Pitt gazed out the port at the passing clouds, knowing the party on the other end seldom answered before the seventh or eighth ring. Finally, on the tenth, a deep voice came through the receiver. "I'm here."
"St. Julien."
"Dirk!" St. Julien Perlmutter boomed, recognizing the voice. "If I'd known it was you, I'd have answered sooner."
"And step out of character? I don't think so."
Pitt could easily picture Perlmutter, all four hundred pounds of him in his ritual silk paisley pajamas, buried amid a mountain of nautical books in the carriage house he called home. Raconteur, gourmand, connoisseur, and acclaimed marine history authority, with a library collection of the world's rarest nautical books, private letters, papers, and plans on almost every ship ever built, he was a walking encyclopedia of man and the sea.
"Where are you, my boy?"
"Thirty-five thousand feet over the Rocky Mountains."
"You couldn't wait to call me in Washington?"
"I wanted to shift a research project into first gear at the first opportunity."
"How can I help you?"
Pitt briefly explained the mysterious chamber and the inscriptions on the walls. Perlmutter listened thoughtfully, interrupting to ask an occasional question. When Pitt finished, Perlmutter inquired, "What specifically do you have in mind?"
"You have files you've accumulated on pre-Columbian contact in the Americas."
"A whole room full of data. Material and theories on all the seafarers who visited North, Central, and South America long before Columbus."
"Do you recall any tales of ancient seafarers who traveled deep inside other continents and built underground chambers? Built them for the sole purpose of leaving a message for those who came later? Were such acts ever mentioned in recorded history?"
"I can't recall any off the top of my head. There are any number of accounts of ancient trade between the peoples of the Americas and seafarers from Europe and Africa. It's thought that extensive mining of copper and tin to make bronze took place as far back as five thousand years ago."
"Where?" asked Pitt.
"Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin."
"Is it true?"
"I, for one, believe so," Perlmutter continued. "There is evidence of ancient mining for lead in Kentucky, serpentine in Pennsylvania, and mica in North Carolina. The mines were worked for many centuries before Christ. Then, mysteriously, the unknown miners vanished within a very short time, leaving their tools and other artifacts of their presence right where they were dropped, not to mention stone sculptures, altars, and dolmens. Dolmens are large prehistoric horizontal stone slabs supported by two or more vertical stones."
"Couldn't they have been created by the Indians?"
"American Indians rarely produced stone sculptures and built few, if any, monuments out of stone. Mining engineers, after studying the ancient excavations, estimate that over seven hundred million pounds of copper were removed and transported away. No one believes the Indians were responsible, because the copper that has been found by archaeologists amounts to only a few hundred pounds' worth of beads and baubles. The early Indians worked very little metal."
"But no indication of underground chambers with enigmatic inscriptions?"
Perlmutter paused. "None that I'm aware of. The miners of prehistory left few signs of pottery or extensive records of inscriptions. Only some logographs and pictographs that are for the most part unreadable. We can only guess at them being, perhaps, Egyptians, Phoenicians, Norsemen, or possibly even an earlier race. There is evidence in the southwest of Celtic mines, and in Arizona it is claimed that Roman artifacts were found outside of Tucson just after the turn of the century. So who can say? Most archaeologists are unwilling to go out on a limb and sanctify pre-Columbian contact. They simply refuse to buy diffusion."
"A spread of cultural influence from one people to another through contact."
"Precisely."
"But why?" asked Pitt. "When there is so much evidence?"
"Archaeologists are a hardheaded bunch," replied Perlmutter. "They're all from Missouri. You have to show them. But because early American cultures did not find a use for the wheel, except for toys, or develop the potter's wheel, they refuse to believe in diffusion."
"There could be any number of reasons. Until the arrival of Cortez and the Spanish, there were no horses or oxen in the Americas. Even I know it took the idea of the wheelbarrow six hundred years to travel from China to Europe."
"What can I say?" Perlmutter sighed. "I'm only a marine history buff who refuses to write treatises on subjects I know little about."
"But you will search your library for any account of underground chambers with indecipherable inscriptions in what would have been remote corners of the world four thousand years ago?"
"I shall do my best."
"Thank you, old friend. I can't ask for more." Pitt had total faith in his old family friend who used to sit Pitt on his lap when he was a little boy and tell him sea stories.
"Is there anything else you haven't told me about this chamber of yours?" queried Perlmutter.
"Only that it came with an artifact."
"You've been holding out on me. What kind of artifact?"
"A life-size skull craved out of pure black obsidian."
Perlmutter let that sink in for a few moments. Finally, he said, "Do you know its significance?"
"None that is obvious," answered Pitt. "All I can tell you is that without modern tools and cutting equipment, the ancient people who cut and smoothed such a large chunk of obsidian must have taken ten generations to produce such an exquisitely finished product."
"You're quite right. Obsidian is a volcanic glass formed by rapid cooling of liquid lava. For many thousands of years, man used it to make arrowheads, knives, and spearheads. Obsidian is very brittle. It's a remarkable feat to have created such an object over the course of a century and a half without shattering or cracking it."
Pitt glanced over at the crate strapped in the seat. "A pity you can't be here to see it, St. Julien."
"No need for that. I already know what it looks like."
Pitt smelled a rat. Perlmutter was famous for toying with his victims when he was about to display his intellectual superiority. Pitt had no choice but to sail into the trap. "You'd have to see it with your own eyes to appreciate its beauty."
"Did I forget to tell you, dear boy," said Perlmutter, his tone dripping with mock innocence, "I know where there is another one?"
11
The Cessna Ultra V touched down on the east runway of Andrews Air Force Base and taxied to the hangars leased by the Air Force to various governmental agencies. NUMA's aircraft and transportation buildings were located on the northeast part of the base. A NUMA van with two security guards was waiting to take Giordino to his condo in Alexandria, Virginia, and Pat to the safe house where her daughter waited.
Pitt carefully carried the wooden box containing the obsidian skull from the aircraft and set it on the ground. He did not accompany Pat and Giordino, but remained behind.
"You're not coming with us?" asked Pat.
"No, a friend is picking me up."
She gave him a penetrating look. "A girl friend?"
He laughed. "Would you believe my godfather?"
"No, I don't think I would," she said sarcastically. "When will I see you again?"
He gave her a light kiss on the forehead. "Sooner than you think."
Then he closed the door and watched as the van drove off toward the main gate of the base. He relaxed and sat on the ground with his back against one wheel of the landing gear, as the pilot and copilot departed. The spring air of Washington was crisp and clear, with temperatures rising unseasonably into the low sixties. He had waited only ten minutes when a very elegant two-tone green-and-silver automobile rolled whisper-quiet to a stop beside the aircraft.