'Rudi Gunn will arrange a NUMA plane. You'll leave tomorrow morning. After your plane lands at the airport near the town of Pointe-a-Pitre in Gaudeloupe, you'll be met by a NUMA representative by the name of Charles Moreau. He has charted a boat for you to sail to Branwyn Island, which lies to the south. You'll have to carry your own dive equipment. Rudi will arrange to airfreight a subbottom profiler to read any anomalies you might find under the silt and sand.'
'Why the rush?' demanded Dirk.
'If word gets out about this, and it will, every treasure hunter in the world will swarm over the island. I want NUMA to get in quick, survey the seabed and get out. If you're successful, we can work with the French who own Guadeloupe to secure the area. Any questions?'
Dirk took Summer's hand. 'What do you think?'
'Sounds exciting.'
'Somehow I knew you'd say that,' Dirk said wearily. 'What time do you want us at the NUMA terminal, Admiral?'
'Better you get an early start. Your plane will take off at six.'
'In the morning?' asked Summer, losing some of her enthusiasm.
Sandecker grinned jovially. 'With luck, you might even hear a rooster crowing on the way to the airport.'
33
After the MEETING, Yaeger took the elevator down to his domain on the tenth floor. Never one for power lunches in Washington's established restaurants, he carried an old-fashioned lunch pail that contained fruit and vegetables and a thermos filled with carrot juice.
He was a slow starter in the morning and didn't have the momentum to jump into work with both feet. Yaeger sat and slowly sipped from a cup of herbal tea he brewed in a cabinet beside his desk, before leaning back and reading the
She slowly materialized wearing a brief blue silk robe with a yellow sash, blue stars and an emblem across the back that read wonder woman. 'How do you like my threads?' she asked in a syrupy voice.
'Where did you find that?' Yaeger demanded. 'In a Goodwill reject box?'
'I surf Internet catalogs in my spare time. I charged it to your wife's Neiman Marcus account.'
'You wish.' Yaeger smiled. Max was a hologram. There was no way she could order, wear or pay for material objects. He shook his head in amazement at Max's nebulous yet vivacious temperament. There were times when he thought that programming Max with his wife's appearance and personality might have been a mistake. 'If you're through showing off, Wonder Woman, I have a little job for you.'
'I'm ready, master,' she replied, mimicking Barbara Eden in the old
Yaeger programmed the disc contents into Max's memory. 'Take your time and see what you make of this.'
Max stood unblinking for a few moments and then asked, 'What do you wish to know?'
'The question is, what possible motive do Odyssey and the Red Chinese have for digging four massive tunnels across Nicaragua from the Atlantic to the Pacific?'
'That's easy. The conundrum doesn't even warm my circuits.'
Yaeger looked at her apparition. 'How can you have an answer? You haven't analyzed the problem yet.'
Max patted her mouth in a yawn. 'This is so elementary. I'm constantly astounded that humans can't think beyond their noses.'
Yaeger was certain he had made a mistake in the program. Her response was far too quick. 'All right, I'm eager to hear your solution.'
'The tunnels were built to transfer a vast amount of water.'
'I don't count that as a dazzling revelation.' He began to feel she had gotten off track. 'A series of tunnels leading into the oceans, and mounting huge pumps, makes that an obvious conclusion.'
'Ah,' Max said, holding up one hand with the index finger raised. 'But do you know why they want to pump massive amounts of water through the tunnels?'
'For a huge desalinization program, an irrigation project? Hell, I don't know.'
'How can humans be so dense?' Max said in frustration. 'Are you ready, master?'
'If you would be so kind.'
'The tunnels were created to divert the South Equatorial Current that flows from Africa into the Caribbean Sea.'
Yaeger was confused. 'What kind of environmental threat would that provoke?'
'Don't you see it?'
'There's more than enough water in the Atlantic Ocean to make up for the loss of a few million gallons.'
'Not funny.'
'What, then?'
Max threw up her hands. 'By diverting the South Equatorial Current, the temperature of the Gulf Stream would drop almost eight degrees by the time its flow reached Europe.'
'And?' Yaeger probed.
'An eight-degree drop in the water that warms Europe would send the continent into a weather pattern equal to northern Siberia's.'
Yaeger could not immediately grasp the enormity of Max's words, nor the unthinkable consequences. 'Are you sure about this?'
'Have I ever been wrong?' Max pouted.
'Eight degrees seems like an excessive decrease,' Yaeger persisted, doubtfully.
'We're only talking maybe a three-degree drop in the water temperature as the Gulf Stream cuts past Florida. But when the icy Labrador Current moves down from the Arctic and meets it after the Stream arcs past the Canadian Maritime Provinces, the temperature drop is magnified. This in turn greatly influences a further temperature decrease across Europe, altering the weather patterns and causing a disruption in the atmosphere from Scandinavia to the Mediterranean.'
The horrendous scheme suddenly became crystal clear to Yaeger. Very slowly, he picked up the phone and dialed Sandecker's office. The admiral's secretary put Yaeger right through.
'Did Max come up with any answers?' asked Sandecker.
'She did.'
'And?'
'Admiral,' Yaeger began in a hoarse voice, 'I'm afraid we have a catastrophe in the making.'
34
Waiting for the helicopter that was over an hour late, Giordino happily slipped into dreamland while Pitt peered over the waters of Lake Nicaragua surrounding the lighthouse through his binoculars. The shoreline to the west was less than three miles away and he could make out a small village. He checked his map and determined that it was the town of Rivas. He then turned his attention to a large majestic island in the shape of a figure eight, no more than five miles to the west, that looked to be quite fertile and thickly forested. Pitt estimated the total area
