Desmond Bagley - Night Of Error

That evening in the saloon I said, 'I'd like to summarize what I've found. Can you stand another short lecture?'

We were moving briskly along with a helpful wind, the treasure had been found and any danger seemed infinitely remote and unlikely. My seminar settled down to hear me out in a state of contentment.

Campbell said, 'I'm getting used to being lectured to by scientists; it's sometimes boring and usually profitable.'

I laughed. 'This time it's very profitable.' I produced my charts and notebook. The high-cobalt nodules seem to be concentrated in a valley or depression, twenty miles wide and a hundred miles long. The nodules lie in varying degrees of richness and density.'

Clare, whom I had discovered to my pleasure to be a quick natural mathematician, said in astonishment, 'But that's two thousand square miles.'

'Quite an area,' I agreed. The richness varies roughly with the depth of the water, from about two per cent at the top of the ridges to a peak of ten per cent in the valley bottom – an inverse curve, if you like. On the other hand, the density varies in a different way. At the extreme north of the valley the density is only half a pound per square foot. At the other end it peaks out at fifty pounds per square foot.'

Campbell said, 'Still at ten per cent cobalt?'

'On the valley bottom, yes.'

'Hot diggety!' he exclaimed. 'A quarter of a billion bucks a square mile!' He and Clare were smiling in delight. Geordie looked dazed – the figures were so fantastic that he couldn't absorb them. Paula looked petrified.

I consulted my notebook again. 'I've worked out some rough figures. I reckon the overall average density over the entire area of two thousand square miles is about eight pounds to the square foot. The overall richness is about six per cent. Considering some of the higher figures, though, you're in for a very fine haul wherever you begin, so systematic mining will pay off.'

Campbell said, Those average figures of yours don't mean a damn thing, Mike. What do I care if the average density is eight pounds when I know of a place where it's actually fifty? That's where we start – we take the rich stuff out first.' He shook his head in wonder. 'This is fantastic – this is the damndest thing. We can prove every pound of our resources before we even start. We'll need a detailed survey, though -with you to head it up.'

'I'd be proud to,' I said. I thought of the advanced equipment and systems I could use and rejoiced inwardly.

'I'll give you the finest survey vessel ever built – with no disrespect to Esmerelda, Geordie. But then – you may not want to do this. You'll be a rich man.' He got up to pour us all drinks as he spoke.

'I won't be until that survey has been made and the operation started,' I pointed out. 'But you couldn't stop me even then.'

Campbell said, 'I've been thinking this thing out. I'm starting a corporation and I'm reserving five per cent of the stock for the crew. Three per cent goes to you, Mike, and two to Geordie. I'll sell twenty per cent to those two guys I know that I mentioned, for twenty million dollars and let the Government – any or all of 'em – have fifty per cent for another twenty million. That starts to take care of the working capital.'

Clare exclaimed, 'Pop, I'm disgusted at you. Don't think I can't add up percentages! You come out with twenty per cent for yourself and you've discovered nothing. All you've done is put up a measly million dollars or so for this expedition.'

'Not quite, Clare,' he said mildly. There's your cut -another five, I think. And I have ideas concerning the remaining fifteen. For centuries people like me have been taking metals out of the earth and putting nothing back. We've been greedy – the whole of mankind has been greedy. As I said the other day, we've been raping this planet.' His voice grew in intensity. 'Now we've got hold of something different and we mustn't spoil it, like we've spoiled everything else that we've laid our greedy hands on. I'm keeping five percent for myself, sure – but the other ten will go into an independent, nonprofit making organization which will push my ideas a little further. We have to find a way to take that stuff out of the sea without disturbing the environment more than we can help, and to put something back – somewhere – by way of recompense.'

'There's one way that I can think of immediately,' I said. 'There are phosphorite nodules as well. You can make good fertilizer out of them, but so far no one has thought of a way of dredging them commercially. We could get them up with the rest, and you could be doing agriculture a bit of good.'

That's what I mean,' Campbell exclaimed. 'You've gone to the heart of it – research is what's needed.' His eyes crinkled. 'How would you like to head up a new foundation?'

'Good grief! I wouldn't know where to start. I'm a field man, not an administrator. You want someone like old Jarvis.'

'You wouldn't be an administrator – I wouldn't waste your time on that. I can hire managers, but you'd be in charge of research.'

'Then nothing would stop me taking it on,' I said, dazzled.

'That's my boy.' He lifted the bottle and inspected it critically. 'Nearly the last of the scotch. Never mind, we can get some more in Suva.'* 5*

I was below when I heard the engine start, so I strolled on deck to find Geordie at the wheel. It was a calm evening without a breath of wind, and there was no sound except the throb of the engine which drove Esmerelda over the placid sea. 'It's lucky you kept some fuel back,' I commented, looking at a steadying sail hanging limply.

'Got a few gallons up my sleeve. I always save a little more than I let anyone know. Mike, what's the depth of water at Fonua Fo'ou?'

'I don't know, Geordie. It varies from year to year. The Pilot gives the latest depth in 1949 as about fifty-four feet, with no sign of the island at all, but it was there in 1941 -though there seemed to have been less of it than there was reported in 1939. A shoal at the northern end had vanished in those couple of years.'

He wasn't happy with this. 'We'll have to go very canny then.'

'We've been around shoals before, Geordie. And we know exactly where this one ought to be – so what's the problem?'

'I don't like this.'

'You don't like what?'

'This weather.'

I looked across at the setting sun and then to the east. The sky was cloudless and everything was peaceful. 'What's wrong with it?'

'I dunno,' he said. 'I've just got a feeling. I don't like that yellow tinge on the horizon northwards. Maybe there's a storm coming up.'

'How's the barometer?' I asked.

'Still normal – nothing wrong there. Maybe I'm being a bit old-womanish.'

He called Taffy to him and handed over the wheel. 'Keep a bloody close watch on that echo sounder, Taff,' he said. 'By my reckoning, we should be nearly there – we've been running long enough. Ian, set a watch out. If there's nothing before dark we'll circle back and come up again in the morning.

He was more twitchy than I'd ever known him, and I couldn't quite tell why. Certainly it didn't appear to have anything to do with a possible chase by Sirena – we'd seen nothing and had no reason to suppose that she would find us. She'd scarcely be waiting at Falcon Island as if it were a handy street corner, I thought. And while my weather sense was not nearly as acute as Geordie's I had had my share of storms, and could see nothing in the sky or on the sea's surface to excite alarm. I didn't push him, and finally turned in to leave him pacing uneasily in the darkness, turning Esmerelda back on her track for a loop during the night hours.

The morning brought more of the same weather – or lack of it. It was calm, quiet and peaceful as we gathered on deck to watch for any telltale breakers while Geordie brought the ship gently back to her last night's position, and then motored slowly ahead. Presently he throttled the engine back to less than three knots. The echo sounder showed a hundred fathoms. Campbell and the girls joined us on deck and their voices were unnaturally loud in the hush of morning.