The Wreck

by Landon Beach

  “Morning!” Hutch shouted from the fair-weather console above the wheelhouse. “Grab the bow line as I bring her past you, then hold her in place.”

  The boat was twenty yards from the dock. Hutch slowed Queen, and as the bow was just past the end of the dock, Nate grabbed the dangling line and checked the forward motion of the boat by holding on and then pulling back. Hutch shut off the engine and descended into the stern where he took the stern line and jumped onto the dock. There, he tied the line to a cleat.

  “Okay, Nate, tie her up.”

  Nate secured his line to a cleat and Queen was motionless against the dock.

  “Good breakfast?”

  “Very good,” Nate said. “How was the fishing?”

  “Weren’t biting on a damn thing today. Not a problem, though, because I had my books to keep me company,” Hutch said, walking past Nate toward the stairs to the deck. “Let’s get her loaded up.”

  The men walked to the end of the dock and Hutch went over to the metal door and crouched down to unlock the master lock. He pulled the lock out of the stainless steel eye and lifted the door. The storage room was large with a high ceiling. Hutch entered and flipped on the lights.

  The right wall was lined with half-a-dozen scuba tanks. Two complete sets of dive gear—regulator, wetsuit, booties, dive knife, yellow underwater light, fins, mask, and snorkel—hung on a rack above. Two spear guns were mounted on the wall like rifles over a fireplace. A metal ring loaded with spears hung from a hook. Resting on the floor in front of the scuba tanks was a compressor.

  Hutch saw Nate looking at the compressor. “I keep that out here during the summer and bring it back to Tyee’s shed for the rest of the year. Although, it might stay out here from now on. I got a brand-new winch that hooks up to the stern of Queen for bringing heavy stuff up from the bottom. It takes up almost the whole damn shed.”

  Nate looked up at and saw a metallic winch hanging from the ceiling. “Why do you have two winches?”

  “Oh, that,” Hutch said looking at the winch. “That’s just the little guy I use for deploying the towfish when I’m using my sidescan sonar. Not too strong.”

  On the left wall was more fishing gear than Nate had ever seen. Poles, reels, nets, vests, waders, tackle box upon tackle box, a fly tying station, five gallon buckets, and a few pieces of equipment Nate couldn’t identify.

  “A lot of that gear was just sitting in Lucille’s garage, so she gave it to me,” Hutch said.

  Lying on the concrete floor in front of the fishing gear was an extra anchor, a set of floodlights, an adjustable metal tripod, and a welding torch with a helmet beside it.

  The back wall was a workbench. Its counter was littered with drills, chisels, hammers, screwdrivers, and saws. There was a sink next to the bench with bottles of chemicals and test tubes in a wooden rack. A gas outlet was at the end of the workbench and a burner was connected to it with a rubber hose. An assortment of brooms—straw, nylon, big, and small—hung on the wall above the workbench along with two sledgehammers, shovels, nylon line, cable buoys, pipes, tubes, baskets, straps, and chain. Underneath the bench were coupling pieces, baskets of nails and bolts plus gallons of glue and rubber cement. Sheets of plywood and lumber were stacked in the corner.

  The dinghy was in the middle of the room and rested on a pair of sawhorses, which Hutch had cut to conform to the keel so that they held the boat snug.

  Hutch ran his hand along the dinghy’s hull and then looked at it. “She’s drier than a celebrity in rehab,” he said. “Let’s get her loaded first.”

  29

  It was near noon and Queen lay at anchor a few hundred yards out from the cave’s opening. Hutch met him near the bow and they untied the dinghy and brought it to the stern. The sea was flat and the sky was cloudless. Nate could see the bottom thirty feet underneath the boat. Hutch went below and came back out dressed in an all black wetsuit. He was holding another one and gave it to Nate.

  “If we were doing a short dive out here today,” he said, “I’d say that we wouldn’t need the suits. But the water in the cave will be colder and who knows how long we’ll be in it.”

  Nate took the wetsuit and put it on. Both men strapped their dive knives to their calves and put their neoprene booties on.

  “Let’s lower her down in the water and then I’ll hop aboard and you can hand me the gear,” said Hutch.

