The density increased as he dove deeper. Then suddenly, as if he’d passed through a door, the water temperature dropped by ten degrees and visibility stretched to almost ten feet. The colder layer acted as a cushion pushing against the warm current above. The bottom appeared and Pitt discerned the shadowy outline of a boat off to his right. He turned and gestured to Giordino, who gave an affirmative nod of his head.
As though growing out of a fog, the superstructure of the Eagle slowly took on shape. She lay like a lifeless animal, alone in haunted silence and watery gloom.
Pitt swam around one side of the hull while Giordino kicked around the other. The yacht was sitting perfectly upright with no indication of list. Except for a thin coating of algae that was forming on her white paint, she looked as pristine as when she rode the surface.
They met at the stern, and Pitt wrote on his message board, “Any damage?”
Giordino wrote back, “None.”
Then they slowly worked their way over the decks, past the darkened windows of the staterooms and up to the bridge. There was nothing to suggest death or tragedy. They probed their lights through the bridge windows into the black interior, but all they saw was eerie desolation. Pitt noted that the engine-room telegraph read ALL STOP.
He hesitated for a brief moment and wrote a new message on his board: “I’m going in.”
Giordino’s eyes glistened under the face-mask lens and he scrawled back, “I’m with you.”
Out of habit they checked their air gauges. There was enough time left for another twelve minutes of diving. Pitt tried the door to the wheelhouse. His heart squeezed within his chest. Even with Giordino at his side, the apprehension was oppressive. The latch turned and he pushed the door open. Taking a deep breath, Pitt swam inside.
The brass gave off a dull gleam under the dive lights. Pitt was curious at the barren look about the room. Nothing was out of place. The floor was clean of any spilled debris. It reminded him of the Pilottown.
Seeing nothing of interest, they threaded their way down a stairway into the lounge area of the deckhouse. In the fluid darkness the large enclosure seemed to yawn into infinity. Everywhere was the same strange neatness. Giordino aimed his light upward. The overhead beams and mahogany paneling had a stark, naked appearance. Then Pitt realized what was wrong. The ceiling should have been littered with objects that float. Everything that might have drifted to the surface and washed ashore must have been removed.
Accompanied by the gurgle of their escaping air bubbles, they glided through the passageway separating the staterooms. The same neat look was everywhere; even the beds and mattresses had been stripped. Their lights darted amid the furniture securely bolted to the carpeted deck. Pitt checked the bathrooms as Giordino probed the closets. By the time they reached the crew’s quarters, they only had seven minutes of air left. Communicating briefly with hand signals, they divided up, Giordino searching the galley and storerooms while Pitt took the engine room.
He found the hatch cover over the engine room locked and bolted. Without a second of lost motion, he quickly removed his dive knife from its leg sheath and pried out the pins in the hinges. The hatch cover, released from its mountings and thrust upward by its buoyancy, sailed past him.
And so did a bloated corpse that burst through the open hatch like a jack-in-the-box.
30
PITT REELED BACKWARD into a bulkhead and watched numbly as an unearthly parade of floating debris and bodies erupted from the engine room. They drifted up to the ceiling, where they hung in grotesque postures like trapped balloons. Though the internal gases had begun to expand, the flesh had not yet started to decompose. Sightless eyes bulged beneath strands of hair that wavered from the disturbance in the water.
Pitt struggled to fight off the grip of shock and revulsion, hardening his mind for the repugnant job he could not leave undone. With creeping nausea merged with cold fear he snaked through the hatch into the engine room.
His eyes were met with a charnel house of death. Bedding, clothing from half-open suitcases, pillows and cushions, anything buoyant enough to float, mingled between a crush of bodies. The scene was a nightmare that could never be imagined or remotely duplicated by a Hollywood horror film.
Most of the corpses wore white Coast Guard uniforms that added to their ghostly appearance. Several had on ordinary work clothes. None showed signs of injury or wounds.
