A few bright stars came through the thinning mists, and Solo said, "Well! I was turned around. Apparently this passage is on the side away from the mainland."
"Did you expect it would be oriented for the view?" asked Illya.
Napoleon didn't answer. In the gray light of pre-dawn he was occupied working them around the coastline of the island and into the open sea where the tide would carry them to land.
Shortly he took a compass bearing and a sighting, and shook his head. "We'll have to crab," he said. "Other wise we'll end up right about the foot of those steps they were going to take me down."
Realization came to both of them simultaneously. "So there was evidence pointing directly to Donzerly after all!" They congratulated each other on the belated ratiocination, and resolved to spring it on Escott at the earliest opportunity.
They looked back at the rocky spur of Donzerly almost two miles away as the light in the sky behind them grew. The dark lighthouse was still a shadow against the horizon, and the air was very still.
Illya heard it first, a low distant whistle that swiftly developed bass overtones and swelled into an approaching roar. They looked into the east, as the mists thinned and vanished about them, and saw a tiny dot low in the sky. Napoleon looked at Illya without a trace of e pression. "What time is it?" he asked, although he wore a watch on his wrist.
Illya also had a watch, but he didn't look at it. His gaze was fixed on the small jet that bore towards them. "I would hazard a guess," he said slowly, "that it is very near to four-thirty."
Neither of them said any more, being occupied for the next fifteen seconds with breaking out and rigging the camouflaging tent which covered the entire liferaft.
Illya made a peephole and looked up as the plane passed high overhead. "It's a Mystere. Probably a ranging run, or a threat of one. It's about 8000 feet."
"It's past," said Napoleon as the sound went over them. "Open the curtain. I want to..."
The curtains had already parted in Illya's grasp. Both of them had an unobstructed view as the twin-jet light bomber passed over Donzerly, and neither missed a detail an instant later when the entire rock was lost for an instant in a green flash. In the shocked fractions of a second that followed, stunned eyes registered photographically the smoke and blast that accompanied the flash. The lighthouse leaped skyward like a missile, but crumbled with terrifying slowness in midair as it rose. The rock itself seemed to disintegrate, and great pieces blew into the sea.
"Ulsenite," breathed Illya. "So Thrush got that after all!
"Get down and hang on!" snapped Napoleon. "That shock wave is going to hit us in -" The shock wave hit them before he finished, but it caught both of them prone with fists around anchored lanyards. Their ears were buffeted only a moment before the sea rose up under them and hurled them skyward like an express elevator, then fell from under them like an amusement park ride. The secondary and tertiary shocks followed, and the outboard engine screamed as the propeller clawed at the air a moment. They rode the waves for several seconds before daring to let go and look up.
The island was shattered. Ten or twenty feet of it stood up from the water like a broken tooth in an old skull. Through binoculars, Napoleon could barely make out any remains of the inhabited areas. Smoke rose slowly from the wreckage, and the sea lapped once again over the splintered rocks of Donzerly. Of the light, there was no sign.
From somewhere a seabird appeared, and circled the stump of rock, then dived at a stunned fish. In minutes thousands of seabirds clustered around the corpse of the island, like white vultures tearing at it. And their sound came across the slow-swelled sea, screeching and cawing over the choice morsels, fluttering, lit with the golden light of the newly-risen sun.
Chapter 16
How Napoleon and Illya Made Their Farewells, and The Rainbow Faded for a Time.
SOMEWHERE IN THE winding maze of alleys that is Soho, beneath the night-shrouded streets, in a hidden room hung with silks and reeking with incense, two men sat as they had before.
"Your hospitality does not sway me," said the man in the gray suit as he picked at a plate of chow mein with his fork. "You said you would give me an answer in two weeks, and tonight your time is up. What is your answer? Will you work for us?"
The old Chinese raised a thin hand. "Business over shared food is not proper. Let us speak instead of inconsequential things. Your latest operation, perhaps." He returned to a bowl of something indescribable, and lifted out a piece of the contents with his chopsticks. He toyed with it a moment, enjoying his guest's reaction like a Moslem tucking away a slab of roast beef before the eyes of a devout Hindu.
The Thrush watched him with care. "This is also business. The destruction of Johnnie Rainbow was necessary. It will also serve as an object lesson to those who oppose us. Do you choose now to join us - or to join him?"
"Please, Englishman. You return to business again. I wish only to speak idly of your successes. You are certain this is one of them?"
"Beyond a doubt. The light was utterly destroyed, and Rainbow with it - because he refused to cooperate."
"Practical and efficient, if somewhat ruthless," said the old Chinese. "How did you identify his body?" He took a sip of tea.
The man in the gray suit paused. "The entire island was destroyed. It would be impossible to find, let alone identify, any bodies after the blast."
"I see." The old Chinese nodded slightly, smiling to himself. "There is a saying, ancient among the warlords of my people. An enemy should not be accounted defeated until his head has stood on a pole at your gate, and you have seen his wife weeping before it."
The Thrush almost registered an emotion. "Perhaps a valid axiom a thousand years ago, Excellency. But to day's engines of destruction are far more capable than your ancestors could have imagined. Rainbow is dead - this is a certainty."
"I have heard those words many times," said the elder. "They have been pronounced over my own humble person more often than I can count, and yet I sit here talking with you."
"Talking, but always avoiding the main question." The man in the gray suit set his plate neatly on the edge of the desk. "I have finished eating, and we will now discuss business."
"I fear we cannot continue this evening," said the aged Oriental, as he opened an intricately-inlaid box at the side of his desk and brought out an ancient, carved pipe with a tiny bowl. "The stars are not favorable for giving a decision at this time." He set something in the bowl of the pipe and picked up a candle. In seconds, the pungent odor of a Ming-Three began to seep around the incense in the room. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, stroking the marmoset which rested silently on his brocaded shoulder.
Finally he spoke again, distantly. "I will contact you when I am ready. Until then it will do you no good to continue approaching me. The interview is at an end."
The man in the gray suit leaned over the desk and sniffed. "You may force our patience too far. Rainbow's fate could be yours as well."