The Kingdom Read online

  “So the Vacuum Ship was never built,” said Selma.

  “Not that we know of. In the late nineteenth century a man named Arthur De Bausset tried to get funding for what he called a vacuum-tube airship, but nothing came of it. As for De Terzi, according to history he kept working on his theory until he died in 1686.”

  “Where?”

  Sam smiled. “In Brescia.”

  “After gallivanting around the Himalayas,” Remi added. “Go on, Selma.”

  “According to the bamboo, De Terzi and his Chinese crew—he doesn’t say how many—crash-landed during a test flight of an airship he was designing for the Kangxi Emperor. The Emperor had named the airship the Great Dragon. Only De Terzi and two others survived the crash. He was the only one uninjured.”

  “The two mummies we found,” Remi said.

  “I checked the dates for the Kangxi Emperor,” said Selma. “He ruled from 1661 to 1722.”

  “The time line fits,” said Sam.

  “Now, here’s the good part: De Terzi states that while foraging for food he found a”—Selma read the printout—“‘mysterious vessel of a design he had never seen, engraved with symbols both similar and dissimilar to those used by my benefactor.’”

  Sam and Remi exchanged smiles.

  Selma continued: “In the final part of the engraving, De Terzi wrote that he had decided to leave his crewmates and head north, back toward the airship’s launch base, something he referred to as Shekar Gompa.”

  Sam said, “Did you check—”

  “I did. Shekar Gompa is only ruins now, but it’s located about forty miles northeast of where you found the ship, in Tibet.”

  “Go on.”

  “If De Terzi made it back to Shekar Gompa, he himself would tell the tale of the journey. If he failed, his body would never be found. The bamboo was to be his testament.”

  “And the mysterious vessel?” said Sam.

  “I left the best for last,” Selma replied. “De Terzi claimed he was going to take the vessel with him as, and I quote, ‘ransom to free my brother Giuseppe, held hostage by the Kangxi Emperor to ensure my return with the Great Dragon.’”

  “He took it with him,” Sam murmured. “He took the Theurang into Tibet.”

  Remi said, “I have so many questions, I don’t know where to start. First, how much history do we have on De Terzi?”

  “There’s very little out there. At least not that I could find,” Selma replied. “According to every source, De Terzi spent his life in Italy. He died there and is buried there. As Sam said, he spent his final years working on his Vacuum Ship.”

  “Both versions of his life can’t be true,” Sam said. “Either he never left Brescia and the bamboo is a hoax or he spent time in China working for the Kangxi Emperor.”

  “And perhaps died there,” Remi added.

  Sam saw the mischievous smile on Selma’s face. He said, “Okay, out with it.”

  “There’s nothing online about De Terzi, but there is a professor at University of Brescia who teaches a class in late Renaissance–era Italian inventors. According to their online catalog, De Terzi figures prominently in the curriculum.”

  Remi said, “You really enjoy doing that, don’t you?”

  “Not in the slightest,” Selma replied solemnly. “Just say the word, and I’ll have you in Italy by tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Just say the word, and we’ll get an Internet appointment for tomorrow.”

  GOLDFISH POINT, LA JOLLA

  CALIFORNIA

  The next day, late afternoon Italian time, on iChat, Sam and Remi introduced themselves and explained, ambiguously, the gist of their interest in Francesco Lana de Terzi to the course’s instructor, Professor Carlotta Moretti. Moretti, a mid-thirties brunette with owlish glasses, smiled at them from the computer screen.

  “So nice to meet you both,” she said in lightly accented English.

  “I am something of a fan, you know.”

  “Of ours?” Remi replied.

  “Si, si. I read about you in the Smithsonian magazine. The Napoleon’s lost cellar, and the cave in the mountains, the, uh . . .”

  “Grand Saint Bernard,” Sam offered.

  “Yes, that is it. Please excuse my prying, but I must ask: are you both well? Your faces?”

