Jack Higgins - Thunder Point

“You worry too much, Brigadier,” Carney told him. “Now let’s get out of here,” and he pushed the throttle forward and took Sea Raider out to open water fast.

The launch was there, of course, but a good mile behind, Serra at the wheel, his eye occasionally going to the dark screen with the blob of light showing what was the Sea Raider . Algaro stood beside him and Noval and Pinto busied themselves with diving equipment in the stern. Algaro didn’t look good. He had a black eye and his mouth was bruised and swollen.

“No chance of losing them?”

“No way,” Serra said. “I’ll show you.” There was a steady and monotonous pinging sound coming from the screen. When he swung the wheel, turning to port, it raised its pitch, sounded frantic. “See, that tells us when we’re off track.” He turned back to starboard, straightening when he got the right sound again, checking the course reading.

“Good,” Algaro said.

“How are you feeling?” Serra asked.

“Well, let’s put it this way. I’ll feel a whole lot better when I’ve sorted those bastards out,” Algaro said, “particularly Dillon,” and he turned and went and joined the others.

The water heaved in heavy, long swells as they drifted in to French Cap Cay. Dillon went to the prow to lower the anchor while Carney maneuvered the boat, leaning out under the blue awning of the flying bridge to give him instructions.

“There’s what we call the Pinnacle under here,” he said. “Its top is about forty-five feet down. That’s what we’re trying to catch the anchor on.” After a while he nodded. “That’s it,” he called and cut the engines.

“What are we going to do?” Dillon asked as he zipped up his diving suit.

“Not much we can do,” Carney told him as he fastened his weight belt. “It’s around ninety-five feet at the most, ranging up to fifty. We can do a turn right round the rock base and general reef area. The visibility is incredible. You’ll not find better anywhere. That’s why I don’t believe this is the right spot. That U-boat would have been spotted before now. By the way, I think you picked up my diving gloves by mistake yesterday and I’ve got yours.” He rummaged in Dillon’s holdall and found the rifle. “Dear God,” he said, taking it out. “What’s this?”

“Insurance,” Dillon said as he pulled on his fins.

“An AK47 is considerably more than that.” Carney unfolded the stock and checked it.

“I would remind you, Mr. Carney, that it was our friends who fired the first shot,” Ferguson said. “You’re familiar with that weapon?”

“I was in Vietnam, Brigadier. I’ve used one for real. They make a real ugly, distinctive sound. I never hope to hear one fired again.”

Carney folded the stock, replaced the AK in the holdall and finished getting his diving gear on. He stepped awkwardly on to the diving platform at its rear and turned. “I’ll see you down there,” he said to Dillon, inserted his mouthpiece and tumbled backwards.

Serra watched them from about a quarter of a mile away through a pair of old binoculars. Noval and Pinto stood ready in their diving suits. Algaro said, “What are they doing?”

“They’ve anchored and Dillon and Carney have gone down. There’s just the Brigadier on deck.”

“What do you want us to do?” Noval asked.

“We’ll go in very fast, but I won’t anchor. We’ll make it a drift dive, catch them by surprise, so be ready to go.”

He pushed the launch up to twenty-five knots and as it surged forward, Noval and Pinto got the rest of their equipment on.

Carney hadn’t exaggerated. There were all colors of coral, barrel and tube sponges, fish of every description, but it was the visibility that was so incredible, the water tinged with a deep blue stretching into a kind of infinity. There was a school of horse-eyed jacks overhead as Dillon followed Carney and a couple of manta rays flapped across the sandy slope to one side.

But Carney had also been right about the U-boat. No question that it could be on a site like this. Dillon followed him along the reef and the base of the rock until finally Carney turned and spread his arms. Dillon understood the gesture and swung round for the return to the boat and saw Noval and Pinto ahead of them and perhaps twenty feet higher. He and Carney hung suspended, watching them, and then the American gestured forward and led the way back to the anchor line. They paused there and looked up and saw the keel of the launch moving in a wide circle. Carney started up the line and Dillon followed him, finally surfacing at the stern.

“When did they arrive?” Dillon asked Ferguson as he shrugged off his jacket and tank.

“About ten minutes after you went down. Roared up at a hell of a speed, didn’t put the anchor down, simply dropped two divers over the stern.”

“We saw them.” Dillon took his gear off and looked across at the launch. “There’s Serra the captain and our old chum Algaro glowering away.”

“They did a neat job of trailing us, I’ll say that,” Carney said. “Anyway, let’s get moving.”

“Are we still going to try this South Drop Place?” Dillon asked.

“I’m game if you are. Haul up the anchor.”

Noval and Pinto surfaced beside the launch and heaved themselves in as Dillon went into the prow and started to pull in the anchor, only it wouldn’t come. “I’ll start the engine and try a little movement,” Carney said.

It made no difference and Dillon looked up. “Stuck fast.”

“Okay.” Carney nodded. “One of us will have to go down and pull it free.”

“Well that’s me obviously.” Dillon picked up his jacket and tank. “We need you to handle the boat.”

Ferguson said, “Have you got enough air left in that thing?”

Dillon checked. “Five hundred. That’s ample.”

“Your turn, Brigadier,” Carney said. “Get in the prow and haul that anchor up the moment it’s free and try not to give yourself a hernia.”

“I’ll do my best, dear boy.”

“One thing, Dillon,” Carney called. “You won’t have the line to come up on and there’s a one- to two-knot current so you’ll most probably surface well away from the boat. Just inflate your jacket and I’ll come and get you.”

As Dillon went in off the stern Algaro said, “What’s happening?”

“Probably the anchor got stuck,” Noval said.

Dillon had, in fact, reached it at that precise moment. It was firmly wedged in a deep crevasse. Above him Carney was working the boat on minimum engine power, and as the line slackened Dillon pulled the anchor free. It dragged over coral for a moment, then started up. He tried to follow, was aware of the current pushing him to one side and didn’t fight it, simply drifted up slowly and surfaced. He was perhaps fifty yards away from Sea Raider and inflated his jacket, lifted high on the heavy swell.

The Brigadier had just about got the anchor in and Noval was the first one to spot Dillon. “There he is.”

“Wonderful.” Algaro shouldered Serra aside and took over the wheel. “I’ll show him.”

He gunned the engine, the launch bore down on Dillon, who frantically swam to one side, just managing to avoid it. Carney cried out a warning, swinging Sea Raider round from the prow, Ferguson almost falling into the sea. Dillon had his left hand raised, holding up the tube that allowed him to expel the air from his buoyancy jacket. The launch swerved in again, brushing him to one side. Algaro, laughing like a maniac, the sound clear across the water, was turning in a wide circle to come in again.

The Brigadier had the AK out of the holdall, was wrestling with it when Carney came down the ladder, his hands sliding on the guard rails. “I know how those things work, you don’t, Brigadier.”