Treasure of Khan dp-19

by Clive Cussler

  The Mongol warrior's body had lain in state in Ulaanbaatar for a week, drawing visits from over two million people, incredibly more than two-thirds the population of the entire country. Pilgrimages from all corners of the country were made by the thousands to lay eyes on his coffin. A three-day funeral procession to his grave site in the Khentii Mountains drew an equally impressive number of well-wishers, who lined the route holding flags and images of the ancient leader. Women and children waved and cried when the caisson rolled by, as if it was a favored relative who had just passed away. A national day of mourning, and future holiday of remembrance, marked the third leg of the procession. On this day, the caravan climbed up a makeshift road to a peaceful spot near the base of Burkhan Khaldun, where the warlord was said to have been born.

  Pitt, Giordino, and Gunn, with Theresa and Wofford alongside, sat in the front row of dignitaries, just a few seats down from Mongolia's president and parliament leaders. Pitt turned and winked at a young boy seated behind him as the funeral procession drew near. Noyon and his parents, special guests of Pitt's, looked on at the surroundings with awe, the boy's eyes widening in wonder as the Khan's caisson finally appeared.

  In a splendor worthy of the greatest conqueror the world has ever known, Genghis Khan's body was carried on a mammoth wooden caisson painted bright yellow. A magnificent team of eight snow-white stallions pulled the funeral cart, seemingly dropping their hooves in perfect unison. Atop the caisson was the granite tomb Pitt had saved from the floodwaters, now covered in fresh lotus blossoms.

  A troupe of aged lamas wearing bright red robes and arched yellow hats quietly took up position in front of the tomb. Down the hill, a pair of monks blew into their radongs, enormous telescopic horns that emitted a deep baritone hum heard all down the valley. As the low resonations wafted in the breeze, the lamas launched into a lengthy funeral prayer, incorporating drums, tambourines, and burning incense. At the completion of the ceremony, the lamas quietly filed off to the side as an old shaman took to the stage.

  The age of Genghis Khan was filled with mysticism, and shamanism played an important role in the nomadic lifestyle. The grizzled shaman, who had a flowing beard and was dressed in caribou skins, danced and chanted around a large fire containing sheep bones. With a shrieking moan, he blessed the Khan's remains, imparting them from the land of the eternal blue sky to an afterlife of conquering the heavens.

  When the service was completed, the granite sarcophagus was rolled into the mausoleum, then sealed with a six-ton slab of polished stone lowered by a crane. The spectators would later all swear they heard a distant clap of thunder at the precise moment the tomb was sealed, even though there was not a cloud in the sky. Genghis Khan was at rest again in his beloved homeland mountains, and his tomb would stand forever as a cultural mecca for tourists, historians, and all the peoples of Mongolia.

  As the crowd began filtering out, Ivan Corsov and Alexander Sarghov approached from the rear, where they had been seated with the Russian ambassador.

  "I see you are as adept at sniffing out historic treasures on land as at sea," Sarghov laughed, giving Pitt and Giordino a friendly bear hug.

  "Simply a bonus for figuring out why somebody tried to sink the Vereshchagin," Pitt replied.

  "Indeed. By the way, we still have our joint research project to complete on Lake Baikal. The Vereshchagin will be repaired and ready to go next season. I hope you both will join us."

  "We'll be there, Alexander."

  "Just as long as there are no more seiche waves," Giordino added.

  Corsov sidled up, his usual ear-to-ear grin in full display.

  "An impressive demonstration of undercover work, my friends," he said. "You should join the Russian Federal Security Service, there is a need for men of your talents."

  "I think my boss might have a thing or two to say about that," Pitt laughed.

  The president of Mongolia approached with a small entourage. Sarghov said a quick farewell, as Pitt slyly noted Corsov melding away into the exiting crowd. A short, polished man of forty-five, the president spoke nearly flawless English.

  "Mr. Pitt, on behalf of the people of Mongolia I wish to thank you and your NUMA team for rescuing Genghis for all posterity."

  "A giant of history deserves to live forever," Pitt replied, nodding toward the mausoleum. "Though it is a shame that the riches of the tomb have all been lost."

