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Pitt stared at him curiously. "The Lax? I don't follow."
"Do you remember Dr. Len Matajic and his assistant Sandecker flicked an ash into the wastebasket. “Jack O'Riley?"
Pitt frowned, recalling. "I airdropped supplies . to them three months ago when they set up camp on an ice floe in Baffin Bay. Dr. Matajic was studying currents below a depth of ten thousand feet, trying to prove a pet theory of his that a deep layer of warm water had the capacity to melt the Pole if only one percent of it could be diverted upward."
"What was the last you heard of them?"
Pitt shrugged. "I left for the Oceanlab Project in California as soon as they began routine housekeeping. Why ask me? You planned and coordinated their expedition.
"Yes, I planned the expedition," Sandecker repeated slowly. He screwed the knuckles of his index fingers into his eyes, then pushed the hands together and folded them. "Matajic and O'Riley are dead. The plane bringing them back from the ice floe crashed in the sea.No trace was found."
"Strange, I hadn't heard. It must have just happened."
Sandecker put another match to his cigar. "A month ago yesterday, to be exact."
Pitt stared at him. "Why the secrecy? Nothing was mentioned in broadcast about their ac'ident. As your special projects director, I should have been one of the first to be informed."
"Only one other man besides myself was aware of their deaths-the radio operator who took their last message. I've made no announcement because I couldn't try to bring them back from their watery grave."
"Sorry, Admiral," Pitt said. "You've lost me completely.”
"All right then," Sandecker said heavily. "Five weeks ago I received a signal from Matajic. Seems O'Riley, while on a scouting trek, spotted a fishing trawler that had moored to the north end of their ice floe. Not being socially aggressive, he returned to base and informed Matajic. Then together, they trolled back and paid a friendly call on the fishermen to determine if they needed assistance. An odd bunch, Matajic said.
The ship flew the flag of Iceland, yet most of the crew were Arabs, while the rest represented at least six different countries including the United Sates. It seems a bearing had burned out in their diesel engine. Rather than drift around while repairs were made, they decided to tie up on the ice flow to let the crew stretch their legs. "Nothing suspicious in that," Pitt commented.
"The captain and crew invited Matajic and O'Riley on board for dinner," Sandecker continued. "This courteous act seemed harmless enough at the time. Later, it was seen as an obvious attempt to avoid suspicion. By sheer coincidence, it backfired."
"SO Our two scientists were also on the list to see something they shouldn't have."
"You guessed it. Some years previously, Kristjan Fyrie had entertained Dr. Hunnewell and Dr. Matajic aboard his yacht. The exterior of the trawler had been altered, Of course, but the instant Matajic stepped into the main salon, he recognized the ship as the Lax.
If he had said nothing, e and O'Riley might have been alive today. Unfortunately, he innocently asked why the proud and plush Lax that he remembered had been converted into a common fishing trawler. It was an honest question, but one that had cruel consequences."
"They could have been murdered then and there and their bodies weighted and dropped into the sea-no one would have ever known."
"It's one thing for a ship to go down at sea with all hands. The newspapers forgot the Lax one week after it disappeared. But two men and a government research station, not likely. The press would have exaggerated and harped on the enigma of the abandoned ice station for years. No, if Matajic and O'Riley had to be eliminated, there were less conspicuous methods."
"Shooting an unarmed plane out of the air without telltale witnesses, for example?"
"That appears to be the pattern," Sandecker said softly. "It wasn't until our two scientists had returned to their base camp that Matajic began to have doubts. The captain of the trawler had simply passed his command off as a sister ship to Fyrie's Lax. It was a possibility, Matajic told himself. But if the ship earned its keep as a fishing trawler, where were the fish? Even the distinct aroma had been missing. He got on the radio and contacted me at NUMA headquarters, told me the story along with his suspicions, and suggested that the Coast Guard make a routine investigation of the trawler. I ordered them to stand by while I sent a supply plane north to return them to Washington as quickly as possible to make a detailed report." Sandecker tapped the cigar ashes into the wastebasket again, a grim expression on his face. "I was too late. The captain of the trawler must have monitored Matajic's message. The pilot made it to the ice floe and picked them up. After that, the three of them vanished."
Sandecker reached inside his breast pocket and pulled out a worn and folded piece -of paper. "This is Matajic's last message."
Pitt took the paper from the admiral's hand and unfolded it across the desk. It read: MAYDAY! MAYDAY!
THE BASTARD'S ATTACKING. BLACK. NUMBER ONE ENGINE IS . . . The words abruptly ended.
"Enter the black jet."
"Exactly. With his only witnesses out of the way, the captain's problem 'was now the Coast Guard, whom he was sure would show up at any moment."
Pitt looked at Sandecker speculatively. "But the Coast Guard didn't come. They were never invited.
You've yet to fully explain why you maintained silence even after you were certain three of NUMA's men were killed, murdered like cattle by a group of traveling butchers."
"At the time I didn't really know." The vagueness wasn't like Sandecker. Normally he was as decisive and direct as a bolt of lightning- "I suppose I didn't want the sons-Of-bitches responsible to have the satisfaction of knowing how successful they 34
