Crescent Dawn (35 page)

Pitt didn’t bother watching the collision but instead swam hard underwater, surfacing only momentarily for a quick gulp of air. He pushed himself until his lungs ached, and his stroke count indicated he was close to where he had cut the
Bullet
loose. Easing to the surface, he gazed toward the pier while regaining his breath. The success of the attack was clearly evident. He could see the yacht drifting helplessly toward shore while the workboat, its motor still throbbing at high revolutions, pounded repeatedly into the pier as its mangled bow sank lower and lower into the water. Numerous people raced along the pier, surveying the scene and yelling in confusion. Pitt couldn’t help but grin when his ears detected a female voice shouting amid the fray.

Secure for the moment, he turned and paddled into the cove, his eyes searching the surface of the water. He took a quick bearing from shore to convince himself he was in the right location, then slowly surveyed the waters around him. In every direction, all he could see was small, dark lapping waves, and he suddenly felt very alone.

For the second time that night, the
Bullet
had disappeared without him.

R
OD ZEIBIG GRIMACED WHEN HE HEARD THE FIRST BURST of automatic gunfire. Any hopes of a stealthy getaway seemed to vanish with the metallic clatter of spent shell casings spewing across the wooden pier. Of greater concern was the safety of Pitt and Giordino, who were clearly the target of the barrage.

Zeibig was surprised to hear the gunfire continue for several minutes unabated. Curiosity finally overcoming his fear, he leaned over the edge of the pier and peeked around the stack of fuel drums. Near the opposite end of the dock, he could just make out the superstructure of the yacht and a number of men yelling to shore. On the pier, he noticed a crewman furiously engaged with one of the mooring lines.

Zeibig ducked back into his hiding nook as more gunfire resumed. Seconds later, the gunfire ceased, and then a loud crash shook the pier, jiggling the fuel drums around him. More shouts erupted in the aftermath, but the gunfire remained silent. With a melancholy conjecture, the archaeologist quietly wondered if Pitt and Giordino had died in a last rebellious act.

Staring blankly into the cove while contemplating his own fate, he noticed a sudden disturbance in the water before him. A dull greenish glow appeared faintly in the depths, which gradually grew brighter. Zeibig looked on, unbelieving, as the transparent bubble of the
Bullet
quietly broke the surface directly in front of him. Seated at the controls was the burly figure of Al Giordino, an unlit cigar dangling from his lips.

The archaeologist didn’t wait for a formal invitation to board but hastily lowered himself down a mussel-covered piling and into the water before the submersible finished surfacing. Swimming to its stern, Zeibig climbed up on one of the exterior ballast tanks, then crept to the rear hatch. Giordino immediately opened the hatch and ushered Zeibig inside, quickly resealing it behind him.

“Boy, am I glad to see you,” Zeibig said, squeezing into the co-pilot’s seat while trying not to drip water on any of the electronics.

“I wasn’t relishing a swim home myself,” Giordino replied, rushing to blow the ballast tanks and submerge the vessel as quickly as possible. Craning his neck upward, he scanned the pier around the fuel drums for sight of any observers.

“No one has bothered to expend much time at this end of the pier,” Zeibig reported, watching the water rise up and over the top of the acrylic bubble. He then turned to Giordino with trepidation in his voice.

“I heard a big crash, and then the shooting stopped. Dirk?”

Giordino nodded. “He stole the workboat that had towed the
Bullet
to the other side of the pier. He cut me loose, then set off after the moored yacht.”

“I think he was successful,” Zeibig replied in a morose tone.

Eyeing a depth-gauge reading of thirty feet, Giordino halted the ballast pumps, then gently backed the submersible away from the pier. Reversing thrust, he angled into the cove, then gave Zeibig a reassuring smile.

“Knowing Dirk, I don’t think he rode the boat to the end of the line. As a matter of fact, I’d wager a month’s salary that he’s swimming laps in the middle of the cove this very moment.”

Zeibig’s eyes immediately perked up. “But how will we ever find him?”

Giordino affectionately patted the pilot console. “We’ll trust the penetrating peepers of the
Bullet
,” he said.

