Testament

by David Gibbins

  “Don’t try to sweet-talk me, Jack. Diving doesn’t mean anything to me any more. What I remember is that you turned away from me to go and grub around in the dirt with Hiebermeyer.”

  “Wrong. I turned away from you because of what you were becoming. What you’ve become now.”

  “You’re not getting out of this one. Not this time.”

  “Do it, then. Just do it.”

  Jack tensed. In that instant of hesitation he knew that he had been right, that Landor could not do it. In one swift movement he brought his left elbow hard into the other man’s abdomen, making him drop the knife and double back against the railing, taking Jack with him. Ahmed and Costas quickly retrieved their weapons, trying to train them on Landor. Jack twisted round, holding Landor back by the chin, struggling to keep his balance. “It looks as if we’re going diving again together after all,” he said, jerking his head down to the water beside the U-boat. “It’s about ten meters deep, and I’ve got a minute or so of air left in this little tank on my back.”

  Landor went wide-eyed, tottering on the edge, his arms wrapping around Jack’s regulator hoses as he tried to get at his throat. “You know my medical condition. You know even that would give me a bend.”

  “That’s your call. You can stay up here and be shot, or go down there and take your chances.”

  They had both leaned out too far, and suddenly they were falling, tumbling down beside the U-boat into the water. They hit the surface in a tangle and went down a few meters, and then Landor released himself and swam down quickly into the gloom toward the base of the chamber, his weak leg trailing behind him as he pulled with his arms. Jack grabbed one of his regulator hoses and put the mouthpiece in, taking a breath and dropping after him. Without a mask, the water was a blur, but he could see Landor on the bottom, looking up, his arms held wide, blowing the remaining air out of his lungs.

  Landor had deliberately gone too deep to surface by himself without drowning. But Jack knew him well enough to know that this was not suicide. Landor was playing him, again, and Jack had no choice but to go along with it. Landor knew that Jack would not let him die, not like this, not underwater, when there was a chance of rescue. It would go against all their training, everything they had learned together all those years ago. It was not suicide, but the depth was enough that if Jack gave him air from his tank, it would almost certainly bring on another bend, enough to require immediate medical attention. Landor would have guessed that they would have brought medics with them, and that a naval vessel from CTF 150 would be on the way, probably with the only recompression chamber in miles and one to which the medics would be obliged to send him. He knew that the game was up, that he was not getting away now with any of the gold, and he was seeking a way out. To be captured unharmed by the Somalis would mean festering in a Mogadishu jail; to be medevacked out to a ship in international waters might mean a chance of escape, a chance for Deep Explorer’s lawyers to get involved and for Landor to live to play this game another day.

  All of that flashed through Jack’s mind as he sank to the bottom. He pulled in the octopus rig and tested the purge valve, holding the mouthpiece at the ready. He could see Landor watching him, eyes wide, suddenly terrified, wondering if he had miscalculated. Then Landor grabbed the regulator and breathed from it, hard and fast, the bubbles billowing above him. Jack knew they only had seconds before the tank would run empty, and he pulled at Landor’s arm, trying to kick up toward the surface. Landor resisted, hyperventilating, knowing that the more air he breathed under pressure the more likely he would be to have a bend. Jack felt his own breathing tighten, and then he pulled the octopus regulator away, pushing Landor back. This time Landor kicked hard and began to ascend, breathing out as he did so, Jack following close behind. They both broke surface to the glare of headlamps from the Somali marines who were standing on the dock with their weapons trained, Costas and Ahmed squatting alongside, ready to help.

  Jack gave an okay signal, and looked over to where Landor was bent double in the water, struggling to keep his head up. “Get him on pure oxygen,” he said, seeing the medic among the marines. “And then get him out of here.”

