Deadly Shoals (27 page)

“
Another
body?” exclaimed Wilkes, looking very animated indeed.

“Aye, sir. When we found him he'd been dead only about thirty-six hours—or so Dr. Ducatel said. It seems evident that he was killed by the same man who killed the storekeeper up by the
salinas,
though, because the deed of sale had gone—and he'd been stabbed to death, just like Adams.”

“But no salty grave—and no shot in the head?”

Captain Wilkes was actually grinning with enjoyment. Wiki wondered if he should smile back, but decided against it, silently shaking his head, instead. The commodore lapsed into thought again, this time rolling the pencil between his fingers. Then he abruptly turned to Captain Coffin. “You called on board the
Trojan
last night, I believe. Where was she headed?”

Captain Coffin looked surprised at the question, but answered readily enough. “Captain Stackpole was heading south—after whales, I thought, though he might be looking for his missing schooner. He wasn't in any particular hurry. She was under easy sail while they finished boiling out their blubber.”

Wilkes nodded decisively. “Take Wiki on board the
Osprey
and go after him.”

“What?”
Captain Coffin stared. To Wiki's surprise, he saw consternation in his father's expression. He expostulated, “How do you know I will find him?”

“If you can navigate your way about Fijian lagoons, then surely it will be a simple matter to find a whaling ship. When you speak to Captain Stackpole, tell him to write me an affidavit. Once I have it in hand, I can seize the
Grim Reaper
in his name if we come across her—and assure him that I will be using it to report the piracy to every man-of-war I meet. And
you,
sir,” Captain Wilkes barked at Wiki, swinging round on him. “When you talk to Captain Stackpole, find out a damn sight more about Adams than you appear to know right now! What kind of sheriff's deputy do you call yourself, when you know so little about the victim? Surely the first job of any investigation is to find out what enemies he had, and what reason anyone would have to kill him?”

Wiki was silent, feeling extremely hard done by, wondering how Captain Wilkes would have behaved in the same circumstances. However, Wilkes didn't even notice, saying to Captain Coffin, “We'll be working on this survey for another three days, so it'll make good use of the interval while you are waiting for the last specimens to be loaded. But be sure to be back in time, or you'll be forced to pursue us all the way to Cape Horn!”

Wiki's father looked very annoyed at being ordered around in this peremptory fashion, but Captain Wilkes didn't pay attention to that, either. “Well, off you go,” he said with satisfaction. Then, on a last thought, he observed to Wiki, “That topknot arrangement is an improvement, but still far from ideal. Did you know that I had a deputation from the men complaining about your hair?”

Wiki said blankly, “Sir?”

“They say that things have started going wrong ever since you had it cut, and applied to me to order you to grow it again, as quickly as possible.”

“Good God,” said Wiki. He felt so bemused that it wasn't until he was back in the
Swallow
boat that he realized he hadn't had a chance to talk about Harden and the sealers.

Twelve

Back on board the
Swallow,
Wiki asked George, “Did Captain Wilkes congratulate you on your promotion?”

Wiki was again in dungarees, and had pulled down his topknot so his hair was comfortably loose. Having thrown a few things into a kit bag, he was ready to head over to the
Osprey
. As he remembered, George's face had been quite bland when they had passed each other in the corridor of the afterhouse of the
Vincennes
. Now, by contrast, his friend was wearing an evil grin.

“Smith was right, for once,” he said. “It was indeed to give me warmest felicitations—but not on account of my promotion. Instead, Wilkes congratulated me because no one from the
Swallow
had joined the jollification on the
Porpoise
!”

“I don't believe it!” Wiki let out a shout of mirth. “How come no one noticed that Constant Keith was there?”

“If anyone did, they neglected to inform our good commodore, old chap.”

“I wonder if he realizes his luck.” Wiki shook his head, still enjoying his laugh. Then he sobered. “Did Captain Wilkes tell you he's going to demote Craven, and appoint someone else in his place?”

George grimaced. “No, he didn't, but it's predictable, I suppose, considering that Craven was one of those making merry. Also, he's a tarry old sailor who is popular with the men, which has always worked against him. Did Wilkes reveal the name of his replacement?”

