Odessa Sea Page 14

  “What was that?” Dahlgren asked.

  “The Canterbury. A Royal Navy C-class light cruiser built in 1915. She was presumed lost at sea in February 1917, but postwar records indicated she was torpedoed by a German U-boat, the UC-29.”

  “This is a long ways from Jutland,” Dahlgren said. “What were they doing squaring off way up here?”

  “The Allies were running guns and munitions to the Russians via Archangel,” Dirk said. “Once the Germans got wind of things, they tried to intervene as best they could.”

  “So the Canterbury was an escort ship?”

  “Possibly. She was on a return voyage from Archangel, though the records didn’t indicate whether she was accompanied by any other vessels.”

  Dirk eased their descent as they approached the bottom at two hundred meters. Almost directly below them, a long dark shape materialized on the seafloor. Too small for a ship, Summer identified it as a ship’s funnel. Lying dented in the sand, it pointed toward a towering black shape at the fringe of their view.

  Dirk engaged the thrusters and glided toward the object, scattering a deep school of mackerel. The ship materialized moments later, a forest green mass of steel engulfed in cold deepwater encrustation. Dirk held up a photo of the Canterbury he had culled from his research.

  Dahlgren glanced at the slab vertical sides of the ship in the image and compared it to the mass in front of them. “Looks like the spitting image.”

  They approached the wreck from its starboard flank, noting the ship rested on its keel at a slight angle. Moving up the side of its hull, Dirk turned to his right, guiding the submersible toward the forward deck. He could already tell from the size and limited open decking that the wreck was neither a freighter nor a fishing vessel. As they hovered above the starboard rail, he spotted the first indication of the ship’s true intent, a corroded light machine gun mounted on a stand. As they moved toward the bow, the submersible’s bright lights cast a shadow over a large gun and turret.

  “Certainly looks like one of her six-inch guns,” Dirk said.

  “We need to roll video.” Summer reached to a control panel and activated an exterior-mounted camera.

  “I’ll try to cover as many features as I can,” Dirk said.

  He slowly crisscrossed the length of the ship, allowing the camera to record the three additional six-inch gun turrets, a stack of torpedoes and launching tubes near the stern, and one remaining funnel. On the port flank, they found a large hole in the lower hull, the handiwork of the U-boat. After filming the damage in detail, Dirk guided the submersible to the Canterbury’s forward superstructure, rising to bridge level.

  Approaching the top-level bridge, they peered through the empty window frames into the control station. Though the wooden ship’s wheel had long since vanished as a feast for marine organisms, the remnants of the brass binnacle and telegraph stood erect near the helm.

  Dirk eased the submersible around the side of the bridge until its propulsion fans kicked up a cloud of sediment that obscured their visibility. He descended a level and moved aft, finding a short bank of cabins whose doors had been jarred open by the ship’s sinking. Poking the nose of the submersible into each room, he let the camera film until the sediment again flew. He continued moving down and aft until the submersible reached the stern rail.

  “That’s almost an hour of video.” Summer shut down the camera. “If that’s not enough detail to document her as the Canterbury, I don’t know what will.”

  “I bet there are some descendants of her crew that will appreciate a viewing,” Dirk said.

  She nodded. “I’ll make sure a copy gets sent to the Royal Navy Association.”

  Dirk took another high-level pass, the ship appearing forlorn in the dark depths. As the submersible began its slow ascent, a silent rumination fell over the NUMA crew, their thoughts on the young sailors who died on the ship a century before.

  Their quiet reflection ended when the submersible broke the surface to find a modern Russian oceanographic ship commanding the seas barely a hundred yards away.

  26

  “They’re on it.”

  Viktor Mansfield grimaced at the words. He looked to the ship’s captain, who stood beside a sonar operator’s console.

  “Are you sure it is the same wreck?” Mansfield asked.