  * * *

  Half an hour later, Jack stood with Costas again at the entrance to the Ahnenerbe chamber. He had stripped off his tank and his tool belt and drunk several water packs brought along by the marine medic, quickly revitalizing himself after his encounter with Landor. All of his attention now was on what lay in front of him. The scene beyond the bullion room was astonishing, one of the most extraordinary sights of his archaeological career. The chamber revealed by their head torches was small, the size of a modest bedroom, but was crammed from ceiling to floor with ancient artifacts, as if they had opened the treasury of a latter-day King Tut. Jack could immediately make out objects of Abyssinian origin on one set of shelves to his left, elaborate gold crosses of a distinctive Ethiopian shape, chalices and cups, a golden crown set with emeralds and rubies. On the other side were trays of artifacts that he recognized from the report that Zaheed had shown him of material that had disappeared from the museums in Somalia and Ethiopia at the time of the fascist occupation, and from the churches.

  “Congratulations, Jack,” Costas said. “It looks like we’ve hit pay dirt.”

  “It’s fantastic,” Jack replied. “When I was reading Captain Wood’s account of his Abyssinia experience in 1868, I researched all of the treasures known to have been looted from Magdala, and their present whereabouts. Hardly anything was recorded of the drumhead auction that General Napier held afterward, and a lot of artifacts disappeared without a trace into private hands. But this collection shows that some of the missing items thought to have been looted then were in fact taken from Abyssinia years later by the Nazis.”

  “You told me that the Patriarch mentioned that secret chamber beneath the church at Magdala, and the Ahnenerbe men spending days scouring the place. Maybe they found other secret caches that the Abyssinians had managed to conceal from the British.”

  Jack held up the crown, and looked pensively at the ground. “I only wish Zaheed had been able to see this. It would have made his day. It’s going to put Ethiopia and Somalia back on the map archaeologically.”

  “Finding this stuff and getting it back to the museums is the greatest credit you can give Zaheed. We wouldn’t have got here without him.”

  Jack made his way through exotic furniture and other artifacts cluttering the floor to a heavy wooden chest in the far corner of the chamber. He lifted the lid, and gasped. “I’ve never seen anything like this outside a Hollywood movie.”

  Costas came over and knelt down beside him, his jaw dropping too. The chest was full of gold and silver coins, thousands of them, of all shapes and sizes. Jack plunged his hands in, grasping what he could and pulling them out, letting the overflow cascade back down and inspecting what was left. “Incredible,” he said. “I’m seeing lots of medieval issues of the sultanate of Mogadishu, and Axumite gold coins of the fourth and fifth century, many of them mint issues. Look at that one: the inscription reads ‘Basileus Axomitus,’ King of the Axumites. I’d say the Ahnenerbe must have got hold of a couple of hoards. But there are also lots of others, Egyptian, Arabian, Indian, gold dinars, lots of Byzantine Roman issues of Theodora and Justinian. Some of those have holes in them showing they were reused as jewelry, very common in India. It looks as if the Ahnenerbe scoured the whole of the Indian Ocean region for this, not just the Horn of Africa. It’s a fantastic porthole into the Indian Ocean trade in antiquity, and it’s going to occupy numismatists for years to come. Not to speak of being a spectacular centerpiece for a museum display.”

  Ahmed appeared at the entrance, leaning in. “That’s the place secured. Landor’s in custody pending evacuation to a secure military hospital in Mogadishu. We’re not letting him out of the country. Captain Ibrahim has radioed to say that a second patrol boat is on the way, as well as a frigate from CTF 150, with a team prepped to deal with removing the uranium
. And it’s game over for the Badass Boys. None of them are left alive. We’re scouring the place in case there are any Nazi munitions that need to be made safe.”

  Costas looked up, dropping the gold coin he had been holding. “Ordnance disposal? Count me in.”

  “Not a chance,” Jack said. “You’re helping me here.”

  Ahmed suddenly saw what Jack was doing. “Merciful Allah,” he exclaimed. “That’s incredible. It looks as if you’ve got your hands full here too.”

  Costas rocked back on his haunches, looking thoughtfully at Jack. “Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum,” he sang quietly.

  Jack turned to him, his arms half buried in gold. “Don’t go there. I mean, just don’t. We are not pirates.”

  “Have you seen yourself? I wish I had a camera. Jack Howard gone over to the dark side.”

  Jack hastily withdrew his hands, self-consciously brushing off a few coins. “Remarkable find,” he murmured. “We need to get these cleaned and into plastic sleeves.”

