Riptide (42 page)

Hatch looked at the lean face. “I know the diversity of diseases is puzzling. The point is, the sword
is
dangerous. We’ve got to figure out
how
and
why
before we plunge ahead and retrieve it.”

Neidelman nodded, smiling distantly. “I see. You can’t figure out why the crew is sick. You’re not even sure what some of
them are sick
of.
But the sword is somehow responsible for everything.”

“It isn’t just the illnesses,” Hatch countered. “You must know that a big Nor’easter is brewing. If it keeps heading our way,
it’ll make last week’s storm look like a spring shower. It would be crazy to continue.”

“Crazy to continue,” Neidelman repeated. “And just how do you propose to stop the dig?”

Hatch paused for a moment as this sunk in. “By appealing to your good sense,” he said, as calmly as he could.

There was a tense silence. “No,” said Neidelman, with a heavy tone of finality. “The dig continues.”

“Then your stubbornness leaves me no choice. I’m going to have to shut down the dig myself for the season, effective immediately.”

“How, exactly?”

“By invoking clause nineteen of our contract.”

Nobody spoke.

“My clause, remember?” Hatch went on. “Giving me the right to stop the dig if I felt conditions had become too dangerous.”

Slowly, Neidelman fished his pipe out of a pocket and loaded it with tobacco. “Funny,” he said in a quiet, dead voice, turning
to Streeter. “Very funny, isn’t it, Mr. Streeter? Now that we’re only thirty hours from the treasure chamber, Dr. Hatch here
wants to shut the whole operation down.”

“In thirty hours,” Hatch said, “the storm may be right on top of us—”

“Somehow,” the Captain interrupted, “I’m not at all convinced it’s the sword, or the storm, that you’re really worried about.
And these papers of yours are medieval mumbo jumbo, if they’re real at all. I don’t see why you…” He paused. Then something
dawned in his eyes. “But yes. Of course I see why. You have another motive, don’t you?”

“What are you talking about?”

“If we pull out now, Thalassa will lose its entire investment. You know very well that our investors have already faced ten
percent overrun calls. They’re not going to cough up another twenty million for next year’s dig. But that’s exactly what you’re
counting on, isn’t it?”

“Don’t lay your paranoid fantasies on me,” Hatch said angrily.

“Oh, but they’re not fantasy, are they?” Neidelman lowered his voice further. “Now that you’ve gotten the information you
need out of Thalassa, now that we’ve practically opened the front door for you, you’d love nothing more than to see us fail.
Then, next year, you could come in, finish the job, and get
all
the treasure. And most importantly, you’d get St. Michael’s Sword.” His eyes glittered with suspicion. “It all makes sense.
It explains why, for example, you were so insistent on that clause nineteen. It explains the computer problems, the endless
delays. Why everything worked on the
Cerberus
but went haywire on the island. You had it all figured out from the beginning.” He shook his head bitterly. “And to think
I trusted you. To think I came to
you
when I suspected we had a saboteur among us.”

“I’m not trying to cheat you out of your treasure. I don’t give a shit about your treasure. My only interest is in the safety
of the crew.”

“The safety of the crew,” Neidelman repeated derisively. He fished a box of matches from his pocket, removed one, and scratched
it into life. But instead of lighting his pipe, he suddenly thrust it close to Hatch’s face. Hatch backed off slightly.

“I want you to understand something,” Neidelman continued, flicking out the match. “In thirty hours, the treasure will be
mine. Now that I know what your game is, Hatch, I’m simply not going to play. Any effort to stop me will be met with force.
Do I make myself clear?”

Hatch looked carefully at Neidelman, trying to read what was going on behind the cold expression. “Force?” he repeated. “Is
that a threat?”

There was a long silence. “That would be a reasonable interpretation,” said Neidelman, dropping his voice even lower.

Hatch drew himself up. “When the sun rises tomorrow,” he said, “if you’re not gone from this island, you will be evicted.
And I give you my personal guarantee that if anyone is killed or hurt, you will be charged with negligent homicide.”

Neidelman turned. “Mr. Streeter?”

Streeter stepped forward.

“Escort Dr. Hatch to the dock.”

Streeter’s narrow features creased into a smile.

“You have no right to do this,” Hatch said. “This is my island.”

Streeter stepped forward and grasped Hatch’s arm.

Taking a step to the side, Hatch balled his right hand into a fist and shot his knuckles into the man’s solar plexus. It was
not a hard blow, but it was placed with anatomical exactness. Streeter dropped to his knees, mouth gaping, the wind knocked
out of him.

“Touch me again,” Hatch said to the gasping figure, “and you’ll be carrying your balls around in a cup.”

Streeter struggled to his feet, violence in his eyes.

“Mr. Streeter, I don’t think force will be necessary,” said Neidelman sharply, as the team leader moved forward menacingly.
“Dr. Hatch will return to his boat peaceably. He realizes there is absolutely nothing he can do here to stop us, now that
we’ve smoked out his plan. And I think he realizes how foolish it would be to try.”

He turned back to Hatch. “I’m a fair man. You took your best shot, and you failed. Your presence is no longer required on
Ragged Island. If you leave, and allow me to finish as we agreed, you’ll still get your share of the treasure. But if you
try to stop me…” Silently, he swept his hands back and placed them on his hips, pulling his slicker aside in the process.
Hatch could clearly see the handgun snugged into his belt.

“Well, what do you know,” Hatch said. “The Captain’s strapped.”

“Get going,” said Streeter, stepping forward.

