destruction of vegetation was practically total.
Giordino's heart went cold when he saw no sign of the yacht carrying Pitt and Maeve in the lagoon.
The dock was scorched and had sunk in the ash-blanketed water beside the demolished warehouses.
Sandecker was horrified. He had had no idea of the scope of the catastrophe. "All those people dead," he muttered. "My fault, all my fault."
Giordino looked at him through understanding eyes. "For every dead inhabitant, there are ten thousand people who owe you their lives."
"Still . . ." Sandecker said solemnly, his voice trailing off.
Giordino flew over a rescue ship that had already anchored in the lagoon. He began decreasing his airspeed in preparation for setting down in a space cleared by Australian army engineers who had parachuted onto the disaster scene first. The rotor's downwash raised huge billows of ash, obscuring Giordino's view. He hovered and slowly worked the collective pitch and cyclic control in coordination with the throttle. Flying blind, he settled the Agusta and touched down with a hard bump. Drawing a deep breath, he sighed as the rotors wound down.
The ash cloud had hardly dissipated when a major in the Australian army, dusted from head to toe and followed by an aide, ran up and opened the entry door. He leaned in the cargo compartment as Sandecker made his way aft. "Major O'Toole," he introduced himself with a broad smile. "Glad to see you. You're the first relief craft to land."
"Our mission is twofold, Major," said Sandecker. "Besides carrying supplies, we're looking for a friend who was last seen on Arthur Dorsett's yacht."
O'Toole shrugged negatively. "Probably sunk. It'll be weeks before the tides clean out the lagoon enough for an underwater search."
"We were hoping the boat might have reached open water."
"You've had no communication from your friend?"
Sandecker shook his head.
"I'm sorry, but chances seem remote that he escaped the eruption."
"I'm sorry too." Sandecker stared at something about a million kilometers away and seemed unaware of the officer standing by the door. Then he pulled himself together. "Can we give you a hand unloading the aircraft?"
"Any help will be greatly appreciated. Most of my men are out rounding up survivors."
With the assistance of one of O'Toole's officers, the boxes containing food, water and medical supplies were removed from the cargo compartment and piled some distance from the helicopter. Failure and sadness stilled any words between Giordino and Sandecker as they returned to the cockpit in preparation for the return flight to Hobart.
Just as the rotors began to rotate, O'Toole came running up, waving both hands excitedly. Giordino opened his side window and leaned out.
"I thought you should know," O'Toole shouted above the engine exhaust. "My communications officer just received a report from a relief ship. They sighted a derelict boat drifting approximately twenty-four kilometers northwest of the island."
The distress in Giordino's face vanished. "Did they stop to investigate for survivors?"
"No. The derelict was badly damaged and looked deserted. The captain rightly assumed his first priority was to reach the island with a team of doctors."
"Thank you, Major." Giordino turned to Sandecker, "You heard?"
"I heard," Sandecker snapped impatiently. "Get this thing in the air."
Giordino required no urging. Within ten minutes of lifting off, they spotted the yacht almost exactly where the captain of the relief ship reported it, wallowing dead amid the marching swells. She rode low in the water with a ten-degree list to port. Her topsides looked as if they had been swept away by a giant broom. Her once proud sapphire-blue hull was scorched black, and her decks wore a heavy coating of gray ash. She had been through hell and she looked it.
"The helicopter pad looks clear," commented Sandecker.
Giordino lined up on the stern of the yacht and made a slow, slightly angled descent. The sea showed no sign of white, indicating a mild wind factor, but the yacht's roll and its list made his landing tricky.
He reduced power and hovered at an angle matching that of the yacht, timing his drop for when the yacht rose on the crest of a wave. At the exact moment, the Agusta flared out, hung for a few seconds and sank to the sloping deck. Giordino immediately applied the brakes to keep the aircraft from rolling into the sea and shut down the engine. They were safely down and their thoughts now turned to fear of what they might find.
Giordino jumped out first and quickly fastened tiedown ropes from the helicopter to the deck.
Hesitating for a moment to draw their breath, they stepped across the charred deck and entered the main salon.
One look at the two inert figures huddled in one corner of the room and Sandecker shook his head despairingly.
He briefly closed his eyes tight, fighting a wave of mental anguish. So awesome was the cruel scene, he couldn't move. There was no sign of life. Grief tore at his heart He stared motionless in sad bewilderment.
They both had to be dead, he thought.
Pitt was holding Maeve in his arms. The side of his face was a mask of dried blood from the injury inflicted by Boudicca. The whole of his chest and side were also stained dark crimson. The charred clothes, the eyebrows and hair that had been singed away, the burns on his face and arms, all gave him the image of someone horribly maimed in an explosion. He looked like he'd died hard.
Maeve seemed as though she had died not knowing her sleep would be eternal. A waxen sheen on her lovely features, she reminded Sandecker of a white, unburned candle, a sleeping beauty no kiss would ever awake.
Giordino knelt down beside Pitt, refusing to believe his old friend was dead. He gently shook Pitt's shoulder. "Dirk! Speak to me, buddy."
Sandecker tried to pull Giordino away. "He's gone," he said in a saddened whisper.
Then with such unexpectedness that both men were frozen in shock and disbelief, Pitt's eyes slowly opened, He stared up at Sandecker and Giordino, not understanding, not recognizing.
His lips quivered, and then he murmured, "God forgive me, I lost her."
THE DUST SETTLES
The tension that was present in the Paris conference room during the previous me
eting could not be felt this time around. Now the atmosphere was relaxed, almost cheerful. The directors of the Multilateral Council of Trade were more congenial as they met to discuss the latest of their international behind-the-scenes business dealings.
The chairs were filled around the long ebony table as the chairman paused', waiting for murmured conversations to die down, before he called the meeting to order.
"Gentlemen, much has happened since our last discussion. At that time we were faced with a threat to our international diamond operations. Now, thanks to a whim of nature, the scheme to destroy our diamond market has been brought to a standstill with the untimely death of Arthur Dorsett."
"Good riddance to bad rubbish," said the chief executive of the diamond cartel, laughing. He could scarcely believe the triumph he felt, and his elation at having a menacing threat fortuitously eliminated without a costly fight.
"Hear! Hear!" came a chorus of voices around the table.
"I'm happy to report," the chairman continued, "the market price of diamonds has risen dramatically in the past few days, while prices of colored gemstones have suffered a substantial drop."
The gray-haired man from one of America's richest families and a former Secretary of State spoke from the other end of the table. "What's to stop Dorsett Consolidated Mining's directors from going ahead with Arthur's program of discounting diamonds throughout his vast chain of jewelry stores?"
The Belgian industrialist from Antwerp made a gesture with his hand as he spoke. "Arthur Dorsett was a megalomaniac. His dreams of grandeur did not include others. He ran his mining operations and sales organizations without a board of directors. Arthur was a one-man band, He trusted no one. Except for occasionally hiring an outside adviser and then squeezing the man or woman dry for whatever expertise he could absorb before throwing them into the street, he ran Dorsett Consolidated alone with no one else at the top."