  "Yes, it is a tragedy that the treasures of Genghis were dispersed to collectors around the world simply to enrich the pockets of Borjin and his siblings. Perhaps our country will be able to buy back some of the antiquities from our newfound oil revenues. Of course, the archaeologists all believe that a greater trove lies with Kublai Khan, whose grave Borjin was thankfully unable to find. At least Kublai and his treasure still reside undisturbed in Mongolia, buried somewhere beneath these hills."

  "Kublai Khan," Pitt muttered, staring at the mausoleum of Genghis. On its granite facade, he noted an engraving of a lone wolf, whose outline figure was painted blue.

  "Yes, that is the legend. Mr. Pitt, I wish to also personally thank you for exposing the corrupt activities of the Borjin family and helping put a stop to their lawlessness. I have initiated an investigation into my own government to determine the extent of the influence-peddling on their behalf. The remnants of their actions will be buried with the body of Borjin, I promise."

  "I hope that Tatiana is proving to be a cooperative witness."

  "Most assuredly," the president replied with a furtive grin. Tatiana, he knew, was being held at a less-than-comfortable security site. "With her help, and the continued assistance of your oil industry companions," he said, nodding toward Theresa and Wofford, "we shall be able to exploit the discovered oil reserves for the good of a new Mongolia."

  "China isn't going to renege on acceding Inner Mongolia?" Gunn asked.

  "It's too politically dangerous for them to do so, both internationally and within the confines of Inner Mongolia, whose occupants largely favored secession from China. No, the Chinese will be happy enough, as we've agreed to sell them oil at a favorable price. That is, until our pipeline to the Russian port of Nakhodka is completed." The president smiled and waved at the Russian ambassador, who stood a few yards away chatting with Sarghov.

  "Just ensure that the oil revenues go to the people who need it most," Pitt requested.

  "Indeed, we've taken a lesson from your own state of Alaska. A portion of the revenues will be distributed to every man, woman, and child in the country. The remainder will support the state's expansion of health, education, and infrastructure. Borjin has taught us that not a dime of profits will end up in the hands of an individual, I can assure you."

  "That is good to know. Mr. President, I have one favor to ask of you. We discovered a plane crash in the Gobi Desert."

  "My director of antiquities has already informed me. We'll be sending a research team from the National University of Mongolia right away to excavate the aircraft. The bodies of those aboard will be returned to their homes for proper burial."

  "They deserve that."

  "It was a pleasure, Mr. Pitt," the president said, as an aide tugged at his sleeve. He turned and started to walk away, then stopped.

  "I almost forgot," he said to Pitt. "A gift from the people of Mongolia to you. I understand you have an appreciation for such objects."

  He pointed down the hill to a large flatbed truck that had discreetly followed the funeral procession up the mountainside. A large covered object sat upright on the truck's bed. As Pitt and the others watched with curiosity, two workmen climbed up and pulled back the canvas covering. Underneath sat the dust-covered Rolls-Royce from Borjin's compound.

  "Should make for a nice restoration project on the weekends," Wofford said, eyeing the decrepit car.

  "My wife Loren will love that," Pitt replied with a devious grin.

  "I'd love to meet her sometime," Theresa said.

  "Next time you are in Washington. Though I take it you'll be
working in Mongolia for some time to come."

  "The company gave us three weeks of paid leave for our ordeal. We are both hoping to go home to rest and recuperate before Jim and I come back."

  From the look she gave Giordino and the tone in her voice, it was clear that the "we" was not referring to Wofford.

  "I don't suppose you could take it upon yourself to nurse a rabid old sea dog like Al back to health during that time," Pitt offered.

  "I was rather counting on it," she said coyly.

  Giordino, leaning on a crutch with his lower leg heavily bandaged, smiled broadly.

  "Thanks, boss. I've always wanted to see the Zuider Zee."

  As the friends parted company, Pitt strolled down the hill toward the flatbed truck. Gunn joined him as he approached the old Rolls.

  "The Mongolian energy minister just told me that the price of oil is down another ten dollars today," he said. "The markets are finally accepting the news that the Avarga Oil Company has been put out of business for good and the destructive earthquakes are finished. Combined with the news of the oil reserves in Inner Mongolia, the experts predict that the price will soon drop to levels below those seen before the Persian Gulf disruption."