He spent two minutes, no more, in there, cringing when a lifeless hand brushed across his arm or a white expressionless face drifted inches in front of his face mask. He could have sworn they were all staring at him, begging for something that was not his to give. One was dressed differently from the others, in a knit sweater covered by a stylish raincoat. Pitt swiftly rifled through the dead man’s pockets.
Pitt had seen enough to be permanently etched in his mind for a lifetime. He hurriedly kicked up the ladder and out of the engine room. Once free of the morbid scene below, he hesitated to read his air gauge. The needle indicated a hundred pounds, an ample supply to reach the sun again if he didn’t linger. He found Giordino rummaging through a cavernous food locker and made an upward gesture with his thumb. Giordino nodded and led the way through a passageway to the outside deck.
A great wave of relief swept over Pitt as the yacht receded into the murk. There wasn’t time to search for the buoy line so they ascended with the bubbles that flowed from their air regulators’ exhaust valves. The water slowly transformed from an almost brown-black to a leaden green. At last they broke the surface and found themselves fifty yards downstream from the Hoki Jamoki.
Sandecker and the boat’s crew of engineers spotted them immediately and quickly began hauling on the lifeline. Sandecker cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, “Hang on, we’ll pull you in.”
Pitt waved, thankful he could lie back and relax. He felt too drained to do anything but lazily float against the current and watch the trees lining the banks slip past. A few minutes later he and Giordino were lifted onto the deck of the old clamming boat.
“Is it the Eagle?” Sandecker asked, unable to mask his curiosity.
Pitt hesitated in answering until he’d removed his air tank. “Yes,” he said finally, “it’s the Eagle.”
Sandecker could not bring himself to ask the question that was gripping his mind. He sidestepped it. “Find anything you want to talk about?”
“The outside is undamaged. She’s sitting upright, her keel resting in about two feet of silt.”
“No sign of life?”
“Not from the exterior.”
It was obvious that Pitt wasn’t going to volunteer any information unless asked. His healthy tan seemed strangely paled.
“Could you see inside?” Sandecker demanded.
“Too dark to make out anything.”
“All right, dammit, let’s have it straight.”
“Now that you’ve asked so pleasantly,” Pitt said stonily, “there’s more dead bodies in the yacht than a cemetery. They were stacked in the engine room from deck to overhead. I counted twenty-one of them.”
“Christ!” Sandecker rasped, suddenly taken aback. “Could you recognize any of them?”
“Thirteen were crewmen. The rest looked to be civilians.”
“Eight civilians?” Sandecker seemed stunned.
“As near as I could judge by their clothing. They weren’t in any condition to interrogate.”
“Eight civilians,” Sandecker repeated. “And none of them looked remotely familiar to you?”
“I’m not sure their own mothers could identify them,” said Pitt. “Why? Was I supposed to know somebody?”
Sandecker shook his head. “I can’t say.”
Pitt couldn’t recall seeing the admiral so distraught. The iron armor had fallen away. The penetrating, intelligent eyes seemed stricken. Pitt watched for a reaction as he spoke.
“If I had to venture an opinion, I’d say someone’ snuffed the candle on half the Chinese embassy.”
“Chinese?” The eyes suddenly turned as sharp as ice picks. “What are you saying?”
“Seven of the eight civilians were from eastern Asia.”
“Could you be in error?” Sandecker asked, regaining a foothold. “With little or no visibility—”
“Visibility was ten feet. And, I’m well aware of the difference between the eye folds of a Caucasian and an Oriental.”
“Thank God,” Sandecker said, exhaling a deep breath.
“I’d be much obliged if you would inform me just what in hell you expected Al and me to find down there.”
Sandecker’s eyes softened. “I owe you an explanation,” he said, “but I can’t give you one. There are events occurring around us that we have no need to know.”
“I have my own project,” said Pitt, his voice turning cold. “I’m not interested in this one.”
