Byzantine Gold

by Chris Karlsen

  Omar judged everyone by his own limited intelligence and imagination. A poor conversationalist, his blunt approach to everything worked against him. If you wanted information from a woman like Saska, you worked slowly, like a patient gardener gathering flowers. You don’t set a bull loose among the roses.

  “I played my role and showed the proper condemnation for such activity,” Darav said.

  “What did you learn?”

  “She mentioned a few well-known private collectors. When I return to camp, I will check their whereabouts and see if any suit our purpose.”

  “I still believe your plan is crazy.”

  How dare the ox call him crazy? Darav slammed his palm against the table. The owner of Ada’s and the waiter looked up and started to come over. He waved them off. “There’s more gold than I previously believed. What is pictured on the MIAR newsletter is a sample.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “Vadim, the Ministry man, indicated the ship might’ve belonged to pirates. For him to suggest this, I suspect he’s aware of much more gold.”

  “He and the other agent continue to be armed?”

  “Yes.” Darav had casually asked Saska if she knew why. She had no idea. It didn’t matter. Omar and the others would have no trouble dealing with two men with handguns alone. Disarm them and the rest is easy. “They are the only obstacle. The others are soft European and American scientists. They’ll offer no resistance.”

  “When will you see the rest of this treasure?” Omar asked.

  “The leader of the project announced he anticipates we’ll begin recovery of the gold by the end of next week. Once the buyer and boats are arranged, you’ll only have a short time to get here. Tell the others to be prepared to move fast.”

  “They know. I took care of this already.”

  “One more thing, I want you to assemble several bombs. On my day off I’ll take photos of the military base and send them to you. Bombs will delay any response from them to the camp.”

  “You want one set off at the site afterward? Why leave any alive to identify us?”

  “I’ll think about it.” For once, Omar had a good point.

  Darav ended the call and left for camp.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  “I think you should look over Nassor’s credentials again. I think he may have padded his resume,” Charlotte said.

  Finished for the day, she and Atakan sat by themselves in the far corner of Ada’s restaurant. Atakan chose the table. A long row of thick Cyprus trees blocked a view of them from the rear. The kitchen blocked another view and the outside tables made them difficult to see from the water side. That left the entrance, which Atakan faced. His gun was holstered to his belt, hidden by the oversized shirt he wore.

  “The Ministry checked his background before approving him. You suspect both our organizations missed something?”

  “It’s possible. The guy’s weird. He’s like no archaeologist I’ve ever met.”

  Charlotte understood the tediousness of finding only sand and saltwater after sifting through the contents of dozens of pots, occasionally wore down everyone’s enthusiasm. But the monotony never extinguished their dedication or their eagerness for what they might find.

  The waiter asked if they wanted their usual, a beer and a red wine. Atakan said yes and the young man left.

  “Weird how?” Atakan asked.

  “The normal curiosity an archaeologist has is missing. He didn’t give a damn about what the amphoras contain. When I brought the subject up, he showed no interest.”

  “Odd, but I don’t see the connection between his lack of curiosity and lying on his application.”

  “The only intellectual spark he’s shown is over the gold and whether the amphoras might hold other high value items.”

  His casual expression shifted to one of concern.

  The waiter returned and Atakan took the drinks from him. “Tell me what he said about the gold,” he asked after the waiter moved away.

  “He hasn’t said anything grossly suspect. It’s more his attitude and questions. He has an extraordinary interest in when we’re excavating the gold and why we haven’t brought it up yet.”

  Like a lit match to a gas jet, mentioning Nassor’s unhealthy interest in the most valuable cargo fired Atakan’s suspicious nature, as she knew it would. He had the typical Ministry mindset regarding artifacts and the potential for theft at a site. His influence generated a stronger instinct for the vulnerability of relics in her. Nassor’s comments taken in conjunction with his poor outlook about the wreck triggered her warning bells.

