Injured people walked the streets bleeding, staring vacantly or searching desperately for loved ones. A clock on top of a building in Cathedral Square of old Havana sat frozen at 6:21. Some residents who had fled their homes during the havoc began to drift back. Others who had no homes to return to walked through the streets, picking their way around the bodies, carrying small bundles containing salvaged possessions.
Every fire unit for a hundred miles streamed into the city and vainly fought the fires spreading throughout the waterfront. A tank of chlorine gas exploded, adding its poison to the ravages of the blaze.
Twice the hundreds of firefighters had to run for cover when a change of wind whipped the blistering heat in their faces.
Even while the rescue operations were being organized, Fidel Castro launched a purge of disloyal government officials and military officers. Raul personally directed the roundup. Most had abandoned the city, having been forewarned of Rum and Cola by Velikov and the KGB. One by one they were arrested, each one stunned by the news the Castro brothers were still alive. By the hundreds they were transported under heavy guard to a secret prison compound deep in the mountains, never to be seen again.
At two o'clock in the afternoon the first U.S. Air Force heavy cargo plane landed at Havana's international airport. Soon a constant stream of aircraft were arriving. Fidel Castro was on hand to greet the volunteer doctors and nurses. He personally saw to it that Cuban relief committees stood by to receive the supplies and cooperate with the incoming Americans.
By early evening, Coast Guard and firefighting vessels from the port of Miami began to stream over the smoke-filled horizon. Bulldozers, heavy equipment, and oil-fire experts from Texas moved into the fiery wreckage along the harbor and wasted no time in attacking the flames.
Despite past political differences the imagination of the United States and Cuba seemed to leap to the occasion and everyone worked together closely on the specific emergencies to be met.
Admiral Sandecker and Al Giordino stepped off a NUMA jet late in the afternoon. They hitched a ride on a truck, loaded with bed linen and military cots, as far as a distribution depot, where Giordino hot-wired and borrowed an abandoned Fiat.
The false sunset from the flames tinted their faces red through the windshield as they gazed incredulously at the gigantic smoke cloud and great sea of fire.
After nearly an hour of winding their way through the city and being directed by police through complicated detours to avoid streets choked with debris and rescue vehicles, they finally reached the Swiss Embassy.
"We have our job cut out," said Sandecker, staring at the ruined buildings and the wreckage littering the wide boulevard of the Malecon.
Giordino nodded sadly. "He may never be found."
"Still, we owe it to him to try."
"Yes," Giordino said heavily. "We owe Dirk that."
They turned and walked through the battered entrance of the embassy and were directed to the communications room of the Special Interests Section.
The room was jammed with news correspondents, waiting their turn to transmit reports of the disaster.
Sandecker shouldered his way through the throng and found a heavyset man dictating to a radio operator. When the man finished, Sandecker tapped him on the arm.
"You Ira Hagen?"
"Yes, I'm Hagen." The hoarse voice matched the tired lines in the face.
"Thought so," said Sandecker. "The President described you in some detail."
Hagen patted his rotund stomach and forced a smile. "I'm not hard to pick out in a crowd." Then he paused and looked at Sandecker strangely. "You say the President--"
"I met with him four hours ago in the White House. My name is James Sandecker and this is Al Giordino. We're with NUMA."
"Yes, Admiral, I know the name. What can I do for you?"
"We're friends of Dirk Pitt and Jessie LeBaron."
Hagen closed his eyes for a second and then gazed at Sandecker steadily. "Mrs. LeBaron is one hell of a woman. Except for a few small cuts and bruises, she came out of the explosion in good shape. She's helping out at an emergency hospital for children in the old cathedral. But if you're looking for Pitt, I'm afraid you're wasting your time. He was at the helm of the Amy Bigalow when she blew up."
Giordino suddenly felt sick at heart. "There's no chance he might have escaped?"
