Riptide

Chapter 4

The dark, terrible outline of the island, so persistent in memory and nightmare, was now once again before him in reality. It was little more than a black silhouette etched hard against the gray of sea and sky: shaped like a peculiar, tilted table, a gradual incline rising from the leeward to sharp bluffs on the seaward coast, punctuated by a hump of land in the center. The surf pounded the bluffs and boiled over the sunken ledges that ringed the island, leaving a scurf of foam that trailed like the wake of a boat. It was, if anything, even bleaker than he remembered: windswept, barren, a mile long and eight hundred yards wide. A single deformed spruce stood above the cobbled beach at the lee end of the island, its top exploded by an old lightning strike, its crabbed branches raised like a witch's hand against the sky.

Everywhere, great ruined hulks of infernal machines rose from the waving sawgrass and tea roses: ancient steam-driven compressors, winches, chains, boilers. A cluster of weather-beaten shacks sat to one side of the old spruce, listing and roofless. At the far end of the beach, Hatch could make out the smooth rounded forms of the Whalebacks that he and Johnny had clambered over, more than twenty-five years before. Along the nearest rocks lay the shattered carcasses of several large boats, dashed and battered by countless storms, their decks and ribbing split and scattered among the granite boulders. Weather-beaten signs, posted every 100 feet above the high water mark, read:

WARNING! EXTREME DANGER NO LANDING

For a moment Neidelman was speechless. "At last," he breathed.

The moment stretched into minutes as the boat drifted. Neidelman lowered his binoculars and turned toward Hatch. "Doctor?" he inquired.

Hatch was bracing himself on the wheel, riding out the memory. Horror washed over him like seasickness as the drizzle splattered the pilothouse windows and the bell buoy tolled mournfully in the mists. But mingled with the horror was something else, something new: the realization that there was a vast treasure down there—that his grandfather had not been a complete fool who destroyed three generations of his family for nothing. In a moment, he knew what his decision had to be: the final answer that was owed to his grandfather, his father, and his brother.

"Dr. Hatch?" Neidelman asked again, the hollows of his face glistening with the damp.

Hatch took several deep breaths and forced himself to relax his desperate grip on the wheel. "Circle the island?" he asked, managing to keep his voice even.

Neidelman stared at him another moment. Then he simply nodded and raised the binoculars again.

Easing the throttle open, Hatch swung seaward, coming out of the lee and turning into the wind. He proceeded under low engine, keeping the boat at three knots, looking away from the Whalebacks and the other, more dreadful landmarks he knew would lie just beyond.

"It's a hard-looking place," Neidelman said. "Harder than I'd ever imagined."

"There's no natural harbor," Hatch replied. "The place is surrounded by reefs, and there's a wicked tiderip. The island's exposed to the open ocean, and it gets hammered by Nor'easters every fall. So many tunnels were dug that a good part of the island is waterlogged and unstable. Even worse, some of the companies brought in explosives. There's unexploded dynamite, blasting caps, and God knows what else beneath the surface, just waiting to go off."

"What's that wreck?" Neidelman said, pointing at a massive, twisted metal structure rearing above the seaweed-slick rocks.

"A barge left over from my grandfather's day. It was anchored offshore with a floating crane, got caught in a Nor'easter, and was thrown on the rocks. After the ocean got through with it, there wasn't anything left to salvage. That was the end of my grandfather's effort."

"Did your grandfather leave any records?" Neidelman asked.

"My father destroyed them." Hatch swallowed hard. "My grandfather bankrupted the family with this island, and my father always hated the place and everything about it. Even before the accident." His voice trailed off and he gripped the wheel, staring straight ahead.

"I'm sorry," Neidelman said, his face softening. "I've been so wrapped up in all this that I sometimes forget your personal tragedy. Forgive me if I've asked any insensitive questions."

Hatch continued gazing over the ship's bow. "It's all right."

Neidelman fell silent, for which Hatch was grateful. Nothing was more painful than hearing the usual platitudes from well-meaning people, especially the one that went Don't blame yourself, it wasn't your fault.

The Plain Jane rounded the southern end of the island and went broadside to the swell. Hatch gave it a little more throttle and plunged ahead.

