Night Diver: A Novel

by Elizabeth Lowell

  “Translate your notes and put them in my inbox,” she said. “Farnsworth will debrief the divers.”

  She and Holden headed out, followed by the blare of the Techno beat as Volkert crawled back into his cocoon.

  CHAPTER 10

  UNDER KATE’S WATCHFUL eyes, the small, valuable goods from the dive had been touched, photographed, packed, taped, and signed across the tape by her so that any opening would breach her signature. The temporary high from seeing the artifacts faded when she sat at the galley table, her computer running on battery power because she felt guilty about every bit of energy she took from the engine’s expensive heartbeat.

  Grandpa had gotten the generator going twice, and twice it had died, so everyone was working on batteries or sleeping. Or sitting, like her, staring at a screen, hoping somehow to change the figures, but they were what they were.

  Bad.

  Soon Larry would have to buy more of the expensive compressed gas, especially helium, or chance running out in a few days. Assuming the generator worked and the divers were in the water and the weather didn’t go to hell.

  I can’t control the weather, she told herself. So concentrate on what I can control.

  Dutifully she focused on the screen, staring at the list of what the divers and siphon had brought up:

  325 grams gold in linked chain

  2 cannonballs, now soaking in a chemical bath to strip away the rust and the corrosion that had built up over the centuries

  1 uncut emerald, thumb-sized

  1 gold facial pick that was both ear, nose, and tooth cleaner, badly bent

  17 silver discs, presumably coinage, total weight of 520 g, also bathing

  assorted pewter drinking and table vessels, damaged and essentially worthless beyond historical value

  6 silver rings, settings empty, now soaking in a bath

  7 silver earrings, settings empty, now soaking in a bath

  1 gold necklace, settings empty but for a few corroded pearls

  1 gold brooch, central setting empty, surrounded by small diamonds

  metal hasp, probably bronze, probably from a small chest, soaking in a bath

  13 gold coins, portrait oriented right, in a mass of coral and silver coins, now soaking in a bath

  It was moments like this that she understood the appeal of gold on an almost physical level. Submerged in water for centuries, yet it still gleamed, tears of the sun, always bright, always valuable, heavy with the weight of time and human adoration.

  “There you are.” Larry’s voice, too hoarse.

  He sat heavily next to her.

  Kate turned. “You look terrible.”

  “Thanks,” he said around a yawn. “Way to make me feel good.”

  “I’m serious. Go get some sleep and shake off whatever bug has you so hollow-eyed.”

  “Sinuses are clear. So are lungs. I’m good to dive. And quit trying to change the subject.”

  “What subject?” she asked.

  “Cameron.”

  “Were we talking about him?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What were we saying?” she asked.

  “Volkert’s a pig, but that’s no reason to take Cameron’s side against a crew member. Morale is bad enough without that.”

  At first she thought her brother was joking. Then she realized that he was serious.

  And seriously wrong.

  “Volkert’s attitude toward me needed adjusting,” Kate said distinctly, “and I adjusted it.”

  “In front of Cameron.”

  “Volkert was being a dick because I turned down his charming offer of sex the second day I was aboard. Holden and I needed information directly related to Volkert’s work and he wasn’t cooperating. He got exactly what he deserved.”

  “Holden and you, huh? How chummy.” Then, before she could say anything, he was talking again. “The Brits have been asking for ridiculous levels of documentation. Check it yourself. Volkert didn’t need you jumping in his shit on Cameron’s behalf. And if they think I’m stealing, they should just come out and say it. They’ve got me looking over my shoulder so much my neck aches. I’m diving my ass off and all I get is grief. Grandpa says the treasure is down there and then he starts yelling about how these idiot Brits have us looking in the wrong place. I’m tired of being on the hook for their opium dreams.”

  Kate leaned over and gave her brother a hug. After a moment he returned it.

  His bones are too close to the surface, she thought. He’s pushing himself too hard. He knows it as well as I do.

  And we both know he’ll keep pushing because it’s all he can do.

