“Yes, we know they have the contracts in place to move glacier water from Alaska, but we've crunched the numbers. There are far too many tankers for the existing market, even if you add China.”

“It takes a while to build a ship. Maybe they want to be ready. They'll mothball the ships until the time is ripe.”

“That's the strange thing. These ships aren't being moth balled. Each tanker has a captain and a crew. They're just sitting in Alaskan waters as if they're waiting.”

“Waiting for what?”

“That's what we would like to know.”

“Something's going on,” Zavala murmured.

“My reporter's nose for news says the same thing.”

Zavala got a cold feeling as if one of those slimy tentacles they talked about had tapped him on the shoulder. He recalled the conversation he had had with Austin about the unseen fears that sometimes come beneath the sea. As usual, Kurt's intuition was on the mark. Zavala's own instincts were telling him that a big, hungry something lay hidden in the blue shadows, watching and waiting. And its name was Gogstad.

NUMA 2 - Blue Gold

CHAPTER 23

CIA director Erwin LeGrand beamed proudly as his fourteen-year-old daughter, Katherine, trotted over on the back of her chestnut gelding. She slipped out of the saddle and presented her father with the trophy for first place, English style.

“This is for your office, Dad,” she said with excitement in her cornflower-blue eyes. “It's for being the best father in the world. You're the one who bought me Val and paid for all those expensive riding lessons.”

LeGrand took the trophy and put his arm around his daughter's shoulders, thinking how much she looked like her mother. “Thank you, Katie, but I wasn't the one who worked so hard to show Valiant who's boss.” He smiled. “I'll only take it on the condition that it's on loan. As soon as I've bragged to everyone at the agency, it's going back in your trophy case with the others.”

LeGrand's pride was mixed with guilt. True, he had supported his daughter's love for riding financially, but this was the first event he had attended in years. The country club photographer came over, and LeGrand posed with his daughter and her horse, wishing as he did that his wife were still alive to make the picture complete.

Katie led Val back to the stable, and LeGrand ambled across the field, chatting with his assistant, a plain but extremely intelligent woman named Hester Leonard. LeGrand was sometimes likened in press reports to a beardless Lincoln, a comparison based on his reputation for honesty and his resemblance to the sixteenth president. He was tall and homely, but there was no mistaking the character etched into his large features. He had earned a reputation for integrity in running the world's largest intelligence-gathering organization, and in another age with no TV and sound bites, he would have been considered seriously as a candidate for president.

Leonard's cell phone buzzed, and she put it to her ear. “Sir,” she said hesitantly, “call for you from Langley.”