"Of the men who fought off the Russians on the docks while the ships slipped out to sea, only two survived. Every one of the crew on board the ships and tugboat is missing. There's little hope any of them made it clear in time. And if the explosions didn't kill them, they surely must have drowned in the tidal wave."
Giordino clenched his fists in frustration. He turned and faced away so the others couldn't see the tears rimming his eyes.
Sandecker shook his head in sorrow. "We'd like to make a search of the hospitals."
"I hate to sound heartless, Admiral, but you'd do better to look in the morgues."
"We'll do both."
"I'll ask the Swiss to arrange a diplomatic pass so you can move freely about the city."
"Thank you."
Hagen looked at both men, his eyes filled with compassion. "If it's any consolation, your friend Pitt was responsible for saving a hundred thousand lives."
Sandecker stared back, a sudden proud look on his face. "And if you knew Dirk Pitt, Mr. Hagen, you'd have expected no less."
>
With not much optimism, Sandecker and Giordino began looking for Pitt in the hospitals. They stepped over countless wounded who lay in rows on the floors as nurses administered what aid they could and teams of exhausted doctors labored in the operating rooms. Numerous times they stopped and helped move stretcher cases before continuing the hunt.
They could not find Pitt among the living.
Next they searched through the makeshift morgues, some with trucks waiting in front containing bodies stacked four and five deep. A small army of embalmers worked feverishly to prevent the spread of disease. The dead lay everywhere like cordwood, their faces bare, staring vacantly at the ceilings. Many were too burned and mutilated to identify and were later buried in a mass ceremony in the Colon cemetery.
One harried morgue attendant showed them the remains of a man reported to have been washed in from the sea. It was not Pitt, and they failed to identify Manny because they did not know him.
The early-morning sun rose over the ravaged city. More injured were found and carried to the hospitals, more dead to the morgues. Troops with fixed bayonets walked the streets to prevent looting.
Flames still raged in the dock area, but the firefighters were making headway. The vast cloud still bloomed black in the sky, and airline pilots reported that easterly winds had carried it as far as Mexico City.
Sickened by the sights they witnessed that night, Sandecker and Giordino were glad to see daylight again. They drove to within three blocks of Cathedral Plaza and were stopped by wreckage blocking the streets. They walked the rest of the way to the temporary children's hospital to find Jessie.
She was soothing a small girl who was whimpering as a doctor encased a slim brown leg in a cast.
Jessie looked up at the admiral and Giordino as they approached. Unconsciously her eyes wandered over their faces, but her weary mind did not recognize them.
"Jessie," said Sandecker softly. "It's Jim Sandecker and Al Giordino."
She looked at them for a few seconds and then it began to register. "Admiral. Al. Oh, thank God you've come." She whispered something in the girl's ear, and then stood and embraced them both, crying uncontrollably.
The doctor nodded at Sandecker. "She's been working like a demon for twenty hours straight. Why don't you see to it she takes a breather."
Each man took an arm and eased her outside. They gently lowered her to a sitting position on the cathedral steps.
Giordino sat down in front of Jessie and looked at her. She was still dressed in combat fatigues. The camouflage pattern was now blotched wi
th bloodstains. Her hair was damp with perspiration and tangled, her eyes red from the pervasive smoke.
"I'm so glad you found me," she said finally. "Did you just arrive?"
"Last night," replied Giordino. "We've been looking for Dirk."
She gazed blankly at the great smoke cloud. "He's gone," she said as if in a trance.
"The bad penny always turns up," Giordino muttered absently.
"They're all gone-- my husband, Dirk, so many others." Her voice died.
"Is there coffee anywhere?" said Sandecker, changing the tack of the conversation. "I think we could all use a cup."
Jessie nodded weakly toward the entrance to the cathedral. "A poor woman whose children are badly injured has been making some for the volunteers."
"I'll get it," said Giordino. He rose and disappeared inside.
Jessie and the admiral sat there for several moments, listening to the sirens and watching the flames leap in the distance.
