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"I see no reason to carry this conversation any further, Mr. Pitt." The voice came as tonelessly as a newscaster giving a weather report in Cheyenne, Wyoming. "Goodbye."
Pitt didn't need to be poked by a sharp stick in the eye to know what was coming. He dove behind an ice hummock in the same instant the machine gun on the conning tower opened up. Bullets buzzed through the air and made strange hissing sounds as they struck the ice. He lay in a slight depression behind the hummock, unable to move. Only now did he regret wearing the NUMA turquoise Arctic gear.
The bright color against the white ice made him an ideal target on which to train their sights.
From where he lay, he could look up at the superstructure of the Polar Storm. So close, yet so far. He began wiggling out of his Arctic suit, stripping it away until he was down to a wool sweater and woolen pants. The boots would prove too clumsy to run in, so he removed them, down to his thermal socks. The hail of bullets stopped, the gunner probably wondering if his fire had struck Pitt.
He rubbed snow on his head so his black hair would not be obvious against the white. Then he peered over a lip of the hummock. The gunner was leaning against his weapon, but the U-boat commander was looking through binoculars in Pitt's direction. After several moments, he could see the commander turn and point toward the ship. The gunner swung his weapon in the direction his captain motioned.
Pitt inhaled a deep breath and took off, sprinting across the ice, pumping his legs and zigzagging with almost the same agility he'd used many years before when playing quarterback for the Air Force Academy, only this time there was no Al Giordino to run interference for him. The ice slashed his socks and cut into his feet, but he shook off the pain.
He had dashed thirty yards before the crew of the U-boat woke up and began firing again. But their shells went high and behind him. Before they corrected and began to lead him, it was too late. He had curled around the rudder of the Polar Storm a second before bullets smashed into the steel, chipping the paint like angry bees.
Safe on the side of the ship away from the submarine, he slowed and caught his breath. The gangway had been pulled up and Gillespie had ordered the ship into a 180-degree turn at Full Ahead, but a rope ladder was thrown over the side. Pitt thankfully jogged along the ship as it increased speed, grasping the ladder and hoisting himself up, just as the jagged ice chunks thrown aside by the bow slid past under his stocking feet.
As soon as he reached the railing, Cox lifted him over and stood him on the deck. "Welcome back,"
he said, with a broad smile.
"Thank you, Ira," Pitt gasped.
"The captain would like you on the bridge."
Pitt simply nodded and padded across the deck to the ladder leading up to the ship's bridge.
"Mr. Pitt."
Turning, he said, "Yes?"
Cox nodded at the bloody footprints Pitt left on the deck. "You might ask the ship's doctor to take a look at your feet."
"I'll make an appointment first thing."
Standing out on the bridge wing, Gillespie was studying the U-boat, her black hull floating rigid amid the ice where she had surfaced. He turned as Pitt hobbled up the ladder. "You had a nasty encounter."
"It must have been something I said."
"Yes, I heard your little exchange."
"Has the commander contacted you?"
Gillespie gave a curt shake of his head. "Not a word."
"Can you get through to the outside world?"
"No. As we suspected, he's effectively jammed all satellite communications."
Pitt stared at the sub. "I wonder what's he's waiting for."
"If I were him, I'd wait until the Polar Storm swings around and heads toward the open sea. Then he'll have us in position for an easy beam shot."
"If that's the case," said Pitt grimly, "it won't be long now."
As if reading the U-boat commander's mind, he saw a puff of smoke from the barrel of the deck gun, instantly followed by an explosion that erupted in the ice immediately behind the icebreaker's big stern.
"That was close," said Bushey, standing in front of the control console.
Evie, who was standing in the door to the bridge, had a dazed expression on her face. "Why are they shooting as us?"
