Clive Cussler - Inca Gold

"Do not waste our time making up your mind. We have other--"

Pitt wasn't in the mood to hear more. He was as certain as he could ever be that Amaru was trying to hold his attention while another of the murderers crept close enough to stick a knife somewhere it would hurt. He did not have the slightest intention of waiting to be made sport of by a gang of sadists. He sprinted across the deck and leaped over the side of the ferry for the second time that evening.

A gold-medal diver would have gracefully soared into the air and performed any number of jackknifes, twists, and somersaults before cleanly entering the water 15 meters (50 feet) below. He'd have also broken his neck and several vertebrae after crashing into the bottom silt only two meters below the surface. Pitt had no aspirations of ever trying out for the U.S. diving team. He went over the side feet first before doubling up and striking the water like a cannonball.

Amaru and his remaining two men ran to the edge of the top deck and looked down.

"Can you see him?" asked Amaru, peering into the dark water.

"No, Tupac, he must have gone under the hull."

"The water is turning dirty," exclaimed another voice. "He must have buried himself in the bottom mud."

"This time we're not taking any chances. Juan, the case of concussion grenades we brought from Guaymas. We'll crush him to pulp. Throw them about five meters from the hull, especially in the water around the paddlewheels."

Pitt made a crater in the seafloor. He didn't impact hard enough to cause any physical damage, but enough to stir up a huge cloud of silt. He uncoiled and swam away from the Alhambra, unseen from above.

He was afraid that once he cleared the cover of murk he might still be seen by the killers. This was not to be. A freshening breeze from the south turned the water surface into a light chop that caused a refraction the lights from the ferryboat could not penetrate.

He swam underwater as far as he could until his lungs began to burn. When he came to the surface, he broke it lightly, trusting in the ski mask to keep his head invisible in the black water. A hundred meters (328 feet) and he was beyond the reach of the lights illuminating the ferry. He could barely distinguish the dark figures moving about on the upper deck. He wondered why they weren't shooting into the water. Then he heard a dull thud, saw the white water rise in a towering splash and felt a surge of pressure that squeezed the air out of him.

Underwater explosives! They were trying to kill him with the concussion from underwater explosives. Four more detonations followed in quick succession. Fortunately, they came from the area amidships, near the paddlewheels. By swimming away from one end of the boat, Pitt had distanced himself from the main force of the detonations.

He doubled over with his knees in front of his chest to absorb the worst of the impact. Thirty meters closer and he would have been pounded into unconsciousness. Sixty meters (200 feet) and he would have been crushed to putty. Pitt increased the gap between himself and the ferry until the eruptions came with the same sensual squeeze as from a strong woman.

He looked up at a clear sky and checked the north star for his approximate bearings. At 14 kilometers (8.7 miles) away, the desolate west coast of the Gulf was the closest land. He tore off the ski mask and rolled over. Face toward the carpet of stars across the sky, he began a comfortable backstroke toward the west.

Pitt was in no condition to try out for the swimming team either. After two hours, his arms felt as if they were lifting twenty-pound weights with each stroke. After six hours, his muscles protested with aches he didn't believe possible. And then finally, and most thankfully, fatigue began to dull the pain. He used the old Boy Scout trick of removing his pants, tying the ankles into knots and swinging them over his head to catch the air, making a reasonably efficient float for rest stops that became more numerous as the night wore on.

There was never any question of stopping and letting himself drift in the hope of being spotted by a fishing boat in daylight. The vision of Loren and Rudi in the hands of Sarason was more than an ample stimulus to drive him on.

The stars in the eastern sky were beginning to fade and blink out when his feet hit bottom, and he staggered out of the water onto a sandy beach where he collapsed and immediately fell asleep.

Ragsdale, wearing an armored body suit beneath a pair of workman's coveralls, casually walked up to the side door of a small warehouse with a For Lease sign in the front window. He laid the empty toolbox he carried on the ground, took a key from his pocket, and opened the door.

Inside, a combined team of twenty FBI and eight Customs agents had assembled and were making last-minute preparations for the raid on the Zolar International building directly across the street. Advance teams had alerted local law enforcement to the operation and scouted the entire industrial complex for unusual activity.

Most of the men and the four women wore assault suits and carried automatic weapons, while several professional experts in the art and antiquities field wore street clothes. The latter were burdened with suitcases crammed with catalogues and photographs of known missing art objects targeted for seizure.

The plan called for the agents to split off into specific assignments once they entered the building. The first team was to secure the building and round up the employees, the second was to search out any stolen cache, while the third was to investigate the administration offices for any paper trail that led to theft operations or illegal purchases. Working separately, a commercial business team specializing in art handling was standing by to crate, remove and store the seized goods. The U.S. Attorney's Office, working on the case for both the FBI and Customs, had insisted the raid be carried out in a faultless manner and that confiscated objects be treated with a velvet touch.

Agent Gaskill was standing at an operations board in the center of the command post. He turned at Ragsdale's approach and smiled. "Still quiet?"

The FBI agent sat down in a canvas chair. "All clear except for the gardener trimming the hedge around the building. The rest of the grounds are as quiet as a churchyard."

Damned clever of the Zolars to use a gardener as a security guard," said Gaskill. "If he hadn't mowed the lawn four times this week, we might have ignored him."

"That and the fact our surveillance identified his Walkman headset as a radio transmitter," added Ragsdale.

"A good sign. If they have nothing to hide, why the wily tactics?"

"Don't get your hopes up. The Zolar warehouse operations may look suspicious, but when the FBI walked in with a search warrant two years ago, we didn't find so much as a stolen ballpoint pen."

"Same with Customs when we talked agents at Internal Revenue into conducting a series of tax audits. Zolar and his family surfaced as pure as the driven snow."

Ragsdale nodded a "thank you" as one of his agents handed him a cup of coffee. "All we've got going for us this time around is the element of surprise. Our last raid failed after a local cop, who was on Zolar's payroll, tipped him off."

"We should be thankful we're not walking into a high security armed fortress."

"Anything from your undercover informant?" asked Gaskill.

Ragsdale shook his head. "He's beginning to think we've put him in the wrong operation. He hasn't turned up the slightest hint of unlawful activities."

"No one in or out of the building except bona fide employees. No illegal goods received or shipped in the past four days. Do you get the feeling we're waiting for it to snow in Galveston?"

"It seems that way."

Gaskill stared at him. "Do you want to rethink this thing and call off the raid?"