The Navigator

“I will.”

“Thanks for your help,” Gamay said. “We won’t delay you any longer.”

McCullough shook hands all around and rolled off to his class.

PAUL WATCHED the professor make his way across the lawn.

“In the file Kurt sent us at Woods Hole, he mentioned that he had been asked to look into the Phoenician puzzle by a State Department guy named Nickerson. He met him on an old Potomac River yacht.”

“I recall the name. Think it’s the same person?”

Paul shrugged and flipped open his cell phone. He scrolled down the index until he found the number of a State Department staffer he had worked with on ocean jurisdiction issues. Moments later, he hung up.

“Nickerson is an undersecretary. My pal at Foggy Bottom doesn’t know him personally but says Nickerson is an insider and a survivor. He’s considered brilliant but eccentric, and he lives on an antique yacht on the Potomac. He gave me the name of the marina but not the yacht. How about making a quick stop along the Potomac on the way home?”

“Wouldn’t it be easier if we knew the boat’s name?” Angela said.

“If we liked doing things the easy way, we wouldn’t be working for NUMA,” Paul said.

THE SEARCH FOR Nickerson’s boat was tougher than the Trouts had anticipated.

A number of boats could have qualified as old, but only one—a white-hulled motor cruiser named Lovely Lady—that fit the bill as an antique.

Paul got out of the SUV and went over to the boat. The deck was deserted, and there didn’t seem to be any signs of life on board. He walked up the boarding plank and called hello a couple of times.

No one answered from the yacht, but a man popped his head out of a cabin cruiser in the next slip.

“Nick’s not on board,” he said. “Took off awhile ago.”

Paul thanked him and headed back to the car. On the way, he glanced at the boat’s name again and noticed that the transom was whiter than the rest of the hull. He went back to Nickerson’s neighbor and asked if the yacht’s name had been changed.

“As a matter of fact, it has,” the man said.

Minutes later, Paul slid behind the steering wheel. “No Nickerson,” he said.

“I saw you checking out the boat’s name,” Gamay said.

“Just curious. Nickerson’s neighbor said the yacht used to be called Thistle.”

Angela’s ears perked up. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Artichokes.”

“Come again?” Trout said.

“It’s something I came across when I was pulling files for my writer friend. The globe artichoke is a thistle.”

Chapter 42

SAXON UNLOCKED THE DOOR to his rented cottage near the bay and snapped the light on. Flashing a toothy grin, he said: “Welcome to the Saxon archaeological conservation lab.”

The chairs and sofa in the musty living room had been pushed back against the walls to make space for a plastic trash barrel and two folding picnic tables set up end to end. Stacked on the tables were layers of thick paper sandwiched between top and bottom plywood sheets.

The amphora lay on the sofa in two pieces. The mottled green surface of the slim, tapering container was pitted with corrosion. The sealed top had been severed from the main part at the neck and lay a few inches from the body. Austin picked up a hacksaw from the table and examined the greenish dust caught in the teeth.

“I see that you used the finest precision instruments.”

“Home Depot, actually,” Saxon said. He looked embarrassed. “I know you’re thinking that I’m a vandal. But I’ve had extensive experience in artifact conservation under primitive conditions and I didn’t want a nosy conservator asking questions. There was a risk, but I would have gone bloody bonkers if I had to wait to find out what’s in that jug. I was very careful.”

“I might have done the same thing,” Austin said, setting the hacksaw down. “I hope you’re telling me that the patient died but the operation was a success.”

Saxon spread his arms wide. “The gods of ancient Phoenicia were smiling on me. It succeeded beyond my wildest dreams. The amphora contained a largely intact papyrus rolled up inside it.”

“It’s been under water a long time,” Zavala said. “What condition was it in?”

“Papyrus thrives best in a dry climate like the Egyptian desert, but the amphora was tightly sealed and the papyrus encapsulated in a leather case. I’m hoping for the best.”

Austin lifted the lid off the trash container. “More high-tech?”

“That’s my ultrasonic humidification chamber. The pages were too brittle to be unwound without damage and had to be humidified. I put water in the bottom of the receptacle, wrapped the roll in sheets of blotting paper, placed it inside a smaller plastic container with holes cut out of it, and clamped the lid on tight.”

“This contraption actually works?”

“In theory. We’ll have to see.” Saxon glanced toward the plywood sandwich on the tables.

“And that must be your super-duper ion dehumidifier,” Austin said.

“When the moistened roll became pliable, I sandwiched it between sheets of blotting paper and Gore-Tex, which absorbs the dampness. The weight of the plywood will flatten out the pages while the papyrus cooks.”

“Did you see any writing on the papyrus?” Austin said.

“Light can darken a papyrus, so I unrolled it with the shades drawn. I glanced at it using a flashlight. It was hard to make out much writing because of the surface stains. I’m hoping that they will have lightened with drying.”

“How soon before we can take a look at it?” Zavala said.

“It should be ready now. In theory.”

A chuckle came from deep in Austin’s throat. “Mr. Saxon is going to be a perfect fit for NUMA, Joe.”

“I agree,” Zavala said. “He’s innovative, ingenious, isn’t afraid to improvise, and is skilled in the fine art of CYA.”

“Pardon me?” Saxon said.

“That’s Spanish for Cover Your Ass,” Zavala explained.

Saxon tweaked the end of his mustache like a silent-film villain. “In that case, I’m glad you are here. If I foul things up, we can share the blame.” He switched off the pole lamps. “Gentlemen, we are about to prove that the Phoenicians reached the shores of North America centuries before Columbus was born.”

Austin slipped his fingers under the edge of the plywood. “Shall we?”

They carefully lifted the top plywood from the pile and set it aside, then removed the Gore-Tex and blotting- paper layers. The papyrus was about fifteen feet long, made up of individual sheets approximately a foot high and twenty inches wide.

The ragged-edged pages were amazingly intact. The papyrus was darkly splotched over much of the mottled brown surface. Script was visible in places, but much of the writing had blended in with the stains.

Saxon looked like a child who’d gotten a pair of socks for his birthday. “Damn! It’s covered with mold.”

His full-speed-ahead exuberance had crashed into a wall of reality. He gazed with stony eyes at the papyrus, then went over to a window and stared out at the bay. Austin wasn’t about to let Saxon come apart. He went into the kitchenette and poured three glasses of water. He came back, gave one to Zavala, another to Saxon, and raised his own.

“We haven’t toasted the man who gave his life to bring this papyrus up from Davy Jones’s locker.”

Saxon got the point. His disappointment was nothing compared to the fate of the diver who had found the wreck and salvaged it. “To Hutch, and his lovely widow,” he said to the clink of glasses. They gathered once more around the papyrus.

Austin advised Saxon to focus. “Ignore the writing for now, and tell us about the physical qualities of the