"Just leave it to me," Giordino said, straight-faced. "Well, it's about that time. I wish I was coming along. Enjoy your swim and have fun."

"I intend to," Pitt murmured. "I intend to."

* * *

Two chimes from the ship's bell sounded Gunn's one-minute warning signal. Pitt, walking awkwardly in his fins, moved onto a small platform that extended over the side of the hull.

"At the sound of the next tone, gentlemen, we go!" He said no more, partly because each man knew what he had to do, partly because there was nothing else to say that had any meaning.

The divers gripped their spearguns a little tighter and silently exchanged glances. One thought and only one thought was on all their minds at this minute: if the jump isn't far enough, a leg could be lost in the whirling propeller. At a gesture from Pitt, they arranged themselves in a line behind the platform.

Before he lowered the mask over his eyes, Pitt took another look at the men around him and for the tenth time studied their identifying features, features he would be able to recognize at a distance underwater. The man nearest him, Ken Knight, the geophysicist, was the only blond in the group; Stan Thomas, the short, runty ship's engineer, wore blue fins and was the only member, Pitt surmised, who could probably handle himself in a tough fight. Next came a red-bearded marine biologist, Lee Spencer, then Gustaf Hersong, a lanky six-foot-six marine botanist—both those men seemed to be grinning at each other over a private joke. The anchor man was the expedition's photographer, Omar Woodson, as true a deadpan character as Pitt had ever seen and who genuinely appeared bored by the whole show. Instead of a speargun, Woodson carried a 35 mm Nykonos with flash, swinging the expensive underwater unit over the railing, negligently, as if it were an old used box camera.

Pitt pulled the mask down over his eyes, whistling softly to himself, and gazed once more at the water. It was passing beneath the platform at a much more leisurely rate now—Gunn had cut the First Attempt's speed to a crawling three knots—slow enough, Pitt decided, for a feet-first entry. His eyes turned past the bow, looking forward with trance-like fixity at the approximate point in the sea where at any moment now he must dive.

At almost the same instant, Gunn scrutinized the fathometer and the jagged cliffs for the last time. His hand slowly raised, groped for the bell line, found it, paused, then gave one hard pull. The metallic clang burst into the hot afternoon air and carried across the surf to the step coastal wall, echoing in a muted undertone back toward the ship.

Pitt, poised on the platform, didn't wait for the echo. Holding the mask firmly in place against his face with one hand and clutching the pole spear in the other, he leaped.