being claimed as salvage. Now they, too, slid down ropes into lifeboats.
As the warm morning sun climbed into a cloudless sky, the ship's list became ever sharper. By 9:50 A.M. she lay on her starboard side at a fortyfivedegree angle. The bow was partially submerged.
The Stockholm hove to about three miles away, her prow a twisted mass of metal. Debris littered the oily water. Two destroyer escorts and four Coast Guard cutters stood by Planes and helicopters circled overhead.
The end came around ten o'clock. Eleven hours after the collision, the Doria rolled completely onto her right side. The empty lifeboats that had defied all the crew's efforts to launch them floated away on their free of their davits at last. Foamy geysers exploded around the perimeter of the ship as air trapped in the hull blew out under pressure through the portholes.
Sunlight glinted on the huge rudder and the wet blades of the twin nineteenfoot propellers that had sent her steaming proudly across the ocean. Within minutes water engulfed the bow, the stern lifted at a steep angle, and the ship slid beneath the sea as if she'd been sucked under by the powerful tentacles of a gigantic sea monster.
As she sank, more seawater rushed into the hull and. filled compartments and staterooms. The pressure tearing apart metal and rivets produced that spooky, almost human moaning that used to send chills up the spines of submariners who had just sunk a ship.
The ship plunged toward the bottom in almost the same angle and position at which she sank. Two hundred twentyfive feet below, she came to a jarring stop, then settled levelly onto her sandy bier on her starboard side. Bubbles seething from hundreds of openings transformed the normally dark water around the wreck to a light blue.
Rubbish whirled around a tremendous vortex for at least fifteenteen minutes. As the water returned to normal, a Coast Guard boat moved in and dropped a marker buoy where the ship had been.
Gone from the world's sight was the twomilliondollar cargo of wines, fine fabrics, furniture, and olive oil.
Gone, too, was the incredible artworkthe murals and tapestries, the bronze statue of the old admiral.
And locked deep in the ship's interior was the black armored truck with the bulletriddled bodies and the deadly secret they had died for.
The tall blond man came .down the gangplank of the Ile de France onto Pier 84 and made his way to the customs shed. Wearing a black wool sailor's cap and a long overcoat, he was indistinguishable from the hundreds of passengers who swarmed onto the deck .
Discharging its humanitarian duty had put the French liner thirtysix hours behind schedule. It arrived in New York on Thursday afternoon to a tumultuous welcome, stayed long enough to unload seven hundred thirtythree Doria survivors. After accomplishing its historic rescue, the ship did a quick turnaround, steamed back up the Hudson River and out to sea. Time was money, after all.
' 'Next,' the customs officer said as he looked up from his table.
The officer wondered for a second if the man in front of him had been injured in the collision and decided the scar had healed long ago. ,
'State Department's waiving passports for survivors. Just sign this blank declaration card. All I need is your name and U.S. address,' the customs inspector said.
'Yes, thank you. They told us on the ship.' The blond man smiled. Or maybe it was just the scar. 'I'm afraid my passport is at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.' He said his name was Johnson and that he was going to Milwaukee.
The officer pointed. 'Follow that line, Mr. Johnson. The Public Health Service has got to check you for communicable diseases. Shouldn't take long. Next, please.'
The health inspection was brief, as promised. Moments later the blond man was through the gate. The crowd of survivors, relatives, and friends had surged from the steamship dock onto the street. There was a traffic jam of slowmoving, hornhonking trafficcars, buses, and taxis. He stopped at the curb and scanned the faces around him until a pair of eyes met his. Then two more and another. He nodded to acknowledge that he had seen his comrades, before they headed off' in different directions:
He moved away from the crowd, toward Fortyfourth Street and flagged down a taxi. He was weary from the night's exertions and looked forward to the chance to rest.
Their work was done. For now.
June 10, 2000
The Moroccan Coast
1 NINA KIROV STOOD AT THE TOP OF the ancient stairway, eyes sweeping the nearly stagnant green waters of the lagoon, thinking she had never seen a coast more barren than this isolated stretch of Moroccan shoreline. Nothing stirred in the oppressive, ovenlike heat. The only sign of human settlement was the duster of puttycolored, barrelroofed tombs that overlooked the lagoon like seaside condominiums for the departed. Centuries of sand drifting through the arched portals had mingled with the dust of the dead. Nina grinned with the delight of a child seeing presents under the Christmas tree. To a marine archaeologist, these bleak surroundings were more beautiful than the white sands and palm trees of a tropical paradise. The very awfulness of the mournful place would have protected it from her biggest fear: site contamination.
Nina vowed to thank Dr. Knox again for persuading her to join the expedition. She had refused the initial invitation, telling the caller from the University of Pennsylvania's respected anthropology department that it would be a waste of time. Every inch of Moroccan coastline must have been explored with a fine-tooth comb by now. Even if someone did discover an underwater site, it would have been buried under tons of concrete by the Romans, who invented waterfront renewal. As much as Nina admired their engineering skills, she considered the Romans Johnny-come-lately spoilers in the grand scheme of history. ,
She knew her refusal had more to do with sour grapes than archaeology. Nina was trying to dig herself out from under a mountain of paperwork generated by a shipwreck project off the coast of Cyprus in waters claimed by the Turks. Preliminary surveys suggested the wreck was of ancient Greek origin, triggering conflicting claims between these old enemies. With national honor at stake, the F16s from Ankara and Athens were warming up their engines when Nina dove on the wreck and identified it as a Syrian merchantman. This brought the Syrians into the mess, but it defused the potential for a bloody encounter. As the owner, president, and sole employee of her marine archaeological consultancy firm, MariTime Research, all the paperwork ended up in Nina's lap.
A few minutes after she told the university she was too busy to accept the invitation, Stanton Knox called.
'My hearing must be going bad, Dr. Kirov,' he said in the dry nasal tones she had heard a hundred times issuing from behind his lectern. 'I actually thought I heard someone tell me you were not interested in our Moroccan expedition, and of course that can't be true.'
Months had passed since she had talked to her old mentor. She smiled, picturing the, snowy shock of hair, the near manic gleam behind the wirerimmed spectacles, and the roue's mustache that curled up at the ends over a puckish mouth.
Nina tried to blunt the inevitable charm offensive she knew was coming.
'With all due respect, Professor Knox, I doubt if there's a stretch of the North African coast that hasn't been overbuilt by the Romans or discovered by somebody else.'
'Brava! I'm glad to see that you recall the first three lessons of Archaeology 101, Dr. Kirov.'
Nina chuckled at the ease with which Knox donned his professorial robe. She was in her thirties, owner of a successful consulting business, and held almost as many degrees as Knox did., Yet she still felt like a student within his aura. 'How could I ever forget? Skepticism, skepticism, and more skepticism.'
'Correct,' he said with obvious joy. 'The three snarling dogs of skepticism who will rip you to pieces unless you present them with a dinner of hard evidence. You'd be surprised at how often my preaching falls on deaf ears.' He sighed theatrically, and his tone became more businesslike. 'Well, I understand your concern, Dr. Kirov. Ordinarily I would agree with you about site contamination, but this location is on the Atlantic coast well beyond the Pillars of Melkarth, away from Roman influence.' '
Interesting. Knox used the Phoenician name for the western end of the Mediterranean where Gibraltar bends low to kiss Tangier. The Greeks and Romans called it the Pillars of Herakles. Nina knew from bitter classroom experience that when it came to names, Knox was as precise as a brain surgeon.
'Well, I'm terribly busy'
'Dr. Kirov, I might as well admit it,' Knox interjected. 'I need your help. Badly. I'm up to my neck in land
