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  "It was to the sixteenth man." Pitt stared down at the grisly remains on the deck. "The unrecorded intruder who became the death of the party."

  Chapter 5

  Iceland, the land of frost and fire, rugged glaciers and smoldering volcanoes, an island prism of lava-bed reds, rolling tundra greens, and placid lake blues stretched under the rich gold glow of the midnight sun. Surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, bounded by the warm waters of the Gulf Stream in the south and by the frigid polar sea to the north, Iceland rests midway as the crow flies between New York and Moscow. A strange island of kaleidoscopic scenes far less cold than its name suggests; the average temperature in the cold month of January rarely rises above that of the New England coast of the United States. To someone seeing it for the first time, Iceland seems indeed an unequaled phenomenon of beauty.

  Pitt watched the jagged snow-packed peaks of the island grow on the horizon and the flashing water below the Ulysses turn from the deep blue of the great ocean depths to the rich green of the inshore surf. Then he altered the controls, and the helicopter dipped neatly on a ninety-degree angle and a parallel course along the steep lava cliffs that burst from the sea below. They passed over a tiny fishing village, nestled on a barron circle bay, its roofs painted in a checkered myriad of tile reds and pastel greens; an outpost at the gateway of the Arctic Circle.

  "What time is it?" Hunnewell asked, awakening from a light sleep.

  "Ten minutes past four in the morning," Pitt replied. "God, to look at the sun, you'd think it was four in the afternoon." Hunnewell yawned loudly and made a vain attempt to stretch in the cramped confines of the cockpit. "About now I'd give my right arm if I could go back to sleep between the crisp white sheets of a soft bed."

  "Keep your eyes propped open, it won't be long now."

  "How far to Reykjavik?"

  "Another half hour." Pitt paused to make a visual check of the instruments. "I could have cut north sooner, but I wanted to sightsee the coastline."

  "Six hours, forty-five minutes since we left the Catawaba. Not bad time."

  "Probably could have shaved that considerably if we weren't handicapped with an extra fuel tank."

  "Without it we'd be back there somewhere trying to swim four hundred miles to shore."

  Pitt grinned. "We could have always sent a Mayday to the Coast Guard."

  "Judging from the mood Commander Koski was in when we took off, I doubt if he'd put himself out for us if we were drowning in a bathtub and he had his hand on the plug."

  "In spite of what Koski thinks of me, I'd vote for him as admiral any time he decided to run. In my book he's a damn good man."

  "You have a funny way of expressing your admiration," Hunnewell said dryly. "Except for your perceptive deduction concerning the flame thrower hat's off to you for that one, by the way-you really didn't tell him a damned thing."

  "We gave him the truth as far as it went. Anything else would have been fifty percent guesswork. The only real fact that we omitted was the name of Fyrie's discovery."

  "Zirtonium." Hunnewell's gaze was lost in the distance. "Atomic number: forty."

  "I barely squeaked through my geology class," Pitt said, smiling. "zirconium? What makes it worth mass murder?"

  "Purified zirconium is vital in the construction of nuclear reactors because it absorbs little or no radiation.

  Every nation in the world with facilities for atomic research would give their eyeteeth to have it obtainable by the carload. Admiral Sandecker is certain that if Fyrie and his scientists did indeed discover a vast zirconium bonanza, it was under the sea close enough to the surface to be raised economically."

  Pitt turned and stared out of the cockpit bubble at the dark ultramarine blue that stretched almost unripPled to the south. A fishing boat with a chain of dories sailed out to sea, the tiny hulls moving as easy as if they were gliding across a tinted mirror. He watched them through eyes that barely saw, his mind dwelling on the exotic element that lay — covered by the cold waters below.

  "A hell of an undertaking," he muttered, just loud enough to be heard over the drone from the engine's exhaust. "The problems of raising raw ore from the sea bottom are emense."

  "Yes, but not insurmountable. Fyrie Limited employs the world's leading experts at underwater mining.

  That's how Kristjan Fyrie built his empire, you know, dredging diamonds off the coast of Africa." Hunnewell spoke with what sounded like simple admiration. "He was only eighteen, a seaman on an old Greek freighter, when he jumped ship at Beira, a small port on the coast Of Mozambique. It didn't take him long to catch the diamond fever. There was a boom on in those days, but the big SYndicates had all the productive claims tied up.

