Lost City

Lost City

by Clive Cussler and Paul Kemprecos

For "spine-tingling adventure on the high seas, nobody beats Clive Cussler!

(Chicago Tribune)

Over the past few years, Clive Cussler's NUMA Files novels, written with Paul Kemprecos, have become critical and fan favorites, each received more enthusiastically than the last. About the most recent triumph, Publishers Weekly wrote, "Cussler's multitude of fans arrive at the table expecting a roiling stew of seafaring adventure, exotic travel destinations, cutting-edge science land] a splash of romance. In White Death, they will find their expectations extravagantly fulfilled!"

And they will find them fulfilled again in Lost City. An enzyme that will dramatically prolong life has been discovered two thousand feet down in the North Atlantic, in an area known as "Lost City." But why are the people attempting to harvest it getting killed? Why are the scientists in a remote Greek laboratory disappearing one by one? What does this all have to do with a body found frozen in the ice high up in the Alps? For Kurt Austin, leader of NUMA's Special Assignments Team, and his colleague Joe Zavala, it's clear they have their work cut out, but it may be even bigger than they think in fact, it may be their greatest challenge ever ...

Rich with all the hair-raising action and endless imagination that have become Cussler's hallmarks, Lost City is an exceptional thriller one of the best yet from "Clive Cussler.

CLIVE CUSSLER is the author or coauthor of twenty five previous books, including, most recently, the Dirk Pitt novel Trojan Odyssey, the NUMA Files novel White Death, and the Oregon adventure Golden Buddha. He is also the author of The Sea Hunters and The Sea Hunters II; these describe the true-life adventures of the real NUMA , which, led by Cussler, has discovered more than sixty ships, including the long-lost Confederate submarine Hunley. Cussler divides his time between Colorado and Arizona.

PAUL KEMPRECOS co-authored the NUMA Files novels Serpent, Blue Gold, Fire Ice, and White Death, and is the Shamus Award-winning author of six underwater detective thrillers. A certified scuba diver and a former newspaper reporter, columnist, and editor, he lives in Massachusetts.

Visit the NUMA website at: www.numa.net

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

DIRK PITT ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER

Trojan Odyssey

Valhalla Rising

Atlantis Found

Flood Tide

Shock Wave

Inca Gold

Sahara

Dragon

Treasure

Cyclops

Deep Six

Pacific Vortex

Night Probe

Vixen 03

Raise the Titanic!

Iceberg

The Mediterranean Caper

KURT AUSTIN ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER WITH PAUL KEMPRECOS

White Death

Fire Ice

Blue Gold

Serpent

OREGON FILES ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER WITH CRAIG DIR GO

The Golden Buddha

NONFICTION BY CLIVE CUSSLER AND CRAIG DIR GO

The Sea Hunters II

Clive Cussler and Dirk Pitt Revealed

The Sea Hunters

LOST CITY

A Novel from the NUMA files

G- P. PUTNAM'S SONS * NEW YORK

CLIVE CUSSLER

with PAUL KEMPRECOS

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to Neal Iverson, associate professor of geology and atmospheric sciences at Iowa State University, for his guided tour of the Svartisen, Norway, subglacial observatory. The books of H. Rider Haggard and Ben Bova provided unique perspectives on the implications of immortality. And a thank-you is in order as well to the SEAmagine Hydrospace Corporation for the use of its remarkable SEA mobile k'

PROLOGUE

The French Alps, August 1914

HIGH ABOVE the soaring majesty of the snowcapped mountains, Jules Fauchard was fighting for his life. Minutes before, his plane had slammed into an invisible wall of air with a force that jarred his teeth. Now updrafts and downdrafts were tossing the light aircraft about like a kite on a string. Fauchard battled the gut-wrenching turbulence with the skill that had been drilled into him by his strict French flying instructors. Then he was through the rough patch, luxuriating in smooth air, unaware that it would nearly prove his undoing.

With his plane finally stable, Fauchard had given in to the most natural of human impulses. He closed his weary eyes. His eyelids fluttered and drooped, then slammed shut as if weighted down with lead. His mind drifted into a shadowy, uncaring realm. His chin slumped onto his chest. His limp fingers relaxed their grip on the control stick. The diminutive red plane wavered drunkenly in what the

French pilots called zperte de vit esse or loss of way, as it slipped off on one wing in a prelude to a tailspin.

Fortunately, Fauchard's inner ear detected the change in equilibrium, and alarms went off in his slumbering brain. His head snapped up and he awakened in a daze, struggling to marshal his muddled thoughts. His nap had lasted only a few seconds, but in that time his plane had lost hundreds of feet of altitude and was about to go into a steep dive. Blood thundered in his head. His wildly beating heart felt as if it were about to explode from his chest.

The French flying schools taught student pilots to fly an airplane with the same light touch as a pianist's on the keys, and Fauchard's endless hours of drill proved their worth now. Using a feather touch on the controls, he made sure not to overcompensate and gently coaxed the plane back on an even keel. Satisfied that the plane was stabilized, he let out the breath he had been holding and gulped in air, the arctic cold striking his lungs like shards of glass.

The sharp pain jolted him from his lethargy. Fully awake again, Fauchard summoned up the mantra that had sustained his resolve throughout his desperate mission. His frozen lips refused to wrap themselves around the syllables, but the words screamed in his brain.

Fail, and millions die.

Fauchard clamped his jaws shut with renewed determination. He rubbed the frost from his goggles and peered over the cockpit cowling. The alpine air was as clear as fine crystal, and even the most distant detail stood out in sharp relief. Ranks of saw-toothed mountains marched off to the horizon, and miniature villages clung to the sides of verdant alpine valleys. Fluffy white clouds were stacked up like piles of newly picked cotton. The sky was luminous in its blue intensity. The summer snow capping the jagged summits was bathed in a soft sky-blue pink from the lowering sun.

Fauchard filled his red-rimmed eyes with the magnificent beauty, as he cocked his ear and listened to the exhaust sound produced by

the eighty-horsepower, four-stroke Gnome rotary engine that powered the Morane-Saulnier N aircraft. All was well. The engine droned on as it had before his near-fatal nap. Fauchard was reassured, but his close call had shaken his self-confidence. He realized, to his astonishment, that he had experienced an unfamiliar emotion. Fear. Not of death, but of failure. Despite his iron resolve, his aching muscles further reminded him that he was a man of flesh and blood like any other.

The open cockpit allowed for little movement and his body was encased in a fur-lined leather coat over a thick Shetland wool sweater, turtleneck, and long underwear. A woolen scarf protected his neck. A leather helmet covered his head and ears, and his hands were enclosed in insulated leather gloves. Fur-lined mountain climber boots of the finest leather were on his feet. Although he was dressed for polar conditions, the icy cold had penetrated to his bones and dulled the edge of his alertness. This was a dangerous development. The Morane-Saulnier was tricky to fly and required undivided attention.

In the face of the gnawing fatigue, Fauchard clung to his sanity with the single-minded stubbornness that had made him into one of the richest industrialists in the world. Fierce determination still showed in his flinty gray eyes and the stubborn tilt of his craggy chin. With his long aquiline nose, Fauchard's profile resembled that of the eagles whose heads graced the family crest on the plane's tail.

He forced his numbed lips to move.

Fail, and millions die.

The stentorian voice that had struck fear in the European halls of power emerged from his throat as a croak, the pitiful sound drowned out by the engine's roar and the rush of air past the fuselage, but Fauchard decided a reward was in order. He reached into the top of his boot and extracted a slim silver flask. He unscrewed the top with difficulty because of the thick gloves, and took a pull from the flask. The high-octane schnapps was made from grapes

grown on his estate and was almost pure alcohol. Warmth flooded through his body.

Thus fortified, he rocked in his seat, wiggled his toes and fingers and hunched his shoulders. As the blood flowed back into his extremities, he thought of the hot Swiss chocolate and fresh-baked bread with melted cheese that awaited him on the other side of the mountains. The thick lips under the bushy handlebar mustache tightened in an ironic smile. He was one of the wealthiest men in the world, yet he was cheered by the prospect of a plowman's meal. So be it.

Fauchard allowed himself an instant of self-congratulation. He was a meticulous man and his escape plan had gone off like clockwork. The family had placed a watch on him after he had made his unwelcome views clear before the council. But while the council had pondered his fate, he'd evaded the watchers with a combination of diversion and luck.

He'd pretended to drink too much and told his butler, who was in the pay of his family, that he was going to bed. When all was quiet, he had quietly left his bedroom chamber, slipped out of the chateau and made his way to where a bicycle was hidden in the woods. Carrying his precious cargo in a backpack, he had ridden through the woods to the airfield. His plane was fueled and ready to go. He had taken off in the dawn's light, stopping twice at remote locations where his most loyal retainers had stockpiled fuel.

He drained the flask and glanced at the compass and clock. He was on course and only minutes behind schedule. The lower peaks ahead indicated that he was nearing the end of his long journey. Soon he would make the final approach to Zurich.

He was thinking about what he would say to the Pope's emissary when it seemed as if a flight of startled birds took off from the starboard wing. He glanced to the right and saw, to his dismay, that the birds were actually shreds of fabric that had peeled off the airfoil,

leaving a ragged hole several inches across. There could be only one explanation. The wing had been hit by gunfire, and the high-pitched roar of the engine had drowned out the noise.

Reacting instinctively, Fauchard banked the plane left, then right, twisting and turning like a swallow in flight. As his eyes scoured the skies, he glimpsed six biplanes flying in V formation below him. With uncanny calm, Fauchard switched off his engine as if he were preparing to volplane to the ground in an unpowered landing.

The Morane-Saulnier dropped like a stone.

Under ordinary circumstances, this would have been suicidal, placing him in his adversary's gun sights But Fauchard had recognized the attacking planes as Aviatiks. The German-built plane of French design was powered by a Mercedes in-line engine and had originally been built for reconnaissance. More important, the machine gun mounted in front of the gunner could fire only upward.

After a fall of a few hundred feet, he gently adjusted the elevator and his plane came up behind the Aviatik formation.

He lined up his plane's nose on the closest Aviatik and squeezed the trigger. The Hotchkiss gun rattled and tracer bullets homed in on the target's tail. Smoke poured from the plane and then flames enveloped the fuselage.

The Aviatik began a long spiraling plunge to earth. A few well-placed volleys brought down another Aviatik as easily as a hunter bagging a tame pheasant.

Fauchard accomplished the kills so swiftly that the other pilots were unaware they were under attack until they saw the greasy black smoke trails from the plummeting planes. The precise formation began to come apart at the seams.

Fauchard broke off the attack. His targets were scattered and the element of surprise was no longer on his side. Instead, he put the Morane-Saulnier into a steep thousand-foot climb into the belly of a puffy cloud.

As the misty gray walls hid his plane from unfriendly eyes, Fauchard leveled off and performed a damage check. So much fabric had ripped off that the wooden ribs of the wing were exposed. Fauchard cursed under his breath. He had hoped to bolt from the cloud and outdistance the Aviatiks with his plane's superior speed, but the damaged wing was slowing him down.

Unable to run, he would have to stay and fight.

Fauchard was outgunned and outnumbered, but he was flying one of the most remarkable aircraft of its day. Developed from a racing plane, the Morane-Saulnier, though tricky to fly, was incredibly nimble and responsive to the lightest touch. In an era when most airplanes had at least two wings, the Morane-Saulnier was a mid winged monoplane. From the bullet-shaped propeller spinner to its triangular tail fin, the Morane-Saulnier was only twenty-two feet long, but it was a deadly gnat by any measure, thanks to a device that would revolutionize aerial warfare.

Saulnier had developed a synchronizing mechanism that allowed the machine gun to fire through the propeller. The system had out paced the newfangled guns, though, which sometimes fired erratically, and since ammunition could hang fire, metal deflectors shielded the propeller blades from errant bullets.

Girding himself for battle, Fauchard reached under the seat and his fingers touched the cold metal of a strongbox. Next to the box was a purple velvet bag, which he pulled out and placed on his lap. Steering the plane with his knees, he extracted a steel helmet of ancient design from the bag and ran his fingers over the engraved surface. The metal was ice-cold to the touch, but heat seemed to radiate from it, surging through his whole body.

He placed the helmet on his head. It fit snugly over the leather covering, and was perfectly balanced. The helmet was unusual, in that its visor was made in the form of a human face whose mustache and

raptor's nose resembled Fauchard's. The visor limited his visibility and he pushed it up above his brow.

Shafts of sunlight were filtering into the cloud dungeon as his cover thinned. He flew through the smoky wisps that marked the edge of the cloud and broke into full daylight.

The Aviatiks were circling below like a school of hungry sharks around a sinking ship. They spotted the Morane and began to climb.

The lead Aviatik slipped below Fauchard's plane and moved into firing range. Fauchard gave a sharp tug on his seat belt to make sure it was tight, and then he pulled the nose of his plane upward, climbing in a great backward loop.

He hung upside down in the cockpit, giving thanks to the French instructor who had taught him the evasive maneuver. He completed the loop and leveled out, placing his plane behind the Aviatiks. He opened fire on the nearest plane, but it peeled off and dove at a steep angle.

Fauchard stayed on the plane's tail, enjoying the thrill of being the hunter rather than the prey. The Aviatik leveled out and made a tight turn, trying to get behind Fauchard. The smaller plane easily matched him.

The Aviatik's move had put it at the mouth of a wide valley. With Fauchard giving the plane little room to maneuver, it flew directly into the valley.

Hoarding his ammunition like a miser, Fauchard fired short bursts from the Hotchkiss. The Aviatik rolled left and right and the tracers went to either side of the plane. It flew lower, trying to stay below Fauchard and his deadly machine gun. Again, Fauchard tried to line up a shot. Again, the Aviatik went lower.

The planes skimmed over the fields at a hundred miles an hour, staying barely fifty feet above the ground. Herds of terrified cows scattered like windblown leaves. The twisting Aviatik managed to

stay out of Fauchard's sights. The rolling contours of the ground compounded the difficulty of a clear shot.

The landscape was a blur of rolling meadows and neat farmhouses. The farms were growing closer together. Fauchard could see the roofs of a town ahead where the valley narrowed to a point.

The Aviatik was following a meandering river that ran up the center of the valley directly toward the town. The pilot flew so low his wheels almost touched the water. Ahead, a quaint field stone bridge crossed the river as the waterway entered the town.

Fauchard's finger was tightening on the trigger, when an overhead shadow broke his concentration. He glanced upward and saw the wheels and fuselage of another Aviatik less than fifty feet above. It dropped lower, trying to force him down. He glanced at the lead Aviatik. It had started its climb to avoid hitting the bridge.

Pedestrians crossing the span had seen the trio of advancing planes and were running for their lives. The sleepy old plow horse pulling a wagon across the bridge reared up on its hind legs for the first time in years as the Aviatik skimmed a few yards over the driver's head.

The overhead plane dropped down to force Fauchard into the bridge, but at the last second he pulled back on his control stick and goosed the throttle. The Morane-Saulnier leaped upward and carried him between the bridge and the Aviatik. There was a huge explosion of hay as the plane's wheels clipped the wagon's load, but Fauchard kept his plane under control, guiding it up over the roofs of the town.

The plane on Fauchard's tail pulled up a second later.

Too late.

Less agile than the monoplane, the Aviatik smashed into the bridge and exploded in a ball of fire. Equally slow to climb, the lead Aviatik grazed a church steeple whose sharp spire gutted its belly. The plane came apart in the air and broke into a hundred pieces.

"Go with God!" Fauchard shouted hoarsely, as he wheeled his plane around and pointed it out of the valley.

Two specks appeared in the distance. Moving fast in his direction. They materialized into the last of the Aviatik squadron.

Fauchard aimed his plane directly between the approaching aircraft. His lips tightened in a grin. He wanted to make sure the family knew what he thought of their attempt to stop him.

He was close enough to see the observers in the front cockpits. The one on his left pointed what looked like a stick, and he saw a flash of light.

He heard a soft tun\ and his rib cage felt as if a fiery poker had been thrust into it. With a chill, he realized that the observer in the Aviatik had resorted to simpler but more reliable technology he had fired at Fauchard with a carbine.

He involuntarily jerked the control stick and his legs stiffened in a spasm. The planes flashed by on either side of him. His hand went limp on the control stick and the plane began to waver. Warm blood from his wound puddled in his seat. His mouth had a coppery taste and he was having trouble keeping things in focus.

He removed his gloves, unbuckled his seat belt and reached down under his seat. His weakening fingers grasped the handle of the metal strongbox. He placed it on his lap, took the V strap that ran through the handle and attached it to his wrist.

Summoning his last remaining reservoir of strength, he pushed himself erect and leaned out of the cockpit. He rolled over the coaming, his body hit the wing and bounced off.

His fingers automatically yanked the ripcord, the cushion he'd been sitting on burst open, and a silk parachute caught the air.

A curtain of blackness was falling over his eyes. He caught glimpses of a cold blue lake and a glacier.

/ have failed.

He was more in shock than pain and felt only a profound and angry sadness.

Millions will die.

He coughed a mouthful of bloody froth and then he knew no more. He hung in his parachute harness, an easy target for one of the Aviatiks as it made another pass.

