Ring of Fire II(37)

Naturally, as the admiral was going to be aboard, Mazalet wanted to go down. Well, as Lars remarked, at least he could be relied on to keep the helmet pump working.





But on his way back the air stopped bubbling. "Lord and saints!" Per swore inside his helmet. "What are they doing back there?" Trying to remain calm he began heading back to the bell. The water around it was still murky and stirred up. With relief Per pulled himself into the port and up the ladder, breaking the surface . . . face to muzzle with a huge cavalry pistol.



"Please stay where you are," Lieutenant Sparre said. "I haven't hurt your brother, but that will change if you do something rash." Slowly, Per lowered himself into the water.



"What are you doing?" Per asked.



Sparre wiped water from his brow. The lieutenant was soaking wet, evidently he, too, had been outside the bell. "I've cut away the messengers and the air hose," he said. "That way you won't be able to inform the surface."



"They'll still know something is wrong," Per said. "But what are you up to, Lieutenant? You're the last one I'd have pegged for a traitor."



Sparre smiled sadly. "It's not about treason, Master Per. I'm loyal to the king, but this is a personal matter." His smile twisted into a rictus of hate. He pointed a shaking finger at Mazalet. "This man ruined my uncle," he snarled. "He spun tales of alchemy and industry, and my uncle lost most of the family money chasing moonbeams. He ruined my life, my family and my chances of marriage."



"I tricked Fleming's nephew, too," Mazalet murmured groggily, blood oozing from his scalp. "Is the admiral in on this?"



"Of course not," Sparre spat. "This is about the honor of my family."



"I'm an idiot," Per mumbled. "From the first accident I thought it was Stolpeskott."



"Hans has nothing to do with it either," Sparre said. "I doubt he'll shed any tears, but he's quite innocent."



"It was you who slit the hose then?" Per asked.



Sparre nodded. "This bastard of a Frenchman was supposed to go down that day."



"So what will you do?" Per asked. "You can kill us all, I suppose, but you'll look very strange coming up all alone."



"I won't be coming up," Sparre said, that sad smile back on his face. "You're such an honorable man, Master Per, that I sometimes forget you're a peasant at heart. To a nobleman the answer would be obvious. I've detached the shackle. Replaced it with a broken one. I have cut the air hose. We will all die down here. The salvage project will die too . . ."



"For which," said Mazalet, "The French will pay handsomely." Sparre stared at him.



Mazalet shrugged. "The offer was made to me. But I don't even rob honest men, let alone kill them."





"Heavens above," Ginny breathed looking into the water. "It's the hose. It's the air hose!" she shouted, but Karl was there already, his face pale under the tan.



"Keep pumping!" he roared waving to the crew. "Are they dead?" he asked.



"No way to know," Ginny said, trying hard to stay calm. "Start to raise the bell. At least we won't have to get the hose down very far. Even for Per and Olof—they haven't been much deeper than fifty-five feet on this dive. They've been down about ninety-three minutes. We'll need fourteen minutes at the ten foot mark."



The windlass began to turn. "There is no weight on it, Karl," yelled a horrified sailor.



"Stop!" shouted Lars. "Lower slowly. To the same depth and three feet."



"Why?" demanded Karl.



"They can reattach it. They can't if we have it here."



"Not if they don't have air. Or something is wrong . . ."



"So we get the air hose down. If they have air, they can solve any problems. Right now they don't have very long."



"How do we do that?" Karl asked looking at the hose.



"We sink it," Lars said. "The hose looks good, it moves like a snake with every spurt of air. We don't need to replace it, and that should save us time."



"Good." Karl said. "We tie the hose to a weight and send it down along the main hawser."



Ginny nodded. "That would work as far as it goes, but how will they get the hose inside? How will they know it is down?"



"We could rig something," Lars voice trailed off.



Ginny took a deep breath. "I'll go down," she said. "I swim far better than all of you. They're on the aftercastle. That stood sixty-five feet high. It shouldn't be more than forty feet down. None of you could swim that, but I can. I'll go down and then inside. As soon as I'm in, one of the others can go out with a helmet and reattach the hose and the hawser. We don't even need the shackle, a big knot will do."