Flood Tide (Dirk Pitt 14)

Pitt's eyebrows raised in speculation. He rose from his chair, walked to a desk and picked up a magnifying glass. Then he studied two of the photos closely before looking up. "These two photos," he said slowly.

"Yes," Perlmutter murmured expectantly.

"They are not of the same ship."

"You're absolutely right. One photo shows the Princess Dou Wan's sister ship, the Princess Yung T'ai."

Pitt stared into Perlmutter's eyes. "You're hiding something from us, you old fox."

"I have no rock-hard proof," said the big history expert, "but I do have a theory."

"We'd all like to hear it," said Sandecker.

Out came another file from the briefcase. "I strongly suspect the distress signal received in Valparaiso was a fabrication that was probably sent by Chiang Kai-shek's agents either on land or from a fishing boat somewhere offshore. The Princess Dou Wan, while en route across the Pacific, was given a few minor modifications by her crew, including a name change. She became the Princess Yung T'ai, which had been broken up at the scrappers a short time before. Under her new disguise, she then continued toward her ultimate destination."

"Very canny of you to fathom the substitution," said Sandecker.

"Not at all," Perlmutter replied modestly. "A fellow researcher in Panama discovered that the Princess Yung T'ai passed through the Canal only three days after the Princess Dou Wan sent her Mayday signal."

"Were you able to trace her course from Panama?" asked Pitt.

Perlmutter nodded. "Thanks to Hiram Yaeger, who used his vast computer complex to trace ship arrivals at ports up and down the eastern seaboard during the first and second week of December, nineteen forty-eight. Bless his little heart, he struck gold. The records show a vessel passing through the Welland Canal listed as the Princess Yung T'ai on December the seventh."

Sandecker's face lit up. "The Welland Canal separates Lake Erie from Lake Ontario."

"It does indeed," agreed Perlmutter.

"My God," Gunn muttered. "That means the Princess Dou Wan didn't disappear in the ocean but sank in one of the Great Lakes."

"Who would have thought it?" Sandecker said more to himself than the others.

"Quite a feat of seamanship to navigate a ship her size down the St. Lawrence River before the seaway was built," said Pitt.

"The Great Lakes," Gunn echoed the words slowly. "Why would Chiang Kai-shek order a ship filled with priceless art treasures to go thousands of miles out of the way? If he wanted to hide the cargo in the United States, why not San Francisco or Los Angeles as a destination?"

"Colonel Hui Wiay claimed he was not told the ship's final destination. But he did know that Chiang Kai-shek flew agents into the U.S. to arrange for the cargo to be unloaded and stored with the utmost secrecy. According to him, it was at the direction of officials at the State Department in Washington, who set up the operation."

"Not a bad plan," said Pitt. "The main port terminals along the East and West coasts were too open. The dockworkers would have known what they were unloading in a second. Word would have spread like wildfire. The Communist leaders back in China would never have suspected their national treasures were to be smuggled into America's heartland and hidden."

"Seems to me a naval base would have been the obvious choice if they wanted secrecy," suggested Harper.

"That would have taken a direct order from the White House," said Sandecker. "They were already catching flak from Communist Romania and Hungary for keeping their royal jewels in a Washington vault after the American Army found them hidden in a salt mine in Austria immediately after the war."

Pitt said, "Not a bad plan when you think about it. Communist Chinese intelligence agents would have put their money on San Francisco. They probably had agents crawling over the dock terminals around the bay, waiting for the Princess Dou Wan to steam under the Golden Gate Bridge, never dreaming the ship was actually headed for a port in the Great Lakes."

"Yes, but what port?" said Gunn. "And on which lake?"

They all turned to Perlmutter. "I can't give you an exact location," he said candidly, "but I do have a lead who might direct us to a ballpark location containing the wreck."

"This person has information you don't?" asked Pitt unbelievingly.

"He does."

Sandecker looked steadily at Perlmutter. "You've questioned him?"

"Not yet. I thought I'd leave that up to you."

"How can you be sure he's reliable?" asked Julia.