Crescent Dawn

by Clive Cussler

  A deep rumble echoed behind them as the twin 500-horsepower motors churned to life. Giordino visually checked several gauges on the instrument panel, then turned to Pitt.

  “We’re ready to roll.”

  “Let’s see what she can do,” Pitt replied, easing back the throttle controls.

  They were immediately pushed back into their seats as the powerful diesels shoved the submersible ahead. In just a few seconds, the vessel was riding high on its sleek white hull, racing across the waves. Pitt felt the sub pitch and roll through the choppy seas, but as he gained a feel for its stability he gently added more throttle. With the control cabin perched near the forward edge of the vessel, he felt like they were flying over the water.

  “Thirty-four knots,” he said, eyeing a navigation screen readout. “Not too shabby.”

  Giordino nodded with a wide smile. “I figure she can do well over forty on a flat sea.”

  They blasted north across the Aegean Sea, bounding for nearly twenty minutes before they spotted a speck on the horizon. They pursued the yacht for another hour, drawing slowly closer as they passed north of the Dardanelles, weaving around a pair of large oil tankers sailing from the Black Sea. The large Turkish island of Gökçeada soon loomed before them, and the yacht altered course to the east of the island.

  Pitt followed on a zigzag course so as not to appear to be directly following the yacht, then eased back on the throttles when they approached within a few miles. The yacht slowly turned away from Gökçeada and angled toward the Turkish mainland, hugging close to the coastline as it gradually reduced speed. Pitt turned and followed on a delayed parallel tack, holding well out to sea while staying within visible range of the luxury boat. Skimming low in the water, from a distance the Bullet appeared to be just a small pleasure craft out for an afternoon cruise.

  The yacht traveled several more miles up the Turkish west coast, then suddenly slowed and veered into a semiprotected cove. As they sped past offshore, Pitt and Giordino could make out a few buildings and a dock with a small freighter moored alongside. Pitt held their course until they were a mile or two north of the cove and well out of sight, before dropping his own throttle to an idle.

  “Seems like we’ve got two choices,” Giordino said. “We can put ashore somewhere and make for the cove on foot. Or we can wait until dark and take the Bullet into the cove through the basement.”

  Pitt eyed the craggy coastline a half mile away.

  “I’m not sure there are a whole lot of good spots to run aground around here,” he said. “Plus, if Zeibig or anyone else should get injured, hiking back out could be problematic.”

  “Agreed. Then into the cove it is.”

  Pitt glanced at his orange-faced Doxa dive watch. “Dusk will be here in about an hour. We can start heading in then.”

  The hour passed quickly. Pitt radioed the Aegean Explorer with their position and instructed Rudi to bring the research vessel to a holding spot ten miles south of the cove. Giordino used the time to retrieve a digital marine chart of the coastal area and program a submerged route into the center of the cove. Once underwater, an autopilot system would drive the submersible to the specified location using computer-enhanced dead reckoning.

  As darkness approached, Pitt guided the Bullet to within a half mile of the cove entrance, then shut off the surface diesels. Giordino sealed and pressurized the engine compartment, then opened a pair of hull gates that allowed water to be pumped into the ballast chambers. The bow chamber flooded first, and the submarine was soon diving beneath the surface.

  Pitt deployed a set of dive fins, then engaged the electric thrusters for propulsion. He fought the urge to turn on the vessel’s exterior floodlights as the watery world beyond the acrylic bubble faded to black. He eased the sub forward at low speed until Giordino told him to release the controls.

  “The autopilot will do the driving from here,” he said.

  “You sure that thing won’t impale us on a submerged rock or obstruction?” Pitt asked.

  “We’re equipped with high-frequency sonar that reads out a hundred meters in front of us. The autopilot will make course corrections for minor obstacles or give us a warning if something substantial is blocking our course.”

  “Kind of takes the fun out of flying blind,” Pitt remarked.

  While Pitt had no aversion to computers, he was old-school when it came to piloting. He could never be completely comfortable letting a computer operate the controls. There was a nuanced feel to the pilot’s controls, both in the air and underwater, which even the best computers could not sense. Or so he told himself. With his hands free, he carefully noted their progress, standing ready to take the controls at a moment’s notice.

