“Then Plautius and his galley must have been attacked before she arrived.”
She grabbed his arm and pulled him toward one of the courtyard walls.
“Come look at this,” she said.
She led him to a trio of large frescoes painted on a linear section of shaded wall. The frescoes looked faded to the point of invisibility, at a quick glance. Dirk stepped closer and studied the first panel. It was a customary Madonna and Child, featuring a haloed infant Jesus held in Mary’s arms. Both figures’ wide eyes and flat dimensions indicated it was a style of art from long ago. The next panel showed a crucifixion scene, Jesus on the cross, his head hung low in agony. Somewhat unusual for the genre, Dirk noted, the two beggar thieves were illustrated hanging from neighboring crosses.
He then stepped to the third panel, where Summer stood with a pleased expression on her face. It depicted a crowned woman in profile pointing toward the upper corner of the fresco. Her finger was pointing at a towering green mountain capped by a pair of crosses. The geological features of Stavrovouni were clearly visible in the hilltop rendering.
“Helena?” Dirk said.
“It has to be,” Summer replied. “Now, look at the bottom.”
Dirk peered closely at the lower portion of the fresco, observing a section of faded blue that represented the sea. The image of three ships on the water was barely visible beneath Helena’s profile. Crude in representation, each ship was the same approximate size, and was powered by both sail and oars. With the proper perspective, Dirk could see that two of the ships appeared to be pursuing the third vessel. Studying the faded plaster, he pointed to the two chase craft.
“This one appears to be sinking by the stern,” he said, “while the other one is turning out to sea.”
“Look at the sail on the lead ship,” Summer said.
Straining his eyes, Dirk could just see a faint symbol on the ship’s sail. It appeared to be an “X” with a high-legged “P” written over its center.
“It’s the Chi-Rho monogram that was used by Constantine,” she explained. “It was the divine symbol that supposedly came to him in a dream before his victory at the Battle of Milvian Bridge. He used it on his battle standard and as an emblem of his rule.”
“Then the picture is either Helena arriving in Cyprus with an escort…” he said.
“Or it is Plautius’s galley fleeing two Cypriot pirate ships,” she said, completing his thought.
A chip in the fresco obscured the path of the galley, but the continuation of a shoreline along the bottom indicated that it was headed toward land. Slightly above the horizon was another small image, of a nude woman emerging from the sea, a pair of dolphins at her side.
“The meaning of that is lost on me,” Summer said as Dirk examined the image.
Just then, the dour monk walked by, having escorted a pair of French tourists through the church. Dirk hailed him and inquired about the frescoes.
“Yes, they are very old,” the monk said. “The archaeologists believe they date to the Byzantine Age. Some have claimed that these walls were part of the original church, but nobody knows for sure.”
“This last fresco,” Summer asked, “is it an image of Helena?”
“Yes,” the monk confirmed. “She’s arrived by sea and envisions the church here on Stavrovouni.”
“Do you know what this figure is?” she asked, pointing to the nude woman.
“That would be Aphrodite. You see, the monastery here was built on the ruins of a temple to Aphrodite. The artist must have been paying homage to the site before Helena commissioned the church to be built here.”
She thanked the monk, then watched him shuffle back to the monastery door.
“Well, we were close,” she said. “Now we know there were two pirate ships, anyway.”
“The image makes it appear that the Roman vessel was still afloat after battling the pirates. It was heading somewhere,” Dirk muttered, staring at the image until his eyes turned blurry. He finally stepped away from the panel and joined Summer in heading toward the exit.
“I guess we got all we can from here,” he said. “By the way, did you talk to Ridley Bannister?”
“Ridley who?” she asked as they descended the stairway to the parking lot.
“Ridley Bannister, the British archaeologist. He said he knew you.”
Receiving a blank look, Dirk proceeded to describe his encounter in the monastery.
“I never saw him,” she said. Then the wheels of suspicion began to turn in her head. “What does he look like?”
“Thin, medium build, sandy hair. I suppose women might find him handsome.”
Summer suddenly froze on the steps. “Did you notice if he was wearing a ring?”
Dirk thought a moment. “Yes, I think so. On his right ring finger. I noticed it when we shook hands. It was solid gold with a funny design, like something out of the Middle Ages.”
Summer’s face turned flush with anger. “That’s the guy who stole the Manifest from Julie and me at gunpoint. He said his name was Baker.”
“He’s a well-known and respected archaeologist,” Dirk said.
“Respected?” Summer hissed. “I bet he’s here searching for the galley, too.”
“One of the monks did mention he was working on a book about Helena.”
Summer was fuming by the time they reached the car. The image of Bannister taking the Manifest in the basement of Kitchener’s manor saturated her mind. She drove aggressively down the winding monastery road, her anger reflected in her driving. Entering the main highway, she never considered that the source of her wrath was in a car now following close behind.
Her temper waned as they reached the outskirts of Limassol. By the time they found the city’s commercial docks, she actually felt encouraged.
“If Bannister is here, then the galley must exist,” she said to Dirk.
“He certainly hasn’t found it yet,” he replied.
Summer nodded with satisfaction. Who knows, she thought, perhaps we’re closer than we think.
91
“Shoving off already?” Summer asked.
She stood on the Aegean Explorer’s bridge, watching a pair of crewmen hoist in and stow the forward mooring line. It had been less than an hour since the ship had touched the dock at Limassol, and she and Dirk had climbed aboard.
Pitt stood near the helm, sipping a cup of coffee.
“We’ve got to get back around to the western side of the Akrotiri Peninsula in order to keep tabs on Rudi’s AUV,” he said.
“I thought you were surveying with the towed sonar fish?”
“We are. We actually completed our first grid off Pissouri and started a new survey grid to the west. But Rudi reconfigured the AUV for sidescan sonar duty, so we put her to work. She’s currently running a large grid to the east of Pissouri. We’ll keep pushing west with the Explorerand cover twice as much ground.”
“Makes sense,” she replied. “How much longer will the AUV stay under?”
“She’ll be down another eighteen hours before surfacing. That will allow us a good run of our own before having to pick her up.”
“Dad, I’m sorry we didn’t come up with more promising research to go on.”
“Your fresco seems to confirm the role of the Pissouri wreck as one of the pirate ships. If the galley exists, we’ve got a good chance of being in the ballpark.”
The Aegean Explorerproceeded to steam south around the stubby Akrotiri Peninsula, then turned northwest toward Pissouri some twenty miles away. The research ship’s sensors soon made contact with a pair of floating transducer buoys, which relayed data from the AUV as it glided over the seabed two hundred feet beneath the surface. While Gunn and Giordino reviewed the AUV’s results, Pitt launched the towed sonar fish off the stern of the Explorer, sharing monitoring duties with Dirk and Summer.