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knots!'
'Okay, Beverley. Hold her steady, we're on our way up!'
Toby returned the handset to its hook just as the ship took a heavy swell on
her quarter that smashed the keel on the coral. In the engine room, close to
the ship's bilges, the noise of steel grating on the bottom was deafening.
Several plates sprang and seawater spewed through the fractured welds.
Jumo took the lead up the catwalk ladder with Toby right behind him. When they
tried to open the double doors leading to the companionway, they discovered
that the frame was distorted and the doors jammed shut, probably as a result
of the punishment the Eldorado was taking. Jumo slithered rapidly down the
ladder and returned with a jemmy. They levered it back and forth and succeeded
in prizing the doors open a few centimetres. After that they refused to budge.
More plates split open. The spewing seawater rose to a roar that was louder
than the pounding diesels.
70
There was a large warning flashing on the control panei accompanied by a
persistent bleeping. It was also flashing on the display over the windows and
was intended to alert everyone on the bridge to the fact that the Eldorado was
underway with the sliding covers for her hull windows open. To drive the point
home, a graphic representation had appeared on the illuminated panel that
showed the gaping hull windows.
Beverley ignored the warnings and concentrated on keeping the helm steady. The
absurd little wheel had no feel, there was no tactile feedback from the
steering motors. Apart from the rudder position indicator, the only suggestion
that she was having any effect was a changed heading reading a few seconds
after she made a course correction. Under normal circumstances she might have
relished the curious sensation of having the huge illuminated platform of
lights, gardens and empty swimming pool stretching before her and advancing
steadily into the night under her control.
As soon as the reading on the echo-sounder was lost, indicating that the
seabed beneath the Eldorado had dropped away to the abyssal depths of the
ocean floor, Beverley operated the controls that opened the seavalves to allow
water to roar into the ballast tanks.
After five minutes of holding the course steady she was worrying about Jumo
and Toby. There was also a different feel above the ship. Just how different
she realized only when the bows failed to lift to a heavy swell. It came
surging across the deck, sweeping everything before it like a giant broom.
Trees, shrubs, plants, flower boxes, all were sent crashing across the deck
and cascading into the swimming pool. Another swell roared across the deck,
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adding to the destruction. Five hundred tonnes of water cascaded into the
swimming pool and stayed there. creating a permanent list. There was another
noise: a distant thunder. The increasing list of the Eldorado told Beverley
what the noise was: the roar of water erupting into the hull through the
yawning windows.
71
Toby's sang-froid deserted him. He swore and hurled the bent jemmy over the
safety rail. It clanged off a gearbox casing. 'Bloody useless!' he yelled at
Jumo. 'Now what do we do?'
Both men were having to cling to the safety rail now that the ship was listing
to port at 20 degrees.
Jumo looked up and pointed to an open supplies hatch set into the ceiling
close to the engine room's forward bulkhead. A heavy loading hook was hanging
on a cable through the hatch, swinging from side to side and occasionally
clanging against the rim of the hatch. 'If the ship leans over onto its side,
we could climb to that without difficulty and maybe lower the hook.'
Toby eyed the hatch. 'Maybe you could climb without difficulty, Jumo,' he
observed caustically, 'but I'm hopeless at climbing. And if the ship goes onto
her beam ends, the chances are it'll go right over and take us down with it.
Next suggestion?'
At that moment the flooded port engine stopped. The starboard engine carried
on manfully for another minute before giving up the struggle.
72
Without power the stricken Eldorado began losing way. Beverley heard shouts.
At first she thought it was Jumo and Toby. Then she realized that the men were
shouting in Japanese. She abandoned the helm and rushed out onto the
observation deck. At that moment the deck floodlighting was extinguished as a
swell tore away a waterproof fuse cover and shorted all the circuits. The
bridge emergency lighting remained on, throwing a reddish glow across the
observation deck.
Beverley saw something ascending the companionway to the bridge: something
with staring bug-like saucer eyes. She backed against the rail as the thing's
head drew level with the deck. It pointed an automatic at her. Her hand went
to the Colt in its holster but the voice froze her movement.
'Don't move,' said the thing.
Beverley knew who the man was behind the fire-fighting mask even before he
pulled it off.
The red lights lent a hellish glow to the raw hatred that was etched into
Marshall Tate's face. 'You're dead!' he screamed. 'Just like your fucking
boyfriend!'
And he fired the automatic.
Twice.
73
Jumo had the climbing talents of a rhesus monkey. Toby watched, fascinated as
the young Japanese gripped his legs around the cooling high-pressure steam
pipe and shinned up. The increasing list and the sudden shocks that traversed
the ship made his task doubly difficult but he kept going.
74
Beverley saw Marshall's finger tighten on the trigger and dived sideways. The
blast was deafening and she actually felt the bullet thwack past her head. At
the precise moment that the second was fired, a swell broke over the Eldorado
with enough force to throw Beverley against Marshall. The cascade of seawa-ter
swept them against the rails in a tangle of arms and legs. Terrified that
Marshall was about to shoot again, Beverley pushed herself away from him and
hauled the Colt from its holster. Marshall was scrabbling wildly for his
automatic that had fallen to the deck.
'No!' Beverley yelled. The revolver exploded like a cannon going off in her
hand and the recoil almost dislocated her shoulder. It was a lucky shot; the
slug tore into Marshall's right arm with such force that it whipped his body
around. He gave a cry of pain and clung to the rail. With a presence of mind
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and an accuracy that surprised her, Beverley lashed out with her foot. It
connected with the automatic and sent it skittering over the edge of the
bridge.
Marshall straightened up, clutching his injured arm, and mouthing a stream of
obscenities at Beverley. Those few seconds
of poisonous diatribe enabled Beverley to recover her balance and her nerve.
When he started towards her, she levelled the Colt and pointed as accurately
as she could at Marshall's head. He stopped. His intense blue eyes were ice
chips of hate, burning with a savage energy of their own in the red emergency
lights.
'You killed Carl,' Beverley stated. 'And now - '
'Schnee killed Olivera!'
'And Schnee worked for you!' Beverley spat. 'I suppose you also killed Theo
Draggon? Well I don't much care any more. I want to see all this and
everything you stand for finished. What happens to me now is immaterial.'
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