Pitt and Hall exchanged grins. Observers always became addicted to watching the sonar data. Julia would be no different. They knew that she would gaze entranced for hours, enthusiastically waiting for the image of a ship to materialize.

"Starting lane one," Wilbanks proclaimed.

"What's our depth, Ralph?" Pitt asked.

Wilbanks glanced up at his depth sounder, which hung from the roof on one side of the helm. "About four hundred ten feet."

An old hand at search-and-survey, Giordino shouted from his comfortable position on the cushion where he lay with his cast propped up on a railing. "I'm going to take a siesta. Yell out if you spot anything."

The hours passed slowly as the Divercity plowed through the low waves at ten miles an hour mowing the lawn, the magnetometer ticking away, the recording line trailing down the center of the graph paper until swinging off to the sides when it detected the presence of iron. In unison, the side-scan sonar emitted a soft clack as the thermal plastic film unreeled from the printer. It revealed a lake bed cold and desolate and free of human debris.

"It's a desert down there," said Julia, rubbing tired eyes.

"No place to build your dream house," said Hall with a little grin.

"That finishes lane twenty-two," Wilbanks broadcast. "Coming around on lane twenty-three."

Julia looked at her watch. "Lunchtime," she announced, opening the picnic basket she had packed at the bed and breakfast. "Anybody besides me hungry?"

"I'm always hungry," Giordino called out from the back of the boat.

"Amazing." Pitt shook his head incredulously. "At twelve feet away, outside in a breeze with the roar of the outboard motor, he can still hear the mere mention of food."

"What delicacies have you prepared?" Giordino asked Julia, having dragged himself to the cabin doorway.

"Apples, granola bars, carrots and herbal ice tea. You have your choice between hummus and avocado sandwiches. It's what I call a healthy lunch."

Every man on the boat looked at each of the others with utter horror. She couldn't have received a more unpalatable reaction if she had said she was volunteering their services as diaper changers at a day-care center. Out of deference to Julia none of the men said anything negative, since she went to the bother of fixing lunch. The fact that she was a woman and their mothers had raised them all as gentlemen added to the dilemma. Giordino, however, did not come from the old school. He complained vociferously.

"Hummus and avocado sandwiches," he said disgustedly. "I'm going to throw myself off the boat and swim to the nearest Burger King—"

"I have a reading on the mag!" Pitt interrupted. "Anything on the sonar?"

"My sonar towfish is trailing farther astern than your mag sensor," said Hall, "so my reading will lag behind yours."

Julia leaned closer to the sonar's printer in anticipation of seeing an object appear from the printer. Slowly, the image of a hard target began to move across the video display and the printer simultaneously.