The Director's lips curled in a humorless smile. He wasn't used to indirect answers. "Very Homeric, Major, but hardly the answer I had in mind."

"Strange but true," Pitt said. "After finding no sign of the heroin on board the Queen Artemisia, I swam to the beach and began doodling with a stick in the sand. A detachable submarine seemed like an abstract idea at first, but the more I doodled, the more concrete it became."

The Director leaned back in his chair and shook his head sadly. "Forty years, a hundred agents from twelve different nations all struggling under the most adverse conditions imaginable to break von Till's smuggling operation. Three of those agents gave up their lives in the struggle." He looked gravely across the desk at Pitt "Somehow it almost seems a tragic joke that our efforts overlooked a solution that was so apparent to someone standing on the outside looking in."

Pitt stared at him in silence.

"By the way," the Director continued, suddenly cheerful, "I don't suppose you've had a chance to hear the results of our Galveston stakeout?"

"No sir." Pitt carefully tapped an ash in an ashtray. "Until five minutes ago I haven't seen or talked to Inspector Zacynthus since we parted on Thasos nearly three weeks ago. I've had no way of knowing whether my small assist paid off for you in Galveston or not."

Zacynthus looked at the Director. "May I fill Major Pitt in, sir?"

The Director nodded.

Zacynthus turned to Pitt.

"Everything went according to plan. Five miles outside the harbor we were met by a small fleet of von Till's fishing boats—a bit tricky at this point, not knowing the proper identification signals. Luckily I persuaded the Queen Jocasta's captain—with the threat of castration with a rusty knife—to desert the enemy and join our side."

"Did anyone come aboard?" Pitt asked.

"There was no danger of that," Zacynthus replied. "A boarding party would have looked too damned suspicious to a passing patrol boat. The fishermen merely stood off and signaled us to detach the sub. Interesting piece of machinery, that sub. The Navy engineers who studied it coming across the Atlantic were quite impressed."

"What made it so unique?"

"It was fully automatic."

"A drone?" Pitt asked incredulously.

"Yes, another one of von Till's clever innovations. You see, if the sub had an accident or was detected by the Harbor Patrol before it reached the cannery there was no way in hell it could be traced or connected to Minerva Lines. And without a crew there would be no one to interrogate."

Pitt was intrigued. "Then it was controlled by one of the fishing boats."