Clive Cussler - Iceberg

"For once your daydreams paid off."

"I don't understand."

"Neither do I except this is beginning to look like a meeting of the clan."

Pitt pulled Tidi out on the terrace and slowly walked her to a corner away from the mainstream of the crowd. He watched the small groups of guests milling about the expansive double doors, catching them looking his way and then turning back, not in embarrassment, but rather as if they were scientists observing an experiment and discussing its probable outcome. He began to get the uneasy feeling that coming into Rondheim's lair was a mistake. He was just in the process of thinking up an excuse to leave when Kirsti Fyrie spied them and came alongside.

"Would you care to be seated in the study? We're almost ready to begin."

"Who is giving the reading?" Tidi asked.

Kirsti's face brightened. "Why, Oskar, of course."

"Oh, dear God," Pitt mumbled under his breath.

Like a lamb to slaughter, he let Kirsti lead him to the study with Tidi tagging behind.

By the time they reached the study and found a seat among the long circular rows of plush armchairs grouped around a raised dais, the room was nearly brimming to capacity. It was small consolation, but Pitt considered he and Tidi fortunate to sit in the last row near the doorway, offering a possible means of unnoticed departure when the opportunity arose. Then his hopes went up in smoke-a servant closed and bolted the doors.

After a few moments, the servant turned a rheostat and dimmed the lights, throwing the study into solid darkness. Then Kirsti climbed the dais and two soft, pink spotlights came on, giving her the aura of a sculptured Greek goddess standing serenely on her pedestal in the Louvre. Pitt mentally undressed her, trying to imagine what an awesome picture she would have made in that revealing condition. He stole a glance at Tidi.

The enraptured quality of her expression made him wonder if it were possible that her thoughts were similar to his. He groped for her hand, found it and squeezed the fingers tightly. Tidi was so absorbed with the vision on the dais, she didn't even notice or respond to Pitts touch.

Standing there motionless, soaking up the stares from an audience still invisible beyond the glare of the spotlight. Fyrie smiled confidently with that inner glow of self-assurance that only a woman truly secure in her loveliness can possess.

She bowed her head toward the hushed bodies in the darkness and began to speak. "Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guests. Tonight, our host, Mr. Oskar Rondheim, will offer for your enjoyment his latest work. This he will read in our native Icelandic tongue.

Then, since most of you understand English, he will read selected verses from the marvelous new contemporary Irish poet, Sean Magee."

Pitt turned and whispered to Tidi. "I should have fortified myself with at least ten more cups of that punch."

He couldn't see Tidi's face. He didn't have to-he felt her elbow jab him sharply in the ribs. When he turned back to Kirsti, she had disappeared and Rondheim hid taken her place.

It might have been said that Pitt suffered the agonies of the damned for the next hour and a half. But he didn't. Five minutes after Rondheim began delivering his Icelandic saga in a rolling monotone, Pitt was sound asleep, content in the fact that no one would notice his lack of poetry appreciation in the darkened surroundings.

No sooner had the first wave of unconsciousness swept over him than Pitt found himself back on the beach for the hundredth time, cradling Dr. Hunnewell's head in his arms. Over and over he watched helplessly as Hunnewell stared vacantly into Pitts eyes, trying to speak, fighting desperately to make himself understood.

Then finally, barely uttering those three words that seemingly had no meaning, a cloud passed over his tired old features and he was dead.

The strange phenomenon of the dream wasn't its actual recurrence, but rather the fact that no two sequences were exactly the same. Each time that Hunnewell died, something was different. In one dream the children would be present on the beach as they had been in reality. In the next, they would be missing, nowhere in sight'. Once the black jet circled overhead, dipping its wings in an unexpected salute. Even Sandecker appeared in one scene, standing over Pitt and Hunnewell and sadly shaking his head. The weather, the layout of the beach, the color of the sea-they all differed from fantasy to fantasy. Only one small detail always remained faithfully-Hunnewell's last words.

The audience's applause woke Pitt up. He stared at nothing in particular, stupidly gathering his thoughts.

The lights had come on and he spent several moments blinking and getting his eyes accustomed to the glare.

Rondheim was still on the dais, smugly accepting the generous acclaim. He held up his hands for silence.

"As most of you know, my favorite diversion is memorizing verse. With all due modesty, I must honestly state that my acquired knowledge is quite formidable. I would, at this time, like to put my reputation on the block and invite any of you in the audience to begin a line of any verse that comes to your mind. If I cannot finish the stanza that follows or, complete the poem to your total satisfaction, I shall personally donate fifty thousand dollars to your favorite charity." He waited until the murmur of excited voices tapered to silence once more.

"Shall we begin? Who will be first to challenge my memory?"

Sir Eric Marks stood." 'Should the guardian friend or mother-' Try that one for an introduction, Oskar."

Rondheim nodded. " 'Tell the woes of wilful waste, Scorn their counsel, scorn their pother; You can hang or drown at last!' " He paused for effect. " 'One and Twenty' by Samuel Johnson."

Marks bowed in acknowledgment. "Absolutely correct."

F. James Kelly rose next. "Finish this one if you can and name the author. 'Now all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams-' " Rondheim hardly skipped a beat.

" 'Are where thy grey eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams-In what ethereal dances, By what eternal streams!' 'The tine in Paradise' and it was written by Edgar Allan Poe."

"My compliments. Oskar." Kelly was visibly impressed. "You rate an A plus."

Rondheim looked about the room, a smile slowly spreading across his chiseled face as a familiar figure rose in the back. "Do you wish to try your luck, Major Pitt?"

Pitt looked at Rondheim somberly. "I can only offer you three words."

"I accept the challenge," Rondheim said confidently. "Please state them."

" 'God save thee,' " Pitt said very slowly, almost as if he were skeptical of any additional tines.

Rondheim laughed. "Elementary, Major. You've done me the kindness of allowing me to quote from my favorite verse." The contempt in Rondheim's voice was there; everyone in the room could feel it." 'God save thee, ancient Mariner, From the fiends, that plague thee thus. Why look'st thou so? With my crossbow I shot the albitross. The sun now rose upon the right. Out on the sea came he, Still hid in mist, and on the left went cioN,n into the sea. And the good south wind still blew behind, But no sweet bird did follow, Nor any day for lo-,mid or Dlay Came to the mariners' hollo. And I had done a hellish time, And it would work 'em woe. For all averred I had killed the bird That made the breeze to blow.' " Then suddenly Rondheim stopped, looking at Pitt curiously. "There's little need to continue. It's obvious to all present that you have asked me to quote 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' by Samuel Taylor Coleridge."

Pitt began to breathe a little easier. The light suddenly became brighter at the end of the tunnel. He knew something that he hadn't known before. It wasn't over yet, but things were looking up. He was glad now that he had played the proverbial long shot. The gamble had paid off in unexpected answers. The nightmare of Hunnewell's death would never trouble his sleep again.