Fire And Ice (39 page)

"You wanted revenge. So does he."

"But you told me he got the guy who tortured him." "He blames all Japanese. I think he's trying to make up

for betraying his friends. I'm sure he talked," Sarah said. "What kind of revenge?" asked Stone.

"He kept talking about Christmas in Tokyo," she replied.

"Four o'clock, Christmas Eve. The Tokyo Tower—but that makes sense, an easy-to-find landmark near the waterfront."

" 'A bang-up Christmas,' he kept saying. 'It's gonna be a bang-up Christmas.' "

"The Dallas Belle," Stone said, "carries more thermal energy than a nuclear bomb. Maybe the crazy loon wants to blow up Tokyo— Jesus!"

"What if it is the gas? But he's not selling it. He's going to detonate it."

"That's not possible. The explosion would be a thousand times worse than the Kobe quake—destroy the banks, stock market, corporate headquarters, the entire Japanese economy."

Sarah's mind trembled again. "He and the Chinese are buying stock."

"If they sell short, they'll own the planet."

"And slaughter twelve million people?"

"And Ronnie."

"Gotcha!"

Moss was hunched up in the forecabin of a triple-engine ocean racer with sat phones, signal trackers, and his laptop. The computer-generated lines of position intersected on the screen.

"Oh, shit!"

He had underestimated the sailboat's speed. She was fifty miles ahead of where he had calculated he would find her. Fifty miles of open ocean. And they had stopped transmitting. He flung open the cockpit hatch. The drivers,

buckled in with three-point harnesses, gazed down at him awaiting orders. "East," he yelled. "Go!"

Engines thundered. The hull began pounding, smashing from wave top to wave top like a giant skipping stone. Down in the wildly leaping forecabin, belted in like the drivers, Moss clung to a handgrip as he explained the situation to Mr. Jack on the sat phone. Mr. Jack said he'd radio the doctors, put the kid on again, and let them talk until Moss was able to locate their signal. Ten minutes later he called back on the sat phone and said, " They're not answering. Probably up on deck and don't hear it." Moss climbed out into the cockpit again. Of course they couldn't hear their radio if they were on deck. It was wet and bitter cold. They had their hatch closed. And without a radio signal to track, no way he was going to spot that damn sailboat before it got dark.

"We've got to radio Japanese Maritime Safety."

"Who will believe us? We don't exist. Neither does the boat. Even our call sign is phony."

"How about the U.S. Navy?"

"Worse bureaucrats than the Japanese."

"CNN?" Sarah asked, then answered her own question. "If we start a panic, the Japanese defense forces will destroy the ship at sea, and Ronnie with it."

"Kerry McGlynn— No, Lydia Chin. She's better connected. And Robert works in Tokyo."

"Will she believe us?"

"She didn't believe me, but she'll believe you."

They scrambled below, and tuned the single-sideband transmitter to Lydia Chin's private shipping channel.

It was a goddamn big ocean, thought Moss. The boat was crashing from wave to wave, his stomach was queasy despite his anti-seasickness ear patch, and the light was fading. The doctors were nowhere to be seen.

"Sir!" Moss heard in his headset. The voice of his radio listener in Kagoshima, on the southern tip of Kyushu. "I hear them, sir! They're broadcasting on nineteen-forty."

"Lock on!"

"Already am, sir."

Moss tuned in his own tracker, then sat-phoned the Dallas Belle to alert Mr. Jack. Mr. Jack was real pleased, until he heard the doctors talking.

They got a good strong signal to Lydia Chin, clear enough to convey the woman's steelin-silk tones. "Sarah," she said, "Are you absolutely sure?"

"Absolutely," Sarah assured her for the third time.

After a long, long silence, a silence so long that Stone thought they'd lost the signal, Lydia said, "I will fly to Tokyo."

"Thank you. Thank you so much."

Lydia's reply was chilling.

"But do understand that from the Japanese point of view, the lives of twelve million people will take precedence over that of one little girl—provided I can even convince them that this is not a tasteless hoax."

Stone grabbed the microphone.

"All you've got to do is convince them to watch for a fifty-thousand-ton gas carrier steaming their way! Tell them to board for a safety check while it's still at sea. Tell them the last we saw they were painting the hull black. A black fifty-thousand-ton LNG vessel shouldn't be too hard to spot."

