Riptide (47 page)

Every limb of his body ached; his clothes were torn; the pain in his nose was worse than he could have ever imagined; and
he was cold to the point of numbness. Yet he felt alive in a way that he had not in many, many years. He’d almost forgotten
what it was like, this wild exhilaration of the spirit. The failed protest no longer had any significance. Indeed, it had not
failed. He had been delivered onto this island. God worked in mysterious ways, but clearly He had brought Clay to Ragged Island
for a reason. There was something he had to accomplish here, something of prime importance. Exactly what, he did not yet know.
But he was confident that, at the right time, the mission would be revealed to him.

He scrambled beyond the high tide mark. Here the footing was better, and he stood up, coughing the last of the seawater from
his lungs. Every cough sent a hideous pain shooting through his ruined nose. But he did not mind the pain. What was it St.
Lawrence had said, when the Romans were roasting him alive over a brazier of hot coals? “Turn me over, Lord. Cook me on the
other side.”

As a child, when other boys had been reading Hardy Boys mysteries and biographies of Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb, Clay’s favorite
book had been Foxe’s
Book of Martyrs.
Even today, as a Congregational minister, he saw nothing wrong in quoting liberally from the lives of the Catholic saints,
and even more liberally from their deaths. Those were people who had been blessed with visions, and with the courage to see
them through, no matter what the cost. Clay was reasonably certain he had the courage. What he’d been lacking recently, he
knew, was the vision.

Now he had to take shelter, get warm, and pray for the revelation of his purpose.

He scanned the shoreline, gray against a black sky, blasted and pelted by the fury of the storm. There were some large rocks
off in the dimness to his right—the kind fishermen called Whalebacks. Beyond was the unnatural dry lagoon formed by Thalassa’s
cofferdam. Except the exposed seabed was not entirely dry. He noted, with a grunt of satisfaction, that the surf was battering
the cofferdam relentlessly. Several of the stanchions were bent and one of the reinforced concrete slabs had warped. Every
blow of the waves sent massive plumes of spray over the top of the wall.

Clay walked up the rocky shore and found shelter in the large earthen embankment, beneath some overhanging tree roots. But
even here the rain was lashing down, and as soon as he stopped moving he began to shiver. Standing up again, he began walking
along the base of the embankment, looking for some kind of windbreak. He saw nobody and heard nobody. Perhaps the island was
tenantless, after all: the plunderers had evacuated in the face of the storm, scattered, like the moneylenders from the temple.

He came to the point of land. Around the edge of the bluff lay the seaward side of the island. Even from here, the sound of
the pounding surf was intense. As he rounded the point, a strip of yellow police tape caught his eye, one end torn free and
fluttering wildly in the wind. He moved forward. Beyond the tape lay a trio of braces, made out of some shiny metal, and behind
them a dark, ragged opening led into the embankment. Maneuvering around the tape and the braces, Clay stepped into the opening,
ducking his head under the low roof as he did so.

Inside, the sound of the surf dropped dramatically, and it was snug and dry. If it wasn’t warm exactly, at least it wasn’t
chilly. He reached into one pocket and took out his little supply of emergency items: the flashlight, the plastic match case,
the miniature first aid kit. He shone the flashlight around the walls and ceiling. It was some kind of small chamber, which
narrowed to a tunnel at the far end.

It was very interesting, very gratifying. He had, in a way, been led to this tunnel. He had little doubt it connected somehow
to the works that were said to honeycomb the center of the island. His shivering increased, and he decided that the first
course of action should be to build a fire and dry out a bit.

He gathered some small driftwood that had washed into the cave, then unscrewed the circular plastic case and upended it. A
dry wooden match fell out into his hand. He smiled with a certain suppressed feeling of triumph. He had carried this waterproof
match case on every boat trip he’d ever taken since coming to Stormhaven. Claire had teased him about it, of course—being
that it was Claire, kind-hearted teasing—but it had rankled nevertheless in that secret part of Clay’s heart kept hidden from
every living creature. And now, that match case was going to play its own part in his destiny.

In short order, a little fire was casting merry shadows on the wall of his cave. The storm howled past the tunnel entrance,
leaving his nest practically untouched. The pain in his nose had subsided to a dull, steady throb.

Clay huddled closer, warming his hands. Soon—very soon, now—he knew the special task that had been set aside for him would
at last be made clear.

I
sobel Bonterre glanced wildly up and down the rocky shore, narrowing her eyes against the wind and lashing rain. Everywhere
she looked, there were shapes in the sand, dark and indistinct, that could have been the body of Malin Hatch. But when she’d
come close enough to investigate, they had all proved to be rocks.

She glanced out to sea. She could see Neidelman’s boat, the
Griffin,
two anchors securing it close to the reef, doggedly riding out the howling gale. Farther out to sea, the elegant white bulk
of the
Cerberus
was barely visible, lights ablaze, the crashing surf having lifted it off the reef onto which it had run aground. It had
evidently lost steerage, and was now being carried out to sea on the strong tidal rip. It was also listing slightly, perhaps
struggling with a flooded bulkhead or two. A few minutes before, she’d seen a small launch put over its side and struggle
through the seas at a frantic pace, disappearing around the far end of the island, toward the Base Camp dock.

