Free Santorini by Alistair MacLean

requested."' Myers left and Talbot said: 'It is my understanding, Admiral, that in your capacity as officer commanding the naval forces in the Eastern Mediterranean you have the power to overrule the President's instructions.'

    'Yes.'

    'Have you done so?'

    'No. You will ask why. Same reason as the President. The greatest good of the greatest good of the greatest number. Why the questioning, Captain? You wouldn't leave here even if I gave a direct order.'

    'I'm just a bit puzzled about the reason given-the greatest good of the greatest good of the greatest number. Bringing a rescue vessel, which admittedly is my idea. Will only increase the greatest danger to a greater number.'

    'I don't think you appreciate just how great the greatest number is in this case. I think Professor Benson here can enlighten you. Enlighten all of us, for I'm rather vague about it. That's why Professor Benson is here.'

    'The good Professor is not at his best,' Benson said. 'He's hungry.'

    'Most remiss of us.' Talbot said. 'Of course you haven't eaten. Dinner, say, in twenty minutes?'

    'I'd settle for a sandwich. Talbot looked at Hawkins and Wickram, both of whom nodded, He pressed a bell.

    'I'm a bit vague about it myself Benson said. 'Certain facts are beyond dispute. What we're sitting on top of at this moment is one of them. According to which estimate of the Pentagon's you choose to believe. there's something like a total of between 144 and 225 megatons of high explosive lying down there. Not that the difference between the lowest and highest estimate is of any significance. The explosion of a pound of high explosive in this wardroom would kill us all. What we are talking about is the explosive power of, let me see, yes, four and a half billion pounds. The human mind cannot comprehend, differences in estimates become irrelevant. All we can say with certainty is that it would be the biggest man-made explosion in history, which doesn't sound so bad when you say it quickly as I'm saying it now.

    'The results of such an explosion are quite unknown but stupefyingly horrendous however optimistic your guess might be, if optimistic is the word I'm looking for, which it isn't. It might fracture the earth's crust, with cataclysmic results. It might destroy part of the ozone layer, which would permit the sun's ultra-violet radiation either to tan us or fry us, depending upon how large a hole had been blasted in the stratosphere: it might equally well cause the onset of a nuclear winter, which is so popular a topic among both scientists and laymen these days. And lastly, but by no means least, are the tsunami effects, vast tidal waves usually generated by undersea earthquakes: those tsunami have been responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of people at a time when they struck low-lying coastal areas.'

    Benson reached out a grateful hand for a glass that Jenkins had brought. Talbot said: 'If you're trying to be encouraging, Professor, you're not doing too well at it.'

    'Ah, better, much better.' Benson lowered his glass and sighed, 'I needed that. There are times when I'm quite capable of terrifying even myself. Encouraging? That's only the half of it. Santorini's the other half. In fact, Santorini is the major part of it. Gifted though mankind is in creating sheer wanton destruction, nature has him whacked every time.'

    'Santorini?' Wickram said. 'Who or what is Santorini?'

    'Ignorance, George, ignorance. You and your fellow physicists should look out from your ivory towers from time to time. Santorini is less than a couple of miles from where you're sitting. Had that name for many centuries. Today it's officially known, as it was five thousand years ago at the height of its civilization, as Thera Island.

    'The island, by whatever name, has had a very turbulent seismic and volcanic history. Don't worry, George, I'm not about to sally forth on my old hobby-horse, not for long anyway, just long enough to try to explain what the greatest