She tilted her head away. "Not when I'm driving."

He gave her right knee an affectionate squeeze and relaxed in the seat, looking up at the stars that twinkled in the brisk spring night through the branches of the trees that flashed overhead, their new leaves just beginning to spread. Karl Wolf. He turned the name over in his head. A good German name, he decided. Destiny Enterprises was worth looking into, even if it might prove to be a dead end.

Loren drove smoothly, deftly passing the few cars that were still on the road that time of morning, and turned into the driveway leading to the NUMA headquarters building's underground parking. A security guard stepped out of the guardhouse, recognized Pitt, and waved him through, lingering to admire the gleaming old Ford. There were only three other cars on the main parking level. She stopped the Ford next to the elevators and turned off the lights and engine.

"Want me to come up with you?" Loren asked.

"I'll only be a few minutes," Pitt said, stepping from the car.

He took the elevator to the main lobby, where it automatically stopped and he had to sign in with the guard at the security desk, surrounded by an array of TV monitors viewing different areas of the building.

"Working late?" the guard asked pleasantly.

"Just a quick stop," Pitt remarked, fighting off a yawn.

Before taking the elevator up to his office, Pitt stepped off on the tenth floor on a hunch. True to his intuition, Hiram Yaeger was still burning the midnight oil. He looked up as Pitt entered his private domain, eyes red from lack of sleep. Max was staring out of her cyberland.

"Dirk," he muttered, rising from his chair and shaking hands. "I didn't expect you to come wandering in this time of night."

"Thought I'd see what you and Dr. O'Connell had raked from the dirt of antiquity," he said genially.

"I hate banal metaphors," said Max.

"That's enough from you," Yaeger said in mock irritation. Then he said to Pitt, "I left a printed report of our latest findings on Admiral Sandecker's desk as of ten o'clock this evening."

"I'll borrow it and return it first thing in the morning."

"Don't rush. He's meeting with the director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency until noon."

"You should be home with your wife and daughters," said Pitt.

"I was working late with Dr. O'Connell," said Yaeger, rubbing his tired eyes. "You just missed her."

"She came in and went to work without resting up after her trip?" Pitt asked in surprise.

"A truly remarkable woman. If I weren't married, I'd throw my hat in her ring."

"You always had a thing for academic women."

"Brains over beauty, I always say."

"Anything you can tell me before I wade through your report?" Pitt queried.

"An amazing story," said Yaeger, almost wistfully.

"I'll second that," Max added.

"This is a private conversation," Yaeger said testily to Max's image before he closed her down. He stood up and stretched. "What we have is an incredible story of a seafaring race of people who lived before the dawn of recorded history, and who, were decimated after a comet struck the earth, causing great waves that engulfed the city ports that they had built in almost every corner of the globe. They lived and died in a forgotten age and a far different world than we know today."

"When I last talked to the admiral, he didn't rule out the legend of Atlantis."

"The lost continent in the middle of the Atlantic doesn't fit into the picture," Yaeger said seriously. "But there is no doubt that a league of maritime nations existed whose people had extensively sailed every sea and charted every continent." He paused and looked at Pitt. "The photos Pat took of the inscriptions inside the burial chamber and the map of the world are in the lab. They should be ready for me to scan into the computer first thing in the morning."

"They show placements of the continents far different than an Earth of the present," Pitt said contemplatively.

Yaeger's bloodshot eyes stared thoughtfully. "I'm beginning to sense that something more catastrophic than a comet strike took place. I've scanned the geological data my people have accumulated over the past ten years. The Ice Age ended quite abruptly in conjunction with a wild fluctuation of the sea. The sea level is over three hundred feet higher than it was nine thousand years ago."

"That would put any building or relics of the Atlanteans quite deep under the coastal waters."

"Not to mention deeply buried in silt."

"Did they call themselves Atlanteans?" asked Pitt.

"I doubt they knew what the word meant," replied Yaeger. "Atlantis is Greek and means daughter of Atlas. Because of Plato, it's become known through the ages as the world before history began, or what is called an antediluvian civilization. Today, anyone who can read, and most who don't, have a knowledge of Atlantis. Everything from resort hotels, technology and finance companies, retail stores, and swimming pool manufacturers to a thousand products including wines and food brands carry the name Atlantis. Countless articles and books have been written about the lost continent, as well as its being a subject of television and motion pictures. But until now, only those who believed in Santa Claus, UFOs, and the supernatural thought it was more than simply a fictional story created by Plato."

Pitt walked to the doorway and turned back. "I wonder what people will say," he said wistfully, "when they find out such a civilization actually existed."

Yaeger smiled. "Many of them will say I told you so."

When Pitt left Yaeger and exited the elevator to the executive offices of NUMA, he couldn't help noticing that the lights in the hallway leading to Admiral Sandecker's suite were dimmed to their lowest level. It seemed strange they were still switched on, but he figured there could be any number of reasons for the faint illumination. At the end of the hallway, he pushed the glass door open into the anteroom outside the admiral's inner office and private conference room. As he stepped inside and walked past the desk occupied by Julie Wolff, the admiral's secretary, he smelled the distinctive fragrance of orange blossoms.

He paused in the doorway and groped for the light switch. In that instant, a figure leaped from the shadows and ran at Pitt, bent over at the waist. Too late, he stiffened as the intruder's head rammed square into his stomach. He stumbled backward, staying on his feet but doubling over, the breath knocked out of him. He made a grab at his assailant as they spun, but Pitt was caught by surprise, and his arm was easily knocked away.

Gasping for breath, with one arm clutching his midsection, Pitt found the light and switched it on. One quick glance at Sandecker's desk and he knew the intruder's mission. The admiral was fanatical about keeping a clean desk. Papers and files were put carefully in a drawer each evening before he left for his Watergate apartment. The surface was empty of Yaeger's report on the ancient seafarers.

His stomach feeling as if it had been tied in a huge knot, Pitt ran to the elevators. The one with the thief was going down, the other elevator was stopped on a floor below. He frantically pushed the button and waited, taking deep breaths to get back on track. The elevator doors spread and he jumped in, pressing the button for the parking lot. The elevator descended quickly without stopping. Thank God for Otis elevators, Pitt thought.