  The Bullet submerged to a depth of thirty feet, then automatically engaged its electronic thrusters. The submersible moved slowly along its programmed path, compensating for a light current as it eased into the entrance of the cove. Giordino noted that the sonar screen remained clear as they crept to the cove’s center. A light flashed on the monitor, and the electric motors ceased whirring as they reached their designated end point.

  “That concludes the automated portion of the program,” Giordino announced.

  Pitt’s hands were already on the controls.

  “Let’s go see if we can find a parking space,” he replied.

  Purging the ballast chambers in tiny increments, they slowly ascended until just the top few inches of the cabin’s acrylic bubble broke the surface. Overhead, they could see that the sky was in its last vestiges of twilight while the water around them appeared black. Giordino shut off all interior lights and unnecessary display panels, then goosed the ballast tanks a final time to elevate them a few more inches.

  Rising out of their seats, the two men gazed at the shoreline. They could see that the circular cove was populated on the northern shoreline by only three buildings. The structures fronted a wooden pier that stretched perpendicular to shore. The blue Italian yacht was clearly visible, docked to the right side of the pier behind a small workboat. On the opposite side of the pier was a large rusty freighter. A wheeled crane on the pier was busy loading cargo onto the freighter under the blaze of some fixed overhead lights.

  “You think Rod is still aboard the yacht?” Giordino asked.

  “I think we should assume so, for starters. What do you say we double-park alongside her and take a look? They shouldn’t be expecting us.”

  “I say surprise is a good thing. Let’s move.”

  Pitt took a course bearing, then submerged the Bullet and crept toward the dockyard. Giordino activated the sonar system, helping guide them to within a few yards of the yacht. Easing gently to the surface again, they arose in its shadow just off its port beam. Pitt started to pull alongside the yacht when he noticed a commotion on the stern deck.

  A trio of armed men came bursting from the interior and turned toward the dock. A second later, a fourth man came into view, being pushed across the deck by the others.

  “It’s Zeibig,” Pitt remarked, catching a brief glimpse of the scientist’s face.

  From their low position in the water, they could just barely see Zeibig, who had his hands tied behind his back. Two of the gunmen roughly hoisted him up onto the dock, then prodded him toward shore. Pitt noticed one of the gunmen return to the boat and take up a casual position on the stern.

  “Scratch one yacht,” Pitt said quietly. “I think it’s time to go invisible.”

  Giordino had already opened the ballast chambers, and the Bullet quickly vanished into the inky depths. They reconnoitered the cove once more, then crept in and surfaced just behind the stern of the freighter, tucking in right against its transom. It was an optimally concealed spot, obscured from shore by the freighter while mostly hidden from the pier by an adjacent stack of fuel drums. Giordino quietly climbed out and attached a mooring line to the pier, Pitt shutting down the power systems and joining him.

  “Won’t be a pretty scene if that big boy fires up his
engines,” Giordino said, eyeing the submersible floating just above the freighter’s propellers.

  “At least we’ve got his license plate number,” Pitt replied, looking up at the ship’s stern. In broad white letters was painted the ship’s name, Osmanli Yildiz , which meant “Ottoman Star.”

  The two men crept along the pier until they reached the shadow of a large generator sitting across from the freighter’s forward hold. Ahead of them was a handful of dockworkers occupied with loading large wooden crates into the freighter with the high crane. The blue yacht, with its armed gunman still pacing the deck, was moored just a few feet in front of it. Giordino gazed ruefully up at the bright overhead lights that illuminated the path ahead.

  “I’m not so sure it’s going to be easy to pass Go and collect our two hundred dollars from here,” he said.

  Pitt nodded, peering around the generator to survey the dockyard. He could see a small two-story stone building onshore flanked by a pair of prefabricated warehouses. The interior of the right-hand warehouse was brightly illuminated, highlighting a pair of forklifts that hauled crates out of an open bay door for the crane to transfer. In contrast, the left-hand warehouse appeared dark, with no visible activity around it.

