"It's madness to throw your lives away," Misty persisted.

"We have no choice," Pitt said firmly. "Time is not on our side."

"What about weapons?" asked Giordino, as casually as if he were asking the price of an ice-cream cone.

"I have a pair of automatic rifles I carry for protection," offered Cussler. "But I can't say how well they and the ammo will perform after being dragged a mile under water."

Pitt shook his head. "Thank you, but it's better we swim in unencumbered. As far as firepower, we'll worry about it when the time comes."

"What about dive equipment? I have four filled air tanks and two regulators."

"The less equipment the better. Dive equipment would only hinder us once we came ashore. We'll snorkel into the lagoon. Nobody could spot us in the dark from twenty feet away."

"You'll have a long swim," said Cussler. "From where I'll moor the boat, the inside of the lagoon is over a mile."

"We'll be lucky to get in by midnight," muttered Giordino.

"I can cut your time by two hours."

Pitt looked at Cussler. "How?"

"I have a dive thruster that will pull you through the water. You can use it to propel you both in tandem."

"That will be a great help, thank you."

"Is there nothing I can say to talk you out of this senselessness?" Misty pleaded.

"No," said Pitt, his lips spread slightly in a comforting smile. "This thing has to be done. There wouldn't be a security facility at the entrance to the channel if there wasn't something inside someone wanted to hide. We have to find out if it's the Deep Encounter."

"And if you're wrong?"

The smile was gone suddenly, and Pitt's face became tense. "If we're wrong, then our friends on board the ship will die because we failed to save them."

Beginning just after sunset, it took the three men two hours to tie several palm tree trunks together into a raft and then construct a rough outline of the Periwinkle with framing scrounged from driftwood. For a finishing touch, a small battery was connected to a string of lights on the framework. Then the raft was anchored on the shore side of the yacht.

"Not a bad facsimile if I do say so," Cussler assented. "It ain't pretty," said Giordino, "but it should fool the security guard sitting in his little hovel five miles away."

Pitt splashed seawater on his face to wash away the sweat brought on by the humidity. "We'll turn on the lights of the raft at the same moment we turn off the lights of the yacht."

Within minutes, Cussler engaged the Periwinkle's big engines and eased the yacht forward as he pressed the switch to the winch that raised the anchor. Then he shifted the lights to the raft and threw the yacht into darkness. He ran the yacht out past the reef, keeping an eye on the depth sounder, gauging the depth of the coral that lurked below the surface like malicious killer teeth, waiting to send the yacht sinking into the depths beyond.