with what you were saying…'
^ 'We will board the ship immediately. And I will not speak with you again unless you give me some proof that all the hostages are at this moment alive and well – alive ^ and ^ well. Put Captain Mackay on the air if you want me to speak to you again…'
^ MacGowan's voice was a growl, Peretti was pale-faced with apprehension, the other men inside the room were leaning forward in their chairs, their expressions tense. Gen. Lepke had his head on one side like a bird, listening, watching MacGowan. They were ^ ^
^ There was a pause, some static crackle, confused noises at the other end on the bridge of the ^ Challenger ^ half a mile from Pier 31. MacGowan had his head down, staring fixedly at the speaker from under his thick eyebrows as though he could see his opponent, as though he were facing a hostile witness in the box. The seconds ticked by and the tension inside the room became almost unbearable. They were all still waiting for the sound of shots, their bodies tensed as though they might be the targets.
^ Firm, steady, unemotional, this was Mackay's first contact with the outside world since the terrorists had seized his ship four days earlier. It was, MacGowan thought, remarkable. 'Are all your crew still alive and well, Captain?' he asked. 'I want to know the position aboard that ship…'
^ 'We are all alive, we are all well, at the moment. And that includes our American passenger, Miss Betty Cordell.'
^ 'We will do everything we can to see you are released safely,' MacGowan said slowly and deliberately. 'We shall continue negotiating for that end,' he went on, knowing that LeCat was listening. 'But no one must be harmed or I shall immediately stop all negotiation…'
^ There was a flurry at the other end, a grunt of pain which every man inside the room felt, then LeCat repeated his instruction once more that no aircraft, no surface or underwater vessel must approach them and abruptly went off the air. Someone in the room let out a deep sigh and then everyone started stirring restlessly, getting up and walking about to ease the tension out of their muscles.
^ 'Because unlike me, you never were a trial lawyer. That man out on the ^ Challenger's ^ bridge is an egomaniac – I'm beginning to get to know him and I can hear it in his voice. For the first time in his life he has a huge audience – everything he says or does is reported across the face of the earth. He knows it, he likes it. His only trump card is he holds the lives of those hostages in his hands…' MacGowan leaned across his desk. 'He's not throwing that away – yet. And the main demand is yet to come – he'll not shoot anyone until he's made that demand. My bet is we still have a few hours left…'
^ 'Your bet is on the lives of twenty-nine people,' Peretti snapped. 'I'm not that much of a gambler.'
^ Gen. Lepke had been staring across the room with a faraway look, as though something had just struck him. 'Has he always made that reference to no underwater vessel approaching the tanker?' he asked. 'I'd like to see the transcripts of all the exchanges you've had with him so far – and the radio signals, too.'
^ Gen. Lepke moved very quickly when he left the room. He knew he had little over an hour to act because soon after seven it would be sunrise. Alone in another office, he put through a call to the Marine base. The dolphins, which had been brought from San Diego for training in the Bay, were sent out within a few minutes of his making the call.
^ At 6.25am Mac the dolphin slipped away from a Marine launch anchored offshore and began swimming strongly into the Bay. Jo, the second dolphin, followed him almost immediately. They swam at a depth of ten feet under the surface, heading for the only ship within half a mile, the tanker ^ Challenger, ^ with Mac in the lead. He came to the surface for air at regular intervals, a graceful creature who had a great affection for his trainer, Marine Sergeant Grumann. It was dark, steamy and fogbound above the surface at that hour, and he went under again with a sense of relief, at home in his natural element as he came closer and closer to the motionless ship.
^ Attached to his nose was a sucker-like disc, rather like a compass set in a rubber base. He had got used to having this strange contraption fixed to him; for days recently Sergeant Grumann had taken him out into the Bay, had then released him and 'pointed' him in a certain direction. He knew exactly what he had to do and he enjoyed the work; even more he enjoyed returning to the launch when Grumann would reward him with a fish. He swam on, a menacing shape moving through the water with a power and sureness no Olympic swimmer could have emulated.
