“You just missed him,” the man replied. “He left with the rest of the crew yesterday.”
“What crew?” I asked.
“We were making a movie with director Richard Stein,” he answered. “Low budget, but a great free location. Then out of nowhere, Bela Lugosi showed up. He’d gotten lost but it worked out great for us in the end! Imagine the luck!”
“What are you talking about?” I shouted. “What movie?”
“He liked the island and the script, so he stayed to make the film!!” the man answered. “Took us three weeks to shoot it!”
“You mean to tell me Lugosi was here for three weeks?” I screamed. “And he just left yesterday?”
“Yes, sir,” the man replied. “A great actor! He didn’t even get paid. He agreed to do it on a percentage!”
“Son of a bitch!” I yelled. “Damn! Dammit!”
“You want a lift?” he replied. “The seaplane should be here any minute.”
The volcano on Fire Island was spitting up like a baby on bad milk. The smoke and fire bellowing from the beast grew by the second.
“I have to go back and get my friend!” I yelled.
“There’s no time!” the man yelled. “The plane is coming now! And the islands are about to explode!”
Chapter Fifty-One
I never piloted a sailboat in my life, but I damned sure got across Shark Alley in no time. I even kicked a few of them because they were getting in my way.
Crumby was waiting for me on the other side, along with Daisy and Pete.
“What happened to Winston?” I asked.
“That crazy bastard went up to the mouth of the volcano!” Crumby replied.
A roar from the volcano nearly drowned Crumby’s words out as fire lit the sky above us like hell itself.
“Why would he do that?” I screamed.
“He said he wanted to take photographs!” the captain replied.
“Come on!” I said, gesturing to the elephants. “We have to get the hell out of here!”
We followed the beach down away from Shark Alley as fire and ashes rained down on us like a bad barbecue in Hoboken.
“We have to get in the water!” Crumby yelled.
Daisy and Pete were getting burned, so we finally swam into the Pacific as the smoke covered the sunset. I climbed on Daisy’s back and Crumby did the same with Pete. We were off of the island, but could still feel the heat as molten lava consumed Fire Island.
“Keep swimming, baby!” I told Daisy. “And don’t look back!”
Hell, I didn’t even know elephants could swim. As it turns out, they are proficient at it. It was a damned good thing that they could, otherwise Crumby and I would be dead.
We rode on the elephants backs far enough away to realize we weren’t going to die after all. Finally, Crumby spoke up.
“I’m sorry you didn’t find your friend,” he said.
“Well, I sort of did,” I answered.
“What do you mean, sort of?” he asked.
“There were men on the island who told me he had been there, but left,” I replied. “Apparently he is alive and well.”
“He went back to America?” Crumby asked.
“Yes,” I answered. I didn’t bother to tell him we’d missed Lugosi by just one day.
“That’s good,” Crumby said. “So, mission accomplished.”
“You could say that,” I replied. “And by the way, I will buy you another boat.”
“You don’t have to do that,” he replied.
“But I want to,” I said.
“No,” he said. “I don’t want one. If we survive this, I don’t think I will ever step foot on another boat again.”
It was still dark when Daisy found the rock. I don’t know how long we’d been swimming. It must have been hours because the sun was just starting to come up. There was barely enough room for the two elephants to walk on. But we were on dry land again. They lay down as Crumby and I climbed off of their backs onto the hard surface.
As the sun rose we realized where we were. It was Horn Island. The lake that made up most of the island was in front of us, and the two huge pillars were on the opposite side of the island. There was nothing else there.
It was obvious that Crumby was depressed. He had lost his boat, his crew, and his purpose to carry on. He took his lucky shark bracelet off and bounced it up and down in his hand, staring at it.
“Someone will find us,” I said. “After all, we’d be pretty hard to miss with two big elephants like this.”
Crumby stood up and tossed the bracelet into the lake. Waves rippled from the impact of the bracelet and bounced back towards us as the sun rose. I looked down at the tiny ripples in the water, feeling just awful about what I’d put the captain through. That’s when I saw it.
The two big pillars on the opposite side of the lake were reflected in the water before me. Had we not been there at that precise moment, I probably would have missed it. Looking at the pillars and their reflection in the lake from that vantage point at that second was astounding. It formed the biggest damned H I’d ever seen.
Unable to speak, I tugged on Crumby’s shirt. All I could do was point. The captain stood up and gazed out over the lake. He dove into the water and began swimming to the other side.
I climbed on Daisy’s back and told Pete to follow us. When we caught up with Crumby, he got on Pete’s back as we finished the trek to the other side of the water. On the far side of the lake, smack dab in the middle, was a ledge just a few feet below the surface of the water. The trunk was clearly visible. We couldn’t lift it, but Daisy and Pete did.
The damned thing didn’t even have a lock on it.
“You think this is it?” I asked.
Crumby opened the trunk and gasped in amazement. He put both of his hands over his mouth and began crying.
“Well son of a bitch!” I said. “You were right!”
“My God! My God!” the captain repeated over and over.
“I can’t believe it!” I said.
We held onto the trunk with our dear lives, straddling it on Daisy’s back as she swam back to the other side of the lake.
Once the trunk was safely on dry ground, we set about the task of counting our booty.
“We should both count,” Crumby said. “We need to know how much is here!”
The captain handed me the first gold bar.
“One,” he said. “Now you say it too.”
“Alright,” I answered. “That is one.”