  That's where Fyrie stood out from the rest-he had a shrewd and creative mind.

  "If diamond deposits could be found on land not two miles from shore, he reasoned, why couldn't they lie underwater on the continental shelf? So every day for five months he dove in the warm waters of the Indian Ocean until he found a section of the seabed that looked promising. Now the trick was scrounging the financing to buy the needed dredging equipment. Fyrie had arrived in Africa with nothing but the shirt on his back. To beg from the white moneyed interests in the territory would have been a waste of time. They would have taken everything and left him with nothing."

  "One percent of something is often better than ninety-nine percent of nothing," Pitt interjected.

  "Not to Kristjan Fyrie," Hunnewell replied defensively. "He had a true Icelander's sense of principle-share the profits but never give them away. He went before the black people of Mozambique and sold them on forming their own syndicate, with Kristjan Fyrie, of course, as president and general manager. After the black people raised the financing for the barge and dredging equipment, Fyrie worked twenty hours a day until the entire operation was running like a computer at IBM. The five months of diving paid off-the dredge began to bring up high-grade diamonds almost immediately. Within two years Fyrie was worth forty million dollars."

  Pitt noticed a dark speck in the sky, several thousand feet higher and in front of the Ulysses. "You certainly seem to have studied the Fyrie history."

  "I know it sounds strange," Hunnewell went on, "but Fyrie seldom stayed with a project more than a few years. Most men would have bled the operation dry. Not Kristjan. After he made a fortune beyond his wildest dreams, he turned the whole business over to the people who financed the venture."

  "Just gave it away?"

  "Lock, stock and the popular barrel. He distributed every share of his stock to the native stockholders, set up a black administration that could run efficiently without him, and took the next boat back to Iceland. Of the few white men held in high esteem by the Africans, the name of Kristjan Fyrie stands right at the top."

  Pitt was watching the solitary dark speck in the northern sky turn into a sleek jet aircraft. He leaned forward, screwing up his eyes against the bright blue glare. The stranger was one of the new executive jets built by the British- fast, reliable and capable of whisking twelve passengers halfway around the world in a matter of hours without a fuel stop. Pitt barely had time to realize that the stranger was painted an ebony black from nose to tail when it swept past his range of vision traveling in the opposite direction.

  "What did Fyrie do for an encore?" he asked.

  "Mined manganese off Vancouver Island in British Columbia and brought in an offshore oil field in Peru to name a few. There were no mergers, no subsidiaries. Kristjan built Fyrie Limited into a great industry specializing in underwater geological exploitation, nothing else."

  "Did he have a family?"

  "No, his parents died in a fire when he was very young. All he had was a twin sister. Don't really know much about her. Fyrie put her through a finishing school in Switzerland, and, so rumor has it, she later became a missionary somewhere in New Guinea. Apparently her brother's fortune meant nothing to-" Hunnewell never finished the sentence. He jerked sideways facing Pitt, his eyes staring blankly, hi
s mouth open in surprise but no words coming out. Pitt barely had time to see the old man slump forward, limp and dead to all appearances, as the plexiglass bubble encircling the cockpit shattered into a thousand jagged slivers and fell away. Twisting to one side and throwing up an arm to protect his face from the blasting wall of cold air, Pitt momentarily lost control of the helicopter. Its aerodynamics drastically altered, the Ulysses nosed sharply upward, almost on its end, throwing Pitt and the unconscious Hunnewell violently against their backrests.

  It was then Pitt became aware of the machine gun shells striking the fuselage aft of the seats. The sudden uncontrolled maneuver temporarily saved their lives; the gunner aboard the black jet had been caught off guard, adjusting his trajectory too late and sending most of his fire into an empty sky. Is slow steed withUnable to match the helicopter without stalling, the mysterious jet soared forward and swung around in a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn for another assault. The bastards must have made a sharp circle east and south and west before attacking from the rear, Pitt quickly figured as he struggled to 'bring the helicopter on a level course, a near impossible task with a two-hundred-mile-an-hour air stream tearing at his eyes. He throttled down, trying desperately to reduce the unseen force that pinned his body against the seat.

