Test Pilot's Daughter: Revenge (34 page)

“
Very nice to meet you ladies,” Henderson said as he shook their hands. His big hands were callused, but he offered a tender grip. “These guys’ll take good care of you. Don’t hesitate to tell them what you need. This is Eric, and this here is Eddy.”

Eric and Eddy were hardly more than teenagers. They wore nothing but swimsuits, and their bare feet flew around the deck with an appearance of familiarity. Both had slim, hard bodies and their skin had been well tanned to a golden brown.

“
It’s very nice to meet you all,” Christina said, pleased with the crew.

“
Hey, I seen you somewhere,” Eddy blurted out. “I know. . . it was on the
TV!
You’re the girls that was stranded on that island. I seen you on the news.”

“
I’m afraid you’re right,” Christina answered. “We were on our way down here when the pilot of our charter croaked in flight. Our friend was killed on that island. She’s the one who did the research on the Spanish galleon of interest. Before she died, I promised I’d come down and look for it.”

“
So, now, which wreck would that be?” Henderson asked with a raised eyebrow and a tone of serious curiosity. “I’ve never seen anyone so eager to advance $10,000 cash. You must know something.”

“
We’re gonna look for the Santo Domingo or the El Capitan,” Heather said.

“
Ho ho, you gotta be kidding!” Henderson cackled. “Well at least you got a sense of humor. Treasure hunters been combing the Exumas for decades trying to find those two. It’s documented the El Capitan went down off the main island, but nobody found nothin’.”

“
We’re aware of that,” Heather said. “We have reason to believe those ships went down a bit further north than the traditional site.”

“
Very interesting,” Henderson answered with a glint in his eye. “Here, let me see your map.”

“
Easy there fella,” Christina snickered. “First, things first. I want to make sure all the documentation is correct, and contracts are signed.”

“
No problem,” Henderson replied. “Let’s go below.”

They sat around a large table in the galley and waded through the paperwork. Finally, Heather unfolded the map prepared by Jessica and rolled it out on the table. The area highlighted clearly showed the three islets in an equilateral triangle just on the west side of the lesser Exumas.

“
Here?” Henderson put his finger on the spot. “You gotta be kidding,” he said with a boisterous laugh. “Those little islands are only a fifteen minute boat ride from here. But I don’t see how it could be there, barely twenty feet of water. What makes you think. . .”

“
Something about equilateral triangles and smudged coordinates in the archives,” Christina chuckled. “Listen. The truth is, we don’t have a clue. Jessica was a research fanatic. It was her life dream to come here and look for the mother lode. We’re just doing this to honor her memory. We love to dive, but we don’t really expect to find anything.”

“
You shittin’ me? You mean you paid ten grand and that’s all you got?” Henderson looked disappointed. The air had been sucked right out of his balloon.

“
Listen, you’ve been fairly paid, okay?” Heather piped in. “Just take us out there and let us look around. You can sweep the area with your metal detectors, and we should know a lot more after a day or two.”

“
No problem lady, just relax. We got our money, and we’ll take care-a-ya.”

“
Hey, if this place looks hopeless,” Christina added, “maybe you could take us somewhere we might actually find something.”

“
I think we could do that,” Henderson agreed. “Ladies, it won’t take long to get there. Why don’t we just go take a peek?”

The weather was perfect for diving, a bright sunny day with little or no wind. The temperature settled in at eighty degrees. Henderson climbed up in the elevated cabin and hit the throttle of his seventy foot trawler. After a short ride across beautiful green water, he carefully navigated the shallows, dodging coral heads on the west side of the islands. He used a GPS to position the
Spanish Fly
on the exact coordinates on Jessica’s map.

“
Doesn’t look like much, does it?” Heather stated.

Christina scanned the area and tried to send her imagination back some two-hundred plus years. The three islets were easy enough to recognize. It was hard to imagine a huge Spanish galleon would cruise into such a shallow bay. But who could guess what a hurricane would do to a ship like that? One would expect the area would have changed over such a long time.

“
Okay, let’s go see what’s down there.” Christina took charge, putting on her gear. Turning to Henderson she said, “We’ll spend about forty-five minutes looking around. If you’d please do a quick metal sweep, we’ll meet you back here on our marker at exactly 2:00 o’clock.”

“
Sounds like plan,” Henderson checked his watch with a friendly smile. “You ladies have fun.”

The two Amigos rolled off the platform into the warm waters of the Bahamas. Due to the abundance of coral heads and the shallow water, most of the boat traffic navigated the other side of the chain. This area was quite isolated. As a result, the water was crystal clear and loaded with fish. It was like diving in an aquarium.

Exactly as they had done many times in the Keys, Heather and Christina swam down to the bottom and started a systematic search, side by side, looking for any shapes or forms that might be man-made. They found a few beer cans, lots of coral and tropical fish, but nothing of significance. At the designated time, they ascended to their dive marker and saw the
Spanish Fly
coming their way. Back on deck, Henderson looked pretty bored.

“
Well, did you girls find anything?”

“
We sure did, found some precious metal,” Christina claimed. “What do you think these babies are worth?” She handed him her tote bag.

