Riley sat back down in the chair and faced the old man. “So what’s this about?”
“I haven’t exactly been honest with you.”
“Gee, Irv, I’m shocked.”
He took in a deep breath and slowly exhaled.
“Okay, I’ll help you out a little,” she said. “It was you who put Nils up to that psychic business with the voices, right? You were the one who knew the dragon would be there.”
His mouth was working feverishly at his dentures as he nodded.
“Do you want to tell me how you knew?” she said.
He nodded. “That’s why I’m here. Nils Skar and I have known each other for years. But there’s more.”
“Go on.”
“Has your boyfriend told you about the uranium?”
“What?”
“He was expecting to find uranium on the Teiyō Maru. And he was part right. The Japanese had their own atomic bomb project under way. The Teiyō Maru did pick up uranium from a German sub in Djakarta and bring it to Luzon. But she unloaded it before going up to Camiguin.”
Riley was startled by the sound of a voice behind her.
“And how do you know that?”
Cole was standing in the open doorway. Riley stood and moved next to Peewee on the bed. “Come on in and listen, okay?” She turned to the old man. “You all right with him hearing this too, Irv?”
“If we’re going to find this mother lode site, he’ll need to know this, too.”
Cole closed the stateroom door and sat in the desk chair. He hiked it up close to the knees of the other two. “So, what do you know, Irv?”
“When I was in the mountains with the Philippine Scouts, we heard the Japs had found a huge sea cave and they were using it to off-load equipment. By this time, the Americans had retaken Manila and Yamashita was still holding out with an estimated ten thousand troops in the mountains of northern Luzon. The Japs were having a hell of a time getting supplies and ammunition past the Americans. Any ships anchored in a cove were likely to get bombed.”
“But they could take all the time they needed if they were inside a cave. I get it.”
“The cave was primarily used as a sub base, but a small ship like the Teiyō Maru was able to fit inside as well. The cave was huge. It went back for several kilometers following an underground river. There were several large chambers and they were using it as a Golden Lily treasure site, too. From what I’ve heard through the years, and what I’ve seen, it’s the biggest of all the Golden Lily sites. The only map to the location of the cave was inside that dragon.”
“And it’s now pulp soup,” Riley said.
“How do you know the uranium was off-loaded there?”
“The Japs’ plan was to bring the uranium to the cave and then load it onto a sub to take it back to the homeland. After that, they intended to blow the entrance to hide their treasure, probably leaving the few troops still there to die inside. They did that a lot with Golden Lily so no survivors other than the royal family would know the locations. Then they’d get away back home in the sub. The problem was they were even losing their subs at an unacceptable rate. That was when this royal prince came up with the plan to hijack a Yank sub. That way they’d be assured of a safe passage.” Peewee looked at Riley. “We’re talking about the Bonefish. That’s how I know all this. Your gramps told me.”
Riley noticed the boat’s roll was getting worse.
Cole said, “We’re starting to feel some swell from the storm, I think.”
“Feels like it,” she said. Then she faced Irv again. “So where is this sea cave?”
“All I know is it’s somewhere south of Vigan. You’ve got about fifteen miles of mountainous coastline there. Today, the mountains inland are part of a national park. You know, we didn’t have GPS in those days, and I never actually saw the cave. When the Japs were placing the charges to blow the entrance, something went off accidentally and they buried themselves and the front cave entrance.”
Riley caught something in the tone of his voice. “You said front entrance. Was there another way in?”
He nodded. “That’s how Ozzie got out. After the war, I went back and I searched, but it’s hundreds of square miles of very difficult terrain. It was Ozzie who told me there was a map that was inside a dragon statue on the Teiyō Maru. The captain stole it, never knowing what it contained.”
“So you focused on trying to find the map.”
“Yup. I came up with the code name Dragon’s Triangle. That gold and the uranium are still in there. And you aren’t the only one after it.”
“My friends back at Natuna Besar.” Riley’s eyes met Cole’s and they nodded in silent agreement.