  She tightened her arms around him, wishing she had something besides red ink and gloom to give him.

  “From what I’ve seen of the dive records,” she said, “they match up to the early metallurgical surveys, and they are consistent when looked at in the aggregate. The divers have gone over areas that showed hits, and sometimes those hits paid off.”

  “And sometimes they didn’t,” he said hoarsely. “Those are the times I hear about.”

  “Maybe I can get Holden to push for someone to come in and run a close survey over the wreck.”

  “We’ve been doing that on the fly when we had an extra diver who happened to be sober. Problem is, just because you get a hit doesn’t mean the goods are at the surface or that we have the equipment to dig down to the metal. The Brits knew it was a crapshoot from the start. That’s what they paid us—crap—and that’s what they give me.” He gave a broken laugh. “The idiots think that holes in the sand we suction out of the wreck don’t fall back in on themselves the moment we look away.”

  She rocked slightly, holding him, trying to comfort him. “I remember watching Dad. As soon as he’d manage to suction out a hole, the sides would dissolve and he’d have to start all over again.”

  “Yeah. When I sleep, sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat, thinking of what will happen if the salvage is a bust.”

  Kate knew what that kind of waking was like. “Hush. You’ve brought up plenty of stuff.”

  “But no treasure chest of jewels. None of the staggering weight of gold Bloody Green’s ship carried.”

  “We don’t know what was aboard when Moon Rose sank. History is as much lies and brags and wishes as truth. Anyone who’s in the salvage business knows that.”

  “Our bosses are bureaucrats,” Larry said with tired savagery. “They’re button pushers and box checkers looking to blame me for their own stupid orders and inflated promises of wealth.”

  She held him, trying to tell him silently that she loved him and supported him.

  “I’ve had about all I can take,” he said roughly. Then he released her and stood up, using the chair as a prop. “I need to know for certain that you’re on my side, okay? You can’t be sticking up for Cameron if he goes pissing off the crew. We have enough trouble keeping crew as it is. Word ashore is that we’re cursed.”

  “I’m on your side.”

  He nodded. “Okay.”

  “Now you promise me one thing.”

  “What?” he asked.

  “Be careful down there.”

  He gave her a crooked smile and a pull on her ponytail. “Every time, Kitty Kat.”

  With worried eyes she watched her brother shamble out the door and heard him call to one of the divers.

  He needs a week of sleep. Or a really big find.

  And she couldn’t give him either one.

  Grimly she went back to the computer, hoping she would discover something that would help her family out.

  In the end, the best she could do was sign off on today’s manifest for the divers. She hit the forward key.

  One more time, she told herself, and switched to the accounting software.

  “You need a break,” Holden said from the doorway.

  She looked up and smiled wearily. “Who doesn’t?”

  “I’ve signed off on the manifest. My computer pinged at me, so I know you have, too. Fa
rnsworth will meet us at the warehouse after he refuels. He can sign off on today’s haul and lock it down. Shouldn’t take us more than an hour, total.”

  “Us?”

  “As in you and me,” he said with satisfaction. “I’m required to have a representative of Moon Rose Limited accompany me and the goods, due to your new protocols.”

  “Oh. I assumed you’d take Larry.”

  “Why would I do that? He hasn’t signed off on anything. Even if he had, he’s so knackered I wouldn’t trust him with custody of a flea. Tag, you’re it, but I’ll buy you lunch afterward.”

  “I don’t think the dive expenses cover lunch out.”

  “I won’t expense it,” Holden said.

  With a smile she gave in to what both of them wanted. “Okay.”

  Wearing khaki pants, a loose, ratty Manchester United T-shirt, and his habitual frown, Farnsworth met Holden and Kate at the warehouse. The clothes emphasized his compact, wiry build. Except for frown lines, he looked about eighteen.

  “There you are,” he said to them. “Good to see you in person, as it were. Seems like we spend all our time in tiny boxes looking at life through little screens and speaking though small microphones. Seeing people in the flesh is always a bit of a surprise.”

  Kate smiled. “You have a particularly small box to work out of.”