He never felt the bullet that crashed through his helmet and drilled into his skull.

With the sun glinting off his helmet, he floated lower until the mountains embraced him to their bosom.

The Scottish Orkneys, the present

JODIE MICHAEL SON was steaming with anger. Earlier in the evening, she and the three remaining contestants of the Outcasts TV show had had to walk in their heavy boots on a thick rope stretched out along a three-foot-high berm made of piled rocks. The stunt had been billed as the "Viking Trial by Fire." Rows of torches blazed away on either side of the rope, adding drama and risk, although the line of fire was actually six feet away. The cameras shot from a low side angle, making the walk seem much more dangerous than it was.

What wasn't phony was the way the producers had schemed to bring the contestants to near violence.

Outcasts was the latest offering in the "reality" shows that had popped up like mushrooms after the success of Survivor and Fear Factor. It was an accelerated combination of both formats, with the shouting matches of Jerry Springer thrown in.

The format was simple. Ten participants had to pass a gamut of

tests over the course of three weeks. Those who failed, or were voted off by the others, had to leave the island.

The winner would make a million dollars, with bonus points, which seemed to be based on how nasty the contestants could be to one another.

The show was considered even more cutthroat than its predecessors, and the producers played tricks to ratchet up the tension. Where other shows were highly competitive, Outcasts was openly combative.

The show's format had been based in part on the Outward Bound survival course, where a participant must live off the land. Unlike the other survival shows, which tended to be set on tropical isles with turquoise waters and swaying palm trees, Outcasts was filmed in the Scottish Orkneys. The contestants had landed in a tacky replica of a Viking ship, to an audience of seabirds.

The island was two miles long and a mile wide. It was mostly rock that had been tortured into knobs and fissures aeons ago by some cataclysm, with a few stands of scraggly trees here and there and a beach of coarse sand where most of the action was filmed. The weather was mild, except at night, and the skin-covered huts were tolerable.

The speck of rock was so insignificant that the locals referred to it as the "Wee Island." This had prompted a hilarious exchange between the producer, Sy Paris, and his assistant, Randy Andleman.

Paris was in one of his typical raves. "We can't film an adventure show on a place called "Wee Island," for god sakes We've got to call it something else." His face lit up. "We'll call it "Skull Island." "

"It doesn't look like a skull," Andleman said. "It looks like an overdone fried egg."

"Close enough," Paris had said, before dashing off.

Jodie, who had witnessed the exchange, elicited a smile from An

dleman when she said, "I think it rather resembles the skull of a dumb TV series producer."

The tests were basically the kind of gross-out stunts, such as ripping live crabs apart and eating them or diving into a tank full of eels, that were guaranteed to make the viewer gag and watch the next installment, to see how bad things would get. Some of the contestants seemed to have been chosen for their aggressiveness and general meanness.

The climax would come when the last two contestants spent the night hunting each other using night scopes and paint-ball guns, a stunt that was based on the short story "The Most Dangerous Game." The survivor was awarded another million dollars.

Jodie was a physical fitness teacher from Orange County, California. She had a killer body in a bikini, although her curves were wasted under her down-filled clothes. She had long, blond hair and a quick intelligence that she had hid to get on the program. Every contestant was typecast, but Jodie refused to play the bimbo role the producers had assigned to her.

In the last quiz for points and demerits, she and the others had been asked whether a conch was a fish, a mollusk or a car. As the show's stereotype blonde, she was supposed to say "Car."

Jeezus, she'd never live something like that down when she got back to civilization.

Since the quiz debacle, the producers had been making strong hints that she should go. She'd given them their chance to oust her when a cinder got in her eye and she'd failed the fire walk. The remaining members of the tribe had gathered around the fire with grave looks on their faces, and Sy Paris had dramatically intoned the order to leave the clan and make her entry into Valhalla. Jeezus.

As she headed away from the campfire now, she fumed at herself for failing the test. But there was still a bounce to her step. After only

a few weeks with these lunatics, she was glad to be off the island. It was a rugged, beautiful setting, but she had grown weary of the backbiting, the manipulation and general sneakiness in which a contestant had to indulge for the dubious honor of being hunted down like a rabid dog.

Beyond the "Gate to Valhalla," an arbor made of plastic whalebones, was a large house trailer that was the quarters for the production crew. While the clan members slept in skin tents and ate bugs, the crew enjoyed heat, comfortable cots and gourmet meals. Once a contestant was thrown out of the game, he or she spent the night in the trailer until a helicopter picked him or her up the next morning.

"Tough luck," said Andleman, who met her at the door. Andleman was a sweetheart, the complete opposite of his hard-driving boss.

"Yeah, real tough. Hot showers. Hot meals. Cell phones."

"Hell, we've got all that right here."

She glanced around at the comfortable accommodations. "So I noticed."

"That's your bunk over there," he said. "Make yourself a drink from the bar, and there's some terrific pate in the fridge that'll help you decompress. I've got to go give Sy a hand. Knock yourself out."

"Thanks, I will."

She went over to the bar and made herself a tall Beefeater martini, straight up. The pate was as delicious as advertised. She was looking forward to going home. The ex-contestants always made the rounds of the TV talk shows to rake over the people they'd left behind. Easy money. She stretched out in a comfortable chair. After a few minutes, the alcohol put her to sleep.

She awoke with a start. In her sleep, she had heard high-pitched screams like the sound of seabirds flocking or children in a playground, against a background of yells and shouts.

Peculiar.

She got up, went to the door and listened. She wondered if Sy had come up with yet another means of humiliation. Maybe he had the others doing a wild savage dance around the fire.

She walked briskly along the path that led to the beach. The noise grew louder, more frantic. Something was dreadfully wrong. These were screams of fright and pain rather than excitement. She picked up her pace and burst through the Gate to Valhalla. What she saw looked like a scene from a Hieronymus Bosch depiction of Hell.

The cast and crew were under attack by hideous creatures that seemed half man, half animal. The savage attackers were snarling, pulling their victims down and tearing at them with claws and teeth.

She saw Sy fall, then Randy. She recognized several bodies that were lying bloody and mauled on the beach.

In the flickering light from the fire, Jodie saw that the attackers had long, filthy white hair down to their shoulders. The faces were like nothing she had ever seen. Ghastly, twisted masks.

One creature clutched a severed arm which he was raising to his mouth. Jodie couldn't help herself, she screamed ... and the other creatures broke off their ungodly feast and looked at her with burning eyes that glowed a luminous red.

She wanted to vomit, but they were coming toward her in a crouching lope.

She ran for her life.

Her first thought was the trailer, but she had enough presence of mind to know she'd be trapped there.

She ran for the high rocky ground, the creatures snuffing behind her like bloodhounds. In the dark, she lost her footing and fell into a fissure, but unknown to her the accident saved her life. Her pursuers lost her scent.

Jodie had cracked her head in the fall. She regained consciousness

once, and thought she heard harsh voices and gunshots. Then she passed out again.

She was still lying unconscious in the fissure the next morning when the helicopter arrived. By the time the crew had scoured the island and finally found Jodie, they had come to a startling discovery.

Everyone else had vanished.

MONEMVASSIA, THE GREEK PeLOPONNESE

IN HIS RECURRING nightmare, Angus MacLean was a staked goat being stalked by a hungry tiger whose yellow eyes stared at him from the jungle shadows. The low growls gradually grew louder until they filled his ears. Then the tiger lunged. He could smell its fetid breath, feel its sharp fangs sinking into his neck. He strained at his collar in a futile attempt to escape. His pathetic, terrified bleating changed to a desperate moan ... and he awakened in a cold sweat, his chest heaving, and his rumpled blankets damp from perspiration.

MacLean stumbled out of his narrow bed and threw open the shutters. The Greek sunlight flooded the whitewashed walls of what had been a monk's cell. He pulled on shorts and a T-shirt, slipped into his walking sandals and stepped outside, blinking his eyes against the shimmer of the sapphire sea. The hammering of his heart subsided.

He took a deep breath, inhaling the perfume like fragrance of the wildflowers that surrounded the two-story stucco monastery. He waited until his hands stopped shaking, then he set off on the morning hike that had proven to be the best antidote for his shattered nerves.

The monastery was built in the shadow of a massive rock, hundreds of feet high, that tour books often referred to as "the Gibraltar of Greece." To reach the summit, he climbed along a path that ran along the top of an ancient wall. Centuries before, the inhabitants of the lower town would retreat to the ramparts to defend themselves from invaders. Only ruins remained of the village that had once housed the entire population in times of siege.

From atop the lofty perch offered by the crumbling foundation of an old Byzantine church, MacLean could see for miles. A few colorful fishing boats were at work. All was seemingly tranquil. MacLean knew that his morning ritual gave him a false sense of security. The people hunting him would not reveal themselves until they killed him.

He prowled among the ruins like a homeless spirit, then descended the wall and made his way back to the monastery's second-floor dining room. The fifteenth-century monastery was one of the traditional buildings the Greek government operated as guest houses around the country. MacLean made a point of arriving for breakfast after all the other guests had left to go sightseeing.

The young man cleaning up in the kitchen smiled and said, "Kali mem, Dr. MacLean

"Kali mera, Angelo," MacLean replied. He tapped his head with his forefinger. "Did you forget?"

Light dawned in Angelo's eyes. "Yes. I'm very sorry. Mr. MacLean

"That's quite all right. Sorry to burden you with my strange requests," MacLean said in his soft Scottish brogue. "But as I said before, I don't want people thinking I can cure their upset stomachs and stomachaches."

"Neh. Yes, of course, Mr. MacLean I understand."

Angelo brought over a bowl of fresh strawberries, honeydew melon and creamy Greek yogurt, topped with local honey and walnuts, and a cup of thick black coffee. Angelo was the young monk who served as resident hostler. He was in his early thirties, with dark curly hair and a handsome face that was usually wreathed in a beatific smile. He was a combination concierge, caretaker, chef and host. He wore ordinary work clothes and the only hint of his vows was the rope tied loosely around his waist.

The two men had struck up a strong friendship in the weeks MacLean had been a guest. Each day, after Angelo finished his breakfast work, they would talk about their shared interest, Byzantine civilization.

MacLean had drifted into historical studies as a diversion from his intense work as a research chemist. Years ago his studies had taken him to Mystra, once the center of the Byzantine world. He had drifted down the Peloponnese and stumbled upon Monemvassia. A narrow causeway flanked by the sea was the only access to the village, a maze of narrow streets and alleys on the other side of the wall whose "one gate" gave Monemvassia its name. MacLean had fallen under the spell of the beautiful place. He vowed to return one day, never thinking that when he came back he'd be running for his life.

The Project had been so innocent at first. MacLean had been teaching advanced chemistry at Edinburgh University when he was offered a dream job doing the pure research that he loved. He'd accepted the position and taken a leave of absence. He threw himself into the work, willing to endure the long hours and intense secrecy. He led one of several teams that were working on enzymes, the complex proteins that produce biochemical reactions.

The Project scientists were cloistered in comfortable dormitories in the French countryside, and had little contact with the outside world. One colleague had jokingly referred to their research as the "Manhattan Project." The isolation posed no problem for MacLean who was a bachelor with no close relatives. Few of his colleagues complained. The astronomical pay and excellent working conditions were ample compensation. Then the Project took a disturbing turn. When MacLean and the others raised questions, they were told not to worry. Instead, they were sent home and told just to wait until the results of their work were analyzed. MacLean had gone to Turkey instead, to explore ruins. When he'd returned to Scotland several weeks later, his answering machine had recorded several hang-ups and a strange telephone message from a former colleague. The scientist asked if MacLean had been reading the papers and urged him to call back. MacLean tried to reach the man, only to learn that he had been killed several days before in a hit-and-run accident. Later, when MacLean was going through his mail pile, he found a packet the scientist had sent before his death. The thick envelope was stuffed with newspaper clips that described a series of accidental deaths. As MacLean read the clips, a shiver ran down his spine. The victims were all scientists who had worked with him on the Project. Scrawled on an enclosed note was the terse warning: "Flee or die!" MacLean wanted to believe the accidents were coincidental, even though it went against his scientific instincts. Then, a few days after he read the clips, a truck tried to run his Mini Cooper off the road. Miraculously, he escaped with only a few scratches. But he'd recognized the truck driver as one of the silent guards who had watched over the scientists at the laboratory. What a fool he had been. MacLean knew he had to flee. But where? Monemvassia had come to mind. It was a popular vacation spot for mainland Greeks. Most of the foreigners who visited the rock came for day trips only. And now here he was.

While MacLean was pondering the events that had brought him there, Angelo came over with a copy of the International Herald Tribune. The monk had to run errands but he would be back in an hour. MacLean nodded and sipped his coffee, savoring the strong dark taste. He skimmed the usual news of economic and political crises. And then his eye caught a headline in the international news briefs:

SURVIVOR SAYS MONSTERS KILLED TV CAST, CREW The dateline was a Scottish island in the Orkneys. Intrigued, he read the story. It was only a few paragraphs long, but when he was done, his hands were shaking. He read the article again until the words blurred. Dear God, he thought. Something awful has happened. He folded the newspaper and went outside, stood in the soothing sunlight and made a decision. He would return home and see if he could get someone to believe his story.

MacLean walked to the city gate and caught a taxi to the ferry office on the causeway, where he bought a ticket for the hydrofoil to Athens the next day. Then he returned to his room and packed his few belongings. What now? He decided to stick to his usual routine for his last day, walked to an outdoor cafe and ordered a tall glass of cold lemonade. He was engrossed in his paper when he became aware that someone was talking to him. He looked up and saw a gray-haired woman in flowered polyester slacks and blouse standing next to his table, holding a camera.

'Sorry to interrupt," she said with a sweet smile. "Would you mind? My husband and I�" Tourists often asked MacLean to document their trips. He was tall and lanky, and with his blue eyes and shock of salt-and-pepper hair, he stood out from the shorter and darker Greeks.

A man sat at a nearby table, giving MacLean a bucktoothed grin. His freckled face was beet-red from too much sun. MacLean nodded and took the camera from the woman's hand. He clicked off some shots of the couple and handed the camera back.

"Thank you so much!" the woman said effusively. "You don't know what it means to have this for our travel album."

"Americans?" MacLean said. His urge to talk English overcame his reluctance to engage anyone in conversation. Angelo's English skills were limited.

The woman beamed. "Is it that obvious? We try so hard to fit in."

Yellow-and-pink polyester was decidedly not a Greek fashion statement, MacLean thought. The woman's husband was wearing a collarless white cotton shirt and black captain's hat like those sold mainly for the tourist trade.

"Came down in the hydrofoil," the man said with a drawl, rising out of his chair. He pressed his moist palm into MacLean "Hell, that was some ride. You English?"

MacLean responded with a look of horror. "Oh no, I'm Scottish."

"I'm one half Scotch and the other half soda," the man said with his horse grin. "Sorry about the mix-up. I'm from Texas. Guess that would be like you thinking we were from Oklahoma."

MacLean wondered why all the Texans he met talked as if everyone had a hearing problem. "I never would have thought that you were from Oklahoma," MacLean said. "Hope you have a nice visit." He started to walk away, only to stop when the woman asked if her husband could take their picture together because he had been so kind to them. MacLean posed with the woman, then her husband.

"Thank you," the woman said. She spoke with a more refined air than her husband. In short order, MacLean learned that Gus and

Emma Harris were from Houston, that Gus had been in the oil business, and she'd been a history teacher, fulfilling her lifelong dream to visit the Cradle of Civilization.

He shook hands, accepted their profuse thanks and set off along the narrow street. He walked fast, hoping they wouldn't be tempted to follow, and took a circuitous route back to the monastery.

MacLean closed the shutters so his room was dark and cool. He slept through the worst of the afternoon heat, then got up and splashed cold water on his face. He stepped outside for a breath of fresh air and was surprised to see the Harrises standing near the old whitewashed chapel in the monastery courtyard.

Gus and his wife were taking pictures of the monastery. They waved and smiled when they saw him, and MacLean went out and offered to show them his room. They were impressed by the workmanship in the dark wood paneling. Back outside again, they gazed up at the sheer cliffs behind the building.

"There must be a wonderful view from up there," Emma said.

"It's a bit of a hike to the top."

"I do a lot of bird-watching back home, so I'm pretty fit. Gus is in better shape than he looks." She smiled. "He used to be a football player, although it's hard to believe now."

"I'm an Aggie," Mr. Harris said. "Texas A and M. There's more of me now than there was back then. Tell you what, though, I'll give it a try."

"Do you think you could show us the way?" Emma asked MacLean

"I'm sorry, I'm leaving on the hydrofoil first thing tomorrow." MacLean told them they might make the climb on their own if they got started early before the sun got too hot.

"You're a dear." She patted MacLean on the cheek in motherly fashion.

He was grinning, admiring their pluck as he watched them depart along the path that ran along the seawall in front of the monastery. They passed Angelo, who was coming back from town.

The monk greeted MacLean then turned to look at the couple. "You have met the Americans from Texas?"

MacLean grin turned to a puzzled frown. "How did you know who they were?"

"They came by yesterday morning. You were up there on your walk." He pointed to the old city.

