38

They had a long way to go. The hangars at the end of the isthmus airstrip were over a mile across the facility from the Lowenhardts' prison quarters. Besides a satellite photo of the facility for a guide, they now had the assistance of the scientists, who were familiar with the layout of the streets.

Claus Lowenhardt fell back to talk softly to Giordino. "Is your friend truly in control of our situation?"

"Let's just say that Dirk is a man of infinite resource who could talk or extricate himself out of almost any awkward situation."

"You trust him." It was a statement more than a question.

"With my life. I've known him for almost forty years and he hasn't failed me yet."

"Is he an intelligence agent?"

"Hardly." Giordino could not suppress a soft laugh. "Dirk is a marine engineer. He's special projects director for the National Underwater and Marine Agency. I'm his second in command."

"God help us!" Lowenhardt muttered. "If I had known you were not highly trained undercover CIA agents, I would have never come with you and risked my wife's life."

"Your lives couldn't be in the hands of a better man," Giordino assured him, his voice low and hard as concrete.

Pitt moved from one structure to another, trying to stay in the shadows away from the streetlamps and overhead lights on the roofs of the buildings. It was not an easy journey. The facility was brightly lit from one end to the other. Floodlights had been installed on every building, along every street to discourage anyone from trying to escape. Because of the abundance of illumination, Pitt scanned the territory through binoculars rather than his nightscope, continually checking for evidence of guards lurking in the shadows.

"The streets seem unusually empty of patrols," he murmured.

"That's because the guards turn loose the dogs until morning," said Hilda.

Giordino came to an abrupt halt. "You didn't say anything about dogs."

"I wasn't asked," she said blankly.

"I'll bet they're Dobermans," Giordino moaned. "I hate Dobermans."

"We're lucky we got this far," Pitt said frankly. "We'll have to be doubly careful from now on."

"And with us fresh out of meat," Giordino grumbled.

Pitt was about to lower his binoculars when he detected a high chain-link fence with circular barbwire running along the top. He could see that a gate on the road leading to the airstrip was guarded by two men who were clearly exposed by an overhead light. Pitt re-focused the lenses and peered again. They were not men but women in blue jumpsuits. Two unleashed dogs nosed the ground in front of the gate. They were Dobermans, and he smiled to himself at Giordino's revulsion of them.

"We have a fence barring the road to the airstrip," he said, passing the binoculars to Giordino.

Giordino peered through the lenses. "Did you notice there is a smaller fence running a few feet in front of the big one?"

"No doubt built to protect the dogs?"

"To keep them from turning crispy-crunchy." Giordino paused and traversed the fence a hundred yards in each direction. "The main fence probably has enough electrical juice running through it to barbecue a buffalo." Giordino paused to check the neighborhood. "And not a vacant street sweeper in sight."

Abruptly, the ground began to move and a low rumbling sound swept the facility. The trees swayed and the windows of the buildings rattled. It was a tremor like the one they experienced inside the lighthouse and on the river. This one lasted longer, over a minute before tapering off. The Dobermans went into a barking frenzy as the guards milled around uneasily. There would be no creeping up on the guards undetected while the dogs were excited and alert.

"We felt an earth tremor earlier," Pitt said to Claus. "Is it coming from the volcano?

"Indirectly," he answered matter-of-factly. "One of the scientists on our research team, Dr. Alfred Honoma, a geophysicist who was lured away from the University of Hawaii, is an expert on volcanoes. In his opinion the tremors have nothing to do with superheated rock ascending through the volcano's fissures. He claims the impending danger is a sudden slip of the volcano's slope that will cause a catastrophic flank collapse."

"How long have you experienced these tremors?" asked Pitt.

"They began a year ago," replied Hilda. "They've increased in frequency until now they come less than an hour apart."

"They've also amplified in intensity," added Claus. "According to Dr. Honoma, some unexplained phenomenon beneath the mountain has caused its surface to shift."

Pitt nodded at Giordino. "The fourth tunnel runs under the base of the volcano."

Giordino merely nodded in agreement.

"Did Honoma have a prediction as to when the shift will occur?" Pitt inquired.

"He thought the final slip might take place at any time."

"What would be the consequences?" Giordino asked.

"If Dr. Honoma is correct," replied Claus, "a devastating flank collapse would unleash a cubic mile of rock, sending it sliding down the mountain slope toward the lake at speeds up to eighty miles an hour."

"That would trigger massive waves once it hit water," said Pitt.

"Yes, the waves could easily wipe out every town and village surrounding the lake."

"What about the Odyssey facility?"

"Since it covers a good part of the volcano's slope, the entire works would be swept away and buried." Claus paused and then he added grimly, "And everybody with it."

"Isn't Odyssey management aware of the threat?"

"They called in their own geologists, who argued that flank collapses are quite rare and only happen somewhere in the world every ten thousand years. My understanding is that word came down from Mr. Specter that there was no threat and to ignore it."

"Specter isn't noted for being considerate of his employees' welfare," said Pitt, recalling the incident on board the Ocean Wanderer.

Suddenly, everyone stiffened and stared up into star-peppered sky toward the unmistakable sound of a helicopter coming in from the air terminal. From the floodlights on the ground the lavender color was clearly visible. They all stood immobile, pressed against the wall of a building, as the rotor blades pounded the night air toward them.

"They're looking for us," rasped a frightened Claus Lowenhardt, clutching his wife around her shoulders.

"Not likely," Pitt asserted. "The pilot isn't circling in a search pattern. They're not onto us yet."

The craft flew directly over them, not more than two hundred feet above. Giordino felt as if he could have hit it with a well-thrown rock. Any second the landing lights would come on and target them like rats in a barn under a dozen flashlights. Then Dame Fortune smiled. The pilot didn't flick on his landing lights until the craft had passed safely beyond where they stood. It banked sharply toward the roof of what looked like a glass-walled office building, hovered and then settled.

Pitt took the binoculars from Giordino and trained them on the aircraft as it landed and the rotor blades slowly swung to a stop. The door came open and several figures in lavender jumpsuits crowded around the steps, as a woman stepped down, wearing a gold jumpsuit. He gently rotated the adjustment until he had a sharp definition. He couldn't be absolutely positive, but he would have bet a year's pay that the person who climbed from the helicopter was the woman who called herself Rita Anderson.