Текст книги "The Navigator"

Автор книги: Clive Cussler

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Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 27 страниц)

Chapter 24

AS AUSTIN SLOTTED THE JEEP into the reserved space in the underground garage, Carina blinked her eyes open. Traces of the drug must have lingered in her bloodstream because she had dozed off within minutes of leaving Benson’s house. The last thing she had remembered was the rolling Virginia countryside.

She glanced around in bewilderment. “Where are we?”

“King Neptune’s lair,” Austin said with a poker face.

He got out of the car and opened the door on the passenger side. He gently took Carina’s arm and led her to the nearest elevator, which swooshed them to the main floor. The doors opened, and they stepped out into the lobby that formed the centerpiece of the imposing, thirty-story NUMA tower of tinted green glass in Arlington, Virginia.

Carina looked around the atrium, with its waterfalls and wall aquariums and the huge globe at the center of the sea green marble floor. The lobby bustled with activity, much of it having to do with milling tour groups that bristled with cameras.

“This is wonderful,” she said in wide-eyed wonder.

“Welcome to the headquarters of the National Underwater and Marine Agency,” Austin said with pride. “This building houses more than two thousand marine scientists and engineers. The people who work here provide the support for another three thousand NUMA people and ships scattered across the world’s oceans.”

Carina pivoted like a ballerina. “I could stay here all day.”

“You’re not the first one to say that. Now we’ll go from the sublime to the ridiculous.”

They got back in the elevator which silently rocketed them to another floor. They stepped out into a thickly carpeted corridor and followed it to an unmarked door. Austin ushered her inside his office with an Alphonse and Gaston swoop of his arm.

Austin’s modest corner space was the antithesis of the sweeping open vista that greeted visitors who came through the front doors of NUMA. It was what a real estate salesperson would describe as comfortable but cozy. There was a dark green rug on the floor. Furniture consisted of two chairs, filing cabinet, and a small sofa. A low bookcase held books devoted mostly to technical marine matters and philosophy.

The desk could have been measured in square inches, unlike the standard acre-sized centerpiece of most Washington offices. On the wall were photos of Austin with a rugged-looking older man who could have been his twin but was undoubtedly his father and pictures of various NUMA research vessels. Despite its unprepossessing dimensions, the office had an impressive of view of the Potomac River and Washington.

“My interior decorator is on vacation,” Austin said in apology. He got two bottles of springwater from a small refrigerator, gave one to Carina, and invited her to sit in a chair. He sat at his desk and lifted his water. “Cheers.”

“Santé,”she said, looking around. “This is not ridiculous at all. It’s quite functional and homey.”

“Thank you. I share a secretary who takes messages for me. I’m away a lot and don’t spend much time here except for special tasks, like this one.”

He took the photographic disk from his pocket and slid it into the computer on his desk. A National Geographic logo came up on the screen, followed by a story headline: “Digging Into the Past of a Forgotten Civilization.” The headline accompanied an article on the excavation into the Hittite settlement. Austin called up all the photos on the disk. The screen immediately filled with small rectangles arranged in neat rows.

Benson had taken hundreds of photos. Austin pushed the ALBUM command for three-second internals and swiveled the screen so Carina could see the photographs.

After a few minutes, Carina pointed to the screen. “That’s it!”

The photo on the screen showed several dirt-covered day workers standing at the edge of a pit, shovels in their hands. Nearby was the supervisor, a portly European wearing a pith helmet and un-soiled shorts and shirt. Protruding from the dirt at the bottom of the pit was a conical-shaped mound.

Austin went through the sequence of about two dozen photos. The series showed the head of the statue being unearthed. Then its shoulders were cleared until the workers were able to get lines under the armpits and hoist it from the hole. The dirt had been cleaned off in later pictures. Benson had taken several close-ups of the face, with its smashed-in nose, along with front, back, and side shots.

“It certainly lookslike our statue,” Carina said. “Unfortunately, this is all we have. A photograph. We’re at a dead end.”

Austin reached into his pocket and pulled out the figurine he had taken from Benson’s fireplace mantle. He set it on the table in front of Carina. “Maybe not.”

Carina took a deep breath. “It’s a miniature version of the Navigator. Where did you find it?”

“At Benson’s house.”

She picked up the figurine. “The fact that it exists at all suggests that it was made from the original.” She crinkled her brow. “From what we know, the statue was shipped from Syria to Baghdad and never saw the light of day. When could this copy have been made?”

