they had taken it for a large torpedo and decided to back off lest one of their machine gun rounds set it off.
The Gray Man turned away, slid down the sharply angled deck to the companionway, and returned to the saloon. Zack was still on his back.
“Would it have killed you to tell me about the sub?”
“I was hoping it would kill you if I didn’t.”
“You going to tell me how to drive it?”
“You’ve never piloted a mini sub?”
“Who the fuck has piloted a mini sub?”
Zack smiled and said nothing.
“Don’t suppose there is an instruction manual lying around anywhere.”
No response.
“I feel like ripping that tube out right now, Zack.”
No response.
“God, when I’m done saving you, I swear I’m going to kill you.” Court knelt and lifted Zack onto his wounded shoulder. He screamed in pain.
Zack screamed as well from the agony of being hefted by his bandaged right arm, but Gentry did nothing to make his patient feel better.
FIFTY-ONE
Court pulled the small canopy shut. From the difficult action of the closing mechanism, and the absence of a good handhold on the inside of the Plexiglas, he got the impression there was some sort of a button or knob that would cause an automatic shut and seal, but Court couldn’t even see the dials and gauges in front of him in the dark, so yanking it tight with his fingertips would just have to do.
He’d managed to get Hightower inside without one iota of assistance from him. By the time they’d made it back on deck, it was listing at twenty-five degrees. Every bit of strength in Court’s good arm was put to use sliding Zack up to the railing and over the side. Skittering together down the wet hull to the sub, the satellite phone popped out of Gentry’s pocket and bounced off into the ocean. Court found a latch on the outside of the canopy and popped it open. He struggled to get Hightower’s dead weight slid into the rear recumbent position. Court buckled him in like a child in a car seat and scooted down into the front.
Exhausted, once enclosed in the small cockpit, he took a few seconds to recover. Then he called back to his unwilling passenger, “Come on, buddy! Give me a hint! What do I do?”
“I’d love to help, bro. But my orders are to terminate you. This is kind of a roundabout way to achieve my objective, but . . .” His voice had grown much weaker after the strain of movement, even if his attitude remained in full effect.
“Fuck your orders. Let’s go for a ride!”
Zack did not reply.
Court went back to feeling around at the controls.
A sudden, loud screech filled the air, and a shell landed in the water twenty-five yards short of the sub. The small craft shuddered, and foamy water splashed on the Plexiglas like a mini-hurricane was passing overhead.
“I guess their smoke break is over,” muttered Hightower from the backseat.
“Shit!” Court began fingering all the dials in front of him, found nothing that felt right to flip or twist or punch. He wanted to activate everything; it might still come to that, but he was scared to do so. He really had no idea what he was getting himself into, only that the alternative was to sit on a sinking ship and dodge high-explosive shells from the patrol boat’s deck gun.
He ran his fingers faster on the controls, feeling for some sort of power button, which he imagined to be larger and more pronounced than what his fingertips had so far come across in the darkness. His hands next moved to either side of him, to the outside of the vinyl armrests, along the walls. On the left side his hand wrapped around a simple lever with a ball extending three inches horizontal from the wall. It was in the “up” position. With nothing else feeling right, he pulled the lever.
Immediately the front of the sub disengaged from the cable attached to the suction cup on the hull of the yacht. The nose dropped towards the water, and Gentry slammed forward into the cockpit controls.
He had neglected to fasten himself in the seat harness as he had Hightower behind him.
He screamed in pain. With all his might he leaned back, felt above him for a lever aft of the one he pulled, and he found it and yanked it down.
The rear cable disengaged, and the midget sub slid off the angled side of the Fatima and plunged five