Indiana Jones and the Dinosaur Eggs (2 page)

"I can't wait that long."

"Why do you need it so desperately?" Belloq asked. "You have more than a professional interest in this chunk of articulated quartz, do you not? Surely you are not superstitious enough to believe the curse... or perhaps you have been seduced by the dark promise of the skull."

Belloq looked at his watch again.

"Ah, high tide."

"Name your price," Indy said. "Anything."

"I
am
greedy," Belloq said. "Under other circumstances, I would make you—how do you say it?—pay through your nose. But backing out on the deal I already have would be akin to suicide, and I am much too self-centered for that kind of foolishness."

"Who," Indy asked, "could be bad enough to scare
you
?"

The water beyond the flagstones began to swell.

The illuminated prow of a German U-boat undulated just beneath the surface, followed by the exposed snout of a forty-five-millimeter deck gun. In the glow of the running lights, Indy could see the telltale bulge of a torpedo tube running alongside her nose.

"Since Hitler became chancellor earlier this year," Belloq said, "the Nazis have launched a desperate effort to locate arcane treasures with supposed supernatural powers. The Crystal Skull is high on their list."

The cavern was filled with the insistent hum of electric motors and the gastric sounds of ballast tanks being trimmed as the submarine fought to maintain its neutral, partially submerged buoyancy in the confines of the cavern.

The conning tower, bristling with periscope and radio aerials, rode a half-dozen feet above the water and its fairwater carried the faint outline of a double-blocked alphanumeric,
U-357.
Unless one was standing beside the boat, identification of it would be impossible.

A pair of sailors emerged from the hatch on top of the conning tower and clambered down to the saddlelike ballast tanks awash with seawater. Slung across their backs were Schmeisser submachine guns. After making fast lines to the centuries-old rings set into the flagstones, the sailors took up positions flanking Belloq.

The Daguerre twins drew their own guns.

"Put them away, you idiots," Belloq snapped in French.

The captain of the
U-357,
a tired-looking former career officer named Wagner, had watched from the observation platform of the conning tower as the boat was secured. Now satisfied, he called down the open hatch.

Franz Kroeger squeezed his shoulders through the hatch and emerged on deck. Kroeger was everything that Wagner was not: young, tall, blond, and with a freshly pressed black uniform that emphasized his perfectly proportioned body. The uniform was devoid of insignia, except for a pair of lightning bolts on the collar. Kroeger was a colonel in the newly formed Leibstandarte SS, Hitler's personal guard, and if things went awry, he wanted no evidence that would point directly back to the former paperhanger who had become, just a few months before, chancellor of Germany.

Kroeger's boots rang sharply on the iron rungs as he descended the con. The deck covering the starboard saddle tank of the
U-357
was in thigh-deep water, but Kroeger managed a swagger as he waded across.

Once up on the flagstones, Kroeger paused and drew a cigarette case from his breast pocket. He lit a Players cigarette with an American lighter, and the smoke wreathed his young blond head like a wicked halo.

"Monsieur Belloq," he said; in his thick German accent the name came out "Bellosh." "I apologize, but my English is better than my French, and I'm sure that your German would grate upon my ears. You may call me Franz, and I am at your service." His heels snapped together sharply and he threw up the Nazi salute.

Belloq returned a halfhearted wave.

"You have the artifact?"

"It is here," Belloq said, and patted the canister beneath him. "According to your instructions, it has not yet been sealed. Do you have the payment?"

"First things first," Kroeger said. "I must inspect the merchandise."

Belloq removed the lid of the canister, reached inside, and pulled what looked to Indy like a leather bowling-ball bag from its interior. He started to hand the case to Kroeger, then drew it back.

"Colonel," Belloq said. "Gloves, please."

Kroeger gave a snort of disgust, but withdrew a pair of leather gloves from the pocket of his uniform and slipped them on. Then he took the case from Belloq, unzipped it, and with a gloved right hand removed the Crystal Skull.

"I did not expect it to be so beautiful," Kroeger said. "It is magnificent. Look how it captures the light!"

Kroeger held the skull aloft.