  “A hiking mishap,” Sam replied. “We’re on the mend.”

  “Oh, good. Well, I was fascinated, and then of course happy when you called. Surprised too. Tell me your interest in Francesco De Terzi and I will try to be of help to you.”

  “His name came up during a project,” Remi said. “We’ve been able to find surprisingly little published about him. We were told you’re something of an expert.”

  Moretti wagged her hand. “Expert, I do not know. I teach about De Terzi, and have had a curiosity about him since I was a little girl.”

  “We’re primarily interested in the latter part of his life; say, the last ten years. First, can you confirm that he had a brother?”

  “Oh, yes. Giuseppe Lana de Terzi.”

  “And is it true Francesco never left Brescia?”

  “Oh, no, that is untrue. De Terzi traveled often to Milan, to Genoa, to other places too.”

  “How about out of Italy? Overseas, perhaps?”

  “It is possible, though I could not say where exactly. Based on some accounts, mostly secondhand accounts of stories De Terzi was said to have told, he traveled distantly between the years 1675 and 1679. Though no historian I know of will confirm that.”

  “Do these stories talk about where he might have been?”

  “Somewhere in the Far East,” replied Moretti. “Asia, is one speculation.”

  “Why would he have gone there?”

  The professor hesitated. “You must understand, this may all be fantasy. There is so little documentation to support any of this.”

  “We understand,” Sam replied.

  “The story goes that De Terzi could find no investors for his aircraft plan.”

  “The Vacuum Ship.”

  “Yes, that. He could find no one to give him money, not the government, not wealthy men here. He journeyed east hoping to find support so he might finish his work.”

  “And did he?”

  “No, not that I am aware of.”

  “What happened when he returned in 1679?” Sam said.

  “It is said he returned to Italy a changed man. Something bad had occurred during his travels, and Giuseppe did not return home. Francesco never spoke of that. Soon after, he resettled in Brescia, left the Jesuit Order, and moved to Vienna, Austria.”

  “In search of investors again?”

  “Perhaps, but in Vienna he found only bad luck.”

  “How so?” asked Remi.

  “Soon after he moved to Vienna he married, and then quickly followed a baby boy. Two years later came the big battle—the Siege and then the Battle of Vienna. Do you know of it?”

  “Only vaguely.”

  “The Siege lasted for two months, the Ottoman Empire fighting the Holy League: the Holy Roman Empire, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the Venetian Republic. In early September of 1683, the final battle was fought. Many tens of thousands of people died, including Francesco De Terzi’s wife and new son.”

  “That’s awful,” Remi said. “So sad.”

  “Si. It is said he was terribly heartbroken. First his brother, and then his new family, all dead. Shortly afterward, De Terzi disappeared again.”

  “Where?”

  Moretti shrugged. “Again, a mystery. He returned again to Brescia in October of 1685, and then died a few months later.”

  “Let me ask you what may sound like an odd question,” Remi said.

  “Please.”

  “Are you, or anyone, absolutely certain De Terzi returned to Brecia in 1685?”

  “That is an odd question. I suppose the answer would be no. I know of nothing that certifies he was buried here—or that he returned, for that matter. That part of the story is, like t
he rest, based on secondhand information. Short of an . . .”

  “Exhumation.”

  “Yes, an exhumation. Only that, and a DNA sample from his descendants, would be proof. Why do you ask? Do you have reason to believe—”

  “No, not really. We’re brainstorming.”

  Sam asked, “About these stories: do you believe any of them?”

  “Part of me wants to believe. It is a thrilling adventure, yes? But, as I said, the official histories of De Terzi’s life contain none of these accounts.”

  “A few minutes ago you said there is so little documentation. Does that mean there is some documentation?” Remi said.

  “There are a few letters, but written by friends. None in De Terzi’s own hand. It is what your justice system calls hearsay, si? Aside from those, there is only one other source that may be related to the stories. I am reluctant to mention it.”

  “Why?”

