Clive Cussler: Inca Gold

"I don't intend to return through the strait," said Drake. "My plan is to head north in search of a northwest passage to England. If that is not successful, I'll follow in Magellan's wake across the Pacific and around Africa."

"The Hind will never see England, not with her cargo holds busting their seams."

"We'll jettison the bulk of the silver on Cano Island off Ecuador, where we can salvage it on a later voyage. The art goods will remain on the Conception."

"But what of your plan to give them to the queen?"

"That still stands," Drake assured him. "You, Thomas, will take ten men from the Hind and sail the galleon to Plymouth."

Cuttill spread his hands in anguish. "I can't possibly sail a vessel her size with only ten men, not through heavy seas."

Drake walked back to his worktable and tapped a pair of brass dividers on a circle marked on a chart. "On charts I found in Captain de Anton's cabin I've indicated a small bay on the coast north of here that should be free of Spaniards. You will sail there and cast off the Spanish officers and all wounded crewmen. Impress twenty of the remaining able-bodied seamen to man the vessel. I'll see you're supplied with more than enough weapons to preserve command and prevent any attempt to wrest control of the ship."

Cuttill knew it was useless to object. Debating with a stubborn man like Drake was a lost cause. He accepted his assignment with a resigned shrug. "I will, of course, do as you command."

Drake's face was confident, his eyes warm. "If anyone can sail a Spanish galleon up to the dock at Plymouth, Thomas, you can. I suspect you'll knock the eyes out of the queen's head when you present her with your cargo."

"I would rather leave that piece of work to you, Captain."

Drake gave Cuttill a friendly pat on one shoulder. "Not to fear, my old friend. I'm ordering you to be standing dockside with a wench on each arm, waiting to greet me when the Hind arrives home."

At sunrise the following morning Cuttill ordered the crewmen to cast off the lines binding the two ships. Safely tucked under one arm was the linen-wrapped box that Drake had directed him to personally give to the queen. He carried it to the captain's cabin and locked it inside a cabinet in the captain's quarters. Then he returned to deck and took command of the Nuestra Senora de la Conception as she drifted away from the Golden Hind. Sails were set under a dazzling crimson sun the superstitious crews on both ships solemnly described as red as a bleeding heart. To their primitive way of thinking it was considered a bad omen.

Drake and Cuttill exchanged final waves as the Golden Hind set a course to the northeast. Cuttill watched the smaller ship until she was hull down over the horizon. He did not share Drake's confidence. A deep feeling of foreboding settled in the pit of his stomach.

Several days later, after dumping many tons of silver ingots and coins off Cano Island to lighten her draft, the sturdy Hind and the intrepid Drake sailed north. . . to what would be known more than two centuries later as Vancouver Island. . . before turning west across the Pacific on their epic voyage.

Far to the south the Conception tacked and headed due east, making landfall and reaching the bay marked on the Spanish chart by Drake sometime late the next evening. The anchor was dropped and the watch lights set.

Daylight brought the sun shining down over the Andes as Cuttill and his crew discovered a large native village of more than a thousand inhabitants, surrounded by a large bay. Without wasting time, he ordered his men to begin ferrying the Spanish officers and their wounded to shore. Twenty of the best seamen among the survivors were offered ten times their Spanish pay to help sail the galleon to England where they were promised to be set free upon landing. All twenty gladly signed on.

Cuttill was standing on the gun deck overseeing the landing operation just after midday when the ship began to vibrate as though a giant hand were rocking it. Everyone immediately stared at the long streamlike ensigns tied to the top of the masts. But only the ends of their tails fluttered under a slight whisper of wind. Then every eye turned to shore where a great cloud of dust rose from the base of the Andes and appeared to be moving toward the sea. A frightening thundering sound increased to deafening proportions along with a tremendous convulsion of the earth. As the crew gawked in stunned fascination, the hills east of the village seemed to rise and fall like breakers rolling on a shallow shore.

The dust cloud descended on the village and swallowed it. Above the uproar came the screams and cries of the villagers and the crashing sounds of their rock and adobe mud houses as they shook apart and crumbled into ruin. None of the crew had ever experienced an earthquake, and few were even aware of such a phenomenon. Half the Protestant English and every one of the Catholic Spaniards on the galleon dropped to their knees and began praying fervently to God for deliverance.

In minutes the dust cloud passed over the ship and dispersed out to sea. They all stared uncomprehendingly at what had been a thriving village bustling with activity. Now it was nothing but flattened ruins. Cries came from those trapped under the debris. A later estimate would show that less than fifty of the local inhabitants survived. The Spaniards on shore ran up and down the beach in panic, shouting and begging to be brought back to the ship. Collecting his senses, Cuttill ignored the pleas, ran to the railing and scanned the surrounding sea. Beyond showing a mild chop, the water appeared indifferent to the nightmare tragedy in the village.

Suddenly desperate to escape the cataclysm on shore, Cuttill began shouting orders to get the galleon underway. The Spanish prisoners cooperated wholeheartedly, working alongside the English to unfurl the sails and pull in the anchor. Meanwhile, the survivors from the village crowded the beach, imploring the galleon's crew to return and help them rescue their relatives from the shattered wreckage and carry them aboard the ship to safety. The seamen turned deaf ears to the pleas, concerned only with their own preservation.

Suddenly, another earthquake shook the land, accompanied by an even more thunderous roar. The terrain began to undulate as if some monster were shaking a giant carpet. This time the sea slowly rolled back, stranding the Concepcion and exposing the floor of the sea. The seamen, none of whom knew how to swim, possessed an unnatural fear of what was under the water. Now they stared wonderingly at the sight of thousands of fish flipping about like wingless birds amid the rocks and corals where they had been left high and dry by the retreating sea. Sharks, squid, and a rainbow of tropical fish all mingled together in their death throes.

A constant flow of tremors moved the earth as the submarine quake caused crustal fracturing, collapsing the seafloor and creating a vast depression. Then it was the sea's turn to go crazy as it swept in from all sides to fill the hole. The water piled up in a gigantic countersurge with incredible speed. Millions of tons of pure destruction rose higher and higher until its crest reached 40 meters (157 feet) high, a phenomenon that would later become known as a tsunami.

There was no time for the helpless men to clutch a solid object for support, no time for the devout to pray. Paralyzed and speechless in fear of the green and frothwhite mountain of water rising before their eyes, they could only stand and watch it rush toward them with the ungodly sounds of a thousand hells. Only Cuttill had the presence of mind to run under the protecting deck over the tiller and wrap his limbs around its long wooden shaft.

Bow on to the colossal wall of water, the Conception arched and soared vertically toward the curling crest. Moments later she was engulfed in a boiling turbulence as nature ran berserk.