"That's funny, they acted as if this was their first day here."

Angelo shrugged. "Maybe when we get old, we'll forget, too."

Suddenly, MacLean felt like the staked goat in his nightmare. A cold emptiness settled in his stomach. He excused himself and went back to his room, where he poured himself a stiff shot of ouzo.

How easy it would have been. They would have climbed to the top of the rock and asked him to pose for a photo near the edge. One shove and down he would go.

Another accident. Another dead scientist.

No heavy lifting. Not even for a sweet old history teacher.

He dug into the plastic bag he used for his dirty laundry. Buried at the bottom was the envelope full of yellowing news clips which he spread on the table.

The headlines were different, but the subject of each story was the same.

SCIENTIST DIES IN AUTO ACCIDENT. SCIENTIST KILLED IN HIT-AND-RUN.

SCIENTIST KILLS WIFE, SELF. SCIENTIST DIES IN SKIING ACCIDENT.

Every one of the victims had worked on the Project. He reread the note: "Flee or die!" Then he put the Herald Tribune clip in with the

others and went to the monastery's reception desk. Angelo was going through a pile of reservations.

"I must leave," MacLean said.

Angelo looked crestfallen. "I'm very sorry. How soon?"

"Tonight."

"Impossible. There is no hydrofoil or bus until tomorrow." , "Nevertheless, I must leave and I'm asking you to help me. I can make it worth your while."

A sad look came into the monk's eyes. "I would do this for friendship, not money."

"I'm sorry," MacLean said. "I'm a little upset."

Angelo was not an unintelligent man.

"This is because of the Americans?"

"Some bad people are after me. These Americans may have been sent to find me. I was stupid and told them I was going on the hydrofoil. I'm not sure if they came alone. They may have someone watching at the gate."

Angelo nodded. "I can take you to the mainland by boat. You will need a car."

"I was hoping you could arrange to rent one for me," MacLean said. He handed Angelo his credit card, which he had tried not to use before, knowing it could be traced.

Angelo called the car rental office on the mainland. He spoke a few minutes and hung up. "Everything is taken care of. They will leave the keys in the car."

"Angelo, I don't know how I can repay you."

"No payment. Give a big gift next time you're in church."

MacLean had a light dinner at a secluded cafe, where he found himself glancing with apprehension at the other tables. The evening passed without event. On the way back to the monastery, he kept looking over his shoulder.

The wait was agonizing. He felt trapped in his room, but he reminded himself that the walls were at least a foot thick and the door could withstand a battering ram. A few minutes after midnight, he heard a soft knock on the door.

Angelo took his bag and led the way along the seawall to a set of stairs that went down to a stone platform used by swimmers for diving. By the light of an electric torch, MacLean could see a small motorboat tied up to the platform. They got into the boat. Angelo was reaching for the mooring line when quiet footfalls could be heard on the steps.

"Out for a midnight cruise?" said the sweet voice of Emma Harris.

"You don't suppose Dr. MacLean was leaving without saying good-bye," her husband said.

After his initial surprise, MacLean found his tongue. "What happened to your Texas drawl, Mr. Harris?"

"Oh, that. Not very authentic, I must admit."

"Don't fret, dear. It was good enough to fool Dr. MacLean Although I must admit that we had a little luck in completing our errand. We were sitting in that delightful little cafe when you happened by. It was nice of you to let us take your picture so we could check it against your file photo. We don't like to make mistakes."

Her husband gave an avuncular chuckle. "I remember saying, "Step into my parlor ..." "

" '... Said the spider to the fly." "

They broke into laughter.

"You were sent by the company," MacLean said.

"They're very clever people," Gus said. "They knew you would be on the lookout for someone who looked like a gangster."

"It's a mistake a lot of people have made," Emma said, a sad note in her voice. "But it keeps us in business, doesn't it, Gus? Well. It was lovely traveling in Greece. But all good things must come to an end."

Angelo had listened to the conversation with a puzzled expression on his face. He was unaware of the danger they were in. Before MacLean could stop him, he reached over to untie the boat.

"Excuse us," he said. "We must go."

They were the last words he would ever utter.

There was the muffled thut of a silenced gun and a scarlet tongue of fire licked the darkness. Angelo clutched his chest and made a gurgling sound. Then he toppled from the boat into the water.

"Bad luck to shoot a monk, my dear," Gus said to his wife.

"He wasn't wearing his cassock," she said, with a pout in her voice. "How was I to know?"

Their voices were hard-edged and mocking.

"Come along, Dr. MacLean Gus said. "We have a car waiting to take you to a company plane." "You're not going to kill me?"

"Oh no," said Emma, again the innocent traveler. "There are other plans for you."

"I don't understand."

"You will, my dear. You will."

The French Alps

THE AEROSPATIALE ALOUETTE light utility helicopter threading its way through the deep alpine valleys appeared as insignificant as a gnat against the backdrop of towering peaks. As the helicopter approached a mountain whose summit was crowned with three uneven knobs, Hank Thurston, seated in the front passenger's seat, tapped the shoulder of the man sitting beside him and pointed through the canopy.

"That's "Le Dormeur," " Thurston said, raising his voice to be heard over the thrashing rotor blades. " "The Sleeping Man." The profile supposedly resembles the face of a sleeper lying on his back."

Thurston was a full professor of glaciology at Iowa State University. Although the scientist was in his forties, his face exuded a boyish enthusiasm. Back in Iowa, Thurston kept his face clean-shaven and his hair neatly trimmed, but after a few days in the field he began to look like a bush pilot. It was a look he cultivated by wearing aviator sunglasses, letting his dark brown hair grow long so gray strands would show and by shaving infrequently, so that his chin was usually covered with stubble.

"Poetic license," said the passenger, Derek Rawlins. "I can see the brow and the nose and chin. It reminds me of the Old Man of the Mountain in New Hampshire before it fell apart, except that the stone profile here is horizontal rather than vertical."

Rawlins was a writer for Outside magazine. He was in his late twenties, and with his air of earnest optimism and neatly trimmed sandy-blond hair and beard, he looked more like a college professor than Thurston did.

The crystal clarity of the air created an illusion of nearness, making the mountain seem as if it was only an arm's length away. After a couple of passes around the crags, the helicopter broke out of its lazy circle, scudded over a razorback ridge and dropped down into a natural bowl several miles across. The floor of the mountain basin was covered by an almost perfectly round lake. Although it was summer, ice cakes as big as Volkswagens floated on the ipirrorlike surface.

"Lac du Dormeur," the professor said. "Carved out by a retreating glacier during the Ice Age and now fed by glacial waters."

"That's the biggest martini on the rocks I've ever seen," Rawlins said.

Thurston laughed. "It's as clear as gin, but you won't find any olive at the bottom. That big square structure built into the mountain off to the side of the glacier is the power plant. The nearest town is on the other side of the mountain range."

The aircraft passed over a wide, sturdy-looking vessel anchored near the shore of the lake. Cranes and booms protruded from the boat's deck.

"What's going on down there?" Rawlins said.

"Some sort of archaeological project," Thurston said. "The boat must have come up the river that drains the lake."

"I'll check it out later," Rawlins said. "Maybe I can pry a raise out

of my editor if I come back with two stories for the price of one." He glanced ahead at a wide ice floe that filled the gap between two mountains. "Wow! That must be our glacier."

"Yup. Im Langue du Dormeur. "The Sleeper's Tongue." " The helicopter made a pass over the river of ice that flowed down a wide valley to the lake. Rugged, snow-dusted foothills of black rock hemmed the glacier in on both sides, shaping it into a rounded point. The edges of the ice field were ragged where the flow encountered crevasses and ravines. The ice had a bluish tinge and was cracked along its surface like the parched tongue of a lost prospector.

Rawlins leaned forward for a better look. "The Sleeper should see a doctor. He's got a bad case of trench mouth."

"As you said, poetic license," Thurston said. "Hold on. We're about to land."

The helicopter darted over the leading edge of the glacier and the pilot put the aircraft into a slow banking turn. Moments later, the chopper's runners touched down on a brown grassy strip a couple of hundred feet from the lake.

Thurston helped the pilot unload a number of cartons from the helicopter and suggested that Rawlins stretch his legs. The reporter walked to the water's edge. The lake was unearthly in its stillness. No ripple of air disturbed the surface, which looked hard enough to walk across. He threw a stone to reassure himself that the lake wasn't frozen solid.

Rawlins's gaze shifted from the widening ripples to the boat anchored about a quarter mile from shore. He recognized the distinctive turquoise blue-green color of the hull immediately. He had encountered vessels of similar color while on writing assignments. Even without the letters numa painted in bold black letters on the hull, he would have known the boat belonged to the National Underwater and Marine Agency. He wondered what a NUMA vessel was doing in this remote place far from the nearest ocean.

There was definitely an unexpected story here, but it would have to wait. Thurston was calling him. A battered Citroen 2C was hurtling toward the parked helicopter in a cloud of dust. The pint-sized auto skidded to a stop next to the chopper and a man who resembled a mountain troll emerged from the driver's side like a creature hatched from a deformed egg. He was short and dark-complexioned, with a black beard and long hair.

The man pumped Thurston's hand. "Wonderful to have you back, Monsieur le profess eur And you must be the journalist, Monsieur Rawlins. I am Bernard LeBlanc. Welcome."

"Thanks, Dr. LeBlanc," Rawlins said. "I've been looking forward to my visit. I can't wait to see the amazing work you're doing here."

"Come along then," LeBlanc said, snatching up the reporter's duffel bag. "Fifi awaits." "Fifi?" Rawlins looked around as if he expected to see a dancer from the Follies Bergere.

Thurston irreverently jerked his thumb at the Citroen. "Fifi is the name of Bernie's car."

"And why shouldn't I give my car a woman's name?" LeBlanc said with a mock expression of pique. "She is faithful and hardworking. And beautiful in her own way."

"That's good enough for me," Rawlins said. He followed LeBlanc to the Citroen and got in the backseat. The boxes of supplies were secured to the roof rack. The other men got in the front and LeBlanc drove Fifi toward the base of the mountain that flanked the right side of the glacier. As the car began its ascent up a gravel road, the helicopter lifted off, gained altitude over the lake and disappeared behind the high ridge.

"You're familiar with the work being done at our subglacial observatory, Monsieur Rawlins?" LeBlanc said over his shoulder.

"Call me Deke. I've read the material. I know that your setup is similar to the Svartisen glacier in Norway."

"Correct," Thurston chimed in. "The Svartisen lab is seven hundred feet under the ice. We're closer to eight hundred. In both places, the melting glacier water is channeled into a turbine to produce hydroelectric power. When the engineers drilled the water conduits, they bored an extra tunnel under the glacier to house our observatory."

The car had entered a forest of stunted pine. LeBlanc drove along the narrow track with seemingly reckless abandon. The wheels were only inches from sheer drop-offs. As the incline became steeper, the Citroen's tiny workhorse of an engine began to wheeze.

"Sounds like Fifi is showing her age," Thurston said.

"It is her heart that is important," LeBlanc replied. Nevertheless, they were crawling at a tortoise pace when the road came to an end. They got out of the car and LeBlanc handed them each a shoulder harness, donning one himself. A box of supplies was strapped onto each harness.

Thurston apologized. "Sorry to recruit you as a Sherpa. We flew in supplies for the entire three weeks we're here, but we went through our from age and vin faster than we expected and used the occasion of your visit to bring in more stuff."

"Not a problem," Rawlins said with a good-natured grin, expertly adjusting the weight so it rode easily on his shoulders. "I used to jackass supplies to the White Mountain huts in New Hampshire before I became an ink-stained hack."

LeBlanc led the way along a path that rose for about a hundred yards through scraggly pines. Above the tree line the ground hardened into flat expanses of rock. The rock was sprayed with daubs of yellow spray paint to mark the trail. Before long, the trail became steeper and smoother where the rocks had been buffed by thousands of years of glacial activity. Water from runoff made the hard surface slick and treacherous to navigate. From time to time they crossed crevasses filled with wet snow.

The reporter was huffing and puffing with exertion and altitude.

He sighed with relief when they stopped at last on a shelf next to a wall of black rock that went up at an almost vertical angle. They were close to two thousand feet above the lake, which shimmered in the rays of the noonday sun. The glacier was out of sight around an escarpment, but Rawlins could feel the raw cold that it radiated, as if someone had left a refrigerator door open.

Thurston pointed to a round opening encased in concrete at the base of the vertical cliff. "Welcome to the Ice Palace."

"It looks like a drainage culvert," Rawlins said.

Thurston laughed and crouched low, ducking his head as he led the way into a corrugated metal tunnel about five feet in diameter. The others followed him in a stooping walk that was made necessary by their backpacks. The passage ended after about a hundred feet and opened into a dimly lit tunnel. The shiny wet orange walls of meta-mprphic rock were striped black with darker minerals.

Rawlins looked around in wonder. "You could drive a truck through this thing." "

With room to spare. "It's thirty feet high and thirty feet wide," Thurston said.

"Too bad you couldn't squeeze Fifi through that culvert," Rawlins said.

"We've thought of it. There's an entrance big enough for a car near the power plant, but Bernie is afraid she'd get beat up running around these tunnels."

"Fifi has a very delicate constitution," LeBlanc said with a snort.

The Frenchman opened a plastic locker set against a wall. He passed around rubber boots and hard hats with miners' lights on the crowns.

Minutes later, they set off into the tunnel, the scuffle of their boots echoing off the walls. As they plodded along, Rawlins squinted into the gloom beyond the reach of his headlamp. "Not exactly the Great White Way."

"The power company put the lighting in when they drilled through. A lot of those dead bulbs haven't been replaced."

"You've probably been asked this, but what brought you into glaciology?" Rawlins said.

"That's not the first time I've heard the question. People think glaciologists are a bit odd. We study huge, ancient, slow-moving masses of ice that take centuries to get anywhere. Hardly a job for a grown man, wouldn't you say, Bernie?"

"Maybe not, but I met a nice Eskimo girl once in the Yukon."

"Spoken like a true glaciologist," Thurston said. "We have in common a love of beauty and a desire to get outdoors. Many of us were seduced into this calling by our first awe-inspiring view of an ice field." He gestured around at the walls of the tunnel. "So it's ironic that we spend weeks at a time under the glacier, far from the sunlight, like a bunch of moles."

"Look what it has done to me," LeBlanc said. "Constant thirty-five degrees and one hundred percent humidity. I used to be tall and blond-haired, but I have shrunk and become a shaggy beast."

"You've been a short shaggy beast for as long as I've known you," Thurston said. "We're down here for three-week stints, and I agree that we do seem a bit mole like But even Bernie will agree that we're lucky. Most glaciologists only observe an ice field from above. We can walk right up and tickle its belly."

"What exactly is the nature of your experiments?" Rawlins asked.

"We're conducting a three-year study on how glaciers move and what they do to the rock they slide over. Hope you can make that sound more exciting when you write your article."

"It won't be too hard. With all the interest in global warming, glaciology has become a hot subject."

"So I hear. The recognition is long overdue. Glaciers are affected by climate, so they can tell us to within a few degrees what the temperature was on earth thousands of years ago. In addition, they trigger changes in the climate. Ah, here we are, Club Dormeur."

Four small buildings that looked like trailer homes sat end to end within a bay carved from the wall.

Thurston opened a door to the nearest structure. "All the comforts of home," he said. "Four bedrooms with room for eight researchers, kitchen, bath with shower. Normally, I've got a geologist and other scientists, but we're down to a skeleton crew consisting of Bernie, a young research assistant from Uppsala University and me. You can dump those supplies here. We're about a thirty-minute walk from the lab. We've got phone connections between the entrance, research tunnel and lab room. I'd better let the folks at the observatory know we're back."

He picked up a wall phone and said a few words. His smile turned into a puzzled frown.

"Say again." He listened intently. "Okay. We'll be right there."

"Is there anything wrong, professor?" LeBlanc said.

Thurston furrowed his brow. "I just talked to my research assistant. Incredible!"

"Qu'est-ce que c'est?" LeBlanc said.

Thurston had a stunned expression on his face. "He says he's found a man frozen in the ice."

TWO HUNDRED FEET below the surface of Lac du Dormeur in waters cold enough to kill an unprotected human, the glowing sphere floated above the gravelly bottom of the glacial lake like a will-o'-the-wisp in a Georgia swamp. Despite the hostile environment, the man and woman seated side by side inside the transparent acrylic cabin were as relaxed as loungers on a love seat. The man was husky in build, with shoulders like twin battering rams. Exposure to sea and sun had bronzed the rugged features that were bathed in the soft orange light from the instrument panel, and bleached the pale, prematurely steely gray hair almost to the color of platinum. With his chiseled profile and intense expression, Kurt Austin had the face of a warrior carved on a Roman victory column. But the flinty hardness that lay under the burnished features was softened by an easy smile, and the piercing coral-blue eyes sparkled with good humor.

Austin was the leader of NUMA's Special Assignments Team, created by former NUMA director Admiral James Sandecker, now vice president of the United States, for undersea missions that often took

place secretly outside the realm of government oversight. A marine engineer by education and experience, Austin had come to NUMA from the CIA, where he had worked for a little-known branch that specialized in underwater intelligence gathering.

