Cape Cod (60 page)

And now black men were rising from the belowdecks blackness to the blackness of the storm. They must have thought they had reached the bottom rung of hell, where torment was not steady and predictable, but an insatiable, roaring monster. The first few to emerge were washed overboard, chained and squealing like pigs.

Two of Milt’s sailors tried to drive the others back with whips and pistols. But the blacks were swarming now, screaming their rage at the white faces and the black storm. They swept their chains down the deck and sent slavers over the side. They wound their chains around the chests of their tormentors and crushed them to death.

And now they were coming after Sam, like black ghosts, their chains clanking above the wind, their eyes flashing with the fury of God. He clutched the book tighter, as if it could protect him and his beloved
Dragon
.

But the
Dragon
was doomed. Her open hatches were filling. She was going over with the next sea, or one after that. The captain was supposed to be the last man to leave the ship. But these were not men. This was cargo. And the sailors cowering in the forecastle, Milt’s men, they were not friends. Sam’s friends were dead. Now only the book mattered.

He threw himself into the lifeboat, and as another sea washed over the deck, he deserted the
Dragon
, just as he had deserted everything else.

CHAPTER 25

July 14

Dead Letters and Greenheads

“This letter was written in 1809. It seems that Sam had disappeared,” said Janice.

“She never stopped worrying about him,” said Janice’s grandmother.

“ ‘Dear Sam, I send this to your last London address, though I have no hope of its reaching you, as you have responded to none of my letters the last two years. If you still read missives from home, hear this: Everything has a cost, and yours grows higher by the day. Do your shipping profits cost you your country? Does your search for comeuppance cost you your happiness? I will continue to write, but only you can make your hard decisions. Hear the words of one who was an exile: come home to your country.’

“At the bottom, it says, ‘Never Sent.’ ”

“Have these helped you?” asked Agnes.

“They’ve given me an idea.” Janice looked at her watch. “Could I come back and read the rest tonight?”

“Take them, if you want.”

“I’d rather leave them here… and the kids, too.”

“Janice—”

That
tone
. Janice headed quickly for the door when she heard it. There were two reasons why her grandmother had aged so well: she did not marry Rake Hilyard when she had the chance, and she brooked no nonsense. That tone said she smelled nonsense.

ii.

Geoff now had the list in his head, and Old Comers was the place to test it.

Carolyn Hallissey said she would talk if he joined her on a boat ride down to Chatham, to inspect the last topsail schooner on the East Coast. “If we buy it and anchor it in our pond, maybe Old Comers can nail down the
Whydah
collection.”

Why not? Her name was on the list, she knew something, he liked her. But he hadn’t expected that they would go alone, or that she would be wearing nothing more than a wraparound skirt over a two-piece bathing suit.

She guided her shallow-draft Novie across the salt pond, through the little channel called the Portanimicut River, and into the calm expanse of Pleasant Bay. The water was warm and shallow here, dotted with islands and limned with salt marshes that looked, in the bright sun, like the land’s living aura.

“The Monomoyick Indians lived here,” said Carolyn. “And they lived very well on the oysters and scallops. Have you ever seen an Indian shell midden?”

“A few small ones.”

She glanced at her watch. “We have time, and I know a good one nearby. Want to see it?”

Of course. Anything to gain a little more of her trust.

She took a channel behind a deserted island and ran the boat up to a beach on the extreme northeast shore. It was so quiet he could hear the Atlantic, wearing itself against the other side of the barrier beach, half a mile away.

“We’ll have to wade in.”

Geoff threw over the anchor and took off his shoes.

Carolyn undid the skirt. Geoff tried not to do a double take. And of course, she was very cool. She said she did this for all her friends. She put on a black baseball cap, smoothed some sunscreen onto her arms, and stepped into the water.

He reminded himself of a few things as he followed: if he thought Rake was killed because of the log, he should not trust her. It was just as likely that he was killed because of Jack’s Island. But the log and the island were linked. And she wanted the log as much as he did. None of this, however, kept him from admiring the high-cut thighs of that bathing suit.

