Seawitch

by Alistair MacLean

  The US navy had two points of cold comfort to offer. What the United States did with its obsolete submarines was to scrap them or sell them to foreign governments: none had ever fallen into the hands of commercial companies or private individuals. Nor were there any Cousteau-type submersibles along the Gulf Coast.

  The telephone call-up bell jangled. Lord Worth switched on the wall-receivers. The radio officer was succinct.

  ‘Helicopter, flying low, due north-west, five miles out.’

  ‘Well, now,’ Larsen said, ‘this should provide a diversion. Coming, Mitchell?’

  ‘In a moment. I have a little note to write. Remember?’

  ‘The note, of course.’ Larsen left. Mitchell penned a brief note in neat printed script that left no room for misinterpretation, folded it in his pocket and went to the door. Lord Worth said: ‘Mind if I come along?’

  ‘Well, there’ll be no danger, but I think you’d be better occupied in listening for messages from radar, radio, sonar and those monitoring the sensory devices attached to the massive anchoring cables.’

  ‘Agreed. And I’ll call up the Secretary to see what luck he’s had in hauling those damned warships off my back.’

  Marina said sweetly: ‘If there’s no danger I’m coming with you.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You have a very limited vocabulary, Mr Mitchell.’

  ‘Instead of trying to be a heroine you might try the Florence Nightingale bit–there are two very sick people through there who require their hands held.’

  ‘You’re too bossy by half, Michael.’

  ‘In today’s idiom, a male chauvinist pig.’

  ‘Could you imagine me marrying a person like you?’

  ‘Your imagination is your business. Besides, I’ve never asked you to.’ He left.

  ‘Well!’ She looked suspiciously at her father, but Lord. Worth had his risibility under complete control. He picked up a phone and asked for the Christmas tree to be opened and the exploratory drilling restarted.

  The helicopter was making its landing approach as Mitchell joined Larsen and Palermo and his men in the deep shadows of the accommodation area. The platform lights had been dimmed but the helipad was brightly illuminated. Palermo had six portable search-lights in position. He nodded to Mitchell, then made his unhurried way to the helipad. He was carrying an envelope in his hand.

  The helicopter touched down, the door opened and men with a discouraging assortment of automatic weapons started to disembark. Palermo said: ‘I’m Marino. Who’s in charge here?’

  ‘Me. Mortensen.’ He was a bulky young man in battle fatigues, and looked more like a bright young lieutenant than the thug he undoubtedly was. ‘I thought Durand was in charge here?’

  ‘He is. At the moment he’s having a brief and painful conversation with Lord Worth. He’s waiting for you in Lord Worth’s quarters.’

  ‘Why are the deck lights so dim?’

  ‘Voltage drop. Being fixed. The helipads have their own generators.’ He pointed. ‘Over there.’

  Mortensen nodded and led his eight men away. Palermo said: ‘Join you in a minute. I have a private message for the pilot from Cronkite.’

  Palermo climbed up into the helicopter. He greeted the pilot and said: ‘I have a message here for you from Cronkite.’

  The pilot registered a degree of surprise. ‘I was under orders to fly straight back.’

  ‘Won’t be long. It appears that Cronkite is anxious to see Lord Worth and his daughters.’

  The pilot grinned and took the envelope from Palermo. He opened it, examined both sides of a blank sheet of paper and said: ‘What gives?’

  ‘This.’ Palermo showed him a gun about the size of a small cannon. ‘I can’t stand dead heroes.’

  The platform lights went out and six searchlights came on. Larsen’s stentorian voice carried clearly. ‘Throw down your guns. You have no chance.’

  One of Mortensen’s men suicidally thought different. He flung himself to the platform deck, loosed off a burst of sub-machine-gun fire and successfully killed one of the search-lights. If he felt any sense of gratification it must have been the shortest on record, for he was dead while the shattered glass was still tinkling down on the platform. The other eight men threw down their guns.

  Palermo sighed, He said to the pilot: ‘See? Dead heroes are no good to anyone, Come along.’