After coming over to NUMA, Austin had assembled a team of experts that included Joe Zavala, a brilliant engineer specializing in underwater vehicles; Paul Trout, a deep-ocean geologist; and Trout's wife, Gamay Morgan-Trout, a highly skilled diver who had specialized in nautical archaeology before attaining her doctorate in marine biology. Working together, they had conducted many successful probes into strange and sinister enigmas on and under the world's oceans.

Not every job that Austin undertook was filled with danger. Some, like his latest assignment, were quite pleasant and more than made up for the bumps, bruises and scars he had collected on various NUMA assignments. Although he had known his female companion only a few days, he had become thoroughly entranced by her. Skye Labelle was in her late thirties. She had olive skin and mischievous violet-blue eyes that peered out from under the brim of her woolen hat. Her hair was dark brown, bordering on black. Her mouth was too wide to be called classical, but her lips were lush and sensual. She had a good body, but it would never make the cover of Sports Illustrated. Her voice was low and cool, and when she spoke it was obvious she had a quick intelligence.

Although she was striking rather than pretty, Austin thought she was one of the most attractive women he had ever met. She reminded him of a portrait of a young raven-haired countess he had seen hanging on the wall of the Louvre. Austin had admired how the artist had cleverly caught the passion and unabashed frankness in the subject's gaze. The woman in the painting had a deviltry in her eyes, as if she wanted to throw off her regal finery and run barefoot through a meadow. He remembered wishing he could have met her in person. And now, it seemed, he had.

"Do you believe in reincarnation?" Austin said, thinking about the museum portrait.

Skye blinked in surprise. They had been talking about glacial geology.

"I don't know. Why do you ask?" She spoke American English with a slight French accent.

"No reason." Austin paused. "I have another, more personal question."

She gave him a wary look. "I think I know. You want to know about my name."

"I've never met anyone named Skye Labelle before."

"Some people believe I must be named after a Las Vegas stripper."

Austin chuckled. "It's more likely that someone in your family had a poetic turn of mind."

"My crazy parents," she said, with a roll of her eyes. "My father was sent to the U.S. as a diplomat. One day he went to the Albuquerque hot air balloon festival and from that day on, he became a fanatical aeronaut. My older brother was named Thaddeus after the early balloonist Thaddeus Lowe. My American mother is an artist, and something of a free spirit, so she thought the idea of my name was wonderful. Father insists he named me after the color of my eyes, but everyone knows babies' eyes are neutral when they are first born. I don't mind. I think it's a nice name."

"They don't get any nicer than Beautiful Sky."

"Merci. And thank you for all this!" She gazed through the bubble and clapped her hands in childlike joy. "This is absolutely wonderful^. I never dreamed that my studies in archaeology would take me under the water inside a big bubble."

"It must beat polishing medieval armor in a musty museum," Austin said.

Skye had a warm, uninhibited laugh. "I spend very little time in

museums except when I'm organizing an exhibition. I do a lot of corporate jobs these days to support my research work."

Austin raised an eyebrow. "The thought of Microsoft and General Motors hiring an expert in arms and armor makes me wonder about their motives."

"Think about it. To survive, a corporation must try to kill or wound its competition while defending itself. Figuratively speaking."

"The original 'cutthroat competition," " Austin said.

"Not bad. I'll use that phrase in my next presentation."

"How do you teach a bunch of executives to draw blood? Figuratively speaking, of course."

"They already have the blood lust. I get them to think 'out of the box," as they like to say. I ask them to pretend that they are supplying arms for competing forces. The old arms makers had to be metallurgists and engineers. Many were artists, like Leonardo, who designed war engines. Weapons and strategy were constantly changing and the people who supplied the armies had to adjust quickly to new conditions."

"The lives of their customers depended on it."

"Right. I might have one group devise a siege machine while another comes up with ways to defend against it. Or I can give one side metal-piercing arrows while the other comes up with armor that works without being unwieldy. Then we switch sides and try again. They learn to use their native intelligence rather than to rely on computers and such."

"Maybe you should offer your services to NUMA. Learning how to blast holes in ten-foot-thick walls with a trebuchet sounds like a lot more fun than staring at budget pie charts."

A sly smile crossed Skye's face. "Well, you know, most executives are men."

"Boys and their toys. A surefire formula for success."

"I'll admit I pander to the childish side of my clients, but my sessions are immensely popular and very lucrative. And they allow me the flexibility to work on projects that might not be possible on my salary from the Sorbonne."

"Projects like the ancient trade routes?"

She nodded. "It would be a major coup if I could prove that tin and other goods traveled overland along the old Amber Route, through the Alpine passes and valleys to the Adriatic, where Phoenician and Minoan ships transported it to the eastern reaches of the Mediterranean. And that the trade went both ways."

"The logistics of your theoretical trade route would have been complex."

"You're a genius! Exactly my point!"

"Thanks for the compliment, but I'm just relating it to my own experiences moving people and material."

"Then you know how complicated it would be. People along the land route, like the Celts and the Etruscans, had to cooperate on trade agreements in order to move the materials along. I think trade was a lot more extensive than my colleagues would admit. All this has fascinating implications about how we view ancient civilizations. They weren't all about war; they knew the value of peaceful alliances a long time before the EU or NAFTA. And I mean to prove it."

"Ancient globalization? An ambitious goal. I wish you luck."

"I'll need it. But if I do succeed I'll have you and NUMA to thank. Your agency has been wonderfully generous in the use of its research vessel and equipment."

"It goes both ways. Your project gives NUMA a chance to test our new vessel in inland waters and to see how this submersible operates under field conditions."

She made a sweeping gesture with her hand. "The scenery is perfectly lovely. All we need is a bottle of champagne and foie gras." Austin leaned over and handed a small plastic cooler to his companion "Can't help you there, but how about ajambon et frontage sandwich?"

"Ham and cheese would be my second choice." She unzipped the cooler, extracted a sandwich, handed it to Austin and took one for herself.

Austin brought the submersible to a hovering stop. As he chewed on his lunch, savoring the crusty baguette and the creamy slab of Camembert cheese, he studied a chart of the lake.

"We're here, alongside a natural shelf that roughly parallels the shoreline," he said, running his finger along a wavy line. "This could have been exposed land centuries ago."

"It goes along with my findings. A section of the Amber Route skirted the shore of Lac du Dormeur. When the waters rose, the traders found another route. Anything we find here would be very old." , "What exactly are we looking for?"

"I'll know it when I see it."

"Good enough for me."

"You're far too trusting. I'll elaborate. The caravans that plied the Amber Route needed places to stop for the night. I'm looking for the ruins of hospices, or settlements that may have grown up around a stopping place. Then I hope to find weapons that would flesh out the full trade story."

They washed their lunch down with Evian water, and Austin's fingers played over the controls. The battery-powered electrical motors hummed, activating the twin lateral thrusters that the sphere rested on, and the submersible continued its exploration.

The SEAmagine SEA mobile was fifteen feet long, about the length of a mid sized Boston whaler, and only seven feet wide, but it was capable of carrying two people in one-atmosphere comfort to a depth of fifteen hundred feet for hours at a time. The vehicle had a range of twelve nautical miles and a maximum speed of 2.5 knots. Unlike most submersibles, which bobbed like a cork when they surfaced, the SEA mobile could be operated like a boat. It sat high in the water when it wasn't submerged, giving the pilot clear visibility, and could cruise to a dive site or edge up to a dive platform.

The SEA mobile looked as if it had been assembled from spare parts cast off from a deep submergence lab. The crystal ball cockpit was fifty-four inches in diameter and it was perched on two flotation cylinders the size of water mains. Two protective metal frames shaped like the letter D flanked the sphere.

The vehicle was built to maintain positive buoyancy at all times and the tendency to float to the surface was countered by a midship-mounted vertical thruster. Because the SEA mobile was balanced to remain level constantly, at the surface or under it, the pilot didn't have to fiddle around with pitch controls to keep it at a horizontal attitude.

Using a navigational acoustic Doppler instrument to keep track of their position, Austin guided the vehicle along the underwater escarpment, a broad shelf that gradually sloped down into the deeper water. Following a basic search pattern, Austin ran a series of parallel lines like someone mowing a lawn. The sub's four halogen lights illuminated the bottom, whose contours had been shaped by the advance and retreat of glaciers.

The sub tracked back and forth for two hours and Austin's eyes were starting to glaze from staring at the monotonous gray seascape. Skye was still entranced by the uniqueness of her surroundings. She leaned forward, chin on her hands, studying every square foot of lake bottom. In time, her persistence paid off.

"There!" She jabbed the air with her forefinger.

Austin slowed the vehicle to a crawl and squinted at a vague shape just beyond the range of the lights, then moved the submersible in for a closer look. The object lying on its side was a massive stone slab about twelve feet long and half as wide. The chisel marks visible along its edges suggested that it was not a natural rock formation.

Other monoliths could be seen nearby, some standing upright; others topped with similar slabs like the Greek letter.

"Seems we took a wrong turn and ended up at Stonehenge," Austin said.

"They're burial monuments," Skye said. "The arches mark the way to a tomb for funeral processions."

Austin increased the power to the thrusters and the vehicle glided over six identical archways spaced thirty feet or so apart. Then the ground on either side of the archways began to rise, creating a shallow valley. The natural hillsides morphed into high cyclopean walls constructed with massive hand-hewn blocks.

The narrow canyon ended abruptly in a sheer vertical wall. Cut into the wall was a rectangular opening that looked like the door on an elephant house. A lintel about thirty feet wide topped the door opening and above the huge slab was a smaller, triangular hole.

"Incredible," Skye said in hushed tones. "It's a tho los

"You've seen this before?" ~~

"It's a beehive tomb. There's one in Mycenae called the "Treasury of Atreus

"Mycenae. That's Greek."

"Yes, but the design is even older. The tombs go back to 2200 B.C. They were used for communal burials in Crete and other parts of the Aegean. Kurt, do you know what this means?" Her voice quivered with excitement. "We could establish trade links between the Aegean and Europe far earlier than anyone has dared to suggest. I'd give anything to get a close look at the tomb."

"My standard price for an underwater tomb tour is an invitation to dinner."

"You can get us inside?"

"Why not? We've got plenty of clearance on either side and above. If we go slowly "

"The hell with slow! Depeche-toi. Vite, vitel" Austin laughed, and moved the submersible forward toward the dark opening. He was as eager as Skye, but he advanced with caution. The lights were beginning to probe the interior when a voice came over the vehicle's radio receiver.

"Kurt, this is support. Come in, please."

The words being transmitted through the water had a metallic vibrato, but Austin recognized the voice of the NUMA boat's captain.

He brought the submersible to a hovering stop and picked up the microphone. "This is the SEA mobile Do you read me?"

"Your voice is a little faint and scratchy, but I can hear you. Please tell Ms. Labelle that Francois wants to talk to her."

Francois Balduc was the French observer NUMA had invited aboard as a courtesy to the French government. He was a pleasant, middle-aged bureaucrat who stayed out of the way except at dinner, when he assisted the cook in turning out some memorable feasts. Austin handed the mike to Skye.

There was a heated discussion in French, which ended when Skye passed the microphone back.

"Merde!" she said with a frown. "We've got to go up."

"Why? We still have plenty of air and power."

"Francois got a call from a big shot in the French government. I'm needed immediately to identify some sort of artifact."

"That doesn't sound very urgent. Can it wait?"

"As far as I'm concerned it can until Napoleon returns from exile," she said with a sigh, "but the government is subsidizing part of my research here, so I'm on call, so to speak. I'm sorry."

Austin stared with narrowed eyes at the opening. "This tomb has been hidden from human view possibly for thousands of years. It's not going anywhere."

Skye nodded in agreement, although her heart clearly wasn't in it.

They looked longingly at the mysterious doorway, and then

Austin put the submersible in a U-turn. Once they were clear of the canyon, he reached for the vertical thruster control, and the submersible began its ascent.

Moments later, the bubble cockpit popped out at the surface near the NUMA catamaran. He maneuvered the craft around behind the boat and drove it over a submerged platform between the twin hulls. The gate was raised and a winch hoisted the platform carrying the submersible up onto the deck.

Francois was awaiting their arrival, an anxious expression on his usually bland face. "I'm so sorry to interrupt your work, Mademoiselle Skye. The co chon who called me was most insistent."

She pecked him lightly on the cheek. "Don't worry, Francois; it's not your fault. Tell me what they want."

He gestured toward the mountains. "They want you over there." "The glacier. Are you sure?"

He nodded his head vigorously. "Yes, yes, I asked the same thing. They were very clear that they needed your expertise. They found something in the ice. That's all I know. The boat is waiting."

Skye turned to Austin, an anxious look on her face. He anticipated her words. "Don't worry. I'll wait until you get back before I dive on the tomb."

She embraced Austin in a warm hug and kissed him on both cheeks.

"Merci, Kurt. I really appreciate this." She shot him a smile that was only a few Btus short of seduction. "There's a nice little bistro on the Left Bank. Good value for the money." She laughed at his blank look. "Don't tell me you've forgotten your dinner invitation? I accept."

Before Austin could reply, Skye climbed down the ladder into the waiting powerboat, the outboard motor buzzed, and the shuttle headed toward shore. Austin was an attractive and charming man, and he had met many fascinating and beautiful women in his career. But as leader of NUMA's Special Assignments Team, he was on call day or night. He was seldom home and his globe-hopping lifestyle was not conducive to a long-term relationship. Most encounters were all too brief.

Austin had been attracted to Skye from the start, and if he read the signals in her glance and smile and voice correctly, the feeling was mutual. He chuckled ruefully at the turnabout. Usually he was the one who went charging off when duty called, while his romantic interest of the moment cooled her heels. He gazed off at the boat making its way toward shore and wondered what sort of artifact could have created so much excitement. He almost wished that he had accompanied Skye.

Within a few hours, he would be thanking the gods that he didn't go along for the ride.

LEBLANC MET SKYE on the beach and correctly sized up her sour mood. But the Frenchman's unkempt appearance masked his considerable Gallic charm and wit. Minutes after Skye got into the car, the troll-like man had her laughing with his stories about the temperamental Fifi.

Skye saw that the Citroen was heading to one side of the ice field and said, "I thought we were going to the glacier."

"Not to the glacier, mademoiselle. We will be going under it. My colleagues and I are studying the movement of the ice at an observatory eight hundred feet beneath Le Dormeur."

"I had no idea," Skye said. "Tell me more."

LeBlanc nodded and launched into an explanation of his work at the observatory. As Skye listened intently, her scientific curiosity took the edge off her irritation at being drawn away from the ship.

"And what is the nature of your work on the lake?" LeBlanc said when he was through. "We emerged from our cave one day and voilal The submersible had appeared like magic."

"I'm an archaeologist with the Sorbonne. The National Under

water and Marine Agency was kind enough to provide a vessel for my research. We traveled up the river that runs into Lac du Dormeur. I hope to find evidence of old Amber Route trading posts under the waters of the lake."

"Fascinating! Have you come across anything of interest?" "Yes. That's why I'm anxious to get back to the project as soon as possible. Could you tell me why my services are so urgently required?"

"We found a body frozen in the ice." "A body?"

"We think it is the corpse of a man."

"Like the Ice Man?" she said, recalling the mummified body of a Neolithic huntsman found in the Alps some years earlier.

LeBlanc shook his head. "We believe this poor fellow is of more recent origin. At first we thought he was a climber who had fallen into a crevasse."

"What made you change your mind?" "You'll have to see."

"Please don't play games with me, Monsieur LeBlanc," Skye snapped. "My specialty is ancient arms and armor, not old bodies. Why am I being called into this?"

"My apologies, mademoiselle. Monsieur Renaud has asked us not to say anything."

Skye's mouth dropped open. "Renaud? From the state archaeological board?"

"One and the same, mademoiselle. He arrived hours after we notified the authorities of the discovery and has put himself in charge. You know him?"

"Oh yes, I know him." She apologized to LeBlanc for jumping down his throat and sat back in her seat, arms folded across her chest. I know him very well, she thought.

Auguste Renaud was a professor of anthropology at the Sorbonne.

He spent little time in teaching, which was a godsend for the students, who despised him, and instead devoted his energy to playing politics. He had built up a cadre of cronies, and with his connections he had risen to a place in the state's archaeological establishment, where he used his influence to reward and punish. He had stymied several of Skye's projects, hinting that they could be put on a fast track if she would sleep with him. Skye had told him she would rather sleep with a roach.

LeBlanc parked the Citroen and led Skye to the tunnel entrance. He scrambled into the entry culvert and, after a moment's hesitation, she followed him to the main tunnel. LeBlanc fitted Skye out with a hard hat and headlamp and they began walking. Five minutes later, they were at the living quarters. LeBlanc used a telephone to call ahead to let the lab know that they were on their way. Then they started off on their half-hour trek.

As they hiked through the tunnel, their footsteps echoed off the dripping walls. Skye glanced around at their damp surroundings and said, "This is like the inside of a wet boot."

"Not exactly the Champs-Elysees, I agree. But the traffic is not as bad as in Paris."