"Amazing," Neidelman muttered. "To think that only this small island of sand and rocks separates us from the largest fortune ever buried."

"Careful, Captain," Hatch replied, putting what he hoped was a playful tone on the warning. "That's the kind of rapturous thinking that bankrupted a dozen companies. Better to remember the old poem:

Because, though free of the outer court

I am, this Temple keeps her shrine

Sacred to Heaven; because, in short

She's not and never can be mine."

Neidelman turned to him. "I see you've had time to do a little extracurricular reading beyond Gray's Anatomy and the Merck manual. Not many bonecutters can quote Coventry Patmore."

Hatch shrugged. "I enjoy a bit of poetry, here and there. I sip it like a fine port. What's your excuse?"

Neidelman smiled briefly. "I spent more than ten years of my life at sea. Sometimes there's precious little else to do but read."

A coughing sound suddenly broke from the island. It grew louder, turning into a low rumble and finally breaking into a throaty heaving groan, like the dying sound of some deep-sea beast. Hatch felt his skin crawl.

"What in blazes is that noise?" Neidelman asked sharply.

"Tide's changing," Hatch replied, shivering slightly in the raw, wet air. "The Water Pit is apparently connected to the sea by a hidden flood tunnel. When the rip current changes and the flow in the tunnel reverses, you hear that noise. At least, that's one theory."

The moan continued, slowly subsiding into a wet stutter before dying away completely.

"You'll hear another theory from the local fishermen," Hatch said. "Maybe you noticed that there aren't any lobster pots around the island. Don't think that's from any lack of lobsters."

"The Ragged Island curse," Neidelman said, nodding, a sardonic look in his eyes. "I've heard of it." There was a long silence while Neidelman looked down at the deck. Then he slowly raised his head. "I can't bring your brother back to life," he said. "But I can promise you this: we will learn what happened to him."

Hatch waved his hand, made speechless by a sudden overflow of emotion. He turned his face to the open pilothouse window, grateful for the concealing presence of the rain. Quite suddenly, he realized he could not bear to spend any more time at the island. He nosed the boat westward without explanation, opening the throttle as they once again entered the encircling mantle of mist. He wanted to return to his motel room, order an early lunch, and wash it down with a pitcher of Bloody Marys.

They broke through the mist into the welcoming gleam of daylight. The wind picked up, and Hatch could feel the droplets of moisture begin to evaporate from his face and hands. He did not look back. But the simple knowledge that the fogbound island was quickly shrinking into the horizon eased the constricting feeling in his chest.

"You should know that we'll be working closely with a first-rate archaeologist and a historian," Neidelman said at his side. "The knowledge we'll gain about seventeenth-century engineering, high seas piracy, and naval technology—perhaps even about Red Ned Ockham's mysterious death—will be of incalculable value. This is as much an archaeological dig as a treasure reclamation."

There was a brief silence. "I'd want to reserve the right to stop the whole show if I felt conditions were growing too dangerous," Hatch said.

"Perfectly understandable. There are eighteen clauses in our boilerplate land-lease contract. We'll just add a nineteenth."

"And if I become part of this," Hatch said more slowly, "I don't want to be a silent partner, looking over anyone's shoulder."

Neidelman stirred the dead ashes of his pipe. "Salvage of this sort is an extremely risky business, especially for the layman. What role do you propose to play?"

Hatch shrugged. "You mentioned that you'd hired an expedition doctor."

Neidelman stopped stirring his pipe long enough to look up and raise his eyebrows. "As required by Maine law. Are you suggesting a change of personnel?"

"Yes."

Neidelman smiled. "And you're comfortable taking leave from Mount Auburn Hospital at such short notice?"

"My research can wait. Besides, we aren't talking about all that long. It's already the end of July. If you're going to do this, it'll have to be over and done within four weeks—for better or worse. The dig can't continue into storm season."

Neidelman leaned over the side of the boat and knocked the dottle from his pipe with a single hard stroke. He straightened up again, the long dark line of Burnt Head framing the horizon behind him.

"In four weeks, it will be over," he said. "Your struggle, and mine."