  He gave her a smile that was almost shy. “I’ll give you a quick recce of the warehouse after we lock up today’s valuables. It went well, didn’t it? The emerald is particularly nice. AO was quite excited. The brooch is lovely, too. At least on the screen.”

  Kate thought of the piece of jewelry, its silky weight and winking diamonds. “The brooch is fine in person, too. The emerald is wrapped in a separate, cushioned box. The color is incredible, like the heart of summer condensed into a single crystal.”

  “Should fetch some pounds on the market,” he said, nodding.

  “Certainly more than that disreputable T-shirt you’re wearing,” Holden said, shaking his head.

  “A vestige of my heavier days,” Farnsworth admitted. “I can’t quite bear to give it up, though. Reminds me of home.”

  “Sounds like you’ve been away for a time,” Holden said. “It softens the edge of the accent.”

  Farnsworth ran a hand through close-cropped hair that was in need of another going-over. “Actually, I went to school in the United States, Boston to be precise. Worked abroad far more than at home. Feel like a tourist when I go back. It’s all high-tech and no factories. Though the apartments are still there. Bloody horrible things, all slabs and no personality. You?”

  “London, London, and London. They let me out of my cage occasionally, but not often. Turns out that I can yell at people almost as well via teleconference as I can in person.”

  “Ah, yes. Unfortunate, that. It just makes our little boxes even smaller. At least this box,” he said, opening the warehouse door, “has breathing room.”

  After the tropical sun, the industrial lighting looked dim and unnatural, a not-quite-twilight that never changed.

  “You haven’t shipped the silver ingots yet?” Holden asked.

  Farnsworth followed the other man’s glance to the stack of ingots sheathed in gleaming, semitransparent plastic. The heavy columns were wrapped in metal bands, sitting on a pallet and waiting to be forklifted aboard a truck for transfer to a cargo ship. There were other boxes and crates laid out around the warehouse, each sealed and stamped and ready for transport.

  “AO is waiting for one of our ships to take the heavy goods, except if we find gold ingots. Then we make special arrangements with a licensed, bonded courier service,” Farnsworth said. “London doesn’t trust the natives with gold.”

  Holden said, “Antiquities doesn’t trust anyone with gold.”

  “Looking at the sheer volume of boxes,” Kate said, “how can your AO complain about the efficiency of the dive operation?”

  Holden and Farnsworth glanced at one another. And laughed.

  “Right,” Kate said. “They are human and they complain.” She looked at the packet she was carrying and gave it to Farnsworth. “They’ll probably complain about this, too.”

  Farnsworth took it, checked that the packet’s seal hadn’t been disturbed, and compared the manifest tag to his pocket computer’s entry. He approved everything as in good order before he tucked the packet under his arm.

  “Lovely. The second length of money chain,” Farnsworth said almost caressingly. “What was it—three hundred grams?”

  “Three thirty,” Holden corrected. “Thirty grams is thirty grams.”

  “Right you are.” Farnsworth walked to the steel desk in a nearby corner, placed the packet in a drawer, and locked it.

  Holden’s eyebrows shot up.

  Kate said, “Is that it? A locked desk in a shabby warehouse near the docks? How can your bosses be sniffing around my family as thieves? This place is a sieve!”

  “Oh, it’s safe enough,” Farnsworth said with a small smile. “Though you can’t see them, there are cameras in every corner, motion triggered and wired into the alarm box over by the roll-away door. The cameras work in darkness and in light as well.”

  “Unless things have changed radically since I was last here,” she said, “the local police will sleep through anything but a woman’s invitation.”

  “The lock and hinges on the warehouse door couldn’t be shot out,” Farnsworth said, “though they could be drilled if you had a diamond tip and three hours. But the instant you touched the exterior openings to the warehouse, an alert goes to the ship. If you’re here, you would be bloody well deafened by the alarms.” He ducked his head. “I spend quite a few nights with my lady friend, whose house is about a hundred meters away. I’m hardly James Bond, but I do know which end of a pistol to hold.”