“No—just that he is the next-oldest lieutenant, that they've been cronies for years, and that they swung the pendulum together as midshipmen.”

George stared. Then he said in frozen tones of horror, “Oh, my God. It sounds a lot like…”

Wiki abruptly had the same terrible thought. “Lawrence J. Smith?”

Rochester nodded grimly. “Let's hope we're wrong,” he said.

If they were not, it was an appalling prospect. As Wiki headed for deck with his kit bag over his shoulder, he wondered what state the fleet would be in when he arrived back from his jaunt on the
Osprey.
There'd been changes enough over the days he'd been up the Río Negro, but this promised to be far worse.

He could see boats plying between the
Vincennes,
the
Peacock,
the
Flying Fish,
the
Sea Gull,
and the beach, presumably part of the afternoon's surveying. The
Porpoise
was lying a long way off, he noticed, undoubtedly with officers on board who were regretting their impulsive hospitality, and nursing their headaches. Though Forsythe's fog had still not materialized, the weather was more ominous than ever. On the way over to the
Osprey,
which was now lying at anchor a couple of miles to the southeast of the fleet, Wiki watched the oily roll of the waves, and became absorbed in the low light of the sky, and the dank feel of the chilly air. The clouds were turning from white to dull gray, with a purple glint running along the horizon to the southwest, while the swell was increasing. There was still no wind, but the instinct from years of whaling in treacherous seas told him that a gale was on the way.

Then the
Swallow
boat came within hailing distance of the
Osprey,
and his attention was taken up in admiration of the 200-ton brigantine. Painted gleaming white, with a lot more shiny brass about her than was usually considered modest, she was a very pretty sight. The figurehead—of a fish hawk, naturally—glinted with gilt. The long, tapered spars on the tall foremast were absolutely square, so precisely aligned that it looked as if Mr. Seward had measured them off with his sextant.

Though her hull was as dainty and fine-lined as a yacht, the brigantine was rigged to withstand China Sea monsoons, with both masts stayed and back-stayed into more than ordinary strength; every inch of her running gear was the best that money could buy. The deep rectangular sails on the foremast—course, topsail, topgallant, and royal, in ascending order—were snowy white, without a single patch in evidence, and the huge fore-and-aft mainsail on the mainmast—the biggest and heaviest sail on the ship, spread between its upper spar, the gaff, and lashed to the boom at its foot—was equally immaculate. As the boat came around the quarter, the low light glinted off the polished tiers of windows in the square stern. Mr. Seward, as George Rochester had described, was more house-proud than the usual first officer of a trader.

Captain Coffin met Wiki at the rail, looking preoccupied and busy. Instead of introducing him to any of the crew, he led the way to the break of the poop, and opened the door to the companionway. At the bottom, he indicated one of the staterooms that lined the larboard side of the afterhouse corridor, and then, with scarcely a word, he headed back up to deck. It was as if he were in a big hurry. As Wiki stood looking around, he could hear him hollering for Mr. Seward and then issuing orders to make sail.

The stateroom didn't offer much in the way of hospitality, either, being small to start with, and cramped even further by bolts of Chinese silk stowed along the bulkheads. Wiki eased past the dunnage to the one piece of furniture, which was a rank of lockers and drawers lipped at the top to make a bed, furnished with a thin mattress, and put down his kit bag, frowning as he wondered about his father's unwelcoming attitude. He could understand why he might be angry with Captain Wilkes's peremptory order, but had expected him to have relaxed into his usual jovial and talkative self by the time his son came aboard.