Austin reached for his phone. “Let’s ask the man who knows.”

Using directory assistance, he found the name of the hospital nearest to Benson’s farm and punched in the number. The receptionist connected him to Benson’s room. Austin put the phone on speaker. The photographer answered with a furry hello, but he perked up when Austin identified himself. He said that he had suffered a concussion and contusions but no fractures.

“I’ll be out of here in a couple of days. Any word on those bastards?”

“Nothing solid. We wondered where you found the figurine on the mantle. The miniature of the statue you photographed at the Syrian dig. Did someone copy the statue at the excavation site?”

“Naw. That one was shipped off right away. Maybe someone copied it from the other statue.”

Austin and Carina exchanged blank looks. “ Whatother statue?” she said. “We were under the impression that there was only one Navigator.”

“Sorry about that. I was going to mention it, but, as you know, I was under the weather when you came by the house. There was a second statue. The German guy who was running the Syrian dig said the statues might have guarded the entrance to an important building or tomb. I took some shots of the old boy, but that was before digital. The film got ruined in the blasted heat.”

“What happened to the second statue?” Austin said.

“Got me. I went on to another assignment. The Geographicwanted shots of native women with bare breasts, so they sent me to Samoa. A couple of years ago I was in Istanbul doing a feature on the Ottoman Empire. I found the little figure in a market. Guy who sold it to me was a bandit, but I bought it anyhow.”

“Do you remember where the market was?”

“Somewhere in the covered bazaar. Shop had a pile of the statues. Damn. Painkiller’s wearing off. Got to call the nurse. Let me know when you find the creeps who bopped me.”

“I will.” Austin thanked Benson, told him to stay well, and clicked off.

Carina looked as if she were sitting on bedsprings. “A secondstatue! We’ve got to find it.”

Austin pictured the sprawling city of Istanbul as he remembered it from an assignment in the Black Sea a couple of years earlier. The covered bazaar spread out over several acres in a bewildering labyrinth of shops. He remembered Zavala’s plans for the Subvette.

“We’ve got a contingent of NUMA people going to Istanbul to help survey an ancient port. Joe Zavala could check out the bazaar for us.”

“And thenwhat?” Carina said. “What if he finds the dealer? We are here and he is there. What good will thatdo us?”

Carina had a point. “I’ll see if there’s a seat on the plane.”

“Make that twoseats.” She raised her hand to cut short Austin’s reply. “I can be a great help. I know someone in Istanbul who’s close to the antiquities market.” She shrugged. “Well, he’s a smuggler, but only of minor artifacts. I’ve used him on several occasions to go after bigger fish. He knows every crooked dealer in Istanbul. He could save us time. He will only work through me.”

Austin gave her proposal a second’s thought. It would be pleasant to have the lovely Italian woman as company, but there were other reasons that had nothing to do with male libido. He was concerned about Carina’s safety if she were left alone. Trouble seemed to dog the young woman’s footsteps. He’d feel better if he could keep an eye on her. Her informant could save a lot of sweat. Carina had successfully tracked down the Navigatorwhere others had failed.

She was putting on an unnecessary display of persistence, showering Austin with other reasons for her to go, stopping only after he put his finger to his lips. He called Zavala and asked if he had room for two passengers. After a short conversation, Austin hung up and turned to Carina, who had been hanging on every word.

“Pack your bags,” he said. “The plane is leaving at eight tonight. I’ll drive you to your hotel and pick you up at five o’clock.”

Carina leaned forward and gave Austin a long and lingering kiss that practically curled his toes. “It will be faster if I take a cab. I’ll be waiting for you.”

Seconds later, she was out the door, and he could hear her padding down the hallway. He glanced at his wristwatch. He kept a packed duffel bag ready at all times. All he had to do was grab it and go.

On the drive to the boathouse, he called his shared secretary and said he would be away for a few days. Then he called Elwood Nickerson and left a similar message. He didn’t go into details. Somehow he didn’t feel comfortable telling the undersecretary of state that the key to heading off an international crisis was a doll-sized figure five thousand miles away.

Chapter 25

“TODAY’S THE DAY,” Paul Trout said with steely determination.

Trout stood wide-legged in a dinghy while he handed fishing tackle to his wife Gamay, who was aboard their twenty-one-foot powerboat. Gamay set the rods into a rack and said, “Ho-hum,” bringing her palm to her lips in an exaggerated yawn. “I recall the same male bragging twenty-four hours ago on this very same spot. It was an empty boast, just like the day before.”

