In October 1771, the Dutch merchant ship Vrouw Maria crashed off the Finnish coast, taking her historic cargo to the depths of the Baltic Sea. The vessel was delivering a dozen Dutch masterpiece paintings to Europe's most voracious collector: Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia. Fast forward to 1999, when a daring Finnish wreck hunter finally finds the ship, upright on the sea floor and perfectly preserved. Telling a dramatic tale that spans from Golden-Age Amsterdam to the present—and featuring 16 pages of photos—Gerald Easter and Mara Vorhees weave together the ship's story with that of Rembrandt's pupil, Gerrit Dou, the artist whose masterpiece was the jewel of the wreckage.