Crumby was shaking and laughing hysterically as he handed me each bar. I knew he would have lost count early on. That’s why he wanted me to count with him.
There were 154 sold gold bars in total. And 123 bags of gold coins.
When we’d counted the last piece, we began putting it all right back in the trunk that it had been stored in for the last forty-something years.
“Congratulations!” I told Crumby. “You did it! You finally did it! What are you going to do with all of this?”
The captain closed the trunk and sat down, leaning his back against it.
“What was the count again?” he asked, smiling as he stared off towards the big H.
“One-hundred and fifty-four bars and one-hundred and twenty three bags,” I answered.
“What do you think that is worth in U.S. dollars?” he asked.
“I have no idea,” I answered. “Close to a million, I would think.”
“That’s a half a million apiece,” the captain said.
“What?” I asked. “What are you saying?”
Crumby looked me in the eye and replied “We are splitting this. Half of this treasure belongs to you!”
“I don’t want it,” I replied. “I don’t deserve it. Hell, I didn’t even believe in it until we found it.”
“I might have said the same thing about your friend Mr. Lugosi,” the captain answered. “Now no argument! We are splitting the gold and that’s an order!”
A few hours later,
a big fat seaplane came down to rescue us. A large merchant ship soon followed, promising to take Daisy and Pete to the Honolulu Zoo.
In the end, we didn’t find Lugosi. But we sure as hell found the treasure.
Epilogue
Shortly after writing the book Looking For Lugosi, Bay called on Bela for a favor.
“I need your help, Bela,” Bay told his old friend. “But you have to come alone, and not tell anyone what we are about to do, ever!”
Lugosi met Bay as instructed at midnight, high atop a hill in Hollywood.
“What is this all about?” Bella asked.
“I need for you to help me dig a grave,” Bay explained.
“Are you serious?” Lugosi asked. “For whom?”
Bay had drug the small trunk all the way up the hill by himself. And the damned thing was pretty heavy.
“It’s not a body,” Bay explained. “It is a treasure, and a curse.”
“You had me come all the way up here to bury a treasure?” Bela asked. “You know I don’t dig ditches anymore! Is this some kind of joke?”
“We need to get rid of this once and for all,” Bay said. “And you’re the only one I can trust.”
“What is inside?” Bela asked.
“The greed of man,” Bay answered. “For thousands of years, it has been the cause of betrayal and murder. We need to bury it forever.”
The two men dug and buried the small chest, covering it with leaves and twigs to make inconspicuous.
As they stumbled down the hill with shovels in hand, Bay turned around and looked up at the giant, illuminated sign behind them. He smiled contently and thanked Lugosi. They had successfully buried the gold under the big H of the famous Hollywood land sign. No one would ever suspect that beneath the bright lights and image lay two million dollars in solid gold.
End Notes
Franklin D. Roosevelt became the first United States President to visit Hawaii. Bay contacted Roosevelt shortly after returning from his journey to brief him on his encounters with the Nazis and Japanese Navy in the Pacific. The President’s visit to Hawaii was publicized as a good will mission but the real reason that Roosevelt went was to see Pearl Harbor for himself. A Nazi or Japanese presence in the area was found to be totally inconclusive. The President concluded that Pearl Harbor was under no immediate threat.
Daisy and Pete found a home at the Honolulu Zoo. They quickly became the most popular residents and lived happily there for the rest of the lives.
Professor Hailey expanded his experiments in growth hormones from sea creatures to humans. His research contributed to producing breakthrough medications to treat adult short stature that are still used to this day.
Hunter Bob opened a museum in Donaphan, Missouri to displayed the stuffed carcasses of animals he had killed over the years. He had squandered the fortune he had made in the farming industry on safaris in Africa and Hawaii. He was shot and killed by his eldest son in 1961 during a dispute over ownership of the museum. His son was not charged in the death. It was ruled to be self-defense. A fake exhibit of Bigfoot was added to the museum shortly after Hunter Bob’s death. It was rumored that it was Bob’s body under the hair and prosthetic effects that made up the Bigfoot display. The exhibit made the museum wildly popular until it closed for good some twenty years later.
Barber, Sharkey and Speck were never found. A formal inquiry into their disappearance was filed in Australia, Hawaii and the United States, but nothing ever came of it.
The volcanic eruption on Elephant Island led to an informal decision agreed upon by trading nations to avoid Hawaii Alley. The small island sunk into the sea, never to be seen again.
Hiwanda was never reported as being missing. She had no certificate of birth and therefore, according to the government, she didn’t exist.
Jonas Crumby became a citizen of the United States and used a portion of his gold to open a seafood restaurant in Los Angeles. The restaurant thrived due primarily to the publicity Crumby had received after arriving in the United States with Bay.
Bay took two weeks off before returning to making movies to write a book titled Looking For Lugosi! For the first time, he did not use Hearst Publishing. The book struggled up the charts but eventually made the New York Times Best Sellers List.
About The Author
Steven M. Thomas attended Webster College and graduated from Lindenwood College with a BA in Journalism. He played drums in various local bands and was in the thick of things during the punk rock/new wave explosion of the late seventies. Steven wrote articles for various publications as well as songs and lyrics. He is the author of the acclaimed autobiography “I WAS A DRUMMER SHE WAS A DANCER” and the follow up called “Drummer Dancer-The Lyrics.” He currently resides in Missouri, where he is raising his son, Justin.
Aloha, Lugosi! The Gretch Bayonne Action Adventure Series Book #4 Page 15