Medusa (NUMA Files 8)

“Good idea,” Coombs said. “Maybe their guy Austin can give the Navy some help doing its job.”

This parting comment was intended as another dig at the Navy, but Casey didn’t come back at Coombs as he had at the earlier jibes from the White House aide. He merely smiled.

“Maybe he can,” he said.

KANE TRIED TO GET a rise out of the man in black.

“Guess we’re going to the mattresses,” he said as they walked to the elevator.

“Huh?” Jones said.

“From The Godfather . . . Mafia talk.”

“We’re not the Mafia, sir.”

No, you’re not, Kane thought as he followed Jones from the room, but you might as well be. He couldn’t resist using another borrowed line from the movie.

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“Don’t forget the cannoli,” he said.

CHAPTER 14

A FEW MINUTES AFTER ONE O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING, AN inflatable pontoon boat softly bumped against the hull of the William Beebe and four figures dressed in black-and-green camouflage suits clambered up the side of the ship on rope ladders suspended from padded grapnel hooks. They vaulted over the rail one by one and dashed across the deck as silently as the shadows they resembled.

Except for the night-shift watch on the bridge, the crew was sound asleep in their cabins, recovering from the exertions of the bathysphere launch and rescue. Austin was awake, however, and after staring at the ceiling, his mind churning, he got up and got dressed and made his way to the machine shop.

He switched on the lights, and went over to examine the blade clamped in a table vise. He found a magnifying glass, placed a desk lamp directly over the blade, and examined the tiny ding near the hilt. Through the lens he saw that the flaw was actually a mark in the shape of an equilateral triangle with a dot at each point.

Austin drew the design on a pad of paper. He stared at it for a few moments but nothing jumped out at him. He set the pad down and went out onto the deck, thinking the cool air might blow away the cobwebs of sleep. He took a deep breath, but the sudden influx of oxygen produced a yawn instead. His synapses needed a stronger jolt.

He looked up at the bridge lights glowing in the window of the pilothouse. The night watch always kept a coffeepot brewing. He climbed the exterior stairs to the starboard bridge wing. A man’s voice came through the partially open door. The words were growled rather than spoken, and had an accent Austin couldn’t place, but one word stood out from the others.

Kane.

Austin’s well-honed instincts came into play. He moved away from the door, plastered his back against the outside wall of the bridge, and edged up to a window. He saw Third Mate Marla Hayes, a male crewman, and Captain Gannon standing together in the pilothouse. The captain must have been rousted from his bunk because he had a jacket on over his pajamas and slippers on his feet.

Four figures wearing commando outfits were gathered around the captain, the third mate, and the crewman. Hoods covered the faces of three of the commandos, the fourth having removed his to reveal an Asian face with jade-green eyes and a clean-shaven head. All four cradled short-barreled automatic weapons carried sidearms, and had long-bladed knives hanging at their waists.

“I’ll tell you again: Dr. Kane is no longer on this ship,” Gannon was saying. “He left hours ago on a seaplane.”

The unhooded commando reacted with the swiftness of a striking rattlesnake, his free hand shooting out in a short, stabbing blow to the captain’s solar plexus.

“Do not lie to me!” he snapped.

The captain doubled over, but he managed to gasp out a reply.

“Kane is not here,” he wheezed. “Search the whole damned ship, if you don’t believe me.”

“No, Captain,” his assailant said. “You will search the ship. Tell everyone to come up to the deck.”

Still bent over in pain, Gannon reluctantly picked up a receiver connected to the Beebe’s public-address system. When he hesitated with the receiver at his mouth, his assailant forcefully jabbed a gun barrel into the captain’s side to show his impatience.

Gannon winced, but he stubbornly resisted the impulse to cry out. He took a deep breath and spoke into the receiver.

“This is the captain. All hands on deck. All officers and crew assemble on the fantail.”

Gannon’s assailant barked out an order, and then he and two of his accomplices herded their three prisoners toward the door leading out onto the wing. Austin saw the move and climbed up a ladder that provided access to the radio tower on the pilothouse roof. From his perch, he watched the group descend to the main deck. He climbed back down and peered in a window. One attacker had been left to guard the ship’s control center.