  Atakan leaned back in the chair, quiet, and oblivious to the noisy racket from the other tables. He watched a young boy fight to maintain possession of a soccer ball. The boy spun around every time his younger brother reached to snatch it away. The parents ignored the battle, along with the cries of the smaller boy on the verge of a tantrum.

  He watched but didn’t really see the boy. Charlotte was familiar with his thousand-yard stare. Atakan’s fixed gaze meant he was lost in thought, analyzing the situation.

  “You’re in the zone, I can tell,” she muttered, “An enviable place right now.”

  She didn’t share his capacity to tune things out. The younger child’s frustration morphed into a full-fledged, foot-stomping tantrum with accompanying wail. She pictured snatching the stupid ball and tossing it into the sea and telling the boys: there, now no one has the ball, so sit down and shut the hell up. Instead, she gulped a large swallow of wine. Finally, the father yanked the ball away and put it on an empty chair at the table.

  “I want to interview his instructors personally. I’ll also speak with his former excavation teams again,” Atakan said at last. “The Ministry can pull his financial records for the past year. If he’s gotten deeply into debt, the theft and sale of artifacts is a great temptation.”

  “I wonder if he’s working alone.”

  “Hard to say, but he’s so flagrant with his obsession over gold, I don’t see the cunning you’d associate with a ring.”

  “If theft is his goal, he’s dumb enough to try and sell anything he takes on eBay.”

  Charlotte had visited Atakan’s unit at the Ministry. When not in the field they checked eBay daily. In their absence, other staff members checked. A number of arrests resulted.

  “Speak of the devil,” she said, seeing Nassor and Saska pass by outside and sit at a table.

  “The devil?” Atakan glanced over at the older boy who retrieved his soccer ball and began torturing his brother again. “You mean the child you want to nuzzle?”

  “Muzzle. I want to muzzle him.”

  “Nuzzle-muzzle, either way, he makes you bonkers. No need to look, I knew your eyes were spinning in your head when his screech turned ear-piercing.”

  “Oh yeah.” She gave a silent thank you when the parents and brothers gathered their things and left.

  Another couple sat at the table vacated by the family. They had a toddler in a stroller. The little girl had a mass of curly brown hair and fat sun-tinged cheeks. She waved a chubby fist at Charlotte.

  “We’ve never talked of it, but do you want children?” Charlotte asked and waved to the child.

  “No.”

  “The Vadim name will die with you,” Charlotte said, surprised. Historically men of most cultures desired a boy to carry on their line.

  “Not a tragedy.”

  Charlotte turned the opposite direction and mumbled in her glass, “I bet your mother has a different opinion.”

  “Her opinion is her own.”

  “You have the hearing of a bat.”

  Atakan smirked. “Sometimes. What about you? Do you want them?”

  “Not especially but I’d consider it if it was important to you,” she said, uncertain that was true. Since he didn’t want children, she didn’t have to delve deeper into her feelings. “One thing for sure, if we ever decide to have children, they won’t be brats.”

  “And
they won’t be bastards either. We will marry. I’m not obsessed with having my family name go on, but I’m not opposed to it either,” he said, a little too brightly than Charlotte would’ve liked. She’d think about the implications of that later.

  “Back to my devil comment,” she said, happy to leave the topic of children. “I was referring to Nassor and Saska.” She pointed to the table where they sat close together, laughing.

  “Very cozy.”

  “Think she’d pick up on anything suspicious he might say?” Charlotte asked.

  “Maybe, men say a lot of stupid things during pillow talk.”

  “They’re not sleeping together that I know of. Has he said something in the men’s dorm indicating they are?”

  “No. I’m guessing they will.”

  “You know Saska better than the rest of us.”

  She didn’t mean the sarcastic comment as a catty, female dig. She thought Atakan’s guess a good one. Saska touched Nassor often as they talked, flirtatious, feminine and subtle gestures. Light touches to his hand or on his arm that made him smile. What Charlotte didn’t get, at all, was how Saska could go from an affair with Atakan to one with a fuzzy lump like Nassor.

