'Don't worry, Alexander,' Pitt said, suppressing a grin. 'Al could fly a 747 through a doughnut hole.'
'It might be best if he parked that thing on shore, rather than risk getting it tossed off the deck,' Gunn said.
'Yes ... of course,' Sarghov stammered, just wishing the helicopter would move away from the bridge.
'If it's all the same to you, I'd like to fly by that wayward fishing boat first and try and alert them,' Pitt said.
Sarghov looked into the markedly calm eyes of Pitt and then nodded in agreement. Pitt quickly reached for the radio microphone.
'Al, what's your fuel status?' he asked.
'Just fueled up ashore at the Port Baikal airfield. Should have about three and a half hours of remaining flight time, if I keep off the gas. But this pilot's seat wasn't exactly manufactured by La-Z-Boy, I feel compelled to mention.' After the better part of the afternoon deploying survey pods across the lake, Giordino was weary from flying the physically demanding craft.
'Go ahead and set her down on the pad, but keep her wound up. We've got an emergency call to make.'
'Roger,' the radio squawked. The helicopter immediately rose and slipped to the rear of the ship, where it gently set down on a rickety platform built above the stern deck.
'Rudi, keep us advised over the radio as to the wave's progress. We'll take the chopper to shore after we head off the fishing boat,' Pitt directed.
'Aye, aye,' Gunn responded as Pitt dashed out of the bridge. Sprinting to the rear of the ship, Pitt ducked down a level to his cabin, emerging seconds later with a red duffel bag flung over his shoulder.
Shooting up a stairwell and down the center passageway, he exited onto the open stern deck, where he edged past a bulbous white decompression chamber. The helicopter thumped loudly above him and he felt a blast of air from its rotors as he climbed a narrow flight of steps onto the helipad and ducked toward the Kamov's passenger door.
The odd little helicopter reminded Pitt of a dragonfly. At first glance, the thirty-foot-long helicopter was little more than a high-framed fuselage. The small cockpit appeared to have been sheared in half behind the twin flight controls, the result of a detachable passenger cabin that had been removed. The vintage helicopter had been designed with versatility in mind, and the dead space could be fitted with a tank for agricultural spraying, an ambulance or passenger cabin, or, in the case of the institute's craft, an open cargo platform. A large rack of tubes was fastened to the platform, which had housed the marine-current survey pods. Above the rack and mounted high on the fuselage was a pair of radial piston engines, which drove the helicopter's two separate contrarotating blades, one fixed above the other. A spindly forked tail led to a large stabilizer and elevator flaps, but no tail rotor. The Ka- 26, or 'Hoodlum' as it was known in the West, was built as a practical multiuse lifting system. Put to marine use, it was perfect for operating off small shipborne platforms.
As Pitt sprinted to the right side of the cockpit, the passenger door popped open and a young Russian technician wearing a ZZ Top baseball cap jumped to the deck. Nodding at Pitt to take his seat, he handed the tall American his radio headset, then quickly scrambled off the platform. Pitt wedged his duffel bag into the footwell and climbed in, glancing toward his old friend in the pilot's seat as he slammed the door shut.
Albert Giordino hardly cut the figure of a suave aviator. The stocky Italian with jackhammer arms stood nearly a foot shorter than Pitt. A shock of unruly black hair curled around his head, while an ever-present cigar protruded from a hard face that hadn't seen a razor in days. His mahogany brown eyes glistened with intelligence and a hint of the sardonic wit that sparkled at even the most trying of times. Pitt's lifelong friend and the director of underwater technology for NUMA was more at home piloting a submersible, but had acquired a silken touch with most types of flying aircraft as well.
'I heard the distress warning. You want to go track that roller as it pounds Listvyanka?' Giordino asked through his headset.
'We've got a social call to make first. Get us airborne and head southeast, and I'll fill you in.'
Giordino quickly lifted the Kamov off the moving ship and climbed to an altitude of two hundred feet, swinging east across the lake. As the helicopter accelerated to eighty-five miles per hour, Pitt provided a description of the seiche wave and the unsuspecting fishing boat. The black hull of the boat soon appeared on the horizon and Giordino adjusted his direction toward the vessel as Pitt radioed back to the
'Rudi, how's our wave rolling?'
'Gaining more power by the minute, Dirk,' Gunn's voice replied soberly. 'The wave is now topping thirty feet in height at its center, with velocity on the increase as it squeezes past the Selenga River delta.'
'How much time before she reaches us?'
Gunn paused as he keyed in a command on the computer. 'ETA to the
'Thanks, Rudi. Keep the hatches battened down. We'll be overhead for the show once we get the fishing boat alerted.'
'Roger,' Gunn replied, suddenly wishing he could trade seats with Pitt.
The wave was still forty miles away and the hills of Listvyanka were now plainly visible to the men on the
-3-
'Looks like we've got some company,' Wofford said, pointing off the fishing boat's stern toward the horizon.
Though Theresa had already spotted the aircraft, Wofford's words made everyone else aboard the boat stop and look. The stubby silver helicopter was approaching from the west and there was no mistaking its beeline path directly toward them.
The fishing boat was cruising toward the eastern shore with its survey gear tailing behind, the crew oblivious to any impending danger. No one aboard had noticed the sudden disappearance of all other surface boats, though an absence of vessel sightings was hardly unusual on the huge lake.
All eyes turned skyward as the ungainly helicopter roared up to the small boat, then pivoted and hovered off the port beam. The survey crew gazed up at an ebony-haired figure in the passenger's seat who waved a microphone toward the window and pointed a finger at his headset.
'He's trying to call us on the radio,' Wofford observed. 'Do you have your ears on, Captain?'
Tatiana translated to the annoyed captain, who shook his head and spoke indignantly back to the Russian woman. He then grabbed a radio microphone from the wheelhouse and held it up toward the helicopter while slicing his free hand horizontally across the front of his throat.
'The captain says his radio has not operated for two years,' Tatiana said, reporting the obvious. 'He states that there is no need for one, he sails efficiently without it.'
'Now why does that not surprise me?' Roy said, rolling his eyes.
'He obviously wasn't in the Boy Scouts,' Wofford added.
'It looks like they want us to turn around,' Theresa said, interpreting new motions from the helicopter copilot. 'I think they want us to return to Listvyanka.'
'The helicopter is from the Limnological Institute,' Tatiana noted. 'They have no authority. We can ignore them.'
'I think they are trying to warn us,' Theresa protested, as the helicopter dipped its rotors several times, while the passenger continued making motions with his hands.
'We're probably intruding on an insignificant experiment of theirs,' Tatiana said. Shooing her arms at the helicopter, she yelled,
***