Trout climbed onto the boat with surprising agility for a man built like a professional basketball player. Although he was six foot eight, he moved with a catlike grace that came from years of experience on boats at the side of his fisherman father. He punched the starter button on the console. The inboard engine came to life with a throaty grumble and a puff of blue exhaust.

“No brag. When you’re born into an old Cape Cod family that’s caught tons of fish over the decades, you expect an off day once in a while.” He stuck his nose in the air like a bloodhound. “That grand-daddy striper is waiting in his honey hole for me to hook him.”

“Now I know why fishermen have a reputation for telling tall tales.” Gamay cast off the mooring line.

Trout gave the throttle a light touch and steered the boat at a slow speed across Eel Pond toward the Water Streetdrawbridge. They passed a bar whose deck overlooked the pond, and Trout smacked his lips. “I can taste that cold frosty beer.”

“Let’s jack up the ante,” Gamay said. “Loser buys dinner too.”

“It’s a bet,” Trout said without hesitation. “Fried clams go great with beer.”

The boat proceeded slowly under the drawbridge and out into the harbor, past the Martha’s Vineyard ferry terminal and the research vessel Atlantis,which was tied up to the dock of the world-famous Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where Trout’s interest in oceanography had been stimulated when he was still a boy.

The boat cleared the harbor and Trout goosed the throttle. The bow angled up on plane and he steered toward the ElizabethIslands, an archipelago that lay in a string southwest of Cape Cod. Gamay puttered about the deck, readying fishing gear.

There were few things better in Trout’s opinion than racing over the waves with the salty breeze in his face and the prospects of a full day of fishing. All he needed to make the outing a perfect ten would be to catch a bigger fish than Gamay. He was used to friendly competition with his wife, but he had been quietly annoyed that she had outfished him over the last two days.

As a young girl growing up on the shores of Lake Michigan, Gamay was no slouch when it came to boats and fishing. Although she had grown into an attractive woman, she retained a hint of the tomboy she had once been. Her good-natured taunts at Trout’s lack of success ran counter to his understated New England persona. He gritted his teeth. Today damn wellbetter be the day or he would never live it down.

Near the low-lying hump that was NaushonIsland, Trout pointed the boat toward a cloud of squalling seabirds diving in the water in search of bait being chased to the surface by larger links in the food chain. Amorphous yellow blobs were popping up on the fish-finder screen. There was a fishy scent in the air. He cut the engine and the boat plowed to a stop.

Gamay handed Trout a fishing rod and took the wheel. It was customary for the highliner on the last trip to let the lowliner go first. Trout settled into the swivel chair and let some line out. He started jigging, continuously jerking the rod to keep the lure traveling through the water.

“Fish on!” he yelled.

He cranked the reel and pulled in a thirty-two-inch-long striped bass. After measuring the fish, he threw it back. Gamay quickly caught a twenty-eight-incher. Again they tossed the fish overboard. They took turns catching stripers in roughly the same size range before the school played out, and they moved to another spot that was equally as productive.

They kept a running compilation and were in a dead heat when Trout felt a sharp tug on the line that almost pulled his arm out. This was going to be the tiebreaker. He was barely aware of a cell phone chiming. Gamay put the phone to her ear and, after a moment, said, “Kurt needs to talk to you.”

Trout cranked the reel like a man possessed. The silver body of a huge fish flashed near the surface. Damn.It was as big as a whale. He tried to concentrate.

“Tell him to wait,” he shouted over his shoulder.

“He can’t wait,” Gamay said. “He and Joe are on their way to Turkey.”

Turkey?The last Trout was aware of, Austin and Zavala were off to Newfoundland. In that instant, Trout lost his train of thought, and the fish. The line went slack. Oh, hell. He got up, handed the rod to Gamay, and took the phone in exchange.

“Hope I’m not interrupting anything,” Austin said.

“Naw,” Trout said. He stared disconsolately at the ripples where he’d last seen the giant striper. “What’s up, Kurt?”

“Can you come up with a computer model that will reconstruct a transatlantic ship voyage? I know it’s a tall order.”

“I’ll give it a try,” Trout said. “I’ll need a date. I can figure in currents, weather, and speed if that information is available.”