  Together, they lifted the dinghy and placed it in the water behind the stern. It was twelve feet long and had a seven horsepower outboard motor. Hutch climbed into the craft and tied off the bow and stern to cleats on Queen’s transom. Nate started to pass down gear: two tanks, two underwater lights, two weight belts, two sets of mask, fins, and snorkel, two shovels, a sledgehammer, two floodlights, a small anchor, and the adjustable tripod to put the floodlights on. When Hutch had everything positioned, he waved Nate into the boat.

  Nate cast both lines off and the dinghy floated a few feet aft of the boat. Hutch pulled the ripcord on the motor. The smell of gas hit the air and the motor began to chug. Hutch twisted the throttle on the handle, and they headed toward the cave opening.

  ✽✽✽

  The cabin cruiser’s engine turned off, and the boat drifted fifty yards off the smaller of the two Sanisstey Islands. Two men came up from below. Each threaded his dive knife’s sheath through the belt in his canvas swim shorts. The helmsman radioed that they had reached their destination and then sat at the wheel and waited as each of the divers put on flippers and a mask. When they finished, they sat on the gunwale. The helmsman handed the taller of the two a waterproof bag that had the men’s shoes, socks, and a pair of binoculars for each.

  “Pick us up in two hours,” the taller man said.

  The helmsman nodded and the two men entered the water. Once they were clear of the stern, the helmsman started the engine and sped off.

  ✽✽✽

  At the cave entrance, Hutch turned off the motor and the dinghy coasted into the cave. He took out a paddle and steered the boat to one side.

  “Nate, hold us in place.”

  Nate grabbed the wall of the cave and the boat came to a stop. Hutch took the tripod out. On the end of each leg was a clamp. He adjusted the legs and clamped one to the aft of the three benches where he had been sitting to operate the motor and clamped the other two on opposite rails. Then, he screwed in a floodlight on top of the tripod and fiddled with it until it was focused on the area of cave in front of the bow. He handed the second floodlight, a handheld version with a pistol grip, to Nate.

  “The mounted light is good for a few hours, so use the handheld sparingly,” said Hutch. “We’ll adjust the mounted one as necessary when we get to the end and check out the dirt pile I found.”

  Nate nodded in agreement. They had discussed the plan on their way in. Hutch would dive and trace the bottom while Nate stayed on board and paddled into the cave, covering both areas in one sweep. If Hutch found anything, he would come up and they would anchor the boat and both dive.

  Hutch strapped on a tank and put on his weight belt and fins. He spit into his mask’s faceplate and rubbed the warm saliva all around. Then, he submerged it in the cool water and brought it back out, shaking it before putting it on.

  Nate held the boat steady as Hutch eased his way over the side and then treaded water while gripping the boat’s rail.

  “I’ll have a look around first and then we’ll start,” Hutch said.

  Nate handed him an underwater light and Hutch slipped below the surface.

  The light swung in a circle just beneath the water and then got smaller as Hutch descended. The smaller light circled once more, then got larger as it came near the surface. Hutch’s head appeared a few feet away from the boat and he pulled the regulator out of his mouth.

  “Twenty-two feet deep here. Mostly sand and rock on the bottom,” said Hutch. “I’ll tap on the hull three times if I want you to stop, otherwise let’s just take it nice and easy.”

  “What if I se
e something?” Nate said.

  “Just knock on the hull and I’ll come up to see what’s cookin’.”

  Hutch put the regulator back in his mouth and submerged. At the bottom, the light focused forward and Nate pushed away from the rock and began to paddle. He would go two or three strokes and then turn on the handheld floodlight for a few seconds, focusing the beam on the ceiling or at places where the mounted light didn’t reach. He looked over the side and saw Hutch’s light creeping along the bottom.

  The cave’s interior was slimy to a few feet above the current water level. The ceiling was a good twenty feet above the water. On the ninth or tenth cycle of paddle and sweep, they reached the boat lift. Nate tapped on the hull and Hutch was soon at the surface.

  “We’re below the lift,” Nate said.

