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  An immense billowing cloud of oily smoke reached hundreds of feet above, flattening in the upper air currents, stretching over the ship like a pall. The base of the cloud was a solid torrent of flame that twisted and surged in a violent storm of orange and yellow. While below, in the deeper reaches of the hull, the flames were an acetylene blue-white, fed into molten temperatures by the intake of air through the shattered plates, creating the effect of a blast furnace.

  Though many of the passengers were able to fight their way up the stairways, over a hundred lay dead below, some trapped and burned in their cabins, others overtaken by smoke inhalation during their attempt to escape topside. The ones who made it were being driven by the flames toward the stern and away from the lifeboats.

  All efforts by the crew to maintain order were engulfed by the chaos. The passengers were finally left to fend for themselves and no one knew which way to turn. All port lifeboats were ablaze, and only three were lowered on the starboard side before the fire drove the crew back. As it was, one boat was beginning to burn by the time it hit the sea.

  Now people began jumping into the water like migrating lemmings. The drop was nearly fifty feet, and a number of those who had life jackets made the mistake of inflating them before plummeting over the side and broke their necks on impact. Women stood spellbound with terror, too frightened to leap. Men cursed in desperation. In the water the swimmers struck out for the few lifeboats, but the crews who manned them started up the engines and sailed beyond reach for fear of being swamped by overloading.

  In the middle of the frenzied drama, the container ship arrived. The captain eased his vessel within a hundred yards of the Leonid Andreyev and put his boats over as fast as they could be lowered. A few minutes later, U.S. Navy sea rescue helicopters appeared and began plucking survivors from the sea.

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  Loren gazed in abstract fascination at the sheet of advancing fire. “Shouldn’t we jump or something?” she asked in a vague tone.

  Pitt didn’t answer immediately. He studied the slanting deck and judged the list to be about forty degrees. “No call to rush things,” he said with expressionless calm. “The flames won’t reach us for another ten minutes. The further the ship heels to port, the shorter the distance to jump. In the meantime, I suggest we start heaving deck chairs overboard so those poor souls in the water have something to hang on to until they’re picked up.”

  Surprisingly, Larimer was the first to react. He began sweeping up the wooden deck chairs in his massive arms and dropping them over the railings. He actually had the look on his face of a man who was enjoying himself. Moran stood huddled against a bulwark, silent, noncommittal, frozen in fear.

  “Take care you don’t hit a swimmer on the head,” Pitt said to Larimer.

  “I wouldn’t dare,” the senator replied with an exhausted smile. “They might be a constituent and I’d lose their vote.”

  After all the chairs in sight had gone over the side, Pitt stood for two or three seconds and took stock. The blast from the heat was not yet unbearable. The fire wouldn’t kill those packed on the stern deck, at least not for a few more minutes. He shouldered his way through the dense throng to the port railing again. The waves rolled only twenty feet below.

  He shouted to Giordino, “Let’s help these people over the side.” Then he turned and cupped his hands to his mouth.

  “There’s no more time to lose!” he yelled at the top of his lungs to make himself heard over the din of the frightened crowd and the roar of the holocaust. “Swim for it or die!”

  Several men took the hint and, clutching the hands of their protesting wives, straddled the railing and slipped out of sight below. Next came three teenage girls who showed no hesitation but dove cleanly into the blue-green swells.

  “Swim to a deck chair and use it for a float,” Giordino instructed everyone repeatedly.

  Pitt separated families into a group and while Loren cheered the children, he directed their parents to jump and latch onto a floating deck chair. Then he held the children over the side by the hands as far as he could reach and let them drqp, holding his breath until the mother and father had them safely in tow.

  The great curtain of flame crept closer and breathing became more difficult. The heat felt as though they were standing in front of an open furnace. A rough head count told Pitt only thirty people were left, but it would be a close race.

  A great hulking fat man stopped and refused to move. “The water’s full of sharks!” he screamed hysterically. “We’re better off here, waiting for the helicopters.”

