Dirk Pitt 1 - Pacific Vortex by Clive Cussler Read Free Book Online

bathroom as if she were making up her mind to throw up in the sink or on the shag carpet. The sink won. She rose unsteadily from the chair and reeled into the bathroom, slamming the door.
    He soon heard the sound of water gushing as the commode was flushed; then the faucet on the sink was turned on. Pitt walked over to the balcony and gazed at the twinkling lights of Honolulu in the distance, while far below, the ocean breakers droned against the beach. He lingered at the balcony perhaps a little too long.
    He was jolted back to reality by the sound of running water in the bathroom; the flow was too constant, too prolonged for normal routine. It took him three steps to reach the door—locked from the inside. No time for a theatrical “are you in there” line. Balancing on one leg, he kicked hard at the lock with the other, revealing an empty room.
    Summer was gone. Her only trace was a trail of knotted bath towels, tied to the shower curtain railing and stretching over the windowsill. Casting an anxious eye below, he saw the last towel dangling only four feet above a chaise lounge on the balcony belonging to the room beneath his. No lights were showing, no shouts of alarm from the tenants. She had escaped safely. For that he was thankful.
    He stood there recalling her face—a face that was probably compassionate and tender and gay.
    Then he cursed himself for letting her get away.
    It was early morning. Thin, ghostly trails of vapor were left behind from a light rain that had come and gone during the night The humidity would have been stifling but for the tradewinds that swept clean the sodden atmosphere and dispersed it over the blue ocean beyond the encircling reefs. The sandy strip of beach that curled from Diamond Head to the Reef Hotel was empty, but already tourists were beginning to trickle from the great glass and concrete hotels to begin a day of sightseeing and shopping excursions.
    Lying crosswise on the sweat-dampened sheets of his bed, a naked Pitt gazed out the open window at a pair of myna birds who were fighting over a disinterested female perched in a neighboring palm tree. Black feathers flew in profusion as the birds squawked riotously, creating a disturbance heard for nearly a block. Then, just as the miniature brawl was about to reach its final round, Pitt's door chime sounded. Reluctantly, he slipped on a terrycloth robe, walked yawning to the door, and opened it.
    “Good morning, Dirk.” A short, fire-haired man with a protruding face, stood in the hall. “I hope I'm not interrupting a romantic interlude?”
    Pitt stretched out his hand. “No, I'm quite alone. Come on in.”
    The little man crossed the threshold, looked unhurriedly about the room, then stepped out on the balcony, taking in the splendid view. He was nattily dressed in a light tan suit and vest, complete with watch and chain. He had a neatly trimmed Ahab, the whaler's red beard, with two evenly spaced white streaks on each side of the chin, presenting a facial growth that was strikingly uncommon. The olive face was beaded with perspiration either from the humidity or from climbing the stairs, or both. When most men wove their lives through the channels of least resistance, Admiral James Sandecker, Chief Director of the National Underwater and Marine Agency, hit every barrier, every obstacle in the shortest line from point A to point B.
    Sandecker turned and nodded over his shoulder. “How in hell do you get any sleep with those damned crows screeching in your ears?”
    “Fortunately, they don't fly amok until the sun's up.” Pitt motioned to the sectional couch. “Get comfortable, Admiral, while I get the coffee going.”
    “Forget the coffee. Nine hours ago I was in Washington. The jet lag has my body chemistry all screwed up. I'd prefer a drink.”
    Pitt pulled out a bottle of Scotch from a cabinet and poured. He glanced across the room only to be met by Sandecker's twinkling blue eyes. What was coming? The head of one of