^ Slowing down, he cruised towards the hull. He was hardly moving at all when he reached his objective and pressed his snout forward gently. The magnetic field inside the Geiger counter did the rest, hauling itself close against the steel hull. Plop! The suckei was attached to the hull. The dolphin paused, feeling the tug of the tide against his huge body. He paused for only a few seconds, then he bobbed his nose hard against the hull. The magnetic field was neutralised for thirty seconds.
^ Released from the hull, Mac turned in a great sweep, his tail swishing against the immovable steel. Then he was swimming hard again, leaving the tanker behind, moving like a projectile through the dark water, heading back for Grumann's launch moored close to the waterfront. Within a few minutes he was swallowing fish while Grumann checked the Geiger counter as the other dolphin reached him. Grumann's hand was unsteady as he picked up the field telephone which linked him to the shore.
^ It was close to sunrise when Gen. Lepke took the call in the outer office. He listened, said, 'Are you absolutely certain?' Replacing the receiver, Lepke walked unhurriedly into the Governor's office where early breakfast was being served to the action committee from a kitchen adjoining the main conference room. The mixed aroma of bacon and eggs and strong coffee did not make Lepke feel hungry. He spoke very quietly to MacGowan so no one else could hear him, and then the two men went into the office Lepke had just left and shut the door behind them. The Governor asked almost the same question Lepke himself had asked over the phone. 'You're sure?'
^ 'The Geiger counter was positive. They have a nuclear device aboard that tanker.'
^ Thursday January 23 was a nightmare for MacGowan as he fought to keep control of the situation in his own hands. There were plenty of other groping hands trying to influence him, to turn him in another direction. Two State Department officials had come in from Washington, one of them George Stark, a lean-faced, precise man who urged the Governor to 'negotiate flexibly…' There were international implications – if there was a catastrophe, a wave of anti-Arab feeling might sweep across America. And there were already rumours that the Golden Apes were considering a further cut in the oil flow to the West… The Atomic Energy Commission experts arrived secretly in the city at ten in the morning – to assess the extent of the threat to the city posed by the nuclear device aboard the tanker.
^ Dr Reisel of the Atomic Energy Commission flew in from Los Angeles where AEC experts had been attending a meeting on the future of nuclear power stations. He headed the team which would play the grim projection game, Operation Apocalypse. A room had been set aside on the floor below MacGowan's office in the Transamerica building and the team went into immediate session.
^ The team comprised experts from the US Air Force, from the US Weather Bureau, Coast Guard service, Planning Division of the Pentagon. US Navy and, above all, radiation specialists. Aboard the Boeing 707 from Los Angeles – they had started discussions while in mid-air – Dr Reisel had emphasised one point over and over again.
^ 'Gentlemen, the thing we must not do is to underestimate the size of the catastrophe. On the basis of the report we draw up the authorities will take certain precautions…' He paused.'… which may include mass- evacuation. If we underestimate the area which could be affected we might all have to leave this country for ever - people would never forgive us. The hell of it is we have to make certain assumptions – as to the likely size of the nuclear device aboard that British tanker. I have made an assumption myself -based on a device manufactured from the five kilograms of Plutonium hi-jacked from Morris, Illinois, ten months ago…'
^ It was Karpis of the FBI who had earlier pinpointed a possible source of the material used to make the device. At 7.30am he had phoned Washington; the reply had come back within thirty minutes. During the past year there had been only one reported case of a sizeable amount of plutonium going missing; the brutal hi-jacking of a GEC security truck in Illinois ten months ago when a canister containing five kilograms had been stolen. The Apocalypse team was rushed from the airport by special bus along Highway 101 with an escort of police outriders and a patrol car, its siren screaming non-stop. Peretti informed the Press that a team of anti-terrorist experts had arrived in the city. Arriving at the Transamerica building, they went up to the room set aside for them and started at once on their macabre exercise.
^ LeCat came back on the ship-to-shore at 10am while Apocalypse was in session, his voice full of confidence as he spoke to MacGowan who sat in his shirt-sleeves despite the morning chill.