  “They can’t hover over the ship because of air turbulence from the heat,” Pitt explained patiently. “You can burn to a cinder or take your chances in the water. Which is it? Be quick, you’re holding up the others.”

  Giordino took two paces, tensed his powerful muscles and lifted the fat procrastinator off his feet. There was no animosity, no expression of meanness in Giordino’s unblinking eyes as he carried the man to the side and unceremoniously dumped him overboard.

  “Send me a postcard,” Giordino shouted after him.

  The diverting action seemed to motivate the few passengers who hung back. One after the other, with Pitt assisting the elderly couples to take the plunge, they departed the burning ship.

  When the last of them was finally gone, Pitt looked around at Loren. “Your turn,” he said.

  “Not without my colleagues,” she said with a feminine resolve.

  Pitt stared below to make certain the water was clear. Larimer was so weak he could barely lift his legs over the rail. Giordino gave him a hand as Loren jumped arm in arm with Moran. Pitt watched anxiously until they all cleared the side and swam away, admiring Loren’s endurance as she shouted words of encouragement to Larimer while towing Moran by the collar.

  “Better give her a hand,” Pitt said to Giordino.

  His friend didn’t have to be urged. He was gone before another word passed between them.

  Pitt took one last look at the Leonid Andreyev. The air around shimmered from the blasting heat waves as flames shot from her every opening. The list was passing fifty degrees and her end was only minutes away. Already her starboard propeller was clear of the water and steam was hissing in white tortured clouds around her waterline.

  As he was poised to leap, Pitt abruptly went rigid in astonishment. At the outer edge of his peripheral vision he saw an arm snake out of a cabin porthole forty feet away. Without hesitation, he picked up one of the still soggy blankets from the deck, threw it over his head and covered the distance in seven strides. A voice inside the cabin was screaming for help. He peered in and saw a woman’s face, eyes wide in terror.

  “Oh, my God, please help us?”

  “How many are you?”

  “Myself and two children.”

  “Pass out the kids.”

  The face disappeared and quickly a boy about six years of age was thrust through the narrow port. Pitt set him between his legs, keeping the blanket suspended above the two of them like a tent. Next came a little girl no more than three. Incredibly she was sound asleep.

  “Give me your hand,” Pitt ordered, knowing in his heart it was hopeless.

  “I can’t get through!” the woman cried. “The opening is too small.”

  “Do you have water in the bathroom?”

  “There’s no pressure.”

  “Strip naked!” Pitt shouted in desperation. “Use your cosmetics. Smear your body with facial creams.”

  The woman nodded in understanding and disappeared inside. Pitt turned and, clutching a child under each arm, rushed to the rail. With great relief he spied Giordino treading water, looking up.

  “Al,” Pitt called. “Catch.”

  If Giordino was surprised to see Pitt collar two more children he didn’t show it. He reached up and gathered them in as effortlessly as if they were footballs.

  “Jump!” he yelled to Pitt. “She’s going over.”

  Without lingering to answer, Pitt
raced back to the cabin port. He realized with only a small corner of his mind that saving the mother was a sheer act of desperation. He passed beyond conscious thought; his movements seemed those of another man, a total stranger.

  The air was so hot and dry his perspiration evaporated before it seeped from his pores. The heat rose from the deck and penetrated the soles of his shoes. He stumbled and nearly fell as a heavy shudder ran through the doomed ship, and she gave a sudden lurch as the deck dropped on an increasing angle to port. She was in her final death agony before capsizing and sinking to the sea bottom.

  Pitt found himself kneeling against the slanting cabin wall, reaching through the port. A pair of hands clasped his wrists and he pulled. The woman’s shoulders and breasts squeezed past the opening. He gave another heave and then her hips scraped through.

  The flames were running up and licking at his back. The deck was dropping away beneath his feet. He held the woman around the waist and leaped off the edge of the cabin as the Leonid Andreyev rolled over, her propellers twisting out of the water and arching toward the sun.

