Murder on the Cape Fear (19 page)

It was a little after five and fully daylight, but here in the heavily wooded neighborhood the streets and lawns were shady. The cool shade felt refreshing after driving around in bright sunlight with the top down.

My cell phone rang. The caller was an excited Binkie. I started to tell him about the Captain’s letter we’d just found but he was much too hyper and cut me off.

“
Ashley, I’ve made an important discovery. I don’t know why I did not make this connection before. Sometimes I think I’m losing it. I’ve become so forgetful. There it was staring me in the face.”

“
You are not getting forgetful,” I said. “You’ve just got a lot on your mind, is all. And what was staring you in the face?”

“
Some of the final entries in the journal were about Pettigrew taking command of the Gibraltar. It had been bought by a small British shipping company for use by a consortium of textile mill owners.”

“
Yes,” I said, “I know that now. He wrote about it in . . .”

I was about to tell him the details of the letter when he cut me off again.

“
Well, I just missed the clue. And I’m so exasperated with myself. I never saw it. I was reading aloud to Ruby from the journal and she is the one who spotted the connection. It’s Mullins. The dead man at Two Sisters was Hugh Mullins. And one of the owners of the shipping company was named Mullins as well. So that’s the clue. It can’t be a coincidence. We think Hugh Mullins was a descendent of the shipping company Mullins. And we think that something having to do with the shipping company caused him to be murdered. But try as I might I cannot find an entry that tells me why.”

“
I can tell you why,” I cried. And I went on to tell him how Captain Pettigrew was transporting gold and other goods to the Confederacy when his ship was sunk and he was taken prisoner.

“
Oh, my, I’ve heard those rumors all of my life but never believed them.”

“
Binkie,” I interjected, “we’ve been hearing sirens and seeing police cars driving toward downtown. What’s going on down there?”

“
We’ve been hearing sirens too,” he replied. “We need to turn on the television and see what’s happening but we were both so engrossed in our discovery, we wanted to call you first. Whatever is happening, it has something to do with Memorial Bridge. They’ve stopped traffic on both ends of the bridge. We can see the lines of cars from our window. Hold on a minute.”

I said to Melanie as she turned onto her street, “There’s trouble on the bridge.”

Binkie was back. “Ruby turned on the TV. You’ll never believe this. A terrorist has threatened to blow up Memorial Bridge.”

“
Oh, no! But wait a minute. You said Mullins was one of the shipping company owners. Who were the other owners?”

“
There was only one other. Ramsey. Mullins and Ramsey, they were the owners. Ashley, I can’t talk. There’s a police officer at our door. We’re being evacuated.”

“
Go! Go!” I shouted into the phone. “Be safe.” But he was gone.

The plot had thickened and my brain raced feverishly to distil it into something that I could comprehend. Melanie pulled into the driveway in front of her ranch house. “You’re awfully quiet over there,” she said, interrupting my attempts to weave a scenario out of what I’d just learned.

“
Melanie, you’ll never believe this. A terrorist has threatened to blow up Memorial Bridge! That’s where all those police cars were going. And that is why we’ve been hearing sirens. But listen to this. This is really odd. The shipping company that owned the Gibraltar was named Mullins and Ramsey. Get it! Ramsey. Drew Ramsey! He’s involved in this.”

Melanie turned to me, eyes wide in horror. “Drew? Drew Ramsey? Our musician? Ashley, Drew is on the Hot Momma with Cam and Jon. If he’s the one . . . if he’s the murderer! We’ve got to call the boys!”

22

Melanie called Cam and I called Jon.

“
Voice mail,” she said. “All I get is voice mail.”

“
Me, too. Jon’s not answering.”

“
Let’s try the ship’s phone.” And we took turns calling the ship, but got the same response. Voice mail. We left frantic messages.

“
I have a really bad feeling,” I said.

“
I’m calling 911,” Melanie said. But after several minutes, she just turned to me and wailed, “They’re not answering.”

