Treasure of Khan

"English?" he finally said without interest. "You would be from the Vereshchagin. A pity you have lost your way."

"But I have found those responsible for trying to sink her," Pitt responded.

Under the dim lights, Pitt could see the man's face flush. He checked his anger as Anatoly and the other crewman approached, shaking their heads.

"No companions? Then put him with the other and quietly deposit them over the side where no one will find them," the man hissed.

The guard stepped forward and thrust the barrel of his pistol into Pitt's ribs and nodded toward the portside passageway. Pitt grudgingly walked toward the shadows where he had left Giordino and turned down the passageway, followed by the guard and two crewmen. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the scar-faced boss return to the bridge via a side stairwell.

Marching past the crossways, he half expected to see Giordino lunge out of the shadows at his assailants, but his partner was nowhere to be seen. Reaching the stern deck, he was prodded toward one of the rusty cargo containers lining the rail. Acting calm and non-resistant, he waited until one of the crewmen fumbled with a padlock on the container before taking the offensive. The guard still poked him in the ribs with a pistol, standing off balance in the process. In a lightning-quick move, Pitt bumped the muzzle away from his body with a flick of his left elbow. Before the guard realized what was happening, Pitt had swung at him, carrying the full weight of his right fist with the momentum. The roundhouse hammered the guard's chin, coming within a hair of knocking him unconscious. Instead, he staggered backward into the arms of Anatoly as the gun clanked to the deck.

The other crewman was still occupied holding the padlock in his hands, so Pitt gambled and dove for the loose gun. As he hit the deck, his outstretched right hand just snared the Yarygin's polymer grip when a one-hundred-seventy-pound mass landed on his back. With calm callousness, Anatoly had wisely pushed the punch-drunk guard back at Pitt, the dazed man landing in a heap on Pitt's back. As Pitt tried to roll the guard off, he felt the cold steel muzzle of an automatic pistol suddenly pressed into the side of his neck. Pitt knew the order not to shoot would only go so far and dropped his gun to the deck.

Pitt was held at gunpoint on his knees until the padlock was freed and the double doors of the twenty-foot-long container were flung open. Shoved roughly in the back, Pitt staggered into the container, falling against a soft object. Under the dim light he realized that he had fallen against a human form, lying crumpled on the container floor. The body moved, the torso pulling up on an elbow as its hidden face turned to Pitt.

"Dirk ... it's good of you to drop in," rasped the weary voice of Alexander Sarghov.

***

When Pitt was apprehended on the bow, Giordino silently cursed from the shadows. Without a weapon at hand, his options were limited. He considered charging the gunman from afar, but there was just too much open deck to cross in plain view. Watching the guard fire a warning shot at Pitt dispelled the thought of conspicuous heroics altogether. Then hearing the men from the dock ru

Moving silently along the bulkhead, he quickstepped down the port deck and turned into the cross-passageway. Just as he turned the corner, a black-clad figure ru

No sooner was the man out cold than the sound of footsteps resonated down the port deck. A glance to the lighted forward deck revealed Pitt being escorted aft. Quickly dragging the unconscious man down the cross-passageway, Giordino ducked back into the conference room. Hoisting the limp body onto the conference table, he noticed that the crewman was his same height and dressed in the same black overalls that the deck guard wore. A quick search turned up no weapons on the man, who was actually the ship's radio operator. Giordino stripped off the overalls and slipped them over his own pants, then pulled on a dark wool fishing cap that the man had been wearing. Satisfied he could in the dark pass as a crewman, he stepped back into the corridor and moved aft, completely unsure of his next move.

***

Sarghov's clothes were rumpled, his hair askew, and his left brow glistened a midnight blue. Though his face was weary, his eyes sparkled with life as he recognized Pitt.

"Alexander, how bad are you hurt?" Pitt asked, helping Sarghov to a sitting position.

"I'm all right," he replied in a stronger voice. "They just roughed me up a little after I laid one of their men down." A slight smile of satisfaction creased his lips.

Behind them, the double doors of the container slammed shut, casting the interior into complete darkness. The hum of a diesel generator kicked to life as one of the crewmen took the controls of a nearby shipboard crane. The operator swung the boom across the deck, jerking it to a stop above the container as its dangling steel hook swung wildly about. Releasing the cable, he let the hook drop until it landed on the container with a metallic clang, then killed the controls.

Inside, Pitt turned on his penlight for illumination as Sarghov regained his strength.

"They tried to sink the Vereshchagin," the Russian said. "Pray tell, your presence here indicates they failed?"

"Not by much," Pitt replied. "We were able to tow the ship ashore before she sank in the bay. The oil survey team is missing. Did they come aboard with you?"

"Yes, but we were separated when we came aboard the freighter. I heard a commotion in the passageway outside my cabin and was met with the muzzle of a pistol when I went to investigate. It was the deck officer, Anatoly. He and the woman Tatiana marched us to a waiting tender at gunpoint and brought us here. Their purpose for doing so is a complete mystery," he added, shaking his head.

"That's less important at the moment than how we get out of here," Pitt said, climbing to his feet.

Sca

Outside its steel walls, Anatoly collected a pair of looped cable strands and wrapped them around the base of the container. The other crew member, a thin man with greasy hair, climbed atop the container and pulled the cables together, then slid them over the crane hook. The guard who had taken the punch from Pitt staggered back to his feet, retrieving his gun while watching the spectacle from a distance.

Jumping from the container roof, the thin crewman returned to the crane controls in a darkened corner a few yards away. Tapping his fingers on the lift lever, he elevated the boom until the cables went taut, then slowly raised the container off the deck until it swung loosely in the air. With his eyes focused on the dangling container, he failed to notice a figure creep silently across the deck and approach from the side.

He additionally failed to see the balled fist that suddenly materialized out of the darkness and struck him below his ear with the kinetic energy of a wrecking ball. Had he not immediately blacked out from the blow to his carotid artery, he would have looked into the face of Al Giordino as he was dragged from the controls like a wet noodle and dumped on the deck.