The Truth According to Blue
Page 5
After about twenty minutes, Jules got bored. “You done?” she called out.
“Not yet,” I called back.
Fifteen minutes later. “How about now?”
“Nope.”
Ten more minutes. “Seriously?”
I wasn’t finished, not even close, but it was getting late. I pulled the tube up to the boat, and Otis did a little happy dance when I climbed aboard. I kneeled so I could scratch his cheeks and he could lick my face.
Jules cringed. “Ew. Are you one of those people who lets their dog lick their mouth?”
Yes. “No.”
“Good, because that’s disgusting.”
I got out my chart book to mark the area I’d covered. It wasn’t much, but I’d get way more done the next day without Jules. And the day after and the day after that.
“I can do that for you tomorrow,” Jules said.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“You’ve got this whole big project,” Jules said. “You didn’t finish it today, did you?”
My brain slowed down like a bicycle chugging through a field of molasses. Maybe it was the heat. Or the sun. It wasn’t my blood sugar because Otis would have noticed. But for some reason my mind couldn’t compute what Jules was saying to me, which seemed to be—but couldn’t possibly be—that she was expecting to come out here again. With me and Otis. Tomorrow.
Jules must have read my face because she said, “Look, there’s no way I’m staying home with the Wicked Witch of West Hollywood, and you’re the only person I know here. Besides, I can help you. We’ve already established I’m a way better student than you are. You can teach me to drive the boat, and then I can move it from place to place so you don’t have to get off the tube.”
Mom’s head suddenly appeared in the sky like a huge rain cloud: Film crew. Two hundred people. Half a million dollars.
My heart dropped straight from my chest to my stomach like one of those death-drop carnival rides. Whooosh… boom!
Mission accomplished, the Mom-head cloud evaporated.
I sighed. “Fine,” I said to Jules. “How early can you get to my house?”
Jules said nine o’clock—which, even after only knowing her a day, I figured meant ten o’clock—and we motored north around the island, eating cashews. Jules talked about some kid at her school who was a big DJ in LA, but the whole time, I was thinking, Why why why why why why whyyyyyy? Until we rounded the big bend in the island and could see beyond the top of the T-bone, and Jules said, “What’s that weird boat over there?”
It looked like a miniature ocean liner, which wouldn’t be weird in the Hamptons. There are always at least a few privately owned boats around that sleep fifty people. But those boats gleam with fancy paintwork and are tricked out with helicopters and Jacuzzis or even motorcycles (for when you go on land). This was a working boat. Nothing fancy about it except its gigantic size, the antennae farm on the flybridge, and some—
“Otis, binoculars.” I shifted to idle. Otis rooted around in the gear bag and then pulled out the binocular case by its strap. “Good boy,” I said, taking it from him.
I adjusted the dials and a big gray-and-white blob came into focus: an old military boat that had been cleaned up and refitted. It had a giant crane and even a submarine drone. On the deck, four people—one of them in a wet suit, another with a professional-looking video camera—were gathered around a laptop. They kept pointing at the screen and then pointing at the water. I felt a tickle in my stomach, like little frogs hopping up and down.
“What is it?” Jules asked, coming around the wheel to stand next to me. “Coast Guard? Some kind of Homeland Security thing? Drug dealers?”
Otis’s ears were on high alert.
“Give me a second,” I said.
I adjusted the binocular dials again. The ship went out of and then back into focus. Every detail perfectly clear, like it was ten feet away instead of a hundred. By now, the frogs were trying to jump their way out through my throat.
“What?” said Jules again.
Those guys weren’t the Coast Guard or Homeland Security or drug dealers. They were worse. Way worse.
I swallowed hard. “Just a random barge.”
They were treasure hunters.
CHAPTER TEN
True Fact: According to William of Ockham, a friar from the 1300s, if there’s more than one explanation for something, the simplest reason is usually true. (TF supplied by Jules Buttersby.)