“
With the threat to the bridge, all 911 lines must be jammed. Binkie said they were evacuating the homes around the bridge.”

“
Ashley, our men are in peril. It’s up to us to save them. Come on.”

“
Come on where? We’ll never get through. Traffic will be jammed up for miles,” I protested.

“
Not the car. The boat. We’ll take the boat.”

“
Ah! Super idea,” I said. “Let’s go.”

She jumped out of the car and reached for my wedding gown. “I’ll get the boat keys and put this inside.”

She was gone in a flash and I raced down the path to the boat house. The Coast Guard station was right across Greenville Sound on the south point of Wrightsville Beach. Their cutters must have departed the port in response to the terrorist threat because I didn’t see any activity around the dock.

Melanie joined me at the boat house, started up the engine, and within minutes we were motoring out of Hewletts Creek and into the waterway. Her speed boat was a 525 horse power Phantom Fury. At the helm, she cried, “Hang on! This boat can go from 0 to 60 in 20 seconds. I’ve never tried it before but here she goes.” And the sporty red boat cut through the current so fast it took my breath away. By the time we flashed by Money Island, I was wet with spray.

I had to shout to be heard. “Drew Ramsey and Hugh Mullins learned about the sinking of the Gibraltar and the vanished gold. Maybe the story was common knowledge in their families, or perhaps they came across old family records that told of the shipment of gold on the Gibraltar.”

Melanie shouted too. “Somehow they learned of the existence of Captain Pettigrew’s journal. They thought the location of the sunken blockade runner would be written about in the journal. They would not have known that the Captain was taken prisoner and conveyed that information in a letter to his mother.”

“
Which his mother never read,” I cried. “No one read the letter. Until now.”

“
So perhaps Drew doesn’t know about the location of the gold,” Melanie shouted, as we passed the mouth of Whiskey Creek.

Wishful thinking! “Oh, he knows,” I said. “Cam would have been much too excited not to tell.”

“
Our men are in peril, Ashley! They are on board the Hot Momma with a killer. Well, I didn’t wait this long to find a man worthy of marriage to lose him to a second-rate musician! So here goes!” And she shoved the throttle forward. The sportster flew down Masonboro Sound.

Snow’s Cut is a man-made channel that divides Wilmington from Carolina Beach and connects the Intracoastal Waterway with the Cape Fear basin. We soared through the churning water, sailed under the Carolina Beach bridge, and headed west for the Cape Fear River.

Once in the river, Melanie slowed the engine. The river spread before us, vast and broad. Not a sign of watercraft could be seen. “Where is everyone?” she asked.

“
Could the Coast Guard have cleared the river?” I wondered.

“
Or they’ve all sailed to Wilmington toward the bridge. To see what happens next.”

She turned to me, her red hair as wet as mine, and I said, “You know, Melanie, I don’t think there is a terrorist threat. I think Drew called in a threat to the PD or the Coast Guard station, knowing they’d all race for the bridge . . . ”

“
Leaving this area clear and unattended, so that he could dive for the gold and sail away with it,” she finished. “Oh, you are a genius, baby sister.”

“
Sail away on the Hot Momma,” I said. “With our men!”

“
Not if we have anything to say about it,” she declared and pushed forward on the throttle.

“
But wait a minute, Melanie. Nobody knows where Craig’s Landing is actually located. Scholars and historians don’t know. They can only guess. They think it was somewhere in the vicinity of where the Air Force Recreational Park is now. Somewhere between Kure Beach and Ft. Fisher.”

At this point, the river flowed swiftly in its rush to join the Atlantic. On the western bank stood the grand Orton Plantation. And, I realized with astonishment, Sunny Point.

“
I know why he had to resort to the ruse of a terrorist bomb on Memorial Bridge,” I said excitedly. “The Sunny Point Army Terminal is directly across the river, and even though it’s inactive, there are still army personnel on the base. He couldn’t risk being intercepted by them. So if they all rushed north to the bridge, he’d be free to dive for the gold, hoist it on board, and sail away.”

