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[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] sffiile reassured Coop. Lovett had never seen her in such good spirits. For Mel, he saw, this meant more than money and adventure: nothing less than the final validation of old Elmo Benteen. In some places the climb was steep and Lovett, peering closely at the stone underfoot, noticed the subtle rounding and polishing of projections suggesting that, at some time or other, this soft limestone had known many a footstep. They moved around a low ridge, still rising, then returned moments later so that the airstrip came in view again. It was clearly visible from here as a line of least vegetation growing toward the beach and the breakers beyond. Then Chip Mason stood at the top of that sheer drop-off, arms akimbo, frowning at the vine-covered rampart he faced. And for one long, goose-pimpled moment, Lovett wondered if this were all some elaborate hoax by his grandson. I'll boot his ass over this five-story bluff, he swore silently. I will! But after a moment of intent scrutiny of the stone embankment, Chip fitted his fingers into a seam; hauled sideways at the apparently immovable rock. An oval slab, no more than two inches thick, rolled away under its thin camouflage of live creeper vines, and the youth turned back to them, grinning. "Miz Benteen, it seems only right for you to go first." Mel Benteen waved her hands before her as if polishing a rmffor. "No, no, caves aren't my strong point, Chip. I'll follow YOU." "Hey, listen now," Myles said, shuffling forward quickly. "Let me do it, okay? I've got an editor to impress." He unlimbered his little camera, took a shot. Reventlo got there first, pausing at the entrance. "Not a good enough reason, Victor." "Wait, wait! Okay then. A hundred bucks, Cris." Myles put his fight hand up to God. "Still not good enough," the Brit said, implacable. Myles ground his teeth. "Son of a-two hundred," he pleaded. "Apiece," Reveiitlo said pleasantly. "Those were very expensive mosquito nets you sold us, Victor." "All right, goddamniit, deal. Now get out of my way." And so saying, survivalist guru Victor Myles pocketed his camera, ducked into the hole, and missed the step, sprawling headfirst into the dim recess. Chip caught the Texan by a trouserleg, warning him about the lack of handrails as Myles regained his feet cursing tunnels, steps, and folks who snickered at folks who fell down. Moments later they were crowding the inner wall in single file, flashlights washing the cave with errant beams. Now their progress was marked by echoes in oppressive blackness. Still in the lead, Myles paused halfway down and let his flash beam play over the booty spread below. "The kid's right, they're Zeroes," he boomed, as "zeroes, eroes, eroes," mocked him faintly. Revendo stopped so suddenly that Benteen collided with him. "No, wait," he said. "Let's have all those torches together." They plied the beams over the nearest fighter, oohing and aahing, until Reventlo slumped against the wall. "My God," he said softly. "Oh, my very dear God." "What's the matter?" Myles seemed ready to believe the worst while gazing at the best. "Not Zeroes," said the Brit. "Yeah," Lovett mused. "Canopy's different; tail cone, too. And something about the cowling.. I don't know, the later models-" "Tojo," said Reventlo, almost in a whisper. "It's a sodding Nakajima Tojo. Tie me kangaroo down if that isn't a Shoki; Tojo, Ki-44, same thing." Gunther had caught up with them now and said for them all, "That's bad?" "That is not bad, not bad at all," Reventio crooned, and there are four of them in here, lads and lass." Now the proper Brit astonished them all with an impromptu dance step, then leaned back against the wall again with a long, low whistle. "The twin-engine there is an old friend, if I may call it that: a Mitsubishi G4M, alias a Betty bomber. But-four Tojos? Out-bloody-standing! "You're starting to piss me off," Lovett said. "That's because you didn't do your homework," his friend rejoined. "There are records of surviving Nip aircraft, Wade. A few Zeroes are still flying. Go on, ask the next question." "You're saying the Tojo is rare," Benteen prodded. "Not rare. You're at liberty to guess how many Tojos made it through the war." No one spoke. "Zed. Zip, and if you'll pardon the expression, zero. They were thought extinct. If these old beauties can be made to work as well as they look-well, it could be closer to two million apiece. You are looking at the only surviving M-44 Tojos on the surface of the globe." "Under it, you mean," said Coop, at Myles's shoulder. "Why are we standing here when we could be-hey, just a froggin' minute here. Smell something?" Just hangar smells. No ammonia, if that's what you mean," Myles said, then continued with due caution. Coop began to descend again behind Myles. "Right. Fuel, lubricant, rubber. After fifty years?" Until that moment, Lovett had taken the familiar odors for granted. Now his mind reeled, and gooseflesh toured his arms as he followed Coop down those steps. A long disused hangar had its own sad, unique stinks: the sweetish odor of old Plexiglas, sometimes' the dry tang of corroded aluminum. Rarely, the scent of old lubricant. But gasoline after fifty years? No way, his gooseflesh chanted in unison. An instant's burst of blue-white light flooded the cave, setting Lovett's night vision back to square, one. "Victor, why are you blinding us at a time like this," Reventlo asked with a courtesy they all knew could be deceptive. "Proof positive," said the Texan. "This little Polaroid is gonna bring me a best-seller." "Kindly warn us from now on, there's a good chap," Reventlo pleaded. One by one, they reached an uneven stony floor that, Lovett found, was old coral filled in by cement Their discovery had become so enormous in Lovett's mind that, for the moment, he had to focus on something more easily grasped. So, as other flashbeams played over the hidden aircraft and more impatient fingers thumped aluminum hides, Wade Lovett walked in a squat, following his flash beam toward the juncture of floor and cave wall. When'he had studied the tool marks on the floor as far as the juncture he moved his flash beam up, following a gentle curvature innocent of tool marks to the point where it became an overhang, then a natural ceiling that swept forward to meet a front wall lost in shadow. "Hell, this was ordinary wave action," he said aloud, gazing at the smoothly contoured roof. No one paid attention, Coop and Reventlo talking a mile a minute as they clambered onto wing roots and slid canopies back. Wade Lovett stood up and strode to the opposite wall, nearly braining himself against a wing trailing edge in the process. He needed only a moment to discover that the front wall was -man-made; [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |