Clive Cussler - Treasure

"How long for the Sounder to reach Santa Inez?"

Stewart stepped into the chart room and made a quick calculation.

"Pushing throttles to the stops, our diesels should put us off the glacier in nine or ten hours."

"Do it," Pitt ordered. "We'll look for you around dawn."

Stewart shook Pitts hand. "You take care, you hear?"

"I'll try not to get my feet wet."

One of the ship's scientists stepped over from the bridge counter. He was black, medium height, and wore a stern expression that looked as if it was chiseled there. His name Clayton Findley, and he spoke in a deep, rich bass voice.

"Excuse me for eavesdropping, gentlemen, but I could have sworn you mentioned Santa Inez Island."

Pitt nodded. "Yes, that's right."

"There's an old zinc mine near the glacier. Closed down when Chile halted government-subsidized production."

"You're familiar with the island?" Pitt asked in surprise.

Findley nodded. "I was chief geologist of an Arizona mining company who thought they might make the army pay through efficient, cost-cutting operations. They sent me down along with a couple of engineers to make a survey. Spent three months in that hell hole. We found the ore grade about played out. Soon after, the mine was shuttered and the equipment abandoned."

:'How are you with a rifle?"

'I've hunted some."

Pitt took him by the arm. "Clayton, my friend, you are a gift from the gods."

Clayton Findley did indeed prove to be a godsend.

While Hollis bnefed his men inside an unused warehouse, Pitt, Gunn and Giordino helped Findley sculpt a diorama of Santa Inez Island from mud scooped beside the airport's runway on an old Ping-Pong table. He refreshed his memory of what he'd forgottened from Pitts nautical chart.

He hardened the miniature landscape with a portable heater and highlighted the features with cans of spray paint scrounged by one of Hollis's men. Gray for the rocky terrain, white for the snow and ice of the glacier. He even molded a scale model of the Lady Flamborough and set it at the foot of the glacier. At last he stood back and admired his handiwork.

"That," he said confidently, "is Santa Inez."

Hollis interrupted his briefing and gathered his men around the table.

Everyone stared at the diorama in thoughtful silence for a few moments.

The island was shaped like the center piece of a jigsaw puzzle produced by a drunken cutter. The ragged shoreline was a mine of spurs and hooks, gashed by barbed fjords and gnarled bays. It backed on the Straits of MageUan to the east and faced the Pacific Ocean to the west.

It was dead ground, not fit for a graveyard, 65 kilometers wide by 95

kilometers in length and peaked by Mount Wharton 1,320 meters high.

Beaches and flat ground were virtually nonexistent. The lowlying mountains rose like rockbound ships, their steep slopes falling in forlorn agony to meet the cold sea.

The ancient glacier sat like a saddle on the island. It was the result of cold and overcast summers that did not melt the ice. Barren escarpments of solid rock flanked the frigid mass, standing in sullen silence as the glacier gouged its irresistible passage toward the water where it calved section after section the way a butcher slices sausage.

Few areas of the world were more hostile to man. The entire island chain of the Magellans was uninhabited by permanent settlers. Through the centuries, men had come and gone leaving behind wrathful names like Break Neck Peninsula, Deceit Island, Calamity Bay, Desolation Isle and Port Famine. It was a hard place. The only vegetation that survived was stunted, twisted evergreens that merged with kind of a scrubby heath.

Findley swept a hand over the model. "Imagine a barren landscape with snow at the higher altitudes, and you pretty much get a picture of the real thing."

Hollis nodded. "Thank you, Mr. Findley. We're much obliged."

"Glad to help."

"All right, let's get down to the hard facts. Major Dillenger will lead the air-drop force, while I'll be in command of the dive team."

Hollis paused briefly to scan the faces of his men. They were lean, hard, purposeful-looking men dressed entirely in black. They were a tough breed of fighters who had survived torturous survival training to earn the distinction of serving with the elite Special Operations Force.

A hell of a team, Hollis thought proudly to himself. The best in the world.

"We've trained long and hard for ship seizures at night," he continued.

"But none where we've given away so many advantages to the enemy. We lack critical intelligence information, the weather conditions are miserable, and we're faced with a glacier that can shatter at any minute. Perplexing problems, tough problems that stand in the way of success. Before we launch our assault in a few hours, we want as many answers as possible. If you see a grave flaw in the operation, sing out. So let's begin."

"Island inhabitants?" Dillenger asked Findley straight away.

"None after we closed the mine."

"Weather conditions?"

"Rains almost constantly It's one of the most heavily watered regions on the continent. You rarely see the sun. Temperatures this time of year run a few degrees below freezing. winds are constant and can get violent at times. The willdchill factor is a bitch, and it's almost certain to be raining."

Dillenger gave Hollis a grave look. "We don't stand a prayer of a pinpoint air drop at night."

Hollis appeared grim. "We'll have to go in with the minichoppers and scale down with ropes."

"You brought helicopters?" asked Gunn incredulously. "I didn't think they had the speed and range-2'

-To fly this far so fast," Hollis finished. "Their military designation has too many letters and digits to memorize. We call them Carrier Pigeons. Small, compact, they carry a pilot in an enclosed cockpit and two men on the outside. Comes equipped with an infrared dome and silenced tail rotors. They can be broken down or assembled in fifteen minutes. One of our C-140s can transport six of them."

"You have another problem," said Pitt.

"Go ahead."

"The Lady Flamborough's navigation radar can be tuned for aircraft. Your Carrier Pigeons may have low profiles, but they can be read on a screen in time for the hijackers to prepare a nasty reception party."

"So much for surprise from the air," said Dillenger morosely.

Hollis looked at Findley. "any adverse conditions we should know about for an assault from the fjord?"

Findley smiled faintly. "You should have an easier time than the Major.

You'll enjoy the advantage of frost smoke."

"Frost smoke?"

"Foglike clouds formed from the contact of cold air with warmer water near the glacial wall. It can rise anywhere from two to ten meters.

Combined with the certain rain, your dive team should be cloaked from the time they begin their approach until they climb onto the decks."

"One of us gets a bit of luck after all," said Dillenger.

Hollis nabbed his chin thoughtfully. "We're not dealing with a textbook operation here. It could Turn real messy if the air drop is a foul-up.

All surprise would be lost, and without it the twenty-man dive team isn't strong enough to engage forty armed hijackers without support."

"Since it's suicidal for your men to parachute onto the ship," said Pitt, "why not drop them farther up the glacier?

from there they can make their way to the edge, and then rappel down ropes onto the main deck."

"We'd be looking at an easy descent," agreed Dillenger. The ice wall is above the ship's superstructure and near enough for us to clear the gap."

Hollis nodded and said, "The thought crossed my mind. any one see an obstacle with this tactict'

"Your biggest danger, as I see it," said Gunn, "is the glacier itself.