  Nassor flicked a glance her way before turning a hard look on Atakan who returned the look in kind. Nassor shot him a grin that sent a chill down Charlotte’s spine. The grin faded as Nassor broke the staring contest first and faced Saska again.

  Wanting to forget Nassor and the creepy grin, Charlotte put her lips to Atakan’s ear and whispered. “What stupid pillow talk things have you said in the past?”

  “Hah! I never made the mistake. And if I had, I’m not so foolish as to repeat them to you.”

  “Hmm, there’s a statement I could drive a truck through.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  “What a mess,” Charlotte said.

  The intact amphoras mapped and tagged on the team’s earlier dives raised hopes for the rest of the cargo’s condition. Those pots and jars were a small part of the cargo. Additional hull removal and deeper access and exploration of the hold revealed the opposite. The top layer of the stacked amphoras lay in a heap, chunks broken from their globular bodies, the rims chipped, the stoppers destroyed. Hundreds of pottery shards were strewn across the grid. The field resembled an earthenware mosaic by Picasso on a bad day.

  “I see what my assignment in the next few off-seasons will be. There’s years and year’s worth of matching and reassembling to do,” Talat said, sounding weary already.

  A sympathetic groan traveled through the AGA masks he, Rachel, Charlotte, and Nassor wore. Come September, they’d return home. Talat was a permanent employee of MIAR. When not on a wreck site, he worked in the main conservation lab in Bodrum.

  “We’ll take the right half of the grid,” Charlotte said.

  She and Nassor labeled their bags with the same designation of the amphoras in that section. They’d gather the shards first. After the pieces were cleared, they’d airlift baskets with the pottery to the Suraya. Removal of the fragments involved several days work and delayed examination of any contents the amphoras that might remain.

  Charlotte tested the sand mounds on the perimeter of her area for a spot to hold her weight without shifting. If the sand gave and she lost her balance, she might land in the pile further damaging the amphoras. Getting cut was a secondary concern.

  She found a suitable spot and knelt. She collected and bagged the largest shards together. The smaller ones, some no bigger than a jigsaw puzzle piece she placed in a different bag. As she cleared, a space wide enough to allow a peek into the secondary layer opened.

  Hull evidence showed the ship’s galley was located above where Charlotte and Nassor knelt. Pots and assorted cooking utensils lay on the seabed in a nearby grid. Over the centuries, currents could’ve carried them the few meters. Or, they were hurled or rolled the other direction when the ship broke apart. The team hadn’t determined what caused her to sink.

  “Nassor, come and look at this.”

  He kicked over and peered down. “We know about the bottom row. What am I supposed to see?”

  “This top row is in shambles and scattered from the deck collapsing on it. The other layer is also spread out in a similar fashion, although the amphoras are less damaged.”

  “They look stacked without care, thrown into the hold as though loaded in a hurry.”

  “Exactly. Stevedores use a uniform system, even then.” She waited for a comment from him. A reiteration of the system used commonly at the time or some observation of the condition of the pots beside hers.

  Nassor kept quiet.

  She considered making an inaccurate comment to see if he’d correct her. Instead, she said what they both knew or should know. “They’d line them in rows and loop ropes through the handles to minimize movement.”

  He nodded but not one of agreement that people give each other when discussing the obvious. His was a funny tip of his chin like people give when hearing new information.

  “No weapons visible, this hold is for supplies only,” she said. “I can’t see the ship’s captain or the cook allowing their supplies stored in this kind of jumble. It’s a waste of valuable space.”

  “I’d say it’s the work of pirates. Pirates more interested in treasure than commodities stored in them. Supplies are easy to replenish. They plunder another ship or raid a port,” Nassor said.

  “You like Atakan’s theory too.”

  “Very much.”