  Eight of the nine men, together with the pilot, were shepherded into a windowless store-room and locked inside. The ninth, Mortensen, was taken to the radio room where he was shortly joined by Mitchell. For the occasion Mitchell had changed into a boiler-suit and makeshift hood, which not only effectively masked his face but also muffled his voice He had no wish to be identified.

  He produced the paper on which he had made notes, screwed the muzzle of his .38 into the base of Mortensen’s neck, told him to contact Cronkite and read out the message and that the slightest deviation from the script would mean a shattered brain. Mortensen was no fool and in his peculiar line of trade he had looked into the face of death more than once. He made the contact, said all was well, that he and Durand were in complete control of the Seawitch but that it might be several hours before the helicopter could return as last-minute engine-failure had damaged the undercarriage. Cronkite seemed reasonably satisfied and hung up.

  When Larsen and Mitchell returned to Lord Worth’s cabin Lord Worth seemed in a more cheerful frame of mind. The Pentagon had reported that the two naval vessels from Cuba and the one from Venezuela were stopped in the water and appeared to be awaiting instructions. The Torbello was on its way again and was expected to arrive in Galveston in ninety minutes. Lord Worth might have felt less satisfied if he’d known that the Torbello, shaking in every rivet, seam and plate, was several hundred miles from Galveston, travelling south-west in calm seas. Mulhooney was in no mood to hang around.

  Marina said accusingly: ‘I heard shots being fired out there.’

  ‘Just warning shots in the air,’ Mitchell said. ‘Frightens the hell out of people.’

  ‘You made them all prisoner.’

  Lord Worth said irritably: ‘Don’t talk nonsense. Now do be quiet. The Commander and I have important matters to discuss.’

  ‘We’ll leave,’ Mitchell said. He looked at Marina. ‘Come and let’s see the patients off.’

  They followed the two stretchers out to the helicopter. They were accompanied by Durand and Aaron–both with their hands lashed behind their backs and on a nine-inch hobble–Dr Greenshaw and one of Palermo’s men, a menacing individual with a sawn-off shot-gun who was to ride guard on the captives until they reached the mainland.

  Mitchell said to Marina: ‘Last chance.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘We’re going to make a great couple,’ Mitchell said gloomily. ‘Monosyllabic is what I mean.’

  They said their goodbyes, watched the helicopter lift off and made their way back to Lord Worth’s quarters. Both he and Larsen were on separate lines, and from the expressions on their faces it was clear that they were less happy with life than they might have been. Both men were trying, with zero effect, to obtain some additional tankerage. There were, in fact, some half-dozen idle tankers on the south and east coast in the 50,000 dw range, but all belonged to the major oil companies who would have gone to the stake sooner than charter any of their vessels to the Worth Hudson Oil Company. The nearest tankers of the required tonnage were either in Britain, Norway or the Mediterranean, and to have brought them across would have involved an intolerable loss of time, not to say money, which last matter lay very close to Lord Worth’s heart. He and Larsen had even considered bringing one of their super-tankers into service, but had decided against it. Because of the tankers’ huge carrying capacity, the loss in revenue would have been unbearably high. And what had happened to the Crusader might even happen to a super-tanker. True, they were insured at Lloyd’s, but that august firm’s marine accident investigators were notoriously, if justifiably, cagey, prudent and tho
roughly cautious men, and although they invariably settled any genuine claim they tended to deliberate at length before making any final decision.

  Another call came through from the Torbello. On course, its estimated time of arrival in Galveston was one hour. Lord Worth said gloomily that they had at least two tankers in operation: they would just have to step up their already crowded schedules.

  One half-hour later another message came through from the tanker. One half-hour to Galveston. Lord Worth might have felt less assured had he known that now that dark had fallen the Starlight, leaving the Georgia where it was, had already moved away in the direction of the Seawitch, its engines running on its electrical batteries. Its chances of sonar detection by the Seawitch were regarded as extremely small. It carried with it highly skilled divers and an unpleasant assortment of mines, limpet mines and amatol beehives, all of which could be controlled by long-distance radio.

  Yet another half-hour passed before the welcome news came through that the tanker Torbello was safely berthed in Galveston. Lord Worth said to Larsen that he intended to make an immediate voice-link call to the port authorities in Galveston to ensure the fastest turn-round ever, money no object.