“Yes, Julie Mendoza. I understand.”
Pitt pulled something from under the sleeve of his wet suit. “Here, I almost forgot. I took this from one of the bodies.”
“What is it?”
Pitt held up a soggy leather billfold. On the inside was a waterproof ID card with a man’s photograph. Opposite was a badge in the shape of a shield. “A Secret Service agent’s identification,” Pitt answered. “His name was Brock, Lyle Brock.”
Sandecker took the billfold without comment. He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got to contact Sam Emmett at FBI. This is his problem now.”
“You can’t drop it that easily, Admiral. We both know NUMA will be called on to raise the Eagle.”
“You’re right, of course,” Sandecker said wearily.
“You’re relieved of that project. You do what you have to do. I’ll have Giordino handle the salvage.” He turned and stepped into the wheelhouse to use the ship-to-shore phone.
Pitt stood looking for a long time at the dark forbidding water of the river, reliving the terrible scene below. A line from an old seaman’s poem ran through his head: “A ghostly ship, with a ghostly crew, with no place to go.”
Then as though closing a curtain, he turned his thoughts back to the Pilottown.
On the east bank of the river, concealed in a thicket of ash trees, a man dressed in Vietnam leaf camouflage fatigues pressed his eye to the viewfinder of a video camera. The warm sun and the heavy humidity caused sweat to trickle down his face. He ignored the discomfort and kept taping, zooming in the telephoto lens until Pitt’s upper body filled the miniature viewing screen. Then he panned along the entire length of the clamming boat, holding for a few seconds on each member of the crew.
A half-hour after the divers climbed out of the water, a small fleet of Coast Guard boats descended around the Hoki Jamoki. A derrick on one of the vessels lifted a large red-banded buoy with a flashing light over the side and dropped it beside the wreck of the Eagle.
When the battery of his recording unit died, the hidden cameraman neatly packed away his equipment and slipped into the approaching dusk.
31
Pitt was contemplating a menu when the maitre d’ of Positano Restaurant on Fairmont Avenue steered Loren to his table. She moved with an athletic grace, nodding and exchanging a few words with the Capitol crowd eating lunch amid the restaurant’s murals and wine racks.
Pitt looked up and their eyes met. She returned his appraising stare with an even smile. Then he rose and pulled back her chair.
“Damn, you look ugly today,” he said.
She laughed. “You continue to mystify me.”
“How so?”
“One minute you’re a gentleman, and the next a slob.”
“I was told women crave variety.”
Her eyes, clear and soft, were amused. “I do give you credit, though. You’re the only man I know who doesn’t kiss my fanny.”
Pitt’s face broke into his infectious grin. “That’s because I don’t need any political favors.”
She made a face and opened a menu. “I don’t have time to be made fun of. I have to get back to my office and respond to a ton of constituents’ mail. What looks good?”
“I thought I’d try the zuppa dipesce.”
“My scale said I was up a pound this morning. I think I’ll just have a salad.”
The waiter approached.
“A drink?” Pitt asked.
“You order.”
“Two Sazerac cocktails on the rocks, and please ask the bartender to pour rye instead of bourbon.”
“Very good, sir,” the waiter acknowledged.
Loren laid her napkin in her lap. “I’ve phoned for two days. Where’ve you been?”
“The admiral sent me on an emergency salvage job.”
“Was she pretty?” she asked, playing the age-old game.
“A coroner might think so. But drowned bodies never turned me on.”
“Sorry,” she said and went sober and quiet until the drinks were brought. They stirred the ice around the glasses and then sipped the reddish contents.
“One of my aides ran across something that might help you,” she said finally.
“What is it?”
She pulled several stapled sheets of typewritten paper from her attaché case and passed them to Pitt. Then she began explaining in a soft undertone.
“Not much meat, I’m afraid, but there’s an interesting report on the CIA’s phantom navy.”