  They were sucked under by the fierce rush of water, swirled around like dolls in a maelstrom. Pitt lashed out with his free hand and feet and struggled upward, seeing the glimmering surface turn from green to blue with agonizing slowness.

  The blood pounded in his ears and his lungs felt as though they were filled with angry wasps. The thin veil of blackness began to tint his vision. He felt the woman go limp under his arm, her body creating an unwelcome drag against his progress. He used up the last particles of oxygen, and a pyrotechnic display flared inside his head. One burst became a bright orange ball that expanded until it exploded in a wavering flash.

  He broke through the surface, his upturned face directed at the afternoon sun. Thankfully he inhaled deep waves of air, enough to ease the blackness, the pounding and the sting in his lungs. Then he quickly circled the woman’s abdomen and squeezed hard several times, forcing the salt water from her throat. She convulsed and began retching, followed by a coughing spell. Only when her breathing returned to near normal and she groaned did he look around for the others.

  Giordino was swimming in Pitt’s direction, pushing one of the deck chairs in front of him. The two children were sitting on top, immune to the tragedy around them, gaily laughing at Giordino’s repertory of funny faces.,

  “I was beginning to wonder if you were going to turn up,” he said.

  “Bad pennies usually do,” said Pitt, keeping the children’s mother afloat until she recovered enough to hang on to the deck chair.

  “I’ll take care of them,” said Giordino. “You better help Loren. I think the senator’s bought it.”

  His arms felt as if they were encased in lead and he was numb with exhaustion, but Pitt carved the water with swift even strokes until he reached the floating jetsam that supported Loren and Larimer.

  Gray-faced, her eyes filled with sadness, Loren grimly held the senator’s head above water. Pitt saw with sinking heart she needn’t have bothered; Larimer would never sit in the Senate again. His skin was mottled and turning a dusky purple. He was game to the end, but the half-century of living in the fast lane had called in the inevitable IOU’s. His heart had gone far beyond its limits and finally quit in protest.

  Gently, Pitt pried Loren’s hands from the senator’s body, and pushed him away. She looked at him blankly as if to object, then turned away, unable to watch as Larimer slowly drifted off, gently pushed by the rolling sea.

  “He deserves a state funeral,” she said, her voice a husky whisper.

  “No matter,” said Pitt, “as long as they know he went out a man.”

  Loren seemed to accept that. She leaned her head on Pitt’s shoulder, the tears intermingling with the salt water on her cheeks.

  Pitt twisted and looked around. “Where’s Moran?”

  “He was picked up by a Navy helicopter.”

  “He deserted you?” Pitt asked incredulously.

  “The crewman shouted that he only had room for one more.”

  “So the illustrious Speaker of the House left a woman to support a dying man while he saved himself.”

  Pitt’s dislike for Moran burned with a cold flame. He became obsessed with the idea of ramming his fist into the little ferret’s face.

  Captain Pokofsky sat in the cabin of the powerboat, his hands clasped over his ears to shut out the terrible cries of the people drowning in the water and the screams of those suffering the agony of their burns. He could not bring himself to look upon the indescribable horror or watch the Leonid Andreyev plunge out of sight to the seabed two thousand fathoms below. He was a living dead man.

  He looked up at Geidar Ombrikov through glazed and listless eyes. “Why did you save me? Why didn’t you let me die with my ship?”

  Ombrikov could plainly see Pokofsky was suffering from severe shock, but he felt no pity for the man. Death was an element the KGB agent was trained to accept. His duty came before all consideration of compassion.

  “I’ve no time for rituals of the sea,” he said coldly. “The noble captain standing on the bridge saluting the flag as his ship sinks under him is so much garbage. State Security needs you, Pokofsky, and I need you to identify the American legislators.”

  “They’re probably dead,” Pokofsky muttered distantly.

  “Then we’ll have to prove it,” Ombrikov snapped ruthlessly. “My superiors won’t accept less than positive identification of their bodies. Nor can we overlook the possibility they may still be alive out there in the water.”