  “Not all pirates were bad, were they?” Costas continued. “I mean, Robin Hood was a kind of pirate, and he took from the rich and gave to the poor. And you can’t tell me that all your Howard nautical ancestors were goody-goody. There must have been the odd Blackbeard among them, right? You must have just a little bit of pirate in you.”

  “I like the sound of giving to the poor. That’s where all those gold bars outside are going. As for this stuff, getting it into museums in the countries where it belongs is going to enrich far more lives than just my own.”

  “You’re telling me that kneeling there up to your elbows in gold, you didn’t just slightly reach out to your inner pirate?”

  Jack looked around at the room, at the treasures he had been holding, suddenly awash with excitement at what they had discovered, at the wonders he would soon be able to reveal to the world. He turned to Costas, his eyes glinting. “My inner pirate? What do you think?”

  Costas slapped him on the back. “I think you’re a hopeless case.”

  Jack put his arm around his friend, tired but elated. “You know me. I’m just an archaeologist.”

  Epilogue

  Three days later, Jack sat on the shore of the island, watching the waves lap the rocks and the evening sunlight cast a rosy hue on the surface of the sea. The last of the naval team who had been working in the U-boat pen had departed half an hour before, leaving one remaining Zodiac for him to drive out with the others when they were ready. Seaquest was holding position half a mile offshore, flanked by warships from the anti-piracy force, one a frigate of the Royal Canadian Navy, the other a US Navy destroyer. They were a reassuring presence, security against any unwanted incursion while the pen was being cleared. Once the uranium had been removed and the Ahnenerbe chamber emptied, the plan was for a naval demolition team to blow the entrance and collapse the cavern. The residual radiation levels in the U-boat were unlikely to pose a long-term hazard, but the site was a war grave, the last resting place of those who had died here in 1945. There was every prospect of the islands becoming the front line in a new war, not against pirates but against Iran and its terrorist affiliates, and the Yemeni and Somali governments had agreed that the archipelago should be a no-go zone until the situation improved.

  Jack watched three figures make their way over the rocky ground from the helipad that had been cleared above the cavern entrance. Rebecca and Jeremy had arrived on Seaquest two days before to help with clearing the Ahnenerbe chamber, due to start tomorrow. The Lynx from Seaquest had dropped them on the island a few minutes ago, and had then clattered off back to the ship. Trailing behind them was a third figure in familiar Hawaiian beach gear, his left arm trussed up in a sling and carrying something on his back. Jack smiled when he saw them, and raised his hand in greeting. They came over and sat down around him, Costas dropping his sack on a flat rock beside the sea. “I had the catering people on Seaquest make me up one of those portable barbecues, with real charcoal. This place isn’t exactly a beach, but it’ll do.”

  “What are we eating?” Jack said.

  Costas reached into the sack, pulled out the foil barbecue tray, and then a wet bag. “Fish,” he said, spilling the contents onto the rock. “Red mullet, wrasse, sea bass. Jeremy speared them this afternoon.”

  Rebecca stared at Jeremy in mock disbelief. “I didn’t know about that. No way. Jeremy couldn’t hit a tin can in front of his nose.”

  “Yep,” Costas said, pulling out a box of matches and a stack of paper plates. “This afternoon while you and your dad were busy, I drove him around to the reef at the back of the island and showed him the fish identification chart, and an hour later we were on our way back with the cooler full.”

  “What was it you said a few days ago?” Jeremy said, eyeing Rebecca. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

  “I still don’t believe it. I challenge you tomorrow. We’ll catch lunch for the entire team.”

  “You’re on.”

  Jack smiled and turned to Costas, inspecting his swollen eye and the cuts and bruises on his face. “You sure you’re okay being out of sick bay?”

  Costas dropped a lit match into the tray, and stirred the charcoal with a stick. “I checked myself out. No way was I staying cooped up in there. How about you?”

  “My back hurts from bouncing around in that Zodiac, and my right knee is playing up. Nothing that won’t be fixed as soon as I’m back in the water again.”

  “Let’s face it, you two are getting a bit old for this kind of thing,” Rebecca said, taking another stick and poking at the fire. “No offense, but you know what I mean. Maybe it’s time you passed the baton to the younger generation.”

