Nighthawk

34

A staccato thumping echoed through the high mountain pass. Ground-dwelling animals looked up nervously and then darted away as a thundering orange machine flew between peaks and its great whirling shadow passed over them.

Joe Zavala was at the controls of the Air-Crane once again. The big helicopter was slow and stable, but it wasn’t the easiest bird to control in a crosswind. As a result, he was more focused on the flying than the scenery. At least his passengers were enjoying the view.

“Now, this is a view fit for the gods,” Urco’s voice called out over the intercom.

Joe glanced back for an instant. The cockpit of the Air-Crane was packed. Kurt sat in the copilot’s seat while Emma, Urco and Paul Trout sat on the jump seats behind them.

“It’s too bad we couldn’t see it at sunrise,” Urco added.

In fact, Joe had seen plenty of the mountains at sunrise, making another run that only he, Kurt and Paul knew about. It had pushed back their arrival at La Jalca. “Sorry about that,” Joe said. “We were slightly delayed.”

“Are we trying to make up time by flying through the mountains instead of over them?” Paul asked.

“Talk to Kurt,” Joe said. “I just go where I’m told to.”

“The Chinese agent claimed she had more support out here,” Kurt said. “If so, the Air-Crane slowly crossing the sky in a nice straight line would be like a big orange arrow pointing to the crash site.”

“Not to mention a tempting target,” Emma said.

Joe banked to the right, rounding another peak and taking them out over the plunging valley on the far side. “Besides,” he added, “this is a lot more fun.”

The mood in the helicopter was upbeat. They were close to finding the missing craft and averting disaster. That hope had given everyone a burst of adrenaline and a second wind.

“Even if they did spot us, it would take forever to get here,” Urco promised. “The road to the lake is very poor; it makes a goat path look like the German autobahn. It was built by the Inca seven hundred years ago and hasn’t been resurfaced since.”

They could see the path from where they were. A long, thin pencil line scraped into the side of the highlands. It curved in and out of the various hills and then began to drop, leading from the high plateau down to the valley and eventually to the lake.

Lake of the Condors sat at the foot of a plateau. It was fed by a river that snaked down from the mountains, entered a gap in the bluff and then shot forward over a ledge and down into the lake.

The drop was two hundred feet, not particularly high for a waterfall, but it poured out of the overhanging rock with substantial force, filling the narrow upper end of the pear-shaped lake.

From the air, it appeared static, a standing wave covered by a veil of spray that sparkled in the sun. Cliffs surrounding it stood like battlements, and the hills sloped downward from there.

“Get your cameras out,” Joe said. “I’m going to buzz the falls while I look for the best spot to set us down.”

They crossed the lake at an angle, giving everyone a great view of the waterfall. Down below, the mirror surface of the lake reflected the blue sky, the green of the hills and white of the clouds, but the water itself was a dark, inky black.

“The water level is fairly low,” Paul said. “There’s a lot of empty beach around the lower half of the lake.”

Joe saw what Paul was describing: dried silt and stones fifty feet wide encircled that section of the lake. Beyond, a rushing stream took the outflow of the lake on its continuing journey toward lower ground and the Pacific Ocean.

Urco pointed out several features, having been to the lake before. “You cannot land over there,” he said, pointing to a flat area. “Too soft. Sometimes a swamp. Best to land up high on the rocks.”

Joe nodded and turned back toward the hills. He found a raised section that looked solid and flat, circled once and put the Air-Crane down on top of it.

Thirty minutes later, they were on the water, cruising across the lake on an inflatable Zodiac. A compact sonar emitter trailed out behind them while a receiver designed to pick up the Nighthawk’s beacon — if it was still transmitting — dangled over the side.

While Joe drove the boat, Kurt kept his eyes on the sonar display. The scan showed a flat-bottomed lake filled with sediment and averaging about sixty feet deep. Here and there, small outcroppings of rock appeared, though nothing to indicate a city had ever existed at this location.

