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"Worn out." Jack made a gesture of helplessness. "No parts for repair. I'm on the waiting list. You know how it is."
The boats were so close now they were almost touching. The lieutenant laid aside the bullhorn and replied in a rasping voice, "I cannot allow that."
"Then I'll have to anchor right here until morning," Jack replied nastily.
The lieutenant angrily threw up his hands in defeat. "Come aboard and make your call."
Jack dropped down a ladder to the deck and jumped across the four-foot gap between the boats. He looked around him with a slow, salty indifference, carefully noting the relaxed attitude of the three-man gun crew, the mate standing by the helm casually lighting a cigar, the tired look on the lieutenant's face.
The only man who was missing, he knew, was the engineer below.
The lieutenant came up to him. "Make it quick. You're interfering with a military operation."
"Forgive me," said Jack slavishly, "but it's not my doing."
He reached forward as if wanting to shake hands and pumped two bullets from a silenced automatic into the lieutenant's heart. Then he calmly shot the helmsman.
The trio around the bow gun crumpled and died under a flight of three precisely aimed arrows, fired by Jack's crew with crossbows. The engineer never felt the bullet that struck him in the temple. He fell over the boat's diesel engine, lifeless hands gripping a rag and a wrench.
Jack and his crewmen carried the bodies below and then swiftly opened all drain plugs and sea cocks.
They returned to the tug and paid no more attention to the sinking patrol boat as it drifted away on the tide into the darkness.
There was no gangway down, so a pair of grappling hooks were thrown over the tanker's deck railing.
Jack and two others clambered up the sides and then hauled up portable acetylene tanks and a cutting torch.
Forty-five minutes later the anchor chains were cut away and the little Pisto, like an ant trying to move an elephant, buried her heavy rope bow fender against the huge stern of the Ozero Baykai. Inch by inch, almost imperceptibly at first, and then yard by yard the tug began nudging the tanker away from the refinery and toward the middle of the bay.
Pitt observed the slothful movement of the Ozero Baykai through a pair of night glasses. Fortunately the ebb tide was working in their favor, pulling the behemoth farther from the core of the city.
He had found a self-contained breathing unit and searched the holds for any sign of a detonating device, but could find nothing. He came to the conclusion it must have been buried somewhere under the ammonium nitrate in one of the middle cargo holds. After nearly two hours, he climbed to the main deck and thankfully breathed in the cool breeze off the sea.
Pitt's watch read 4:30 when the Pisto came about and returned to the docks. She made straight for the munitions ship. Jack backed her in until Moe's men hauled in the tow wire that was unreeled from the great winch on the stern of the tug and made fast to the Ozero Zaysan's aft bollards. The lines were cast off, but just as the Pisto prepared to pull, a military convoy of four trucks came roaring onto the wharf.
Pitt dropped down the gangway and hit the dock at a dead run. He dodged around a loading crane and stopped at the stern line. He heaved the fat, oily rope off the bollard and let it fall in the water. There was no time to cast off the bow line. Heavily armed men were dropping from the trucks and forming into combat teams. He climbed the gangway and engaged the electric winch that lifted it level with the deck to prevent any assault from the wharf.
He snatched up the bridge phone and rang the engine room. "Manny, they're here" was all he said.
"I've got vacuum and enough steam in one boiler to move her."
"Nice work, my friend. You shaved off an hour and a half."
"Then let's haul ass."
Pitt walked over to the ship's telegraph and moved the pointers to Stand By. He threw the helm over so the stern would swing away from the pier first. Then he rang for Dead Slow Astern.
Manny rang back from the engine room and Pitt could feel the engines begin to vibrate beneath his feet.
Clark realized with sudden dismay that his small group of men were greatly outnumbered and any escape route cut off. He also discovered that they were not up against ordinary Cuban soldiers but an elite force of Soviet marines. At best he might gain a few minutes' grace-- enough time for the ships to move clear of the docks.
He reached into a canvas bag hanging from his belt and took out a grenade. He stepped from the shadows and lobbed the grenade into the rear truck. The explosion came like a dull thump, followed by a brilliant flash of flame as the fuel tank burst. The truck seemed to blossom outward, and men were thrown across the dock like fiery bowling pins.
He ran through the dazed and disorganized Russians, leaping over the screaming injured who were rolling around the dock desperately trying to douse their flaming clothing. The next detonations came in rapid succession, echoing across the bay, as he heaved three more grenades under the remaining trucks.
Fresh flame and clouds of smoke billowed above the roofs of the warehouses. The marines frantically abandoned their vehicles and scrambled for their lives out of the holocaust. A few were galvanized into action and began firing into the darkness at anything that vaguely resembled a human form. The ragged fusillade mingled with the sound of shattering glass as the windows of the warehouses were blown away.
Clark's small team of six fighters held their fire. The few shots that came in their direction went over their heads. They waited as Clark mingled in the disorganized melee, unsuspected in his Cuban officer's uniform, cursing in fluent Russian and ordering the marines to regroup and charge up the wharf.