  Pitt turned his attention to the stone building in the center. A bright porch light illuminated its front façade, clearly revealing a gunman standing guard outside the front door.

  “The stone building in the middle,” he whispered to Giordino. “That’s where Zeibig has to be.”

  He peered again, spotting the headlights of a car that was approaching from the surrounding hillside. The vehicle bounded down a steep gravel road, then turned onto the dock and pulled up in front of the stone building. Pitt was surprised to recognize the car as a late-model Jaguar sedan. A well-dressed man and woman climbed out of the car and entered the building.

  “I think we need to make our play pretty quickly,” Pitt whispered.

  “Any thoughts on how to get off this pier?” Giordino asked, sitting perched on the side of a ladder tilted against the generator.

  Pitt looked around, then gazed at Giordino for a moment, a small grin spreading across his face.

  “Al,” he said, “I think you’re sitting on it.”

  34

  NOBODY PAID ANY ATTENTION TO THE TWO MEN DRESSED in faded turquoise jumpsuits walking down the pier with their heads hanging down and carrying an aluminum ladder. They were obviously a pair of crewmen from the freighter returning the borrowed equipment to shore. Only they were members of the crew that nobody had ever seen before.

  The men working on the dock were busy securing a crate marked “Textiles” to the crane and paid no heed as Pitt and Giordino passed by. Pitt had noticed the guard on the yacht glance at them momentarily before turning away.

  “Which way do we go, boss?” Giordino asked as he stepped off the pier, holding the front end of the ladder.

  The illuminated warehouse was nearly in front of them, its open bay door, just a few yards to their right.

  “I say we avoid the crowds and go left,” Pitt replied. “Let’s shoot for the other warehouse.”

  They turned and walked along the waterfront, passing the narrow stone building. Pitt guessed it had originally been built as a fisherman’s house but now served as an administrative office for the dock facility. Unlike the gunman on the yacht, the man guarding the front door eyed them suspiciously as they passed by the courtyard in front of the house. Giordino attempted to trivialize their presence by casually whistling “Yankee Doodle Dandy” as they passed, figuring the Turkish gunman would be unfamiliar with the tune.

  They soon reached the second warehouse, a darkened building with its large waterfront drop-down door sealed shut. Giordino tried the handle on a small entry door alongside and found it unlocked. Without hesitating, he led Pitt inside, where they deposited the ladder against a work desk illuminated by a flickering overhead light. The rest of the building’s interior was empty, save for some dusty crates in the corner and a large sealed container near the rear loading dock.

  “That was easy enough,” Pitt said, “but I don’t think waltzing in the front door of the building next door looks as promising.”

  “No, that guard watched us like a hawk. Maybe there’s a back door?”

  Pitt nodded. “Let’s go see.”

  Picking up a wooden mallet he noticed lying on the desk, he walked across the warehouse with Giordino. Adjacent to the loading dock was a small entry door, which they slipped through. They quietly made their way to the back side of the stone building only to find it had no rear or side doors. Pitt approached one of the lower-level windows and tried to peek in, but the blinds had been tightly drawn. He stepped away and studied the second-floor windows, then tiptoed back to the warehouse to confer with Giordino.

  “Looks like we’re back to the front door,” Giordino said.

  “Actually, I was thinking of trying an upstairs entry,” Pitt replied.

  “Upstairs?”

  Pitt motioned toward the ladder. “Might as well put that thing to use. The windows were dark upstairs, but they didn’t appear to have the blinds drawn. If you can create a distraction, I could climb up and enter through one of the windows. We can try to surprise them from above.”

  “Like I said, surprise is a good thing. I’ll go get the ladder while you work on that distraction.”

  As Giordino padded across the warehouse, Pitt stuck his head out the back door and searched for a means to create a diversion. An option appeared in the form of a flatbed truck parked behind the opposite warehouse. He ducked back inside as Giordino approached with the ladder, but then he suddenly looked past him curiously.

  “What’s up?” Giordino asked.

