Clive Cussler - Inca Gold

"To get back to our conversation," said Gaskill, daintily removing a bone from the quail with his massive hands. "I almost laid my hands on another of the Specter's acquisitions."

"Yes, I heard about your blown stakeout," Ragsdale muttered, having a difficult time bringing his mind back on track. "A Peruvian mummy covered in gold, wasn't it?"

"The Golden Body Suit of Tiapollo."

"Where did you go wrong?"

"Bad timing more than anything. While we were keeping an eye on the owner's penthouse, a gang of thieves acting as furniture movers snatched the mummy from an apartment on a lower floor where it was hidden along with a huge cache of other art and artifacts, all with shady histories."

"This soup is outstanding," Ragsdale said, trying to get the waitress's attention. "I'd better take another look at the menu and order an entree. Have you made up a catalogue yet?"

"End of the week. I suspect there may be between thirty and forty items on your FBI wish list of stolen art in my suspect's underground collection."

The waitress wandered over with the wine and Ragsdale ordered seared salmon with sweet corn, shiitake mushrooms, and spinach. "Good choice, honey," she drawled as she opened the bottle.

Ragsdale shook his head in wonderment before turning his attention back to Gaskill. "What's the name of the collector who squirreled away the hot art?"

"His name is Adolphus Rummel, a wealthy scrap dealer out of Chicago. His name ring a bell?"

"No, but then I've never met a big-time underground buyer and collector who held open house. Any chance Rummel will talk?"

"No way," said Gaskill regretfully. "He's already hired Jacob Morganthaler and is suing to get his confiscated art objects back."

"Jury-rig Jake," Ragsdale said disgustedly. "Friend and champion of indicted black market art dealers and collectors."

"With his acquittal record, we should consider ourselves lucky he doesn't defend murderers and drug dealers."

"Any leads on who stole the golden body suit?"

"None. A clean job. If I didn't know better, I'd say the Specter did it."

Not unless he came back from the dead. He'd have to be well over ninety years old."

Gaskill held up his glass, and Ragsdale poured the wine. "Suppose he had a son, or established a dynasty who carried on the family tradition?"

"That's a thought. Except that no calendars with circled dates have been left at art robberies for over fifty years."

"They could have branched out into smuggling and forgeries and dropped the cornball theatrics. Today's professionals know that modern investigative technology could easily comb enough evidence out of those hokey calendars to put a collar on them."

"Maybe." Ragsdale paused as the waitress brought his salmon. He sniffed the aroma and gazed in delight at the presentation. "I hope it tastes as good as it looks."

"Guaranteed, honey," the old waitress cackled, "or your money back."

Ragsdale drained his wine and poured another glass. "I can hear your mind clicking from here. Where are you headed?"

"Whoever committed the robbery didn't do it to gain a higher price from another black market collector," Gaskill replied. "I did some research on the golden body suit encasing the mummy. Reportedly, it was covered with engraved hieroglyphs, illustrating a long voyage by a fleet of Inca ships carrying a vast treasure, including a huge golden chain. I believe the thieves took it so they can trace a path to the mother lode."

"Does the suit tell what happened to the treasure?"

"Legend says it was buried on an island of an inland sea. How's your salmon?"

"The best I've ever eaten," said Ragsdale happily. "And believe you me, that's a compliment. So where do you go from here?"

"The engravings on the suit have to be translated. The Inca did not have a method of writing or illustrating events like the Mayans, but photographs of the suit taken before its earlier theft from Spain show definite indications of a pictorial graphic system. The thieves will need the services of an expert to decode these glyphs. Interpretation of ancient pictographs is not exactly an overcrowded field."

"So you're going to chase down whoever gets the job?"

"Hardly a major effort. There are only five leading specialists. Two of them are a husband and wife team by the name of Moore. They're considered the best in the field."

"You've done your homework."

Gaskill shrugged. "The greed of the thieves is the only lead I've got."

"If you require the services of the bureau," Ragsdale said, "you have only to call me."

"I appreciate that, Francis, thank you."

"There's one other thing."

"Yes?"

"Can you introduce me to the chef? I'd like an inside track on a table for Saturday night."

After a short layover at the Lima airport to pick up the EG&G magnetometer that was flown in from the Deep Fathom by a U.S. Embassy helicopter, Pitt, Giordino, and Gunn boarded a commercial flight to Quito, the capital of Ecuador. It was after two o'clock in the morning when they landed in the middle of a thunderstorm. As soon as they stepped through the gate they were met by a representative of the state oil company, who was acting on behalf of the managing director Gunn had negotiated with for a helicopter. He quickly herded them into a limousine that drove to the opposite side of the field, followed by a small van carrying their luggage and electronic equipment. The two-vehicle convoy stopped in front of a fully serviced McDonnell Douglas Explorer helicopter. As they exited the limo, Rudi Gunn turned to express his appreciation, but the oil company official had rolled up the window and ordered the driver to move on.

"Makes one want to lead a clean life," Giordino muttered at the efficiency of it all.

"They owed us bigger than I thought," said Pitt, ignoring the downpour and staring blissfully at the big, red, twin-engined helicopter with no tail rotor.

"Is it a good aircraft?" asked Gunn naively.

"Only the finest rotorcraft in the sky today," replied Pitt. "Stable, reliable, and smooth as oil on water. Costs about two point seven-five million. We couldn't have asked for a better machine to conduct a search and survey project from the air."

"How far to the Bay of Caraquez?"

"About two hundred and ten kilometers. We can make it in less than an hour with this machine."

"I hope you don't plan to fly over strange terrain in the dark during a tropical storm," Gunn said uneasily, holding a newspaper over his head as a shield against the rain.

Pitt shook his head. "No, we'll wait for first light."

Giordino nodded toward the helicopter. "If I know only one thing, it's not to take a shower with my clothes on. I recommend we throw our baggage and electronic gear on board and get a few hours sleep before dawn."

"That's the best idea I've heard all day," Pitt agreed heartily.

Once their equipment was stowed, Giordino and Gunn reclined the backrests of two passenger seats and fell asleep within minutes. Pitt sat in the pilot's seat under a small lamp and studied the data accumulated by Perlmutter and Yaeger. He was too excited to be tired, certainly not on the eve of a shipwreck search. Most men turn from Jekyll to Hyde whenever the thought of a treasure hunt floods their brain. But Pitt's stimulant was not greed but the challenge of entering the unknown to pursue a trail laid down by adventurous men like him, who lived and died in another era, men who left a mystery for later generations to unravel.

What kind of men walked the decks of sixteenth-century ships, he wondered. Besides the lure of adventure and the remote prospect of riches, what possessed them to sail on voyages sometimes lasting three or more years on ships not much larger than a modest suburban, two-story house? Out of sight of land for months at a time, their teeth falling out from the ravages of scurvy, the crews were decimated by malnutrition and disease. Many were the voyages completed by only ship's officers, who had survived on more abundant rations than the common seamen. Of the eighty-eight men on board the Golden Hind when Drake battled through the Strait of Magellan into the Pacific, only fifty-six were left when he entered Plymouth Harbor.