  “It is fiction, a short story written by De Terzi’s sister a few years after his death. Though named differently, the protagonist is clearly intended to be Francesco. Most thought the sister was trying to make money on his fame by exploiting the rumors.”

  “Can you give us the gist of the story?”

  “A fanciful tale, really.” Moretti gathered her thoughts. “The hero of the story leaves his home in Italy. After braving many dangers, he is captured by a tyrant in a strange land. He is forced to build a flying ship of war. The ship crashes in a desolate place, and just the hero and two of his comrades survive, only to eventually die of their injuries. The hero then finds a mysterious treasure, which the natives tell him is cursed, but he ignores the warning and undertakes an arduous journey back to the tyrant’s castle. Once there, he finds that his traveling companion, who the tyrant had been holding hostage, has been executed.

  “The hero returns to Italy with the treasure only to find more tragedy: his family has been killed by the plague. The hero is now convinced the curse is real, so he sets out to return the treasure to where he found it and is never heard from again.”

  Sam and Remi struggled to keep their faces expressionless.

  Sam said, “You don’t happen to have a copy of this story, do you?”

  “Yes, of course. I believe I have it in the original Italian as well as a very good English translation. As soon as we have finished our conversation, I will send you an electronic version.”

  38

  GOLDFISH POINT, LA JOLLA

  CALIFORNIA

  With copies of “The Great Dragon” on each of their iPads, Sam and Remi thanked Professor Moretti for her help. Sam and Remi read the story and e-mailed copies to Selma, Wendy, and Pete. As Remi was sending a copy of the story to Jack, Selma connected with him via iChat.

  “You two look absolutely giddy,” Karna said. “Don’t keep me in suspense. What have you found?”

  Sam said to Remi, “You tell him.”

  Remi first recounted their conversation with Moretti, then gave everyone a summary of “The Great Dragon.”

  “Incredible,” said Selma. “You’ve both read the story?”

  “Yes,” said Sam. “It should be in your e-mail. You too, Jack.”

  “Yes, I see it here.”

  “How closely does the story match the bamboo engraving?” asked Wendy.

  “If you replace the clearly fictional bits of the story with De Terzi’s alleged testament, you get what reads like a factual account: the crash, the number of survivors, the discovery of a mysterious treasure, the trek home . . . It’s all there.”

  “And the time line fits,” Remi said. “Between the secondhand accounts of De Terzi’s comings and goings, he could easily have been traveling to and from China.”

  “I am flabbergasted,” said Karna.

  Pete, who was paging through the story on Sam’s iPad, said, “What’s this map on the frontispiece?”

  “That’s the hero’s journey to return the treasure,” replied Remi. “Jack, do you have that?”

  “Looking at it right now. It appears De Terzi arrives from the west and first stops at what is labeled here as a castle. This, we can assume, is Shekar Gompa.”

  “The launch base for the airship,” Sam said.

  “And possibly the burial site for Giuseppe,” added Remi.

  Karna continued: “From Shekar Gompa, De Terzi travels east to the Great City. Based on the position of Shekar, the city could be Lhasa.”

  “Why would he go there?” asked Wendy. “The crash site is forty miles south of Shekar Gompa. Wasn’t he trying to return the treasure?”

  “Yes,” Sam replied, “but in the story when he reaches the castle a local wise man tells him he must return the treasure to ‘its rightful home.’ He is told to seek out another wise man in the Great City to the west.”

  Karna picked up Sam’s line of thought: “From the Great City, De Terzi continues eastward, eventually arrives at . . . I don’t know. There’s only an X here.”

  “Shangri-La,” Remi suggested.

  There were a few moments of silence from Karna, then: “You’re going to have to excuse me. Apologies. I’ll get back to you.”

  The iChat screen went dark.

  Karna was back thirty minutes later. “There are some rough grid lines and other landmarks on this map I’ll have to cross-reference, but using the distance from Shekar Gompa to Lhasa as a benchmark, the final leg of De Terzi’s journey ended in an area that’s know today as the Tsangpo Gorge.”

