“Follow that railing,” Upali said. “To the right must be aft.” Suresh didn’t answer, but the view on the monitor, with its wide-angle lens, zoomed along the upper hull of the ship, encrusted with hard and soft corals and the occasional waving sea fan. Then, something unmistakable. A cannon. “We’ve got ourselves a warship,” Upali leaned back and smiled. I’d bet a round of beers that this is the Vampire.”

“We got very lucky,” said Suresh, not taking his eyes from the screen. “She’s literally hanging over a cliff. A few more feet to the north and this wreck would be in 2,000 feet of water.”

“A little beyond your diving depth, eh, machang?” Upali elbowed him in the ribs and laughed.

For the next several hours, they scoured the wreck with the ROV, methodically working from forward to aft, breaking for lunch and, later, some tea. By late afternoon, they still hadn’t found any evidence that positively identified this ship as the Vampire, but Upali was sure that it was. The old war records and British Admiralty charts showed no other shipwrecks in this area, and judging from its size and armaments, it was clearly a destroyer. To know for sure, Upali would compare the footage from the ROV to the photos and engineering drawings he had of the Vampire back at the Deep Blue. He was ready to call it a day. They’d be back out tomorrow with more definite surveying goals. Upali pulled out his phone and dashed off a cryptic message: “Think we’ve found Dracula.” He smiled. Tusker would be so jealous.

“Hey, come look at this,” Suresh called from the monitor. Upali yawned and came back inside. “There’s a perfectly rectangular hole in the hull here. There’s no sea life growing around it either. Almost looks… fresh.”

There, on the monitor, was a wide maw into the ship’s hold, outlined in a black jagged rectangle. It couldn’t be from a torpedo or explosion of any kind. “Maybe a hatch that came free when she sank?” Suresh mused.

“No, not there. That’s below the water line. I’ve never seen anything like that,” Upali replied. “Can you get inside there safely?”

“Shouldn’t be too hard,” Suresh said, tweaking the joystick. The ROV responded. “That hole is big enough for a car to drive through.”

Inside was a jumble of debris, covered in seven decades of silt, unrecognizable. Upali gasped aloud. What a treasure trove for an archaeologist—a time capsule unseen since World War II. Suddenly, a bright object appeared on the monitor, so out of place it caused the two men to jump. It was yellow, spherical, and reflected back the white light of the ROV lamps. As Suresh moved the craft in closer, Upali leaned in and squinted. He could make out writing. He mouthed the words, “Kirby Morgan…”