“I’m not seeing any skyscrapers,” he said to Urco.

“The ruins lie beneath the silt,” Urco explained. “As we get closer to the waterfall, you’ll see some of them jutting out where the current has scoured the sediment away.”

“Have you been down there?” Kurt asked.

“I don’t dive,” he said. “But some of my people do. I should learn, though. Up on the surface, grave robbers and the elements have taken away so much of what we could discover. But down there, preserved beneath the mud, lie untouched treasures from the past.”

Kurt nodded. He was more interested in an untouched aircraft from the present, but he understood Urco’s excitement.

While Kurt and Urco kept their eyes on the sonar scanner, Emma and Paul were working with the underwater receiver. She wore a headset and was listening for a signal. Paul was directing the receiver by hand.

“Anything?” he asked, operating with the skills of a man who’d grown up adjusting the rabbit ears on his TV.

Even with the headphones on, Emma was straining to hear a tiny electronic beep over the wind and the outboard motor. “Not yet.”

Paul held the unit steady, twisting a lever that turned the submerged receiver five degrees at a time. “How about now?”

She shook her head.

Kurt stole a glance her way. Tension lined her face. If the Nighthawk wasn’t here, they were in major trouble and all but out of time.

He looked back at the sonar display. For the first time, the underwater profile of the lake had begun to change. Small mounds became noticeable and then block-like structures protruding through the silt. The depth was increasing as well.

Kurt looked up; they were nearing the waterfall. The force of the drop and the outflow of water had carved a deeper pool at this end as the current scoured away the sediment and deposited it farther out in the lake.

“You see?” Urco said, pointing to squared-off sections of the screen. “Streets, avenues, buildings — it’s a city. A drowned city.”

Kurt wasn’t so sure. He’d seen rock formations that looked man-made before. The Bimini Road off the Bahamas came to mind, as did the Yonaguni ruins near Japan, a place that many thought was a submerged temple complex even though geologists insisted it was nothing more than a formation of stratified granite.

He chose not to burst Urco’s bubble, at the moment. “We’ll have to dive on it to get a better look,” Kurt said. “But I won’t deny it’s plenty interesting.”

Urco grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him with appreciation. “You won’t be disappointed.”

By now, they’d come close enough to the waterfall that the overspray was drifting across them. Kurt wiped the screen of the laptop and covered the keyboard.

He glanced at Joe. “Nothing on this pass. Take us back around.”

Joe nodded and turned the wheel. But instead of turning in front of the falls, he guided them in behind it. Because of the overhang of rock high above and the speed with which the water was traveling when it flew off the edge, there was a thirty-foot gap at the bottom.

The Zodiac cruised into that gap and sped between the curtain of water and the cliffside. The rock wall was dark and wet and pockmarked with caves.

“More burial chambers,” Urco said, pointing. “I would like it if they remain undisturbed.”

Kurt studied the dark caverns as they sped past. “Understood,” he said.

The next leg took them down the middle of the lake. They hadn’t gone far when Emma held up a hand. “Slow down,” she said. “I’m picking up something.”

Joe cut the throttle back, the boat settled and all eyes fell upon Emma.

“Ten degrees to the right,” she requested.

Paul turned the lever and stopped.

“Ten more?” she asked, and then, when he’d done that, added, “Back five.”

Emma held both hands against the headphones, pressing them to her ears. She looked out over the water and pointed. “That way. Slowly.”

Joe nudged the throttle and the Zodiac moved forward at a speed just above idle. At Emma’s direction, they made a wide circle and then a narrower one, homing in on the signal.

Finally, Emma held up her hand once more and Joe brought the Zodiac to a stop.

As the boat settled, Emma pulled the headphone jack out of the receiver so everyone could hear the signal… Beep… Beep… Beep… Steady and low.

“It’s here,” she said, a wave of relief washing over her face. “The Nighthawk is here.”