  "So the oil panic has subsided and a global depression averted. Maybe the economic powers that be will finally learn the lesson and focus on developing renewable energy sources in earnest."

  "They won't until they absolutely have to," Gunn said. "Incidentally, I was told that the Pentagon was none too happy that all three of von Wachter's seismic devices were completely destroyed, after the last-known device was sunk in the Persian Gulf."

  "NUMA can't take responsibility for that one."

  "True. It was a lucky stroke that Summer and Dirk stumbled upon Borjin's brother and the second device in Hawaii. Or he stumbled upon them. Had the ship traveled on to Valdez and damaged the Alaska Pipeline as planned, there would have been real pandemonium."

  "It was the Chinese wreck Summer found. It drew them there for some reason," Pitt said. A faraway look crossed his face as he mentally searched the clues. Then his green eyes suddenly sparkled in enlightenment.

  Gunn was oblivious to the mystery, focused instead on the immediate demands of his government.

  "Not only were all of the seismic devices destroyed, but von Wachter's research materials as well.

  Apparently, Borjin had all of the professor's data in the laboratory building, which is now a pile of charcoal. There's nothing left for anyone to be able to resurrect the technology."

  "Is that a bad thing?"

  "I suppose not. Though I'd feel better if I knew the knowledge was in our hands and not the likes of Borjin."

  "Just between you, me, and the car," Pitt said, "I happen to know that the operator's manual you lifted from the lab survived the flood and fire."

  "The manual survived? It would give a big leg up to anyone trying to duplicate von Wachter's work. I hope it's secure."

  "It's found a safe and permanent home."

  "You sure about that?" Gunn asked.

  Pitt walked to the rear of the Rolls and opened a large leather trunk mounted to the car's luggage rack.

  Lying at the bottom of the musty interior was the seismic array operator's manual, with the shaft from the crossbow arrow still protruding from its cover.

  Gunn let out a low whistle, then put his hands over his eyes and turned away.

  "I never saw it," he said.

  Pitt latched up the trunk, then casually inspected the rest of the car. Overhead, a bank of dark gray clouds began moving in rapidly from the west. The remaining mourners milling about the tomb quickly headed toward their vehicles parked below to avoid the pending deluge.

  "I guess we better be on our way," Gunn said, steering Pitt toward their rented jeep down the hill. "So, it's back to Washington?"

  Pitt stopped and stared at the mausoleum of Genghis Khan one last time. Then he shook his head.

  "No, Rudi, you go on ahead. I'll catch up in a few days."

  "You staying here a bit longer?"

  "No," Pitt replied with a faraway twinkle in his eye. "I'm going to hunt a wolf."

  -66-

  The tropical sun beat warmly on the deck of the Mariana Explorer as she rounded the rocky lava finger of Kahakahakea Point. The NUMA ship's captain, Bill Stenseth, slowed the vessel as it entered the mouth of the now-familiar cove in Keliuli Bay. Ahead and to his left he noted a red marker buoy bobbing on the surface. Seventy feet beneath it lay the mangled remains of the Avarga Oil Company drill ship, partially buried under a pile of loose lava rock. With the depths shallowing, Stenseth took the research ship no farther, stopping engines and then dropping anchor.

  "Keliuli Bay," he announced, turning toward the rear of the bridge.

  Seated at a mahogany chart table, Pitt was examining a coastal chart of Hawaii with a magnifying glass.

  Unfurled beside the map was the cheetah skin he had retrieved from Leigh Hunt's crashed Fokker in the Gobi Desert. Pitt's children, Dirk and Summer, stood nearby, looking over their father's shoulder with curiosity.

  "So, this is the scene of the crime," the elder Pitt said, rising from the table and peering out the window.

  He stretched his arms and yawned, tired from his recent flight from Ulaanbaatar to Honolulu, via Irkutsk and Tokyo. The warm humid air felt refreshing on his skin, after leaving Mongolia during a late-summer cold snap that had snow flurries in the air when he boarded his flight.

