Serpent (22 page)

Her mouth widened in a bewitching smile. "It's good to see you, too, Mr. Austin. How are you feeling?"

"Wonderful, now," he replied. The formality of the polite exchange couldn't mask its quiet intensity. They held each other's hands seconds longer than they should have, until Sandecker broke the spell with an exaggerated clearing of his throat. Austin turned to see the bemused expressions of his NUMA colleagues, and his face flushed. He realized he was reacting like a dewy-eyed schoolboy caught by his girl-loathing pals.

Sandecker made a round of introductions. The older man was J. Prescott Danvers, executive director of an organization called the World Archaeological Council. The other stranger was Jack Quinn of the East Asia Foundation. Sandecker looked at his watch. "Now that we've dispensed with the formalities, shall we get right down to business? Hiram?"

While Yaeger fiddled with the keyboard of a Macintosh Powerbook, Austin took a seat next to Trout. As usual, Trout's appearance was impeccable. His light brown hair was parted down the middle, as was the style during the Jazz Age, and combed back on the temples. He was wearing a tan poplin suit, Oxford blue shirt, and fine of the large, colorfully designed bow ties he was addicted to. In contrast to his sartorial correctness, Trout also favored workboots, an eccentricity some thought was homage to his fisherman father. In reality it was a habit he picked up at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution where many scientists wore them.

The son of a Cape Cod fisherman, Trout spent much of his boyhood hanging around the world-famous institution and was offered weekend and summer jobs by scientists who went out of their way to be friendly to a youngster so fascinated by the ocean. His love of the sea later took him to the equally renowned Scripps Institution of Oceanography majoring in deep ocean geology.

"Thought you were down in the Yucatan with Gamay," Austin said. It was unusual to see Trout without his wife. They had met at Scripps, where she was studying for a doctorate in marine biology, and they were married after graduation. Rudi Gunn, an old friend from his high school days, persuaded Paul to come on board as a member of a special team being put, together by Admiral Sandecker. Paul accepted, but only on the condition that his wife went with him. Delighted that he was getting two topnotch people, Sandecker readily accepted.

Trout's chin seemed constantly dipped in thought. As was his habit he spoke with his head lowered, and, although he wore contact lenses, he peered upward, as if over glasses.

Speaking in the nasal twang and broad A of his native Cape Cod, Trout said, "She'd been trying for weeks to make an appointment with a VIP from the national anthropological museum in Mexico City. Guy couldn't change the date, so I'm, here for the two of us."

Sandecker had taken up a post in front of a large rear-projection screen linked to Yaeger's computer. He nodded to Yaeger, and a second later a map of northwest Africa appeared on the screen. Indicating Morocco and using an unlit Managua cigar to point to a blinking red arrow, Sandecker said, All in this room are aware of the attack on Dr. Kirov and the disappearance of her expedition." He turned to Austin and Zavala. "Kurt, while you and Zavala were recuperating, two more expeditions were reported missing."

Taking the cue, Yaeger projected a map of the world on the screen. He pointed to three red blinking arrows. "Mr. Quinn's organization lost a group here in China. Two scientists and their helper have disappeared from India. This one is Morocco."..

"Thank you, Hiram," Sandecker said. "Dr. Danvers, if you could tell us a little about your organization."

"I'd be happy to," Danvers replied, rising. His elegant voice still bore its pseudo-British prep school imprint. "The World Archaeological Council in Washington is a clearing house for information having to do with the world archaeological community At any given moment dozens of projects are under way around the globe, he said with a wave at the map: "They are sponsored by foundations, universities, governmental entities, or combinations of all three. Our job is to collect all this information and dispense it back to them, as needed, in controlled quantities."

"Perhaps .you might give us a specific example," Sandecker coached.

Danvers thought for a moment. "One of our members, a university in this case, recently wanted to do some work in Uzbekistan. With one call to our computer banks we could tell them about all past, current, and future work in that country, provide all the papers published in recent years, bibliographies of reference books, and names of experts in the field. We would have maps and charts, information on practical matters, such as local politics, sources of workers, transportation, conditions of roads, weather, and so on."

Sandecker cut to the chase. "Would you also have records of expeditions that have vanished?"

"Well" Danvers furrowed his frosty brow. "Not as such. It is up to the various members to provide material. As I said, we're collectors and dispensers. Our material is primarily academic. In the Uzbekistan example there would be no mention of a disappearance unless the university provided it. Perhaps warnings that a certain territory might be hazardous. On the other hand, the information might be there, spread throughout the databank, but it would be a question of bringing all that together, and that would be a monumental task"

"I understand," Sandecker said. "Hiram, would you help us out here?"

Yaeger pecked away at the computer. One after another, red blinking arrows appeared on the various continents. He had added about a dozen new sites to the three on the map.

"These are all expeditions that have vanished over the last ten years," he said.

Danvers's nostrils flared as if he smelled a bad odor.

"Impossible," he said. "Where did you get the information to make such a preposterous assertion?"

Yaeger shrugged laconically. "I got it from the files of your organization."

"That can't be," Danvers said. "You have to be a member of the WAC to access our database. And much of the information is privileged. Not even members can move from file to file. They have to be cleared after giving their code name."

This wasn't the first time Yaeger heard somebody suggest his electronic babies could barely walk when in reality they could sprint. He had long ago learned not to argue. He simply smiled.