  “Our hull-mounted sonar array shows a one-hundred-and-thirty-five-meter steel wreck, possibly mounting guns. We’re within a half mile of the German submarine’s coordinates of the sinking, in an otherwise remote section of the Norwegian coast. Come see for yourself.”

  Mansfield stomped across the bridge of the Russian oceanographic survey ship Tavda and glanced at the color sonar screen. He didn’t have to study the image’s details to know it was the Canterbury. “How did they know to get here now?”

  The hog-faced captain of the Tavda chortled. “Why don’t you call them up and ask?”

  “You talk to them. Tell them the wreck is a sovereign ship of Russia and to stand off.”

  The captain nodded. “I can do that.”

  Mansfield gazed at the turquoise survey ship, then focused on a submersible surfacing near its stern. “Before you talk to them, have my demolitions kit brought to the launch deck. I’m going to take care of the wreck straightaway.”

  Across the waves, the recovery team pulled the yellow NUMA submersible aboard the Odin. The lights on the stern deck were fully ablaze under the fading daylight as Dirk, Summer, and Dahlgren exited the craft. Dahlgren set the recovery team to work, inspecting the submersible and preparing it for future dives.

  “I’m going to make a copy of the video first thing.” Summer hurried toward a nearby laboratory bay, carrying a portable hard drive.

  Dirk gave her a wave. “I’ll report to the bridge and see what the Russians are doing here.”

  He made his way to the Odin’s pilothouse, where the captain, a bearded man named Littleton, was peering through binoculars at the Tavda. “What’s up with our nosey neighbors?”

  “Good question,” Littleton said. “He steamed right up to our position and wasn’t very considerate about backing away when I told him we had underwater operations in progress.” He passed the binoculars to Dirk. “Nice-looking ship, though.”

  Dirk admired the Russian vessel, nearly twice the size of the Odin. It featured multiple A-frames for deploying equipment, a moon pool, and a covered helicopter on an elevated pad amidships.

  “She’s called the Tavda,” Littleton said. “A recently launched oceanographic research ship with icebreaking capability. Apparently, she’s also designed to perform deep-sea salvage operations. Or so say the news reports.”

  “Looks first-rate. I wonder what she’s doing here?”

  His query was answered a short time later when the ship’s radio crackled with a Russian-accented voice. “Research vessel Odin, this is the survey ship Tavda. You are intruding on a shipwreck of the Russian Federation. Please vacate the area at once.”

  “Tavda, this is Odin,” Littleton said. “We have conducted a survey of the wreck and ascertained she is the British light cruiser Canterbury, sunk in 1917. Over.”

  There was a long pause. “Negative. The wreck is a warship of Russia. We must insist that you vacate the site at once.”

  Littleton looked at the Tavda again with his binoculars. A small contingent of armed Marines were assembling on the fan deck. He turned back to Dirk. “I think they’re serious about the wreck. Could they be right?”

  “It’s possible but doesn’t seem likely. The wreck’s dimensions and features match up perfectly to the specs we have on the Canterbury. But I guess it doesn’t much matter now. We’ve got the video of the survey. We can turn it over to the British and let them fight the Russians over it.”

  The captain nodded. “Then I guess we’re done here.” Littleton radioed the Tavda and informed them the NUMA ship
would move off the site as requested.

  Summer stepped onto the bridge a few minutes later. “Why are we moving?” she asked.

  “We don’t want to get shot over a rusty shipwreck.” Dirk motioned toward the Tavda. “Our Russian neighbors claim it’s theirs—and seem willing to wage a war over it.”

  Summer shook her head. “No, I think we need to take another dive on her. There’s something on the video I think you should see.”

  She plugged a flash drive into a computer at the rear of the bridge. Dirk and Littleton crowded around as footage of the Canterbury appeared. Summer fast-forwarded to the halfway point.

  “At about thirty minutes in, we filmed the starboard cabins just beneath the bridge,” she said. “This is the first one coming up.”