Skye was awestruck at the engineering accomplishment the tunnel represented and kept up a barrage of questions about the details as they trudged deeper into the tunnel. At one point, they came upon a square section of concrete surrounding a steel door in the tunnel wall.

"Where does that door go?" she inquired.

"It leads to another tunnel that connects to the hydroelectric system. When the flow through the tunnels is slow earlier in the year, we can open the door, ford a little stream, and go places farther into the system. But this time of year, the water rises, so we keep the door shut."

"You can get to the power plant from here?"

"There are tunnels all through the mountain and under the ice cap, but only the dry ones are accessible. The others carry the water

to the plant. A regular river flows under the glacier and the current can become quite brisk. We don't normally work this late in the season. Melting water flows in the natural cavities between the ice and the rock, creates pockets and slows down our research. But our work took longer this spring than we thought it would."

"How do you get air down here?" Skye said, sniffing at the dampness.

"If we were to keep going past the lab and under the glacier for another kilometer more or less, eventually we would come to a large opening on the far side of the ice. It was used to bring in the trailers for the lab and staff. It's been left open like a mine entrance. Air flows in from there."

Skye shivered in the dank cold. "I admire your determination. This is not the most pleasant place to work."

LeBlanc's deep laugh echoed off the dripping walls. "It's most un-pleasant, very boring, and we're always soaked to the bone. We take a few trips into the sunlight during our three-week stays here, but it's depressing to have to return to the caves, so we tend to stay in the lab, which is dry and well lit. It's equipped with computers, vacuum pumps for filtering sediments, even a walk-in freezer so we can work on ice samples without having them melt. After working an eighteen-hour day, you shower and crawl into bed, so the time goes by fast. Ah, I see that we're almost there."

Like the living quarters, the lab trailers were nestled in a carved-out section of wall. As LeBlanc stepped up to the nearest lab, the door opened and a tall thin figure stepped out. The sight of Renaud rekindled Skye's simmering wrath. He actually resembled a praying mantis more than a roach. He had a triangular face, wide at the top, with a pointed chin. His nose was long and his eyes small and close together. His thinning hair was a pallid red.

Renaud greeted Skye with the limp, moist handshake that had triggered her revulsion the first time she met him.

"Good morning, my dear Mademoiselle Labelle. Thank you for coming to this damp, dark cave."

"You're welcome, Professor Renaud." She glanced around at the inhospitable surroundings. "This environment must suit you well."

Renaud ignored the veiled suggestion that he had crawled out from under a rock and ran his eyes up and down Skye's well-put-together body as if he could see through her heavy clothing. "Anyplace where you and I are together suits me well."

Skye stifled her gag reflex. "Perhaps you can tell me what was so important that you had to pull me away from my work."

"With pleasure." He reached over to take her by the arm. Skye stepped out of reach and linked her arm through LeBlanc's.

"Lead on," she said.

The glaciologist had been watching the verbal fencing with mirthful-eyes. His mouth widened in a toothy grin and he and Skye walked arm in arm to a steep flight of rough wooden stairs. The stairs led up to a tunnel about twelve feet high and ten feet wide.

Approximately twenty paces from the stairs, the tunnel branched out into a Y. LeBlanc escorted Skye down the right-hand passageway. Water was streaming along a shallow channel that had been cut in the tunnel floor for drainage. A black rubber hose about four inches in diameter ran alongside one wall.

"Water jet," LeBlanc explained. "We collect the drainage water, heat it up and spray it on the ice to melt it. The ice is like putty at the bottom of the glacier. We're constantly melting it, otherwise it would re-form at the rate of two to three feet a day."

"That's very fast," Skye said.

"Very. Sometimes we go as far as fifty meters into the glacier and we have to be alert so the ice doesn't close behind us."

The tunnel ended in an icy slope about ten feet high. They clambered up the slippery rock surface on a ladder and entered an ice cave with space enough to hold more than a dozen people. The walls and

ceiling were bluish white except for areas that were covered with dirt scraped up by the movement of the glacier.

"We're at the bottom of the glacier," LeBlanc said. "There is nothing but ice above our heads for eight hundred feet. This is the dirtiest part of the ice floe. It gets cleaner the more you drill into it. I must leave now to do an errand for Monsieur Renaud."

Skye thanked him and then her attention was drawn to the far wall where a man in a raincoat was spraying the ice with a hot water hose. The melting ice generated clouds of steam, which made the damp air in the room even harder to breathe. The man turned off the jet when he saw he had visitors and came over to shake hands.

"Welcome to our little observatory, Mademoiselle Labelle. Hope the trip from the outside wasn't too arduous. My name is Hank Thurston. I'm Bernie's colleague. This is Craig Rossi, our assistant from Uppsala University," he said, gesturing at a young man in his early twenties, "and that's Derek Rawlins, who's writing about our work for Outside magazine."

As Skye shook hands, Renaud brushed by the others and went over to the wall to examine a vaguely human figure that was locked in the ice.

"As you can see, this gentleman has been frozen for some time," Renaud said. Glancing at Skye, he said, "Not unlike some of the women I have encountered."

No one laughed at the joke. Skye stepped past Renaud and ran her fingers around the perimeter of the dark shape. The limbs were twisted in grotesque positions.

"We found him when we were enlarging the cave," Thurston explained.

"He looks more like a bug on a windshield than a man," Skye said.

"We're lucky he's not just a big greasy smear," Thurston said. "He's in pretty good shape, considering. The ice at the bottom of a glacier, and anything in it, is squeezed like putty by hundreds of tons of pressure."

Skye peered at the vague form. "Are you assuming that he was on top of the glacier at one point?"

"Sure," Thurston said. "With a valley glacier like Le Dormeur or some of the others you'll find in the Alps, a reasonable amount of snowfall moves pretty fast through the ice."

"How long would it take?"

"My guess is that it would take a hundred years, more or less, to get from the top to the bottom of Le Dormeur." It would only work for an object near the head of the glacier high in the mountains, where ice flows vertically as well as horizontally."

"Then it's possible that he was a climber who fell into a crevasse?"

"That's what we thought at first. Then we took a closer look."

Skye put her face closer to the ice. The body was dressed almost entirely in dark leather, from his boots to the snug Snoopy-type cap.

Tufts of fur lining poked out here and there. A gun holster, pistol still in it, hung from a belt.

Her gaze moved up to the face. The features were unclear through the ice, but the skin was burnished to a dark copper color, as if he had lain out in the sun too long. The eyes were covered with a pair of goggles.

"Incredible," she whispered, then stepped back and turned to Renaud. "But what does this have to do with me?"

Renaud smiled and went over to a plastic storage container and reached inside. He grunted as he lifted out a steel helmet. "This was found near the man's head."

Skye took the helmet and studied the intricate design engraved on the metal, pursing her lips in thought. The visor was formed into the face of a man with a large nose and a bushy mustache. The crown was engraved with ornate, interlocking flowers and stems, and mythical creatures revolved like planets around a stylized three-headed eagle. The eagle's mouths were open in a defiant scream and bundles of spears and arrows were clutched in its sharp claws.

"We actually discovered the helmet first," Thurston said. "We shut down the pump immediately and luckily we didn't damage the body."

"A wise decision," Renaud said. "An archaeological site is vulnerable to contamination, very much like a crime scene."

Skye poked her fingers through a rough opening in the right side of the helmet. "This looks like a bullet hole."

Renaud snorted. "Bullet hole! A spear or an arrow would be more appropriate."

"It's not unusual to see proof marks, dents in armor where it was tested against firearms," Skye said. "The hole is unusually clean. This steel is of exceptionally high quality. Look, except for a few scratches and dings it's hardly damaged after being squeezed by the ice. You've called in a forensics expert?" she said.

"He should be here tomorrow," Renaud said. "We don't need a specialist to tell us this fellow is dead. What can you tell us about this helmet?"

"I can't place it," she said, with a shake of her head. "The general shape resembles some I have seen, but the markings are unknown to me. I'd have to look for an armorer's mark and check it against my database. There are many contradictions here." She gazed at the body. "The clothing and the gun look twentieth century. He appears to be an aviator, judging from his uniform and the goggles. Why would he be wearing an old helmet, if that is the case?"

"Very interesting, Mademoiselle Labelle," Renaud said with an impatient sigh, "but I expected you to be more help." He took the helmet from her hands and replaced it in the container after first pulling out a small riveted strongbox. He cradled the battered metal box like a baby. "This was near the body. What we find inside may

identify this person and tell us how he got here. In the meantime," he said to Thurston, "I would like you to continue melting the ice around the body in case there are other identifying objects. I will take full responsibility."

Thurston gave him a skeptical look, and then shrugged. "This is your country," he said, and started the hot water hose again. He melted another few inches of ice on either side of the body, but found nothing. After a while they went back to the lab for some nourishment and to warm up, then returned to the ice cave and resumed their explorations. When Renaud said he would stay in the lab while the others went back to the ice cave, no one protested.

Thurston had worked on the ice for a while longer before Renaud showed up and clapped his hands for attention. "We must stop for now. We have visitors."

Excited voices echoed along the passageway. A moment later, a trio of men carrying video and still cameras and notebooks burst into the cave. Except for a tall man, who held politely back, they noisily jostled each other and bumped shoulders in their zest to film the body.

Skye grabbed Renaud by the sleeve and pulled him aside. "What are these reporters doing here?" she demanded.

He looked down his long thin nose. "/ invited them. They are part of a press pool chosen by lot to cover this great discovery."

"You don't even know what this discovery is," she said with unveiled contempt in her voice. "And you just lectured us against contaminating the site."

He dismissed her protest with an airy wave of his hand. "It's important to let the world know about this wonderful find." Renaud raised his voice to gain the reporters' attention. "I'll answer your questions about the mummy as soon as we move outside the tomb," Renaud said, leading the way out of the cave. Skye simmered with anger.

"Jeezus!" said Rawlins. "Mummy. Tomb. He's making himself sound like he just found King Tut."

The photographers took another battery of shots and moved out of the chamber, except for the tall man. He was around six and a half feet tall, his face was a pasty white and he had a muscular build that matched his height. A camera hung around his neck and slung from his shoulder was a large canvas gear bag. He stared impassively at the body for a moment, and then he followed after the others.

"I overheard what you said to Renaud," Thurston said to Skye. "The site will start freezing up again soon and maybe that will protect it."

"Good. Let's see what that idiot is cooking up in the meantime."

They hurried from the cave and down the ladder and the wooden stairs to the main tunnel. Renaud stood outside a lab building, holding the strongbox high above his head.

"What's in it?" a reporter called out.

"We don't know. We will have to open it under controlled circumstances so as not to damage the contents."

He spun around on his heel so everyone could get a shot. The big man with the camera around his neck failed to take advantage of the photo op, however. Instead, he shouldered his way past the others, ignored the murmurs of protest from his fellow reporters and planted himself directly in front of Renaud.

"Give the box to me," he said in an impassive tone, extending his large hand.

Renaud looked startled. Then, thinking the man was joking, decided to play along with the game. He grinned and hugged the box tightly to his chest. "Not on your life," he said.

"No," the man said, without raising his voice. "Not on your life!"

He reached inside his coat, brought out a pistol and slammed the barrel down on Renaud's knuckles. The expression in Renaud's eyes went from amusement to surprise to pain. He collapsed to his knees, clutching his mangled fingers.

The man caught the box before it fell to the ground. Then he wheeled around and waved the gun at the reporters, who fell over themselves trying to back up, before he strode off down the tunnel.

"Stop him!" Renaud said through his pain, holding his crushed fingers.

"What about that telephone?" one reporter said.

Thurston snatched the telephone off the wall and held it to his ear. "Dead," he said with a frown. "The line must have been cut. There's no one back at the living quarters anyhow. We'll hike to the entrance and call for help."

Thurston and LeBlanc helped Renaud to his feet. They administered first aid to his hand with a kit from the lab while the reporters speculated as to the identity of the big man. None of them recognized him. He had simply appeared bearing the proper credentials and been given a seat on the float plane that dropped them off at the edge of the lake where LeBlanc had picked them up.

LeBlanc and Skye said they would join Thurston. The reporters decided to stay put after Thurston warned that the gunman might be waiting in the tunnel. They walked briskly for several minutes, their headlamps stabbing the semidarkness. Then they walked at a slower pace and more deliberately, as if they expected the big man to leap out of the darkness. They listened for footsteps, but all they heard was the dripping of water off the ceiling and walls.

Suddenly, a loud hollow explosion came from the dark tunnel ahead, followed by an earthshaking shock. Almost simultaneously, a blast of hot air surged through the tunnel. They hit the ground, trying to bury their faces into the wet floor as the pressure wave swept over them.

When it seemed safe, they stood and wiped the muck off their faces. Their ears were ringing, so they had to shout to be heard. "What was that}" LeBlanc said.

"Let's take a look." Thurston started forward, fearing the worst.

"Wait!" Skye said.

"What's wrong?" Thurston said.

"Look at your feet."

Light from their headlamps began to reflect off something that was sparkling and moving on the tunnel floor.

"Water!" Thurston yelled.

The torrent rushed toward them.

They turned and ran deeper into the tunnel, with waves lapping at their heels.

THROUGH HIS BINOCULARS Austin had watched Skye get into a car and followed the vehicle as it climbed the slope to one side of the glacier and disappeared berjind the trees. It was as if the earth had swallowed her up. As he leaned against the ship's railing, his eyes were drawn to La Langue du Dormeur. With its mottled surface and the dark brooding peaks on both sides, the glacier looked like a scene from the planet Pluto. Sun glistened on the ice, but it did little to alleviate the waves of cold that poured off the surface and rolled across the mirror-flat lake surface.

Thinking back to Skye's theory, that caravans using the Amber Route had made their way around the edge of the lake, he tried to put himself in the boots of the ancient travelers and wondered what they would have made of a natural phenomenon as big and implacable as the glacier. More than likely, they would have taken it as a creation of the gods, who had to be appeased. Maybe the underwater tomb had something to do with the glacier. He was as anxious to explore the tomb as she was. It would take little effort to launch

the submersible and take a solo run, but she would never forgive him. And he wouldn't blame her.

Austin decided to make sure the submersible was ready for a dive when Skye did return. As he checked out the SEA mobile with a fine-tooth comb, Austin could hear his father's voice in his head reminding him to make sure of every detail. His father, the wealthy owner of a marine salvage company based in Seattle, had taught Kurt basic seamanship and given him a couple of nuggets of nautical advice. Never tie a knot that can't be undone with a flip of the line, even when the line was wet. And always keep your boat "shipshape and Bristol fashion."

Austin had taken his father's words to heart. The knots he learned through constant practice never snagged. He made sure the lines on the sailing pram his father built for him were neatly coiled, and the brightwork polished and metal kept clean of corrosion. The advice stayed with him when he went on to college. While studying for his master's degree in systems management at the University of Washington, he also attended a highly rated diving school in Seattle and trained as a professional diver, attaining high proficiency in a number of specialized areas.

After college he worked on North Sea oil rigs for two years and returned to his father's salvage company for six years, before being lured into government service by a little-known branch of the CIA that specialized in underwater intelligence-gathering. At the end of the Cold War, the CIA closed down the undersea investigation branch and he moved over to NUMA.

As a lover of philosophy, with its search for truth and hidden meanings, Austin knew the Old Man's advice went beyond the practical tasks associated with running a boat. His father was telling him in simple terms about life, and the need to be ready and prepared for the unexpected. It was advice Austin took seriously, and his attention

to detail had saved his life and those around him on more than one occasion.

He tested the batteries, made sure the air tanks had been replaced with fresh ones, and examined the vehicle with a practiced eye. Satisfied with his inspection, he gently rapped his knuckles against the transparent dome. "Shipshape and Bristol fashion," he said with a smile.

Austin climbed down from the submersible onto the deck of the Mummichug. The twin-hulled, eighty-foot craft was the smallest NUMA research vessel he had ever worked on. Like the tiny fish that was its namesake, the Mummichug was at home in fresh or salt water. It was a modified version of a vessel designed for inshore duty in the cantankerous waters along the New England coast.

It was seaworthy and fast, driven by powerful diesel engines that gave it a cruising speed of 20 knots. It slept eight and was ideal for short missions. Despite its size, the Mummichug?" winches and A-frame could haul heavy loads. And a larger vessel would not have been able to navigate the winding river to the glacier.

Finding himself at loose ends without Skye to talk to, Austin grabbed a mug of coffee in the galley, and then went below to the remote sensing lab. It was a small space crammed with several computer monitors set up on tables. Like everything else on the ship, the lab was understated, although electronic nerves and ganglions connected the monitors to a sophisticated array of sensing instruments.

He plunked himself down in a chair in front of a screen, took a sip of coffee and called up the file on the side-scan sonar display. Dr. Harold Edgerton had pioneered side scan sonar in 1963 when he'd mounted a sonar transducer on the side rather than the bottom of his survey boat. The discovery, which allowed surface vessels to cover large areas of bottom, would revolutionize underwater search techniques.

When the Mummichug had first arrived on site, Skye had asked for a survey along the shore across the lake from the glacier, which would have presented a formidable roadblock to caravans. She reasoned that travelers would have lingered near the river before fording it and a settlement might have built up nearby. The waterway itself may have been used as a tributary of the Amber Route.

