Mission: Earth "Death Quest" (35 page)

Wood and bits of metal flew into the flame-rent air!

What seemed to be a body was visible for an instant and then was gone!

Flaming bits of debris were spattering all around, hissing as they hit.

The end of a dock was burning and lighting up the scene.

A searchlight came on and raked the water.

Heller dived.

I was instantly on the phone. I demanded the harbor master. There was a wait. He came on the line.

"You missed him!" I shouted. "He escaped off the back of the boat before you fired!"

"Nonsense," said the harbor master. "The boat was under control and seeking to avoid us."

"He had a radio control!" I yelled. "He's still out there in the harbor."

"You bet he is," the harbor master said. "In bits and pieces. I saw him fly through the air myself and explode to nothing!"

"That was a dummy!"

"I know a live man when I see one that is dead!" said the harbor master. "We got him! Are you Feds trying to take away the credit?"

"No, no! The credit is all yours! But mind what I say. He's still alive. He will still try. You search that harbor and if you find him, kill him. It's a Federal order!"

"All right," he said and rang off.

I was fuming. How could Heller have known? Then I recalled that he had read the message sent by Captain Grumper of the Coast Guard and might have suspected it had gone to all points.

(Bleep) Heller! Him and his can of beer!

Haggardly, I watched to see what would happen next. All I got for two solid hours was an occasional slop of water and a bubble's-eye view of the harbor.

They had a workboat under searchlights recovering debris. But that was not important. They also had a patrol launch cruising around, sweeping the water with long beam fingers.

I couldn't really make out where Heller was. At length when he lifted his arm, I saw that he was wearing a wet suit. I cursed. He had had a whole afternoon and all the resources he could loot from the Coast Guard ship to prepare his entrance. He was operating in a practiced role, that of the Fleet combat engineer, an officer with a fifty-volunteer star. But he was in very hostile waters and I doubted if ever before he had had as accurate a spy device on him as I had placed: this very viewer system.

I called the harbor master twice more, telling him I knew for sure the man was in the water and would be making for the yacht. He said he was taking every precaution.

Then suddenly I got a clear view of the ship. The
Golden Sunset
was lying to anchor, well away from everything else. My, she looked big-like a liner.

Floating stages were all around her, secured to her by cables. On her starboard side, her own landing ladder and white side were bathed in her own floodlights.

The view vanished and I had only blackness.

Then suddenly another view: her bow loomed up like a knife. Then it was gone.

If I could just determine exactly where he would be, I could alert them!

Another view. The ship seemed far away. She was broadside on and the landing stage and floodlights were glaring beyond the black expanse.

Excitedly, I called the harbor master. "He's about a hundred yards abeam of the ship on her starboard side!"

"Got it!" he said and slammed the receiver down.

And he certainly did! I heard the approaching pulse of engines almost immediately. The harbor master, bless him, must be in radio contact with his patrol launch.

A brief view of the launch, coming head on at speed, directly toward Heller!

Then blackness in the viewer.

I waited, breathless. A minute, two minutes, three minutes...

Another view! He was directly astern! About fifty yards from the yacht! The scroll,
Golden Sunset, New York,
was plain in the shimmery harbor lights:

I got the harbor master again. "He's fifty yards astern of the yacht! GET HIM!"

"Right!" barked the harbor master.

The view was gone. But engines began to churn in the audio, getting louder.

A water-washed glimpse of the patrol launch showed. It was coming straight at him!

Blackness. One minute, two minutes, three minutes. I was holding my breath. Four minutes, five minutes... What the Hells was going on?

Dizzy and lightheaded from not breathing, I shook my head to clear it. My viewer was just staying black!

Scuba gear! He must be using scuba, taken from the
81!
Yes, there was the hollow, rhythmical sound I had ignored. But where was he?

Time passed.

Then I thought I saw something. I could not be sure. It was just blackness against black.

I turned up the viewer gain all I could. Yes! An underwater piling! Heller was underneath a dock!

A view!

He was looking at a gas/diesel supply float with a huge sign on it. The Marina!

I grabbed the phone. "Now you've got him!" I shouted. "What's the dock directly across from your floating fuel stage?"

"That's my office!" said the harbor master.

"He's in the water under it!" I said. "SHOOT HIM!"

The phone went back on the hook hurriedly.

Voices! I heard voices in my audio.

"That God (bleeped) Fed on the phone says he's right under this dock!" It was the harbor master's voice!

"How the (bleep) would he know?"

"The hell with that! Get down on that fuel stage with rifles, fast. You, Hyper, get down that ladder and start shooting under there!"

Blackness.

The funky thud and moan a bullet makes going under water! Another shot. Another!

The churn of the launch engine.

A view!

It was from mid-channel, looking back at the dock.

Flame geysering into the sky!

Concussion in the water!

The whole office went in slow motion up into the sky, turned over and fell apart in flaming chunks.

The patrol launch disintegrated in a flash of fire.

The whole fuel depot went up! A roaring mushroom of churning fire blossomed in the sky.

Fragments struck with a thunk and hiss close by.

At water level, a sweep of the scene.

It was just fires now, burning bright.

"Well, it wasn't underwater detection gear, anyway,"

muttered Heller. Then his eye fastened on a distant floating body. He said, "I'm sorry, you guys. May your Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on your souls." He sounded very sad.

I was cursing. I didn't have anybody I could call.

But hope was not dead. The yacht had been alerted and he still had that gauntlet to run. That lighted landing stage could not be approached. Possibly they'd get Heller yet!

About ten minutes later I got another view. It was of a wire cable, lighter black against the darker black of night.