  The video showed the interior of the bridge as the submersible slid around to the starboard side. The submersible then dropped down a level and focused on an open steel door. The camera peered into the small room, showing the corroded remains of a metal desk and porcelain sink on one side and some scattered debris on the floor. The view lingered for a moment, then slowly turned away and out of the cabin as a flurry of silt from one of the submersible’s side thrusters filled the room.

  “There!” Summer stopped the video.

  Dirk and Littleton looked at each other and shook their heads.

  “Didn’t see anything,” Dirk said.

  “Look on the floor, near the side bulkhead, just before the silt gets thrown up.” Summer replayed the last section of the video, this time at slow speed.

  “That?” Dirk pointed at a reflection in the corner.

  “Yes.”

  Summer froze the frame and enlarged the image. Dirk and Littleton stared at it and nodded. There was no mistaking the small object that glimmered on the floor.

  It was a bar of solid gold.

  27

  With a large plastic crate of explosives secured to the submersible’s prow, Mansfield could barely see through the forward viewport. Only by raising his head and sitting forward in the pilot’s seat could he see past the crate to the stern of the Tavda.

  He glanced to the right of the cockpit, where a technician completed a predive checklist.

  “Clear to proceed?” Mansfield asked.

  “Yes, all systems are operational.”

  Mansfield radioed the deck crew to initiate launch. The large white submersible was hoisted over the ship’s moon pool and lowered into the water. Mansfield flooded the ballast tanks and activated a forward-looking sonar system. Before the submersible reached the seafloor, he had a directional bead on the shipwreck.

  He approached the Canterbury from the stern, then elevated the submersible past one of the ship’s massive bronze propellers, which were embedded in the seafloor. Reaching the stern rail, he moved forward along the portside deck. Due to his limited visibility, he kept the submersible well outboard of the ship.

  As he passed a gun turret amidships, he discerned the rising shadow of the cruiser’s high superstructure. Ascending to the bridge, he inspected it briefly, then eased the submersible down a level. As gently as he could, he parked the vessel on the corroded steel supports of what had been a teakwood deck. A row of four cabins stretched in front of them.

  Mansfield nodded to the technician. “Release the explosives here.”

  Kromer, the Moscow researcher, had provided him a crude plan of the ship and concluded Sir Leigh Hunt most likely would have berthed among the officers’ cabins beneath the bridge.

  Using an articulated robotic arm, the technician released a strap securing the explosives, then pushed the plastic crate off a forward-mounted skid plate. Mansfield assisted by backing the submersible away from the bulkhead. As the crate slid away, stirring a small cloud of silt, Mansfield noticed a faint light near the top of the bridge.

  The technician strained to see through the murk. “It’s away, and positioned against the bulkhead.”

  Mansfield looked for himself, then immediately elevated the submersible. Ascending past the top of the bridge, he was met by the lights of another submersible.

  The two crafts faced each other nose to nose, their LED exterior lights blinding each other’s pilot. Mansfield made out the blue lettering NUMA on the opposing vessel’s stern. In the opposing cockpit, he spotted two men and a woman wearing turquoise jumpsuits.

  The two submersibles operated on different communication frequencies, so they could not talk to each other. Mansfield called his support ship to relay a message to the Odin. A response came seconds later.

  “The NUMA ship reports its submersible left something on the wreck that it needs to retrieve. They will leave the site shortly.”

  Mansfield shook his head. “I think not,” he said to his copilot.

  As the NUMA submersible turned and descended on the starboard side of the superstructure, its occupants gave Mansfield a friendly wave. The Russian watched it disappear, then guided his submersible down a parallel path on the port side of the bridge. Returning to the crate of explosives, he eased close and hovered over it. “Activate the timer.”

  The technician extended the manipulator arm and opened a small compartment door. Mansfield edged close so that they could look down into the opening, where a timer clock sat next to a large toggle switch.

