Dragon (Dirk Pitt 10)

A deep despair settled in the control sphere. Any hope of rescue was a fantasy. The only certainty was a future salvage project to retrieve Old Gert and their bodies long after they were dead.

Dale Nichols, special assistant to the President, puffed on his pipe and peered over his old-style reading spectacles as Raymond Jordan entered his office.

Jordan managed a smile despite the sickly sweet tobacco fumes that hung in the office like smog under an inversion layer. "Good afternoon, Dale."

"Still raining?" asked Nichols.

"Mostly turned to drizzle."

Jordan noted that Nichols was under pressure. The "protector of the presidential realm" was a class operator, but the thicket of coffee-brown hair looked like a hayfield in a crosswind, the eyes darted more than usual, and there were tension lines in the face Jordan had never seen before.

"The President and the Vice President are waiting," said Nichols quickly. "They're most anxious to hear an update on the Pacific blast."

"I have the latest report," Jordan said reassuringly.

Though he was one of the five most powerful men in official Washington, Jordan was not known to the general public. Nor was he familiar to most bureaucrats or politicians. As Director of Central Intelligence Jordan headed the National Security Service and reported directly to the President.

He lived in the spectral world of espionage and intelligence, and there were very few outsiders who were aware of the disasters and tragedies that he and his agents had saved the American people from.

Jordan did not strike a stranger as a man with a brilliant intellect who possessed a photographic memory and was conversant in seven languages. He seemed as ordinary-looking as his men and women in the field. Medium height, late fifties, healthy head of silver-gray hair, solid frame with slight paunch, kindly oakbrown eyes. A faithful husband to his wife of thirty-seven years, they had twin daughters in college, both studying marine biology.

The President and Vice President were engaged in quiet conversation as Nichols ushered Jordan into the Oval Office. They turned instantly and faced Jordan, who observed that they were as uptight as the President's special assistant.

"Thank you for coming, Ray," said the President without fanfare, nervously motioning to a green couch beneath a portrait of Andrew Jackson. "Please sit down and tell us what in hell is going on out in the Pacific."

Jordan always found himself amused by the painful uneasiness that gripped politicians during an impending crisis. No elected official had the seasoned toughness and experience of career men such as the Director of Central Intelligence. And they could never bring themselves to respect or accept the immense power Jordan and his counterparts possessed to control and orchestrate international events.

Jordan nodded to the President, who towered a good head above him, and sat down. Calmly, with what seemed to the others agonizing slowness, he set a large leather accountant's style briefcase on the floor and spread it open. Then he pulled out a file as a reference.

"Do we have a situation?" the President asked impatiently, using the formal watchword for an imminent threat to the civilian population, such as a nuclear attack.

"Yes, sir, unfortunately we do."

"What are we looking at'?"

Jordan glanced at the report purely for effect. He'd already memorized the entire thirty pages. "At precisely eleven-fifty-four hours, an explosion of great force took place in the North Pacific, approximately nine hundred kilometers northeast of Midway Island. One of our Pyramider spy satellites recorded the flash and atmospheric disturbance with cameras and recorded the shock wave from clandestine hydrophonic buoys. The data was transmitted directly to the National Security Agency, where it was analyzed. This was followed by readings from seismographic array stations linked to NORAD, who in turn relayed the information to CIA technicians at Langley."

"And the conclusion?" the President pushed.

"They agreed the explosion was nuclear," he said calmly. "Nothing else could be that massive."

Except for Jordan, who seemed as relaxed as if he was watching a soap opera on television, the expressions of the other three men in the Oval Office looked positively grim at the abhorrent thought that was finally thrown out in the open.

"Are we on DEFCOM Alert?" inquired the President, referring to the scale of nuclear readiness.

Jordan nodded. "I've taken the liberty of ordering NORAD to go immediately to a DEFCOM-Three Alert with standby and staging for DEFCOM-Two, depending on the reaction by the Soviets."

Nichols stared at Jordan. "Are we airborne?"

"A Casper SR-Ninety recon aircraft took off from Edwards Air Force Base twenty minutes ago to verify and collect additional data."

"Are we certain the shock wave was caused by a nuclear explosion?" asked the Vice President, a man in his early forties who had spent only six years in Congress before being tapped for the number-two job.

The consummate politician, he was out of his depth on intelligence gathering. "It might have been an underwater earthquake or volcanic eruption."

Jordan shook his head. "The seismographic recordings showed a sharp pulse associated with nuclear detonations. The reflection from an earthquake goes back and forth for a longer length of time. Computer enhancement confirms that fact. We should have a good idea of the energy in kilotons after the Casper collects atmospheric radiation samples."