While the submersible had carried out its underwater mission, the ship had continued its sonar survey along the lake's perimeter. Austin wanted to see what the scan had picked up. He put the screen in a slow scroll and the high-resolution sonar image flowed down from the top of the monitor like twin amber waterfalls. Displayed on the right side of the screen were latitude, longitude and position.

Interpreting sonar images requires a practiced eye, but it is not the most exciting occupation. With its flat, gravelly bottom, Lac du Dormeur was even more monotonous than some. Austin found his thoughts drifting off. His eyelids had dropped to half-mast, but they snapped open when an anomaly caught his attention. He scrolled back, leaned forward to examine the dark cross etched against the monotone background, then, with a click of the computer mouse, zoomed in on the image and enhanced the details.

He was looking at a plane; he could even see the cockpit. He clicked on the print icon and a few seconds later a picture rolled off the printer. He studied the image under a strong light. Part of a wing seemed to be missing. He rose from his seat and was headed for the door, intending to alert the captain to his find, when Francois burst into the lab. He was obviously agitated. The French observer usually wore an imperturbable smile, but he looked as if he had just heard that the Eiffel Tower had fallen.

"Monsieur Austin, you must come quickly to the bridge."

"What's wrong?" Austin said.

"It's Mademoiselle Skye."

Austin's stomach did a flip-flop. "What about her?"

An incomprehensible mishmash of Franglais streamed from the man's mouth. Austin brushed past the sputtering Frenchman and climbed two steps at a time to the bridge. The captain was in the pilothouse, talking into the radio microphone. When he saw Kurt, he said, "Attendez," and set the mike aside.

Captain Jack Fortier was a slightly built man of French-Canadian origin who had become a U.S. citizen so he could work for NUMA. His ability to speak French had come in handy on the expedition, although some of the locals he encountered snickered behind his back at his strong Quebecois accent. Fortier told Austin that the derision didn't bother him because his language was the purer, unsullied by regional accents, as in France. Not much seemed to bother the captain, which is why Austin was surprised to see Fortier's brow furrowed with worry.. "What's happened to Skye?" Austin said, getting right to the point.

"I'm on the phone with the supervisor of the power plant. He says there has been an accident."

A chill danced up and down Austin's spine. "What sort of accident?"

"Skye and some other people were in a tunnel under the glacier."

"What was she doing there?"

"There's an observatory under the ice where scientists can study the movement of the glacier. It's part of the tunnel system the power company built to use water coming off the glacier. Apparently something went wrong and water flooded the tunnel."

"Has the power plant been able to make contact with the observatory?"

"No. The telephone line is down."

"So we don't know if they're dead or alive."

"Apparently not," Fortier said in a half whisper.

The news rocked Austin back on his heels. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly as he collected his thoughts.

Rallying, he said, "Tell the plant supervisor I want to meet with him. Tell him to have detailed plans of the tunnel system ready. And rustle up a boat to get me to shore." Austin paused as he realized that he was barking orders at the captain. "Sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to sound like a marine drill sergeant. This is your ship. Those were only suggestions."

"Suggestions well taken," the captain replied with a smile. "Don't worry about it. I don't have a clue what to do next. The ship and crew are at your command."

Captain Fortier picked up the mike and began to speak French.

Austin stared at the glacier through the pilothouse window. He was as still as a bronze statue, but his calmness was deceiving. His nimble mind was racing ahead, exploring strategies. But he knew it was all mental smoke and mirrors for now because he couldn't come up with a plan until he knew exactly what he had to deal with.

He thought of the beguiling expression on Skye's face as she left the ship. He knew the odds were against it, but he vowed to see that enchanting smile again.

A TRUCK AWAITED AUSTIN on the beach. The driver tore up the hill to the plant at breakneck speed. As the truck approached the block-shaped gray concrete structure, which was built into the base of a steep mountain wall, Austin could see someone pacing back and forth in front of the entrance. The truck skidded to a stop and the man rushed over, opened the door for Austin and extended his hand in greeting.

"Parlez-vous Frangais, Monsieur Austin?"

"Iparle a little," Austin replied as he got out of the truck.

"D'accord. Okay," the man said with an indulgent smile. "I speak enough English. My name is Guy Lessard. I am the plant supervisor. This is a terrible business."

"Then you must know that time is of the essence," Austin said.

Lessard was a short wiry man with a precisely trimmed mustache adorning his thin face. He had an air of nervous energy, as if he had tapped into one of the power lines that streamed from the plant on high metal towers.

"Yes, I understand. Come. I'll explain the situation." Walking briskly, he led the way through the door.

Austin glanced around at the small plain lobby. "Somehow I expected a larger facility."

"Don't be deceived," Lessard replied. "This is a portal building. It's used mostly as office space and living quarters. The plant itself extends deep into the mountain. Come."

They passed through another door on the far side of the lobby and stepped into a large, brightly lit cavern.

"We took advantage of the natural rock formations to give us a start on the drilling," Lessard said, his voice bouncing off the walls and ceiling. "There are some fifty kilometers of tunnels running under the mountain and beneath the glacier."

Austin let out a low whistle. "There are highways in the States that aren't that long," Austin said.

"It was a formidable achievement. The engineers used a tunnel-boring machine with a diameter of nearly thirty feet. It was a simple matter to drill the research tunnel."

He led the way across the cavern to a tunnel entrance. Austin's ears picked up a low hum, like the sound of a hundred beehives.

"That noise must be your generator," he said.

"Yes, we only have one turbine now, but there are plans to build a second one." He paused at a door in the tunnel wall. "Here we are in the control room."

The plant's nerve center was a sterile chamber about fifty feet square, that looked like the inside of a giant slot machine. Arrayed along three walls were banks of blinking lights, electrical dials, gauges and switches. Lessard went over to a horseshoe-shaped console that dominated the center of the room, sat down in front of a computer monitor and motioned for Austin to take the chair beside him.

"You know what we do at this plant?" he said.

"In general. I've been told that you tap the melting water from the glacier for hydroelectric power."

Lessard nodded. "The technology is relatively uncomplicated. Snow falls from the sky and builds up on the glacier. In warm weather the glacier ice melts, forming water pockets and rivers. The torrent is channeled through the tunnels to the turbine. Voila! You have electricity. Clean and cheap and renewable." Lessard's routine explanation couldn't hide the pride in his voice.

"Simple in theory, but impressive in execution," Austin said as he pictured the system in his mind. "You must have a large crew."

"There are only three of us," Lessard said. "One for each shift. The plant is almost entirely automated and could probably run itself without us."

"Could you show me a diagram of the system?" Lessard's hands played over the keyboard. A diagram flashed onto the screen, similar to the display in a metropolitan traffic control center. The intersecting colored lines reminded Austin of the map for the London Underground.

"Those lines that are blinking blue represent tunnels that have water running through them. The red ones are dry conduits. The turbine is here."

Austin stared at the lines, trying to make sense of the confusing display. "Which tunnel was flooded?"

Lessard tapped the screen with a fingertip. "This one. The main access to the observatory." The line was blinking blue.

"Is there any way to shut down the flow?"

"We tried when we detected water getting into the research tunnel. Apparently, the concrete wall between the research and water tunnels has been breached. By diverting the flow in the other tunnels, we were able to contain it. The research tunnel remains filled with water."

"Do you have any idea how this wall you mentioned was breached?"

"A gate at this intersection provides access from one tunnel to another. It's closed this time of year as a safeguard because the water is high. The gate is made to withstand tons of pressure. I don't know what could have happened."

"Is there any way to drain that tunnel water off?"

"Yes, we could seal off some tunnels and pump the water out eventually, but it would take days," came the devastating reply.

Austin indicated the glowing screen in front of them. "Even with this extensive network of tunnels?"

"I'll show you what the problem is."

Lessard led the way out of the control room and they walked along a tunnel for several minutes. The omnipresent hum of the turbine was overpowered by another sound like a strong wind blowing through the trees. They climbed a flight of metal stairs on the other side of a steel door to an observation platform protected by a watertight plastic-and-metal canopy. Lessard explained that they were in one of several off-site control rooms. The rushing noise had become a roar.

Lessard flicked a wall switch and a floodlight illuminated a section of tunnel where a torrent raged. The foaming water level almost reached the observation bubble. Austin stared at the white water, sensing its vast power.

"This time of year water melts from huge pockets in the ice," Lessard shouted over the racket. "They add to the normal flow. It's like the floods you get in swollen rivers when the mountain snow melts too quickly in the spring." Lessard had a pained expression on his narrow face. "I'm sorry we can't help you or the people trapped inside."

"You've helped me a great deal already, but I'll need to see a detailed diagram of the research tunnel."

"Of course." As Lessard led the way back to the control room, he

decided he liked this American. Austin was thorough and methodical, qualities Lessard prized above all others.

Back in the main nerve center, Austin glanced at the wall clock and saw that precious minutes had gone by since the tour began. Lessard went over to a metal cabinet, slid open a wide shallow drawer and pulled out a set of blueprints.

"Here is the main entrance to the research tunnel. It's not much more than a culvert. These rectangles are the living quarters for the scientists. The lab is about a mile from the main entrance. As you can see in this side view, there are stairs that run up through the ceiling to another level, where there is a passage that leads to the subglacial observatory itself."

"Do we know how many people could be trapped?"

"There were three in the scientific team most recently. Sometimes, when they get sick of being underground, we get together to drink a few glasses of wine. Then there is the woman from your ship. A float plane brought some people in before the accident, but I don't know how many it had aboard when it took off a short while ago."

Austin leaned over the diagram, his eyes taking in every detail. "Suppose the people under the glacier made it to the observatory. The air trapped in this passageway would keep the water from inundating the observatory area."

"That's true," Lessard said with little enthusiasm.

"If there is air, they could still be alive."

"Also true, but their supply of air is limited. This may be a case of the living envying the dead."

Austin didn't have to be reminded of the gruesome fate that awaited Skye and the others. Even if they had survived the flood, they faced a slow and uneasy death from lack of oxygen. He concentrated on the diagram and noticed that the main tunnel continued on for some distance beyond the observatory. "Where does this go?"

"It continues about 1.5 kilometers, rising gradually to another entrance."

"Another culvert?"

"No. There is an opening like a mine entrance in the side of the mountain."

"I'd like to see it," Austin said. A plan was forming in his mind. It was based on conjecture and assumption, and would need a healthy dose of luck to work, but it was all he had.

"It's on the other side of the glacier. The only way to get to it is by air, but I can show you where it is from here."

Minutes later, they were on the flat roof of the power plant. Lessard pointed to a ravine on the far side of the glacier. "It's right near that little valley."

Austin followed the pointing finger with his eyes, and then glanced toward the sky. A big helicopter was lumbering toward the power plant.

"Thank God!" Lessard said. "At last, someone has answered my call for help."

Hurrying downstairs, the two men emerged from the power plant as the helicopter dropped out of the sky. The truck driver and another man Austin assumed to be the plant's third shift were outside, watching the helicopter touch down on a landing pad a few hundred feet from the plant's front door. As the rotors whirled to a halt, three men emerged from the chopper. Austin frowned. This was no rescue party. All three men were wearing dark suits that had middle management written all over them.

"It is my superior, Monsieur Drouet. He never comes here," Lessard said, unable to contain the awe in his voice.

Drouet was a portly man with a Hercule Poirot mustache. He hustled over and in an accusatory tone said, "What is going on, Lessard?"

While the plant supervisor explained the situation, Austin checked his watch. The hands seemed to be flying around the dial.

"What effect has this incident had on production?" Drouet said.

Austin's smoldering temper erupted. "You might be more interested in what effect it has on the people trapped inside that glacier."

The man tilted his chin, managing to look down his nose at Austin even though he was shorter by several inches.

"Who are you?" he said, like the caterpillar addressing Alice from the mushroom.

Lessard intervened. "This is Mr. Austin with the American government."

"American?" Austin could swear he heard the man sniff. "This is none of your business," Drouet said.

"You're wrong. It is very much my business," Austin replied in a level voice that cloaked his anger. "My friend is in that tunnel."

Drouet was unmoved. "I have to wait for orders from my superior after I report to him. I'm not without sympathy. I'll order a rescue attempt immediately."

"That's not soon enough," Austin said. "We have to do something now." \

"Nevertheless, it's the best I can do. Now, if you'll excuse me."

With that, he and the other suited men filed into the power plant. Lessard glanced at Austin, shook his head sadly and trailed after them.

Austin was trying to stifle the impulse to drag the bureaucrat back by the collar when he heard the sound of an engine and saw a dot in the sky. The dot grew larger and became a helicopter, smaller than the first. It shot across the lake, circled once around the power plant, then set down next to the other chopper in a cloud of dust.

Even before the rotors stopped, a slim, dark-complexioned man hopped out and gave Austin a wave. Joe Zavala strode over with an easy lope and a slight athletic swing to his shoulders, his relaxed walk

a holdover from his boxing days, when he fought professionally as a middleweight to earn his way through college. His handsome, un-marred features testified to the success of his time in the ring.

The gregarious, soft-spoken Zavala had been recruited by Admiral Sandecker as soon as he graduated from the New York Maritime College, and he had been an invaluable member of the Special Assignments Team, working with Austin on many jobs. He had a brilliant mechanical mind and was a skilled pilot, with thousands of hours flying helicopters, small jets and turboprop aircraft.

Several days earlier, they had traveled to France together. While Austin flew on to the Alps to hook up with the Mummichug, Joe had stopped in Paris. As an expert in the design and building of underwater vehicles, he had been asked to join a panel on manned versus unmanned submersibles sponsored by IFREMER, the French Institute of Marine Research and Exploration.

Austin had called Zavala on his cell phone after learning about the tunnel accident. "Sorry to break up your trip to Paris," he had said. "You broke up more than that. I met a member of the National Assembly who showed me the town." "What's his name?"

"Her name is Denise. After a tour of Paris, we decided to head for the mountains where the young lady has a chalet. I'm in Chamonix." Austin was not surprised to hear Zavala's story. With his soulful eyes and thick black hair combed straight back, Joe resembled a younger version of screen and TV actor Ricardo Montalban. The combination of good looks, good-humored charm and intelligence made him an object of desire to many of the single women around Washington, and the same qualities attracted females wherever he went. Sometimes it could be a distraction, especially on a mission, but in this case it was a godsend. Chamonix was only a few mountains away. "Even better. I need your help."

Zavala could tell by the urgency in his friend's voice that the situation was serious. "I'm on my way," Zavala said.

Reunited on the barren hill overlooking the lake, they shook hands and Austin apologized again for putting a damper on his friend's love life. A slight smile cracked the ends of Zavala's lips.

"No problem, pal. Denise is a fellow public servant and understood completely when I said duty called." He glanced at the helicopter. "She also pulled strings to get me transportation."

"I owe your young lady a bottle of champagne and some flowers."

"I always knew that you were a true romantic at heart." Zavala gazed around and said, "Beautiful scenery, even if it's a little bleak. What's going on?"

Austin headed for the helicopter. "I'll fill you in on the way."

MOMENTS LATER, they were airborne. As they flew over the glacier, Austin gave Zavala a Reader's Digest-style condensed version of events.

"Hell of a mess," Zavala said when he heard the story. "Sorry about your friend. Skye sounds like someone I'd like to meet."

"I hope you'll have that pleasure," Austin said, although he knew the odds were long and becoming longer with every passing minute.

He directed Zavala to the valley Lessard had pointed out from the roof of the power plant. Zavala landed at a spot of ground that was more or less level among the ledges and crags. They took an electric torch from the helicopter's emergency kit and walked up a gradual slope. The damp cold radiating from the glacier penetrated their thick jackets. A concrete casing framed the entrance to the tunnel. The area in front of the opening was washed out and dozens of miniature canyons ran down the slope. They stepped into a tunnel similar in size to those Austin had seen behind the power plant. The

slanting floor was wet, and after they had gone in a few yards, water lapped at their toes.

"Not exactly the tunnel of love, is it?" Zavala said, peering into the darkness.

"It's what I would expect the river Styx to look like." Austin stared at the black water for a moment, and then a bolt of energy seemed to pass through his body. "Let's get back to the power plant."

Drouet and his companions emerged from the plant building after Zavala's helicopter touched down. Drouet hurried over to greet Austin.

"I must apologize for my earlier behavior," he said. "I didn't have all the facts about this horrible situation. I have since talked to my superiors and the American embassy, which told me about you and NUMA, Monsieur Austin. I didn't know there were French citizens trapped under the glacier."

"Should their nationality have made any difference?"

"No, of course not. Inexcusable. You will be happy to know I have sent for help. A rescue team is on its way."

"That's a start. How long before they get here?"

Drouet hesitated, knowing the answer was unsatisfactory. "Three or four hours."

"You must know that will be too late."

Drouet wrung his hands in anguish. He was obviously distressed. "At least we can recover the bodies. It's the best I can do."

"It's not the best I can do, Monsieur Drouet. We're going to try to bring them back alive, but we'll need your help."

"You're not serious! Those poor people are trapped under eight hundred feet of ice." He studied the silent determination in Austin's face and arched an eyebrow. "Very well. I'll knock heads together to get you anything you need. Tell me what I must do."

