"Could there have been another Princess Dou Wan?" asked Julia.

Perlmutter shook his head negatively. "The International Ships Registry only lists one Princess Dou Wan between eighteen fifty and the present. The signal must have been sent as a red herring from another Chinese vessel."

"Where did the rumor originate that Chinese antiquities were on board?" asked Pitt.

Perlmutter held out his hands, palms upward in a sign of unknowing. "A myth, a legend, the sea is full of them. The only sources I'm aware of were unreliable dockworkers and Nationalist Chinese soldiers who were in charge of loading the ship. They were later captured and interrogated by the Communists. One claimed a crate broke open while itXwas being lifted aboard, revealing a life-size bronze prancing horse."

"How on earth did you find all this information?" said Julia, overwhelmed with Perlmutter's knowledge of maritime disasters.

He smiled. "From a fellow researcher in China. I have sources around the world that I rely on to send me books and information related to shipwrecks whenever they find it. They know that I pay top dollar for reports that contain new and uncovered ground. The story of the Princess Dou Wan came from an old friend who is China's top historian and researcher by the name of Zhu Kwan. We've corresponded and exchanged maritime information for many years. It was he who mentioned a legend surrounding the alleged treasure ship."

"Was Zhu Kwan able to give you a manifest of the treasure?" Pitt inquired.

"No, he claimed only that his research led him to believe that before Mao's troops marched into Shanghai, Chiang Kai-shek cleaned out the museums, galleries and private collections of Chinese antiquities. Records of art and artifacts before World War n in China are sketchy to say the least. It is pretty well known that after the Communists took over, there were few antiquities to be found. All that you see in China today were discovered and excavated since nineteen forty-eight."

"Not one of the lost treasures was ever found?"

"Not to my knowledge," Perlmutter admitted. "Nor has Zhu Kwan told me any different."

Pitt took the last swallow from his glass of the forty-year-old port. "So a vast part of China's heritage may lie on the bottom of the sea."

Julia's expression altered to curiosity. "This is all most interesting, but I fail to see what good any of this has to do with Qin Shang's illegal immigrant-smuggling operations."

Pitt took her hand and held it tightly. "Your Immigration and Naturalization Service, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation can strike Qin Shang and his rotten empire from the front and sides. But his obsession with the lost antiquities of China opens the door for the National Underwater and Marine Agency to strike him from the rear, where he least expects it. St. Julien and I will have to play catch-up. But we're very good at what we do. Together, we make a better search team than any Qin Shang can put together." Pitt paused, and his expression lightened. "Now the only trick we have to perform is to find the Princess Dou Wan before Qin Shang."