“Fourteen scientists and technicians from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, plus seventeen delivery crew and deckhands, give or take, including electricians, pipe fitters, and welders who’ll be doing work on the rig while en route.”
“I didn’t know oil exploration was going on in that part of the Atlantic,” Wyner said.
“It’s a scientific experiment, but that part is irrelevant. I was hired to send the rig to the bottom.”
“That’s thirty-one people versus the four of us,” Gurov said. “Any of them with security or military backgrounds?”
“To this point no, and we will have the help of one person aboard who’ll provide us with real-time intel.”
“Military background or not, the crew will not simply jump overboard when we show up. Some of them will resist,” Kabatov said. “What equipment will we have to use?”
“That will depend on which option we go with,” DeCamp told them. “At this point there are two, and I’ll want your input.”
“It’ll take a hell of a lot of explosives to do any real damage to something that large,” Wyner said. “I did a year of contract security work aboard one of them in the Persian Gulf, during the first American war. The Saudis were a little nervous with all the ordnance flying around, and the money was good.”
“I didn’t see that in your resume,” DeCamp said, vexed.
Wyner shrugged. “I didn’t put down every job I’d ever had.”
“Anyone else with oil rig experience?”
The Russians said no.
Patience was another of the virtues that the colonel had taught him in Durban. “The angry man is the out- of-control soldier, usually the first to die in battle. Remember it.”
“The delivery crew and deckhands have shore leave days on a rotating schedule. Option one is to arrange for an accident that would take out four of them, and then apply for jobs aboard the rig.”
“Doesn’t wash,” Wyner said. “Why would they hire the four of us and not someone else?”
“InterOil does the hiring, and we have help there. But you’re right, might be a bit of a stretch. The alternative would be for us to take out only two.”
“Assuming it would be two of us, and not you, how would you and whoever else get aboard?”
“They’ll have a media event, which I would attend, for starts, to legitimize myself. And then when the rig is well offshore, we’d return aboard a helicopter with four more operators and take over. If we go with that option it would be your job to disable whatever communications gear you could get to, including sat phones.”
“And number two,” Wyner asked.
“We scuba to the rig, and plant explosives in a pair of the legs.”
Gurov suddenly grinned, seeing everything. “Only one problem with that scenario. The rig will capsize and sink, but there will be survivors. The only way we’re going to get rid of them all is to kill them first and lock their bodies in one of the compartments, so there’d be no floaters.”
“Why kill them?” Kabatov asked. “Just herd them into the crew’s mess and lock the door.”
DeCamp had wanted to try the scuba approach first, mainly because it had been drummed into his head to plan for every possibility and to train for each one and find the unknown variables, the overlooked problem that could ruin everything. Like this tonight.
“So, what’s the problem?” Gurov asked.
“Won’t work this way,” Wyner said, and he explained.
From the moment DeCamp had realized the scuba approach wasn’t going to work, he’d decided on the other simpler plan, more elegant, less chance of failure. He would make a call to his contact aboard the oil platform to arrange for two of the least skilled men on the construction crew, roustabouts, to be fired for whatever reason he could find, and replace them with Kabatov and Gurov. The contact’s name had been supplied by Wolfhardt, who’d apparently had something on the man. Money, DeCamp had suspected, which was one of the great motivators, and he didn’t expect any difficulties. And it would give them additional inside information, the only danger if either Kabatov or Gurov — especially Gurov — got into it with one of the legitimate crewmen or scientists aboard the rig. They would have to keep their mouths shut, and do their work until the attack. Perhaps one week, or a little less.
“We’re flying back to Tripoli tonight,” he told them. “We’re done here.”
“What’s next?” Wyner asked.
“Nikolai and Boris are going to make their way to Biloxi, Mississippi, where they’ll be hired as replacements for a pair of deckhands aboard the rig.”
Gurov brightened. “How will we know which guys you want us to take down?”
“Won’t be necessary. Just show up at the union hall and you’ll get the jobs.”
“Too bad.”
“You’ll have plenty of chance to spill blood,” DeCamp said. “A lot of blood.”
“What about me?” Wyner asked.
“You’re coming to London with me to hire four more operators, familiarize them with the rig, and from there move the ops to New Orleans, where we’ll pick up our equipment.”
“How will we communicate?” Kabatov asked. “In case something changes or goes wrong.”
“I have a Nokia encrypted sat phone for you.”
“How do we get out of there when it’s over?”
“By helicopter out to a ship heading to the Panama Canal.”
“A lot could go wrong,” Wyner commented.
“And probably will,” DeCamp said.
Gurov laughed. “I say fuck it! I’m in.”
And the others nodded.
FORTY-SIX
They didn’t notice the stiff breeze when the 737 touched down at the Biloxi Airport, because it was right on the nose, but when the big passenger jet left the runway and trundled slowly to the terminal it almost felt as if the airplane would tip over on a wing. Then they came into the lee of the big building and it seemed as if they’d come indoors out of a gale.
“I hope the helicopter pilot knows what he’s doing,” Eve said. “Vanessa is twenty-five miles out in the Gulf, and it’s going to be a lot worse out there.”
“Oil rig ferry pilots have to be good enough to pull guys off the platforms in all kinds of weather,” McGarvey said, trying a little to soothe her.
She’d been preoccupied all the way down from Washington, not about a possible attack but about the two tons of equipment that had been trucked from Princeton. As of eight this morning when she’d talked to Don, who’d come down two days ago, the truck hadn’t shown up yet. Which was just as well. Keeping her focused on the logistics and then the science of her project would make his job all the easier.
“You’re right,” she said. “And I’m acting like an idiot.”
McGarvey laughed. “At least a smart idiot.”
And she laughed, too. “It’s not that I’ll be glad when it’s over, I’ll be glad when it starts at Hutchinson Island. Because that’s really the beginning, to actually see if the damned thing works.”
“Doubts?”
“Yeah, plenty of them,” Eve said. “Don calls it healthy skepticism.”
Most of Eve’s clothing and personal things she would need for the twelve-day trip and afterwards when the experiment began had been packed aboard the truck with the scientific equipment, which was just one more minor irritant she’d been facing. One among a million, she’d confided in him at one point.
“Scientists are absolute nitpickers,” she’d said. “Detail people, patient, persistent, persevering, unremitting, and usually unhurried. But almost always worried that they’re overlooking something, not seeing the forest for the trees, missing the obvious.” She’d smiled. “The best of them have the capability to step back at just the right
