being proposed. The foundation would donate an ongoing grant in a bank of your choice. You could draw on the bank account at any time for any purpose, with one stipulation: The money must be spent to recover the Iraqi artifacts. There is no current limit on the funds available.”
Suddenly interested, Carina considered the offer. “Mr. Baltazar is most generous.”
Benoir beamed. “Well, Mademoiselle Mechadi?”
Carina was in a quandary. She was balancing several UNESCO assignments, but she couldn’t let a chance like this pass. She scanned the agreement. “Let me study this proposal and I’ll call you tomorrow with my answer.”
The next day she called Benoir and told him her answer was yes. In her UNESCO job, Carina had worked with governments, international police, museum people, and archaeology experts, but the possibilities of unlimited funding opened up whole new worlds. With wads of cash in her hand, she would be able to buy access to the unsavory characters who populated the antiquities trade. And so it was. Soon she developed an effective network of police and underworld informants who often gave her leads on antiquities missing from countries other than Iraq.
One of her more reliable sources was a crooked Egyptian army officer she knew only as the Colonel. Less than a week before, he had called her out of the blue with the news that the cache of Iraqi objects she had been looking for was being put up for sale by a petty thief named Hassan. She told the officer that she would see him within forty-eight hours, wired him a deposit, and told him to make the buy sight unseen.
The agreement with the Baltazar Foundation required that she keep it informed of immediate developments. She called Benoir with the news about Hassan, and Benoir said he would pass the news along. Before flying to Cairo, she called Professor Nasir in Baghdad and told him that she was close to recovering the cache.
Nasir was delighted, but conditions were still chaotic in Iraq and he was worried about the safety of the collection. He was trying to find funds to set up an efficient record-keeping system for the museum’s existing collection. Nasir enthusiastically embraced Carina’s suggestion that the artifacts be used to leverage donations. He would sign a waiver allowing her to keep the artifacts temporarily in her possession and would contact the Iraqi embassy in Washington to alert the diplomatic staff to the possibility of a tour.
Events moved quickly when she got to Egypt. Over lunch at the Nile Sheraton Hotel, the Colonel said he had already acquired the collection. He gallantly bought her lunch after she had paid him his full fee. That night, in a warehouse on the docks of Port Said, she had waited with growing excitement for the truck that pulled in shortly after midnight.
The artifacts in the truck were covered with dirt, but they were in more or less decent condition. She did a quick inventory by flashlight, writing down a description and number for each item. One of the larger pieces was a tall statue of a man wearing a kilt and conical cap. The bronze surface was caked from grime from the bearded face to the cat at the feet of the figure. The statue didn’t appear on her original artifact list, but a wrinkled paper tag affixed to one arm by a string identified the work as the
Flying ahead of the freighter to Salerno, she arranged for the trans-shipment of the cargo to the United States on the
She stopped during her walk now and peered down an alley between stacks to make sure that the blue- painted container was still there. She continued on to the bow, where a blast of icy air hit her as she stepped out onto the open deck.
The captain had told her over dinner the night before that the ship’s cruising speed was eighteen knots. He would reduce that as they neared Newfoundland and entered the area known as “Iceberg Alley.” The warning made her more curious than fearful.
She paused at the bow to look for icebergs. Only trunk-sized chunks floated in the gray sea. Several layers of clothing were still not enough to keep the icy fingers of wind from tickling her ribs. Hot coffee and scrambled eggs would be waiting in the mess hall. She turned her back to the open sea and headed along the ship’s port side.
Carina was about two-thirds of the way to the bridge when she heard a beating sound above the swash of the hull through the sea. She looked up and saw a pair of helicopters flying close together a couple of hundred feet above water level. They were rapidly approaching the ship. No markings of any kind were visible on the black fuselages.
Carina was surprised at their sudden appearance. The ship was a hundred miles from land. She remembered the captain’s mention of oil and gas rigs in the area. The helicopters must belong to a drilling platform.
The helicopters buzzed the ship barely above mast level, banked around in a tight formation, and circled the moving vessel like birds of prey in an ever-tightening spiral before disappearing out of the line of sight. The sound of spinning rotors faded. The helicopters evidently had landed on top of the container stacks.
Carina was sure she’d learn the identity of the visitors when she got to the mess hall. She resumed her walk, only to suddenly stop in her tracks. Ahead of her, a figure dropped down from a container stack at the end of a rope and landed on the deck. Three more figures rappelled down the rope and stood in her way. Masks hid their faces except for the eyes. They were dressed in tight-fitting black uniforms and armed with short-barreled automatic weapons.
Carina turned and ran, but four more armed figures had descended from the stacks behind her, and they closed in on her. One of the strangers grabbed her by the arm and spun her around, and her wrists were roughly tied behind her back with duct tape.
She was shoved in the direction of the bridge house and a gun muzzle was jabbed hard between the shoulder blades. More figures were coming in their direction. Carina recognized two Filipino crewmen. She saw their smiling faces and the situation became crystal clear. The Filipinos were working with the hijackers.
The raiding party split up into two groups. One crewman set out toward the bridge house with four hijackers. The other man led the way along the deck. The whole operation had been conducted in silence. These men knew what they were doing and what they wanted, Carina thought. But she was dumbfounded when the crewman directed her to the container box holding her artifacts and rapped his gloved knuckles on the metal surface.
The container door was hemmed in by other boxes. A hijacker opened a metal suitcase and removed a torch and oxygen tank. He assembled the torch, ignited the flame, and adjusted it to a fine point. He donned a pair of goggles to protect his eyes from the shower of sparks and methodically began to cut a hole in the side of the container.
An involuntary cry of protest escaped Carina’s lips. Her outburst brought an instant response. One of her captors grabbed her arms and kicked her in the ankle at the same time. Catrina, having lost her footing and unable to use her arms to break her fall, hit the deck. Her forehead smashed against a hard surface and she blacked out.
When she regained consciousness, she was lying on her back in semidarkness. Her head throbbed with pain. She rolled over on her side and saw that she was wedged between two wooden cartons inside the container. Light streamed into the space from a rectangular hole framed by ragged edges from the cutting torch.
She tried to stand, but it was difficult to get her feet under her with her hands bound behind her back, and the effort made her dizzy. As she lay on the cold steel floor with her chest heaving from exertion, she saw a shadow against the crates. A man peered in at her through the hole. His face was slightly plump around the cheeks, but the round eyes that stared out of the cherubic face had a demonic intensity.
Carina’s blood ran cold. It was one of the most frightening faces she had ever seen.
Her expression must have mirrored her thoughts because the man smiled.
Carina was almost grateful when she passed out again.
Chapter 9
THE ORANGE-AND-WHITE HERCULES 130HC long-range surveillance aircraft had taken off at dawn from St. John’s and headed east on a seven-hour flight for the International Ice Patrol. Cruising at three hundred fifty miles