  “Hold us steady for a minute,” said Hutch. “Give me that handheld light.”

  Nate grabbed the side of the cave again and handed Hutch the light. Hutch turned it on and aimed the beam up the shaft at the lift bars part way down where he had swung out and dropped from. Then, he moved the light up the face of the cliff; there was graffiti all over the wall.

  “Looks like some little shits used to have their friends lower them in the boat to spray-paint,” Hutch said.

  Hutch continued upward, past ‘Jamie was here 1962’ and ‘John Olsen is a whore’ until he reached the boathouse opening. He stopped the beam and squinted.

  “What do you see?” Nate said.

  Hutch swept the beam to the right and then back again.

  “Thought I saw a person’s shadow, but I guess not.”

  He swept the beam all around the opening once more and then directed it straight ahead. “Looks like the ceiling slants down. Watch the tripod,” he said.

  Hutch turned the floodlight off and lifted it for Nate to grab, but Nate was looking up into the opening.

  “What you lookin’ at?”

  Nate eyed him. “Do you think anyone knows we’re out here?”

  “Who would care?” Hutch said.

  “I don’t know,” Nate shrugged, “just wondering.”

  “Tyee and Lucille are the only ones on my end. Well, and probably Mickey. I’m sure Tyee told him, but he’s not going to say anything. Hell, we haven’t even found anything yet,” Hutch said, and then looked back up at the opening. “Who have you told?”

  “My wife. And a couple we had over for dinner a few nights ago,” Nate said.

  “Well then there’s nothin’ to worry about. Is there?”

  His words echoed into the cave.

  Hutch pulled his mask back over his face and flipped on his underwater light. “Let’s get started again, shall we?”

  The cave’s ceiling lowered as they moved further in, and the underwater light appeared larger as the water became shallower. The cave started to bend to the right, and then the floodlight illuminated a wall of solid rock ahead. Nate tapped on the hull and Hutch appeared.

  “What is it?” Hutch said.

  Nate had the hand light trained on the wall a few boat lengths ahead of them and moved it down toward the water. There was no more than three feet of clearance, maybe less.

  “We’ll have to take down the tripod,” said Hutch. “It was pitch black when I came through here. I had no idea that it dropped this low. Near the plateau though, it opens up. How high, I have no idea.”

  Hutch held the boat against the side of the cave while Nate unclamped the tripod and laid down flat on the boat with the handheld floodlight aimed forward.

  “I’m ready,” Nate said.

  Hutch moved to the stern and kicked. The boat slid under the lowered ceiling and the sides of the cave narrowed to a few feet on either side of the boat. In a minute they were through and the ceiling began to slope up.

  After resetting the tripod, Hutch said, “Hold us here. I’ll dive and cover the area we missed.”

  Nate turned his body around and sat on the middle bench.

  “Let me turn off the lights and get my eyes used to the dark before you go under, then I can watch you,” Nate said as he steadied the boat in place.

  “Okay,” Hutch said, and Nate turned off the floodlights.

  It took about thirty seconds for his eyes to adjust.

  “All right, Hutch,” he said.

  He heard Hutch take a breath from his regulator and then the sound of bubbles as Hutch dove. Nate followed the light, but soon lost it as Hutch got into the tunnel portion. If Hutch had a problem, got snagged on the bottom or something, Nate would have no way of knowing. He could see nothing now, so he waited. The only sound was the echo of each breath he took.

  ✽✽✽

  The sides of the cave narrowed even more underwater and there was barely enough room to navigate. Hutch glided and moved his light from side to side. The floor of the tunnel was almost all rocks. He crouched on the bottom and then pushed off, reaching his hand upwards until he felt air, and then sank back down. He guessed he was in around ten feet of water. The bottom began to widen and he was out of the tunnel. He turned around and felt a surge of water behind him. He paid no attention to it, thinking his motion had caused the efflux. He started kicking back into the tunnel and toward Nate.

  30

  Nate saw the light appear and moments later Hutch was next to the boat.

  “Nothing back there,” Hutch said. “The plateau shouldn’t be too far away.”

