Odessa Sea (Dirk Pitt 24)

Summer laughed. “It’s wonderful to see you again, Julien. How was your nautical history conference?”

“Smashing. There were some excellent papers on early wrecks being investigated in the Mediterranean, as well as some exciting research topics here in England. My presentation on the Aztec sea canoes you and your father discovered in the Caribbean was quite well received.”

As one of the world’s leading maritime historians, Perlmutter was a walking encyclopedia of shipwreck knowledge. A longtime friend of the Pitt family, he had been a trusted resource on many NUMA projects, as well as being a reliably jovial dining companion. Aside from his passion for nautical history, Perlmutter was a dedicated gourmand.

“I almost forgot.” Summer handed over a bottle in a felt bag. “A gift from Norway.”

Perlmutter opened the bag to reveal a dark green bottle. He studied the label, then chuckled. “Aquavit, of course. Why, thank you. It makes for a delightful cordial.” He slid open a walnut compartment beneath the driver’s window, exposing a small bar set. Cracking the seal on the bottle, he poured three glasses and passed them around.

“Skål!” he toasted.

Summer sniffed the harsh-tasting liquid with a grimace.

Dirk noticed her reaction and smiled. “At least it will keep you warm if the London fog rolls in.”

As they sipped their drinks, the Rolls driver slithered around the east end of Hyde Park before pulling up to a corner brick building. Perlmutter led his guests into a side door beneath a brass plate engraved Le Gavroche. A historic training ground for London’s top chefs, Le Gavroche was easily the city’s best French restaurant.

Perlmutter had a spring in his step as they were guided downstairs and seated in a green velveteen tufted booth. Ordering a lobster mousse appetizer, he sighed with delight. “I recall when a pork pie was considered haute cuisine in London. My, how times have changed for the better.”

“Tell the truth, Julien,” Summer asked. “Was it the nautical conference or London’s fine dining that enticed your visit from Washington?”

“I refuse to answer that on the grounds it may prove incriminatory.” He patted his stomach and laughed.

Ordering a roast duck in port jus to Dirk’s turbot and Summer’s Dover sole, he forced himself to turn his attention from food. “Now, tell me about this Norwegian shipwreck of yours.”

“It’s British, actually.” Dirk described their discovery of the Canterbury and their encounter with the Russian salvage ship.

“My word, that is most aggressive behavior,” Perlmutter said. “Any idea why the Russians would take such a keen interest in a rusty Royal Navy cruiser?”

Summer reached into her purse and retrieved a photo of the gold bar. “We found this in a cabin near the bridge.”

Perlmutter’s eyes lit up. “Perhaps there is more in the hold, though a light cruiser makes for a poor cargo ship.”

“We suspect that’s what the Russians are after,” Dirk said. “Note the stampings on the bar.”

Perlmutter had already focused on the imprint of the double-headed eagle. “House of Romanov,” he whispered. “Small wonder the Russians claimed the wreck as their own. Tell me again, when was the Canterbury sunk?”

“February twenty-sixth, 1917,” Dirk said. “She had left Archangel a few days earlier.”

The wheels began churning in Perlmutter’s head, taking him far from the French restaurant. “Most curious.” He placed the photo on the table. “My land-based history may be a bit rusty, but, as I recall, the Russian monarchy possessed an enormous inventory of gold at the beginning of World War I. What they didn’t have, however, was an adequate supply of weapons and ammunition for their troops. They shipped gold bullion to the Allies in exchange for munitions, first via Archangel, then from Vladivostok after the Germans wised up and laid mines in the west. An attempted gold shipment from Archangel in 1917 would have been both dangerous and somewhat extraordinary but not impossible.”

“How can we find out more about the Canterbury’s last voyage?” Summer asked.

“Dr. Charles Trehorne, Emeritus Professor of Nautical Archaeology at Oxford. He’s a colleague and an expert on Royal Navy shipwrecks. I’ll ring him this evening and see if we can meet with him tomorrow.” He twirled the wineglass with his thick fingers.

Savoring the aroma of the Bordeaux, he slipped the photo of the gold bar back to her. “What did you do with the gold itself?”

“We brought it with us,” Summer said. “It’s in the room safe at the hotel. I’m sure no one would suspect I have anything of value there.”

Perlmutter nodded and took another sip. He had no way of knowing, but at that very moment, Summer’s room safe was both open and empty.

• • •

DRESSED IN A HOUSEMAID’S UNIFORM, the Russian agent Martina had entered The Gore’s rear service door, concealing an assortment of electronic infiltration devices in a bucket of cleaning supplies covered by a towel. She climbed a stairwell to the third floor and found the room numbers to which she’d been directed by a hacker at the Russian Embassy.

She started with Dirk’s room, slipping a card key into the door lock, which had been precoded by the hacker with the correct security code. Dirk hadn’t bothered unpacking, which made her mission simpler. She started with his unlocked suitcase, rifling through it and finding nothing of intelligence value. Moving to the room telephone, she attached a tiny wireless transmitter to its base, supplemented by a signal booster she attached to the back of the window curtains. The device would transmit all phone and room conversations to a listening station in the panel van parked down the street, at least until its batteries expired in a week or so. Finally, she dug out a ring of keys and found a master that matched the hotel manager’s emergency key to the room safe. Inside, she found only Dirk’s passport. She ignored that, closed the safe, and hurried to the next room.

She repeated the procedure in Summer’s suite, at least to the point of opening the room safe. Startled by the gold bar, she removed it and set it on the bed, along with Summer’s passport, laptop, and a flash drive. Using her small electronic tablet, she photographed the bar from all sides, then returned it to the safe with the computer and passport. She inserted the flash drive into the tablet and copied its files, then returned it and closed the safe.