"You cannot do this to me and live," he hissed. "Even if I'm killed, I have devised methods to make those responsible pay."
"An avenging hit team," said Pitt dryly. "How foresighted of you. After cooking in the sun, you must be tired and thirsty. Please take a chair. AI, bring Mr. Massarde a bottle of his special French mineral water."
Massarde very slowly eased into a soft leather chair, his face suddenly taut from agony. Settled finally in a comfortable position, he took a deep breath. "You are fools if you think you can get away with this. Kazim has ambitious officers who will quickly step into his place, men who are as vicious and cunning as he was, and who will send a force to bury you in the desert before the next sun."
He reached for the bottle of water held out to him by Giordino and swallowed its entire contents within seconds. Without being asked, Giordino handed him another.
Pitt couldn't help but admire Massarde's incomparable nerve. The man acted as if he was in complete control of his situation:
Massarde finished off the second bottle and then looked around his office for his personal secretary. "Where is Verenne?"
"Dead," Pitt said tersely.
For the first time Massarde looked genuinely surprised. "You murdered him?"
Pitt shrugged indifferently. "He tried to stab Giordino here. Stupid of him to attack a man carrying a gun with a letter opener."
"He did that?" Massarde asked warily.
"I can show you the body if you like."
"Not at all like Verenne. He was a coward."
Pitt exchanged glances with Giordino. Verenne had already been put to work and was under guard in an office two floors below.
"I've got a proposition for you," said Pitt.
"What deal could you possibly make with me?" snarled Massarde.
"I've had a change of heart. If you promise to mend your crooked ways, I'll let you walk from this room, board your helicopter, and leave Mali."
"Is this some sort of joke?"
"Not at all. I've decided the sooner you're out of my hair, the better."
"Surely you can't be serious," said Brunone. "The man is a dangerous menace. He'll strike back at his first opportunity."
"Yes, the Scorpion. Is that what you're called, Massarde?"
The Frenchman did not answer, but sat in sullen silence.
"Are you sure you know what you're doing?" asked Giordino.
"There will be no argument," Pitt said harshly. "I want this scum out of here, and I want him out now. Captain Brunone, escort Massarde to his helicopter and see that it lifts off with him on it."
Massarde rose shakily to his feet; the sunburned skin was tightening and it was with only an agonized effort that he could stand straight. Despite the pain he smiled. His mind was churning again. "I will require several hours to pack my things and personal records."
"You have exactly two minutes to get off the project."
Massarde swore, bitterly and vilely. "Not like this, not without my clothes. My God, man, show some decency."
"What do you know about decency?" Pitt said dispassionately. "Captain Brunone, get this son of a bitch out of here before I kill him myself."
Brunone didn't have to order his two men. He simply nodded and they hustled the wildly cursing Yves Massarde into the elevator. No word passed between the three men in the office as they stood at the window and watched the humiliated mogul roughly shoved aboard his luxury helicopter. The door was closed and the rotors began to thump the hot air. In less than four minutes it had disappeared over the desert to the north.
"He's heading northeast," observed Giordino.
"My guess is Libya," said Brunone. "And then on to hidden exile before recovering his loot."
"His final destination is of no consequence," Pitt said, yawning.
"You should have killed him," Brunone said, his voice sharp with disappointment.
"No need to bother. He won't live out the week."
"How can you say that?" asked an astonished Brunone. "You let him go free. Why? The man has the resilience and lives of a cat. He's not about to die from sunburn."
"No, but he will die." Pitt nodded at Giordino. "Did you make the switch okay?"
Giordino grinned back. "As smoothly as decanting wine."
Brunone looked confused. "What are you talking about?"
"Tying Massarde down out in the sun," explained Pitt, "I wanted to make him thirsty."
"Thirsty? I don't understand."
"Al here, emptied the bottles of mineral water and refilled them with water contaminated by chemicals leaking from the underground storage vault."
