Riptide

surprise as he noticed they weren't after the lobster, but were instead fleeing the boat as fast as they could, heading toward the mainland. In the sudden hush left by their departure, he heard the chunk of lobster hit the deckboards with a soft splat.

As he gazed after the birds, frowning, he felt a convulsive shudder pass under his feet. He leaped out of the chair, thinking the anchor cable had parted and the Plain Jane had run aground. But the cable was still taut. Except for the thin veil of mist that girdled the island, the sky overhead was clear; there was no lightning. Quickly, he scanned the surroundings for any unusual activity. Had they been dynamiting? No, it was too early for that. . . .

Then his eyes fell on a patch of ocean, just inside the reef about a hundred yards away.

In an area some thirty feet in diameter, the placid surface of the water had suddenly broken into chop. A roiling mass of bubbles crested the surface. There was a second shudder, another explosion of bubbles. As they died away, the surface of the water began to move counterclockwise: slowly at first, then faster. A dimple appeared in its center, almost immediately imploding into a funnel. A whirlpool, Hatch thought. What the hell—?

A burst of static on the scanner brought Hatch to the railing. There was hysterical shouting on the bands: first from one, then many voices. '. . . Man down!' broke through the riot of sounds. '... Get the rope around him!' cried another voice. Then: 'Look out! Those beams are about to go!'

Suddenly, Hatch's private radio burst to life. 'Hatch, do you copy?' came Neidelman's clipped tones. 'We've got a man trapped on the island.'

'Understood,' Hatch said, firing up the big diesels. 'I'm bringing the boat to the pier now.' As a puff of wind blew shreds of mist from the island, he could make out a cluster of white-suited men near the island's center, scurrying frantically.

'Forget the pier,' Neidelman broke in again, a fresh note of urgency coloring his voice. 'No time. He'll be dead in five minutes.'

Hatch glanced around for a desperate moment. Then he cut the engines, grabbed his medical bag, and pulled the Plain Jane's dinghy alongside. Tearing the rope free of its cleat, he tossed it into the dinghy, then leaped over the side after it. The dinghy heeled crazily under his sudden weight. Half-kneeling, half- falling onto the stern seat, Hatch pulled at the starter rope. The outboard leaped into life with an angry buzz. Grabbing the throttle, he pointed the little boat toward the circle of reefs. Somewhere near the south end, there were two narrow gaps in the jagged underwater rocks. He hoped to hell he remembered where they were.

As the shoreline drew nearer, Hatch watched the water beneath the bow turning from a bottomless gray to green. If only there was a bigger swell, he thought, I could see the rocks through the breaking water. He glanced at his watch: no time to play it safe. Taking a deep breath, he opened the throttle wide with a flick of his wrist. The boat sprang forward eagerly, and the green outline of the submerged reefs grew lighter as the water became rapidly shallower. Hatch braced himself against the throttle, preparing himself for the impact.

Then he was past the reef and the ocean floor sank away again. He aimed the boat at a small pebbled area between the two Whalebacks, keeping the throttle wide open until the last second. Then he cut the engine and swiveled the outboard upward, raising the propeller above the wake. He felt the shock as the bow of the dinghy hit the shore and skidded up across the shingles.

Before the boat came to a halt, Hatch had grabbed his kit and was scrambling up the embankment. He could now hear the shouts and cries directly ahead. At the top of the rise, he stopped. Ahead stretched an unbroken mass of sawgrass and fragrant tea roses, swaying in the breeze, concealing the deadly ground below. This wild southern end of the island had not yet been mapped by the Thalassa team. It's suicide to run across there, he thought even as his legs began to move and he was crashing through the brush, jumping over old beams and skittering across rotten platforms and around gaping holes.

In a minute he was among the group of white-suited figures clustered around the ragged mouth of a pit. The smell of seawater and freshly disturbed earth rose from its dark maw. Several ropes were wrapped around a nearby winch. 'Name's Streeter,' shouted the nearest figure. 'Team leader.' He was the same man who had stood behind Neidelman during his speech—a lean figure with compressed lips and a marine-style haircut.

Without a word, two of the others began buckling a Swiss Seat harness around Hatch.

Hatch glanced into the pit, and his stomach contracted involuntarily. Dozens of feet down—it was impossible to tell exactly how far—he could see the yellow lances of flashlight beams. Two roped figures were frantically working at a thick beam. Beneath the beam, Hatch was horrified to see another figure, moving feebly. Its mouth opened. Over the roar of water, Hatch thought he could hear an anguished scream.

'What the hell happened?' Hatch cried, grabbing a medical kit from his bag.

'One of the dating team fell into this shaft,' Streeter replied. 'His name's Ken Field. We sent a rope down, but it must have snagged on a beam. Triggered some kind of cave-in. His legs are pinned by the beam, and the water's rising fast. We've got three minutes, no more.'

'Get him a scuba tank!' Hatch yelled as he signaled the winch operator to lower him into the pit.

'No time!' came Streeter's reply. 'The divers are too far offshore.'

'Nice way to lead the team.'

'He's already roped,' Streeter continued after a moment. 'Just cut him loose and we'll haul him up.'

Cut him loose? Hatch thought just as he was shoved off the edge of the pit. Before he could think, he was swinging in space, the roar of water almost deafening in the confines of the shaft. He dropped for a moment in near free fall, then the Swiss Seat jerked him to a rude halt beside the two rescuers. Swinging around, he found a purchase, then glanced down.

The man lay on his back, the massive beam lying diagonally across his left ankle and right knee, pinning him tightly. As Hatch watched, the man opened his mouth again, crying out with pain. One rescuer was scrabbling rocks and dirt away from the man, while the other was chopping at the beam with a heavy ax. Chips flew everywhere, filling the pit with the smell of rotten wood. Beneath them, Hatch could see the water, rising at a terrifying rate.

He knew immediately that it was hopeless; they could never chop through the beam in time. He glanced at the rising water and made a quick mental calculation: no more than two minutes before the man would be covered, even less than Streeter had guessed. He mentally reviewed his options, then realized there were none. No time for painkiller, no time for an anaesthetic, no time for anything. He rummaged desperately through his kit: a couple of