With his own eyes glued to a navigation screen, Giordino guided the submersible along a meandering track he had recorded at the point where Pitt had cut him free from the workboat. The dead reckoning system wouldn’t return him to an exact position the way GPS would, but it would be very close.

Giordino followed the trail at a depth of thirty feet, gradually rising to just ten feet as he approached the original starting point. He then eased back on the propulsion controls until they hovered in a stationary position.

“Are we out of range of their gunmen?” Zeibig asked.

Giordino shook his head. “We were lucky not to take any fire earlier. They were all focused on stopping the boat. I don’t think I’d like to give them a second chance.”

He reached over and toggled on several switches beside an overhead monitor. “Let’s hope the boss hasn’t strayed too close to shore.”

A grainy blank image appeared on the monitor as it displayed the readings from the submersible’s sonar system. Giordino dialed up the system’s frequency, which produced a more detailed image while reducing the range of the scan. Both men studied the screen intently, seeing only a flat display of mottled shadows. Giordino then feathered a side thruster, gently rotating the submersible in a clockwise direction. There was little change in the image as the forward-looking sensor scanned the center of the cove. Then Giordino noticed a small smudge at the top of the screen.

“There’s something small about a hundred feet away,” he said.

“Is it Dirk?” Zeibig asked.

“If it’s not a porpoise, a kayak, or a million other potential items of floating debris,” he replied.

He adjusted the thrusters and guided the submersible toward the target, watching it grow in size as they moved closer. When the shadow began to run off the top of the sonar screen, Giordino knew they were almost directly beneath the target.

“Time to take a look,” he said, then gently purged the ballast tanks.

Pitt was floating on his back, conserving energy from his swim from the workboat and several minutes of treading water, when he felt a slight disruption in the water beneath him. He turned over to see the dim interior lights of the
Bullet
, rising fast just a few feet away. He swam closer, positioning himself directly above the acrylic bubble as it broke to the surface. Giordino was quick to cut the ascent, allowing only the top few inches of the
Bullet
to bob above the water.

Pitt lay prone on the bubble, spreading his arms wide for support. Beneath him, he could see Giordino looking up at him with a relieved smile, then motioning to inquire if he was okay. Pitt pressed his thumb and forefinger together and held it against the acrylic, then pointed toward the center of the cove. Giordino nodded in reply, then gestured for him to hang on.

Hugging the acrylic with his arms and legs, Pitt held tight as the submersible began moving forward. Giordino eased the thrusters ahead slowly until they were creeping along at just a few knots. Pitt felt like he was waterskiing on his belly. The small waves sloshed around his face, and he had to strain his neck skyward every few seconds to grab a breath of fresh air. When the dock lights receded to a safe distance, Pitt rapped his knuckles as hard as he could on the acrylic. The forward movement halted immediately, and a few seconds later the submersible rose fully to the surface amid a small surge of bubbles.

Pitt slid off the acrylic nose and onto the
Bullet
’s frame, then stepped to the rear hatch. He hesitated a moment, turning a last gaze toward shore. In the distance, he could just make out the workboat alongside the pier, sinking heavily by its bow. Nearby, some men in a Zodiac were trying to run a line from the pier to the yacht before it drifted aground. With some measure of relief, Pitt could see that hunting for the submersible appeared low on the shore crew’s priorities. The hatch then popped open beside him, and Giordino welcomed him inside.

“Thanks for coming back to get me,” Pitt said with a sideways grin.

“King Al leaves no man behind,” Giordino puffed. “I trust you kept our shore hosts duly occupied?”

“Put a nasty scratch in their yacht, which should keep them out of commission for the moment,” he replied. “Nevertheless, since you have already retrieved the good Dr. Zeibig I see no point in loitering.”

He followed Giordino to the pilot seats, where they quickly submerged the vessel. Silently, they crept out of the cove at a safe depth, ascending again once they were a half mile offshore. Giordino reconfigured the
Bullet
for surface running, and to Zeibig’s astonishment they were soon charging across the black sea at better than thirty knots.