  Jack turned and looked at Costas, and they both stared at Rebecca. “Maybe it’s time the younger generation went back and finished school,” Jack said.

  “I didn’t mean the diving, I meant all the commando stuff,” Rebecca continued, looking at them deadpan. “You could delegate that to your up-and-coming protégés—Jeremy, for example.”

  “Whoa,” Jeremy said. “Spearfishing is one thing, wielding a Kalashnikov is another. I’m an epigrapher, not Indiana Jones.”

  “Long may it stay that way,” Jack said. “Without your expertise with the Phoenician inscriptions, we’d be telling a different story.”

  Costas put the grill on the tray and sat beside it. “So, Jack. We found our gold after all. We made up for what we lost on Clan Macpherson.”

  “What you lost, you mean. I didn’t try to defuse that torpedo.”

  “You weren’t ever going to let it fall into the hands of Landor, were you?”

  “It’s true. You made it easier for me.”

  “So what’s the plan with this new haul?”

  “There are some formalities to get through with the Yemeni and Somali authorities, but nobody’s going to claim ownership or stand in the way of the plan I’d envisaged for the Clan Macpherson gold. The South African government has agreed to take the bars and rebrand them under UN ownership, and our UN rep has already secured approval for a new agency specifically to disburse the funds. We’re looking at half going to West Africa, to alleviate child poverty and for disease prevention, and half going to the Horn of Africa, to the coastal communities of Somalia, for development aid. How does that sound?”

  “Pretty amazing, Dad,” Rebecca said. “I’d like to be part of that.”

  “That kind of aid in Somalia might help to wean young men away from piracy,” Costas said.

  “Not just piracy, but the lure of the extremists,” Jack replied. “This coast is a prime recruiting ground, with so many young men unemployed and directionless. I had a long discussion about it with the naval force commander yesterday. It’ll be a challenge to get the balance right, but we envisage a combination of poverty alleviation, funding schools and educational programs, and seeding economic initiatives, especially those focused on rebooting traditional subsistence activities. None of it will work without effective policing of the offshore t
erritorial zone to exclude the foreign trawlers that have nearly destroyed the local fish stocks, the main factor that has driven the men to piracy. We want to see the patrol boats policing against outsiders, not against the Somalis themselves. That gold will help to extinguish piracy along the coast.”

  “Amen to that,” Costas said, wincing as he held his arm. “And a big finger to the Nazis and their schemes. Whoever once might have owned that gold, this is the best place for it.”

  “So what about the Ark of the Covenant?” Rebecca said.

  Jack said nothing. He was staring out to sea, looking south toward the huge stretch of coast that the ancients called the Runs of Azania, toward the island of Madagascar and the very extremity of Africa, to the cape where a Phoenician adventurer had put up a bronze plaque with an extraordinary message to posterity more than two and a half thousand years ago. In his mind’s eye he imagined the scene, saw Hanno tapping in that final symbol as the wind howled and the sea churned against the rocky headland below; for a moment, gazing out to sea, he saw not Seaquest and the two warships but a lone Phoenician vessel battling its way up the coast, carrying a cargo to a secret destination in a covenant with a people who knew they might not see their most sacred treasure for many generations to come. He was convinced that what he was imagining was real, not just a flight of fancy; he had seen the plaque with his own eyes, as real as the flecks of gold on the animal hide that Maurice had excavated in Carthage. And he remembered standing with Zaheed in front of the Chapel of the Tablet at Axum, sensing with sudden clarity why it was that the ancient prophets of Israel had wanted their treasure concealed, and why the time was not yet right to reveal it, even though their descendants ruled once again in the Holy Land and might need the strength of their covenant more than ever.

  Costas laid the first of the fillets on the grill, and they watched as the steam rose above them into the darkening sky. “Another one of those biblical passages I can remember,” Costas said, staring into the embers. “Jeremiah, chapter three, verses sixteen and seventeen. ‘And it shall come to pass, when ye be multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, saith the Lord, they shall say no more the ark of the covenant of the Lord; neither shall it come to mind: neither shall they remember it; neither shall they visit it; neither shall that be done any more. At that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord; and all the nations shall be gathered unto it.’”