Whether it had been Streeter in the launch, or someone else, she did not know. But she did know one thing: however advanced
the research vessel, a person could not pilot and man the harpoon at the same time. And that meant that, whatever was happening
here, it was not the work of a single madman. Streeter had help.

She shivered, drawing the waterlogged slicker closer around her. There was still no sign of Hatch. If he’d survived the destruction
of the dinghy, chances were he’d have washed up along this stretch of beach. But he hadn’t, she was now sure of that. The
rest of the coastline was rockbound, unprotected from the fury of the sea…

She stepped down hard on the terrible feeling that threatened to grip her heart. No matter what, she had to finish what they’d
started.

She began heading toward Base Camp the long way, the careful way, skirting the black stretch of shoreline. The wind had increased
its fury, whipping white spume off the crests of the waves and throwing it far inland. The roar of the surf on the reefs was
so loud, so continuous, that Bonterre barely heard the cracks of thunder above the constant booming.

She slowly approached the cluster of huts. The communications tower was dark, the microwave horns hanging loose, swinging
in the wind. One of the island generators had fallen silent, while the other was shaking and shuddering like a live thing
on its steel platform, screaming in protest at the load. She crept up between the dead generator and the fuel tanks and scanned
the camp. In its center, she could make out a series of small glowing rectangles: the windows of Island One.

She crept forward cautiously, keeping to the shadows that knitted the ground between the huts. Reaching Island One, she peered
in the window. The command center was deserted.

She flitted across the rutted roadway to the window of the medical hut. It, too, looked deserted. She tried the door, cursing
when she found it locked, then crept to the rear of the structure. She reached down for a rock, raised it toward the small
rear window, and rammed it through, knowing there was no chance of being heard over the storm. Reaching through the shards
of glass, she unlocked the window from the inside and swung it open.

The room she slithered into was Hatch’s emergency quarters. The narrow cot was unused, as pristine and rumple-free as the
day it had been first installed. She moved quickly through the room, rummaging through drawers, looking for a gun, a knife,
any kind of weapon. She found only a long, heavy flashlight. Snapping on the light and keeping its beam toward the ground,
she moved through the doorway into the medical facility beyond. To one side was Hatch’s private office, and to the other was
a corridor leading to the waiting area. Along the far wall of the corridor was a door marked
MEDICAL SUPPLIES
. It was locked, as she knew it would be, but it seemed flimsy, constructed with a hollow core. Two well-placed kicks split
it down the middle.

The small room was filled on three sides by glass-fronted cabinets, drugs above, equipment below. Bonterre had no idea what
the Geiger counter would look like; she only knew that Hatch had called it a Radmeter. She broke the glass front of the nearest
cabinet with the flashlight and rummaged through the lower drawers, spilling the contents to the floor. Nothing. Turning,
she broke the glass of the second cabinet, pulling out the drawers, stopping briefly to slip something into her pocket. In
the lowest drawer she found a small black nylon carrying case with a large Radmetrics logo sewn to its front. Inside was a
strange-looking device with foldable handles and a leather strap. Its upper surface held a vacuum fluorescent display and
a tiny keyboard. Extending from the front was a small boom similar to a condenser microphone.

She hunted for a power switch, found it, and snapped it on, praying the battery was charged. There was a low beep and a message
appeared on the display:

RADMETRIC SYSTEMS INC.
RADIATION MONITORING AND POSITIONING SYSTEM
RUNNING RADMETRICS RELEASE 3.0.2(a) SOFTWARE
WELCOME, NEW USER
DO YOU NEED HELP? (Y/N)

“All that I can get,” she muttered, hitting the
7
key. A terse series of instructions scrolled slowly across the screen. She scanned them quickly, then shut the machine off,
realizing it was a waste of time to try to master it. The batteries were working, but there was no way of knowing how much
of a charge they held.

She zipped the machine back into its carrying case and returned to Hatch’s quarters. Suddenly, she froze. A sound, sharp and
foreign, had briefly separated itself from the dull howl of the storm: a sound like the report of a gun.

She slung the carrying case over her shoulder and headed for the broken window.

H
atch lay on the rocks, drowsy and comfortable, the sea washing around his chest. One part of his mind was mildly annoyed at
having been plucked from the bosom of the sea. The other part, small but growing, was horrified at what the first part was
thinking.

He was alive, that much he knew; alive, with all the pain and misery that came along with it. How long he had lain there he
could only guess.

Now he gradually became aware of aches in his shoulders, knees, and shins. As he thought about them, the aches quickly grew
into throbs. His hands and feet were stiff with cold and his head felt waterlogged. The second part of his brain—the part
that was saying all this was a good thing—was now telling him to get his sorry ass out of the water and up the rocky beach.

He wheezed in a breath full of seawater and was seized with a fit of coughing. The spasm brought him to his knees; his limbs
collapsed and he fell again to the wet rocks. Struggling to a crawl, he managed to make the few feet out of reach of the water.
There he rested on a large outcropping of granite, the rock cool and smooth beneath his cheek.

As his head cleared, memories began to return, one by one. He remembered Neidelman, and the sword, and why he’d returned to
the island. He remembered the crossing, the
Plain Jane
capsizing, the dinghy, Streeter…