“Actually, very little is available. This was a Phoenician ship. The crossing was made around 900 B.C.”

Trout was more intrigued than discouraged. “Tell me more,” he said.

“I’ve sent you a package by special courier. Should be there by now. It will explain everything. This is urgent. I’ll call first chance I get. Bye.”

“What was that all about?” Gamay said after Trout clicked off.

He explained Kurt’s request. They would have to call it a day. He stared longingly at another cloud of wheeling seabirds. “Damn shame about that fish.”

Gamay pecked him on the cheek. “I saw him. It was a monster. I think it’s my turn to buy the beer.”

THE PACKAGE from Austin was leaning against the front door of the two-hundred-year-old Cape Cod cottage that overlooked a circular kettle pond. Trout had grown up in the broad-roofed house within walking distance of the Oceanographic Institution, whose scientists had encouraged his boyhood curiosity about the ocean.

He and Gamay sat at the harvest table in the kitchen, munching on the ham-and-cheese roll-ups they had prepared for their picnic lunch as they went over the Jefferson file. At one point, Gamay looked up from her reading and blew a strand of dark red hair out of her eyes.

“This is unbelievable!”

Trout took a swig from a can of Buzzards Bay ale. “I’m trying to figure out what we can do. My experience with computer modeling is mostly deep-sea geology. You made the switch from nautical archaeology to marine biology. We could pull something together, but it wouldn’t be pretty. We’ll need help.”

Gamay smiled, showing the slight space between her front teeth, a dental anomaly that somehow looked attractive on her. “Didn’t we hear some gossip last night?”

Trout recalled the gentle ribbing he had received from the local barflies who had heard about his fishing contest with Gamay. Then he remembered someone mentioning a familiar name. He snapped his fingers. “Charlie Summers is in town.”

Gamay handed Trout the phone and he called the research-vessel dock. He got through to Summers, who was working on a retrofit for the Atlantis,and laid out the problem.

“That’s a lot more interesting than what I’m doing,” Summers said. “Can you come over now?”

Minutes later, the Trouts were walking out onto the research-vessel dock. A stocky man with a square jaw and thinning straw-hued hair greeted them with effusive hugs.

Summers was a well-known naval architect who specialized in the design of research and educational vessels. He often consulted in the design of luxury yachts, and was an expert in the stability of large sailing vessels.

He gave Gamay a big wink. “Thought you two would be out fishing today.”

“News of our competition got around fast,” Trout said with a smirk.

“It’s the talk of the town. You know how gossipy fishermen and scientists are.”

“Paul almost beat me today,” Gamay offered.

Summers roared with laughter. “Please don’t tell me it was the one that got away.” He wiped the tears from his eyes. “Now, what’s all this about Phoenicians?”

Trout jumped at the chance to change the subject. “We got a call from NUMA this morning. Someone is doing research on pre-Columbian contact and needed help replicating a voyage. We get a lot of odd requests.”

“Not odd at all. I’ve read reams of material on Phoenician shipbuilding. There’s no doubt from a naval architect’s point of view that they had the capacity to go almost anywhere they wanted.”

“Then you canhelp us plot a course?” Gamay said.

Summers shook his head. “That’s a tough one,” he said. “The Phoenicians left no maps or charts. They guarded their sea knowledge with their lives.” Noting the disappointment in Gamay’s face, he added: “But we can take a stab at it. Let’s go build us a ship.”

Summers led the way into a brick building where he had his temporary office. He sat behind a computer and clicked off the schematic diagram of the Atlantisthat had been displayed on the screen.

“I see we’re going to build a virtual ship,” Trout said.

“That’s the very best kind,” Summers said with a grin. “They never sink, and you don’t have to worry about mutinies.” He called up a computer file and a drawing of a square-sailed vessel appeared on the monitor.

“Is that a Phoenician ship?” Gamay said.

“This is one type, based on pictures from vases, sculptures, models, and coins. It’s an early design. It’s got a keel, rounded hull, oars, and a high seat for the steersman.”

“We’re looking for something capable of deep-ocean travel,” Trout said.

Summers leaned back in his chair. “Their ship designs were modified by need. The Phoenicians graduated from shore coasting and stops at night to long, uninterrupted voyages. I’m going to use a software program developed for some architects doing research in Portugal and at Texas A&M. They created a methodology to test and evaluate the sailing characteristics of ships where no plans were available. The goal was to come up with a comprehensive image. They used Portuguese naus, the trade ships that sailed from Europe around Africa to India and back. Watch.”