  The technician glanced at Mansfield for confirmation, then reached in with the manipulator and flipped the switch. The LED timer illuminated with a preset time of twenty minutes, which began counting down. “Detonation timer activated,” he said.

  Mansfield nodded and activated the thrusters. Backing away from the Canterbury, he purged the ballast tanks and they began ascending toward the surface. Rising above the wreck, he spotted the lights of the NUMA submersible on the opposite side of the Canterbury’s bridge. He watched with satisfaction as he distanced himself from the opposing submersible—and the explosives-laden wreck.

  28

  “Get me a little closer,” Summer urged.

  Dirk had maneuvered the submersible to the doorway of the first starboard cabin, where Summer extended the manipulator to its full reach. The gold bar, under a thin coating of silt, lay just beyond Summer’s grasp.

  “I can’t get much closer without knocking down a bulkhead or two.” Dirk elevated the submersible and pivoted it slightly before bringing the nose against the doorway a second time, then dropping to the deck. A fresh cloud of silt rolled through the cabin, forcing Summer to wait for the water to clear.

  Through the easing murk, she extended the manipulator once more and again fell short.

  Dahlgren noticed a slim bone handle protruding beneath the bar. “It looks like it’s sitting atop the remains of an attaché case. Maybe you can pull it over.”

  Summer grabbed the handle with the claw. Pulling gently, she shook her head as the handle tore away from the decayed remains of the case. “Nice idea, in theory.” She released the handle and gazed at the gold bar. “I’d hate to leave it here for the Russians.”

  “You just need a rake.” Dirk scanned the cabin and pointed to several thin, rusty slats. “Try one of those bits of scrap over there.”

  Summer used the manipulator to reach one of the steel slats, a remnant of a bed frame. Using it like a rake as Dirk suggested, she dragged the bar a foot or two, then released the beam and wrapped the manipulator’s claws around the gold bar. “Got it.”

  Dirk began easing the submersible away from the cabin when a deep rumble sounded through the water. A second later, they were struck by an invisible shock wave. The submersible was hurled away from the ship, smashing over the side rail and tumbling end over end until driven into the seabed a short distance away. As bits of corroded debris fell through the water in a black rain, the submersible vanished in a cloud of silt.

  The submersible’s darkened interior echoed with hissing, creaking, and electrical alarms, as well as some human moans. Su
mmer wiped a bead of blood from her eyes that had trickled from a gashed scalp and realized the interior wasn’t completely dark. A thin row of panel lights flashed near the helm, filling the interior with red and yellow hues.

  Her head felt like a jackhammer was splitting her skull, and when she tried to move, her limbs refused to respond. Someone rummaged around the floorboards and shoved her leg aside, igniting a new agony. She tried to cry out but felt too woozy to speak. She perked up when she realized it was her brother but flinched when he leaned over and she saw his face was red. Was it blood or just the lights?

  “Hang on, sis,” he said. “The elevator is headed up.”

  She gave him a smile and then drifted into a cold, deep sleep.

  29

  Mansfield’s submersible reached the surface as the explosives detonated. He and his copilot felt only a slight vibration but watched as a fountain of froth erupted from the sea nearby. The submersible was hoisted aboard the Tavda, and Mansfield made his way to the bridge.

  “The American ship has inquired about an explosion,” the captain said.

  “Tell them we know nothing about it but are standing by to assist if needed.”

  Mansfield listened to the angry voice of Littleton relay that he had a submersible in the water. Smiling, he turned to the Tavda’s captain. “Reply that we can assist in the search, but, regrettably, our own submersible requires immediate repairs, which will take several hours.”

  The Odin’s captain ignored the message.

  A short time later, Mansfield noticed the NUMA ship had several spotlights trained on the water. Following the beams through a pair of binoculars, he spotted the yellow submarine bobbing on the surface.

  “So they survived,” he muttered. He turned to the captain. “The Americans will surely leave the site now. When they do, follow them at the extreme range of our radar system until they give an indication of turning to port.”