  He got his voice-link in just one minute–the Lord Worths of this world are never kept waiting. When he made his customary peremptory demands the harbour-master expressed a considerable degree of surprise.

  ‘I really can’t imagine what you are talking about, sir.’

  ‘God damn it, I always know what I’m talking about.’

  ‘Not in this case, Lord Worth. I’m afraid you’ve been misinformed or hoaxed. The Torbello has not arrived.’

  ‘But damn it, I’ve just heard–’

  ‘One moment, please.’

  The moment passed into about thirty, during which Mitchell thoughtfully brought Lord Worth a glass of scotch, which he half-consumed at one gulp. Then the voice came through again.

  ‘Disturbing news. Not only is there no sign of your tanker, but our radar scanners show no signs of any vessel of that size being within a radius of forty miles.’

  ‘Then what the devil can have happened to her? I was speaking to her only two or three minutes ago.’

  ‘On her own call-sign?’

  ‘Yes. damn it.’

  ‘Then obviously she’s come to no harm.’

  Lord Worth hung up without as much as a courtesy thank-you. He glowered at Larsen and Mitchell as if what had happened had been their fault. He said at length: ‘I can only conclude that the captain of the Torbello has gone off his rocker.’

  Mitchell said: ‘And I conclude that he’s safely under lock and key aboard his own ship.’

  Lord Worth was heavily ironic. ‘In addition to your many other accomplishments you’ve now become psychic.’

  ‘Your Torbello has been hijacked.’

  ‘Hijacked! Hijacked! Now you’ve gone off your rocker. Whoever heard of a tanker being hijacked?’

  ‘Whoever heard of a jumbo-jet being hijacked until the first one was? After what happened to the Crusader in Galveston the captain of the Torbello would have been extremely wary of being approached, far less boarded, by any other vessel unless it were a craft with respectability beyond question. The only two such types of craft are naval or coastguard. We’ve heard that the Marine Gulf Corporation’s survey vessel has been stolen. Many of those survey vessels are ex-coastguard with a helipad for a helicopter to carry out seismological pattern bombing. The ship was called the Hammond. With your connections you could find out in minutes.’

  Lord Worth did find out in minutes. He said: ‘So you’re right.’ He was too dumbfounded even to apologize. ‘And this of course was the Questar that Cronkite sailed from Galveston. God only knows what name it goes under now. What next, I wonder?’

  Mitchell said: ‘A call from Cronkite, I should think.’

  ‘What would he call me for?’

  ‘Some outrageous demands, I should imagine. I don’t know.’

  Lord Worth was nothing if not resilient. He had powerful and influential friends. He called an admiral friend in the naval headquarters in Washington and demanded that an air-sea search unit be despatched immediately to the scene. The navy apologetically said that they would have to obtain the permission of their Commander-in-Chief–in effect, the President. The President, apparently, professed a profound if polite degree of disinterest. Neither he nor Congress had any reason to love the oil companies who had so frequently flouted them, which was less than fair to Lord Worth who had never flouted anyone in Washington in his life More, the search almost certainly lay outside their jurisdictional waters. Besides, it was raining in the Gulf and black as the Earl of Hell’s waistcoat, and though their radar might well pick up a hundred ships in the area visual identification would be impossible.

  He tried the CIA. Their disinterest was even more profound. In the several years past they had had their fingers badly burnt in public and all their spare time was devoted to licking their wounds.

  The FBI curtly reminded him that their activities were purely internal and that anyway they got sea-sick whenever they ventured on water.

  Lord Worth considered making an appeal to the UNO, but was dissuaded by Larsen and Mitchell. Not only would the Gulf states, Venezuela, Nigeria, every Communist country and what now went by the name of the Third World–and they held the vast majority of votes in the UNO–veto any such suggestion: the UNO had no legal power to initiate any such action. Apart from that, by that time the entire UNO were probably in bed anyway.

  For once in his life Lord Worth appeared to be at a loss. Life, it appeared, could hold no more for him. But Lord Worth was discovering that, upon occasion, he could be as fallible as the next man: for seconds later he was at an utter and total loss.

