Pitt felt as if he had entered a time machine. He could not believe he was staring at men who had been citizens of Imperial Rome. Ancient mariners who sailed into ports long buried under the debris of later civilizations, ancestors over sixty generations from the past.
They had not been prepared for the Arctic cold. None wore heavy clothing; all were bundled in coarse blankets. They seemed small in size compared to Pitt; all would have measured a good head shorter. One little man was bald, with gray woolly side hair. Another had shaggy red hair and was heavily bearded. Most were clean-shaven. from what he could read through their icy covering, the youngest was around eighteen and the oldest close to forty years of age.
The mariner who had died while writing had a leather cap pulled tight around his head and long strips of wool wrapped around his legs and feet. He was bent over a small stack of wax tablets resting on the scarred surface of a small folding table. A stylus was still gripped in his right hand.
The crew did not look as if they had starved or died slowly from the cold. Death had come suddenly and unexpectedly.
Pitt guessed the cause. All hatch covers had been tightly sealed to keep out the cold, and the only opening for ventilation had frozen over.
The pots containing the last meal were sitting on the small oil stove.
There was no way for the heat and smoke to escape to the outside. Lethal carbon monoxide had built up within the cargo hold. Unconsciousness had struck without warning, and each man died where he sat.
Almost as if he was afraid to awaken the long-dead seaman, Pitt very carefully chipped the ice away from the wax tablets until they came free. Then he unzipped the front of his dry suit and slipped them inside.
Pitt no longer noticed the agony of the cold, the nervous sweat that was trickling from his pores, or the shivering. His mind was so absorbed in the morbid scene that he failed to hear Giordino's repeated demands for a reply.
"Are you still with us?" asked Giordino. "Answer, dammit!"
Pitt mumbled a few unintelligible words.
"Say again. Are you in trouble?"
Giordino's concerned tone finally shook Pitt out of his trancelike state.
Inform Commander Knight his worst fear is confirmed," Pitt answered.
"The antique status Of the ship is genuine. And by the way," he added in a monotonous, laconic voice, "you might also mention that if he needs witnesses, I can produce the crew."
"You're wanted on the phone," Julius SchiHer's wife called through the kitchen window.
Schiller looked up from the barbecue in the backyard of his tree-shaded home in Chevy Chase. "They give a name?"
"No, but it sounds like Dale Nichols."
He sighed and held up a pair of tongs. "Come mind the steaks so they won't burn."
Mrs. Schiller gave her husband a brief kiss as they passed each other on the porch. He entered his study, closed the door and picked up the receiver.
"Yes?"
"Julius, Dale."
"What's on your mind?"
"Sorry to call on a Sunday," said Nichols. "Did I interrupt anything?"
"Only a family barbecue."
"You must be a diehard. It's only forty-five degrees outside."
"Beats smoking up the garage-"
"Steak and scrambled eggs, that's my favorite."
Schiller caught Nichols's drift on the eggs and switched his phone onto a secure line that entered a computer scramble mode. "Okay, Dale, what have you got?"
"Hala Kamil. The exchange came off smoothly,"
"Her look-alike is at Walter Reed Hospital?" Schiller asked.
"Under tight security to go along with the act:"
"Who doubled for her?"
"Teri Rooney, the actress. She did a superb makeup job. You couldn't tell her apart from the real SecretaryGeneral unless you were nose to nose-As a backup, we arranged a press conference by hospital doctors.
They gave out a story describing her serious condition."
"And Kantil?"
"She remained on the Air Force plane that brought her from Greenland.
After refueling, it flew to Buckley Field near Denver. from there she was flown by helicopter to Breckenridge. "
"The ski resort in Colorado?"
"Yes, she's resting comfortably at Senator Pitts chalet just outside of town. No injuries except a few bruises and a mild case of frostbite."
"How is she taking her forced convalescence?"
"No word yet. Hala was heavily sedated when she was carried from the hospital at Thule. But she'll go along when she learns of our operation to safeguard her arrival at the U.N.
headquarters to address the opening session of the General Assembly. A reliable source close to her says she plans on making a scathing indictment of Yazid, exposing him as a religious charlatan and offering proof of his underground terrorist activities."
"I've read a report from the same source," Schiller admitted.
"Five days until the opening session," said Nichols. "Yazid will pull out all stops to blow her away."
"She's got to be kept on ice until she steps to the podium," Schiller said, deadly serious.
"She's safe," said Nichols. "any word from the Egyptian government on your end?"
"President Hasan is giving us his full cooperation regarding Kantil.
He's scratching every hour he can buy or steal to launch his new economic reforms and replace military leaders with men he can trust.
Hala Kantil is the only thread preventing Yazid from attempting a quick grab for the Egyptian government. If Yazid's assassins stop her before her speech goes out over world news satellite channels, there is a real danger of Egypt becoming another Iran before the monday is out."
"Relax, Yazid won't get wise to the scam until it's too late," said Nichols confidentially.
"I assume she is under heavy guard?"
"By a top team of Secret Service agents. The President is personally keeping a tight grip on the operation."
Schiller's wife knocked on the door and spoke loudly from the other side. "Steaks are ready, Julius."
"In a minute," he answered.
Nichols picked up on the exchange. "That's all I have for now. I'll let you get back to your steaks."
"I'd feel better if the FBI was lending a hand," said Schiller.
"The White House security staff has considered every contingency. The President thought it best to keep all intelligence within a tight circle."
Schiller paused pensively for a moment. Then he said, "Don't screw it up, Dale."
"Not to worry. I promise, Hala Kamil will arrive at the U.N. building in New York in pristine condition and full of fire."
"She'd better."
"Does the sun set in the west?"
Schiller set down the phone. He had an uneasy feeling. He hoped to God the White House knew what it was doing.
Across the street three men sat in the back of a Ford van with "Capitol Plumbing, 24-hour emergency service" painted on the panels. The cramped interior was crowded with electronic eavesdropping equipment.
Tedium had set in five hours ago. Surveillance is perhaps the most boring job since watching rails rust. One man smoked and the other two didn't and couldn't stand the stale air. All were stiff and cold.