“So we’re back to mystical Ajima Island,” Pitt said harshly. “You say it’s the only painting of the series Suma doesn’t own?”
“Yes,” Jordan replied. “Hanamura said he acted almost desperate to get his hands on it.”
“Any clue to where it might be?”
“The Ajima painting was last seen in the Japanese embassy in Berlin just before Germany fell. Old OSS records claim it was included with art the Nazis plundered from Italy, and transported by train to northwestern Germany ahead of the advancing Russian Army in the last weeks of the war. Then it disappeared from history.”
“No record at all of it having been recovered?’
“None.”
“And we have no idea as to the island’s general location or its appearance?”
“Not a scrap.”
“Unfortunate,” Pitt commented. “Find the painting, match the shape of the shoreline portrayed by the artist, and you have the location of Hideki Suma’s extortion hideaway, or so it says in a bedtime story.”
Jordan’s eyes narrowed. “It happens to be the best lead we’ve got going for us.”
Pitt wasn’t convinced. “Your spy planes and satellites should easily detect the installation.”
“The four main islands of Japan—Honshu, Kyushu, Hokkaido, and Shikoku—are surrounded by nearly a thousand smaller islands. Finding the right one can hardly be called easy.”
“Then why not isolate only those that can be connected by a tunnel to any of the four main islands?”
“Give us some credit for brains,” Jordan said irritably. “We’ve already eliminated any island farther than ten miles offshore and concentrated on the rest. First of all, no suspicious activities or structures appear above their surfaces. Not unusual when we assume the entire installation must be deep underground. And lastly, almost all the islands’ geology is made up of volcanic rock our sensors can’t penetrate. Have I answered your question?”
Pitt dug in. “No one can excavate a tunnel without hauling away dirt and rock.”
“Apparently the Japanese have. Analysis of our satellite photos shows no signs of a coastal tunnel excavation or roads leading into an entrance.”
Pitt shrugged his shoulders and waved the white flag. “So we’re back to a painting somewhere in the great beyond.”
Jordan suddenly leaned forward in his chair and stared hard at Pitt. “This is where you earn your pay.”
Pitt could see it coming, but not quite. “You’re going to send me to Japan to dive around islands, is that the pitch?”
“Wrong,” said Jordan with a patronizing smile Pitt didn’t like one bit. “You’re going to Germany and dive in a Luftwaffe bunker.”
36
“THEY SIMPLY DOVE in and vanished.”
Pitt crouched on one knee and stared past the half-submerged tractor into the black ominous water. He was tired from jet lag, and he’d barely slept a couple of hours on the plane from Washington. How rotten not to have time to enjoy a good breakfast at a local inn and sleep past noon, he wallowed in self-pity.
“Their safety lines were sliced apart.” The young officer who led the German naval dive team held up a nylon line whose end appeared razor-severed. “By what? We can’t begin to guess.”
“Communication line too?” Pitt slowly sipped at a cup of coffee. He picked up a small stone with his free hand and idly tossed it in the water, observing the ripples that spread from the splash.
“The phone line connected to the lead diver was also cut,” admitted the German. He stood tall and well muscled. His English carried only a slight trace of an accent. “Soon after the two man team dropped into the pond, they discovered an underwater tunnel leading to the west. They swam a distance of ninety meters before reporting the tunnel ended at a small chamber with a steel door. A few minutes later the phone and safety lines went slack. I sent another team in to investigate. They disappeared like the others.”
Pitt turned his head and looked at the men of the German Navy dive team who stood helpless and saddened at the loss of their friends. They were clustered around the folding tables and chairs of a portable command post manned by a group of police underwater rescue divers. A trio of men in civilian clothes, who Pitt assumed were government officials, questioned the divers in low voices.
“When did the last man go in?” Pitt asked.
“Four hours before you arrived,” said the young dive officer, who had introduced himself as Lieutenant Helmut Reinhardt. “I had a devil of a time keeping the rest of my men from following. But I’m not about to risk another life until I know what’s going on in there.” He paused and tipped his head toward the police divers, who were attired in bright orange dry suits. “Those idiot police, however, think they’re invincible. They’re planning to send one of their teams inside.”
“Some people are born for suicide,” said Giordino with a yawn. “Take me for example. I wouldn’t go in there without a nuclear submarine. No daredevil ventures by Mrs. Giordino’s boy. I intend to die in bed entwined with an erotic beauty from the Far East.”
“Don’t pay any attention to him, ” said Pitt. “Put him in a dark place and he hallucinates.”
“I see,” murmured Reinhardt, but obviously he didn’t.
Finally Pitt rose and nodded in Frank Mancuso’s direction. “Booby-trapped,” he said simply.
Mancuso nodded. “I agree. The entrances to the treasure tunnels in the Philippines were packed with bombs rigged to go off if struck by digging equipment. The difference is the Japs planned to return and retrieve the treasure, while the Nazis intended for their booby traps to destroy the loot along with the searchers.”
“Whatever trapped my men in there,” said Reinhardt bitterly, unable to say the word “killed,” “was not bombs.”
One of the official-looking men walked over from the command post and addressed Pitt. “Who are you, and whom do you represent?” he demanded in German.
Pitt turned to Reinhardt, who translated the question. Then he refaced his interrogator. “Tell him the three of us were invited.”
“You are American?” the stranger blurted in broken English, his face blank in astonishment. “Who gave you authorization to be here?”
“Who’s this mook?” Giordino inquired in blissful ignorance.
Reinhardt couldn’t suppress a slight grin. “Herr Gert Haider, Minister of Historic Works. Sir, Herr Dirk Pitt and his staff from the American National Underwater and Marine Agency in Washington. They are here at the personal invitation of Chancellor Lange.”
Haider looked as if he’d been punched in the stomach. He quickly recovered, straightened to his full height, half a head short of tall, and attempted to intimidate Pitt with a superior Teutonic demeanor. “Your purpose?”
“We’ve come for the same reason as you,” replied Pitt, studying his fingernails. “If old interrogation records of Nazi officials in your Berlin archives and our Library of Congress are correct, eighteen thousand works of art were hidden in excavated tunnels under a secret airfield. This could very well prove to be that secret airfield with its art depository chamber extending somewhere beyond the water barrier.”
Haider wisely realized he couldn’t bluster the tough, purposeful-looking men dressed in loose blue-green Viking dry suits. “You know, of course, any art that is found belongs to the German Republic until it can be traced and returned to the original owners.”
“We’re fully aware of that,” said Pitt. “We’re only interested in one particular piece.”
“Which one?”
“Sorry, I’m not allowed to say.”
Haider played his last card. “I must insist the police dive team be the first to enter the chamber.”
“Fine by us.” Giordino bowed and gestured toward the dark water. “Maybe if one of your deputies is lucky enough to make it in and back, we’ll find out what’s eating people in that hell hole down there.”