and ribs bruised from harsh contact with the submerged machinery. But
after twenty minutes, he stood up again.
Let's go/ he said and resettled the helmet. The hiatus had given him a
chance to replan the operation, thinking his way around the problems he
had found down there; now the work seemed to fall more readily into
place, though he had lost all sense of time alone in the infernal
resounding cavern of steel and he was not sure of the hour, or the phase
of the day, when at last he was ready to carry the messenger out through
the gap.
Send it down/ he ordered into his headset, and the reel of light line
came down, swinging and circling under the glaring floodlights to the
ship's motion and throwing grotesque shadows into the far corners of the
engine room.
The line was of finely plaited Dacron, with enormous strength and
elasticity in relation to its thinness and tightness. One end was
secured on the deck high above, and Nick threaded it into the sheave
blocks carefully, so that it was free to run.
Then he clamped the reel of line on to his belt, riding it on his hip
where it could be protected from snagging when he made the passage of
the gap.
He realized then how close to final exhaustion he was, and he considered
breaking off the work to rest again, but the heightened action of the
sea into the hull warned him against further delay. An hour from now
the task might be impossible, he had to go, and he reached for the
reserve of strength and purpose deep inside himself, surprised to find
that it was still there - for the icy chill of the water seemed to have
penetrated his suit and entered his soul, dulling every sense and
turning his very bones brittle and heavy.
It must be day outside, he realised, for light came through the gash of
steel, pale light further obscured by the filthy muck of mixed oil and
water contained in the hull.
He clung to one of the engine-room stringers, his head seven feet from
the opening, breathing in the slow, even rhythm of the experienced scuba
diver, feeling the ebb and flow through the hull, and trying to find
some pattern in the action of the water. But it seemed entirely random,
a hissing, bubbling ingestion followed by three or four irregular and
weak inflows, then three vicious exhalations of such power that they
would have windmilled a swimming man end over into those daggers of
splayed steel.
He had to choose and ride a middling-sized swell, strong enough to take
him through smoothly, without the dangerous power and turbulence of
those viciously large swells.
I'm ready to go now, David/ he said into his helmet.
Confirm that the work boat is standing by for the pick-up outside the
hull. We are all ready. David Allen's voice was tense and sharp.
Here we go/ said Nick, this was his wave now. There was no point in
waiting longer.
He checked the reel on his belt, ensuring that the line was free to run,
and watched the gash suck in clean green water, filled with tiny bright
bubbles, little diamond chips that flew past his head to warn him of the