A quick radio call to the
Aegean Explorer
confirmed that she was standing off the southeast tip of Gökçeada. Thirty minutes later, the lights of the research vessel came into clear view upon the horizon. As they drew closer, Pitt and Giordino saw that a second, larger vessel was positioned on the opposite side of the
Explorer
. Giordino slowly eased back the
Bullet
’s throttles as it approached, guiding it alongside the starboard flank of the NUMA ship and an overhanging crane. Pitt recognized the second vessel as a Turkish Coast Guard frigate, which held station a short distance off the
Explorer
’s port beam.

“Looks like the cavalry has finally arrived,” Pitt said.

“I’ll gladly point the way to the guys in the black hats,” Zeibig replied.

A pair of divers appeared in a Zodiac and attached a lift cable to the
Bullet
, then the sleek submersible was hoisted aboard. Rudi Gunn stood on the stern deck and helped secure the sub before stepping to the rear hatch. His downturned face brightened when he saw Zeibig climb out ahead of Pitt and Giordino.

“Rod, are you all right?” he asked, helping the archaeologist step to the deck.

“Yes, thanks to Dirk and Al. I could use a bit of help in losing these, however,” he added, holding up his handcuffed wrists.

“The shipboard machine shop should be able to manage that,” Gunn replied.

“Al’s got the location of the yacht and its crew,” Pitt said. “A little base of operations up the coast. We can pass the coordinates to the Turkish Coast Guard or run up there with them in the
Explorer
.”

“I’m afraid that’s not in the cards,” Gunn replied, shaking his head. “We’ve been ordered to proceed to Çanakkale, a port town on the Dardanelles, as soon as we got you safely aboard.”

He motioned toward the Turkish frigate, which had inched closer when the submersible appeared. Pitt gazed over and noticed for the first time that a row of armed sailors lined the frigate’s rail, their weapons pointed at the NUMA research ship.

“What’s with the threatening posture?” he asked. “We’ve had two crewmen murdered and another kidnapped. Didn’t you radio the Coast Guard earlier?”

“I did,” Gunn replied testily. “But that’s not why they’re here. It seems somebody else called them first.”

“Then why the show of arms?”

“Because,” Gunn said, his eyes red with anger, “we are under arrest for looting a submerged cultural resource.”

D
USK HAD ARRIVED IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN, casting a pale rosy tint to the sky as the
Ottoman Star
broached the entrance to the Port of Beirut, just north of the Lebanese capital. The old frigate had made a swift voyage from the Aegean, reaching the port city in less than forty-eight hours. Circling past a modern new containership terminal, the freighter turned west through the port complex, steaming in slowly to dock at an older general-cargo quay.

Despite the late hour, many of the local dockworkers stopped and stared as the freighter was berthed, smiling at the odd spectacle on her deck. Carefully wedged beside the forward hatch and resting on a hastily constructed wooden cradle sat the damaged Italian yacht. A pair of workmen in coveralls was busy cutting and patching the large gash in its hull inflicted by the now sunken workboat.

Maria sat quietly on one side of the ship’s bridge, silently watching the captain deal with the small parade of port, customs, and trade representatives who filed aboard in search of paperwork and money. Only when the local textile distributor complained about his short shipment did she intervene.

“We were forced to accelerate our departure,” she said bluntly. “You’ll receive the difference with the next shipment.”

The browbeaten distributor nodded, then left quietly, not wishing to tangle with the fiery woman who owned the ship.

The dockyard cranes were quickly engaged, and soon metal containers filled with Turkish textiles and produce were being rapidly unloaded from the ship. Maria stuck to her perch on the bridge, watching the work with disinterested eyes. Only when she spotted a dilapidated Toyota truck pull up and park alongside the gangway did she sit upright and stiffen. She turned to one of the Janissary guards that her brother had sent to accompany her on the voyage.

“A man I am to meet has just pulled up on the dock. Please search him carefully, then escort him to my cabin,” she ordered.

The Janissary nodded, then stepped briskly off the bridge. He was mildly surprised to find the driver of the truck was an Arab attired in scruffy peasant clothes and wearing a ragged
keffiyeh
wrapped around his head. His dark eyes glared with intensity, however, deflecting attention from the long scar on the right side of his jaw, which he had acquired in a knife fight while a teen. The guard duly searched him, then showed him aboard, escorting him to Maria’s large and stylishly appointed cabin.