“I can find my own way.” Hatch backed up to the far wall, and then—without taking his eyes off the Captain—he climbed out
of the excavation to the base of the array, where the lift was already depositing the first diggers of the next shift.

T
he rising sun tore free of a distant bar of cloud and cast a brilliant trail across the ocean, illuminating a crowd of boats
packing Stormhaven’s small harbor from channel entrance to piers.

Chugging slowly through a gap in the center of the crowd was a small dragger, Woody Clay standing at its wheel. The boat veered
and almost brushed the peppercan buoy at the head of the channel before steadying and resuming its outward course; Clay was
an indifferent sailor.

Reaching the harbor entrance, he turned the boat and cut the motor. Raising a battered megaphone, he shouted instructions
to the surrounding crowd, his voice full of such conviction that even the ancient, buzzing amplification could not distort
it. He was answered by a series of coughs and roars as numerous engines came to life. The boats at the front of the harbor
cast off their moorings, pulled through the channel, and throttled up. They were followed by more, then still more, until
the bay filled with long spreading wakes of the fleet as it headed in the direction of Ragged Island.

Three hours later and six miles to the southeast, the light struggled down through the mist into the vast, damp labyrinth
of braces and cribbing that made up the Water Pit. It threw a dim, spectral illumination over the complex workings that filled
the Pit’s mouth.

At the lowest depths of the Pit, 180 feet down, neither day nor night had any relevance. Gerard Neidelman stood beside a small
staging platform, watching the crew dig feverishly beneath him. It was a few minutes short of noon. Faintly, above the grumble
of the air ducts and the clank of the winch chain, Neidelman could just make out a clamor of air horns and boat cannon on
the surface.

He listened for a moment. Then he reached for his portable telephone.

“Streeter?”

“Here, Captain,” came the voice from Orthanc, 200 feet above, faint and gravelly through a wash of static.

“Let’s have your report.”

“About two dozen boats in all, Captain. They’ve formed a ring around the
Cerberus,
trying to set up a blockade. Guess they think that’s where everyone is.” There was a further crackle of static that might
have been a laugh. “Only Roger-son’s on board to hear them. I sent the rest of the research team ashore last night.”

“Any signs of sabotage or interference?”

“No, Captain, they’re pretty tame. A lot of noise, but nothing to worry about.”

“Anything else?”

“Magnusen’s picking up a sensor anomaly at the sixty-four foot level. It’s probably nothing, the secondary grid shows nothing
unusual.”

“I’ll take a look.” Neidelman thought for a moment. “Mr. Streeter, I’d like you to meet me there.”

“Aye, aye.”

Neidelman climbed up the ladder from the dig site to the base of the electric lift, his movements lithe and fluid despite
his lack of sleep. He took the lift up to the sixty-foot level, then moved out onto the platform and climbed carefully down
the spars to the errant sensor. He verified the sensor was operational and returned to the platform just as Streeter completed
the descent down the far side of the array.

“Any problems?” Streeter asked.

“Not with the sensor,” Neidelman reached over and switched off Streeter’s comm link to Orthanc. “But I’ve been thinking about
Hatch.”

There was a squeal of gears, then a mechanical groan from below, as the powerful winch pulled another load of dirt and mud
up from the dig site. The two men watched as the large iron bucket rose from the depths, condensation gleaming under the harsh
lights.

“Only eight more feet to the treasure chamber,” Neidelman murmured as he watched the bucket recede into the circle of light
overhead. “Ninety-six inches.”

He turned to Streeter. “I want all nonessential personnel off the island. Everyone. Say whatever you want, use that protest
or the storm as excuses, if you like. We don’t want a lot of extra bodies around rubbernecking during the actual extraction.
When the shift changes at two, send the diggers home, too. This next shift should see the job finished. We’ll winch the treasure
up in the bucket, and I’ll carry the sword myself. We need to get it out as soon as possible. Can Rogerson be trusted?”

“He’ll do what I tell him, sir.”

Neidelman nodded. “Bring the
Cerberus
and my command vessel close to the island, but keep them well clear of the reef. We’ll use the launches and split the treasure
between the two boats, as a precaution.” He fell silent a moment, his eyes far away.

“I don’t think we’re through with him,” he began again in a low voice, as if his thoughts had never left Hatch. “I’ve underestimated
him all along and I may be underestimating him now. Once he gets home, he’s going to start thinking. He’ll realize it might
take days, even weeks, to get a legal injunction against us. And possession is nine tenths of the law. He could cry clause
nineteen until he’s blue in the face. But by that point, everything would be academic.”

He touched Streeter’s lapel. “Who would have thought a billion dollars wouldn’t be enough for the greedy bastard? He’s going
to think of a plan. I want you to find out what that plan is, and stop it. We’re only hours away from Ockham’s treasure, and,
by God, I don’t want any nasty surprises before we get to it.” He gripped the lapel suddenly. “And for Chrissake, whatever
you do, don’t let Hatch set foot on this island again. He could do a lot of damage.”

Streeter looked back impassively. “Any particular way you want him handled?”

Neidelman released the lapel and took a step back. “I’ve always found you to be a creative and resourceful seaman, Mr. Streeter.
I leave the matter to your discretion.”

Streeter’s eyebrows rose momentarily in what might have been anticipation, or perhaps merely a muscle spasm.

“Aye, aye, sir,” he said.

Neidelman leaned forward and switched the comm set back on. “Keep in touch, Mr. Streeter.”

Then he was back on the lift and descending once again. Streeter turned back toward the ladder array. In a moment, he, too,
was gone.