opened his mouth-apparently to protest, given Porter Stone’s standing order for compartmentalization-but then he simply shrugged, smiled faintly, and gestured him forward.
The archaeological team had finished their initial examination of the skeleton discovered by the dive team- now it was up to Rush to perform what would be, in essence, a postmortem.
The collection of bones themselves sat in a blue plastic evidence locker, set upon a wheeled cart of stainless steel. As the others watched, Rush snapped on a pair of latex gloves, then pulled the ceiling-mounted microphone toward him, pressed the Record button, and began to speak.
“Examination of remains found on day sixteen of project, in a shallow cave within grid square G three. Ethan Rush performing the analysis, with Gail Trapsin assisting.” A pause. “The matrix of silt and mud surrounding the remains has apparently acted as a preservative, and the skeleton is in very good condition, considering. Nevertheless, there is considerable decay.”
He took the cover from the evidence locker, then began carefully removing the bones and placing them on the nearby autopsy table. “The cranial and facial bones are intact, as are those of the rib cage, arms, and vertebral column. Dive teams have searched for the remainder of the skeleton, without success, finding only a few leathery fragments of what might once have been sandals. The archaeological team has speculated that only the upper portion of the body was preserved in the silty matrix, and that the lower section has completely decayed and is no longer extant.”
He placed the bones on the table, roughly in anatomical order. Logan looked at them curiously. They were a dark brown, almost mahogany, as if varnished by their five-millennium-long mud bath. As Rush worked, bringing out more bones, the room began to smell of the Sudd: peat, vegetal decay, and an odd, sweetish smell that made Logan feel faintly nauseous.
Rush spoke into the microphone again. “Radiocarbon dating by mass spectrometer indicates that the bones are approximately fifty-two hundred years old, with a two percent margin of error due to the natural contaminants in the surrounding matrix.”
“Contemporaneous with Narmer,” Romero said quietly as she toyed with her ever-present fountain pen.
“Found with the body was a round shield, badly deteriorated, and the remains of what appears to be a mace.”
“Equipment of the pharaoh’s personal bodyguard,” Romero added.
“While, as I mention, the shield is in poor condition,” Rush continued, “the archaeology team has used reverse-investment casting, in concert with digital enhancement, to sharpen the remains of what seems to be ornamentation on the shield’s face. Archaeology believes the ornament to be a serekh, enclosing two symbols: a fish, and what appears to be a tool of some kind.”
“A catfish and a chisel,” Romero said. “The phonetic representation of Narmer’s name. At least, that’s what I assume-if March would ever let me take a look at the damn thing.”
Rush pressed the button on the microphone. “Christina, would you mind reserving your comments until after I’ve finished my report?”
Romero inclined her head and pressed her fingers lightly to her forehead in mock genuflection. “Sorry.”
Rush addressed the microphone again. “As for the bones themselves, the skull is relatively intact, the neurocranium and the splanchnocranium suffering the least amount of damage. The temporal bones are missing. The mandible, hyoid bone, and clavicle show somewhat more deterioration. Most of the teeth are missing, and those that remain show the advanced caries common to the period.” He paused to examine the rest of the bones. “The articulated vertebra grow increasingly damaged and decayed as we move from the cervical to the thoracic to the lumbar. The last extant vertebra is L two-the sacral and coccygeal vertebrae are entirely missing. Ribs one through eight are extant. While the lower of the existing ribs become increasingly damaged, there are distinct marks on the anterior of rib six”-here he paused again for a closer look-“that suggest the scraping of a knife or sword. This would lead one to assume the manner of death to be homicide.”
“I knew it!” Romero shouted in a triumphant voice.
This sudden outburst, in marked contrast to Rush’s even, reasoned tone, caused Logan to jump. Once again, Rush turned off the microphone, an irritated look crossing his face. “Christina, I have to insist that you-”
“But you’re wrong about the manner of death,” Romero interrupted again. The note of triumph had not left her voice. “It wasn’t murder. It was suicide.”
Rush’s look of irritation turned to something closer to disbelief. “How can you possibly know-”
“And that isn’t all. Not far away-maybe fifty, maybe a hundred yards north of where this was discovered- we’re going to find more skeletons. A whole hell of a lot more skeletons. I’m off to tell Valentino where to concentrate his divers.” And without another word she turned and walked briskly out of the medical bay, leaving Logan and Rush to look at each other in bafflement.
20
The discovery of the skeleton had another effect beyond boosting the spirits of the searchers and raising the level of excitement across the Station-it also heralded the approach of Porter Stone himself. Arriving sometime late that evening under cover of darkness, he called for a Station-wide meeting the following morning. All work-even the diving itself-would take a thirty-minute recess while Stone addressed the expeditionary team.
The meeting was to be held in the largest space on the Station: the machine shop in Green. As Logan stepped into the shop at precisely ten o’clock, he looked around curiously. Metal racks stretched from floor to ceiling on three of the walls, containing every imaginable part, tool, and piece of equipment. Several Jet Skis sat on lifts in various stages of disassembly. A half-dozen other large sections of engines and diving equipment were arrayed on metal tables. In one corner sat what looked like part of the ruined generator, its flanks blackened and ugly under the bright work lights.
Logan’s glance shifted from the room itself to those standing within it, waiting for Stone. It was an incredibly diverse crowd: scientists in lab coats, technicians, divers, roustabouts, cooks, electricians, mechanics, engineers, historians, archaeologists, pilots-a throng of some one hundred and fifty people, all gathered here at the whim of a single man: a man with a crystal clear vision of what he wanted to accomplish and with the iron will to see that vision through.
As if on cue, Stone stepped into the machine shop. The crowd broke into spontaneous applause. Stone moved through the multitude, shaking hands, murmuring fragments of sentences to people who stopped him. He had abandoned the Arab garb for a linen suit, but if he had been wearing a leather bomber jacket and a pith helmet he would have looked no more the adventurer: something about his tanned, heavily weathered skin and the way his tall, lean body moved with an almost animal grace seemed to exude exploration and discovery.
Reaching the back of the room, he turned to face the group, smiling broadly, and raised his hands. Gradually, the crowd fell into a restive silence. Stone glanced around, still smiling, allowing the drama to build. And then at last he cleared his throat and began to speak.
“My first experience as a treasure seeker,” he said, “took place when I was eleven. In the Colorado town where I grew up, there was a local legend about a band of Indians that had once lived in the fields just outside town. Boys like myself, college students, even professional archaeologists had visited those fields again and again, dug holes and test trenches, swept the area with metal detectors-all without finding so much as a single bead. I was among them. I must have wandered over those fields a dozen times, eyes on the ground, searching.
“And then one day I raised my eyes from the ground. I looked-really looked — at the place for the first time. Beyond the fields, the land fell gently down to the Rio Grande, about a mile away. There were stands of cottonwoods along the river, and the grass was lush and thick.
“In my youthful mind’s eye I traveled back two hundred years. I saw a band of Indians, camped on the river’s edge. There was water for drinking and cooking, abundant fish, sweet grass for the horses, shade and shelter beneath the trees. Then I looked at the dry, barren field in which I stood. Why, I wondered, would Native Americans make their camp here-when another, more favorable spot was so close by?
“So I hiked the mile down to the river and began poking around in the dirt and grass by the riverbank. And within ten minutes I discovered this.” Reaching into his pocket, he drew something out and held it up for the crowd to see. Logan saw it was an obsidian arrowhead, perfectly flaked: a real beauty.