  Pokofsky placed his hands over his face and shuddered. “I can’t—”

  Before the words were out of his mouth, Ombrikov roughly dragged him to his feet and shoved him out on the open deck. “Damn you!” he shouted. “Look for them!”

  Pokofsky clenched his jaws and stared at the appalling reality of the floating wreckage and hundreds of struggling men, women and children. He choked off a sound deep inside him, his face blanched.

  “No!” he shouted. He leaped over the side so quickly, suddenly, neither Ombrikov nor his crew could stop him. He hit the water swimming and dove deep until the white of his uniform was lost to view on the surface.

  The boats from the container ship hauled in the survivors as fast as they could reach them, quickly filling to capacity and unloading their human cargo before returning to the center of the flotsam to continue the rescue. The sea was filled with debris of all kinds, dead bodies of all ages, and those still fighting to live. Fortunately the water was warm and none suffered from exposure, nor did the threat of sharks ever materialize.

  One boat jockeyed close to Giordino, who helped lift the mother and her two children on board. Then he scrambled over the freeboard and motioned for the helmsman to steer toward Pitt and Loren. They were among the last few to be fished out.

  As the boat slipped alongside, Pitt raised his hand in greeting to the short, stocky figure that leaned over the side.

  “Hello,” Pitt said, grinning widely. “Are we ever glad to see you.”

  “Happy to be of service,” replied the steward Pitt had passed earlier at the elevator. He was also grinning, baring a set of large upper teeth parted by a wide gap.

  He reached down, grasped Loren by the wrists and pulled her effortlessly out of the water and into the boat. Pitt stretched out his hand, but the steward ignored it.

  “Sorry,” he said, “we have no more room.”

  “What — what are you talking about?” Pitt demanded. “The boat is half empty.”

  “You are not welcome aboard my vessel.”

  “You damned well don’t even own it.”

  “Oh, but I do.”

  Pitt stared at the steward in sheer incredulity, then slowly turned and took one long comprehensive look across the water at the container ship. The name of the starboard bow was Chalmette, but the lettering on the sides of the containers stacked on the main deck read “Bougainville.” Pitt felt as though he’d been kicked in t
he stomach.

  “Our confrontation is a lucky circumstance for me, Mr. Pitt, but I fear a misfortune for yourself.”

  Pitt stared at the steward. “You know me?”

  The grin turned into an expression of hate and contempt. “Only too well. Your meddling has cost Bougainville Maritime dearly.”

  “Tell me who are you?” asked Pitt, stalling for time and desperately glancing in the sky for a Navy recovery helicopter.

  “I don’t think I’ll give you the satisfaction,” the steward said with all the warmth of a frozen food locker.

  Unable to hear the conversation, Loren pulled at the steward’s arm. “Why don’t you bring him on board? What are you waiting for?”

  He turned and savagely backhanded her across the cheek, sending her stumbling backward, falling across two survivors who sat in stunned surprise.

  Giordino, who was standing in the stern of the boat, started forward. A seaman produced an automatic shotgun from under a seat and rammed the wooden shoulder stock into his stomach. Giordino’s jaw dropped open; he gasped for breath and lost his footing, dropping partially over the side of the boat, arms trailing in the water.

  The steward’s lips tightened and the smooth yellow features bore no readable expression. Only his eyes shone with evil. “Thank you for being so cooperative, Mr. Pitt. Thank you for so thoughtfully coming to me.”

  “Get screwed!” Pitt snapped in defiance.

  The steward raised an oar over his head. “Bon voyage, Dirk Pitt.”

  The oar swung downward and clipped Pitt on the right side of his chest, driving him under the water. The wind was crushed from his lungs and a stabbing pain swept over his rib cage. He resurfaced and lifted his left arm above his head to ward off the next inevitable blow. His move came too late. The oar in the hands of the steward mashed Pitt’s extended arm down and struck the top of his head.