“Okay, Otis, but just because they’re treasure hunters doesn’t necessarily mean they’re hunting our treasure, right? Long Island is loaded with wrecks. Hundreds, maybe even thousands!”
Otis looked up from his breakfast bowl in the kitchen the next morning and tilted his head at me, which I took to mean Absolutely. Chances are they’re hunting for something else. Or possibly What do I know? I’m a dog.
“It’s true. I read it in Scouring the Seas.”
I explained to Otis all the reasons why it was too soon to panic until Jules’s dad’s personal assistant dropped her at my house at 8:54, and Jules shoved the front page of the East Hampton Star in my face.
BILLIONAIRE SEARCHES FOR LOST TREASURE IN GARDINER’S BAY
Famed investor-entrepreneur William “Fitz” Fitzgibbons came clean yesterday about what his trawler, Windfall, is doing in Gardiner’s Bay. “We’re looking for the holy grail!” he announced, standing on the deck of his boat with his team, including award-winning filmmaker Sonia Jacobs, who is filming the entire hunt for a documentary. “The payroll of the Golden Lion is one of the most famous missing treasures of all time. And I have reason to believe it’s right here in these waters.”
In 1663, the Dutch ship Golden Lion sailed from Amsterdam to Java with the payroll of the East India Company. A week from their destination, a crew of mutineers escaped from the ship with the whole payroll, six trunks filled with three million florins of gold, silver, and copper. Soon after the Golden Lion reached Java, she burned to ashes in a mysterious fire. The payroll was never seen again.
Fitzgibbons wouldn’t explain why he believed the payroll was here in the waters off Long Island, just that he had “a key piece of evidence and a strong hunch. I’ve hired the best marine salvage team in the world, and we won’t rest until I’ve got every last gold coin in my pockets!”
Fitzgibbons is known throughout the world for anticipating the great black pepper shortage of 1998, a move that netted him his first hundred million dollars. He has since parlayed that fortune into a media franchise, his own airline, and sole ownership of the Pimientos, Puerto Rico’s first professional hockey team. “Hockey,” he likes to say, “is the only sport where great heroes get to beat the living daylights out of each other on ice.”
Next to the article was a picture of Fitzgibbons on the bridge of his boat, his hand on the wheel and a Pimientos cap on his head.
“So?” I said, even though my head felt like it was doing quadruple axels on my neck.
Jules tossed the newspaper in the air, and Otis pounced on the falling pages.
“A: We’ve already established I’m not an idiot. B: Did you really think I believed you about a dumb science project? And C: When were you going to tell me?” she said.
“Actually, I really did get an Incomplete in science,” I said, my brain somersaulting.
Of course Pop Pop and I had read about the Golden Lion’s famous missing payroll, and we even had a hunch that our family’s treasure was connected to it somehow. After all, we had a VOC coin from the payroll, and we knew that Great-Times-Twelve-Grandma Petra was from Amsterdam and Great-Times-Twelve-Grandpa Abraham was from Java, which was the exact route of the Golden Lion. But we had no proof they were on the ship. Our family stories don’t say when or how the Great-Times-Twelves met or when they came to this country. Plus, we knew they were both born in 1651, which meant they were only twelve years old during the mutiny.
“Okay, listen up, because this is how it’s going to go,” Jules said, paci
ng back and forth in my kitchen. “You’re looking for the Golden Lion payroll and I’m going to look with you. We’ll go out every morning and stay out all day until we find it. I overnighted one of those bucket things on Amazon. Today, we’ll just take turns with yours.”
For the record, an underwater-view bucket is about sixty dollars on Amazon. You can get one at a marine supply store for twenty-five. I made mine for seven. But that was beside the point, a distraction from the newspaper headlines that were flashing before my eyes, which were:
PROFESSIONAL TREASURE HUNTERS ARE IN MY WATER!
and
JULES IS GOING TO RUIN EVERYTHING!
and
WHAT “KEY PIECE OF EVIDENCE” DOES FITZ FITZGIBBONS HAVE THAT MAKES HIM THINK THE GOLDEN LION PAYROLL IS IN SAG HARBOR?