  The thought occurred to her too. She deliberately didn’t express the possibility to Nassor. With his unhealthy interest in valuable relics, she wondered if he’d make the suggestion.

  “Why?” she asked, curiosity piqued as to what reason he’d give.

  There was a long pause before he answered, “Seems a sexier theory than explaining away the mess as the usual goods found on a warship for the Empire.”

  Not a reason she’d have associated with Nassor. To her, nothing about him exuded sex or lusty desires. Everyone on the team cracked off-color jokes or remarks at times—everyone except him. And when they did, he never laughed. Maybe he didn’t understand sarcasm or maybe he was one of those people with no sense of humor. She’d put money on the last.

  “American movies show sexy pirates, when they’re Caribbean or English. The movies with Barbary Coast pirates are always shown as dirty savages,” he added with a touch of heat in his tone.

  Strange statement. She tried to remember a movie with Barbary Coast pirates and couldn’t.

  “Why is that?” he asked.

  “Johnny Depp can’t do a North African accent,” she said flippantly blowing off the weird question.

  “Who?”

  “Johnny Depp. You know the star of Pirates of the Caribbean.

  Darav’s blank expression remained.

  “Never mind. Whatever region they originate from, a pirate is a pirate. You want bragging rights for gangs of murderers, rapists, and thieves?”

  “For good or bad, we are what we are. Cultural pride must prevail,” he said with a little more heat.

  “If I understand you, you don’t care how these criminals are presented, as long as all their cultural groups are shown equally good or equally bad?”

  He turned to her with anger in his eyes. “Yes, it is an insult and unfair to show one group in a constant negative light and not the others.”

  “I applaud your passion, but this is all academic. We don’t know the purpose of the ship yet.”

  “You’re right, of course,” he said in a calmer voice.

  He swam away and returned to bagging shards.

  Charlotte continued to collect and bag, but her mind was on Nassor. His extraordinary resentment of the popularity, romanticizing to some extent, of western pirates over the Arab ones stumped her. It’s the movies. Who gives a fig how they’re portrayed? She reassessed him again.

  Archaeologists from various organizations freely discuss the politics of artifacts among themselves and
with media outlets. The acquisition, retention, sale, and exhibition was a source of fiery debate. On occasion, the MIAR team talked about the topic too, but it never turned angry or unpleasant. Their international team avoided any criticism regarding the policies of individual governments.

  His strong feelings had nothing to do with the men who sailed this specific ship or the artifacts as a cultural heritage issue. They were broader based and definitely geo-political. Charlotte thought it resulted from the fact he was Egyptian. His pride was understandable. Egypt’s achievements and powerful influence was felt across the ancient world. For the sake of team camaraderie and peace, she hoped he kept his attitude to himself.

  Another troubling possibility entered her mind. Although unlikely, it had to be considered. What if his passionate view wasn’t based on nationalist or Arab superiority? What if it was religion based? Was he a radical, a fervent Islamist?

  Few of the team held deep religious beliefs. They favored facts obtained from scientific sources or historical record. They placed their faith in what they could see and touch and smell and not in the unpredictable nature of invisible deities. That said, Derek had a lucky coin he rubbed before each dive. Rachel wore a St. Christopher’s necklace. Atakan vehemently denied he was superstitious, but had a nazar boncugu--protection against the evil eye, attached to his key ring. She smiled to herself and kissed him when he attached the blue-glass bead to her key chain too.

  She glanced over at Nassor. No one knew his beliefs. If he held radical beliefs, he’d see the team as Infidels. Then, why work with them? She dismissed the idea. The man was an odd duck, true. Pro-Jihadist? No.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Charlotte sat in the shade to write. She’d brought a Bounty Bar and tested the softness with her thumb and forefinger. It felt solid so she put it aside to eat when she was done. By the time she finished, the bar was a tad squishy to the touch.

  “Read this,” she told Atakan.