Watery light glimmered through the square sidelight above the berth, sending reflections rippling over the whitewashed bulkheads as the
Osprey
wallowed in the heavy swell. Wiki could hear the cadets calling out to each other as they hauled on lines and laid aloft—familiar sounds, though it was nine years since he had last sailed on the
Osprey.
At the time, he had been just fifteen, and it had been a short voyage to the West Indies, after a freight of sugar and fruit. Within weeks of that last cruise, his father had sailed off on a voyage to the Orient, expecting to come back a year later to find Wiki still at home with his stepmother—Captain Coffin's legal, childless, Nantucket-bred wife. However, the instant the
Osprey
had disappeared over the horizon, Mrs. Coffin had packed Wiki off to a college for missionaries in New Hampshire, in an attempt to reform what she considered his wicked native ways. There, he had met George, and after a few months of skipping classes together to hunt the forest with the local Indians, they had absconded entirely, paddling off down the Connecticut River in a birchbark canoe they had built themselves. When Wiki had reappeared in Salem, Mrs. Coffin's next move had been to send him off to sea on her brother's whaleship, so that by the time her husband got back home, his illegitimate son was back in the Pacific where she reckoned he belonged.

Since then, their paths had crossed only occasionally, mostly by accident, and usually in some farflung port. They were always glad to see each other … but, as Wiki mused now, his father had never invited him to join the crew of the
Osprey,
even when he was currently without a berth. Wiki hadn't thought much about it in the past, but now he found it odd. For some reason, it seemed, Captain Coffin didn't want his son on board his ship.

Then Wiki was distracted by the realization that instead of making way, the
Osprey
was still sagging uneasily up and over the swells. A rolling thud rang out in the distance—the
Vincennes
firing a gun to call in her boats. Obviously, Forsythe's fog was upon them at last. It was impossible to stop himself from heading up the companionway to check on the state of affairs, and so he arrived at the rail just in time to see the ships of the fleet disappear one after another in the flowing mist.

The far-off
Porpoise
vanished first. Then the
Vincennes
faded like a ghost, the
Peacock
turned into a wraith, and finally the
Swallow
was lost to view. After that, it was as if the
Osprey
were floating alone in a shifting gray cloud. Dank moisture clung to the rigging. All the sails were spread, but there was no wind to fill them. Instead, the canvas sheets flopped against the tall masts with the slow pulse of the swell.

When Wiki leaned back against the rail and craned his neck he could just glimpse the royal sail dangling at the very top of the foremast hamper. Birds swirled and screamed around it, and then flew off, heading toward the land. Every instinct told him that a gale was in the offing—one of the vicious southwesterlies the Argentinians called
pampero
. The expedition ships, like the
Swallow,
had used the respite to get their heavy foul-weather sails bent, in preparation for awful weather on the way to Cape Horn and beyond, but he saw with disquiet that while the forecourse, topsail, and mainsail of the brigantine were made of stout foul-weather canvas, the topgallant and royal were light ones, as if the
Osprey
were halfway through being readied for the subequatorial trades. Also, if Wilkes should issue an order for the fleet to claw upwind, away from the dangerous lee shore, the brigantine was not far off the path of the expedition ships. The air was as still as death, right now, but Wiki headed anxiously for the quarterdeck.

Captain Coffin was on the weather side, keeping his balance with one upraised hand in the starboard shrouds, deep in conversation with Mr. Seward. Studying them curiously, Wiki was struck again by the mate's good looks. With his curly blond hair, high cheekbones, light green eyes, and square, thin-boned jaw, the fellow was rather Scandinavian in appearance, he thought. In his mid-thirties, he was young enough to have some gaiety of spirit, Wiki thought, and remembered that he had an engaging half-grin. However, when Alf Seward heard Wiki's step and looked up, he certainly didn't smile. Instead, his expression hardened into hostility.

Remembering what George had said about Mr. Seward's possessive, jealous attitude, Wiki wondered if his first mate was the reason his father was so reluctant to have his son on board his ship. Because of the suspicion, his voice was abrupt as he said, “I think a
pampero
is in the offing.”

His father frowned. “It's the wrong time of the year.”

“I don't like the weather mix—the drop in temperature, the fog, the heavy swell.”

Again, the flagship fired a cannon, which echoed flatly in the clinging mist. In the silence that followed, Wiki saw that Mr. Seward was glancing from his face to Captain Coffin's and back, looking for similarities and differences, no doubt, like everyone else who knew that they were father and son. If he did see a resemblance, he wasn't happy about it, that was plain. The slender pipestem clenched between his white teeth puffed aggressive little clouds of smoke.