The Minoan Cipher (A Matinicus “Matt” Hawkins Adventure Book 2) (5 page)

Hawkins had rolled out of bed at dawn, downed a mug of black Jamaican coffee and grunted through a half hour of Navy SEAL exercises. After his workout, he had pulled on his biking shorts and jersey and grabbed his helmet. Before heading to the front door, he stopped in the kitchen and threw some dog munchies into a bowl for Quisset, the female golden retriever he had adopted from the animal rescue league. Her name meant Star of the Sea in the language of Cape Cod’s Wampanoag Indian tribe.

He plunked the helmet over his salt-and-pepper mane of hair and buckled the chin strap. “Be back in a while,” he said. Quisset barely lifted her nose from her dish. “Okay, be that way, doll. Good thing for you that I’ve got a weakness for blondes.”

He wheeled his bike from the front porch of his Victorian-era house to the street where he pushed off and rode through the quiet neighborhood. He pedaled along the harbor past the Marine Biological Laboratory and the Georgian-style brick buildings of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the academic powerhouse that had transformed the old fishing village into a world-renowned center for oceanic research. Cars and trucks were lining up in the island ferry parking lot for the morning run to Martha’s Vineyard.

Hawkins rode on to the Shining Sea bike path and picked up speed. He swept past Nobska Light hill and along expanses of turquoise water and velvety marshes cloaked in sea mist. He braked to a stop at the end of the path after covering more than ten miles, downed a deep swallow from his water bottle, and set off on the return stretch. By the time he reached the ferry terminal he had accomplished his two-fold mission.

He had beefed up the muscles of the leg that had been shattered by an improvised explosive device on a Navy SEAL operation in Afghanistan. And the cool breeze in his face had blown away the mental fog shrouding his brain. Thoughts fluttered around his head like butterflies, making him eager to get back to work before they flew away.

The Water Street drawbridge was being raised for a sailboat heading out of Eel Pond. He almost made it across the short span but had to skid to a stop when the gate dropped in place. He cursed a bit too loudly for some tourists, who moved away, allowing Hawkins to be the first across when the bridge came down. A couple of hundred yards past the bridge, Hawkins turned off Water Street and rode to the oceanographic institution’s south dock. He leaned his bike against the twenty-foot-long metal shipping container that served his field office, opened the door and stepped inside.

Slipping his helmet off, he settled into a swivel chair, then powered up his laptop. The file he’d abandoned appeared on the screen. Late the previous night his frustration had peaked. Slamming the cover down on the computer, he’d walked across the street to the Captain Kidd bar, grabbed a beer and sat under the mural of pirates burying a treasure chest. After downing his second beer, he’d decided that an early morning bike ride might stimulate his sluggish mind.

He had hit the wall that stood between him and the completion of a big job for the Navy. His contract required him to design a new generation of ocean gliders. The torpedo-shaped drones were the ‘sexy new thing’ in undersea technology. Operating on its own, an ocean glider could swoop into the depths of the sea to gather data on water temperatures and currents, then rise to the surface to broadcast its findings.

Navy strategists envisioned fleets of gliders surveying ocean weather and integrating the data with satellites, radar stations, research buoys and other gliders. Ensuring smooth communication had been a major challenge, even for Hawkins, who was one of Woods Hole’s leading robotics engineers.

After his final tour of Afghanistan, and months of physical therapy, Hawkins had enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, specializing in the undersea application of robotics science. He excelled as a student and, after wrapping up his studies, he moved to Woods Hole and formed the SeaBot Corporation. He bought a forty-two-foot fishing trawler to use for sea tests and hired its former owner, a veteran fisherman named Howard Snow, to run the
Osprey
for him.

Except for Snowy he worked alone, but the Navy job was complex and he had assembled a group of the best engineers in Woods Hole. The SEALs had trained him to work closely with others on dangerous operations. He was kicked out of the Navy when he started asking questions about the ambush that had maimed him, and since then he found it difficult to trust anyone but himself.

He had recovered physically except for a slight limp. With his six-foot-two height and sturdy frame, he was an imposing figure. But he’d slapped a Band-Aid on an emotional wound that needed surgery. The scientific community around Woods Hole considered Hawkins a brilliant loner. His only real friend was Snowy, who used a dry Yankee sense of humor and a shrug of the shoulders to deal with the Hawkins temperament.

Working with a team again had been an opportunity to polish his image. He had had to dull the sharp edges of his personality and put a lid on his impatience. It seemed to have worked. No new friends, but at least he didn’t frighten people with a hair-trigger temper and alienate them with his barbed tongue. So far, so good.

The bike ride had improved his mental clarity. An hour after he sat down at his computer, the pieces of the puzzle came together. He checked his computations. Air-tight. With a click of the computer mouse, he sent the file to the other team engineers, and then he brewed a cup of coffee to reward himself. As he raised the mug to his lips he heard the computer chirp. Someone was Skyping him.

That was fast.

The face on the monitor was not one of his project teammates. The woman peering out at him over metal-rimmed glasses had a high-bridged nose, and the skin on her prominent cheekbones was burnished to a healthy pink glow. Her reddish-blonde hair was gathered back from violet-hued eyes.

“Hello, Matt,” she said. “Remember me?”

Hawkins smiled. “All the gods on Olympus could not make me forget you, Kalliste. You look terrific.”

Kalliste Kalchis was a nautical archaeologist with the Greek government. Hawkins had helped her two years earlier with an underwater survey of the Santorini caldera. She was in her early fifties, but projected the vitality of a woman twenty years younger.

Speaking with a British accent she had picked up while studying at Oxford, she said, “When did you become Greek, Matt?”