  The black jet swept by again. but this time Pitt was ready for it. He pulled the Ulysses to an abrupt horizontal stop, the rotor blades frantically beating the atmosphere, raising the light craft in a straight vertical climb.

  The dodge worked. The pilot of the jet roared under Pitt, unable to bring the machine gun to bear. Twice more Pitt managed to shake his attacker, but it was only a question of time before his opponent compensated for his rapidly diminishing bag of tricks.

  Pitt didn't kid himself. There was no escape; the battle was too one-sided. The score was seven to nothing in favor of the visitors, with only a few seconds left to play in the fourth quarter. A grim smile wrinkled around Pitts eyes as he lowered the copter to a bare twenty feet above the water. Victory was hopeless, but there was a slight chance, an infinitesimal fingertip chance, he thought, for a tie score. He studied the inkblack aircraft as it jockied for the last pass. There was nothing left now but the mad clangor of steeljacketed bullets smashing through the thin aluminum skin of the Ulysses. Pitt steadied the small defenseless craft and hovered as the jet dove like a concrete bird, directly toward him.

  The gunner, laying prone and firing out an open cargo door, played it cool this time. He laid down a steady stream of shells, waiting for the narrowing gap to carry them into the path of the helicopter. The barrage of death was only thirty yards away now. Pitt braced himself for the impact and threw the Ulysses straight up into the attacking plane, the helicopter's rotor blade! shattering as they sliced through the jet's horizontal stabilizer. Instinctively Pitt flicked the ignition switch off as the turbine engine, without the drag from the rotor, raced wildly mid the howl of tortured metal. Then the racket stopped, and the sky was silent except for the wind that whistled in Pitts ears.

  He snatched a glance at the strange jet just before it crashed into the sea, nose first, it's tail section hanging like a broken arm. Pitt and the unconscious Hunnewell weren't much better off. All they could do was sit and wait for the crippled helicopter to drop like a stone nearly seventy feet into the cold Atlantic water.

  When the crash came, it was much worse than Pitt had anticipated. The Ulysses fell on its side into the Iceland surf in six feet of water, a scant football field length from shore. Pitts head whipped sideways and glanced off the door frame, sending him into a vortex of darkness. Fortunately the agonizing shock of the icy water jolted him back to dizzy wakefulness. Waves of nausea swept over him, and he knew he was only a hairbreadth away from saying To hell with it and drifting off to sleep for the last time.

  His face twisted with pain, Pitt undid his seat belt and shoulder harness, taking a gulp of air before a breaking wave crest passed over the helicopter, then quickly he unfastened the insensible Hunnewell and lifted his head above the swirling water. At that instant, Pitt slipped and lost his balance as a crashing breaker knocked him from the Ulysses into the surf. Still grasping Hunnewell by a death grip on the coat collar, he battled the rolling surge as it swept him toward shore, rolling him end-over-end across the uneven rocky bottom.

  If Pitt ever wondered what it was like to drown, he had a pretty good idea now. The freezing water stung every square inch of his skin like a million bees. His ears failed to pop, and his head was one tormenting ache; his nostrils filled with water, stabbing like a knife at his frontal sinus, and the thin membranes of his lungs felt as if they'd been dipped in nitric acid. Finally, after bashing his knees into a bed of rocks, he struggled to his feet, his head bursting gratefully into the pure Icelandic air. He swore to himself then and there that if he should ever decide to commit suicide, it definitely wouldn't be by drowning.

  He staggered from the water onto a pebble-strewn beach, half carrying, half dragging Hunnewell like a drunk leading a drunk. A few steps beyond the tideline Pitt eased his burden down and checked the doctor's pulse and breathing; both were on the fast side but regular.

  Then he saw Hunnewell's left arm. It had been terribly mangled at the elbow by the machine gun bullets. As quickly as his numbed hands would allow, Pitt took off his shirt, tore off the sleeves, and tightly wrapped them around the wound to stem the flow of blood. As bad as the tissue damage looked, there was no artery spurt, so he automatically discarded the idea of a tourniquet in favor of direct pressure. Then he sat Hunnewell up against a large rock, made a crude sling, and elevated the wound to aid the control of bleeding.