  Pitt's return to Hawaii brought with it a certain melancholy, which deepened during his layover in Honolulu. With a three-hour wait for his commuter flight to Hilo, he rented a car and drove across the Koolau Mountains to the east shore of Oahu. Off a side road near Kailua Beach, he wandered into a tiny cemetery that overlooked the ocean. It was a small but well-maintained patch of green surrounded by lush foliage. Pitt sauntered methodically through the grounds, examining the assorted tombstones.

  Beneath the shadowy branches of a blossoming plumeria tree, he found the grave site of Summer Moran.

  His first and deepest love, and the mother of his children, Summer Moran had died only recently. Pitt had not known she was alive and living in seclusion after a disfiguring accident, believing that she had died decades earlier. He had lived the years trying to purge her memory from his mind and heart, until the sudden arrival of his two grown children on his doorstep. A flood of emotions returned, and he painfully wondered how his life would have been different, had he known she was alive and raising their twin children. He had forged a close bond with the kids now, and he had the love of his wife Loren. But the feeling of loss remained, tinged with anger at losing the time he could have spent with her.

  With heaviness in his chest, he gathered up a handful of the fragrant plumeria blossoms and sprinkled them gently over her grave. For a long while, he stood wistfully by her side, staring out at the ocean. The gentle rolling waves from his other love, the sea, helped wash away the pain he felt. He finally stepped from the cemetery tired and drained, but with a renewed sense of hopefulness.

  Standing on the bridge now with his children, he felt a warm glow, knowing a part of Summer still lived.

  The adventuresome spirit rekindled, he refocused on the mystery Chinese shipwreck.

  "The marker buoy is where Summer laid waste to the drill ship." Dirk smiled, pointing out the window.

  "The Chinese wreck site is almost in the dead center of the cove," he said, swinging his arm around to the right.

  "The artifacts have all dated to at least the thirteenth century?" Pitt asked.

  "Everything has indicated as much," Summer replied. "The ceramic pieces recovered date from the late Song to the early Yuan dynasties. The wood samples came up elm and date to approximately 1280. The famed Chinese shipyard of Longjiang used elm and other woods in their ship construction, which is another piece of confirming evidence."

  "The local geological records don't hurt either," Dirk said. "Since the wreck was devoured by a lava flow, we
checked the known history of volcanic eruptions on the Big Island. Although Kilauea is the best-known and most-active volcano, Hualalai and Mauna Loa also have a recent history of activity. The closest to our spot here, Mauna Loa, has erupted thirty-six times in the last one hundred fifty years. She's had an untold number of lava releases in the centuries prior. Local geologists have been able to radiocarbon-date charcoal samplings recovered from beneath the lava flows. One lava sample study, from neighboring Pohue Bay, dates around eight hundred years old. We don't know for sure if the lava flows that washed into the cove and buried our ship were from that same eruption, but my money says it was. If so, then our ship would have arrived no later than 1300 a.d."

  "Does anything correlate with your cryptic cheetah skin?" Summer asked.

  "It is impossible to date, but the voyage depicted shows some interesting similarities," Pitt replied. "The lead vessel is a mammoth four-masted junk, which seems to match the size of your wreck, based on the rudder uncovered by Dirk and Jack. Unfortunately, there was no narrative accompanying the images.

  Only a few decipherable words appear on the skin, which translates as 'A lasting voyage to paradise.' "

  Pitt sat down and studied the two-dimensional artistry on the animal skin again. The series of drawings clearly showed a four-masted junk at sail with two smaller support ships. Several panels depicted a long ocean voyage until the ships arrived at a cluster of islands. Though crudely marked, the islands lay in the same relative position as the largest of Hawaii's eight islands. The large junk was shown landing on the biggest island, anchoring near a cave at the base of a high cliff. The final panel was what most intrigued Pitt. It showed the moored ship near some crates at the base of the cliff. Fire and smoke enveloped the ship and the surrounding landside. Pitt studied a flag burning on the ship's mast with particular interest.

  "The volcanic eruption fits like a glove," he said. "The flames in the drawing look like a brush fire, but that's the secret. It wasn't a fire at all but a volcanic eruption."