  “Your front-runner for the location of Shangri-La,” said Sam.

  “Yes indeed. Sam, Remi, you may have just solved a riddle six hundred years in the making.”

  Sam said, “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. How long will it take you to nail down the locations on the map?”

  “I’ll start right now. Give me a day.”

  39

  ARUNACHAL PRADESH REGION

  NORTHERN INDIA

  “Jack!” Remi called. “I didn’t really believe you’d show up.”

  Karna’s SUV rolled to a stop, and he climbed out. Remi gave him a hug, Sam shook his hand. “Glad you’re on board, Jack.”

  “As am I.”

  Standing behind Karna, Ajay nodded and smiled at them.

  Karna said, “You two look better than when I last saw your faces. Remi, how’s the foot? And the ribs?”

  “Healed enough that I can get around without gritting my teeth. I’ve got ACE bandages, a good pair of hiking boots, and a bottle of ibuprofen.”

  “Outstanding.”

  “She’ll outmarch all of us,” Sam said.

  “Any trouble getting here? Any tails? Suspicious people?”

  Remi answered. “None of the above.”

  Since their last conversation with Charles King, they had neither seen nor heard from him, his children, or Zhilan Hsu. It was a development they found at once pleasing and unnerving.

  “Jack, how did you conquer your fear of flying?” said Sam.

  “I didn’t, actually,” Karna replied. “I was utterly terrified from the moment we lifted off from Kathmandu to the moment I stepped off the plane in Bangladesh. My excitement for our expedition temporarily overpowered my fear, and, voilà, here I am.”

  “Here” was the end of a five-hundred-mile overland journey Sam and Remi had finished just a few hours earlier. Situated on the banks of the Siang River, the quiet town of Yingkiong, population nine hundred, was the last outpost of any significant population in northern India. From there, the next city, Nyingchi, Tibet, was a hundred miles northeast, through some of the world’s most forbidding jungles.

  Ten days had passed since their iChat conversation. It had taken that long to make all the necessary travel arrangements. True to his word, Karna had contacted them the next day, having worked nonstop in hopes of deciphering the map from “The Great Dragon.”

  De Terzi’s land navigation skills must have rivaled those of the Sentinels, Karna had explained. Both the bearings and distances on De Terzi’s map were remarkably accurate, mis
sing the real-world measurements by less than a mile and one compass degree. Once finished with his calculations, Karna was certain he had triangulated the location of Shangri-La down to a two-mile diameter. As he had suspected all along, the coordinates were in the heart of the Tsangpo River Gorge.

  Sam and Remi had studied the area on Google Earth but had seen nothing but towering peaks, raging rivers, and thick forests. Nothing that looked like a mushroom.

  Karna said, “What say we retire to a bar for a drink and a bit of chalk talk? It’s best you understand the nastiness we’re in for before we set out in the morning.”

  The tavern was a two-story building with a corrugated tin lean-to roof and clapboard walls. Inside, the lower level was devoted to a reception area and a restaurant that looked as if it had been stolen from a 1950s Hollywood western: wooden floors, a long J-shaped bar, and vertical posts supporting exposed ceiling joists. Their rooms for the night, Karna told them, were on the second floor.

  The tavern was surprisingly crowded. They found a trestle table against the wall beneath a flickering neon Schlitz sign and ordered four beers. They were ice-cold.

  “Most of what I’m going to tell you I got from Ajay, but since he’s not the loquacious type you’ll have to rely on my memory. As I told you, these are Ajay’s old stomping grounds, so we’re in good hands. By the way, Ajay, what’s the status of our transportation?”

  “All arranged, Mr. Karna.”

  “Fantastic. Correct me if I get offtrack while I’m talking, Ajay.”

  “Yes, Mr. Karna.”

  Karna sighed. “Can’t get him to call me Jack. Been trying for years.”