Raise the Titanic

    Pitt could see that there was nothing to be gained by further interrogation. He looked down at Dana and smiled. She looked up and smiled back with an anxious-to-please smile.

    "We dirty old men had best leave you alone to rest for a while," he said. "If you need anything, one of us will always be close by."

    Sandecker followed Pitt over to the entrance to the grand staircase. "What do you make of it?" Sandecker asked. "Why would anyone want to harm Dana?"

    "For the same reason they killed Henry Munk."

    "You think she got wise to one of the Soviet agents?"

    "More likely, in her case, it was a matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

    "The last thing we need on our hands now is an injured woman." Sandecker sighed. "There'll be hell to pay when Gene Seagram gets my radio message about what happened to his wife."

    "With all due respect, sir, I told Gu

    "It would appear my authority means nothing around here," Sandecker said acidly. "Anything else you neglected to tell me, Pitt? Like who those outlandish cowboy boots belong to?"

    "The boots belong to Ben Drummer."

   "I've never seen him wear them. How would . . . how could you know that?"

    "I discovered them when I searched his quarters on the Capricorn."

    "Now you've added burglarizing to your other talents," Sandecker said.

    "Drummer wasn't alone. Giordino and I have searched every one of the salvage crews' belongings over the past month."

    "Find anything of interest?"

    "Nothing incriminating."

    "Who do you think injured Dana?"

    It wasn't Drummer. That much is certain. He's got at least a dozen witnesses including you and me, Admiral, who will testify that he's been on board the Titanic since yesterday. It would have been impossible for him to attack Dana Seagram on a ship that was fifty miles away."

    At that moment, Woodson came up and caught Pitt's arm. "Sorry for the interruption, boss, but we just received an urgent call from the Juneau. I'm afraid it's bad news."

    "Let's have it," Sandecker said wearily. "The outlook can't possibly be painted any blacker than it is now."

    "Oh, but it can," Woodson said. "The message is from the missile cruiser's captain and reads 'Have received distress call from eastbound freighter Laguna Star, bearing zero five degrees, a hundred and ten miles north of your position. Must respond. Repeat, must respond. Sorry to leave you. Good luck to the Titanic!'"

    "'Good luck to the Titanic'," Sandecker echoed. His voice was flat and empty of life. "We might as well raise a flashing sign on the hull that says, 'Welcome thieves and pirates. Come one, come all'."

    So now it begins, Pitt thought to himself.

    But the only sensation that coursed through his body was a sudden, overwhelming urge to go to the bathroom.

61

    The air in Admiral Joseph Kemper's Pentagon office reeked of stale cigarette smoke and half-eaten sandwiches, and it almost seemed to crackle under the invisible cloud of tension.

    Kemper and Gene Seagram were huddled over the admiral's desk in quiet conversation while Mel Do

    "It was the security desk. The President is on his way up."

    Do

    Kemper came from behind his desk and shook the President's hand. "Nice to see you, Mr. President. Please make yourself at home. May I get you something?"

    The President sca

    Kemper gri

    Keith nodded. "One Bloody Mary coming up, sir."

    "I hope you gentlemen won't mind me standing watch with you," the President said, "but I have a heavy stake in this too!"

    "Not at all, sir," Nicholson answered. "We're happy to have you."

    "What is the situation at the moment?"

    Admiral Kemper gave a full briefing to the President, describing the unexpected ferocity of the hurricane, showing the positions of the ships on a projected wall map, and explaining the Titanic's towing operation.

    "Was it absolutely necessary that the Juneau be ordered off station?" the President asked.

    "A distress call is a distress call," Kemper replied solemnly, "and must be answered by every ship in the area, regardless of the circumstances."

    "We have to play according to the other team's rules until half time," Nicholson said. "After that, it's our game."

    "Do you think, Admiral Kemper, that the Titanic can stand up to the battering of a hurricane?"

    "As long as the tugs can keep her bow into the wind and sea, she's an odds-on favorite to come through with flying colors."

    "And if for some reason the tugs ca

    Kemper avoided the President's gaze and shrugged.

    "Then it's in God's hands."

    "Nothing could be done?"

    "No, sir. There is simply no way to protect any one vessel caught in the clutches of a hurricane. It becomes a case of every ship for herself."

    "I see."

    A knock at the door, and another officer entered, laid two slips of paper on Kemper's desk, and retreated.

    Kemper read the notes and poked up, his face set in a grim expression. "A message from the Capricorn," he said. "Your wife, Mr. Seagram . . . your wife is reported missing. A search party aboard ship was unable to locate her. They fear she was lost overboard. I'm sorry."

    Seagram sagged into Collins' arms, his eyes widened in stu

    Do

    Kemper gestured to the President for his attention. "There's another message, sir. From the Samuel R. Wallace, one of the tugs towing the Titanic. The towing cable," Kemper said. "It snapped. The Titanic is adrift in the center of the hurricane."

    The cable hung like a dead snake over the stern of the Wallace, its severed end swaying in the black depths a quarter of a mile below.