Night Probe! (Dirk Pitt 6)

Shaw exhaled a lungful of smoke. "If you live long enough to return to England, the Prime Minister himself will pin a medal on you." All for tearing up a scrap of paper?"

"That scrap of paper is more important than you'll ever know."

"For what it's going to cost us in blood and sweat, it'd damned well better be," groused Caldweiler.

A small convoy of armored personnel carriers rolled to a stop. An officer in battle dress leaped from the lead vehicle and shouted an order. A stream of marines, clutching automatic weapons, poured to the ground and began assembling in squads.

The officer, who had an eye for authority, walked straight up to the admiral.

"Admiral Sandecker?"

Sandecker fairly beamed at the recognition. "At your service."

"Lieutenant Sanchez." The arm snapped in a salute. "Third Marine Force Reconnaissance."

"Glad to see you." Sandecker returned the salute.

"My orders were unclear as to our deployment."

"How many men do you have?"

"Three squads. Forty including myself."

"All right, one squad to cordon off the immediate area, two to patrol the woods around the hill."

"Yes, sir."

"And Lieutenant. We don't know what to expect. Tell your men to tread with a light foot."

Sandecker turned and walked to the escape shaft. The last bar of the grating had been cut away. The diving team stood ready to pierce the heart of the hill. A curious silence fell over everyone. They all stared at the black opening as though it was a sinister doorway to hell.

Pitt had donned an exposure suit and was cinching the harness of his air tank. When he was satisfied everything was in order, he nodded to Riley and the dive team. "Okay. Let's make a night probe."

Sandecker looked at him. "A night probe?"

"An old diver's term for exploring the dark of underwater caves."

Sandecker looked grim. "Take no chances and stay healthy . . ."

"Keep your fingers crossed I hope you find the treaty in there."

"Both hands. The other is in case Shaw gets in before you do."

"Yes," said Pitt wryly. "There is always that."

Then he entered the beckoning portal and was swallowed up in blackness.

The old escape route from the main quarry sloped downward into the bowels of the hill. The walls were seven feet high and showed the scars from the miners' picks. The air was moist with the faint b

ut ominous smell of a mausoleum. After about twenty yards, the passageway curved and all light was lost from the outside.

The dive lights were switched on, and Pitt, followed by Riley and three men, continued on, their footsteps echoing into the eternal darkness ahead.

They passed an empty ore car, its small iron wheels joined in rusting bond to narrow rails. Several picks and shovels stood neatly stacked in a chiseled niche as though waiting for calloused hands to grasp their handles again. Nearby were other artifacts: a broken miner's lamp, a sledgehammer and the faded, stuck-together pages of a Montgomery Ward catalog. The pages were frozen open on advertisements displaying upright player pianos.

Ajumble of fallen rocks blocked their way for twenty minutes until they cleared a path. Everyone kept a suspicious eye trained on the rotting timbers that sagged under the weight of the crumbling roof No word was spoken while they worked. The un communicated fear of being crushed by a cave-in chilled their minds. Finally they wormed their way past the barrier and found the tunnel floor covered by several inches of water.

When their knees became submerged, Pitt stopped and held up a hand. "The water level will be over our heads before long," he said. "I think the safety team better set up operations here."