He gave the microphone back to Sarah and stepped up the companionway to look for ships. The water looked empty, until, miles behind the boat, in the northwest where the advancing winter night had not yet darkened the water, he saw movement. Veronica descended the sea it had just climbed and he lost sight of it. He reached into the cockpit for the binoculars which were hanging from the steering pedestal. The Swan attained the next crest, which was capped with foam. He saw it again, closer, sheets of spray hurled skyward by a thin dark wedge.

"What in hell . . . Sarah!"

He needed her eyes. Feeling a sudden urgency, he dropped down the companionway and handed her the binoculars.

"Take a look astern. Five, six miles."

She bounded up the companionway and called down a moment later. "It's a small motorboat. He's heading straight for us."

"Where the hell did he come from? We're a hundred miles offshore— Hold on, Lydia." The binoculars revealed a Cigarette class ocean racer—a type favored by drug smugglers and the American DEAcovering the distance at fifty knots. "Japanese customs?"

"I can't tell."

"Got to be Customs or Coast Guard. Maybe they'll listen to us."I don't see a Japanese flag." He looked around. Not a ship in sight.

At four miles he heard its engines, a staccato thunder, muted but growing louder. Audible too was a boom each time the racing hull went airborne and smashed down on the next wave. It closed within a half mile and turned broadside to the Swan. Sarah moved closer to Stone and he instinctively put his arm around her. As the black hull rose on a big sea, it was suddenly illuminated by a flash of light. They heard a sharp bang. Incredulous, they watched a dark cylinder travel across the water, skimming the crests, hurtling toward them.

"CHEER UP, PAL. WE'RE ON OUR WAY."

Ronnie was still sitting in the radio operator's chair, swinging her feet and gazing tearyeyed at the radio. Mr. Jack put on a peaked cap covered with gold insignia, and held a smaller one out to her.

"Tugs are here, Mr. Jack."

"Come on, pal. Gotta give the captain a hand."

He tossed her the cap. She caught it and tried it on. Like every piece of clothing he had given her, it fit perfectly. She wondered if he'd sent storekeepers to measure her while she slept.

"And put on that parka. Going to be cold downriver. No, no. Not the red one. Uniform. Can't sail a ship outta uniform."

Sure enough, he'd brought another parka, navy blue, and it fit too. His nose, she noted, was almost as red as the parka he threw to the deck for Ah Lee to pick up later. He stank of whiskey.

"Move it! Double time."

He made a show of jogging down the corridor to the bridge, but he really just walked because his shoulder still hurt when he tried to run.

Ronnie trailed after him, her heart heavy, her mind alert. At least Moss wasn't around. She hadn't seen him since yesterday. Maybe he fell overboard. Good riddance, Mummy would say.

On the bridge, the captain was speaking into a walkiesquawkie and a Chinese pilot had come aboard, and a crewman she hadn't seen before was standing at the helm. You couldn't see out the front windows anymore. But the radar repeaters were lighted. The deck vibrated from the engine. Just like on Veronica, everything seemed to shimmer, all ready to sail.

Mr. Jack opened the door to the port bridge wing and motioned her to follow. She didn't want to. It was so cold. But there he was, out where the tip of the wing extended a few feet past the new superstructure, pointing and demanding she look. The tugs were billowing smoke and steam and hooting madly. Two of them were pulling lines from the Dallas Belle's stern. The third waited in the river. And boy, were they going to be surprised when they got a look at the Dallas Belle. Not quite the ship they had towed in. The gutted hull that remained of the old cruise ship looked like an empty soap dish.

"Mr. Jack!" The captain, calling from the door. "Scrambler."

"Be right back, pal. Stay here."

She watched him walk inside and waited, shivering. Ever since Moss left he'd been calling her "pal" instead of "14d". It was like having a friend and it made her feel a little better, which was weird because he was the one doing all the bad stuff. Mr. Jack took the superencrypted satellite phone into the computer room, where he was alone. "What?" "Radio-guided missile right in the gut."

"Missile? Moss, am I paying you to be stupid?" "No, Mr. Jack."

"Why didn't you ride alongside and drop a grenade in their laps? It's a goddammed sailboat, for crissake." "Your Japanese guy didn't have a grenade."

"But he had a missile. Terrific."

"Besides, why get close enough for a firefight if I got a missile?"

"You already searched his boat. They don't carry guns."

