The Navigator

Chapter 1

BAGHDAD, IRAQ, 2003

CARINA MECHADI WAS INCANDESCENT with rage. The young Italian woman threw off sparks like a Roman candle as she surveyed the rubble that littered the administrative offices of the IraqiNationalMuseum. Cabinets had been overturned. Files were scattered as if they’d been caught up in a whirlwind. Desks and chairs had been smashed to splinters. The vindictiveness of the destruction was appalling.

Carina unleashed a withering outburst that dissected the parentage, sexual orientation, and prowess of the vandals who had wreaked such senseless havoc.

The wave of blue language washed over the young U.S. Marine corporal who had been hovering protectively nearby cradling an M4 carbine in his arms. The only two Italian words the marine knew were pepperoni and pizza. He didn’t need a lexicon to tell him that he’d witnessed a display of razor-edged invective worthy of a longshoreman with a sore back.

The muscular language was all the more amazing considering its source. Carina was a foot shorter than the marine. The battle gear the military people had insisted she wear made the slender woman appear even smaller. She looked like a turtle too small for its shell in the borrowed flak jacket. The desert-camouflage uniform was meant for a small man. The helmet that concealed her long sable hair sat so low it almost hid her cornflower blue eyes.

Carina noticed the marine’s astonished grin. She blushed with embarrassment and brought her tirade to a halt. “Sorry about that.”

“No problem, ma’am,” the corporal said. “You ever want to be a drill instructor, the Marine Corps would be glad to have you.”

The heat faded from her dusky face. Full lips that seemed better suited for seduction than for swearing widened in a broad smile that revealed perfect white teeth. With the fire in her words extinguished, her voice was low and cool. Speaking with a slight accent, she said, “Thank you for the offer, Corporal O’Leary.” She glanced at the rubble at her feet. “As you can see, I’m quite passionate when it comes to this sort of thing.”

“Don’t blame you for being pissed—” The marine’s cheeks flushed and he glanced away. “Excuse me, I mean for being mad, ma’am. Hell of a mess.”

Saddam Hussein’s elite Republican Guard had set up a defensive position in the eleven-acre museum complex in the heart of Baghdad on the western bank of the Tigris. The Iraqi troops had run for their lives in the face of the American advance, leaving the museum unguarded for thirty-six hours. Hundreds of plunderers had rampaged through the complex until they were chased out by the senior staff.

The Republican Guards had shed their uniforms and burned piles of identity cards in their hurry to return to civilian life. In a last gasp of defiance, someone had scrawled DEATH TO ALL AMERICANS on a courtyard wall.

“We’ve seen all we need to see here,” Carina said with a grimace.

With Corporal O’Leary trailing a few paces behind, she plodded out of the administrative offices. Her leaden-footed gait was only partly the fault of the army boots on her feet. She was weighed down by a feeling of dread at what she would find, or not find, in the public gallery, where the museum’s prize holdings were exhibited in more than five hundred display cases.

The walk down the long central corridor only served to heighten her fears. A number of sarcophagi had been cracked open and statues decapitated.

Carina set foot in the first gallery and the air involuntarily escaped from her lungs. She wandered from room to room as if in a daze. Every case looked as if it had been vacuumed clean.

She entered a gallery that had held Babylonian artifacts. A portly, middle-aged man was bent over a smashed cabinet. Standing next to him was a young Iraqi, who raised his AK-47 when they entered.

The marine brought the carbine to his shoulder.

The heavyset man looked up and stared through thick lenses at the marine. There was disdain rather than fear in his eyes. His glance shifted to Carina and his face lit up in a fourteen-karat smile.

“My dear Miss Mechadi,” he said with undisguised warmth.

“Hello, Dr. Nasir. Glad to see that you’re all right.” Carina turned to the marine. “Corporal, this is Mohammed Jassim Nasir. He’s senior curator here at the museum.”

The marine lowered his weapon. After a pause to show that he had not been intimidated by the American, the Iraqi did the same with his gun. They continued to eye each other warily.

Nasir came over to clasp Carina’s hands in his. “You shouldn’t have come so soon. It is still dangerous.”

“You are here, professor.”

“Of course. This institution has been my lifeblood.”

“I understand completely,” Carina said. “But the area around the museum is secure.” She nodded toward her marine escort. “Besides, Corporal O’Leary is keeping close watch on me.”

Nasir’s brow clouded over. “I hope this gentleman is a better guard than his friends were. If not for my brave colleagues the disaster would have been total.”

Carina understood Nasir’s anger. The American troops arrived four days after the museum’s curators had told the commanders about the looting. Carina had tried desperately to have them move in sooner. She had waved the UNESCO identification card hanging around her neck under the noses of the American officers only to be told that the situation was too fluid and dangerous.

Carina saw no use arguing over who was to blame. The damage had already been done. “I’ve talked to the Americans,” she said. “They said there would have been a bloody battle if they came in earlier.”

Nasir shot a drop-dead glance in the marine’s direction. “I understand. They were too busy guarding the oil wells.” The unsympathetic expression on his nut-brown face suggested that he would have preferred bloodshed to looting.

