"There's a lot of water in the gulf, to that I can attest, and under water you could be almost on top of something and still miss it. Peter tried to get Zoubeeir to narrow it down a little, and in a manner of speaking, he did. The god of the sea, Zoubeeir maintained, lined up with a piece of rock that looked like a camel on the shore. Trouble was, there's been a lot of development along the gulf since Zoubeeir was sponge diving, so if that particular rock formation ever existed anywhere but in the old man's imagination, I expect it's long gone.
"Peter was undaunted, though. One day near the end of the term, not having had any contact with him for a few years, I get a phone call out of the blue. "˜You've been mired in theory long enough,' Peter said. "˜It's time to find Zoubeeir's graveyard of amphorae and the golden god of the sea.' I took the bait. Marine archaeology is a relatively new discipline--it simply wasn't possible to do much of it until underwater technology was developed, particularly the Aqua-Lung, which wasn't invented until the 1940's. It was true I'd been immersed in theory about Mediterranean shipping routes, currents, and trade routes and all the rest. It was an exciting idea to go out and see what all that study would get me, and I confess I got bitten by the bug a little, too."
He paused and looked out to sea for a moment.
"You and Peter aren't still partners?" I asked.
"Nope," he replied. "The second summer I came over to help him, we had a serious difference of opinion. There were a couple of incidents that summer, one that caused me to question Peter's commitment to the protection of the heritage resource, another to question his sanity.
"While we both wanted to find Zoubeeir's ship, I wanted to find it for the knowledge it could bring, although if I was being completely honest, I could also see it making my reputation in the field. He wanted the treasure. At the end of the day, these were essentially incompatible philosophies, no matter how much the salvage industry claims the two visions can co-exist. I've come to look upon salvage companies as the marine equivalents of tomb robbers--not all, maybe, but many of them. We actually found a wreck, south of here, not very old, maybe three hundred years, but I was very excited about it, concerned about dating the wreck, seeing it was properly mapped and photographed. I went into town to get some equipment, and when I came back, the divers had already raised a lot of the stuff and were dividing it up. I was furious. I told Peter he was just paying lip service to marine archaeology, that I was along for window dressing. He was suitably contrite, said it wouldn't happen again, and for a while I tried to make myself believe him.
"But then there was the other incident." Briars took a deep breath before continuing. "I don't want to get into it, but we lost a diver, a young man, a kid really, one of my students. The sea was pretty choppy that day. I thought we should call it quits and head for shore. But Peter had seen something on the side scan sonar that he thought was worth checking out. There was only one diver that had any time left that day. You have to keep very close track of how much time you can be down in any given day: It depends on the depth you're working at, essentially. And you never go down without a buddy. The kid was over the side before anyone knew what was happening. I am certain Peter told him to go, although he denied it. We lost the trail of bubbles almost immediately in the choppy water. You have no idea what that's like, standing helplessly on the deck counting the seconds, knowing you're too late. Two of us went in, even though we'd had enough for one day. He was gone. We never found him. That was it for me. I left Peter's expedition. I went home and gave up the search for shipwrecks for a year or two. I remember I phoned the kid's parents when I got home. Talked to his dad. It was one of the worst things I've ever had to do in my life. The man was just shattered. Told me he'd entrusted his son to me, and I'd let him die. Which maybe I did. Maybe I didn't protest enough, you know, turned a blind eye to Peter's shenanigans. Anyway, why am I telling you this? You've had a rather rough few days yourself. Are you feeling okay?"
"Not too bad, all things considered," I replied. "But you're back looking for Zoubeeir's ship."
"Yes. Peter and I eventually became competitors, maybe even enemies, two former friends, two boats, both looking for the same thing. I said that there's a lot of water around here, but apparently, judging from the mess they've made of my boat, there wasn't enough for the two of us."
"Why did you come back?" I'd heard about people like this, obsessed with hidden treasure, sunken or otherwise. People who saw clues everywhere, and who refused to acknowledge information that would say they were wrong. People who were prepared to risk everything for some elusive and probably imaginary windfall. Peter Groves sounded like one of those people. The question was, I suppose, was I talking to another one now?
"I'm not entirely sure. I do know that if we could find this shipwreck, if it does exist, it would be a tremendous find. Ships that old are not exactly a dime a dozen. What it would tell us about life at that time would be spectacular. That's the thing about shipwrecks, you know. Archaeologists often dig up graveyards, tombs, that kind of thing, but the people in them have been specially prepared, laid out for the afterlife. Shipwrecks are different. They are little microcosms of life at the time. If they're merchant ships, you get an idea of what was valued in those times. You might get to see the difference between the officers and the common sailors, in terms of the utensils they used for eating, and so on. You are getting a chance to see the here and now of a particular time period, not the great hereafter, if you see what I mean. That's what I say, anyway, and I believe it. But maybe another reason is that my wife and I are getting divorced, my kids are essentially grown up, and I decided there were worse things to do with my sabbatical. I made a proposal to a foundation and got some funding.
"I've often wondered," Briars mused, "whether the kid, Mark Henderson, his name was, found something at the end. That's a real danger, you know. You see something really important--you might be the first person to see a ship in centuries, if not millennia. In your excitement, you ignore the timer that says it's time to head for the surface. But if he did see something, I couldn't find that, either."
"Here they are," Hedi called. "Any news?" he said to the first diver up the ladder.
"No joy," a young woman said, pulling off her mask and shaking her tank free. She pulled her blond hair back into a twist, and grabbed a towel.
"Ah, well. Come over and meet Lara," Briars said. "Lara, these are a couple more members of the team: Sandy Groves," he said, gesturing toward the young woman, "and Gus Patterson."
"Hi," they said in unison.
"Nothing?" Briars asked.
"'Fraid not," Gus said. "We found the formation that showed up on the scanner before it got trashed, but it turned out to be nothing. A wooden boat, yes, but one that went down about a week and a half ago, by the look of it. Nice to meet you, Lara."
"What did I tell you? Another day of great hopes dashed," Briars said, with a shrug.
The engines throttled up and the ship moved on several hundred yards, the outboard bouncing along behind. "We've got time for one more dive," Hedi said, slowing down and anchoring in a new position. "In you go, you two. You know the drill. I want you back up here on deck in no more than twenty-five minutes." Ron and Khmais sat on the gunwales, and then rolled backward into the water. "Watch for them," Hedi said to the others.