Austin was pleasantly surprised to learn that Drouet's plump exterior hid a layer of steel.

"Thank you for your offer. First, I'd like to borrow your helicopter and pilot."

"Yes, of course, but I see your friend has a helicopter."

"I'll need a bigger one."

"I don't understand. These unfortunate people are trapped in the ground, not the air."

"Nevertheless." Austin gave Drouet a hard look that said he was through wasting time.

Drouet nodded vigorously. "Very well. You have my full cooperation."

While Drouet scurried over to talk to his pilot, Austin called the NUMA vessel's captain on a hand radio and spent several minutes sketching out his plan. Fortier listened carefully.

"I'll get right on it," he said. Austin thanked him and gazed at the glacier, sizing up the adversary he was about to tackle. He had no room in his scheme of things for self-doubt. He knew plans could go awry, and had scars all over his body to prove it. He also knew that problems could be fixed. He was certain that, with luck, his scheme would work. What he wasn't sure of was whether Skye was still alive.

SKYE WAS VERY much alive. Renaud, who was feeling the full force of her fury, could attest to that. After Renaud had made one of his self-serving comments, Skye had snapped. She had laced into the hapless Frenchman, her eyes bright with tears of rage as she tongue-lashed him for ruining the biggest discovery of her career. Renaud finally summoned up the courage to croak a protest. Skye had exhausted her repertoire and lung power by then and cut him short with a withering glare and a well-chosen word.

"Idiot!"

Renaud tried to play on her sympathy. "Can't you see I'm injured?" He held his bruised and lacerated hand.

"It's your own stupid fault," she said coldly. "How in God's name could you allow a man with a gun to come into this place?"

"I thought he was a reporter."

"You have the brain of an amoeba. Amoebas don't think. They ooze."

"Mademoiselle, please," LeBlanc entreated. "We have only so much air to breathe. Save your strength."

"Save it for what}" She pointed to the ceiling. "It may have escaped your attention, but we are stuck under a very large glacier."

LeBlanc put his finger to his lips.

Skye glanced around at the cold and frightened faces and saw she was making the others even more miserable. She realized, too, that her tirade against Renaud was a product of her fear and frustration. She apologized to LeBlanc and clamped her lips tightly together, but before she did so, she muttered, "He is an idiot."

Then she went over and plunked down next to Rawlins, the magazine writer, who was sitting with his back against a wall, writing in a notebook. He had bunched a plastic tarp together and was using it to insulate his posterior from contact with the wet floor. She snuggled close for warmth, saying, "Pardon me for being forward, but I'm freezing."

Rawlins blinked in surprise, set the notebook aside and then gallantly wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

"You were pretty hot a minute ago," he said.

"Sorry for losing my temper in front of everyone," she murmured.

"I don't blame you, but try to look on the bright side. At least we've got lights."

The floodwaters must have missed the wires that ran along the top of the tunnel to the power plant. Although the lights had flickered a few times, the power was still on. The wet and weary survivors were crowded into the stretch of tunnel that ran between the ice cave and the stairs.

Despite his optimistic observation, Rawlins knew they were short on time. He and the others were finding it more difficult to breathe. He attempted to divert his thoughts.

"What was that scientific discovery you were talking about?" he asked Skye.

A dreamy look came into her eyes. "I found an ancient tomb under the waters of the lake. I think it may have had something to do with

the Amber Route, which means that trade contacts between Europe and the Mediterranean countries go further back than anyone has ever imagined. To Minoan or Mycenaean times maybe." Rawlins groaned. "Are you all right?" Skye said.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Oh hell, no, I'm not. The only reason I'm here was to do a story on the subglacial observatory. Then they found the body in the ice, which would have been a major exclusive. Then a thug posing as a reporter pistol-whips your pal Renaud and floods the tunnel. Wow! My stuff would have been picked up all over the world. I would have been the next Jon Krakauer. Publishers would be pounding on my door with book deals. Now, you tell me about the Minoan angle."

"I don't know that it's Minoan," Skye said, trying to ease his distress. "I could be wrong."

He shook his head sadly.

The TV reporter, who had been listening to the conversation, said, "Don't blame you for feeling bad, but put yourself in my place. I've got video of the body and the French guy getting smacked with the gun."

The other reporter tapped his tape recorder. "Yeah, and I got the voices all on tape."

Rawlins stared at the fire hose snaking past their feet. "I wonder if we could use a water jet to melt a tunnel through the glacier."

Thurston was sitting next to Rawlins. He chuckled and said, "I've already done some calculations in my head. It will take us about three months if we work steadily."

"Do we get time off for Sundays and holidays?" Rawlins asked.

Everyone laughed, except for Renaud.

Rawlins's offbeat humor reminded Skye of Austin. How long had it been since she left the ship? She glanced at her watch and realized that only a few hours had elapsed. She had been eagerly looking for

ward to their date. She'd been entranced by the rugged profile, the pale, almost white hair, but it went beyond physical attraction. He was interesting, a study in contrasts. Austin had a quick sense of humor and he could be warm and gentle, but she detected diamond hardness behind the twinkle in those blue eyes. And, of course, there were those magnificent shoulders. She wouldn't be surprised if he could walk on the bottom of the sea.

Her eyes shifted to Renaud, who was at the far end of the attractiveness spectrum. He sat on the other side of the tunnel, nursing his swollen hand. She frowned, thinking that the worst part of this whole affair was being entombed with an insect like Renaud. The thought depressed her, so she rose and walked to the staircase that led down to the main tunnel. Black water lapped over the top of the staircase. Not a chance of escape. She became depressed again. Looking for a diversion, she sloshed through puddles and climbed the ladder to the ice cave.

The glacier was already starting to retake its lost territory. New ice had formed in jagged icicles where there was none before. The ice had thickened and the body was no longer visible in its tomb. The helmet was still in its container. She picked it up and held it under a light where she could see the etchings. They were intricate and finely executed. The work of a master. The design struck her as not being simply decorative. There was a rhythm to it, as if it were telling a story. The metal seemed to pulsate with a life of its own. She got a grip on her rampaging thoughts. Lack of air was making her imagine things. If only she had more time, she could figure it out. Damn that Renaud.

She carried the helmet back into the tunnel. The walk in the thin air had exhausted her. She found a spot against the wall, propped the helmet beside her and sat down. The others had stopped talking. She could see their chests heaving as they sucked the anorexic air into

their lungs. She found that she was doing the same, gulping like a fish out of water, but still not meeting the demands of her lungs. Her chin dropped, and she fell asleep.

When she awoke, the lights had finally gone out. So, she said to herself, we will die in darkness after all. She tried to call out to the others, to wish them a farewell, but she didn't have the strength. She fell asleep again.

AUSTIN STRAPPED THE last waterproof stuff bag onto the SEA mobile flat rear deck behind the bubble cockpit and stepped back to inspect the job. The vehicle looked more like a mechanical pack mule than a high-tech submersible, but the jerry-rigged arrangement would have to do. With no idea how many people were trapped under the glacier, he had rounded up every set of scuba equipment and backup gear he could find and simply hoped for the best.

Austin gave an okay sign to Francois. The government observer had been standing by with a hand radio, acting as a combined liaison and translator between the ship and the helicopter. Frangois returned the gesture and spoke into the hand radio. The pilot of the French helicopter was waiting for the call.

Within minutes, the helicopter was lifting off the beach. It flew out to the NUMA boat, where it hovered and dropped a cable down to the deck. Austin ducked his head against the blast from the spinning rotors, grabbed the hook at the end of the cable and attached it to a four-point harness system. He and the crew had already secured the trailer and submersible so the load could be lifted in one piece.

He gave the pilot a thumbs-up. The cable went taut and the helicopter rose slightly and hung in space with its rotors madly slashing the air. Despite the ear-shattering racket, the submersible and trailer only lifted a few inches off the deck. The combined weight of the sub, trailer and cargo were beyond the aircraft's lifting capacity. Austin signaled the chopper to ease off. The line went slack and the load thumped back onto the deck.

Austin pointed to the helicopter and shouted in Francois's ear. "Tell them to stay where they are until I figure this out." As Francois translated, Austin got on his own radio and called Zavala, whose helicopter had been circling high above the ship. "We've got a problem," Austin said.

"So I see. Wish this chopper was a sky crane," he said, referring to the huge industrial helicopters that were designed to hoist big loads.

"We may not need one." Austin laid out what he had in mind. Zavala laughed and said, "My life must have been very dull before I met you." "Well?"

"Tricky," Zavala said. "Dangerous as hell. Audacious. But possible." Austin never doubted his partner's flying skills. Zavala had thousands of hours as a pilot in helicopters, small jet and turboprop aircraft. It was the vagaries, the unexpected that bothered him. A shift of the wind, human inattention or equipment failure could turn a carefully calculated risk into a disaster. In this case, the job could end with a mix-up in translation. He had to be sure the message was clear.

He pulled Francois aside and told him what he wanted the French pilot to do. Then he made him repeat his instructions back to him. Francois nodded in understanding. He spoke into his radio and the

French helicopter moved off to the side so that the lifting line was at an angle.

Zavala's chopper darted in and dropped a line, which Austin quickly spliced onto the harness. He gave the choppers a visual check, making sure there was plenty of space between the two aircraft. They would be pulled together by the weight they were lifting and he didn't want the helicopters tangling rotors.

Once more, Austin gave the signal to lift. The rotors churned away in earsplitting concert and this time the submersible and trailer seemed to leap skyward. A foot. Two feet. A yard. Two yards. The pilots were well aware of the fact that the helicopters were of unequal size and power, and adjusted for the difference with amazing skill.

They rose in slow motion, the strange load swinging between them until they were a couple of hundred feet above the lake's surface, and then they flew toward land until they were lost against the dark rock of the mountains. Zavala kept up a running commentary over the radio. He had to break off a couple of times to correct his position.

Austin didn't breathe easily until he heard Zavala's laconic announcement: "The eagles have landed."

Austin and several crewmen scrambled into a small boat and were on shore waiting when the helicopters came back, flying side by side, and landed on the beach. Austin climbed into Zavala's chopper and the French helicopter took on crew from the Mummichug.

Minutes later, they dropped down for a landing near the bright yellow SEA mobile which was on its trailer in front of the tunnel entrance. Austin supervised the crew as they adjusted the sub's load. Then the trailer was backed into the sloping tunnel to the water's edge. Chocks were inserted behind the wheels, while Austin left the tunnel to confer with Lessard. At Austin's request, the plant supervisor had retrieved another blueprint from his trove. He spread it out on a flat rock.

"These are the internal aluminum supports I told you about. You'll

encounter them a few hundred feet inside the tunnel. There are twelve sets laid three abreast, approximately ten yards between one set and the other."

"The submersible is less than eight feet wide," Austin said. "I've figured out that I'll only have to cut one column in each set to squeeze through."

"I suggest that you stagger your cuts. In other words, don't cut the same column position in every set. As you can see by this diagram,

the ceiling is the thinnest here of any place within the tunnel. You've got hundreds of tons of ice and rock pressing down on the tunnel."

"I've figured that into the equation."

Lessard's eyes bored into Austin's face. "I called Paris after you posed your plan and talked to a friend in the state power company. He said this end of the tunnel was built to move the lab trailers into place. It was discarded as prime access because as time went on there was danger of the roof collapsing. The columns were installed to keep the tunnel open as a ventilating air shaft. This is what worries me," he said, drawing his finger across the top of the tunnel drawn on the blueprint. "There's a large unstable pocket of water here. Because of the lateness of the season, it is even bigger than usual. If there is a weakness in the support system, the whole ceiling could come down."

"It's worth the risk," Austin said.

"You've considered the possibility that you're risking your lives in vain, that the people are already dead."

Austin replied with a grim smile, "We won't know that until we take a look, will we?"

Lessard regarded Austin with an expression of admiration. The American with the pale hair and arresting blue eyes was either insane or supremely confident in his abilities. "You must like this woman very much."

"I only met her a few days ago, but we have a dinner date in Paris and I intend to keep it."

Lessard replied with a shrug. Gallantry was something a Frenchman could appreciate. "The first few weeks are the time of maximum attraction between a man and a woman, before they know each other well. Well, bonne chance, mon ami. I see your friend wants your attention."

Austin thanked Lessard for his advice and went over to where Zavala was standing in front of the tunnel entrance.

"I've gone over the sub's control system. Pretty simple stuff," Zavala said.

"I knew you wouldn't have a problem." Austin took a last glance around. "Time to vamoose, amigo."

Zavala gave him a sour look. "You've been watching too many reruns of the Cisco Kid."

Austin pulled on an insulated one-piece dry suit. Looking like a big Day-Glo Gumby, he led the way into the tunnel^ and slipped a helmet containing an underwater acoustic transceiver onto his head. Zavala helped him on with his air tank and weight belt, and then gave him a hand climbing onto the back of the submersible.

He sat behind the bubble using the waterproof stuff bags as a seat and pulled on his fins. A crewman handed up a lightweight underwater cutting torch and oxygen tank, which Austin secured to the deck with bungee cords. Zavala got into the cabin and gave Austin the high sign.

"Ready to roll?" Austin said, testing his headset.

"Sure, but I feel like the bubble boy."

"You can trade places with me anytime you'd like, Bubble Boy."

Zavala chuckled. "Thanks, but I'll pass on the generous offer. You look natural riding shotgun, Tex."

Austin rapped on the bubble. He was ready.

The launch crew lifted the trailer hitch and slowly let the trailer roll into the water, keeping its speed under control with a pair of launching lines, until the wheels were submerged. As soon as the vehicle started to float, the crew jerked on the pull lines and pushed the vehicle at the same time. The SEA mobile floated free of the trailer and the motors came alive.

Zavala used the lateral thrusters on the tail section to put the SEA mobile into a 360-degree turn, facing the vehicle into the tunnel. He moved the vehicle forward until the water was deep enough to submerge. Using a light touch on the vertical thruster, he pushed the sub down until the hull was under water. The tail thrusters whirred again, the submersible moved forward, going deeper, and the water washed over Austin and the bubble.

The quartet of halogen lights in the front of the vehicle played off the orange walls and ceiling, and the reflected light gave the water a brownish cast.

Zavala's metallic voice came over Austin's earphones.

"This is like diving into a bucket of chocolate mole sauce."

"I'll remember that the next time I eat in a Mexican restaurant. I was thinking about something more poetic and Dante-ish, like a descent into Hades."

"At least Hades is warm and dry. How far are the first support columns?"

Austin stared into the murk beyond the reach of the lights and thought he saw a dull glint of metal. He stood up and leaned against the bubble, holding onto the D-shaped protective bars that flanked the cabin.

"I think they're coming up now."

Zavala slowed the submersible to a stop a few yards from the first set of aluminum columns, each about six inches across, that barred the way. Carrying the torch and tank, Austin swam to the base of the middle column. He ignited the torch and the sharp blue flame

quickly cut through the metal close to the base. At the top of the column he made another cut, and then he yelled "Timber!" and pushed the middle section out. He motioned for Zavala to follow, directing him through the gap with hand signals, like an airport worker guiding a plane to its gate. Then he went on to the next set of columns.

As he swam, he cast a wary glance above his head and tried not to think of the thousands of gallons of water and tons of ice pressing down on the thin rock ceiling. Heeding Lessard's advice, he cut the right-hand column on the second set. Again Zavala moved the vehicle through. Austin cut a middle column, then a left-hand one on the next set. Then he started the process over again.

The work went smoothly. Before long, twelve columns lay on the tunnel floor. Austin resumed his seat on the back of the submersible and told Zavala to go at the vehicle's top speed of 2.5 knots. Although they were moving at a brisk walk, the darkness and the closeness of the walls combined made it seem to Austin as if he were on Neptune's chariot flying down to the Abyss..

With nothing to do but hold on, he extended his thoughts to the difficult task ahead. Lessard's words echoed in his ears. The Frenchman was right about maximum attraction. He might also be right about everyone in the tunnel being dead.

It had been easier being optimistic while he was in daylight. But as they plunged deeper into the stygian darkness, he knew that the rescue attempt could be in vain. He had to admit that there was little chance that anyone could remain alive for long in this dreadful place. Reluctantly, he steeled himself for the worst.

IN HER DREAM, Skye was having dinner with Austin in a Parisian bistro near the Eiffel Tower and he was saying, "Wake up," and she was answering with no little irritation, "I'm not asleep."

Wake up, Skye.

Austin again. Irritating man.

Then Austin was reaching across the table, past the wine and pate, gently slapping her cheek, and she was getting angrier. She opened her mouth. "Stop!"

"That's better," Austin said.

Her eyelids popped open like a pair of broken window shades and she turned her face away from the blinding light. The light shifted and she saw Austin's face. He looked worried. He gently squeezed her cheeks until she opened her mouth, then she felt the hard plastic mouthpiece of a scuba regulator between her teeth.

Air flowed into her lungs, reviving her, and she saw that Austin was kneeling by her side. He was wearing an orange dry suit and some strange sort of headgear. He took her hand and gently wrapped her fingers around the small air tank that fed the regulator.

He removed the regulator from his own mouth.

"Can you stay awake for a minute?" he said.