Melanie cut the engine. “We’ve got to be quiet from here on. The chances of him finding that gold are zero. Nobody knows where Craig’s Landing used to be, so he won’t know either.”

“
Maybe he thinks he’ll get lucky,” I said. I had a dreadful thought. “Or maybe he thinks Jon and Cam know where it is and he is forcing them to tell at gun point. We’ve got to find them. Do you have a plan?”

“
Yes. We’ll sneak on board the Hot Momma, hope he’s in the water, and sail her away, leaving him behind.”

“
But what if Jon and Cam are diving with him? We can’t sail off without them. What if they don’t know anything about the bogus terrorist plot to blow up Memorial Bridge?”

“
Let’s just pray they are not diving,” she replied, as the Fury floated downstream.

“
And let’s pray they are still alive,” I whispered.

The river was dark and menacing, shaded by the tall trees on the western shore. Far to the South I could see the tip of the Old Baldy Lighthouse.

And then suddenly, there was the Hot Momma, directly ahead, anchored off the forested shore. The current was outbound and delivered us to the aft of Cam’s sleek white yacht without a whisper of a sound. Melanie steered for the sport deck. I jumped onto the deck, uncoiled the rope and tied it securely to a cleat.

Melanie scrambled onto the sport deck and together we stealthily mounted the outside stairs. Standing on either side of the sliding glass doors, we peered into the salon. “He’s not in there,” Melanie said.

“
And neither are Jon and Cam,” I said.

“
Come on,” she said, and carefully slid the glass door open. And naturally I followed. Don’t I always follow Melanie?

“
Shuuussshhh,” she hissed unnecessarily. I knew enough not to make noise. Melanie always sees herself as the leader and me as the follower, and most times I accept those roles, but this was different - we were on a mission to save the lives of the men we loved.

I sidled along the paneled wall of the salon. “We’ve got to search the ship, and we’ve got to be quiet about it,” I mouthed. Thick beige carpeting muffled our footsteps as we made our way to the galley/dining area. We stopped at the large granite-topped island and listened.

I shook my head negatively. I heard nothing more than the creak of the boat in the water, and the soft sound of the current lapping the boat’s hull.

I pointed to the steps that led to the bow and the pilothouse. I started up them, not making a sound. Melanie was at my heels.

The sight that met my eyes made me gasp, “No!” but still in a whisper.

“
Oh, you poor babies,” Melanie cried softly.

Jon and Cam were sitting on the floor, back to back, bound together with duct tape. Their wrists and ankles were bound as well, and tape covered their mouths. But their eyes were alive and alert and happy to see us.

I hurried to Jon. “This might hurt,” I said squeamishly. “But I’ve got to peel off that tape.”

Seizing one corner between thumb and forefinger, I pulled off the tape as gently as I could, while Melanie did the same for Cam. “Poor baby,” she said again, and kissed Cam’s freed lips.

“
Thank God, you’re here,” Jon said. Already Melanie and I were unwinding the duct tape from their torsos. The tape made a sucking sound as it was released.

“
Where is he?” I asked. “Where’s Drew?”

I freed Jon’s hands.

“
He’s down there,” Cam said soberly, nodding with his chin to the river beneath the ship.

The men unwrapped their ankles and got to their feet.

“
We’ve got to get out of here,” Melanie said and started for the helm.

“
He’s gone,” Jon said with finality, and rubbed his wrists back to life. And when I looked at him questioningly, he went on to tell me what he and Cam already knew. “He won’t be coming up.”

“
What?” Melanie asked.

But immediately I knew.

“
He took my gear,” Cam said. “He’s about the same size as me so he suited up in my wetsuit.”

“
And he took Cam’s gear. The tank with the slow leak,” Jon said.

“
What faulty air tube?” Melanie asked, confused.

Jon went on, “He didn’t know enough to check the pressure gauge or the flow-out air. I don’t believe he had any experience. But he was willing to take the risk. All he was thinking about was getting to that gold, and spending it.”