Indy—and the others—caught their breath. Even in the weak glow of the electric bulbs an unholy rainbow of secondary colors burst forth from deep within the skull, shimmering above their heads. The bluish glow of the corona effect, caused by static electricity, danced down Kroeger's sleeve to his shoulder.

As Kroeger turned the skull on his outstretched—and gloved—palm, its vacant eye sockets seemed to skewer all who returned its gaze.

"What power is reputed to lie within this thing?" Kroeger asked. "What makes it so special that men are willing to risk their lives and their reputations to possess it?"

"I have been asking that very question," Belloq said.

Indy's palms became damp. He remembered the first and only time he had touched the skull with his bare hands, how the skull had seemed to throb in time to his heart. Indy was close enough to Kroeger to reach out and snatch the skull....

"The chancellor will be well pleased," Kroeger said, and plunged the skull back into its leather case. "Even if its power is based on mere superstition, it is an unparalleled work of art that will become an inspiration to those of us who have sworn fidelity to the point of death and beyond."

The cavern seemed infinitely darker now.

After handing the case back to Belloq, who gently returned it to the interior of the canister, the colonel removed his gloves and snapped his fingers. Two sailors struggled with a case from the deck of the
U-357.

They placed the case at Belloq's feet.

"Aren't you going to inspect it?" Kroeger asked.

"I trust you," Belloq said. "But then, I must. What could I do if it were ingots of lead instead of gold? You could blow this cavern to bits, and Malevil above it."

"We could," Kroeger said. "But we won't."

"Merci,"
Belloq said humorlessly.

"But we do insist that you retire now from your shadowy activities," Kroeger said. "You have made your fortune. Be well satisfied, and avoid the temptation to accept work from our competitors."

"But
mon ami
," Belloq protested. "This was not part of the bargain. I am an archaeologist. It is not a matter of money, but of passion."

"Ah, passion," Kroeger said wistfully. "The weakness of the non-Aryan races. The French, I understand, are particularly susceptible to meaningless sentimentality. How difficult it must be to live with such a handicap."

"You've got to be kidding," Indy blurted out. "Who
are
you guys?"

Kroeger looked at Indy as if he had just noticed him for the first time. He stepped forward and peered at Indy with piercing blue eyes that squinted against the smoke curling up from the cigarette dangling at the corner of his mouth.

Kroeger placed a hand beneath Indy's chin and held his face toward the light, inspecting the recent work of the Daguerre twins. His thumb paused at the scar on Indy's chin left so many years ago by a bullwhip.

"Who is this wretched creature?"

"The name is Jones."

Indy grabbed Kroeger's wrist.

With a flourish, the sailors on either side of Belloq leveled their submachine guns. The Daguerre twins drew their guns at the same time, and Belloq cringed in the middle.

Belloq began to laugh, if unconvincingly.

"He is nobody," the Frenchman said nonchalantly. "A fool... An American tourist who stumbled into the cavern quite by accident. As you can see, my men have already taken care of him."

"Too bad they did not pay more attention to his tongue," Kroeger said, and motioned for his men to lower their weapons. "Jones... such a pedestrian name, no?"

"I do a lot of walking," Indy said.

Kroeger lifted the flap of Indy's holster and withdrew the Webley. "Do American tourists always go abroad armed, Herr Jones?"

"Doctor
Jones," Indy said. "I'm a college professor. Princeton. And by the way, that thing isn't loaded—I get uncomfortable in a foreign city, and I carry it just in case I need to scare somebody."

"Is that so?" Kroeger asked. He placed the Webley firmly against Indy's temple. He pulled the trigger. The hammer fell with a metallic
snap!

"Ah, I see that you are correct." Kroeger laughed.

"There is no need to waste your time on this one," Belloq said quickly. "He is really quite harmless."

"Quite," Indy said. "Say, I thought all of these old U-boats were destroyed according to the Treaty of Versailles, but looks like they missed this one." He slowly took the revolver from Kroeger and returned it to the holster. "But I guess you guys have been too busy persecuting Jews, closing down newspapers, and abolishing trial by jury. Huh, Major?"

"Colonel," Kroeger corrected, then bit his lip. "Clever. I am impressed. But tell me, why do you enjoy flirting with death?"

"It beats burning books on a Saturday night."

