'Yes, yes,' Pencroft pushed. 'I'm out of tea and brandy and at my age that's more important to me than this conversation that seems to have no end to it.' Indy knew the old man was in pain but was concealing it beneath sudden brusqueness.
Treadwell took a deep breath. 'The flying boat, that Rohrbach with the diamonds aboard and perhaps this mysterious cube as well, never made it to Germany. '
That brought up both Indy and Pencroft, fully attentive. 'Don't tell me that someone hijacked the German airliner!'
Pencroft said, on the edge of bursting out into laughter.
'What happened?' Indy asked quietly.
'We were told what happened,' Treadwell said, hesitating.
'Speak up, man!' Pencroft shouted.
'There is one man we talked with,' Treadwell said slowly and carefully, 'who apparently was a member of the Rohrbach crew. The only survivor of an attack on that airplane. He told us they had flown the night through to cross Africa. The pilot kept the airplane high, at fourteen thousand feet, which is about the limit for a Rohrbach with a heavy fuel load. He also spoke about the cold at altitude, and some of the crew having headaches from the lack of oxygen.'
'Yes, yes,' Pencroft prompted. 'Then what?'
'There was a great deal of excitement in the cockpit. He saw the radioman—he remembered him as Stryker, and we've confirmed that, by the way—anyway, Stryker was upset about his radios not working, and then after some more excitement in the cockpit, while they were
over what was apparently the center of the Mediterranean, von Moreau started his descent to land on the water.'
'You haven't said why he'd do that,' Indy said critically. 'I don't want this to be a guessing game about engine problems or fuel or whatever. Why did the pilot start down?'
'The crewman—'
'Wait a moment,' Pencroft interrupted. 'You said one survivor. How'd you get this bloke?'
'A French airliner, flying low over the sea to stay beneath clouds at night, saw a fire beneath them. They didn't know what it was. It could have been a crashed airplane or a ship of some kind. They fired off a radio distress call right away. We were fortunate enough in having a British vessel nearby, and it went promptly to where the French had reported the fire. They found some wreckage in the water, and their searchlights picked out one man clinging to a section of wood. He was injured rather badly. Broken bones, burns, shock. The moment they had attended to him as best they could, the purser asked him if there might be any other survivors, lifeboats; anything. He said no.'
'Go on. What did he say?' Indy demanded.
Treadwell took a deep breath. 'He said they were forced down by some huge vessel in the sky, gleaming, silvery. That it was perhaps a thousand yards in length, very fast—'
'That couldn't be a dirigible,' Pencroft murmured. 'Nothing of that size—'
Indy gestured to Pencroft to let Treadwell continue.
'A lot of what he Said seemed to be babbling, and of course he was suffering from his pain and his injuries. But the purser said he was quite adamant about this vessel and its size, that it was very fast, and that several of the crew were amazed to notice that it didn't have any engines.'
'That's one hell of a sausage balloon you're describing,' Indy said, openly disbelieving.
'I'm not describing. I am telling you what we heard from this one man.
There's more.'
'Go on, go on,' Pencroft prodded.
'A number of silvery, or golden, the man wasn't sure, craft separated from the huge ship. They were shaped like scimitars, he said. Or perhaps crescents, or boomerangs. Whatever they were they moved with tremendous speed, whirling about the Rohrbach like it was stuck in mud.' Treadwell paused. 'And those didn't have any engines, either.'
'Why did the airliner land?' Indy asked.
'Apparently there was a radio message from the larger ship telling them to land, or be destroyed. Then the scimitar ships took up close formation with the Rohrbach. They landed on the sea, the bigger vessel came down very low, and what appeared to be humanlike figures lowered from the vessel to the flying boat. They shot up the wings, first, then opened fire on the crew. The two pilots were killed immediately. That's all this man knew. He was hit, and tumbled from the Rohrbach into the water. He had on an inflatable vest, but didn't use it right away. Moments later, he said, the flying boat was burning and then it exploded. He was burned in the explosion, and just managed to get his vest inflated before he passed out.'
'What happened with this great machine and the scimitars that fly about without engines?'
'We don't know.'
'You're certain this isn't all a fairy tale?' Indy jabbed at Treadwell.
'Professor Jones, there are thirtytwo dead men in South Africa, two destroyed trains, and a railway trestle blown to smithereens. The South Africans are frantic with the loss of what they say was a billion dollars worth of gems. A Rohrbach flying boat is destroyed, or if not destroyed, most certainly it and its crew are missing. We have an eyewitness with incredible stories of what he claims to have seen, and you have not heard the hysteria within Germany about the entire affair.
And your rumor from South Africa did reach the Vatican; the Pope and his inner circle are in a dither about the artifact.'
'Can I talk with this survivor?' Indy asked aloud.
'I'd like to talk to him as well,' Treadwell answered, his tone showing clear disappointment. 'Unfortunately, he did not live very long. Right now our people in Germany are using their special contacts to determine his
