Clive Cussler - Cyclops

"We're friends of Dirk Pitt and Jessie LeBaron."

Hagen closed his eyes for a second and then gazed at Sandecker steadily. "Mrs. LeBaron is one hell of a woman. Except for a few small cuts and bruises, she came out of the explosion in good shape. She's helping out at an emergency hospital for children in the old cathedral. But if you're looking for Pitt, I'm afraid you're wasting your time. He was at the helm of the Amy Bigalow when she blew up."

Giordino suddenly felt sick at heart. "There's no chance he might have escaped?"

"Of the men who fought off the Russians on the docks while the ships slipped out to sea, only two survived. Every one of the crew on board the ships and tugboat is missing. There's little hope any of them made it clear in time. And if the explosions didn't kill them, they surely must have drowned in the tidal wave."

Giordino clenched his fists in frustration. He turned and faced away so the others couldn't see the tears rimming his eyes.

Sandecker shook his head in sorrow. "We'd like to make a search of the hospitals."

"I hate to sound heartless, Admiral, but you'd do better to look in the morgues."

"We'll do both."

"I'll ask the Swiss to arrange a diplomatic pass so you can move freely about the city."

"Thank you."

Hagen looked at both men, his eyes filled with compassion. "If it's any consolation, your friend Pitt was responsible for saving a hundred thousand lives."

Sandecker stared back, a sudden proud look on his face. "And if you knew Dirk Pitt, Mr. Hagen, you'd have expected no less."

<<77>>

With not much optimism, Sandecker and Giordino began looking for Pitt in the hospitals. They stepped over countless wounded who lay in rows on the floors as nurses administered what aid they could and teams of exhausted doctors labored in the operating rooms. Numerous times they stopped and helped move stretcher cases before continuing the hunt.

They could not find Pitt among the living.

Next they searched through the makeshift morgues, some with trucks waiting in front containing bodies stacked four and five deep. A small army of embalmers worked feverishly to prevent the spread of disease. The dead lay everywhere like cordwood, their faces bare, staring vacantly at the ceilings. Many were too burned and mutilated to identify and were later buried in a mass ceremony in the Colon cemetery.

One harried morgue attendant showed them the remains of a man reported to have been washed in from the sea. It was not Pitt, and they failed to identify Manny because they did not know him.

The early-morning sun rose over the ravaged city. More injured were found and carried to the hospitals, more dead to the morgues. Troops with fixed bayonets walked the streets to prevent looting. Flames still raged in the dock area, but the firefighters were making headway. The vast cloud still bloomed black in the sky, and airline pilots reported that easterly winds had carried it as far as Mexico City.

Sickened by the sights they witnessed that night, Sandecker and Giordino were glad to see daylight again. They drove to within three blocks of Cathedral Plaza and were stopped by wreckage blocking the streets. They walked the rest of the way to the temporary children's hospital to find Jessie.

She was soothing a small girl who was whimpering as a doctor encased a slim brown leg in a cast. Jessie looked up at the admiral and Giordino as they approached. Unconsciously her eyes wandered over their faces, but her weary mind did not recognize them.

"Jessie," said Sandecker softly. "It's Jim Sandecker and Al Giordino."

She looked at them for a few seconds and then it began to register. "Admiral. Al. Oh, thank God you've come." She whispered something in the girl's ear, and then stood and embraced them both, crying uncontrollably.

The doctor nodded at Sandecker. "She's been working like a demon for twenty hours straight. Why don't you see to it she takes a breather."

Each man took an arm and eased her outside. They gently lowered her to a sitting position on the cathedral steps.

Giordino sat down in front of Jessie and looked at her. She was still dressed in combat fatigues. The camouflage pattern was now blotched with bloodstains. Her hair was damp with perspiration and tangled, her eyes red from the pervasive smoke.

"I'm so glad you found me," she said finally. "Did you just arrive?"

"Last night," replied Giordino. "We've been looking for Dirk."

She gazed blankly at the great smoke cloud. "He's gone," she said as if in a trance.

"The bad penny always turns up," Giordino muttered absently.

"They're all gone-- my husband, Dirk, so many others." Her voice died.

"Is there coffee anywhere?" said Sandecker, changing the tack of the conversation. "I think we could all use a cup."

Jessie nodded weakly toward the entrance to the cathedral. "A poor woman whose children are badly injured has been making some for the volunteers."

"I'll get it," said Giordino. He rose and disappeared inside.

Jessie and the admiral sat there for several moments, listening to the sirens and watching the flames leap in the distance.

"When we return to Washington," Sandecker said at last, "if I can help in any way. . ."

"You're most kind, Admiral, but I can manage." She hesitated. "There is one thing. Do you think that Raymond's body might be found and shipped home for burial?"

"I'm sure after all you've done, Castro will cut through any red tape."

"Strange how we became drawn into all this because of the treasure."

"The La Dorada?"

Jessie's eyes stared at a group of figures walking toward them in the distance, but she gave no sign of seeing them. "Men have been beguiled by her for nearly five hundred years, and most have died because of their lust to own her. Stupid. . . stupid to waste lives over a statue."

"She is still considered the greatest treasure of them all."

Jessie closed her eyes tiredly. "Thank heavens it's hidden. Who knows how many men would kill for it."

"Dirk would never climb over someone's bones for money," Sandecker said. "I know him too well. He was in it for the adventure and the challenge of solving a mystery, not for profit."

Jessie did not reply. She opened her eyes and finally took notice of the approaching party. She could not see them clearly. One of them seemed seven feet tall through the yellow haze from the smoke. The others were quite small. They were singing, but she couldn't make out the tune.

Giordino returned with a small board holding three cups. He stopped and stared for a long moment at the group threading their way through the rubble in the plaza.

The figure in the middle wasn't seven feet tall, but a man with a small boy perched on his shoulders. The boy looked frightened and tightly laced his hands around the man's forehead, obscuring the upper part of his face. A young girl was cradled in one muscled arm, while the opposite hand was clutched by a girl no more than five. A string of ten or eleven other children followed close behind. They sounded as if they were singing in halting English. Three dogs trotted alongside and yapped in accompaniment.

Sandecker looked at Giordino curiously. The barrel-chested Italian blinked away the eye-watering smoke and gazed with an intense wondering expression at the strange and pathetic sight.

The man looked like an apparition, exhausted, desperately so. His clothes were in tatters and he walked with a limp. The eyes were sunken and the gaunt face was streaked with dried blood. Yet his jaw was determined, and he led the children in song with a booming voice.

"I must go back to work," said Jessie, struggling to her feet. "Those children will need care."

They were close enough now so that Giordino could make out the song they were singing.