“Right. And it’s not just that they want to sell it to the highest bidder. They already have a buyer. The Saudis are pissed that Iran is getting a bomb, and they want one of their own.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” Cole said.
The bow of the boat rose up on an especially large swell. Riley remembered the glass she’d left on the desk and jumped up to grab it. The prayer gau rolled off the desk onto the cabin sole. She picked it up and went to roll it back up in the silk, then stopped.
“Cole, come here a minute.” She spread the piece of silk out on the flat surface. The piece was about eighteen inches square. Half of it had been wetted by the wine and the more she looked at it, the more she thought it wasn’t just age that had turned the fabric brown. “When I was a kid, my mother taught me how to do silk painting. You use something called resist to stop the dye from spreading across the fabric. See how this brown coloring stops here?” She pointed at the fabric.
“Yeah,” he said. “It looks deliberate.”
Peewee got up and crossed to the desk. “Well, I’ll be,” he said. “That son of a gun. That’s invisible ink. It’s an old OSS trick. I’ve only ever seen it used on paper. You dissolve sodium bicarbonate in water and use it as ink. Put grape juice”—he looked up at Riley—“or in this case wine on it and it will ‘develop.’ He used something as a resist—probably wax.”
“He?” Riley said.
“Yeah, Prince Kaya Masako.”
Riley turned to Cole. “You got any more of that wine?”
Cole disappeared for a minute and returned with a plate and the wine bottle. He spread the dry part of the cloth out on the plate and then poured the wine on it. They watched as the edges of the cloth turned pink but a distinct shape formed in the center.
Riley took hold of the edge of the plate and gave it a quarter turn. “Does that look to you like a pretty good map of northern Luzon?”
“Sure does,” Cole said. “And just south and a little inland from where Vigan would be, that sure looks to me like a little X.”
“As in X marks the spot?” she said.
Riley turned to Peewee. His head was up, facing the bulkhead, but it was clear from the look on his face he was a hundred miles away.
“You okay, Irv?” She touched his arm and he flinched, then gave his head a shake.
“What?” he said. “Oh, sorry. I was just thinking about the path this piece of silk took to get here. So while we’ve been spinning our wheels trying to decode the map to the location of the Teiyō Maru—”
Riley smiled and nodded. “We had the map to the treasure site with us all along.”
“I’ll go tell Theo to change course. If we turn now, we could be entering the Abra River at Vigan by late tomorrow afternoon.” Cole disappeared out the door.
“Doesn’t that mean we’ll be heading toward the typhoon?” she asked aloud, but he was already gone.
Camp John Hay
Baguio, Philippines
December 5, 2012
The Manor at Camp John Hay was the closest one could find to a five-star hotel in Baguio, and Elijah was pleased that they had offered him a suite. Those were usually booked up far in advance, especially as the holidays were approaching. Camp Hay had been built in 1903 as a place where American troops could enjoy a little
R & R. Even after the end of the Second World War when the Philippines became independent, Camp Hay had remained under the control of the United States Air Force. The property had been turned over to the Philippines in 1991, and it remained a favorite of the military, corporate, and intelligence communities for meetings and holidays. At an elevation of five thousand feet, the cool, dry air was a welcome respite from the heat and humidity of Manila.
When they drove through Baguio City, Elijah had directed Benny to stop at a hardware store. He had found the tools he needed: a metal file, a fine whetstone, light oil, and a few sheets of four-hundred-grit sandpaper. Then they had driven out to Camp Hay and Elijah had dismissed the savage and sent him back to the mine.
In spite of all his failings, Wolfgang had done an excellent job of cleaning up the gold work on the ceremonial sword, but he had made no attempt at sharpening the blade. That was just as well, since working the blade was an art. Elijah had been taught to sharpen swords by a master swordsmith in Kyoto. He had explained that you could not force an edge onto the blade. Rather, one had to be patient and allow the edge to reveal itself.