"You Americans amuse me," Kroeger said. "Everything is a joke to you, and you denounce what you do not understand. Wait, let me tell
you
one. It's about an American who was at the wrong place at the wrong time, and his overly sentimental French friend is unable to save him. Hilarious. Oh, I'm sorry, you look as if you've already heard it."

"Belloq is nobody's friend," Indy said.

"Is this true, Rene?" Kroeger asked. "You have no association with this man, no connection of any sort?"

"None." Belloq shrugged.

"Then you won't mind killing him," Kroeger said. He relieved one of the sailors of his submachine gun and placed it in Belloq's hands. "You may keep the weapon, as a souvenir of your service to the Third Reich. And do not be surprised if you receive, from time to time, a reminder of your obligation to the Fatherland."

Kroeger snapped his fingers and the sailors lifted the yellow canister between them and carried it carefully toward the
U-357.
The colonel followed, stepping from the flagstones onto the submerged deck of the submarine, then paused.

"I am sorry we did not get to know one another better. But I do not have the luxury of time, since the tide will soon be going out and I have no desire to ground this boat in French territorial waters.
Auf Wiedersehen, Doktor Jones
."

In a moment Kroeger had slipped down into the conning tower and dogged the hatch behind him. The submarine was already in motion. The con slid deeper into the water as the boat backed out of the cavern toward the subterranean passage to the open sea.

"I could come to hate those guys," Indy mused.

Belloq tossed the submarine gun to Claude, the nearest of the Daguerre twins.

"Surely you're not going to kill me," Indy said, and showed Belloq his empty palms. "The Nazis are gone. There's nobody here but us. I thought we were
friends.
What about all that talk of working together someday?"

"Impossible," Belloq said. "If I do not kill you, they will kill me. In the measure of things, Dr. Jones, it is a small price to pay for my peace of mind."

Claude Daguerre jabbed the snout of the submachine gun in Indy's direction and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. Jean stepped forward and attempted to wrest the gun from his brother. Belloq cursed them in French to find the safety, but Indy was already scrambling toward the water. He snatched his hat and bullwhip from Belloq's feet at the same time as he heard the clink of the safety.

The cavern erupted in the chatter of gunfire and the whine of ricochets as the submachine gun, the object of a tug-of-war between the Daguerre twins, came to life. Belloq was screaming in French at the twins to take better aim, that any respectable Chicago gangster would know how to handle a fully automatic weapon, so why couldn't they?

Indy jammed his hat tightly onto his head, filled his lungs, and dove into the black water. Bullets zipped around him, strings of bubbles marking their trajectories like aquatic tracers. He felt one of the slugs sting his thigh, but he resisted the urge to grasp the wound and instead swam with all of his might after the slowly retreating submarine. In the dim glow of the running lights he could see the silhouette of the deck gun, and as he reached it he lashed his whip tightly around the muzzle.

He could feel the rhythmic thrum of the screws as the submarine negotiated the passage, and the harsh grating of metal against rock made his heart beat a little faster. The pressure in his ears increased to a painful level as the submarine dove deeper. Indy risked freeing one of his hands from the muzzle of the gun. By pinching his nose and blowing gently, he forced air into the tiny eustachian tubes in the back of his throat. There was a crinkling sound in his ears as the pressure equalized, and the pain disappeared.

His chest, however, felt like fire.

The carbon dioxide building in his lungs was pleading for release. He knew from experience that, for him, this sensation came at a minute and a half underwater. He opened his mouth and let a little of the spent air escape from his lips, which eased the fire somewhat, buying him a little more time. Professional skin divers could hold their breath for four minutes or more, but Indy knew that his own limit was well below that. He had, at best, another ninety seconds. If the U-boat had not cleared the passage into the harbor by the end of that time, Indy knew he would drown.

Indy shut his eyes and forced his mind to go elsewhere, to disengage from his tortured lungs and throbbing brain, to green fields and sunlit pastures. Then the pale blue eyes of Alecia Dunstin popped into his mind, and he studied the waves of her hair, the curve of her jaw, the fullness of her lips. He remembered their first meeting at the British Museum in London, while he stood in front of her desk with hat in hand as she seemed to reach down to his very soul with those remarkable blue eyes. If he drowned, he thought, he would have only one regret.