Scanning the arrows blinking merrily on the map, Sandecker said, "I think we can all agree that this goes beyond the realm of coincidence."

Danvers was still dumbfounded that his database had been violated by someone who looked like a cast member of Hair. "Well beyond the realm," he said, doing his best to preserve his dignity.

"My sincere apologies, Dr. Danvers," Sandecker said. "When I first heard about the Moroccan incident I asked Hiram to run a survey of similar cases in press reports and to crosscheck them with other information available. That he chose your organization to burglarize in cyberspace is testimony to the WAC's importance. I'm afraid, however, that the news is even worse."

Taking the cue Yaeger said, "I ran a scan of archaeological stories in the major publications, compared them with your files, then kept refining the search, separating the wheat from the chaff. The past five years was easy. Things got harder as I got back to the time before people started using computers. This survey isn't complete, but what I have is pretty thoroughly documented. I kicked out all expeditions that didn't have dead bodies or were wiped out by natural disasters."

He clicked his mouse. There was a gasp from Danvers. The map was lit up like a Tunes Square neon sign. Dozens of little red arrows winked on every continent.

Quinn's reaction was one of anger. "That's crazy," he said. "This isn't Indiana Jones stuff we're dealing with, for Godsakes! Archaeological digs don't just disappear off the face of the earth without anyone knowing."

Calmly Sandecker said, "Good point, Mr. Quinn. We, too, were astonished at the number of expeditions that had simply vanished into thin air. The public is not indifferent to these events, but the incidents have been spread out over decades, and at one time it was fairly commonplace for explorers to disappear from public view for years. Sometimes permanently. Would we have known what happened to Dr. Livingstone if the intrepid Stanley hadn't gone after him?"

"But what about news reports?" Quinn said.

Sandecker said, "From what Hiram has explained to me, occasionally somebody at a major outlet with resources like The New York Times would dig into his morgue and note a similar happening, comparing it to a more recent incident. When there was widespread publicity, such as in the 1936 disappearance of a National Geographic expedition into Sardinia, the incident was simply ascribed to bandits or misfortune. We can discount a percentage of them. Floods and volcanoes, for instance." He paused. "What I find disturbing is that the trend is on the increase."

Still unconvinced, Austin leaned forward on his elbows, staring intently at the map. "Communications are a lot more efficient now than they were in Stanley's day," he said. "Could that have something to do with these vanishings?"

"I factored that into the equation, Kurt," said Yaeger. "The curve still shows an upswing."

Rudi Gunn removed his horn-rimmed glasses and nibbled thoughtfully on the earpiece. "Reminds me of a movie I saw," he mused. "Somebody Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe.

"Only in this case it is not chefs, and the incidents aren't confined to a single continent," Sandecker said. "If Dr. Kirov's experience is any indication, someone is killing the great archaeologists of the world."

Danvers sat back in his seat, his ruddy face now as white as bread dough. "Good Lord," he said with a hoarse whisper. "What on earth is happening?"

"What indeed?" Sandecker's blue eyes moved from face to face. "I asked Hiram to codify similar elements these disappearances had. Nothing presented itself on the surface. The expeditions were incredibly diverse. They varied in size from three people to more than twenty and took place all over the world. They were organized by a wide spectrum of groups or individuals. There were common denominators, however. What the police call the MO was the same in all cases before Morocco. The expeditions simply vanished. Dr. Kirov's experience was traumatic, but it may be a stroke of good luck in the long run if it can prevent similar disasters. We know now that these expeditions did not simply go into thin air. That they were wiped out by teams of trained assassins."

"Thugee," Gunn said quietly.

"What's that mean?" Quinn said.

"It's where our word thug came from. It means 'thief' in Hindi, what they called followers of the Indian cult of Kali. They would infiltrate a caravan, strangle people at night, hide their bodies, and steal goods. The British broke the cult up in the 1800s, ,and it went out of business for the most part. One' of these latest disappearances was in India."

Nobody who knew Gunn was surprised when he produced arcane bits of information. The short, slight Gunn was a sheer genius. Number one in his graduating class at the Naval Academy, the former navy commander could be enjoying a top staff job with the Navy Department. He had advanced degrees in chemistry, finance, and oceanography but preferred underwater science to warfare. He served in submarines as Sandecker's chief aide, and when the admiral resigned from the navy to form NUMA, Gunn followed. In compiling reports and researching he had absorbed much of the wide-ranging material from the hundreds of books with which he surrounded himself.

"I checked them out," Yaeger said. "Ninja and hashshashin, too. You're right, there are similarities."

Sandecker didn't dismiss the suggestion out of hand. "The idea of a secret society of murderers is certainly interesting," he said. "Let's put it on the back burner for now while I discuss that other common element. As far as could be documented, all expeditions victimized in recent years reported finding pre-Columbian artifacts in unlikely places." He paused for dramatic effect. And according to Hiram's findings, all were funded to some extent by Time-Quest. Do either of you gentlemen know anything about this organization?"

"Sure," Quinn said. "Our foundation has used them any number of times. Totally respectable as far as I know You see their ads in all the archaeological magazines. They're known to be pretty generous with grant money. They'll fund your expedition if they like it. Better still, they'll send volunteers, people who pay for the thrill of working a dig. They're tied in with some of the environmental and retired persons organizations. As I say, they're on the up-and-up."