The Golden Lion burned to ashes without the payroll on it. How the payroll ended up across the globe with my ancestors was a question I couldn’t begin to answer. The pieces from Pop Pop’s puzzle floated in the air around me—a Dutch girl, a Javanese boy, a square-sailed wooden ship laden with gold—swirling, rearranging, coming together in a bigger, eye-crossing, dizzying picture:
The Great-Times-Twelves sailed to America with one of the most famous missing treasures in history, which they may possibly have stolen as part of a mutiny when they were twelve years old!
“Okay, fine,” I said to Jules, who had stopped pacing and was glaring at me with her hands on her hips. “I’m looking for the Golden Lion payroll. But you can’t help me.”
“Why not?”
“You don’t know anything about sailing or looking for wrecks.” Which was my nice way of saying You’ll get in my way and take all the credit.
“I learn fast.”
I could tell Jules wasn’t going to give in, but I held back from telling her about Pop Pop and the real reason I didn’t want her with me. It felt too private. “Why do you even want to come, anyway? It’s just lying on a rubber doughnut with your face in a bucket in the same patch of water, day after day after day.”
Jules crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Well, I’m obviously not here because of your thrilling company. Do I have to spell it out? You’re the only person I know, and even being with you is better than being with her.”
Which, when you think about it, could have been a gigantic compliment—being with me was better than being with Anna Bowdin, a famous movie star. Except that since Jules hated Anna with the molten blaze of a thousand volcanos, it was actually a gigantic insult.
“No,” I said. “You can’t come with me.”
Jules raised her eyebrows. “You really want me to tell my dad you refuse to hang out with me anymore?”
We were still standing in the kitchen. Over Jules’s shoulder I could see our family portrait on the wall, a photograph of me, Otis, Mom, and Dad together on the beach. All of a sudden, the picture came to life. Dad reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a vial of insulin, which he held in front of him in his open palm, like Oliver Twist. Please, sir…
You know how people make wishes on birthday candles and stray eyelashes and shooting stars? My wishes are always for stuff I want, like no line at the movie theater or a pimple to go away or maybe a Category 4 hurricane so school will be closed for two weeks, like it was last year. One day I asked my dad what he wished for.
“I always wish for the same thing,” he said.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“A cure for diabetes.”
UGH.
I tried Jules one last time. “No offense, but I want to do this alone.”
“No offense, but I don’t care.”
Which was how I found myself motoring back to paradise with Jules again. Jules, whose three biggest interests were her hair, her phone, and her hair, had suddenly morphed into Jules Buttersby, investigative reporter.
“How did you know about the treasure?”
I told her the story about the Great-Times-Twelves.
“What makes you think it’s here? I mean, those guys think it’s over there on the other side of the bay and they’re professionals.”
I showed her the sorrowful hound.
“That’s not a dog head. It’s a boot. Like the platform snowshoes Prada did last year except upside down.”
“It’s not a boot. Look at it from the side.”
Jules leaned over the rail and squinted. “Nope. Still a boot.”
“Otis, point.”
Otis stood at attention like a hound scenting prey. “See?” I said. “Look at the angle of his nose.”
Jules shook her head. “I still think we should move over to where the professional searchers are. They’ve got all that equipment and we’ve got a bucket. They must know something we don’t.”
“Well, I think we should stay here,” I said, pronouncing each word slowly and carefully so there could be no possible misunderstanding. “And, besides, we can’t go near those guys. We can’t let them know we’re looking for the treasure or they’ll chase us off.”
Jules thought about that while I hooked the bucket on my arm and tied a bandana over my head to keep the sun off my neck.
“You’re right,” she said. “They can’t know about us. We’ll stay here.”
I slammed down the bucket. “Excuse me? Let’s get something straight. This is my project and my plan. You don’t get to decide where we look. I do.”
