Clive Cussler - Treasure

As scheduled, their aircraft had landed at a nearby military airport while it was still dark. The storm came as an added bonus, holding visibility to a few hundred meters and keeping their arrival unobserved.

The Chilean military command was most generous in their hospitality and provided hangar space for Hollis's small flight of C-140s and Ospreys to park out of sight.

They moved from the shelter of a warehouse as the research ship's mooring lines were dropped over the dock bollards and the gangway lowered. Both men flinched as the full force of the icy wind struck them.

A tall man with a craggy face and a friendly grin, wearing a ski jacket, appeared on the bridge wing. He cupped his hands around his mouth.

"Senor L6pez?" he shouted through the sleet.

"Si!" Hollis yelled back.

"Who's your friend?"

"Mi amigo es Sefior Jones," Hollis answered, nodding at Dillenger.

"I've heard better Spanish in a Chinese restaurant," Dillenger muttered.

"Please come on board. After you'reach the main deck, take the ladder to your right and come up to the bridge."

"Gracias.

The two leaders of America's elite fighting force dutifully walked up the slanted gangway and climbed the ladder as directed. Hollis's curiosity was eating him up. An hour before reaching Punta Arenas, he'd received an urgent coded communication from General Dodge ordering him to covertly meet the Sounder when she docked in port. No explanation, no further instructions. He knew only from a hurried briefing in Virginia that the survey ship and its crew were responsible for discovering the deception between the Mexican container ship and the Lady Flamborough. Nothing else. He was most interested in learning why she suddenly appeared in Punta Arenas at almost the same time as his SOF

team.

Hollis did not like being left in the dark, and he was in an intensely testy mood.

The man who hailed him was still standing on the bridge wing. Hollis looked into mesmeric green eyes-very opaque green indeed. They belonged to a lean, broad-shouldered man whose uncovered black hair was speckled with white flakes of ice. He stared at the two officers for all of five seconds, time enough to complete a survey. Then he removed his right hand slowly from a coat pocket and stuck it out.

"Colonel Hollis, Major Dillenger, my name is Dirk Pitt."

"Seems you know more about us than we do you, Mr. Pitt.

"A situation that will be quickly rectified," Pitt said cheerfully.

"Please follow me to the Captain's cabin. The coffee's on, and we can talk where it's warm and private."

They gratefully stepped out of the cold and trailed Pitt down one deck to Stewart's quarters. Once inside, Pitt introduced Gunn, Giordino and Captain Stewart. The SOF officers shook hands all around and gratefully accepted the coffee.

"Please sit down," said Stewart, offering chairs.

Dillenger sank into a chair, but Hollis shook his head.

"Thank you, I'd rather stand." He cast a questioning look at the four men from NUMA. "If I can speak frankly, would you mind telling me what in hell is going on?"

"Obviously it concerns the Lady Flamborough, " said Pitt.

"What's there to discuss? The terrorists have destroyed her. "

"She's still very much afloat," Pitt assured him.

"I've received no word to that effect," said Hollis. "The last satellite photo shows no trace of her."

"Take my word for it."

"Show me your evidence."

"You don't screw around, do you?"

"My men and I flew here to save lives," Hollis said roughly. "No one, not even my superiors, has demonstrated to me that people on board that ship can still be saved."

"You have to understand, Colonel," said Pitt, his voice abruptly cutting like a whip, "we're not dealing with your usual gun-happy terrorists.

Their leader is extremely resourceful. Until now he's outwitted the best security brains in the business. And he keeps right on doing it."

saw through the disguise," said Hollis, throwing a left-handed compliment.

"We were lucky. If the Sounder hadn't been surveying in that part of the sea, our discovery of the General Bravo might have taken a month. As it is, we've cut the hijackers' lead time down to one or two days."

Hollis's pessimism began to melt away. This man wasn't giving an inch.

He wondered if the rescue operation might take place after all.

"Where is the proof?" he asked bluntly.

"We don't know," answered Gunn.

"Not so much as an approximate position?"

"The best we can offer is an educated guess," said Giordino.

"Based on what?"

Gunn looked expectantly at Pitt, who smiled and carried the ball again.

"Intuition.

Hollis's hopes began to crumble. "Are you using tarot cards or a crystal ball?" he asked sardonically.

"Actually, I favor tea leaves," replied Pitt, tit for tat.

There was a brief silence, long and cold. Hollis rightly figured aggression wasn't going to get him anywhere. He finished his coffee and turned the cup round and round,

"All right, gentlemen. I regret coming on a little too strong. I'm not used to dealing with civilians."

There was no malice in Pitts face, just a look of amusement. "If it will make you feel more comfortable, I carry the rank of Major in the Air Force."

Hollis frowned. "May I ask what you're doing on a NUMA vessel?"

"Call it a permanent assignment-a long story we don't have time to get into."

Dillenger caught it first. Hollis should have caught it the minute they were introduced, but his mind was saturated with questions.

"Are you by chance related to Senator George Pitt?" asked Dillenger.

"Father and son,"

A small piece of the curtain lifted atld the two officers saw a shaft of light beneath. Hollis pulled up a chair and settled in. "Okay, Mr.

Pitt, please tell me what you've got."

Dillenger cut in, "The last report showed The Lady Flamborough heading for the Antarctic. You say she's still on the surface. New photos will easily pick her out amid the ice floes. "

"If you're betting on the SR-ninety Casper," said Pitt, "save your money."

Dillenger gave Hollis a bleak look. They were outdistanced. This oddball group of ocean engineers had as much information in hand as they did.

"from a hundred thousand kilometers an SR-ninety can reveal three-dimensional images so sharp that you can distinguish the stitching on a soccer ball," stated Hollis.

"No question. But suppose the ball is camouflaged to look like a rock."

"I still don't know-"

"You'd see more clearly if we showed you," said Pitt. "The crew has set up a demonstration on deck."

The open deck on the stern had been covered over with a large, opaque blanket of white plastic, firmly secured to keep it taut and prevent it from billowing under the constant breeze. Captain Stewart stood by with two crew members who manned a fire hose.

"During our survey of the area around the General Bravo we recovered a roll of this plastic," Pitt lectured. "I believe it accidentally fell off the Lady Flamborough when the two vessels rendezvoused. It was sitting on the seabed among empty barrels of paint the hijackers used to remodel the cruise liner to resemble the Mexican container ship.

Granted, the evidence is inconclusive. You'll have to take my word for that. But it all points to another makeup job. Nothing showed on the last satellite photo because all eyes were searching for a ship. The Lady Flamborough no longer looks like one. The hijack leader must be into art appreciation. He took a page from the controversial sculptor Christo, who's famous for his outdoor sculptures in plastic. He wraps the stuff around buildings, coastlines and islands. He hung a monstrous curtain in Rifle Gap, Colorado, and made a fence running for miles in Mwill County, California. The chief hijacker went one better and wrapped the entire cruise liner. The liner is not a huge ship. The basic outline of her hull could have been altered by props and scaffolding. With the sheets all cut and numbered as to position, a hundred hostages and hijackers might have done the job in ten hours flat. They were working at it when the Landsat orbited overhead. The enhanced blowup was not clear enough to reveal details of the activity.