"02 - The Mediterranean Caper (b)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cussler Clive)

"Nothing," returned Pitt.

"You said an unidentified aircraft. I take it, that means one?"

"That's precisely what Brady Control said before they went off the air."

"It doesn't make sense. Why would one plane attack a United States Air Force Base?"

"Who knows," Pitt said, easing the control column back slightly. "Maybe it's an irate Greek farmer who's tired of our jets scaring his goals. Anyway. it can't be a full-scale attack, or Washington would have notified us by now. We'll have to wait and see" He rubbed his eyes and blinked away the drowsiness. "Get ready, I'm going to take her up, circle in over those hills and come down out of the sun for a closer look."

"Take it nice and easy." Giordino's eyebrows came together and he grinned a serious grin. "This old bus is way overmatched if that's a rocket firing jet down there."

"Don't worry," Pitt laughed. "My main goal in life is to stay healthy as long as possible." He pushed the throttles forward, and the two Pratt & Whitney Wasp engines increased their beat. His large, brown hands moved efficiently, pulling back on the control column, and the plane aimed its flat snout at the sun. The big Catalina rose steadily, gaining altitude by the second, and circled above the Thasos mountains in the direction of the growing smoke cloud. Suddenly, a voice broke in over Pitt's headset. The unexpected sound nearly deafened his ears before he could lower the volume-the same voice be heard before, but stronger this time.

"This is Brady Control calling. We are under attack! I repeat, we are under attack! Come in anybody, please reply!" The voice was near hysteria. Pitt replied, "Brady Control, this is PBY-086. Over."

"Thank God, someone answered," the voice gasped.

"I tried to raise you before, Brady Control, but you faded and went off the air."

"I was hit in the first attack, I.. . I must have

passed out I'm all right now." The words sounded broken, but coherent

"We're approximately ten miles west of you at six thousand feet." Pitt spoke slowly and did not repeat his position. "What is your situation?"

"We have no defense. All our aircraft were destroyed on the ground. The nearest interceptor squadron is seven hundred miles away. They'll never get here in time. Can you assist?"

Pitt shook his head from side to side from habit. "Negative Brady Control. My top speed is under one hundred ninety knots and I only have a couple of rifles on board. We'd be wasting our time engaging a jet."

"Please assist," the voice pleaded. "Our attacker is not a jet bomber but a World War I biplane. I repeat, our attacker is a World War I biplane. Please assist."

Pitt and Giordino merely looked at each other, dumbfounded. It was a full ten seconds before Pitt could pull his senses back into reign.

"Okay, Brady Control, we're coming in. But you'd better know your aircraft identification or you're going to make a pair of little old silver-haired mother damn sad if my co-pilot and I buy the farm. Over and out." Pitt turned to Giordino and spoke quickly without facial expression his tone confident and calculating. "Go aft and throw open the side hatches. Use one of the carbines and make like a sharpshooter."

"I can't believe what I'm hearing," Giordino said stunned.

Pitt shook his head. "I can't quite accept it either, but we've got to give those guys down there on the ground a helping hand. Now hurry it up."

"I'll do it," Giordino muttered. "But I still don't believe it."

"Yours is not to reason why, my friend," Pitt lightly punched Giordino on the arm and smiled briefly.

"Good luck."

"Save it for yourself, you bleed just as easily as I do," Giordino said soberly. Then, muttering quietly under his breath, he rose from the co-pilot's seat and made his way to the ship's waist. Once there he pulled the thirty caliber carbine from an upright cabinet and shoved a fifteen shot clip into the receiver. A blast of warm air struck his face, filling the compartment when he opened the waist batches. He checked the gun once more and sat down to wait; his thoughts drifting to the big man who was piloting the plane. Giordino had known Pitt for a long time. They'd played together as boys, ran on the same high school track team and dated the same girls. He knew Pitt better than any man alive; any woman too, for that matter.

Pitt was, in a sense, two men, neither of them directly related to the other. There was the coldly efficient Dirk Pitt who rarely made a mistake, and yet was humorous, unpretentious and easily made friends with everyone who came in contact with him; a rare combination.