  A voice-over call came through. It was, as Mitchell had predicted it would be, Cronkite. He was glad to inform Lord Worth that there was no cause for concern over the Torbello as she was in safe hands.

  ‘Where?’ Had his daughter not been present Lord Worth would undoubtedly have qualified his question with a few choice adjectives.

  ‘I prefer not to specify exactly. Enough to say that she is securely anchored in the territorial waters of a Central American country. It is my intention to dispose of the oil to this very poor and oil-deficient country–’ he did not mention that it was his intention to sell it at half-price, which would bring in a few acceptable hundred thousand dollars–’then take the tanker out to sea and sink it in a hundred fathoms. Unless, of course–’

  ‘Unless what?’ Lord Worth asked. His voice had assumed a peculiar hoarseness.

  ‘Unless you close down the Christmas tree on the Seawitch and immediately stop all pumping and drilling.’

  ‘Fool.’

  ‘You said what?’

  ‘Your thugs have already attended to that. Haven’t they told you?’

  ‘I want proof. I want Mortensen.’

  Lord Worth said wearily: ‘Hold on. We’ll get him.’

  Mitchell went to fetch him. By the time he returned, again overalled and masked, Mortensen had been thoroughly briefed. He confirmed to Cronkite that all pumping and drilling had stopped. Cronkite expressed his satisfaction and the radio link went dead. Mitchell removed the .38 from the base of Mortensen’s skull and two of Palermo’s men took him from the room. Mitchell took off his hood and Marina looked at him with a mixture of horror and incredulity.

  She whispered: ‘You were ready to kill him.’

  ‘Not at all. I was going to pat him on the head and tell him what a good boy he was. I asked you to get off this rig.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  Lord Worth had barely begun to wipe his brow when two men hurried into the room. One was Palermo and the other was one of the rig crew, Simpson, whose duty it was to monitor the sensory instruments attached to the platform’s legs and the tensioning anchor cables. He was obviously in a state of considerable agitation.

  Lord Worth said: ‘What fresh horror does fate hold i
n store for us now?’

  ‘Somebody below the rig, sir. My instruments have gone a bit haywire. Some object, something almost certainly metallic, sir, is in intermittent contact with the western leg.’

  ‘There can be no doubt about this?’ Simpson shook his head. ‘Seems damnably odd that Cronkite would try to bring down the Seawitch with his own men on board.’

  Mitchell said ‘Maybe he doesn’t want to bring it down, just damage the leg enough to destroy the buoyancy in the leg and the adjacent members and to tilt the Seawitch so that the drill and the pumping mechanism are rendered useless Maybe anything. Or maybe he would be prepared to sacrifice his own men to get you.’ He turned to Palermo ‘I know you have scuba equipment aboard. Show me.’ They left.

  Marina said: ‘I suppose he’s off to murder someone else. He’s not really human, is he?’

  Lord Worth looked at her without enthusiasm. ‘If you call being inhuman wanting to see that you don’t die, then he’s inhuman. There’s only one person aboard this rig he really cares for and you damned well know it. I never thought. I’d be ashamed of a daughter of mine.’

  Palermo had in fact, two trained scuba divers with him, but Mitchell chose only one to accompany him. Palermo was not a man to be easily impressed but he had seen enough of Mitchell not to question his judgment. In remarkably quick time Mitchell and the other man, who went by the name of Sawyers, were dressed in scuba outfits, and were equipped with reloadable compressed air harpoon guns and sheath knives. They were lowered to the water by the only available means in such a giant TLP–in a wire mesh cage attached to the boom of the derrick crane. Once at water level they opened the hinged door, dived and swam to the giant western leg.

  Simpson had made no mistake. They were indeed at work down there, two of them, attached by airlines and cables to the shadowy outline of a vessel some twenty feet above them. Both wore powerful headlamps. They were energetically engaged in attaching limpet mines, conventional magnetic mines and wrap round rolls of beehive amatol to the enormous leg. They had enough explosives there, Mitchell figured, to bring down the Eiffel Tower. Maybe Cronkite did intend to destroy the leg. That Cronkite was unhinged seemed more probable than not.