"When we return to Washington," Sandecker said at last, "if I can help in any way. . ."
"You're most kind, Admiral, but I can manage." She hesitated. "There is one thing. Do you think that Raymond's body might be found and shipped home for burial?"
"I'm sure after all you've done, Castro will cut through any red tape."
"Strange how we became drawn into all this because of the treasure."
"The La Dorada?"
Jessie's eyes stared at a group of figures walking toward them in the distance, but she gave no sign of seeing them. "Men have been beguiled by her for nearly five hundred years, and most have died because of their lust to own her. Stupid. . . stupid to waste lives over a statue."
"She is still considered the greatest treasure of them all."
Jessie closed her eyes tiredly. "Thank heavens it's hidden. Who knows how many men would kill for it."
"Dirk would never climb over someone's bones for money," Sandecker said. "I know him too well. He was in it for the adventure and the challenge of solving a mystery, not for profit."
Jessie did not reply. She opened her eyes and finally took notice of the approaching party. She could not see them clearly. One of them seemed seven feet tall through the yellow haze from the smoke. The others were quite small. They were singing, but she couldn't make out the tune.
Giordino returned with a small board holding three cups. He stopped and stared for a long moment at the group threading their way through the rubble in the plaza.
The figure in the middle wasn't seven feet tall, but a man with a small boy perched on his shoulders.
The boy looked frightened and tightly laced his hands around the man's forehead, obscuring the upper part of his face. A young girl was cradled in one muscled arm, while the opposite hand was clutched by a girl no more than five. A string of ten or eleven other children followed close behind. They sounded as if they were singing in halting English. Three dogs trotted alongside and yapped in accompaniment.
Sandecker looked at Giordino curiously. The barrel-chested Italian blinked away the eye-watering smoke and gazed with an intense wondering expression at the strange and pathetic sight.
The man looked like an apparition, exhausted, desperately so. His clothes were in tatters and he walked with a limp. The eyes were sunken and the gaunt face was streaked with dried blood. Yet his jaw was determined, and he led the children in song with a booming voice.
"I must go back to work," said Jessie, struggling to her feet. "Those children will need care."
They were close enough now so that Giordino could make out the song they were singing.
I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy. A Yankee Doodle do or die. . .
Giordino's jaw dropped and his eyes widened in disbelief. He pointed in uncomprehending awe. Then he threw the coffee cups over his shoulder and bounded down the steps of the cathedral like a madman.
"It's him!" he shouted.
A real live nephew of my Uncle Sam. Born on the fourth of July.
"What was that?" Sandecker shouted after him. "What did you say?"
Jessie jumped to her feet, suddenly oblivious to the wrenching fatigue, and ran after Giordino. "He's come back!" she cried.
Then Sandecker took off.
The children stopped in midchorus and huddled around the man, frightened at the sudden appearance of three people shouting and running toward them. They clung to him as life itself. The dogs closed ranks around his legs and began barking louder than ever.
Giordino halted and stood there only two feet away, not sure of what to say that was meaningful. He smiled and smiled in immense delight and relief. At last he found his tongue.
"Welcome back, Lazarus."
Pitt grinned impishly. "Hello, pal. You wouldn't happen to have a dry martini in your pocket?"
>
Six hours later Pitt was sleeping like a stone in an empty alcove of the cathedral. He had refused to go down until the children were cared for and the dogs fed. Then he insisted that Jessie get some rest too.
They lay a few feet apart on double blankets that served as pads against the hard tile floor. Faithful Giordino sat in a wicker chair at the entrance of the alcove, guarding against invasion of their sleep, shushing an occasional band of children who played too close and too loud.
He stiffened at the sight of Sandecker approaching with a group of uniformed Cubans at his heels. Ira Hagen was among them, looking older and far more tired than when Giordino had last seen him, hardly twenty hours previously. The man next to Hagen and directly behind the admiral, Giordino recognized immediately. He rose to his feet as Sandecker nodded toward the sleeping figures.
