Boland.»
«There is one thing,» Pitt said.
«Name it,» Hunter snapped back.
«I'm only low man on the totem pole around here. Until this morning, Td never heard of any of this. I'll be of little service to you without some idea of what's behind all this talk about a mysterious vacuum in the sea that gobbles up ships.»
Hunter looked thoughtfully at Pitt. «My apologies.» He paused, then went on very quietly indeed. «I take it that you're aware of the Bermuda Triangle.»
Pitt nodded, muttering an affirmative.
«The Triangle,» Hunter continued, «isn't the only area in the world where unexplainable things happen. The Mediterranean Sea has its share. And though it has received less publicity, the Romondo region of the Pacific southeast of Japan has been claiming more ships over the last two centuries than most of the oceans combined. Which brings us to the last and most unusual area: the Pacific Vortex.»
«Personally, I think ifs a lot of crap,» Pitt said sharply.
«Oh, I don't know,» Boland replied. «There are a lot of respected scientists who feel there is something to it.»
«So you're a skeptic?» Hunter asked Pitt.
«Im strictly along for the ride. I believe only what I can see, smell, and touch.»
Hunter looked and sounded resigned. «Gentlemen, it makes no damned difference what our opinions are. It's the facts that count; and that's what we're going to pursue as long as I command the 101st Fleet Our job is to salvage. And right now, our primary job is to find and raise the Starbuck. We got entangled in this Pacific Vortex myth only because of the strange circumstances surrounding the message from Commander Dupree. If we can clear up the mystery of the Starbuck's loss while solving the disappearance of other ships over the years, so much the better for the maritime freight and shipping industries. If the Russians or Chinese get their hands on her before we do, it's going to piss off a lot of people in Washington.»
«Particularly the Navy Department,» Boland added.
Hunter nodded. «The Navy Department and every scientific research lab and engineering firm that worked for years planning and constructing the most advanced nuclear submarine afloat The people who poured their sweat and labor into the Starbuck won't take it kindly if it turns up tied to a Soviet pier in Vladivostok.»
«Are there any similarities between the Starbucks disappearance and the other ships and planes that have been lost?» Pitt asked.
«I'll answer your question, Major.» Boland's tone was cutting. «To begin with, unlike the Bermuda Triangle, there are no instances of aircraft lost over the Pacific Vortex. And secondly, when there are no survivors, lifeboats, bodies, or floating debris, there is no way to make a connection. The only link between the submarine and the other missing vessels is that they all disappeared within a well-defined sector of the Pacific Ocean.»
Denver leaned over and touched Pitt on the arm. «Except for the message capsule you discovered on the Kaena Point Beach, there is only one other piece of evidence seen by man.»
Pitt said: «Admiral Sandecker mentioned such an exception.»
«The Lillie Marlene,» Hunter said quietly. «An incident that is even more extraordinary than the Mary Celeste.» Hunter opened a drawer and fumbled around for a moment. «There isn't much to it, only a few pages.» He handed a file folder to Pitt and, in the same motion, hit the intercom and grunted into it «Yager, bring us some coffee.»
Pitt settled into his chair, noted the title on the folder, and began reading:
The Strange Disaster of the S.S. Littie Marlene On the afternoon of July 10, 1968, the S.S. LMie Marlene, a former British torpedo boat converted to a private yacht, left the port of Honolulu and set a course northwest of the island of Oahu for the express purpose of filming a lifeboat scene for a movie under the direction of Herbert Verhusson, internationally recognized film producer and registered owner of the ship. The sea was calm and the weather fair with a few scattered clouds; a wind blew from the northeast at approximately four knots.