His suite at the Manor provided a sitting area complete with a couch and a low coffee table. He’d had room service bring him a glass of scotch when he returned from a late dinner, and now Elijah took a towel from the bath and placed it on the table. He arranged his tools on the towel. Starting with the file, he took off the heavy layer of corroded steel along the edge. Then he dribbled a layer of oil onto the stone and began the tedious process of sliding the blade across the stone. When the oil turned too black, he cleaned the stone and re-oiled it with clear, golden oil.
For nearly an hour he worked the edge. Slow and steady. It was important to hold the blade at no more than a thirty-degree angle and to remain consistent with every pull across the stone. Elijah found the work soothing. It recharged him after the energy he had expended at the mine and gave him time to think.
Benny had failed repeatedly, but now his failure could turn out to work in Elijah’s favor. Rather than salvaging the wreck himself, Elijah would let this Cole Thatcher do it for him. Nils would tell him when Thatcher had brought the uranium to the surface, and Elijah could then hijack the salvage boat and dispose of the crew at sea. Al-Habib would then send one of his yachts to rendezvous at a remote location, and once they transferred the cargo, Elijah could sink the salvage boat in deep water and proceed with the Saudis to their next port of call. No trail. A clean operation. God helps those who help themselves. And he intended to help himself to whatever Cole Thatcher found.
Elijah considered himself a devout man, but his God wasn’t the peace-loving God that his Quaker parents and sister believed in. His was a lightning-bolt-throwing, vengeful God. The fact that Elijah succeeded and excelled at everything he did was proof of his God’s love.
His thoughts were interrupted when his cell phone rang. He recognized the number. The day was dawning in San Francisco and the Philippines situation was first on their agenda.
“Elijah, I want an update. Now. These delays are unacceptable.”
He was beyond caring what Black thought now. The Saudi was his new boss. But he didn’t want Black to come looking for him until he’d had time to disappear.
“I was hoping to be able to give you better news. We’ve made progress, but the results are not what we hoped. I got our property back from the old man and we deciphered the map. My men have located the wreck in the Babuyan Islands, but the cargo isn’t there. Either someone got to it before us, or it never existed to begin with.”
Elijah held the phone away from his ear as the stream of curse words exploded from the phone.
When the other man slowed, Elijah said, “I was very disappointed, too. I was hoping the promised gold would keep me employed awhile longer.”
“You sound too calm about this, Hawkes. How do I know you’re telling me the truth?”
“You don’t.”
“What kind of game are you playing?”
“You don’t know if I’m telling you the truth or not—but at the end of the day, you’ve got to trust somebody unless you want to do everything yourself. That’s your call. You know where I live. I know you can have me killed at any time.”
“Well, I don’t suppose you’d take that stand if you were trying to double-cross me. So what’s next?”
“Back to the archives, I suppose. We know the gold is there. We’ve only found fifty percent of what the Japanese stole.”
When he disconnected the call, Elijah hurled his phone at the couch cushion. He got up and with his fists balled up at his sides, he paced the length of the sitting room, pivoted, and strode back. How dare he accuse me?
His phone chirped again. Certain it was Black calling back with more accusations, he barked into it. “Hello?”
“Mr. Hawkes, this is Nils.” The voice was very soft.
“Skar, I can barely hear you.”
“I can’t speak any louder. I stole their sat phone and I’m in the head. They dove on the wreck today and the hold was empty.”
“What? That’s not possible.” In an instant he wondered if somehow his lie to Black had been turned to truth. Was God punishing him for lying?
“The old man told me to tell the divers to look for a gold statue of a dragon. There was supposed to be maps to all the treasure sites inside.”
“So, did they find it?”
“Yeah, they did, but the maps had turned to mush from the seawater.”
“Shit. Shit. Shit.”
“Wait. There’s more. Just now they found out there is something written on the silk cloth that was wrapped around the gau.”
“What do you mean ‘something’?”
“Like maybe another map.”
“I’m getting tired of these damn maps.”
