Clive Cussler: Skeleton Coast

“So is this the biggest cock-and-bull story I’ve ever heard or did you actually do it?”

H. A. held up one of his saddlebags. He shook it, but the wind was too fierce for anyone to hear the stones rattling around inside. “Let’s just say I’ve made your trip worth your while. How long have you been waiting for us?’

“We got here five days ago and have been firing a flare every night at seven just like you asked.”

“Check your ship’s chronometer. It’s running a minute slow.” Rather than make introductions H. A.

said, “Listen, Charlie, there’s about a hundred Herero bucks after us, and the sooner we’re off the beach and over the horizon the happier I’ll be.”

Turnbaugh began directing the exhausted men into the dory. “We can get you off the beach but not over the horizon for a while.”

Ryder put a hand on his dirty uniform jacket. “What’s the matter?”

“We grounded ourselves when the tide went out. The shoals and sand-bars along the coast are always shifting. Come next high tide we’ll float free. Don’t worry.”

“Oh, one thing,” Ryder said before stepping into the little boat. “Do you have a pistol?”

“What? Why?” H. A. twitched his head over his shoulder to where the horses huddled together, growing more terrified as the storm strengthened.

“I think the captain has an old Webley,” Turnbaugh said.

“I’d be obliged if you fetched it for me.”

“They’re just horses,” Varley said, huddled in the dory.

“Who deserve something better than dying on this forsaken beach after what they did for us.”

“I’ll do it,” Charlie said. H. A. helped push the little craft until she floated free and waited with the horses, talking to them soothingly and rubbing their heads and necks. Turnbaugh returned fifteen minutes later and silently handed over the weapon. A minute after that, H. A. climbed slowly into the dory and sat unmoving as he was rowed out to the tramp freighter.

He found his men in the wardroom devouring plates of food and drinking enough water to make each of them look a little green. H. A. took measured sips, allowing his body to adjust. Captain James Kirby stepped into the small room with Charlie and the ship’s engineer just as H. A. took his first bite of stew left over from the officers’ mess.

“H. A. Ryder, you’ve got more lives than a cat,” the captain boomed. He was a great bear of a man with thick dark hair and a beard that reached midway down his chest. “And if it had been anyone other than you making such a damned fool request I would have told them to shove off.”

The two men shook hands warmly. “At the price you’re charging I knew you’d wait until hell froze over.”

“Speaking of price?” One of Kirby’s bushy eyebrows climbed halfway up his forehead.

Ryder placed his saddlebag on the floor and made a show of undoing its buckles, drawing out the moment until he could taste the crew’s greed. He opened the flap, rummaged through the bag’s contents until he found a stone he thought appropriate, and set it on the table. There was a collective gasp. The light in the wardroom was just a pair of lanterns hanging from hooks in the ceiling but they caught the diamond’s fire and cast it around so it looked like they were standing inside a rainbow.

“This ought to pay you for your trouble,” H. A. deadpanned.

“With a little change left over,” Captain Kirby breathed, touching the stone for the first time.

A rough hand woke H. A. the following morning at six. He tried to ignore it and turned away on the tiny bunk he was using while Charlie Turnbaugh was on duty. “H. A., damnit. Get up.”

“What is it?”

“We’ve got a problem.”

The grimness in Turnbaugh’s voice brought Ryder instantly awake. He swung off the bunk and reached for his clothes. Dust spilled from the cloth as he struggled into his pants and shirt. “What is it?”

“You have to see it to believe it.”

Ryder was aware that the storm continued to blow stronger than ever. The wind screamed over the ship like an animal trying to claw its way in while even stronger gusts made the entire vessel shudder.

Turnbaugh led him up to the bridge. Dun light filtered though the windscreen and it was almost impossible to see theRove ’s bow only a hundred and fifty feet away. H. A. saw the problem immediately. The storm had dumped so much sand on the freighter’s deck that the weight of it pinned her to the bottom despite the rising tide. Furthermore, where once they had a hundred yards of water between them and the beach, now less than fifty separated ship from shore.

The Kalahari and the Atlantic were locked in their eternal struggle for territory, a fight between the erosive actions of waves verses the awesome volume of sand the desert could pour onto the waters.

They had fought each other since the dawn of time, constantly reshaping the coastline as sand found weaknesses in the constant scouring of current and tide and struggled to expand the desert a foot or a yard or a mile. And all this played out with little regard to the ship caught in the tumult.

“I need every available hand to start shoveling,” Kirby said darkly. “If the storm doesn’t abate, this ship is going to be landlocked by nightfall.”

Turnbaugh and Ryder rousted their respective crews and using coal shovels from the engine room, pans from the kitchen, and a hip bath from the captain’s washroom they ran into the raging storm. With scarves covering their mouths and the wind so strong that talking was impossible, they pushed mounds of loose sand off the deck and into the water. They raged against the tempest, cursing it because every shovelful they heaved over the side only seemed to come back into their faces.

It was like trying to hold back the tide. They managed to get one hatch scraped clean only to see the amount of sand piled onto the other three had doubled. Five adventurers and a ship’s compliment of twenty was no match for the storm that had traveled across thousands of square miles of seared earth.

Visibility was cut to almost zero, so the men worked blind, their eyes tightly closed to the stinging grit that assaulted theRove from every point on the compass.

After an hour of frantic work, H. A. went to look for Charlie. “It’s no use. We have to wait and hope the storm slows.” Even with his lips touching Turnbaugh’s ear Ryder had to repeat himself three times to be heard over the shrieking wind.

“You’re right,” Charlie screamed back and together they went to recall their men.

The crews staggered back into the superstructure, shedding cascades of sand with each step. H. A. and Jon Varley were the last ones through the hatch, H. A. out of duty to make sure everyone was all right, Varley because he had a rat’s cunning to never give in when he was certain of a reward.

It was still difficult to hear out of the wind inside the companionway.

“Dear Jesus, please let this end.” So awed by the force of nature arrayed against them, Peter was almost in tears.

“Do we have everyone?” Charlie asked.

“I think so.” H. A. sagged against a bulkhead. “Did you do a head count?”

Turnbaugh started counting off his people when there was a sharp rap on the hatchway.

“Good God, someone’s still out there,” someone called.

Varley was closest to the hatch and undogged the latches. The wind slammed the door against its stops as the gale whipped into the ship, scouring paint from the walls with the merest touch. It appeared no one was there. It had to have been a loose piece of equipment rattling outside.

Varley lurched forward to close the door and had it almost shut when a bright silver blade emerged a hand’s span from his back. Gore dripped from the spear’s tip, and when it was pulled from the raw wound blood sprayed the stunned crew. Jon pirouetted as he collapsed to the deck, his mouth working soundlessly as his shirt turned crimson. A dark wraith wearing little but feathers and a cloth around his waist stepped over Varley with an assegai in his hands. Behind him more shapes were primed for the charge, their war cries rivaling even that of the storm.