Clive Cussler - Deep Six

“I think there is,” Pitt said confidently. “What began as a cheap insurance fraud is unraveling into a cover-up of far greater proportions.”

“Why your interest in this?” Perlmutter asked, staring Pitt in the eyes.

Pitt’s gaze was distant. “I can’t tell you.”

“A classified government investigation maybe?”

“I’m on my own in this one, but it’s related to a ‘most secret’ project.”

Perlmutter gave in good-naturedly. “Okay, old friend, no more prying questions.” He helped himself to another dumpling. “If you suspect the ship buried under the volcano is the San Marino and not the Pilot-town, where do you go from here?”

“Inchon, Korea. The Sosan Trading Company might hold the key.”

“Don’t waste your time. The trading company is most certainly a false front, a name on a registry certificate. As is the case with most shipping companies, all trace of ownership ends at an obscure post office box. If I were you, I’d give it up as a lost cause.”

“You’d never make a football coach,” Pitt said with a laugh. “Your half-time locker-room speech would discourage your team into throwing away a twenty-point lead.”

“Another glass of schnapps, if you please?” said Perlmutter in a grumbling tone, holding out his glass as Pitt poured. “Tell you what I’ll do. Two of my corresponding friends on nautical research are Koreans. I’ll have them check out Sosan Trading for you.”

“And the Pusan shipyards for any records covering the scrapping of the Belle Chasse.”

“All right, I’ll throw that in too.”

“I’m grateful for your help.”

“No guarantees.”

“I don’t expect any.”

“What’s your next move?”

“Send out press releases.”

Loren looked up, puzzled. “Send what?”

“Press releases,” Pitt answered casually, “to announce the discovery of both the San Marino and the Pilottown and describe NUMA’s plans for inspecting the wrecks.”

“When did you dream up that foolish stunt?” Loren asked.

“About ten seconds ago.”

Perlmutter gave Pitt the stare of a psychiatrist about to commit a hopeless mental case. “I fail to see the purpose.”

“No one in the world is immune from curiosity,” Pitt exclaimed with a devious glint in his green eyes. “Somebody from the parent company that owned those ships will step from behind the shroud of corporate anonymity to check the story. And when they do, I’ll have their ass.”

When oates entered the White House Situation Room, the men seated around the conference table came to their feet. It was a sign of respect for the man who now shouldered the vast problems of the nation’s uncertain future. The responsibility for the far-reaching decisions of the next few days, and perhaps longer, would be his alone. There were some in the room who had mistrusted his cold aloofness, his cultivated holy image. They now cast off personal dislike and rallied to his side.

He took the chair at the head of the table. He motioned to the others to sit and turned to Sam Emmett, the gruff-spoken chief of the FBI, and Martin Brogan, the urbane, intellectual director of the CIA.

“Have you gentlemen been fully briefed?”

Emmett nodded toward Fawcett, seated at the table’s other end. “Dan has described the situation.”

“Either of you got anything on this?”

Brogan shook his head slowly. “Off the top of my head I can’t recall hearing any indications or rumors from our intelligence sources pointing to an operation of this magnitude. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have something that was misinterpreted.”

“I’m in pretty much the same boat as Martin,” said Emmett. “It’s beyond comprehension that a presidential abduction could slip through the Bureau’s fingers without even a vague clue.”

Oates’s next question was put to Brogan. “Do we have any intelligence that might lead us to suspect the Russians?”

“Soviet President Antonov doesn’t consider our President half the threat he did Reagan. He’d be risking a massive confrontation if it ever leaked to the American public his government was involved. You could compare it to striking a hornet’s nest with a stick. I can’t see what, if any, gains the Russians would net.”

“What’s your gut reaction, Sam?” Oates asked Emmett. “Could this be terrorist-inspired?”

“Too elaborate. This operation took an immense amount of planning and money. The ingenuity is incredible. It goes far beyond the capabilities of any terrorist organization.”

“Any theories?” asked Oates, addressing the table.

“I can think of at least four Arab leaders who might have a motive for blackmailing the U.S.,” said General Metcalf. “And Qaddafi of Libya heads the list.”

“They certainly have the financial resources,” said Defense Secretary Simmons.

“But hardly the sophistication,” Brogan added.

Alan Mercier, the National Security Adviser, motioned with his hand to speak. “In my estimation the conspiracy is of domestic origin rather than foreign.”

“What’s your reasoning?” Oates asked.

“Our land and space listening systems monitor every telephone and radio transmission around the world, and it’s no secret to everyone present that our new tenth-generation computers can break any code the Russians or our Allies devise. It stands to reason that an intricate operation of this size would require a flow of international message traffic leading up to the act and a report of success afterwards.” Mercier paused to make his point. “Our analysts have not intercepted a foreign communication that suggests the slightest connection with the disappearance.”

Simmons sucked noisily on his pipe. “I think Alan makes a good case.”

“Okay,” Oates said, “foreign blackmail rates a low score. So what are we looking at from the domestic angle?”

Dan Fawcett, who had previously been silent, spoke up. “It may sound farfetched, but we can’t eliminate a corporate plot to overthrow the government.”

Oates leaned back and straightened his shoulders. “Maybe not as farfetched as we think. The President went after the financial institutions and the multinational conglomerates with a vengeance. His tax programs took a hell of a bite out of their profits. They’re pumping money into the opposition party’s campaign coffers faster than their banks can print the checks.”

“I warned him about grandstanding on the issue of helping the poor by taxing the rich,” Fawcett said. “But he refused to listen. He alienated the nation’s businessmen, as well as the working middle class. Politicians just can’t seem to get it into their heads that a vast number of American families with a working wife are in a fifty-percent tax bracket.”

“The President has powerful enemies,” Mercier conceded. “However, it’s inconceivable to me that any corporate empire could steal away the President and congressional leaders without its leaking to a law-enforcement agency.”

“I agree,” Emmett said. “Too many people had to be in on it. Somebody would have gotten cold feet and spilled the scheme.”

“I think we’d better call a halt to speculation,” said Oates. “Let’s get back on the track. The first step is to launch a massive investigation while keeping up a business-as-usual front. Use whatever cover story you feel is plausible. If at all possible, don’t even let your key people in on this.”

“What about a central command post during the investigation?” Emmett asked.