Treasure of Khan (Dirk Pitt 19)

Kharitonov looked up in thought for a moment. "Yes, now that I think about it, I believe it was. Forgive a tired man for not recalling that earlier. Perhaps they know something of our missing oil survey team. And the whereabouts of Alexander and Anatoly," he added with a cross tone.

The Russian captain reached for the radio and issued a call to the freighter whose name, Primoski, was taken from a mountain range on Lake Baikal's western shore. A grunt voice answered almost immediately and replied in short, clipped responses to the captain's questions. As they conversed, Pitt played the binoculars over the old freighter, focusing a long gaze on the freighter's bare ste

rn deck.

"Al, take a look at this."

Giordino ambled over and grabbed the binoculars, studying the freighter carefully. Noting the covered cargo being unloaded, he said, "Being rather secretive with their cargo, wouldn't you say? Though I'm sure if we asked, they'd say it's nothing more than used tractor parts."

"Take a look at the stern deck," Pitt prompted.

"There was a derrick on that deck last night," Giordino observed. "It has disappeared, like our friends."

"Granted it was dark when we flew over the ship, but that derrick looked to be no Tinkertoy piece."

"No, it wasn't something that could be disassembled in short order without an army of mechanical engineers," Giordino said.

"From what I've seen through the glasses, it's a skeleton crew working that ship."

The hearty voice of the captain interrupted as he hung up the radio microphone.

"I'm sorry, gentlemen. The captain of the Primoski reports that he has taken on no passengers, has not seen or heard from any oil survey team or, in fact, was even aware of their activities on the lake."

"And I bet he doesn't know who's buried in Grant's tomb, either," Giordino said.

"Did he happen to reveal his ship's manifest?" Pitt asked.

"Why, yes," Kharitonov replied. "They are transporting agricultural equipment and tractor components from Irkutsk to Baikalskoye."

-8-

THE ROOKIE POLICEMAN tasked with ensuring that no one left the ship quickly grew bored with his assignment. Pacing the shore tirelessly a few yards from where the Vereshchagin's bow had ground into the lake bed, he had alertly monitored the vessel as the sun went down. But as the evening hour waned without event, his attention began to wander. Loud thumping noises from a bar up the street gradually seized his senses and it wasn't long before he had swiveled around to face the bar's entrance, hoping to catch sight of an attractive tourist or college coed visiting from Irkutsk. Sufficiently distracted, he had almost no chance of spotting two men dressed in black who quietly slid a small Zodiac over the Vereshchagin's stern rail, then silently dropped themselves into the rubber boat.

Pitt and Giordino eased the Zodiac away from the Vereshchagin, careful to keep the research ship between them and the shore guard.

"A couple of nice friendly drinking establishments are just a short paddle away, and you want to take us on a fishing expedition," Giordino whispered.

"Overpriced tourist traps that hawk warm beer and stale pretzels," Pitt countered.

"Alas, a warm beer is still better than no beer," he replied poetically.

Though they quickly melted into the dark night, Pitt had them row almost a mile from shore before pulling on the starter rope to the boat's 25-horsepower outboard motor. The small engine quickly coughed to life, and Pitt turned the boat parallel to shore as they putted forward at slow speed. Once the boat was moving, Giordino lifted a three-foot-long sonar towfish from the floorboard and slipped it over the side, feeding it out to nearly the full length of its hundred-meter electronic tow cable. Securing the line to the gunwale, he flipped open a laptop computer and initiated the side-scan sonar's operating software. Within minutes, a yellow-tinted image of the lake bed began scrolling down the screen.

"The picture show has started," Giordino announced, "featuring an undulating sandy bottom one hundred seventy feet deep."

Pitt continued running the boat parallel to shore until he was even with the black freighter. He held his course for another quarter mile before turning the Zodiac around and running back in the opposite direction, a few dozen meters farther into the lake.

"The Primorski looked to be parked in this neighborhood when we flew over her last night," Pitt said, waving an arm toward the southeast. His eyes turned and studied the landmarks on shore to the north, which he tried to recall sighting from the helicopter.

Giordino nodded. "I agree, we should be in the ballpark."

Pitt pulled a compass from his pocket and took a heading, then set it on the bench in front of him. Tracking the bearing with the occasional flash of a penlight, he held a steady course until he passed a half mile in the other direction, then turned and backtracked again farther to the south. For the next hour, they continued the search, moving farther offshore as Giordino monitored the bottom contours on the laptop computer.

Pitt turned his eyes to shore, preparing to turn at the end of an imaginary lane when Giordino said, "Got something."

Pitt held his course, leaning forward to examine the image on the laptop. A dark linear object began scrolling down the screen, followed by another thin line that angled toward it. The image slowly evolved into a large A shape that had grown a few additional cross-members.

"Length is about forty feet," Giordino said. "Sure looks like the structure we saw sitting on the poop deck of the Primorski last night. Shame on them for littering the lake."