a rescue mission to save her own scientists.'
'Hala Kamil is a lady with high principles,' said Sandecker with conviction. 'More idealistic than most men I know. I think we can safely rely on her to have Genera Bock send Colonel Levant and his men back into Mali.'
'People are dying in the mines like rats,' said Pitt, the bitterness of his tone obvious to the men listening. 'God only knows how many were murdered since Al and I escaped. Every hour counts.'
'I'll contact the Secretary General and brief her,' promised Sandecker. 'If Levant moves as fast as he did to save Rudi, I suspect you'll be explaining the situation face-to face with him before breakfast in your time zone.'
Ninety minutes after Sandecker's call to Hala Kamil and General Bock, Colonel Levant and his men and equipment were in the air and winging over the Atlantic toward a French air force base outside of Algiers.
General Hugo Bock arranged the maps and satellite photos on his desk and picked up an antique magnifying glass that had been given to him by his grandfather when he collected stamps as a young boy. The glass was highly polished without a flaw, and when adjusted to his eyes, enlarged the image it was trained upon without distortion around the circular edges. The piece had traveled with Bock all during his army career as a kind of good luck charm.
He took a sip of coffee and began examining the area inside the small circles he'd marked on the maps and photographs that indicated the approximate location of Tebezza. Though Pitt's description of the mine site, relayed to Bock from Sandecker by fax, was a rough estimate, the General's eye soon zeroed in on the landing strip and the vague road that led off through the narrow canyon splitting the high, rocky plateau.
This fellow Pitt, he thought, was most observant.
The man must have memorized what few landmarks he had seen during his epic trek across the desert into Algeria and backtracked them in his mind's eye to the mine.
Bock began to study the terrain of the surrounding desert and did not like what he saw. The mission to rescue Gunn from the Gao airport had been relatively simple. Launched from an Egyptian military base near Cairo, the UN force had only to swoop in and seize the Gao airport, retrieve Gunn, and be on their way. Tebezza was a much tougher nut to crack.
Levant's team would have to land at the desert airstrip, travel nearly 20 kilometers to the mine entrance, assault and secure a maze of tunnels and caverns, transport God knows how many prisoners back to the airstrip, load everyone on board, and take off.
The critical problem was too much time on the ground. The transport was a sitting duck and invited attack by Kazim's air force. The time involved in a round trip of 40 kilometers over a primitive desert road considerably raised the odds of failure.
The attack could not rely purely on split-timing. There were too many unknown variables. Preventing any outside communication was critical. Bock could not see how the operation could be accomplished in less than one and a half hours minimum. Two could spell disaster.
His fist cracked the desk. 'Damn!' he uttered harshly to himself. 'No time for preparation, no time for planning. An emergency mission to save lives. Hell, we'll probably lose more than we save.'
After looking at the operation from every angle, Bock sighed and dialed his desk phone. Hala Kamil's secretarial aide put him right through.
'Yes, General,' she said. 'I did not expect to hear from you so soon. Is there a problem with the rescue mission?'
'A number of them, I'm afraid, Madam Secretary. We're stretched far too thin on this one. Colonel Levant is going to need backup.'
'I'll authorize whatever additional UN forces you require.'
'We have none to spare,' explained Bock. 'My remaining forces are on security duty at the Syrian-Israeli border or performing civilian rescue operations during the unrest and rioting inside India. Colonel Levant's backup will have to come from outside the UN.'
There was a moment of silence as Hala assembled her thoughts. 'This is most difficult,' she said finally. 'I'm not sure who I can turn to.'
'What about the Americans?'
'Unlike his predecessors, their new President is most reluctant to interfere in the problems of third world nations. As a point of fact, it was he who requested that I authorize you to save the two men from NUMA.'
'Why was I not informed?' Bock asked.
'Admiral Sandecker could provide us with no intelligence as to their exact whereabouts. While waiting for leads, they escaped on their own, making any rescue attempt unnecessary.'
'Tebezza will not be a swift and sure operation,' Bock said grimly.
'Can you guarantee me success?' asked Hala.
'I'm confident in the ability of my men, Madam Secretary, but I cannot make any guarantees. If anything, I fear the cost in casualties will be high.'
'We cannot sit back and do nothing,' Hala said solemnly. 'Dr. Hopper and his team of scientists are members of the UN. It is our duty to save our own people.'
'I quite agree,' said Bock. 'But I'd feel more secure if we could count on a backup force should Colonel Levant become trapped by Malian military forces.'
'Perhaps the British or the French will be more willing--'
'The Americans can mount a more rapid response,' Bock interrupted. 'If I had my way, I would demand their Delta Force.'
Hala went quiet, reluctant to give a concession, knowing the Chief Executive of the United States would prove stubborn and noncommittal. 'I will talk with the President and present our case,' Hala said resignedly. 'I can do no more.'
'Then I shall inform Colonel Levant there is no room for misjudgment or error, and that he can expect no help.'
'Perhaps he will benefit from luck.'
Bock breathed deeply. He could feel a cold chill of apprehension down his spine. 'Whenever I banked on luck, Madam Secretary, something always went terribly wrong.'
St. Julien Perlmutter was sitting in his immense library that housed thousands of books, most neatly arranged on varnished mahogany shelves. At least two hundred, however, were haphazardly stacked and scattered loosely around the Persian carpet or piled on a badly worn rolltop desk. He sat with slippered feet propped on the untidy desktop reading a seventeenth-century manuscript while dressed in his uniform of the day, silk pajamas under a paisley robe.
Perlmutter was a legendary expert on maritime history. His collection of historical records and literature on ships and the sea was considered the finest in the world. Museum curators around the nation would have happily given any limb he requested or a blank check to obtain his massive library. But money mattered little to a man with a fifty-million dollar inheritance, except to purchase additional rare books about the sea he didn't already own.
Love of women didn't come close to his love of research. If any man or woman could passionately give an hour lecture on any shipwreck ever recorded, it was St. Julien Perlmutter. Every salvager and treasure hunter in Europe and America sooner or later showed up on his doorstep for guidance.
A monster of a man, he weighed nearly 181 kilograms, or 400 pounds. He was a product of gourmet food and drink and little or no exercise beyond picking up a book and opening its pages. He had merry sky-blue eyes and a red face buried under a huge gray beard.
His phone rang, and he pushed aside several opened books to reach it. 'Perlmutter here.'
'Julien, it's Dirk Pitt.'
'Dirk, my boy,' he fairly shouted. 'A long time since I've heard your voice.'
'Can't be more than three weeks.'
'Who counts the hours when one is on the track of a shipwreck,' he laughed.
'Certainly not you or I'
'Why don't you hop over for a bite of my famous Crepes Perlmutter?'
'I'm afraid they'd get cold by the time I arrived,' Pitt replied.
'Where are you?'
'Algiers.'