Otis came around to stand with his flank pressed against my leg, to show Jules that he and I were a team and we always would be, no matter what. Jules looked kind of awkward and un-Jules-like for a few seconds, which made me feel a little guilty—but just a little.
Then she tossed her hair over her shoulder and grabbed her tote bag. “I brought some supplies.” She emptied the bag onto the deck and pointed at an orange-and-white box in the pile of stuff. “This is the French kind of sunscreen with the microspheres. It’s way better than anything on the market here. That’s my dad’s underwater camera. It’s good down to fifty feet. This is for Otis.” The thing for Otis unfolded into an awning with red and white stripes. Somebody needed to call Coney Island in the 1920s and tell them they found one of their cabanas. “And I brought lunch. Brown rice veggie sushi and turkey wraps. Our chef made them.”
I looked at the pile. “Thanks, but I’ve got sunscreen, we don’t need a camera, and that umbrella thing is basically a billboard announcing to the world, ‘Hey! We’re here! Come check us out while we hunt for the treasure!’” I paused. “But tell Mrs. Alvarado thanks for lunch. It looks really good.”
Jules glared at me. “Fine. Everything I brought is total garbage. So tell me, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, what do you need?”
I threw my arms up. “Nothing! That’s the point. I can do this whole thing by myself. I don’t need you!”
And I don’t want you. I just want Otis and Pop Pop.
Jules opened her mouth and shut it. Then her face morphed from angry to smug. “Yeah, you do.”
“I know, I know. Your dad, the party, the money. You’ve played those cards already, Jules.”
“Not that,” she said, stuffing things back into her tote bag. “Something else. It’s not enough for you to stay out of their way. You need to know what the pros are doing. What they’re finding. You need to throw them off the trail if they get close. And you need me to do it.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
True Fact: Real life smells way worse than it looks in the movies.
“This is a terrible idea,” I said.
“It’s a fantastic idea,” Jules said.
The next morning, Jules and I were at the fuel dock, the place at the Sag Harbor marina where everybody brings their boats to refuel. Everybody including Fitz Fitzgibbons and the Windfall.
I’d left Otis with Nora’s dad, Dr. Joshi, who happens to be the town dentist. Eloise, the hygienist there, is also the dog trainer who trained Otis for us, and Otis likes to hang out with her while she cleans people’s teeth. Eloise says Otis makes an excellent antianxiety dog.
But Jules said that Fitz was a media mogul and therefore a master of spreading fake news. Plus, she was sure he’d made everyone on his boat sign an NDA (nondisclosure agreement—I had to ask).
It’s possible Jules had a point.
Which was why we were now at the gas dock about to break the law. Or, rather, I was about to break the law, since I knew more about boats, while Jules got to be the lookout.
I was boiling in my sweatshirt, which I was wearing to hide the plastic bag that contained the spy camera I was supposed to install on the bridge of the Windfall when nobody was looking. Just to be clear, the bridge is where the captain spends most of their time steering the boat, and therefore where you might expect any important information to be shared. It’s also inside the boat. As in, I had to climb onto the deck and then go inside and install a piece of spy equipment. I had to break and then I had to enter. Well, hopefully not break, but definitely enter and install.
Which was not only the first illegal thing I’d ever done, it was also the most dangerous thing I’d ever done, including the time I licked a flagpole in January on a dare from Douglas, and Nora had to run back into school for a bowl of hot water to douse me with so I wouldn’t rip my tongue off. How was it that I’d known Nora practically my whole life and we’d never broken the law, but I’d known Jules all of four days, and here I was, embarking on a life of crime?
The Windfall was there getting her tank filled, which I estimated would take about two or three hours. But Fitz had gone to the Breakfast Buoy to get an egg sandwich, which I estimated would take about ten or fifteen minutes. The crew was also gone, and I had no idea when they’d be back.
The dock was crowded with every kind of boat—from little dinghies to comfy lobster boats to glitzy motor yachts. Which meant that tons of people were coming and going.