“Didn’t know they had one,” Pitt said, scanning the pages.
“Since 1963 they have accumulated a small fleet of ships that few people inside the government know about. And the few who are aware of the fleet won’t admit it exists. Besides surveillance, its primary function is to carry out clandestine operations involving the transporting of men and supplies for the infiltration of agents or guerrillas into unfriendly countries. Originally it was put together to harass Castro after his takeover of Cuba. Several years later, when it became apparent that Castro was too strong to topple, their activities were curtailed, partly because the Cubans threatened to retaliate against American fishing vessels. From that time on the CIA navy expanded its sphere of operations from Central America to the fighting in Vietnam to Africa and the Middle East. Do you follow?”
“I’m with you, but I have no idea where it’s leading.”
“Just be patient,” she said. “Several years ago an attack cargo transport called the Hobson was a part of the Navy’s reserve mothball fleet at Philadelphia. She was decommissioned and sold to a commercial shipping company, a cover for the CIA. They spared no expense in rebuilding her to outwardly resemble a common cargo carrier, while her interior was filled with concealed armament, including a new missile system, highly sophisticated communications and listening gear, and a facility for launching fast patrol and landing boats through swinging bow doors.
“She was manned and ready on station during Iran’s disastrous invasion of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia in 1985. Flying the maritime flag of Panama, she secretly sank two Soviet spy ships in the Persian Gulf. The Russians could never prove who did it, because none of our Navy ships were within range. They still think the missiles that destroyed their ships came from the Saudi shore.”
“And you found out about all this?”
“I have my sources,” she informed him.
“Does the Hobson have anything to do with the Pilottown?”
“Indirectly,” Loren answered.
“Go on.”
“Three years ago, the Hobson vanished with all hands off the Pacific Coast of Mexico.”
“So?”
“So three months later the CIA found her again.”
“Sounds familiar,” Pitt mused.
“My thought too.” Loren nodded. “A replay of the San Marino and the Belle Chasse.”
“Where was the Hobson discovered?”
Before Loren could answer, the waiter set their plates on the table. The zuppa di pesce, an Italian bouillabaisse, looked sensational.
As soon as the waiter walked out of earshot he nodded to her. “Go on.”
“I don’t k
now how the CIA tracked the ship down, but they came on her sitting in a dry dock in Sydney, Australia, where she was undergoing a major face-lift.”
“They find who she was registered to?”
“She flew the Philippine flag under the registry of Samar Exporters. A bogus firm that was incorporated only a few weeks earlier in Manila. Her new name was Buras.”
“Buras,” Pitt echoed. “Must be the name of a person. How’s your salad?”
“The dressing is very tasty. And yours?”
“Excellent,” he answered. “An act of sheer stupidity on the part of the pirates to steal a ship belonging to the CIA.”
“A case of a mugger rolling a drunk and finding out the drunk was an undercover detective.”
“What happened next in Sydney?”
“Nothing. The CIA, working with the Australian branch of the British Secret Service, tried to apprehend the owners of the Buras but were never able to find them.”
“No leads, no witnesses?”
“The small Korean crew living on board had been recruited in Singapore. They knew little and could only give a description of the captain, who had vanished.”
Pitt took a swallow of water and examined a page of the report. “Not much of an ID. Korean, medium height, one hundred sixty-five pounds, black hair, gap in front teeth. That narrows it down to about five or ten million men,” he said sarcastically. “Well, at least now I don’t feel so bad. If the CIA can’t pin a make on whoever is sailing around the world hijacking ships, I sure as hell can’t.”
“Has St. Julien Perlmutter called you?”
Pitt shook his head. “Haven’t heard a word. Probably lost heart and deserted the cause.”
“I have to desert the cause too,” Loren said gently. “But only for a little while.”
Pitt looked at her sternly a moment, then relaxed and laughed. “How did a nice girl ever become a politician?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Chauvinist.”
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