The Stone Monkey (Lincoln Rhyme 4)

Amelia Sachs realized something about the eerie banging she'd been hearing since she'd entered the ship. Three fast bangs, three slow.

It was Morse code for S-O-S. And it was coming from somewhere deep within the ship.

Chapter Thirty-seven

S-O-S.

The universal distress call.

S-O . . .

Somebody was alive! The Coast Guard had missed a survivor. Should she go find the other divers? Sachs wondered.

But that would take too long; Sachs imagined from the uneven pounding that the trapped air the survivor was breathing was nearly gone. Besides, the sound seemed to be coming from nearby. It should take only minutes to find the person.

But where were they exactly?

Well, obviously it hadn't come from the direction of the bridge, through which she'd entered the ship. It wasn't coming from the cabins here either. It had to be one of the holds or the engine room--in the lower part of the ship. Now, with the Dragon on its side, those areas were level with her, on her left.

Yes, no?

For this she couldn't ask Lincoln Rhyme's advice.

There was no one to help her here.

Oh, Jesus, I'm really going to do this, aren't

I?

Less than 1200 pounds of air left.

So you better get your butt going, girl.

Sachs glanced at the faint illumination where the bridge was, then she turned away from it toward the darkness--and the claustrophobia--and kicked hard. Following the clanking.

S-O-S.

But when she came to the end of the black corridor, from which she thought she heard the code, Sachs found no way to get into the interior of the ship. The corridor just ended. She pressed her head against the wood, though, and could distinctly hear the clanging.

O-S.

Training the light on the wall she discovered a small door. She opened it and gasped as a green eel swam leisurely past her. She let her heart calm and gazed inside, looking to her left, into the bowels of the ship. The shaft was a dumbwaiter, presumably to cart supplies up to the cabin deck and the bridge from the lower decks. It measured about two feet by two feet.

Confronting the thought of swimming into the narrow space, she now thought about going back for help. But she'd already wasted too much time finding the doorway.

Oh, man . . .

One thousand pounds of air.

Clank, clank . . .

She closed her eyes and shook her head.

Can't do it. No way.

S-O-S.

Amelia Sachs, calm as tea when she hit 130 miles per hour in her Camaro SS, would wake up sobbing after dreams of herself imprisoned in chambers and tunnels and mine shafts.