"What if he picked up a fullie in Shanghai? Get my ass sprayed."

"Moss, you know damned well he'd have a better chance of screwing the mayor's daughter than acquiring an automatic weapon in Shanghai.",

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry, Mr. Jack. It seemed like a good idea."

"Anybody see you?"

"No. Middle of nowhere out here. Hundred miles from land."

"Did they sink?"

"They're on fire."

"Are they sinking?"

"They're on fire!" Moss protested angrily. "Looks like Baghdad on CNN."

"Make sure they sink."

He jammed the phone in his pocket and walked back to the bridge. Ronnie had her nose pressed to the glass. Probably oughta adopt her, take pity on an orphan. For a long five seconds after the missile struck Veronica, Stone couldn't believe they were still alive. Then black smoke began gushing out of both sides of the hull, followed by astonishingly bright flame.

Their attacker had overestimated the strength of fiberglass; the warhead—probably armor-piercing—hadn't detonated. The missile had passed right through the hull without exploding. But its fiery tail had ignited a fire.

He closed the cabin hatch and ran toward the bow, yelling, "Hit the extinguishers." Sarah opened a cockpit hatch and yanked a red cord, activating Halon fire extinguishers in the engine box and main cabin, and a sodium bicarbonate tank in the galley. She shut down the generator, which would consume the Halon gas. Stone tore open a hatch in the foredeck, turned on the fire hose, and dragged it back to the cockpit. Sarah was ready at the cabin hatch with a portable extinguisher.

While they waited for the Halon to work—air from the hatch would dissipate the smothering gas—they stripped off their foul-weather jackets, which were made of synthetics that would melt to their skin. Flame and smoke still gushed from the sides. Stone nodded. Sarah slid the hatch open. Black smoke poured out. He filled his lungs with air and leaned in with the hose.

Flames were dancing on both sides of the cabin. Neither the Halon nor the sodium bicarbonate, which was best used on a galley grease fire, had extinguished the fire. Stone twisted the nozzle. The pump started clanking. The hose bucked in his hands, and a jet of water shot into the smoke. The missile had blasted through the nav station, where minutes earlier Sarah had been hunched over the radio, across the cabin, and out through the galley.

He knocked down the flames in the galley and stepped into the smoke-filled cabin. Sarah followed him with the portable extinguisher.

"Port side!" he shouted in the darkness, spraying fresh flames to starboard. She directed Halon on the burning nav station. Suddenly, it was dark. The fire was out. They scrambled up the companionway, coughing and gasping for clean air. Then Stone went down again with the portable to make sure the fire didn't flare up again. The missile had bored a four-inch hole in the port side—scattering the electronics—and, exiting starboard, had blown a jagged hole a foot wide. Water gushed in when the boat heeled.

"They're coming," Sarah called.

Across the darkening sea, Stone heard their engines getting louder.

"Get my hammer and chisel," he yelled, frantically pulling up the floorboards.

"What are you doing?" she cried.

"Chisel!"

He flung the floorboards out of his way and knelt in the bilge. When he reached back she slapped the chisel butt into his hand, and when he reached again, the hammer.

"What are you doing?"

"Get a light."

She grabbed one from a charger, found it half-melted by the fire, and grabbed another from the toolbox.

"Here! Point it here."

She aimed it into the bilge, where oily water was sloshing with the movement of the boat. He pressed the cutting edge of the chisel to the fiberglass and banged the butt with the hammer. Sarah watched, mystified. They were directly over the keel. The sharp tool stripped away layers of white gel coat and then shards of the clear, glassy material below. Suddenly a seam opened. A foot-long rectangle of fiberglass pulled away. Michael jammed the chisel under it, twisted hard, and it popped out, revealing a deep slot into which he lowered his hand.

Veronica heeled before a gust, and seawater plumed through the hole in the galley.

"Shove a cushion into that!"

Then, to her amazement, Michael drew a narrow box about two feet long out of the slot. He popped a row of catches. Watertight seals parted with a sucking sound. Inside was a matte-black gun and three banana-shaped ammunition clips duct-taped together.

"What is that?"

Stone gave her a look. She had been born in a soldier's house. Like it or not, she knew a semiautomatic when she saw one. And she knew, too, the futility of carrying protection you had to surrender to island governments before cruising their remote and unguarded waters.