“I’m not aware that I had. I’m still the half-Yankee, half-Micmac Indian from Maine that you knew.”

“Only a Greek could flatter a woman with such silver-tongued skill.”

“
Now
who’s doing the flattering?” Hawkins said.

Kalliste laughed. “Guilty as charged. How are you?”

“Wonderful, Kalliste. Working with you and your colleagues was a turning point for me. I have many fond memories of that time.”

Kalliste’s husband had died of cancer only a year before the expedition; it had been her first time out in the field since his death. She and Matt spent hours under the stars, talking about their lives. Their discussions put things in perspective for him. As she pointed out, Hawkins had lost the full use of a leg, but she had lost a whole man.

“I’m happy to hear that, Matt. How would you like the opportunity to make even
more
fond memories? I’m organizing an expedition and would love to have you aboard.”

“Glad to help, Kalliste. When is it?”

“We’ll be on site in about a week. I apologize for the short notice, but it’s a complicated situation.”

Hawkins glanced at the note-covered notes scattered on his desktop.

“That could be a problem,” he said with a slow shake of his head. “I’m trying to wrap up a big Navy contract here.”

Kalliste put her forefinger to her lips, like a school teacher silencing a talkative pupil. “Before you say no, let me send you a quick e-mail. Then we’ll talk again.”

Her face vanished. The computer chirped. Hawkins clicked on the e-mail attachment and the ghostly green sonar image of a ship popped up on the screen. Hawkins printed the picture and studied the long tapered bow and stern of the vessel. In addition to SeaBot, he ran a non-profit shipwreck foundation called Sea Search and had surveyed a number of shipwrecks off New England’s coast, but none were older than the 18
^th
century. The lines of this vessel were unfamiliar, but he guessed that it was very old. Googling ‘Ancient Ships,’ dozens of files popped up. An Egyptian craft had similar lines. But the vessel in Kalliste’s attachment was broader amidships and more substantial-looking in general.

He scrolled through the images and stopped at an artist’s rendering based on contemporary descriptions. The illustration showed kilted crewmen working on a square-rigged vessel. He held the printed image next to the screen. The ships were almost identical.

Hawkins sat back in his chair, folded his hands behind his head, and stared at the screen for a few seconds before he clicked the Skype symbol. Kalliste’s face re-appeared immediately. She raised an eyebrow.

“I knew you wouldn’t be long.”

He held the picture up to the camera lens. “I did some research on this ship.”

“And what did your research tell you?”

“That I’d be a fool not to join your expedition.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Kalliste clapped her hands with joy. “
Megala
epharisto
, Matt. Thank you so much. You won’t be sorry.”

Hawkins raised his palm. “I didn’t say I was actually
joining
the expedition. I’m still involved in my ocean glider project.”

“But Matt—”

Softening his tone, he said, “This Navy project is a big deal for me. It goes back to that stuff we talked about. Putting the past behind us.”

“I understand, Matt. It was rude to pressure you.”

“Not at all, Kalliste. I owe you. Look, I’m waiting for word from my team. If it’s a go, we’ll submit our package to the Navy to study. That should give me a window of time to join your project. We don’t have to sit on our hands. The Oceanographic Institution would jump at the chance to sponsor your expedition.”

Kalliste jerked her head back and clicked her tongue in the Greek gesture for an emphatic no. “Later, maybe. If word gets out now, the site could be contaminated by unauthorized salvage groups.”

“Good point, Kalliste. I’ll keep my mouth zipped. How can I help?”

“I’d like you to do a preliminary survey. Once we make a positive ID, we can move to a big-budget project that includes security.”

“Sounds doable. What can you tell me about the wreck?”

“It’s about thirty miles off the coast of Spain, near Cadiz, in two-hundred-fifty feet of water.”

Kalliste explained how the wreck was discovered. A fishing boat had snagged its net on an unmarked obstruction. The captain was aware that the ocean floor was littered with the ghosts of war. More than one fisherman had been killed trying to haul in a load that turned out to be a live mine or artillery shell. He cut the net free, marked the GPS position and called the authorities. A Spanish coast guard cutter ran a sonar survey. The image was relayed to an expert in ancient ships at the University of Madrid.

“He made a tentative identification,” Kalliste said. “Then he sent the picture to my boss at the antiquities department in Athens, who passed it on to me. I confirmed the Spaniard’s initial evaluation.”

“That the ship is Minoan.”

She clapped her hands again. “I love smart men.”

“I don’t deserve the Nobel prize for this one, Kalliste. I compared your photo to ships online. If you’re right, this would be the first discovery of an intact Minoan ship. Very big deal.”

“Exactly. A
very
big deal, as my boss and the Spaniard ship expert told their respective governments. They asked for money to fund a joint expedition. The governments told them
ohi
.”

Hawkins knew from his time in Greece that
ohi
meant an unequivocal
no
.

“That doesn’t make sense. Someone in the government must have realized this is a major find.”

“Don’t you read the papers or watch TV, Matt? Greece and Spain are the beggars of Europe. If people see their leaders throwing money in the water, they will throw their leaders in the water as well.”

“That’s an interesting picture, Kalliste. But if the governments said no, where did you dig up the money for this expedition?”

“The professor in Madrid suggested that I talk to Hidden History. It’s an American television history channel. They agreed to fund an initial survey. If that project produces evidence confirming the initial identification, they will open their pocketbooks for a full expedition. They’re offering a bare-bones budget, just enough to cover the cost of the survey boat. It’s not much, Matt. I can’t pay you for your time or travel.”

Hawkins remembered the sweet honey pastry he had enjoyed on the Santorini expedition. “No problem, Kalliste. You can pay me in
baklava
.”