He looked up. He was on the dark side of the yacht. He was holding on to the edge of the rigged collision stage which lay against its side. From where he was, the wire that secured the stage went up twenty or more feet to the lowest visible deck.

There were two more decks visible above and a man was visible against the stars and faintly luminescent sky. A guard. With a rifle. He was looking aft and across the water to where the explosions had recently occurred. The light of a renewed burst of flame flicked against his white uniform.

Heller reached up and took hold of the wire cable. With his other hand he made sure that the semi-floating sack was secure to his scuba-tank straps.

Then, hand over hand, he began to lift himself up the cable.

"Ouch!" he said in a whisper. He was looking at his right hand while he held on with the other. He had apparently snagged his palm on a wire cable fray.

It made me feel better, with all the trouble he was causing me! He didn't have engineer gloves and wire cable always has loose strands like needles broken in it and sticking out. Served him right, getting in my way!

But it didn't stop him. With a glance at the guard above, Heller began to climb apin, hand over hand, up the wire.

I couldn't understand why the guard couldn't see him! All he had to do was look down!

Heller stopped twice more. The cable was biting his palms, tearing the cheap cotton gloves to bits!

Hand over hand he went. He glanced one final time at the guard above and went over the rail onto the deck.

Why hadn't that idiot seen him! Then I realized belatedly that the guard, glancing now and then at the fire on shore, was keeping himself night blind, the stupid fool! He couldn't see something black against black water.

Heller found a deck locker, probably life jackets. He opened it. He crushed aside whatever it held and then got out of his scuba tanks, mask, weight belt and flippers and put them in.

He picked up his sack and went to a deck door. With ear against it, he listened. Then he opened it and stepped into a passageway. The lights were on but they were dimmed for night.

He looked around, orienting himself.

Footsteps clattering down a ladder.

Heller opened a door and stepped in, closed it

behind him. He fumbled for a switch and turned the lights on.

A crewman was asleep in the bunk!

He was in the crew area of the ship!

A cook's hat was on a peg.

Heller shut the light off.

The cook turned over with a grunt.

Heller opened the door and listened. Only some machinery running.

He went out, located some steps and went up a deck. Suddenly he found what he could use: a posted emergency-drill plan of the ship. It was set in a brass frame upon a walnut-panelled wall. It gave an outline of the ship, deck by deck, with all lifeboats, fire hydrants and compartments plainly marked.

I had not realized how extensive this yacht was! But two hundred feet of vessel with lots of beam must make her at least two thousand tons. Music salon. Nightclub. Theater. Steam baths. Breakfast dining room. Luncheon dining room. Banquet hall. Gymnasium. Inside swimming pool. Sun swimming pool. Squash court. Race track... race track? Yes, there it was marked, and beside it, Miniature car garage.

Cabins, cabins, cabins. The ship must have room for fifty guests or more. In suites, yet! What a yacht! More like a liner! And apparently fairly new, judging by the modernness of the decor. It must have cost a fortune to build and was costing another one to keep up.

He found what he thought he wanted: Owner's Master Suite. He traced out the ways to get to it from where he was.

He went up another deck. He halted, listening, before he went into a passageway. He looked around carefully.

Polished walnut and mahogany and brass with colorful tiled decks.

In a rush he went to another cross passage, stopped and listened. Footsteps on the deck above. He froze. They receded.

He got something out of his sack. I held my breath. Was he going to shoot up this ship? Blow it up?

He moved into the passageway again. There was a big, impressive, brass-bound door ahead of him. Owner's Master Suite, Drawing Room. He passed it by. Next door, Owner's Master Suite, Bathroom. He passed it by. Next door, Owner's Master Suite, Dressing Room. He went by it. Then, Owner's Master Suite, Bedchamber. He halted.

He didn't try the knob. He went silently to work with a picklock.

He went in through the door so quickly and shut it so silently behind him that the surprise was absolute. The Countess Krak was propped up in bed, wearing a blue negligee. A silken cover was over her bent knees against which she was holding a neglected magazine. She was looking out through a square, brass-bound port toward fires on the beach. But her posture showed no interest.

Something must have made her aware that someone else was in the room.

She whipped her head sideways. She went white!

With all her might she hurled the magazine across the room!

It struck him with a thud in the chest.

"No, no," he said. "It's me. I'm sorry I frightened you!"

She peered at him, up on her knees now, on the bed. Then, "Jettero, get away from me! Your sins have blackened your face."

"Dear," he said, "you've got to listen."

"There is nothing to listen to!" she flamed. "You lied to me about other women! You married some cheap harlot! And then you married another one! You have blasted all my hopes and dreams! Get out! I never want to see you again!"

"Dear, are you going to listen to me or do I sit on you!"

"Don't you touch me, you philandering, unprincipled beast!" Her hands had been grasping about. She seized a bottle of sun lotion and hurled it at him with all her might!

It grazed his head and crashed against the wall behind him!

She leaped off the bed, grabbed for a chair to throw at him. It raised my hopes. She could kill men!

Heller suddenly dived. He hit her legs just above the knee.

She went down with a thump against the Persian carpet.

Instantly she was back at him, scratching, trying to bite.

He caught her arms and then quickly shifted to grip both her wrists with one hand. He sat down on her and

with one of his thighs, pinned her kicking legs to the floor.

"You brute!" she screamed.

She tried to bite the hand which held her wrists. He moved it and her wrists up above her head and held them against the floor.

"You," he said, "are going to do some listening!"

"I won't!"

With his free hand he was snaking his sack toward him. He fumbled inside it, brought out a stack of papers and laid them on the floor.