At 2050 hours on July 13, the Coast Guard station at Makapuu Point and the Naval Communications Center at Pearl Harbor, picked up a distress call from the ship, followed by a position. Air rescue at Hickam Field was alerted, and Naval and Coast Guard ships set out from Oahu. After the Mayday calls continued for twelve minutes, there was silence, broken by the final and mysterious words from the Lillie Marlene: «They come out of the mist The captain, first mate dead. Crew fighting. No chance. Too many. Passengers first to go. No one, even women, spared.» Then came an incoherent sentence. «A ship sighted on the southern horizon. Oh God! If only it arrives in time. Mr. Verhusson dead. They're coming for me now. No more time. They hear the radio. Do not blame the captain. He could not have known. They are pounding in the door now. Not much time. I do not understand. The ship is moving again. Help! For God's sake, help us! Oh, sweet Jesus. They're…» The final message ended here.
The first ship on the scene was the Spanish freighter, the San Gabriel. It was only twelve miles away when it picked up the Lillie Marlene's Mayday signal. It was, in fact, the ship the radio operator sighted before he fell silent As the Spanish steamer pulled alongside, her crew noted that the yacht seemed to be in an undamaged condition and was underway at a slow speed, leaving a narrow wake behind her stern. Suddenly, and unexplicably, the Lillie Marlene stopped dead in the water, enabling the captain of the San Gabriel to send out a boarding party. They found a dead ship with a dead crew. The lifeless bodies of the passengers, the film technicians, the ship's officers, and crew, were lying in scattered heaps about the decks and in the cabins below. In the radio room the corpse of the operator lay slumped over the transmitter, the red ON light still blinking on the panel.
The officer leading the boarding crew immediately radioed the captain of the San Gabriel. There was terror in his voice as he described what they had found. The victims' bodies had turned green and their faces had been melted away, as if burned by a tremendous heat. A stench pervaded the ship, described as sulfurous in nature. The position of the bodies seemed to indicate that there had been a terrific struggle before they had died. Arms and legs were twisted in unnatural contortions, and the hideously burned faces all seemed to be facing north. Even a small dog, obviously one of the passenger's, bore the same strange injuries.
After a short conference in the wheelhouse, the boarding party signaled the captain of the San Gabriel for a towing rope. It was their intent to claim the Lillie Marlene as salvage and tow the yacht and her morbid cargo to Honolulu.
Then suddenly, before the San Gabriel could come into position, a massive explosion ripped the Lillie Marlene from bow to stern. The force from the blast rocked the San Gabriel and hurled debris over a quarter of a mile.
Horror-struck, the crew and captain of the San Gabriel stood by helplessly as the shattered remains of the Lillie Marlene settled and then plunged from sight, taking with it the entire boarding party.
After studying the evidence and listening to eyewitnesses, the Coast Guard Board of Inquiry closed the case with the finding: «The death of the crew and passengers and the subsequent explosion and sinking of the yacht, the Lillie Marlene, can only be classified as caused by circumstances or persons unknown.»
Pitt closed the folder and placed it on Hunter's desk.
«What we have there,» Hunter said somberly, «is the only known case of a distress call prior to the disaster, as well as eyewitness reports as to the condition of the personnel involved.»
Pitt said: «It would appear that the Lillie Marlene was attacked by a boarding crew.»
Boland shook his head. «The men who boarded from the San Gabriel were cleared. Radio directional equipment established the Spanish freighter's position as being twelve miles from the disaster when she answered the distress call.»
«No other ship was sighted?» Pitt asked.
«I know what you're thinking,» Denver volunteered. «But piracy on the high seas went out with the manufacture of cutlasses.»
«Dupree's message also mentioned a mist or fog bank,» Pitt persisted. «Did the San Gabriel sight anything resembling a fog?»
«Negative,» Hunter answered. «The first Mayday came in at 2050 hours. That's dusk in this latitude. A dark horizon would have blotted out any hint of an isolated fog bank.»
«Besides,» Denver said, «fog in this part of the Pacific Ocean in the month of July is as rare as a blizzard on WaiMki Beach. A small, localized fog bank is formed when stagnant warm air cools to condensation most often on a still night when it meets with a cool surface. There are no such conditions around these parts. The winds are nearly