"It's called poetic justice." Giordino held up the empty bottles. "He drank almost 3 liters of the stuff."
"As his internal organs disintegrate, his brain will be eaten away and he will go mad." Pitt's tone was ice cold, his face chiseled in stone.
"There is no hope for him?" a dazed Brunone asked.
Pitt shook his head. "Yves Massarde will die strapped to a bed, screaming to escape his torment. I only wish his victims could be there to see it."
THE TEXAS
June 10, 1996
Washington, D. C.
Two weeks after the siege of Fort Foureau, Admiral Sandecker was seated in a conference room at NUMA's headquarters in Washington at the head of along table. Dr. Chapman, Hiram Yaeger, and Rudi Gunn sat alongside, staring into a large TV monitor embedded in one wall.
The Admiral motioned impatiently at the blank screen. "When are they going to come on?"
Yaeger was holding a telephone to his ear while studying the monitor. "The satellite should be downlinking their signal from Mali any second."
Almost before Yaeger finished speaking, a picture flickered and settled onto the screen. Pitt and Giordino sat together behind a desk piled with file folders and papers while facing into a camera. "Are you receiving us all right on your end?" asked Yaeger.
"Hello, Hiram," answered Pitt. "Nice to see your face and hear your voice."
"You're looking good here. Everyone is anxious to talk to you."
"Good morning, Dirk," greeted Sandecker. "How are your injuries?"
"It's afternoon here, Admiral. And I'm healing nicely, thank you."
After Pitt exchanged friendly greetings with Rudi Gunn and Dr. Chapman, the Admiral launched the discussion. "We have good news," he said enthusiastically. "A satellite survey of the South Atlantic, computer analyzed only an hour ago, shows the growth rate of the red tide as falling off. All of Yaeger's projections indicate that the spread is slowly grinding to a halt."
"And not a week too soon," said Gunn. "We've already detected a 5 percent drop in the world's total oxygen supply. It wouldn't be long before we'd all begin to feel the effects."
"All automobiles from every cooperating nation in the world were within twenty-four hours of being banned from the streets," Yaeger lectured. "All aircraft grounded, all industrial factories shut down. The world was a hair away from coming to a standstill."
"But it appears both our efforts have paid off," acknowledged Chapman. "You and Al, finding and burning the source of the synthetic amino acid that stimulated the dinoflagellate population explosion, and our NUMA scientific team discovering the little critters are fussy about reproducing if they're subjected to a one-part-per=million dose of copper."
"Have you found a significant drop in the contamination streaming into the Niger River since we shut off the flow?" asked Pitt.
Gunn nodded. "By nearly 30 percent. I underestimated the migration rate of groundwater from the hazardous waste project south to the river. It moves more rapidly through the textured sand and gravel of the Sahara than I originally projected."
"How long before the pollution reaches a safe level?"
"Dr. Chapman and I are predicting a good six months before most of its residue has flowed into the ocean."
"Cutting off the pollutant was a vital first step," Chapman spelled out. "It gave us extra time to air drop copper particles over large areas o
f the tides. I think it's safe to say we've turned the corner on an eco-disaster of frightening consequences."
"But the battle is far from over," Sandecker reminded him. "The United States alone produces only 58 percent of the oxygen it consumes, oxygen mostly created by plankton in the Pacific Ocean. In another twenty years, because of the increase in auto and air traffic, and the continuing devastation to the world's forests and wetlands, we'll begin to use up our oxygen faster than nature can replenish it."
"And we still face the problem we're currently experiencing of chemicals poisoning the oceans," Chapman followed the Admiral. "We've had a bad scare, but the near tragedy with the red tides has demonstrated how critically close human and wildlife are to the last gasp of oxygen"
"Maybe from now on," said Pitt, "we won't take our air supply for granted."
"Two weeks have passed since you took over Fort Foureau," said Sandecker. "What's your situation with the operation?"