“The old man says what you are looking for is in a sea cave close to Vigan. The Japanese sealed the front entrance, but there is another entrance in the mountains.”
“Are you still at Camiguin?”
“No. They say there’s a typhoon coming. We’re running for cover—but we just changed course for Vigan.”
“I’ll drive there tomorrow and meet you. Skar, if you can’t steal this cloth, at least get a photo of it. Then call me.”
When Elijah picked up the sandpaper and returned to the sword, he had to force himself to be gentle. Why couldn’t things have gone according to his plan? And how dare Black show him that kind of disrespect?
Stop, he told himself. Feel the power of the blade. Make her as beautiful as she was the day the swordsmith made her. He polished the rest of the blade, removing all corrosion on the fine steel. Using a washcloth, he wiped the excess oil off the blade and buffed the sword to a glistening shine.
Unable to help himself, he touched his finger to the edge, and a thin line of red split his fingertip when he pulled it away. He smiled at the line and watched the blood seep out the cut. A hot tingle of excitement traveled down his spine to his scrotum. He reached for the edge again, but drew his hand back. He looked around the room for something to cut. The bed, wood furniture, a television. Nothing that would satisfy his need to cut.
He placed the sword on the towel and slid down the couch toward the end table. When he picked up the phone receiver, he pushed the button to ring the front desk.
“Yes,” he said, “I’m in room 426. Could you have someone bring me up some fresh towels, please?”
The knock came sooner than he expected. He tossed the velvet cloth across the sword on the table and went to the door. The maid looked no more than eighteen years old, a petite little Filipina with her shiny black hair pulled back in a girlish ponytail. She smiled shyly at him as she offered him a stack of white fluffy towels.
He turned his back to the door and walked across the room. “Just put them in the bathroom for me.”
When he heard her in the bathroom, he picked up the sword and strode across to the entry door. He closed it, turned the dead bolt, and added the chain. He wa
s standing in front of the door with the sword in his hand when she returned.
She stopped and her eyes grew large when she saw him. “Don’t scream,” he said. “I promise, I’ll hurt you if you scream.”
He walked closer to her and touched the tip of the sword to her chin. He inhaled and he was pleased she wore no perfume.
The girl blinked her big brown eyes and a single tear rolled down one cheek.
“Are you frightened?”
She nodded and he saw her shoulders tremble.
“Do just as I say. Take off your dress.”
A sob convulsed her body, but she did as she was told. Not like the American woman.
When the loose-fitting dress fell to the floor and she stood in her white bra and underwear, he was pleased to see that while she was not much more than five feet tall, she had large breasts for her small frame. He slid the tip of the sword off her chin and down to her chest. He tickled the tip up under her bra strap. When he turned the blade flat against her skin and slid it under the slender strap of fabric, the blade made a thin red line on the curve of her breast. She whimpered as a small drop of blood rolled down the inside of her breast. He inhaled the intoxicating scent of her blood before he turned the sword edge up and sliced through the other strap.
He felt that hot tingle again between his legs, and he clenched as he felt himself grow stronger. Yes, he thought. He deserved this. God helps those who help themselves.
South China Sea
Off the Philippines
December 6, 2012
Cole had made hot chocolate for them before he went off watch at midnight. Riley wished that she could have had Cole as her watch partner, but she understood why he wanted to pair himself with the Norwegian while she got paired up with Peewee. Cole didn’t trust either one of them.
She had tried to use the head right after Cole went to try to get some rest, but the door was locked. She returned to the helm.
The old man was seated in the helmsman chair, so she had wedged her body into the corner where the dash met the side of the wheelhouse. The seas were running twelve to fifteen feet now and the trawler was twisting and rolling in the wild swell. It sometimes took all her strength just to stay upright. The wind instruments showed a sustained thirty knots, with frequent gusts much higher. The motion of the trawler was quite a bit different from her sailboat, and there were too many open spaces with too little to hold on to.
Dragon's Triangle (The Shipwreck Adventures Book 2) Page 35