“
Let’s see, those should bring about three cents on the aluminum market,” he snorted. “If you find a couple million more, you could pay for your trip. How about some lunch? The boys got some lobster.”

“
Well, to tell you the truth we’re a little sick of seafood, but I reckon we could eat it,” Heather replied.

Sitting down to a delicious lobster boil, they talked the situation over with Henderson. It was a nice place to dive, but he said he couldn’t see spending a whole week there.

“
Listen, the area between the three islands is only about a square mile. I can scan the entire segment by noon tomorrow. If we don’t see anything by then, I’d suggest we move south of Staniel Cay. Some tourists found some coins there just a couple a weeks ago.”

“
Sounds good,” Christina agreed. “What do you think, Heather?”

“
Sure, why not?”

They spent the rest of the day searching the central area between the islands without success and cruised back to Staniel Cay to meet Lazer at the bar.

“
Only a couple of beer cans, huh? Guess I done better than you two. Bone fishing is spectacular in these parts.”

“
We’ll probably finish scanning the area tomorrow,” Christina said. “Then Henderson promised to take us down the island.”

“
There’s a party on the beach tonight,” he said. “Why don’t the three of us go down thar and get skunked?”

“
Sure you don’t mind if I tag along?” Heather asked.

“
Hell no, little lady,” answered Lazer. He threw an arm around her. “We need to swing down thar and find you a new beau. How ‘bout one of those stinkin’ rich plantation owners?”

“
After last night,” she replied, “I’ve decided to swear off men altogether. Think I’ll just find me a nice convent in the Himalayas and become a nun.”

He choked on his beer and said, “Shiiiyaaat girl. Now, wouldn’t that be a waste?”

They all laughed.

The meal for the evening was a Bahamian delight, fried conch and French fries. After dinner they joined the party and had a great time dancing on the beach.
Something magic about the sound of steel drums after dark,
Christina thought. Heather didn’t seem to be hurting for company as there were plenty of guys on the prowl. Drinking their fair share of rum punch, they partied to the wee hours.

* * *

Christina awoke early with a pounding headache. She had to drag Heather out of bed. Lazer decided to sleep in. Both girls were feeling the aftereffects of too much booze as the trawler plowed the shallow waters. They searched over a much larger area that morning looking for anything out of the ordinary. After only two hours, they were already discouraged.

Christina couldn’t stomach any more seafood. While the deckhands were eating lunch, the girls napped in the shade trying to conserve energy. After a second dive early in the afternoon, they surfaced and saw the boys waving frantically. Swimming over to the boat, they climbed aboard as she wondered what was going on.

“
Come look at this here,” Eric beckoned, pointing aloft.

They stripped off diving gear and followed him to the upper deck. Henderson was eyeballing a strip-chart that showed the output of his magnetometer. Christina thought he looked like a doctor inspecting an EKG. He motioned with a body language that said,
Something’s up
.

“
Now don’t get your hopes up, but you need to look at this. See the big swings on the chart? We got a marker on the far north corner of the triangle. Don’t have any idea what it is, but there’s a hell of a lot of metal down there. You girls take a little rest, then I’m going to send my boys down with you to check it out.”

“
Do you think it’s treasure?” Heather asked.

“
Could be anything,” he replied. “Somebody might a dumped some old cars in there for all I know. But it is unusual to see so much metal in one spot. Damn sure worth a look see.”

Twenty minutes later the two girls and the deckhands rolled into the warm water with fresh tanks. The girls ventured side by side with Christina leading the way. As she scanned the coral heads, all she could think about was her departed friend. Could Jessica have solved the riddle when so many others failed?
God, girl, if you could just be here right now, you’d know where to look,
she thought. Stunned by a sudden humming in her ears, she actually heard a response. It was a mysterious mantra. A weird feeling came over her as ghostly tones formed strange words.

Found in a mound . . . found in a mound . . . found in a mound
.

Christina had an overpowering feeling that Jessica was there. She instinctively looked to her left where Jessica normally swam, but there was no one. Reaching for a logical explanation, she concluded it must be oxygen deprivation. She could swear Jessica had whispered in her ear,
Found in a mound.
What could it mean?

She stopped swimming and signaled to Heather with her palm extended in a blocking motion. She came up vertical with her flippers resting on the sand. Carefully scanning the area, she inspected each one of the many coral heads within their range of view. One formation looked slightly different. Instead of the mushroom shape typical of coral heads in the Bahamas, it was strangely smooth like an old Indian burial mound she had seen as a child.

Found in a mound
, the words flashed again. Some inexplicable force drew her to the knoll, and she swam hard with Heather in tow. They eased up on the formation and gave it a good look. On closer inspection, it had a unique profile. She saw a sharp angle at one end and started fanning the sand away. In no more than a few seconds, she had uncovered the butt end of what appeared to be a large cannon. They exchanged looks of absolute astonishment.

Christina blinked her eyes and heard more ghostly moans.

Run under the gun. . .Run under the gun.

She tried to move the massive cylinder, but it wouldn’t budge. She used her hands to dig a hole beneath it, pulling out sand and mud. To her amazement, two perfectly round disks tumbled out from under the gun, right into Heather’s waiting hands.