'Not sure,' Munk answered. 'There's something sticking up from the sediment about twenty yards astern. I can only see a vague shape under the stern lights.'
Everyone waited.
It seemed an eternity before Munk spoke again 'Okay, I've got it.'
Gunn turned to Woodson. 'Activate the two stereo bottom cameras and strobes. We should have this on film.'
Woodson nodded and moved off toward his equipment.
'Can you describe it?' Spencer asked.
'It looks like a funnel sticking upright in the ooze.' Munk's voice came through the instrument tunnel disembodied, but even the reverberated tone could not disguise the excitement behind it.
Gunn's expression went skeptical. 'Funnel?'
Drummer leaned over Gunn's shoulder. 'What kind of funnel?'
'A funnel with a hollow cone tapering to a point that you pour stuff through, you dumb rebel,' Munk replied irritably. 'It's passing under the starboard hull now. Tell Giordino to hold the boat stationary the second it appears under the bow viewports.'
Gunn stepped over to Giordino. 'Can you hold our position?'
'I'll give it a go, but if the current starts swinging us broadside, I won't be able to keep precise control and we'll lose visual contact with whatever that thing is out there.'
Gunn moved to the bow and lay down on the rubber sheathed floor. He stared out of one of the four forward viewports together with Merker and Spencer. They all saw the object almost immediately. It was as Munk had described it simply an inverted bell-shaped funnel about five inches in diameter, its tip protruding from the bottom sediment. Surprisingly, its condition was good. The exterior surface of the metal was tarnished, to be sure, but it appeared to be sound and solid, with no indication of flaking or heavy rust layers.
'Holding steady,' Giordino said, 'but I can't guarantee for how long.'
Without turning from the viewport, Gunn motioned to Woodson, who was bent over a pair of cameras, zooming their lenses toward the object on the sea floor. 'Omar?'
'Focused and shooting.'
Merker twisted around and looked at Gunn. 'Let's make a grab for it.'
Gunn remained silent, his nose almost touching the port. He seemed lost in concentration.
Merker's eyes narrowed questioningly. 'What about it, Rudi? I say let's grab it.'
The words finally penetrated Gunn's thoughts. 'Yes, yes, by all means,' he mumbled vaguely.
Merker unhooked a metal box that was attached to the forward bulkhead by a five-foot cable and positioned himself at the center viewport. The box contained a series of toggle switches that surrounded a small circular knob. It was the control unit for the manipulator, a four-hundred-pound mechanical arm that hung grotesquely from the lower bow of the Sappho I.
Merker pushed a switch that activated the arm. Then he deftly moved his fingers over the controls as the mechanism hummed and the arm extended to its full seven-foot reach. It was eight inches shy of the funnel in the sediment outside.
'I need another foot,' Merker said.
'Get ready,' Giordino replied. 'The forward movement may break my position.'
The funnel seemed to pass with agonizing slowness under the manipulator's stainless-steel claw. Merker gently eased the pincers over the lip of the funnel, and then he pressed another switch and they closed, but his timing was off; the current clutched the submersible and began swinging it broadside. The claw missed by no more than an inch and its pincers came together empty.
'She's breaking to port,' Giordino yelled, 'I can't hold her.'
Quickly, Merker's fingers danced over the control box. He would have to try for a second grab on the fly. If he missed again, it would be next to impossible to relocate the funnel under the limited visibility. Sweat began erupting on his brow, and his hands grew tense.
He bent the arm against its stop and turned the claw six degrees to starboard, compensating for the opposite swing of the Sappho. He flipped the switch again and the claw dropped, and the pincers closed in almost the same motion. The lip of the funnel rested between them.
Merker had it.
Now he eased the arm upward, gradually easing the funnel from its resting place in the sediment. The sweat was rolling into his eyes now, but he kept them open. There could be no hesitating one mistake and the object would be lost on the sea floor forever. Then the slimy ooze relinquished its hold and the funnel came free and rose up toward the viewports.
'My God!' Woodson whispered. 'That's no funnel.'
'It looks like a horn,' Merker said.
Gunn shook his head. 'It's a cornet.'
'How can you be sure?' Giordino had left the pilot's console and was peering over Gunn's shoulder through the port.
'I played one in my high-school band.'
The others recognized it now, too. They could readily make out the flaring mouth of the bell and behind it, the curved tubes leading to the valves and mouthpiece.
'Judging from the look of it,' Merker said, 'I'd say it was brass.'
'That's why Munk's magnetometer barely picked it up on the graph,' Giordino added. 'The mouthpiece and the valve pistons are the only parts that contain iron.'
'Ah wonder how long it's been down here?' Drummer asked no one in particular.
'It'd be more intriguing to know where it came from,' said Merker.
'Obviously thrown overboard from a passing ship,' Giordino said carelessly. 'Probably by some kid who hated music lessons.'
'Maybe its owner is somewhere down here, too.' Merker spoke without looking up.
Spencer shivered. 'There's a chilling thought for you.'
The interior of the Sappho I fell silent.
25
The antique Ford trimotor aircraft, famed in aviation history as the Tin Goose, looked too awkward to fly, and yet she banked as gracefully and majestically as an albatross when she lined up for her final approach to the runway of the Washington National Airport.
Pitt eased back the three throttles and the old bird touched down with all the delicacy of an autumn leaf kissing high grass. He taxied over to one of the NUMA hangars at the north end of the airport, where his waiting maintenance crew chocked the wheels and made the routine throatcutting sign. Flipping off the ignition switches, he watched the silver-bladed propellers gradually slow their revolutions and come to rest, gleaming in the late afternoon sun. Then he removed the headphones, draped them on the control column, undid the latch on his side window and pushed it open.
A bewildered frown slowly creased Pitt's forehead and hung there in the tanned, leathery skin. A man was standing on the asphalt below, frantically waving his hands.
'May I come aboard?' Gene Seagram shouted.
'I'll come down,' Pitt yelled back.
'No, please stay where you are.'
Pitt shrugged and leaned back in his seat. It took Seagram only a few seconds to climb aboard the trimotor and push open the cockpit door. He wore a stylish tan suit with vest, but his well-tailored appearance was diluted by a sea of wrinkles that creased the material, making it obvious that he hadn't seen a bed for at least twenty-four hours.
'Where did you ever find such a gorgeous old machine?' Seagram asked.
'I ran across it at Keflavik, Iceland,' Pitt replied. 'Managed to buy it at a fair price and have it shipped back to the States.'
'She's a beauty.'
Pitt motioned Seagram to the empty copilot's seat. 'You sure you want to talk in here? In a few minutes the sun will make this cabin feel like the inside of an incinerator.'