Summers bent forward and clicked the mouse. A computer-generated image of a three-masted ship appeared on the screen.

“Looks like a ghost ship,” Gamay observed.

“This is only the foundation. They fed the info from a wreck survey into a computer. Using the software, they developed plans for the ship’s rigging, sails, and spars. The picture is one of those images. By coming up with a hypothetical reconstruction of the ship’s hull, they figured out how the ship performed at sea and in adverse weather. Once they had that mathematical model, they could test it in a wind tunnel.”

“And you can do the same for a Phoenician ship?” Trout said.

“No problem. We’ll use three known Phoenician wrecks that were found in the western Mediterranean and off the coast of Israel. The ships were upright and perfectly preserved in cold water. We used the Jason,the same remote-operated vehicle that photographed Titanic,to come up with a photomosaic. I programmed the specs into my computer.”

A set of drawings that looked like blueprints for a shipbuilder filled the screen. The drawings showed the ship as seen from above, the side, and head-on.

“The plans indicate the ship is only fifty-five feet long,” Trout pointed out.

“This is a composite of the Israel ships. I’ll add some length. I tweaked the program so that it will automatically add in design features that would have evolved with the increase in the ship’s size.”

A skeletal, three-dimensional image appeared, outlining the ship’s timbers and other structural elements. The spaces between the timbers began to fill in. Decks, oars, rigging, and sail materialized, along with a ramming beak on the prow. The last feature was a carved horse head on the bow.

“ Voilà!A ship of Tarshish.”

“It’s magnificent,” Gamay said. “The lines are functional yet graceful.”

“She would be around two hundred feet long, as I reckon,” Summers said. “That ship could go anywhere in the world.”

“Which brings us back to our original problem,” Trout said. “How do we figure out that vessel’s transatlantic routes?”

Pursing his lips, Summers said, “It’s possible to back into a solution like those guys did with the nau. You’d need wind, current, and weather patterns, work in the ship’s probable speed, figure out the pilot’s choices according to ship design, and then factor in historical accounts.”

Gamay let out a heavy sigh. “We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

Summers glanced at his wristwatch. “Me too. They want the Atlantisready to sail in three days.”

THE TROUTS thanked Summers and walked back along the main street of Woods Hole. “Where do you think we should go from here?” Gamay said.

“Tough to say. Kurt only gave us a few crumbs of information. He’s not going to be happy, but I don’t think we have enough to pull this thing together. We may need another approach.”

Like many married couples, Paul and Gamay had a way of anticipating each other’s thoughts. Their work for the NUMA Special Assignments Team, where unspoken communication could mean the difference between life and death, had honed their skills to a sharp edge.

“I’ve been thinking the same thing,” Gamay said. “Every sea voyage starts on land. Let’s go through the Jefferson file again. There may be something we missed.”

Back at the house, they sat at the kitchen table, read half the file, and then exchanged the sections. They both finished reading at about the same time.

Gamay put the papers down and said, “What pops out at you?”

“Meriwether Lewis,” Trout said. “He was on his way to tell Jefferson what he had found when he died.”

“That intrigued me too.” She riffled through the papers in front of her. “Lewis had materialevidence he wanted to show Jefferson. I suggest that we try to figure out what happened to it.”

“Might be almost as tough as reconstructing a Phoenician voyage,” Trout said.

“There’s a nexus that might help us,” Gamay said. “Jefferson was president of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia. He sent Lewis there to prep him in the sciences for his historic exploration. While Lewis was in Philadelphia, Jefferson devised the cipher for them to use.”

Trout blinked his large brown eyes in a barely noticeable show of excitement and picked up the thread. “Jefferson wrote to members of the society to tell them about his Indian language research and the theft of his papers. He contacted a society scholar, who identified the words on the vellum map as Phoenician. The artichoke file was found at the society.”

“That’s better than knowing Kevin Bacon or six degrees of separation,” Gamay said. She looked through the file and found a number for the Philosophical Society and the name of the researcher who had discovered the file. She called Angela Worth, identified herself, and made an appointment to meet the next day.

As Gamay hung up, Trout grinned and said, “You realize our vacation has come to an end.”

“That’s okay,” Gamay said. “I think I’m getting tired of fishing.”

Trout gave a weary shrug of his shoulders.

“I knowI am,” he said.