Riptide

you abort your mission and return to the surface at once.'

'Why?' Neidelman asked. 'Is there some problem with the equipment?'

'No, nothing like that.' Streeter seemed uncertain how to proceed. 'Let me patch St. John in to you, he'll explain.'

Neidelman flashed a quick, questioning look at Bonterre, who shrugged in return.

The clipped tones of the historian came across the radio. 'Captain Neidelman, it's Christopher St. John. I'm on the Cerberus. Scylla has just cracked several portions of the journal.'

'Excellent,' the Captain said. 'But what's the emergency?'

'It's what Macallan wrote in this second part. Let me read it to you.'

As Hatch stood on the ladder array—waiting in clammy darkness at the heart of the Water Pit—the voice of the Englishman reading Macallan's journal seemed to be coming from a different world entirely:

I have not been easy this se'ennight past. I feel it a certainty that Ockham has plans to dispatch me, as he hath so easily dispatched many others, once my usefulness in this vile enterprise has come to an ende. And so, by dint of the harrowing of my soule in the small hours, I have decided upon a course of action. It is this foul treasure, as much as the pirate Ockham, that is evil, and hath caused our miserie upon this forsaken island; and the death of so many in its taking. It is the treasure of the devil himself, and as such shall I treate it. . .

St. John paused and there was the rustling of a computer printout.

'You want us to abort the mission over this?' The exasperation of Neidelman's voice was plain.

'Captain, there's more. Here it is:

Now that the Treasure Pitt hath been constructed, I know my time draweth to a close. My soule is at rest. Under my direction the pirate Ockham and his bande, unbeknownst, have created a permanent Tombe for these unholie gains, got by such suffering and grief. This hoard shall not be repossessed by mortal means. It is thus that I have labored, by various stratagems and conceits, to place this treasure in such wise that not Ockham, nor any other man, shall ever retrieve it. The Pitt is unconquerable, invincible. Ockham believes that he holds the key, and he shall Die for that belief. I tell ye now, ye who decipher these lines, heed my warning: to descend the Pitt means grave danger to lyfe and limbe; to seize the treasure means certayne Death. Ye who luste after the key to the Treasure Pitt shall find instead the key to the next world, and your carcase shall rot close to the Hell where your soule hath gone.'

St. John's voice stopped, and the group remained silent. Hatch looked at Neidelman: a slight tremor had taken hold of his jaw, and his eyes were narrow.

'So you see,' St. John began again. 'It appears the key to the Water Pit is that there is no key. It must have been Macallan's ultimate revenge against the pirate who kidnapped him: to bury his treasure in such a way that it could never be retrieved. Not by Ockham. Not by anyone.'

'The point is,' Streeter's voice broke in, 'it's not safe for anyone to remain in the Pit until we've deciphered the rest of the code and analyzed this further. It sounds like Macallan has some kind of trap in store for anyone who —'

'Nonsense,' interrupted Neidelman. 'The danger he's talking about is the booby trap that killed Simon Rutter two hundred years ago and flooded the Pit.'

There was another long silence. Hatch looked at Bonterre, then at Neidelman. The Captain's face remained stony, his lips compressed and set.

'Captain?' Streeter's voice came again. 'St. John doesn't quite read it that way—'

'This is moot,' the Captain snapped. 'We're almost done here, just another couple of sensors to set and calibrate, and then we'll come up.'

'I think St. John has a point,' Hatch said. 'We should cut this short, at least until we figure out what Macallan was talking about.'

'I agree,' said Bonterre.

Neidelman's glance flitted between them. 'Absolutely not,' he said brusquely. He closed his satchel, then looked upward. 'Mr. Wopner?'

The programmer was not on the ladder, and there was no response on the intercom. 'He must be down the passage, calibrating the sensors we placed inside the vault,' Bonterre said.

'Then let's call him back. Christ, he probably switched off his transmitter.' The Captain began to ascend the ladder, brushing past them as he climbed. The ladder trembled slightly under his weight.

Just a moment, Hatch thought. That isn't right. The ladder array had never trembled before.

Then it came again: a slight shudder, barely perceptible beneath his fingertips and under his instep. He looked questioningly at Bonterre, and in her glance he could see that she felt it, too.

'Dr. Magnusen, report!' Neidelman spoke sharply. 'What's going on?'

'All normal, Captain.'

'Rankin?' Neidelman asked into his radio.

'The scopes show a seismic event, but it's threshold, way below the danger level. Is there a problem?'

'We're feeling a—' the Captain began. Suddenly, a violent shudder twisted the ladder, shaking Hatch's hold. One of his feet skidded from the rung and he grabbed desperately to maintain his purchase. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Bonterre clinging tightly to the array. There was another jolt, then another. Above him, Hatch could hear a distant crumbling sound, like earth collapsing, and a low, barely audible rumble.

'What the hell's happening?' the Captain shouted.

'Sir!' came Magnusen's voice. 'We're picking up ground displacement somewhere in your vicinity.'

'Okay, you win. Let's find Wopner and get the hell out.'

They scrambled up the ladder to the hundred-foot platform, the entrance to the vaulted tunnel opening above