Austin puzzled over the function of the machines, trying to put what he saw together with the hot water discharges, but came up with nothing. He undid a portable waterproof video camera from his belt and filmed the scene below. Satisfied with his work, he decided to get an overview. He rose off the disk and was panning the camera when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye.
He froze, floating above the structure. The egg-shaped elevator Zavala had described descended from the shimmering surface. It moved along its track and disappeared into a circular hatch that was opening on the roof of the underwater structure closest to the face of the cliff. Austin resumed his camera work only to be interrupted again, this time by Zavala.
'Better get back here pronto! The water temp readings are shooting up.'
There was no mistaking the urgency in Zavala's voice. 'On my way!'
Austin threshed the water with strong kicks of his powerful legs maintaining a rhythm that ate up the yards. Zavala wasn't
kidding about the heat buildup. Austin was sweating under his wet suit. He vowed never to boil a lobster again. 'Hurry,' Zavala said. 'The temp is going off the tracks!'
The Brogan's silvery beacon blinked in the gloom. Austin reached down and switched on a small strobe that hung from his buoyancy compensator. The Brogan moved in to meet him. The heat had become more intense. Austin grabbed onto the back of the moving sub and snapped his harness buckle in place. With Austin aboard, the Brogan quickly wheeled about and was headed for the mouth of the lagoon, motors whining at top speed. Zavala barked, 'Something's wrong, Kurt! I am detecting alarms inside the facility.' Moments later, Austin heard a loud, muffled whump. He turned to look over his shoulder just as the facility exploded in a fiery ball. The inferno instantly incinerated every living thing in the enclosed space. Superheated gas shot up pipes into the tortilla factory. Luckily, the factory was empty be cause it was Sunday. The Brogan wasn't as fortunate. It was caught by the shock wave and tumbled end over end with Austin desperately clinging on.
Austin felt as if he had been kicked by a giant invisible mule. The harness straps let go, and he was flung forward, arms and legs flailing, in a tangle of air hoses. He cartwheeled for an eternity and might have kept going halfway across the Pacific if he hadn't slammed into the net strung across the mouth of the la goon. He hit the mesh with his feet, which was fortunate, be-. cause a headfirst impact would have broken his neck. The netting yielded, then snapped back. Austin shot out like a rock in a boy's slingshot.
Right into the path of the oncoming submersible.
The mini's dome had been ripped off, and Zavala was no longer inside. The sub tumbled at Austin on a collision course. Austin brought his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. He seemed fated to be smashed like a bug on a car windshield when the sub did a little hop that took it over Austin's head. He felt a painful impact as a pontoon grazed his shoulder. Then he was buffeted by secondary shock waves from
multiple explosions that slowed his velocity and tossed him back after the mini-sub. The Brogan had battered its way through the net, and this time there was nothing to stop him.
Instinctively, he swooped his arm out to retrieve his regulator hose, clenched the mouthpiece between his teeth, and took a breathy gulp of air. The regulator was still working. His face mask was a cobweb of fracture lines where one of the hoses had hit the lens. Better the mask than his face! He whipped the use less mask off, assumed a vertical position, and did a complete turn.
He knew he had better get to the surface, but he wasn't going to do it without Zavala. One more try. He spun slowly around. Without the mask his vision was blurred, but he thought he saw a spot of purple and swam toward it. Zavala was floating a few feet off the bottom. Bubbles were coming from his mouth.
Austin pushed the regulator toward Zavala's face, not sure if it ever found its mark, because the willpower he had been using to operate on was eaten away by the black angry surf crashing against his brain. He reached down and let the quick-release buckle go on his weight belt and groped for the inflation valve of his buoyancy compensator. He thought he heard another explosion. Then he blacked out completely.
Chapter 10
Trout stood at the door of the hut as motionless as a totem pole, watching and listening. He had been at his post for hours, staring into the darkness, his every sense alert to catch any change in the rhythms of the night. He had watched the day wind down and seen the shadows mix with the false dusk created by smoldering cook fires. The last few natives had disappeared into their huts like sullen phantoms, and the village went silent except for the brief muffled cry of a baby. Trout was thinking what an unhealthy place this was. It was as if he and Gamay had stumbled into a plague ward.
The Dutchman had kicked the family out of the hut closest to his and with a sweep of his hand ushered the Trouts through the door like the doorman at the Ritz. Slivers of light filtered through the grass walls into the dim interior. Hardly a breath of fresh air entered the close confines. The floor was dirt, a couple of hammocks were slung from support poles, and the furniture consisted of two crude stools and a cutting board fashioned out of stumps. The stifling heat and primitive accommodations didn't faze Trout. He was more bothered by the feeling he and Gamay were trapped.
He wrinkled his nose, a gesture he'd picked up from his father, a Cape Cod fisherman. Trout could picture his father walking to the end of the pier in the predawn darkness and sniffing the air like an old hound dog. Most days he'd say, 'Finest kind,
cap. Let's go fishing.' But some mornings he would wrinkle his nose and head for the coffee shop without another word. Any doubts about the elder Trout's olfactory prowess disappeared one beautiful morning when he stayed in port and six fishermen were lost in an unpredicted offshore storm. Things hadn't smelled right, his father explained later.
Trout had the same feeling although he was far from the sea in the heart of the Venezuelan rain forest. It was simply too quiet. There were no voices, no coughing, nothing to indicate human habitation of any kind. While it was still light Trout had committed every detail of the village to his near-photographic memory. He began to imagine that the population of the village must have silently vanished in the night. He backed away from the doorway and bent over the still form lying in a hammock. Gamay reached up and felt his face with a light touch of her fingers.
'I'm awake,' she said. 'Just thinking.'
'About what?'
She sat up and swung her feet onto the floor. 'I don't trust our friend the Flying Dutchman any further than I could throw him. Not that I would touch him. Yech.'
'I agree with your sentiments exactly. I think someone is watching us.' He glanced toward the doorway. 'This hut re minds me of a lobster trap. One way in, no way out, except to the cooking pot. I suggest we spend the night on the boat.'
'Much as I hate to leave these five-star accommodations, I'm ready when you are. Question. How do we sneak off with someone watching?'
'Simple, we go out the back door.'
'There wasn't a back door last time I looked.'
'Guess you've never heard of Yankee ingenuity,' Trout said smugly. 'If you would stand watch I'll put my cleverness to work.' He slipped a hunting knife from its belt sheath and went to the back of the hut. Kneeling, he slipped the eight-inch blade through the thatch and began to saw. The rustle and snap were barely audible, but to be on the safe side he timed his sawing to
the cry of an unknown forest creature that made a noise like a rat-tail file on metal. Within minutes he had cut a rectangular opening about two feet square in the rear wall. He went to the front of the hut and guided Gamay by the arm to the newly crated exit. She stuck her head through to make sure it was safe, then was out in an instant. Paul's basketball player body slithered out a second later.
They stood side-by-side behind the hut listening to the sym phony of insect buzzes and bird calls. Earlier Gamay had noticed a path that went from behind the huts to the river. They could see the faint outline of hard-packed earth. Gamay led the way, and before long the huts were behind them and their nostrils picked up the river odor of