  “Thus the reason you insisted on that expensive speedboat so you could race around at all hours,” Kate said.

  “It costs less than a night guard would. Your brother approved it.”

  Holden spoke up when Kate still looked unhappy. “Looks like you’re almost as secure here as the local bank.”

  “More, actually. The light goods go out by a bonded carrier tomorrow. I’ll take them to the airplane personally. The heavy goods are just that. Too heavy for local thieves to bother with, and too distinctive to fence even if you could manage to steal them. AO has a whacking great reward posted for information resulting in the trial and punishment of any locals trafficking in England’s sunken treasure.” He turned to Holden. “Speaking of heavy goods, did you bring any?”

  “Some bits and bobs,” Holden said, pointing at the Volkswagen, which had been parked close to the roll-away door. “Cannonballs, anchor chain, shot, that sort of thing.”

  Farnsworth looked out at the truck in the steaming early-afternoon sun. “Now then, who can I enlist in assisting me in the unloading and conveyance of submarine treasures?”

  Kate glanced sideways at Holden and smiled. “Tag, you’re it. I’ve already signed the material over to you, and you’ve accepted. The designated weighty marine treasures are the property of the Crown, which means they’re all yours.”

  Holden sighed at the thought of heavy lifting in the tropical sun. “All right then,” he said to Farnsworth. “And while we work, you can explain to me how Man U is going to keep the Cup out of Arsenal’s hands this year.”

  “It’s quite clear that the superior ball-handling . . .” Farnsworth’s voice faded as he and Holden disappeared outside, leaving Kate alone with the boxes of salvage from Moon Rose.

  Awful lot of boxes for stuff that is coming out of a so-so salvage dive, she thought. But what do I know? Grandpa was never much for preserving scraps of wood and broken crockery.

  If this setup is any indication, it costs a lot to preserve history.

  She thought it was worth every penny, but she wasn’t the one paying the bills.

  “ . . . and that’s why they’ll win,” Farnsworth said, returning to put a cannonbal
l and a box of lead shot on a processing table.

  Despite his wiry frame, he must have had decent muscle, because he wasn’t huffing or dumping the weight with relief.

  Holden eased a big armload of metal chain onto the table, saying something that was buried in the clatter.

  Two Vincentians came in a side door and walked to the long packing table. As they went to work, they talked in an island creole that was as soft on the ears as a sea breeze, except for the occasional, startling upper-crust British phrase. From what Kate could catch, their lunch had been almost as delectable as the woman who served it.

  Kate’s stomach growled.

  “You may oversee the packing if you like,” Farnsworth said, looking at his watch. “I have to stay anyway to enter their hours and lock up when they finish.”

  “Not necessary for me,” she said, looking at Holden.

  “Time for lunch,” he agreed, turning away. Then, as they reached the rolling door, Holden called over his shoulder, “Call me instantly if any alarms go off.”

  Without looking up, Farnsworth nodded and waved.

  “I heard the divers talking about the food at a local café,” Holden said as they closed the doors to the battered truck. “It’s only a kilometer from here, called the Dive In. Or would you like something fancier?”

  “Go for dive food,” she said instantly. “It’s cheap, filling, and the portions are big enough that I won’t have to cook dinner. We’ll just eat the leftovers.”

  “What if the food is awful?”

  “Then dinner will be, too.”

  He laughed as she put the truck in gear and followed his directions.

  When they broke out of the forest, the sky was silver blue with heat, the breeze almost nonexistent. Flat-bottomed clouds drifted lazily, sending deep blue shadows over the water. The darker blue looked as cool as ice cream.

  Though the area she drove to could most charitably be described as semi-industrial waterfront on the cheap, children shrieked with laughter as they played tag in the sand and debris or slipped like little seals into and through the warm water. Hearing them, she felt something in her relax. She remembered being that young, laughing and playing on the beach and jumping off the dive step of the Golden Bough in the shimmering heat of the doldrums. She had loved it, and no matter how her mother had hovered over her with sunscreen and broad hats, Kate still had some freckles to show for it.