The Last Titanic Story by Chris Angus

Author:Chris Angus [Angus, chris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Titanic, nazis, Chris Angus, treasure, adventure
Publisher: Iguana Books
Published: 2012-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 29

Present Day

The plane bucked and shook so hard it felt like it would come apart. Snow sprayed in a huge rooster tail from beneath the skis, as the pilot struggled to maintain control. The surface of the glacier was full of hidden depressions, ripples of ice-hard snow and worst of all, crevasses. It was sheer madness to attempt to land.

Finally they slowed and came to a jarring halt only yards from a slab of ice that loomed up above the flat terrain. The pilot turned the plane in the direction they would need for takeoff and left the engine idling. With an air temperature of zero and wind chill at thirty below, he could not risk being unable to restart. He released his rigid hands from the controls, lowered them to his lap and slumped his shoulders with relief.

“Well done,” Kretschmer said, putting one hand on the pilot’s shoulder. He grabbed his heavy parka and struggled into it. Two men with rifles in the rear passenger seat did the same. When they were ready, Kretschmer said to the pilot, “It should take us only ten minutes or so to walk to the crevasse. Keep the engine running. As soon as we know what happened to them, we’ll be back.”

With that, he opened the cockpit door and stepped out into the frigid arctic blast. The two men followed. Kretschmer didn’t really think the trio they had shot at could have survived their headlong plunge into the crevasse. But after several low passes, they simply could not tell from the plane what had happened to them. And he needed to know. The entire reason for being here was to find the diary. He couldn’t leave without it.

They struggled against the wind which had blown the ice field free of snow so they at least did not have to wade through hip-deep drifts. When they reached the massive slab where Laura, Matt and Ulrik had signaled the plane, the men proceeded cautiously. They could not be absolutely certain the party had no guns. Though none were in evidence from the air and they had not been fired upon, there was still no point in taking chances. They spread out along a fifty-foot front and eased up on the great hole in the ice.

Nothing.

Kretschmer stared into the crevasse in disgust. A solitary ice anchor was still embedded in the ice at the lip of the gaping hole in front of them. The half-inch nylon line attached to it disappeared out of sight below.

“Wilhelm, shoulder your weapon and go see what’s down there,” Kretschmer said.

The man looked at the rope and back at his boss. Fear washed over his face. He had been well trained not to question those in authority, and indeed, he knew that to do so with Kretschmer could well be suicide. He had seen it before. Still, the beckoning black hole in the ice seemed as certain a way to death as any other.

“It will be very difficult to get back out, I think,” he said.

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