The Storm - Cussler Clive (книги без сокращений .TXT) 📗

Paul looked around. “I do have one idea,” he said. “I’m just not sure you’re going to like it much.”

“At this point,” Marchetti said, “we don’t have much of a choice.”

CHAPTER 43

THE SURPRISE WIND THAT HAD PULLED KURT, LEILANI AND Ishmael along gusted for the better part of two hours. At times it threatened to lift the boat out of the water. Halfway through the ride, the strange reflective effect vanished as quickly as it had come, both from the water around them and from their bodies.

“Do you think they’re gone?” Leilani had asked.

“Doubt it,” Kurt said. “Whatever made them shine seems to have passed, but I’m guessing they’re still on us and in the sea.”

The wind began to taper over the next hour. Wherever it came from, it blew itself out an hour before dusk. The starboard side of the boat sagged further and the three of them had no choice but to hug the port bolsters to keep the boat from tipping. As it was, every little wave that came up washed over the slanted deck.

Kurt reeled the chutes in, wrung them out and stored them. He was almost done when a shout from Ishmael startled him.

“Land!” Ishmael shouted. “Land ahead!”

Kurt looked up. Low on the horizon was a greenish blur. In the failing light it could have been a cloud catching some weird reflection.

Kurt pulled the binoculars out, wiped the lenses and held them to his eyes.

“Please let it be land,” Leilani said, clasping her hands together. “Please.”

Kurt could see green and the tops of trees. “It’s land all right,” he said, slapping Ishmael on the shoulder. “It’s land, big-time.”

He put the binoculars away and moved to the tail end of the boat. He switched the fuel line to reserve and cranked up the outboard. It sputtered to life, and Kurt twisted the throttle.

With the prop going again, the half-deflated boat moved in a crablike fashion that soon had Kurt soaked to the bone in the surprisingly cold water.

After twenty minutes, he could see a central peak, maybe fifty feet high and covered in vegetation. Flat land ran out on both sides of it. He could see waves breaking on a reef that surrounded the island.

“Volcanic atoll,” he said. “We’re going to have to get over the reef to get on dry land. We might have to swim for it.”

He looked at Ishmael and then to Leilani.

“You still have his gun?”

She nodded. “Yes, but—”

“Give it to me.”

She handed him the pistol that both of them knew was empty. He held it at the ready. “She’s going to untie you,” Kurt said. “You cause any trouble, I’ll fill you full of more holes than the boat.”

“No trouble,” Ishmael said.

Kurt nodded and Leilani disconnected the carabiner and heaved the anchor over the side. Next she untied his legs and threw the rope away.

Kurt waited for him to make some move, but all he did was stretch his legs and smile with relief.

By now they were closing in on the reef that surrounded the island. The waves weren’t too bad, but it was pretty turbulent where there were gaps in the reef.

“Should we look for a calmer spot?” Leilani asked.

“Tank’s got to be almost dry,” Kurt replied.

He went for the first gap he saw. The floundering boat plowed toward it like a barge, shoving a low surge of water in front of it. The water around them changed from dark blue to turquoise, and the chop got worse where the submerged sections of the reef affected the wave dynamics.

One second they’d crest a two-foot wave and the next they’d be hit from the side by another and dropped into a trough that seemed to drag them backward. The hard spine of the boat ground across something solid, and the prop chewed into it.

Two waves from behind combined and shoved them forward and to port. They scraped over more coral as the foam from a third wave washed over them.

Kurt turned the outboard this way and that, gunning the throttle and backing off, using it as both a motor and rudder. The backwash through the gap fought against them, but with the next set of breakers they surged forward again. This time the port side hit hard and both the chambers were ripped open.

“We’ve taken a hit,” Leilani shouted.

“Stay in the boat as long as you can,” Kurt shouted.

He gunned the throttle once more. The outboard revved for ten seconds or so and then began to sputter. He backed off a little, but it was too late. The motor stalled, starved of fuel. Another wave smashed them sideways.

“Go!” Kurt shouted.

Ishmael clambered over the side. Leilani hesitated and then went in, diving forward. Another wave smacked the sinking boat, and Kurt also lunged forward into the surf.

He swam with everything he had. But twenty-four hours without food, a lack of water and the exertion of the past two days counted against him. Fatigue would not wait long to set in.

The undertow pushed him back and then a wave swept him forward. He scraped over some more coral, jammed his foot onto a solid piece and pushed off hard, again launching himself forward. The boots made it hard to swim, but they were worth their weight in gold each time he kicked off against the reef.

When the undertow returned, he wedged his feet into the coral and held his ground. The foam blinded him as the swells rose over him. Something soft crashed into him from the front.

It was Leilani.

He grabbed her and shoved her forward with the next wave, and they surged through into the calmer section of water inside the protective ring of the reef.

Kurt swam hard. Leilani did the same. When his feet hit the sand, he dug in and waded forward, one hand on Leilani’s life jacket, dragging her with him.

They made it out of the surf and collapsed on the white sand, far enough down the beach that the waves still washed up against them.

Breathing was almost the limit of what he could handle at the moment, but he managed to say a few words: “You all right?”

She nodded, her chest heaving and falling, as his was.

Kurt looked around. They were alone. “Ishmael?”

He saw nothing, heard no response.

“Ishmael!”

“There!” Leilani said, pointing.

He lay facedown in the foam as the waves washed him up onto the sand and then dragged him backward.

Kurt got up, stumbled in Ishmael’s direction and crashed back into the sea. He grabbed Ishmael and dragged him to shore.

Ishmael began coughing and choking and spitting up water. A brief look told Kurt he would survive.

Before he could celebrate, a pair of long shadows fell over Kurt from behind. He recognized the shapes of rifles and burly men in the surreal shadows painted on the sand.

He turned. Several men stood with the sun to their backs. They seemed to be wearing ragged uniforms and helmets and carrying heavy bolt-action rifles.

As they approached, he saw them better. They were dark-skinned men, looking almost like Aboriginal Australians but with Polynesian features as well. Their rifles were old M1 carbines with five-shot clips and their uniforms and helmets looked like U.S. Marines circa 1945. Several more of them stood among the trees at the top of the beach.

Kurt was too exhausted and too surprised to do much more than watch as one of the men approached him. The man held the long rifle casually but wore a look of utter seriousness on his face.

“Welcome to Pickett’s Island,” he said in deeply accented English. “In the name of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, I make you my prisoner.”

CHAPTER 44

FROM JOE’S PERSPECTIVE EITHER THE DOCKING PROCEDURE for the ferry was overly complicated or the boat and its captain were ill suited to the task. A full hour after the bay doors had been opened and the ship had been shunted back and forth a dozen times, they finally bumped against a pier.