A thirty-foot embankment, covered with trees and brush, rose from the beach. Until you got close, you couldn’t tell that part of the embankment was composed entirely of shells.

It looked as if someone had backed a truck to the edge and dumped shells from every restaurant on the Cape—clams, quahaugs, scallops, oysters—then planted a few trees in the middle of the mess to cover it up. But
this
dump had been open before the Pilgrims sailed.

“The Indians would have had their village up above.” She poked into the midden with a stick. “They probably lived there for generations, growing corn, hunting deer, harvesting shellfish.”

What revels this hillside had seen, he thought. What feasts of corn and scallops, what peaceful days beneath a canopy of blue. What a setup—the boat, the solitude, the shell midden, the bathing suit. Stay cynical or you could get into trouble.

But he liked her. He could not deny that, and she seemed to be working toward the same end as he was, even here. She said the shell midden could give him a sense of perspective about his work. And in a way that was all he was looking for. Architects dreamed grand dreams, but whole cultures came and went without leaving anything more than a pile of shells.

What happened next might have been planned. But it took a small and random series of events to set it in motion.

Somebody, someplace in the bay, had thrown a beer bottle over the side of a boat. The bottle was carried by the tide to this beach. A little boy looking for arrowheads broke the bottle in the thoughtless way that little boys do such things. The glass worked itself into the sand. Carolyn stepped on it, and it sliced into her foot.

Time to be cool. He put an arm under her shoulders and helped her to the boat. She sat on a bow seat. He perched on the gunwale, her foot on his thigh.

Seawater. Best thing for infection. A clean bucket of seawater over the foot, towel it dry, two butterfly bandages to hold it together. “And next time, wear your shoes.” Very
cool
.

“You have gentle hands.”

Here the cool began to melt. He could not resist sliding his fingers up to the little gold chain around her ankle.

He was new to this—whatever
this
was—and he couldn’t tell from the look on her face if she was encouraging him or just counting style points. But she was in no hurry to move her foot.

Setup
. This is a setup. She wants something.

But the flesh was weaker than he thought. He brushed his thumb across the pads of her toes. Her expression did not change, so he did it again. The toes were soft, the nails painted a subtle pink.

An outboard puttered in a distant channel, two terns squawked over the barrier beach, the tide lapped against the side of the hull… and the whole bay, for a moment, seemed to pivot around his thumb and the tips of her toes.

He traced a delicate line along her instep to her ankle. Still her expression did not change. Was she waiting for him to go further? Subtracting points? He let his touch travel the soft curve halfway to her knee. There he stopped.

If this was a game, she had to start playing. After a moment she slid her foot along his thigh, to the cuff of his tennis shorts.

Setup. This is a…
the little voice in the back of his head faded like a Boston television signal. He leaned forward to kiss her.

And the first greenhead found them. This is a fly that breeds in the salt marshes. It is born with an enormous green head, a taste for salty flesh, and a sting like a hot needle. Geoff felt a small tickle at his ankle, a little pain, then a shock. But these flies would have had to be carrying knives to interrupt—

Slap!
Carolyn nailed one on her neck.

He pressed his lips to hers, and another little green-skulled bastard landed on his ankle. It bit just as her lips parted, and it bit… and bit, and the sting traveled from his ankle right up his backbone. But he kept kissing until—
slap
—she whacked at another one on the side of her neck and hit him right in the jaw, which jolted his brain back into working order.

He sank into a sitting position on the deck. “If this is a setup, next time bring some Raid.”

“What?”

When he was at ease within his tennis shorts, he jumped up and started the engine. “You want as much from me as I do from you.” He turned the boat back toward the Portanimicut River and the museum. “We’re playing a game.”

“I’m a divorced woman who hasn’t been kissed in months.”

“I’m a sucker for nice legs.” He threw her her skirt. “And soft toes.” He picked up his sweat socks and threw her those, too.

