81

Zak waited until his security team had closed in on Pitt and Giordino before leaving the warm confines of the icebreaker. Though he had no way of knowing for sure whether either man was Pitt, his instincts told him it was so.

“Thompson and White trailed them trying to move inland,” reported one of the mercenaries, who had returned to the ship. “There’s an old boat up on shore that they apparently climbed into.”

“A boat?” Zak asked.

“Yes, some old sailing ship. It’s lodged in a ravine and covered with ice.”

Zak glanced at the stolen co-op map, which was lying on the chart table. Had he miscalculated again? Was it no mine at all but a ship that was the source of the Inuit ruthenium?

“Take me to the ship,” he barked. “I’ll go sort this out.” The wind still blew in sporadic gusts, stinging his face as they trudged across the sea ice. The freshening winds began to clear the ground fog, and Zak could see down the coastline to where several of his men stood at the base of a narrow bluff. There was no sign of any ship, and he started to wonder if his security team had been out in the cold too long. But when he approached the ravine, he saw the massive black hull of the Erebus wedged against the ridge and he stared in wonderment. His attention was diverted by one of his approaching men.

“Their tracks lead up the gulch. We’re pretty certain they climbed aboard the ship,” said the man, the gap-toothed tough named White.

“Select two other men and board the ship,” Zak replied, as an additional five men gathered around him. “The rest of you spread out on the beach, in case they try to backtrack.”

White pulled two men aside and began climbing up the gulch with Zak trailing behind. The ice-strewn terrain rose to within a few feet of the upper deck, requiring a short climb up the hull sides and over the rail to get aboard. White was the first to climb up, slinging his gun over his shoulder as he scaled the hull and threw a leg over the railing. As his foot touched the deck, he looked straight across to find a black-haired man stepping up the ladderway with an armful of old muskets.

“Freeze!” White yelled with deafening authority.

But Pitt didn’t.

It was instantly a deadly race to bring their arms to bear, neither man hesitating a second. White had the advantage of a smaller weapon, but he was caught in an awkward position with one leg still over the rail. He quickly grabbed at the gun grip and flipped the barrel forward but nervously squeezed the trigger before taking aim. A harmless seam of bullets ripped across the deck and into a mound of ice near the ladderway before a loud pop erupted from across the deck.

With nerves as cold as the ice that encompassed the ship, Pitt had calmly dropped all the weapons but one, pulling the thick stock of a loaded Brown Bess musket to his shoulder. The gunman’s bullets ricocheted off the deck nearby as he quickly aimed the long barrel, then squeezed the trigger. It felt like minutes to Pitt before the external percussion cap ignited the black powder charge and sent a lead ball blasting out the muzzle.

At short range, the Brown Bess was deadly accurate, and Pitt’s aim held true. The lead ball struck White just below the collarbone, the impact throwing him clear off the rail. His body cartwheeled over the side, slamming into the frozen turf at Zak’s feet. With a confused look in his eye, he stared up momentarily at Zak, then died.

Zak callously stepped over the body while pulling out his Glock automatic pistol.

“Take them,” he hissed at the other two men, waving his gun at the ship.

The gun battle quickly descended into a deadly game of cat and mouse. Pitt and Giordino took turns popping out of the ladder well and rapidly firing two or three of the antique weapons, ducking bursts from the incoming automatic weapons. A heavy pall of smoke from the burnt black powder soon obscured visibility on the deck, making aim difficult for the shooters on both sides.

Pitt and Giordino established an ad hoc reloading station at the base of the ladderway, allowing one man to shoot while the other reloaded additional weapons. Pitt had found a small cask in the Spirit Room containing five pounds of black powder, which he carried to the lower deck. The cask was used to fill a number of small hand flasks, which in turn were used to load black powder into the muskets, shotguns, and percussion pistols found below. In the lengthy reloading process from the days of old, the powder was poured into the barrel and compressed with a ramrod, followed by the lead shot and a layer of wadding, which was rammed yet again. Pitt was no stranger to firing antique weapons and showed Giordino the proper quantity of powder and ramming technique to speed the process. Loading a long-barreled musket took half a minute, but with repeated efforts both men were soon reloading in less than fifteen seconds. Popping out of the ladderway, they would then fire singly or in succession, trying to keep their opponents guessing.

Despite their superior firepower, Zak and his men had a tough time getting a clean shot off. Forced to climb up the hull, they had to grab the side rail and cower behind its planking while trying to bring their guns to bear. Pitt and Giordino could easily spot their movements and soon had bloodied the hands of the gunmen by splintering the rail with lead. Zak quietly moved in front of the other two gunmen, clinging deftly to the outer rail. He turned and whispered to the other men between rounds.

“Rise and fire together after the next shot.”

Both men nodded, holding their heads down while waiting for the next burst of musket fire. It was Pitt’s turn to fire, and he crouched atop the ladderway with a flintlock pistol on the top step and two muskets across his lap. Shouldering one of the muskets, he peered over the lip of the deck, scanning the side rail through the gun smoke left from Giordino’s last shots. The top of a black parka wavered above a point on the rail, and he quickly drew a bead on the target. He waited for a head to pop up but the gunman refused to budge. Deciding to test the stopping power of the side rail, Pitt lowered his aim a foot and pulled the trigger.

The shot bore through the aged planking and into the calf muscle of the gunman crouching behind. But his body was already reacting to the sound of the musket shot, and he rose with his machine gun to fire. Ten feet down the rail, the second gunman followed suit.

Through the black haze, Pitt detected both men rising and immediately ducked into the ladderway. But as he back-stepped, his instincts took over, and he grabbed the pistol on the step. As his body ducked below the deck, his arm went up with the pistol. His hand was aligned closer to the second gunmen, and he whipped the barrel toward the man’s head and quickly squeezed the trigger.

A simultaneous explosion of lead ripped across the surrounding deck, blasting a shower of splinters on top of him. His ears told him that one of the machine guns had ceased firing, while the other still peppered the ladderway. Sinking to the lower deck with a slight dizziness, he turned to Giordino, who was headed up with a pair of wood-handled pistols and a Purdey shotgun.

“I think I got one of them,” he said.

Giordino stopped in midstep, noticing a pool of blood growing on the deck next to Pitt’s feet.

“You’ve been hit.”

Pitt looked down, then raised his right arm. A V-shaped hole had been ripped through the sleeve beneath his lower forearm, dripping a steady flow of blood. Pitt squeezed his hand, which still gripped his pistol.

“Missed the bone,” he said.

He slipped off the wool jacket as Giordino stepped over and ripped open the sleeve on Pitt’s sweater. Two ugly holes tore through the meaty part of his forearm, somehow missing nerves and bone. Giordino quickly tore strips from Pitt’s sweater and wrapped them tightly around the wound, then helped Pitt back into his jacket.