Читать книгу End Game - Dale Brown - Страница 17

The light looked like the barest pinprick in a black curtain, yet everyone aboard the raft saw it instantly.

‘There!’ said the coxswain. He lifted a small signal light and began signaling.

‘Go,’ said Sattari, pushing his oar. ‘Stroke!’

The little raft heaved itself forward as the men pushed at the oar. Sattari felt the commando he had rescued stirring next to him.

‘Rest,’ he told the man. ‘We’re almost there.’

‘Ship!’ said the coxswain.

Sattari swept his head back, though he continued to row. The low silhouette of the Indian patrol boat had appeared to the northeast; it was perhaps three kilometers away.

‘Stroke,’ insisted Sattari. The pinprick had grown to the size of a mayfly.

Sattari had personally told the commander of each of the four midget submarines to leave if threatened – even if that meant stranding the team he was assigned to retrieve. He did not regret the order, nor did he curse the Indian ship as it continued to move in the direction of the light. He only urged his men to row harder.

His own arms felt as if they were going to fall off. His head seemed to have tripled in weight, and his eyes ached.

‘Two hundred meters!’ called the coxswain.

A searchlight on the Indian ship, barely a kilometer away, swept the ocean.

‘Stroke!’ yelled Sattari. ‘Stroke!’

And then they were there, clambering over the rail at the stern. The sleek conning toward the bow looked like the swept cabin of a speedboat, and the entire craft was not much longer than a runabout.

‘Get aboard, get aboard,’ said Sattari.

He pulled the raft close to him, then plunged his knife into its side. As it began to deflate, he saw the Indian patrol boat bearing down on them, its lights reaching out in the darkness.

One of the other commandos took the raft and began to pull it down into the hatch.

‘No. Let it go. It will give them something to look at,’ said Sattari. He tossed it off the side, then pulled himself down the hatchway. The submarine’s crewman came down right behind him, securing the hatch.

‘Commander, we are aboard. Dive,’ Sattari said loudly, though the command was clearly unnecessary; he could feel the small vessel gliding forward, already sinking beneath the waves.