"Wake them up," he said quietly.
Jessie struggled up from the depths and moaned. Giordino had to shake her by the shoulder several times to keep her from slipping back again. Still bone-tired and drugged from sleep, she sat up and shook her head to clear the blurriness.
Pitt came awake almost instantly, his mind triggered like an alarm clock. He twisted around and elbowed himself to a sitting position, eyes alert and sweeping the men standing around him in a half circle.
"Dirk," said Sandecker. "This is President Fidel Castro. He was making an inspection tour of the hospitals and was told you and Jessie were here. He'd like to talk to you."
Before Pitt could make a remark, Castro stepped forward, took his hand, and pulled him to his feet with surprising strength. The magnetic brown eyes met with piercing opaline green. Castro wore neat, starched olive fatigues with a commander in chief's shoulder insignia, in contrast to Pitt, who still had on the same ragged and dirty clothes as when he arrived at the cathedral.
"So this is the man who made idiots out of my security police and saved the city," said Castro in Spanish.
Jessie translated, and Pitt made a negative gesture. "I was only one of the luckier men who survived.
At least two dozen others died trying to prevent the tragedy."
"If the ships had exploded while still tied to the docks, most of Havana would now be a leveled wasteland. A tomb for myself as well as half a million people. Cuba is grateful and wishes to make you a Hero of the Revolution."
"There goes my standing in the neighborhood," muttered Pitt.
Jessie threw him a distasteful look and didn't translate.
"What did he say?" asked Castro.
Jessie cleared her throat. "Ah. . . he said he is honored to accept."
Castro then asked Pitt to describe the seizing of the ships. "Tell me what you saw," he said politely.
"Everything you know that happened. From the beginning."
"Starting with the time we left the Swiss Embassy?" Pitt asked, his eyes narrowed in furtive but shrewd reflection.
"If you wish," answered Castro, comprehending the look.
As Pitt narrated the desperate fight on the docks and the struggle to move the Amy Bigalow and the Ozero Zuysun from the harbor, Castro interrupted with a barrage of questions. The Cuban leader's curiosity was insatiable. The report took almost as long as the actu
al event.
Pitt related the facts as straight and unemotionally as he could, knowing he could never do justice to the incredible courage of men who selflessly gave their lives for people of another country. He told of Clark's magnificent holding action against overwhelming odds-- how Manny and Moe and their crews struggled in the dark bowels of the ships to get them under way, knowing they could be blown into atoms at any moment. He told how Jack and his crew stayed with the tugboat, towing the death ships out to sea until it was too late to escape. He wished they could all be there to tell their own stories, and he wondered what they might have said. He smiled to himself, knowing how Manny would have turned the air blue with pungent language.
At last Pitt told of being swept into the city by the tidal wave and blacking out, and how he regained consciousness hanging upside down from an overhead jewelry-shop sign. He related how staggering through the debris he heard a little girl crying, and pulled her and a brother from under the wreckage of a collapsed apartment building. After that he seemed to attract lost children like a magnet. Rescue workers added to his collection during the night. When no more could be found alive, a policeman directed Pitt to the children's hospital and relief center, where he was discovered by his friends.
Suddenly Pitt's voice trailed off and he dropped his hands limply to his sides. "That's all there is to tell."
Castro looked at Pitt steadily, his face filled with emotion. He stepped forward and embraced him.
"Thank you," he murmured in a broken voice. Then he kissed Jessie on both cheeks and shook Hagen's hand. "Cuba thanks you all. We will not forget."
Pitt looked at Castro slyly. "I wonder if I might ask a favor?"
"You have but to name it," Castro quickly answered.
Pitt hesitated, then he said, "There is this taxi driver named Herberto Figueroa. If I were to find him a restored 'fifty-seven Chevrolet in the States and have it shipped, do you suppose you could arrange for him to take delivery. Herberto and I would both be very grateful."