“I’m as sickened as you are,” she said. “This is terrible.”

“Well, it’s not as bad as it seems here,” Nasir said with unexpected optimism. “The artifacts taken from this case were minor items. Fortunately, the museum had put together a contingency plan after the 1991 invasion. The curators moved most of the artifacts to safe rooms known only to the five most senior museum officers.”

“That’s wonderful, Professor!”

Nasir’s sunny mood was short-lived. He tugged fretfully at his beard. “I wish the rest of the news were as good,” he said with a doleful note in his voice. “Other parts of the museum did not fare as well. The thieves looted the greatest treasures of Mesopotamia. They took the sacred vase and the mask of Warka, the Bassetki statue, the ivory of the lioness attacking the Nubian, and the twin copper bulls.”

“Those objects are priceless!”

“Unlike the petty thieves we chased out of the museum, the people who removed the more-valuable antiquities were sophisticated. They bypassed the Black Obelisk, for instance.”

“They must have known that the original is in the Louvre.”

Nasir’s lips tightened in a grim smile. “They didn’t touch any copies. They were very organized and selective. Come, I’ll show you.”

Nasir led the way to the aboveground storage rooms. The shelves lining the walls were empty. Dozens of jars, vessels, and shards littered the floor. Carina kicked away an army uniform.

“The Republican Guards spent time here as well,” she said. “Any idea of how much is missing?”

“It will take years to assess the loss. I’m estimating around three thousand or so pieces gone. I wish I could say that was the worst of it.”

They walked into a gallery that displayed Roman antiquities. The professor pushed aside a corner shelf to reveal a hidden door whose glass paneling had been smashed and steel grate bent back. He fumbled in his pocket for a candle and a cigarette lighter. They descended the narrow set of stairs to metal doors that were wide-open, with no sign of forced entry. A wall sealed the space beyond the door. The concrete bricks had been pried away to make a large opening.

They climbed through the opening into a hot and airless room. An acrid stench assaulted their nostrils. Footprints on the dusty floor had been cordoned off with yellow tape placed at the crime scene by a team of investigators.

Carina glanced around. “Where are we?”

“The basement storage area. There are five rooms down here. Few people in the museum even know this place exists. That’s why we thought the collection was safe. We were wrong, as you can see.”

He moved the candle in an arc. Its yellow light fell upon dozens of plastic fishing boxes thrown willy-nilly around the room.

“I’ve never seen such absolute chaos,” Carina whispered.

“The boxes held cylinder seals, beads, coins, glass bottles, amulets, and jewelry. Thousands of items are missing.” He brought the candle over to dozens of larger plastic boxes that lined the walls. “They didn’t bother with these. Apparently, they knew they were empty.”

Corporal O’Leary surveyed the wreckage with a street fighter’s eye for entrances and exits. “If you don’t mind my asking sir, how’d they know how to find this place?”

Nasir’s heavy features drooped and he gave a glum nod of his head. “You Americans aren’t the only ones who have reason to be embarrassed. We suspect someone on our staff with intimate knowledge of the museum alerted the thieves to this room. We have fingerprinted our staff, except for the head of security, who has not come back to reclaim his job.”

“I was wondering why I didn’t see any evidence of the door being forced,” Carina said.

“The thieves came into the basement the same way we did, but they had forgotten torches or never expected they would need them.” He picked up a piece of burned rubber foam. “They used this material from upstairs for torchlight. The stuff burns quickly and the fumes would have been terrible. We found a set of keys on the floor. They probably dropped the keys and couldn’t find them. They missed thirty cabinets with our best cylinder seals and tens of thousands of gold and silver coins. I’d guess about ten thousand excavated artifacts are missing. Hundreds of boxes were left intact, praise Allah.”

They filed through a doorway into a larger space filled with antiquities of every size and shape. “These are objects that were given a preliminary identification and were to be absorbed into the main collection as work allowed. Some have been stored here for years.”

“The footprints lead in here,” Carina said.

“The thieves evidently thought there was something of value in this room. We would have no way of knowing until we go over our inventory. We are far too busy trying to retrieve more precious items.”

“I heard there was an amnesty,” she said.

“That’s right. It has somewhat restored some of my faith in human nature. People have brought in thousands of items, including the mask of Warka. I expect that objects will continue to be returned, but, as you know, the most valuable ones are probably in the possession of some wealthy collector in New York or London.”

Carina sighed in agreement. The thefts had been carefully planned. The invasion took weeks to gear up. Unscrupulous dealers in Europe and the United States could take advance orders for specific objects from rich clients.

The antiquities business had become almost as lucrative as drug trafficking. London and New York were the main markets. Stolen antiquities from illegal excavations in Greece, Italy, and South America were often laundered through Switzerland, where objects can gain legal title after only five years in the country.

Carina stood in silence amid the empty boxes, apparently lost in thought. After a moment, she said, “Perhaps I can speed up the amnesty process.”

“But how? We have spread the word far and wide.”

She turned to the marine. “I’ll need your help, Corporal O’Leary.”

“I was ordered to comply with any request you asked for, ma’am.”

Carina spread her lips in a mysterious smile. “I was counting on that.”