  Hutch went back under, and Nate pushed the boat out from the wall and began to paddle. The cave widened, and when he energized the handheld floodlight, he noticed that the ceiling had risen to at least twenty feet above the water. He turned off his floodlight and watched as the underwater light’s beam moved from side to side.

  He paddled three strokes, and the mounted floodlight’s range reached the rock plateau Hutch had told him about. The cave narrowed, and he felt like he was in an auditorium moving toward a raised stage. He aimed the handheld at the plateau and followed it up. From this distance, there appeared to be a mass of dirt that rose from the back of the plateau. The ceiling curved down but it was difficult to discern where it went behind the pile. He turned off the light and paddled a few more strokes. They must be getting near the point where Hutch had told him the water depth became shallow. He could now see the back of the cave on both sides of the pile with the handheld light and estimated that in half a dozen strokes the boat would be there. Nate looked over the side but didn’t see Hutch’s underwater light. He turned around to see if Hutch was behind the boat. He wasn’t. He paddled once more and the light reappeared up ahead. Nate moved the boat over Hutch and held on to the side of the cave. The light on the bottom wasn’t moving. Nate knocked on the hull a few times. The light stayed fixed on the bottom. Nate knocked harder. A few seconds later, the light pulled back and came to the surface.

  “We’re almost to the plateau,” Nate said, pointing at the rise ahead.

  “Found somethin’,” Hutch said.

  “What?”

  “I think it’s a small boat, or used to be one. It’s half buried and smashed up by a couple of boulders. Remember when I said my feet hit something close to the plateau the first time?”

  Nate nodded.

  “I think it was this boat. She appears to be split near her hind quarter with the front two thirds almost sticking straight up. There’s a boulder on the other side that she’s propped up against. I went past her and all the way to the back wall. The bottom slopes up in another boat length or two. On the slope I found an oar.”

  “Where do you think this boat came from?” Nate said.

  “Don’t know. She’s been here awhile though,” Hutch said.

  “Do you want to look at it further or head to the plateau?”

  “We can come back to it, let’s go to the plateau.”

  Hutch stayed on the surface and when he could feel the bottom he took off his fins and walked the boat up the rest of the way.

  Nate grabbed Hutch’s tank and placed it in the boat. The plateau was about tw
o feet above the water’s surface and Hutch climbed up until he was on top. Nate adjusted the mounted floodlight to illuminate the plateau.

  “It’s closer quarters up here than I thought,” Hutch said. “It’s only about eight feet wide. The ceiling above me is nine or ten feet but we’ll be hitting our heads back where the dirt pile seems to come out of the wall.”

  “Room enough for two up there?” Nate said.

  “Should be,” Hutch said. “Throw me that other floodlight.”

  Nate did and Hutch approached the dirt pile. On the right of the pile, about knee high, he saw rock showing amidst the dirt. He placed his foot on the rock, pushing on it, but the rock went nowhere. He bent down and followed the surface into the dirt on all sides until he was convinced that it was a large boulder. He stood back up and shined the floodlight at the top of the pile where it was flush with the ceiling.

  “We’ve got a cave-in, Nate,” said Hutch. “It’s the only explanation that makes any sense. There’s a boulder on the right side of the pile and I’m sure there’s more.”

  “What’s your plan?”

  “Let’s anchor the dinghy out away from the plateau. Then, we’ll come up here with the shovels and see what we can dig out.”

  Twenty minutes later, the dinghy was anchored ten yards away from the plateau and Hutch and Nate had uncovered three boulders. Together they had rolled them to the edge of the plateau and pushed them into the water. Shovelful after shovelful were emptied into the water. Finally, Hutch dug his shovel in and felt it hit something that was not rock. He motioned for Nate to come over and Nate dug out the area around Hutch’s shovel with his hands until the object was clear. Hutch’s spade had hit a piece of wood.

  “What in the hell is that doing back here?” Nate said.

  Hutch pulled his shovel from the wood and together they unearthed what appeared to be a beam. They put down their shovels and pulled the beam out. It was surprisingly light, and no sooner had they raised it off the ground when a three foot section broke off the end. They set the rotted log down and Hutch examined it.