  “Look at this,” Pitt said, stepping closer to the steel shipping container sitting nearby.

  It was painted in a desert-khaki-camouflage scheme, but it was some black-stenciled lettering that had caught Pitt’s attention. Several points around the container were marked, in English, “Danger—High Explosives.” Beneath the warning was stenciled “Department of the U.S. Army.”

  “What the heck would a container of Army explosives be doing here?” Giordino asked.

  “Search me. But I’d be willing to bet the Army doesn’t know about it.”

  Pitt walked to the front of the container and slid across the dead bolt, then swung open the heavy steel door. Inside were dozens of small wooden crates with similar warnings stenciled on their sides, each tightly secured to metal shelves. Near the doorway, one of the crates had been pried open. Inside were several small plastic containers the size of bricks.

  Pitt pulled one of the containers out and peeled off the plastic lid. Inside was a small rectangular block of a compressed clear powdery substance.

  “Plastic explosives?” Giordino asked.

  “It doesn’t look like C-4, but it must be something similar to it. There’s enough here to blow this warehouse to the moon and back.”

  “You think that stuff might be helpful in creating a distraction?” Giordino asked, raising an eyebrow in a sly arch.

  “I know so,” Pitt replied, resealing the container and handing it carefully to his partner. “There’s a truck parked in back of the other warehouse. See if you can make it go boom.”

  “And you?”

  Pitt held up the hammer. “I’ll be knocking on the door upstairs.”

  35

  ZEIBIG HAD NOT FEARED FOR HIS LIFE. HE WAS CERTAINLY distressed at being abducted at gunpoint, handcuffed, and locked in a cabin on a luxury yacht. Reaching the cove, he had his doubts as he was roughly herded ashore and into the old stone building, where he was directed to sit in an open conference room. His captors, all tall, pale-skinned men with hardened dark eyes, were certainly menacing enough. Yet they had not yet proven to be abusive. His feelings changed when a car pulled up in front and an austere Turkish couple emerged and entered the building.

  Zeibig noted the guards suddenly assume a stiff, deferenti
al posture as the visitors stepped inside. The archaeologist could hear them discussing the freighter and its cargo with a dock foreman for several minutes, surprised that the woman seemed to be making most of the demands. Finishing their shipping business, the couple strolled into the conference room, where the man glared at Zeibig with angry contempt.

  “So, you are the one responsible for stealing the artifacts of Suleiman the Magnificent,” Ozden Celik hissed, a vein throbbing out from his temple.

  Dressed in an expensive suit, he looked to Zeibig to be a successful businessman. But the red-eyed anger in the man bordered on psychotic.

  “We were simply conducting a preliminary site investigation under the auspices of the Istanbul Archaeology Museum,” Zeibig replied. “We are required to turn over all recovered artifacts to the state, which we were intending to do when we returned to Istanbul in two weeks.”

  “And who gave the Archaeology Museum ownership of the wreck?” Celik asked with a furl of his lips.

  “That you’ll have to take up with the Turkish Cultural Minister,” Zeibig replied.

  Celik ignored the comment as he moved to the conference table with Maria at his side. Spread across the mahogany surface were several dozen artifacts that the NUMA divers had retrieved from the wreck site. Zeibig watched them peruse the items, then he suddenly became wide-eyed himself at the sight of Gunn’s monolith lying at the far end of the table. Curiosity caused him to crane his neck, but it was too far away to make out the inscription.

  “To what age have you dated this shipwreck?” Maria asked. She was dressed in dark slacks and a plum-colored sweater but unstylish walking shoes.

  “Some coins given to the museum indicate that the wreck sank in approximately 1570,” Zeibig said.

  “Is it an Ottoman vessel?”

  “The materials and construction techniques are consistent with coastal merchant vessels of the eastern Mediterranean in that era. That’s as much as we know at the moment.”

  Celik carefully reviewed the collection of artifacts, admiring fragments of four-hundred-year-old ceramic plates and bowls. With the experienced eye of a collector, he knew that the wreck had been accurately dated, confirmed by the coins now in his possession. Then he approached the monolith.