Riptide (45 page)

C
lay peered through the screaming murk, gripping the wheel with aching arms. The boat struck each towering wave with a crashing
shudder, water bursting over the bows, wind tearing foam from the crests. Every wave smothered the pilothouse windows in white
as the dragger tipped and began its sickening descent into the trough. For a moment there would be sudden, windless silence;
then the craft would lift with a sickening lurch and begin the cycle over again.

Ten minutes earlier, when he’d tried the forward searchlight, he learned the boat had blown some fuses and lost most of its
electrical power. The backup batteries were dead, too—he hadn’t checked them, as he knew he should. But he’d been busy with
other things: Earlier, without warning, the
Cerberus
had raised anchor and gotten underway, ignoring his horn, the vast white bulk moving inexorably into the black, lashing sea.
Alone, violently tossed, he had followed it for a time, fruitlessly hailing, until it disappeared into the furious darkness.

He looked around the cabin, trying to assess the situation. It had been a serious mistake to follow the
Cerberus,
he realized that now. If they had not heeded him before, they certainly would not stop to heed him now. Besides, out of the
lee of Ragged Island, the ocean was literally boiling: the eastbound swell was beating against the outbound tide, creating
a viciously steep cross-sea. The loran was dead, leaving him with the compass in the binnacle as his only navigational tool.
He was trying to steer by the compass, using dead reckoning. But Clay knew he was no navigator, and with no light he could
read the compass only by lightning flashes. There was a flashlight in his pocket, but Clay desperately needed both hands to
steer.

Burnt Head Light was socked in, and the screaming wind and surf were so loud he’d practically have to run over the bell buoy
to hear it. Clay wrapped both elbows around the wheel and leaned against it, trying desperately to think. The island was less
than a half mile away. Clay knew even a superb mariner would have a difficult job bringing the boat in through the reefs to
Thalassa’s dock in this weather. But—even if his fierce determination to land on Ragged Island had wavered—it would have been
more difficult still to cross the six miles of hell to Stormhaven.

Twice, he thought he heard the deep-throated sound of the
Cerberus’s
engines. But it made no sense: first it was heading east, later heading west, as if searching—or waiting—for something.

He checked the compass in a flash of lightning, holding the wheel with weakening arms, while the boat sagged into yet another
trough. He made a slight correction to his course, heading now almost directly into the sea. The boat shuddered its way into
another comber and a sheer wall of black-and-gray water rose off the bows, higher and higher, and he realized that the correction
was in fact a mistake. As the wave toppled back down upon the pilothouse, the entire boat was jammed downward with a wrenching
twist. The tremendous force of the water popped one of the windows from its frame and seawater slammed into Clay. He had just
enough time to brace against the wheel and cling with all his might against the blast.

The boat shuddered, pressing lower and lower into the boiling sea, and just when he thought she would founder he again felt
the grateful surge of buoyancy. The boat rose until the seas parted and rolled off the deck. As the boat crested and the lightning
flashed, he had a brief glimpse of a heaving, storm-flecked ocean. Ahead lay a shadow of calmer water: the lee of Ragged Island.

Clay looked up into the black sky and a few words escaped his lips:
Oh Lord, if it be Thy will—
and then he was fighting the sea again, turning the boat diagonally and leaning against the wheel as another surge of water
came crashing through the open window. He rode the swell down, the boat shuddering as it slid into calmer water.

Before Clay had time to draw a relieved breath, he realized that the water was calm only in comparison to the tempest that
raged beyond. A heavy swell warped around the island from both sides, making a confused sea, but at least now he could turn
directly toward the mooring. He pushed the throttle up a tick and listened to the responding rumble of the engine.

The increased speed seemed to give the boat a little more stability. It ploughed ahead, plunging, surging upward, then plunging
again. With the window out and the searchlight dead, he had trouble navigating in those brief moments of vision at the top
of the swells. He realized, dimly, that it might be wise to throttle back, just in case the—

There was a stunning crash as the boat bottomed itself against the reef. Clay was thrown violently forward into the wheel,
breaking his nose; then he was tossed back against the far wall of the pilothouse. Surf, surging over the reef, slewed the
boat sideways, then a second roller spun the boat full broadside. Clay fought his way back to the wheel, snorting blood and
brine, trying to clear his head. Then a third wave slammed the boat over on its beam ends, and he was thrown free of the deck
into a perfect chaos of water and wind.

H
atch swung the nose of the
Plain Jane
into the channel. Behind came a rattling symphony of lines slapping masts as the boats bobbed hysterically at their moorings.
The wind was cold, the sky thick with water. He took a taste: as much salt as it was fresh. He’d seen seas like this before
in his childhood. But he’d never been foolhardy enough to venture out in them.

He took one final look back at the shore, then turned to sea and throttled up. They passed the floating 5
MPH
and
NO WAKE
signs, so thrashed by the sea that they hung sideways, as if admitting defeat.

Bonterre came up beside him, clinging to the instrument housing with both hands.

“Well?” she screamed in his ear.

“Isobel, I’ve been a damn fool,” he shouted back. “I’ve seen those same basic symptoms a thousand times. It was staring me
right in the face. Anyone who’s ever undergone radiation treatment for cancer knows what it’s all about.”

“Radiation treatment?”