She nodded.

"Don't go away. I'll be right back."

Then he stood and walked toward the staircase. In the brief instant before he descended into the water with his electric torch, she saw the others who'd been trapped with her, all looking like derelicts sleeping off a cheap wine hinge in an alley.

Moments later, the water in the stairway emitted an eerie glow and Austin reappeared holding a line slung over one shoulder. He dug his feet in and hauled on the line like a Volga boatman. The floor was treacherous underfoot and he slipped to his knee, but he was up immediately. A plastic bag that was attached to the line came out of the water and slid across the floor like a big fish. More bags followed.

Austin quickly unzipped the bags and handed out the air tanks that they contained. He had to shake a few people into a groggy consciousness, but when they got their first breath. of air, they revived quickly. As they greedily sucked down the life-giving air, the metallic sound of the regulator valves was loud in the confined space.

Skye spit out the mouthpiece. "What are you doing here?" she said, like a society doyenne addressing a party crasher.

He hoisted Skye gently to her feet and kissed her on the forehead. "Never let it be said that Kurt Austin let a little hell or high water stand in the way of our dinner date." "Dinner! But "

Austin tucked the regulator back between Skye's lips. "No time for talking."

Then he was opening the other bags and pulling out dry suits. Rawlins and Thurston were both certified divers, as it turned out, and they helped the others get into their suits and scuba gear. Before long, the survivors were suited up. Not exactly a SEAL team, Austin thought, but with a lot of luck they might make it.

"Ready to go home?" he asked.

The muted chorus that echoed in the cave was incomprehensible but enthusiastic.

"Okay," he said. "Follow me."

Austin led the pitiful-looking cave dwellers down the staircase and into the flooded tunnel. More than one eyebrow was raised at the strange vision of Zavala waving at them from inside his glowing bubble.

Austin had foreseen that his passengers would need something to hold on to during their ride. Before he and the Mummichugs crew had piled the dive gear bags onto the sub, they had stretched fishing net over the SEA mobile deck. With vigorous use of hand signals, pushes and prods, Austin arranged the cave survivors facedown on the deck in rows of three like sardines in a can.

He put Renaud, with his bad hand, in the first row, right behind the bubble, between the reporters. Skye was in the middle row between Rawlins and Thurston, who were the most experienced in the water. He would be behind her in the third row between LeBlanc, who seemed strong as a bull, and Rossi, the young research assistant. As insurance, Austin ran lines over the backs of his passengers as if he were securing any bulky cargo. The submersible was practically invisible under the tightly packed bodies, but the arrangement was the best he could think of with the limited space available. Austin swam to the rear, where he put himself behind Skye. He would have to move freely from his perch later, so he left himself unfettered.

"All our ducks are lined up in a row," he said over the communicator. "Tight quarters back here, so I'd advise against picking up hitchhikers."

With a whirr of electric motors, the SEA mobile inched forward at a crawl, then sped up to a walk. Austin knew the survivors must be weary beyond words. Although he had cautioned the group to be

patient, the vehicle's slow pace was maddening and he was having trouble abiding by his own advice.

At least he could talk to Zavala. The others were alone with their thoughts. The submersible plowed through the tunnel as if it were being pulled by a team of turtles. At times, the submersible seemed to be standing still and the tunnel walls were moving past them. The only sounds were the monotonous hum of the motor and the burble of escaping air bubbles. He almost yelled for joy when Zavala announced, "Kurt, I can see the columns dead ahead."

Austin lifted his head. "Stop before you get to them. I'll bird-dog you through the slalom course."

The SEA mobile coasted to a halt. Austin detached himself from the deck and rose above the bubble. The first set of supports gleamed about thirty feet ahead. With easy, rhythmic kicks of his fins, Austin swam toward the supports and passed through the gap he had cut in the columns. Then he spun around and waved Zavala through like a traffic cop, directing him to the right or left as needed.

The submersible eased slowly through the opening. Zavala veered from his straight course to steer through the next opening and that's when he got into trouble. The overburdened submersible responded sluggishly and skidded into a slide. Using a steady hand on the thruster controls, he arrested the sideways momentum and headed the submersible toward the opening. But as the vehicle passed through the breach, he tried to compensate and the sub clipped a column and began to fishtail.

Austin swam off to one side and plastered himself against a tunnel wall until Zavala prudently brought the SEA mobile to a stop. Austin swam up to the cabin.

"You really have to do something about your driving, old pal." "Sorry," Zavala said. "With all the weight in the back, this thing handles like a bumper boat."

"Try to remember that you're not behind the wheel of your Corvette."

Zavala smiled. "I wish I were."

Austin inspected the passengers, saw that they were holding up, and swam ahead to the next set of columns. He held his breath as the vehicle and its load eased through without incident. Zavala was getting the hang of controlling the sub and they successfully navigated several more sets of columns. Austin kept a count in his head. Only three more sets of pillars to go.

As he approached the next set of columns he noticed something was off-kilter. He squinted through his mask and was not reassured by what he saw. He had cut the middle column out and now the supports on either side of the opening looked like a pair of bowed legs. A quick movement caught his eye and he glanced upward. Bubbles were streaming through a narrow fissure in the ceiling.

Austin didn't have to be a structural engineer to figure out what was happening. The ceiling weight was too much for the remaining supports to bear. They could collapse any second, entombing the submersible and its passengers in the tunnel forever.

"Joe, we've got a problem ahead," Austin said, doing his best to keep his voice calm.

"I see what you mean," Zavala replied, leaning forward to peer through the bubble. "Those columns look like a cowboy's legs. Any advice on how we navigate this mousetrap?"

"The same way porcupines make love. Carefully. Make sure you walk in my footprints."

Austin swam toward the bowed supports and easily passed through with space on either side. He turned and shielded his eyes against the sub's bright halogen lights, then waved Zavala ahead. Zavala successfully maneuvered the vehicle through the opening without touching either column. But he ran into trouble from an unexpected quarter. Part of the net trailing off the rear end of the submersible snagged on the stub of the column Austin had cut. Zavala felt the tug and instinctively applied power without thinking. It was the worst possible thing he could have done. The vehicle hesitated as the thrusters dug in, then the net tore free and the sub lurched ahead out of control, smashing into the right-hand column of the next set with all of its substantial weight. Zavala quickly compensated for the wild swing. But it was too late. The damaged column buckled.

Austin watched the slow-motion disaster unfold. His eyes darted to the ceiling, suddenly obscured by a massive cloud of bubbles. "Move out!" Austin shouted. "The roofs coming down!" Curses in Spanish filled Austin's earphones.

Zavala applied full power to the thrusters and aimed for the next gap. The vehicle passed within feet of Austin. With perfect timing, he reached out and grabbed on to the fishnet, dangling like a Hollywood stunt man on a runaway stagecoach.

Zavala was more intent on haste than precision and didn't bother to fine-tune his steering. The vehicle clipped a column. It was only a tiny dent, but the column bent and snapped. Austin had managed to scramble back on to the deck by then and he held on grimly as the vehicle spun completely around and regained its proper heading. One more opening loomed ahead.

The submersible made a clean pass through the space without touching a column. But the damage had already been done.

The ceiling burst asunder and crashed down in a crushing avalanche of huge boulders, releasing the water stored in the glacial pocket. Thousands of gallons of water poured into the confined space of the tunnel. A powerful pressure wave hit the SEA mobile and pushed it through the tunnel like a leaf through a sluice.

The wave rushed toward the entrance, carrying the vehicle on its crest.

Unaware of the drama unfolding in the dark recesses below the

glacier, the support crew had drifted back to the helicopters. The lone crewman who'd been keeping watch for the vehicle had stepped outside the tunnel for air when he heard the roar issue from the bowels of the earth. His legs reacted before his brain did and carried him away from the tunnel mouth. He was off to one side, hiding behind a boulder, when the vehicle shot out of the tunnel's entrance into the open air.

The wave's full force expended itself outside the cave, leaving the vehicle high and dry. Dazed and battered passengers untied the lines that held them and dropped off the deck. They spit out the regulators and sucked fresh air into their lungs in great coughing gulps.

Zavala was out of the cabin running back toward the tunnel. He stepped aside when a secondary, weaker wave burst from the tunnel, surged around the vehicle and disgorged a struggling figure in an orange suit. Austin's cracked face mask was askew. The communicator helmet had been ripped from his head and the force of the wave was rolling him like a ball caught in the surf.

Zavala reached down, caught Austin in mi droll and helped him to his feet.

He was as unsteady as a drunk and his eyes were as glassy as marbles. Austin spit out a mouthful of foul water and barked like a wet dog.

"Like I said, Joe. You really have to do something about your driving."

THE FRENCH rescue team arrived an hour later. The helicopter dropped down in front of the power plant like an osprey on a fish. Even before its runners had touched the ground, six dashing and rugged mountain climbers piled out the door, lugging carabiners and coils of rope. Their leader explained that they brought mountain

climbing equipment because they understood people were trapped on the glacier, not under it.

When the leader learned that his team's services were not needed, he shrugged and admitted philosophically that even a crack mountain team would have been useless in a water rescue. Then he broke out a couple of bottles of champagne he had brought along. Raising his glass high in a toast, he said there would be other opportunities; people were always getting into trouble in the mountains.

After the impromptu celebration, Austin supervised the submersible return to the Mummichug, and then he returned to the power plant with Zavala. The survivors had been shuttled to the plant for showers and hot food. Dressed in a motley assortment of borrowed clothes, they had gathered in the plant's recreation room to tell their story.

The reporters ran the videotapes of the attack on Renaud, but they were of poor quality and showed only a blurred glimpse of the gunman's face. The audiotape revealed little except for the brief exchange between Renaud and his assailant.

Austin was nursing his bumps and bruises with a bottle of Belgian beer from the power plant's larder. He sat with his chin cradled in his hand, feeling his anger grow as Skye and the others trapped in the tunnel described details of the cold-blooded act that almost condemned several innocent people to a horrible death under the ice.

"This is a matter for the police," said Drouet, the power plant supervisor, after he had heard the full story. "The authorities should be notified immediately."

Austin held his tongue. By the time the gendarmes arrived, the trail would be colder than the beer in his hand.

Renaud was anxious to leave. Brandishing his hand as if it were a fatal wound, he bullied his way and found a seat on the power plant helicopter. Rawlins and the reporters were eager to file details of

their story, which had gone far beyond the discovery of the frozen body. The reporters called in the chartered float plane that had delivered them to the glacier.

The plane's pilot cleared up one mystery. He said he'd been waiting on the lake for the reporters to return from the glacier, when a big man he had brought in showed up at the beach in LeBlanc's Citroen. The man said the other reporters were staying overnight, and that he needed a ride out immediately.

Skye watched the float plane skim across the lake for a takeoff and she broke into laughter. "Did you see Renaud? He was using his injured hand to push other people out of the way so he could get on first."

"The mocking tone of your voice suggests that you are not sorry to see Renaud leave," Austin said.

She pretended she was washing her hands. "Good riddance to bad rubbish, as my father used to say."

Lessard was standing next to Skye, and he had a sad look in his eyes as he watched the float plane leap from the lake and head toward a valley between two mountain peaks.

"Well, Monsieur Austin, I must go back to work," he said in a mournful voice. "Thank you for the excitement you and your friends have brought to this lonely outpost."

Austin grasped Lessard's hand in a firm grip. "The rescue would have been impossible without your help," Austin said. "I don't think you'll be alone for long. When the story gets out, you'll be inundated with reporters. The police will be sniffing around here as well."

Lessard looked more pleased than annoyed. "You thin\ so?" He beamed. "If you'll excuse me, I'd better get back to my office to prepare for visitors. I'll have a truck drive you back to the lake if you'd like."

"I'll walk with you," Skye said. "I've got to pick up something I left in the plant."

Zavala said of Lessard, "That gentleman apparently isn't content with his fifteen minutes of fame. Now, if you are through with my services "

Austin put his hand on Zavala's shoulder. "Don't tell me you want to leave this garden spot so you can to get back to Chamonix and your French pastry."

Zavala's eyes followed Skye. "It appears I'm not the only one partaking of the local delicacies?"

"You're way ahead of me, Joe. The young lady and I haven't even had our first date yet."

"Well, I'm the last guy to stand in the way of true romance." "Nor am I," Austin said, walking Zavala to the helicopter. "See you in Paris."

THE TRAFFIC JAM was horrendous even by Washington standards. Paul Trout had been sitting behind the steering wheel of his Humvee, staring with glazed eyes at the wall-to-wall carpet of cars clogging Pennsylvania Avenue, when he turned suddenly to Gamay and said, "My gills are starting to close up."

Gamay rolled her eyes in the way of a wife long used to her husband's eccentricities. She knew what was coming. Paul's family said only half-jokingly that if a Trout stayed away from his ancestral home for too long, he would start gasping for breath like a fish out of water. Therefore she wasn't surprised when he made an illegal U-turn, displaying the contempt for rules of the road that seems born into Massachusetts drivers.

While Paul drove as if he were on Desert Storm maneuvers, she used her cell phone to call the airline for reservations and to let their NUMA office know they would be away for a few days. They whirled through their Georgetown town house like twin tornadoes, packed their overnight bags and dashed to the airport.

Less than two hours after their shuttle flight landed in Boston,

they were on Cape Cod, strolling along Water Street in the village of Woods Hole, where Trout had been born and raised. Woods Hole's main thoroughfare is about a quarter of a mile long, squeezed between a salt pond and a harbor, and bordered on both sides by buildings that house organizations devoted to marine and environmental science.

The most conspicuous of these is the world-renowned Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Nearby, in a vintage brick-and-granite edifice, is the Marine Biological Laboratory, whose research programs and library of nearly two hundred thousand volumes attract scholars from around the globe. Within walking distance of the MBL is the National Marine Fisheries aquarium. On the outskirts of the village are the U.S. Geological Survey and dozens of sea education institutions and private companies that produce the high-tech underwater gadgets used by ocean scientists the world over.

A breeze was coming off the harbor from the direction of the Elizabeth Islands. Trout paused on the tiny drawbridgejthat separates Eel Pond and Great Harbor and he filled his lungs with salty air, thinking that there must be some truth to the gill-closing story. He could actually breathe again. /

Trout was the son of a local fisherman and his wife, and his family still owned the low-slung Cape Cod cottage where he had been raised. His intellectual home was the Oceanographic Institution. As a boy he used to run errands for some of the scientists who worked at the institution and it was at their encouragement that he had specialized in deep-ocean geology, a move that would bring him eventually to NUMA and its Special Assignments Team.

Within hours of their arrival, Paul had checked on his house, touched base with several relatives and stopped off for lunch with Gamay at a local watering hole where he knew everyone at the bar. Then he began to make the rounds. He was visiting the Institution's Deep Submergence Lab where an old colleague was bringing him

up-to-date on the latest in autonomous underwater vehicles, when the phone rang.

"It's for you," his colleague said, handing Trout the phone. A voice boomed on the line. "Hello, Trout. This is Sam Osborne. Heard down at the post office that you were back in town. How are you and your lovely wife?"

Osborne was a phycologist, one of the world's foremost experts in the science of algology, or the study of algae. After years of teaching, he still talked in a range that was two or three decibels above that of a normal human being.

Trout didn't bother asking how Osborne had tracked him down. It was impossible to keep anything secret in a village the size of Woods Hole. "We're fine, thank you. Nice of you to give me a call, Dr. Osborne."

Osborne cleared his throat. "Weller actually I wasn't calling you. I wanted to speak to your wife."

Trout smiled. "I don't blame you for that. Gamay is much prettier than I am."

He handed the phone to his wife. Gamay Morgan-Trout was an attractive woman, not gorgeous or overly sexy, but appealing to most men. She had a flashing smile with a slight gap in her upper teeth like the model-actress Lauren Hutton. She was tall, five feet ten, and 135 pounds, slim for her height. Her hair, which was long and generally worn swirled, was dark red, the reason her father, a wine connoisseur, had named her after the grape of Beaujolais.

More open and vivacious than her husband, she worked well with men, a talent that went back to her tomboy days in Wisconsin. Her father was a successful developer who had encouraged her to compete with men, teaching her to sail and shoot skeet. She was an expert diver and marksman.

Gamay listened for a moment, and then said, "We'll be right over."

Hanging up, she said, "Dr. Osborne has asked us to come by the MBL. He says it's urgent."

"Everything is urgent to Sam," Paul said.

"Now, now. You needn't be snide just because he wanted to talk to me."

"I don't have a snide bone in my body," Paul said, linking arms with Gamay.

He bid good-bye to his colleague in the Submergence Lab and he and Gamay set off along Water Street. A few minutes later, they were climbing the wide stone steps at the Lillie Research Building, where they went through an arched doorway into a quiet lobby.

Dr. Osborne was waiting for them just inside. He pumped Paul's hand and embraced Gamay, whom he'd had as a student when she was studying marine biology at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography in California. Osborne was in his mid-fifties, and his receding, curly white hair seemed to be slipping off the back of his skull. He had a big-boned physique and large workman's hands that looked more suitable for handling a pickax than the delicate strands of marine vegetation that were his specialty.

"Thanks for coming over," he said. "I hope that This is no imposition."