The skirt she put on. The sweat socks she tossed over the side.

“Thank God for the greenheads,” he said.

“I agree.” She got very businesslike again, as though covering hurt feelings.

And she was good enough at it that he felt bad. Maybe he had been too harsh with her. Maybe she really
did
like him and couldn’t help herself. But remember, you’re married.

She limped over and took back the wheel. “You said you had some questions.”

“What do you know about a doctor from Hertfordshire?”

Her arm stiffened on the throttle and the boat jerked forward. “Who?”

“His name was Thayer, ship’s doctor of the
Somerset.”

“He
came from Hertfordshire?”

She was covering up. He could tell by the way she stared ahead with that neutral look on her face, the one she used when she turned on the tape recorder and waited for him to talk or when he touched her toes and she waited for him to touch her thigh. Go ahead, say a little more, do a little more before I reveal anything. A game.

Trade a little knowledge for a little more? “The transcript of your interview with my uncle mentions a painting called
Voyage from Hertfordshire.”

She puttered back into the pond and headed for her dock. “He showed me all his Hilyards, the Pilgrim paintings, the House on Billingsgate studies. Are you saying there’s a connection?”

“Coincidence, connection… who knows?” He thought of another item on the list. “Considering that Tom Hilyard usually painted the Pilgrims, why would he paint something like
Voyage from Hertfordshire?”

“Who knows? Why did he start painting the Billingsgate house? For the last years of his life, all he painted was the Billingsgate house, from every angle. He started off as a Howard Pyle rip-off, and turned into the forerunner of Edward Hopper? Why?”

Like a sphinx, he thought, a smart, beautiful sphinx. “You
started
all this with your questions, you know. Now my uncle’s dead.”

At that, she stopped the boat, right in the middle of Portanimicut Pond. “You were ready to climb into my bathing suit ten minutes ago. Now you’re saying
what?”

“I’m trying to find the log. So are you. As for your bathing suit, that was a setup.”

She slammed the throttle forward. The boat lurched. And Geoff toppled over the side. “Swim to your car,” she shouted, “and don’t come around with any more questions.”

iii.

When he got home to Truro, he was still wet, soaked through with a miserable mixture of pond scum, guilt, and confusion that got worse when he found a letter taped to the door.

Dear Geoff,

It was true a hundred and seventy years ago, and it’s true today: there are no easy answers. Everything has a cost, and yours is getting higher by the day. Does your concern for a slash-covered island cost your professional future? My family’s future? Does your treasure hunt cost your family? I’ve tried to help you, but you are a silly, stubborn man. Only you can make your hard decisions. So make them. Read your broadsides, see your imaginary stalkers, watch the fog turn silver and float away. But remember that winter is coming.

I don’t like to do this. But there are times when a man has to be alone, hearing nothing but the sounds of his own heart and unspoken voice. And it is these isolated sounds, more than the happy din of a noisy household, that will make him understand how much he needs the gentle things, a loving woman’s voice or the laughter of children.

I’ll call day after tomorrow.

She didn’t talk like this. But it was her handwriting. Had the guys who followed him in the boat been here? Kidnapped Janice and the kids? But why this and not some kind of threat? Or had she, by some enormous coincidence, seen him in that boat with Carolyn Hallissey? Impossible.

He picked up the phone and called her father’s house.

Dickerson answered. The usual growl sounded soft and distant. “Hiya, Geoff. That bluefish was terrific. Had it—”

“Where’s Janice?”

“She says she doesn’t want to see you for a few days.”

“Where is she?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Tell me, or you’ll never get my land.”

“I don’t know.”

Geoff hung up and called their Boston home. No answer. That didn’t mean they weren’t there. It was eight o’clock. He could reach Boston in two hours and stop this before it did some kind of damage to the kids.

Sixty-five miles an hour all the way to Beacon Street. There was a light on. He let himself in. But the door wasn’t chained from the inside. The timer had turned on the light. The refrigerator was empty. He took a leak and turned right around again.