“Yes. What happens to those patients? They get nauseated. They lose their energy. Their hair. White cell counts go through
the floor. Among all the weird ailments I’ve seen this last week, every one had those points in common.”

Bonterre hesitated, eyes wide despite the blinding surf.

“St. Michael’s Sword is
radioactive.
Think about it. Long-term exposure to radioactivity kills your bone marrow cells, basically stops cell division. It cripples
the immune system, makes you an easy mark. That’s why the Thalassa crew had all those exotic diseases that kept distracting
me. But the lack of cell division also stops the healing process, causes hair loss. Look at how my own hand has been so slow
to heal. Severe exposure leads to osteoporosis and loss of teeth. Symptoms similar to scurvy.”

“And it might also explain the computer problems.”

“What do you mean?”

“Stray radiation causes havoc with microelectronics.” Bonterre squinted at him, rain and seawater streaming across her face.
“But why go out in this murderous storm?”

“We know the sword is radioactive. But that’s all we know about it. The thing’s been shut up in a lead box, and yet it’s still
killed everyone who’s come in contact with it over the last seven hundred years. God only knows what would happen if Neidelman
took it out of the casket. We can’t allow that to happen.”

As the boat came out of the lee of Burnt Head, the sea slammed into the
Plain Jane’s
hull with brutal ferocity. Hatch shut up abruptly and spun the wheel, trying to take the heading sea at a diagonal. The air
around the boat was filled with pulverized water and spindrift. He checked the binnacle, corrected course, and scanned the
loran.

Bonterre gripped the rails with both hands, lowering her head against the driving rain. “But what
is
the sword, then?”

“God only knows. Whatever it is, it’s hot as hell. I for one don’t want to—”

He fell silent abruptly, staring ahead. A white line loomed out of the murk, towering over the top of the boat. For a moment,
he wondered if it was a large ship.

“Jesus,” he muttered, distantly surprised by the matter-of-fact tone in his own voice. “Look at that.”

It was no ship. He realized, with horror, that it was the breaking top of a massive wave. “Help me hold the wheel!” he yelled.

Leaning forward, Bonterre clapped both hands on the wheel while he worked desperately at the throttle. The boat rose along
the almost vertical face while Hatch gingerly increased the throttle, trying to keep the boat aligned. As the breaking top
of the comber struck, there was an explosion of white and a tremendous hollow roar; he braced himself against the mass of
water and held his breath.

The boat seemed suspended for a moment inside the wave; then it suddenly broke free and tipped over the crest with a violent
corkscrew motion. He quickly eased up on the throttle and the boat sank into the following trough at a sickening speed. There
was a moment of perverse, eerie calm as the boat was protected from the wind in the hollow between the waves. Then the next
great face of green water, honeycombed with foam, rose up out of the dark before them.

“It’ll get even worse beyond Wreck Island,” he yelled.

Bonterre didn’t bother to answer, clinging to the wheel as the boat lurched toward another crest with a jarring crash.

Glancing at the loran screen, Hatch saw the boat was being carried southeastward by a riptide at a good four knots. He corrected
course to compensate, one hand on the throttle and the other on the wheel. Bonterre helped steady the helm through the dips.

“The professor was right,” Hatch shouted. “I couldn’t have done this without you.”

The spray and wind had pulled Bonterre’s long hair loose from her sou’wester, and it streamed behind her in a ravishing tangle
of black. Her face was flushed, whether from fear or excitement he could not tell.

Another comber swept over the boat and he turned his eyes back to the fury.

“How will you convince Neidelman the sword is radioactive?” Bonterre hollered.

“When Thalassa set up my office, they included all kinds of crazy equipment. Including a radiologist’s Radmeter. A high-tech
Geiger counter. I never even turned the damn thing on.” Hatch shook his head as they began to climb another wave. “If I had,
it would have gone nuts. All those sick diggers, coming in covered with radioactive dirt. It doesn’t matter how much Neidelman
wants the sword. He won’t be able to argue with that meter.”

He could just barely hear, over the sound of the wind and his own shouting voice, the distant thudding of surf off the starboard
side: Wreck Island. As they came out of the lee, the wind increased in intensity. Now, as if on cue, he could see a massive
white line, far bigger than any previous wave, rising up above the
Plain Jane.
It loomed over their heads, water hissing along its crest. The boat fell into the silent trough and began to rise. His heart
hammering in his chest, Hatch gave the boat a little more acceleration as he felt the swell begin to lift them once again.

“Hang on!” he yelled as the top of the wave reached them. Goosing the throttle, he pointed the boat straight into the roiling
mass of water. The
Plain Jane
was thrown violently backward into a strange twilight world where both air and sea were made of water. Then, suddenly, they
were through, the propeller whining helplessly as the prow fell down the foamy backside of the wave. As they slid into another
glassy trough, Hatch saw a second white line materializing out of the gloom ahead, churning and shifting like a mad thing.

He struggled with the panic and despair that rose within him. That last hadn’t been a freakish wave. It was going to be like
this for the next three miles.

He began to feel an ominous sensation at each twist of the boat: a funny vibration, a tug at the wheel. The boat felt weighty
and overballasted. He peered aft through the lashing wind. The bilge pumps had been running at full capacity since they left
the harbor, but the old
Plain Jane
had no well meter. There was no way of knowing the depth of water in the hold without checking it himself.