"Pretty damned good, actually," answered Giordino. "After cutting off all incoming waste shipments by train, we've kept the solar reactor burning day and night. Another thirty-six hours should see all industrial contaminants that Massarde hid away in the underground storage vaults destroyed."
"What have you done about the nuclear waste storage?" asked Chapman.
"After they had a brief rest from their ordeal at Tebezza," Pitt replied, "I asked the original French engineers who supervised the construction of the project to return. They agreed and have since assembled Malian work crews to continue excavating the storage chamber down to 1.5 kilometers."
"Will that depth keep high-level waste safe from earth's organisms? Plutonium 239, for example, has a half-life of 24,000 years."
Pitt smiled. "Unknowingly, Massarde couldn't have selected a better place for the deep burial of waste. The geology is very stable in this part of the Sahara. The rock beds have been undisturbed for hundreds of millions of years. We're nowhere near crustal-plate boundaries, and far below existing groundwater. No one will have to worry about the waste affecting life ever again."
"How do you intend to contain the waste after it's stored underground?"
"The safety criteria the French waste experts have created are stringent. Before burial in the deep rock it will be encased in concrete and then in a stainless-steel cylinder. This is surrounded by a layer of asphalt and a cast-iron enclosure. Finally, a backfill of concrete is poured around the container before it is embedded in the rock."
Chapman grinned from ear to ear. "My compliments, Dirk. You've put together a world-class waste disposal site."
"Another bit of interesting news," said Sandecker. "Our government and that of Mongolia have shut down Massarde's hazardous waste projects in the Mojave and Gobi Deserts after surprise inspections by a team of international waste investigators found them to be substandard and unsafe."
"The Australian outback installation was also closed," Chapman added.
Pitt sat back and sighed. "I'm happy to hear Massarde is out of the waste disposal business."
"Speaking of the Scorpion," said Giordino, "how's his condition?"
"He was buried in Tripoli yesterday," replied Sandecker. "CIA agents reported that just before he died, he went insane and tried to make a meal of a doctor."
"The perfect ending," Giordino muttered sardonically.
"By the way," said Sandecker. "The President sends his warmest regards and thanks. Says he's going to issue a special citation of merit for your achievement."
Pitt and Giordino turned to each other and shrugged indifferently.
Sandecker chose to ignore the display of distaste. "You might be interested in knowing that for the first time in two decades, our State Department is working closely with the new Malian parliament. Much of the improved relations were due to you turning all profits from the project over to the government to aid their social programs."
"It seemed the proper thing to do since we couldn't profit by it," said Pitt benevolently.
"Any chance of a coup by the army?" inquired Gunn.
"Without Kazim, the inner core of his officers fell apart. To a man they crawled on their knees and swore undying allegiance to the leaders of the new government."
"It's been almost a month since any of us have seen your ugly faces in person," Sandecker smiled. "Your job is finished in the Sahara. When can I expect you back in Washington?"
"Even the turmoil and mess of the nation's capital would look good after this place," muttered Giordino.
"A week's vacation would be nice," Pitt answered seriously. "I have to ship something home and take care of some personal business. And then there's a little historical project I'd like to investigate here in the desert."
"The Texas?"
"How did you know?"
"St. Julien Perlmutter whispered in my ear."
"I'd be grateful for a favor, Admiral."
Sandecker made an act of shrugging condescendingly. "I guess I owe you a little free time."
"Please arrange for Julien to fly to Mali as quickly as possible."
"With Julien weighing in at 180 kilograms," Sandecker looked at Pitt roguishly, "you'll never get him on a camel."
"Much less induce him to trek over blistering sand under a blazing sun," Gunn joined in.
"If I'm right," said Pitt, staring through the monitor at them in amusement, "all I'll need to get Julien to walk twenty paces across desert terrain is a bottle of chilled Chardonnay."
"Before I forget," Sandecker spoke up, "the Aussies were overjoyed at your discovery of Kitty Mannock and her aircraft. You and Giordino are national heroes according to the Sydney papers."