  Pitt could do nothing more for his friend, so he lay down on the lumpy carpet of stone and let the unwelcome pain in his body and the hated currents of nausea sweep through his body. Relaxing as much as the sickness would let him, he closed his eyes, shutting out a magnificent view of the cloud-dotted Arctic sky.

  Deep unconsciousness should have held Pitt for at least several hours, but a distant alarm in the depths of his brain, began signaling, and instinctively, in response to the stimuli, his eyes popped open only twenty minutes after they had closed. The scene was different; the sky and clouds were still there, but something stood in front of them. It took a second for Pitts eyes to focus on the five children standing around him. There was no fear in their faces as they stared down at Pitt and Hunnewell.

  Pitt sat up on one elbow, forced a smile-it wasn't easy-and said, "Good morning, group. Up a bit early, aren't you?"

  As if on cue, the younger children looked at the oldest, a boy. He hesitated several moments, collecting his words before he spoke. "My brothers and sisters and I were herding our father's cows on the meadow above the cliffs. We saw your-" he paused, his face blank.

  "Helicopter?" Pitt prompted.

  "Yes, that is it." The boy's face brightened. "Helicopter. We saw your helicopter lying in the ocean." A slight blush reddened his flawless Scandinavian complexion. "I am ashamed that my English is not so good."

  "No," Pitt said softly. "I'm the one who is ashamed. You speak English like an Oxford professor, while I can't even offer you two words in Icelandic."

  The boy beamed at the compliment as he helped Pitt struggle awkwardly to his feet. "You are hurt, sir. Your head bleeds."

  "I'll survive. It's my friend who is injured seriously. We must get him to the nearest doctor quickly."

  "I sent my younger sister to fetch my father when We discovered you. He will bring his truck soon."

  Just then, Hunnewell moaned softly. Pitt leaned over him, cradling the bald head. The old man was conscious now. His eyes rolled and stared at Pitt briefly, and then stared at the children. He was breathing heavily. and tried to speak, but the words caught in his throat. There was a strange kind of serenity in his eyes as he gripped Pitts hand, and in a strained effort murmured, "God save thee-" Then he trembled and gave a little gasp.

  Dr. Hunnewell was dead.

  Chapter 6

>   The farmer and his oldest boy carried Hunnewell to the Land Rover. Pitt rode in the back holding the oceanographer's head in his lap. He closed the glazed, sightless eyes and smoothed the few long strands of white hair.

  Most children would have been terrified of death, but the boys and girls who surrounded Pitt in the bed of the truck sat silently and calmly, their expressions devoid of all but total acceptance of the only certainty that waits for everyone.

  The farmer, a big handsome outdoor-hardened man, drove slowly up a narrow road to the top of the cliff and through the meadows, pulling a small cloud of volcanic red dust behind the tailgate. Within minutes he stopped at a small cottage on the outskirts of a village of white farmhouses dominated by the traditional Icelandic churchyard.

  A somber little man with soft green eyes enlarged by thick steelrimmed glasses came out, introduced himself as Dr. Jonsson and, after examining Hunnewell, led Pitt into the cottage where he stitched and bandaged Pitts three-inch head gash and made him change into some dry clothes. Later, as Pitt was drinking a strong brew of coffee and schnaps forced on him by the doctor, the boy and his father entered.

  The boy nodded to Pitt and spoke. "My father would consider it a great honor if he could transport you and your friend to Reykjavik if that is where you wish to go."

  Pitt stood and stared a moment into the father's warm gray eyes. "You tell your father that I am deeply grateful, and that the honor is mine." Pitt held out his hand and the Icelander gripped it hard.

  The boy translated. His father simply nodded and then they both turned and left the room without another word.

  Pitt lit a cigarette and looked quizzically at Dr. Jonsson. "You're a member of a strange people, Doctor. You all seem to be brimming with warmth and courtesy within, but your exterior seems completely dry of any emotion."

  "You'll find the citizens of Reykjavik more open. This is the country; we are born into an isolated and stark but beautiful land. Icelanders who live away from the city are not noted for gossip; we can almost come to understand each other's thoughts before we speak. Life and love are commonplace; death is merely an accepted occurrence."