"Do they have plans for a recovery?"
"A wealthy rancher from her home town has agreed to fund the operation. He plans to restore the plane and hang it in a museum in Melbourne. A recovery team should be at the location you provided by tomorrow."
"And Kitty?"
"A national holiday when her body is returned. I was told by the Australian ambassador that contributions are pouring in from all over the country for a memorial over her proposed grave site."
"Our country should contribute too, especially the South."
Curious, Sandecker asked, "What is our connection with her?"
"She's going to lead us to the Texas, " answered Pitt matter-of-factly.
Sandecker exchanged questioning looks with the NUMA men around the table. Then he refaced Pitt's image in the monitor and said, "We'd all be interested in knowing how a woman who's been dead for sixty-five years can pull off that little trick."
"I found Kitty's logbook in the wreckage," Pitt replied slowly. "She describes her discovery of a ship before she died, an iron ship buried in the desert."
"Good lord!" Perlmutter uttered as he peered out the helicopter's windshield at the sunrise illuminating the dead land below. "You walked through that?"
"Actually, we sailed across this section of the desert in our improvised land yacht," Pitt answered. "We're flying our trek in reverse."
Perlmutter had flown into Algiers on a military jet, and then caught a commercial airliner to the small desert city of Adrar in southern Algeria. There, Pitt and Giordino had met him shortly after midnight and escorted him aboard a helicopter they'd borrowed from the project's French construction crew.
After refueling, they headed south, spotting the land yacht just after dawn, lying forlornly on its side where they had left it after their rescue by the Arab truck driver. They landed and dismantled the old wing, cables, and wheels that had saved their lives, lashing the pieces to the landing skids of the helicopter. Then they lifted off with Pitt at the controls and set a course for the ravine that held Kitty Mannock's lost aircraft:
During the flight, Perlmutter read over a copy Pitt had made of Kitty's logbook. "What a courageous lady," he said in admiration. "With only a few swallows of water, a broken ankle, and a badly sprained knee, she hobbled nearly 16 kilometers under the most wretched conditions."
"And that wa
s only one way," Pitt reminded him. "After stumbling on the ship in the desert, she limped back to her aircraft."
"Yes, here it is," said Perlmutter, reading aloud.
Wednesday, October 14. Extreme heat. Becoming very miserable. Followed ravine southward until it finally opened out onto a wide, dry riverbed, I estimate about 10 miles from plane. Have trouble sleeping in the bitter cold nights. This afternoon I found a strange-looking ship half buried, in the desert. Thought I was hallucinating, but after touching the sloping sides of iron, I realized it was real. Entered around an old cannon protruding through an opening and spent the night. Shelter at last.
Thursday, October 15. Searched interior of ship. Too dark to see very much. Found several remains of the former crew. Very well preserved. Must have been dead a long time judging from the look of their uniforms. A plane flew over, but did not see the ship. I could not climb outside in time to signal. It was traveling in the direction of my crash. I will never be found here and have decided to return to my plane in the chance it has been discovered. I know now it was a mistake to try and walk out. If searchers found my plane they could never follow my trail. The wind has blown sand over it like snow in a blizzard. The desert has its own game, and I cannot beat it.
Perlmutter paused and looked up. "That explains why you found the logbook with her entries at the crash site. She carne back in the vain hope the search planes had found hers."
"What were her last words?" asked Giordino.
Perlmutter turned a page and continued reading.
Sunday, October 18. Returned to plane but have seen to sign of rescue party. Am pretty well done in. If I am round after I'm gone, please forgive the grief I've caused. A kiss for my mum and dad. Tell them I tried to die bravely. I cannot write more, my brain no longer controls my hand.
When Perlmutter finished, each man felt a deep sense of sadness and melancholy. They were all moved by Kitty's epic fight to survive. Tough guys to the end, they all fought to suppress their glistening eyes.
"She could have taught a lot of men the meaning of courage," Pitt said heavily.
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