"Well, you got to fix it somehow, what with you and the girl child takin' all them baths," Jemimah goes on. "And I can't make biscuits and soups and such without water." She has a basket of potatoes next to her on the deck and reaches down for one and begins to peel it.
"I know, Jemimah," I say, then sigh, as I turn to go down into my cabin. "Don't worry, we'll fix it."
When I get there, I doff my clothes and reach for my swimming suit, which had been hung up to dry from yesterday's diving, and climb into the bottom part.
The suit has worked out beautifully. When first I got it wet, it shrank up most admirably, molding itself to my form perfectly and I was no more bothered with loose cloth swirling about me underwater. Plus, it doesn't go all transparent when wet like my shirt and drawers did, so I don't have to be constantly pulling it away from myself. The only thing the bottom of the suit does do that's a little annoying is ride up over my butt cheeks a bit, but, again, who cares about that?
The first time I appeared on deck in it, the day after the encounter with that horrid eel, I heard some sharp intakes of breath from certain members of my crew, but they all got over it right quick. After all, it's just me in all my scrawniness, so who could possibly care? Well, Higgins does, for one, as he is right there with a towel to wrap around me every time I step back on the deck after a day's diving. Davy just laughed and said, "And what would Jaimy say about his blushing bride-to-be if he saw her prancin' about like that?" And I shot back, "Just you mind your work, Seaman Jones, and don't worry about what your betters are thinkin'. Remember, Davy, who's the Captain of this here barky."
I'm slipping the straps of my suit top over my shoulders as I hear a light knock on the door—two raps, a pause, then another two.
"Come in, Higgins, and do me up." In a moment I feel his hands at my shoulder blades, fastening the buttons. There, all nice and snug now.
Higgins goes to the drawer where I keep my pistols, takes them out, and commences loading them.
"I don't think I'll need those today. The place looks to be deserted." I reach into my seabag and pull out a red bandanna, which I tie around my neck to keep off the sun.
"Still, Miss, there's no sense in taking chances." Unless we are in some nice, safe town, Higgins doesn't like to let me out of his sight without my being armed.
I roll up the short legs of the suit as far as they will go and then put my right foot up on my chair. Taking my shiv in its sheath from the desktop, I strap it around my right calf—I had altered the sheath's harness to fit there where it is out of the way yet still very convenient to my hand when needed underwater—and then stand with my fists on my hips, grin, and say, "So, Higgins, how do I look?"
"Perfectly barbarous." He sighs, with one of his deep whatever-is-to-be-done-with-her sighs. "However, let's get these on you to complete the travesty."
He straps on my pistols and I am out the hatch, over the deck, and into the Star.
"All right, lads, let's go."
It takes us about a half hour to get to the western tip of the key, then we start to work our way eastward close to shore, peering into the wall of mangroves for any sign of an opening. The bottom, about four feet down, is mostly sandy with occasional large patches of waving sea grass. I'm standing at the mast, Davy's in the bow, Tink's tending the sail, while Daniel's on the tiller. I wanted to give Daniel some experience in small-boat handling, plus let him show off to Joan-nie what a fine young sailor lad he is. She is seated beside him, feigning disinterest in his manly display.
The Doctor has a long glass with him and scans the treetops for any species of bird he might not yet have seen and recorded. We see a flock of pink things flying overhead, which gets him most agitated. "Roseate spoonbills! If I could just get one to have stuffed and taken back to London! Jones, shoot one!"
Davy lifts the rifle and looks to me and I shake my head and say, "Nay, Doctor, if it please you, they are much too high. And we wouldn't want to alert any wild savages that might be lurking about to our presence, now would we?" Davy lowers the rifle. Dr. Sebastian may be in charge of the expedition, but I run the ship. "There will be other opportunities, Doctor, I assure you."
There was actually a good chance Davy might have brought down one of the birds. The old smooth-bore muskets of twenty years ago have no place on my ship. No, now we have fine rifles with grooved barrels to give the bullets a spin on their way to the target, making them much more deadly accurate. Plus, these rifles use percussion caps instead of flintlocks. They cost Faber Shipping a bundle, but, hey, while the Nancy B. Alsop may be small compared to a man-o'-war, all her gear is the very finest. On the way down from Boston, I had the crew practice with the weapons, blasting countless bottles off the fantail, and Davy and Tink in particular have grown into superior marksmen. Looking at the rifle in Davy's hands, I reflect that science marches ever onward and advances us in many, many ways—the ways of war and killing not being the least of them.
"Whole bunch of the same damn thing," grumbles Davy as we glide along the featureless shore. We are about a mile from the western tip now and have seen nothing. Everybody on the Nancy B. has known for a long time that what we are seeking is not just scientific specimens but rather Spanish gold, and they are growing impatient.
"Hey. Wait a minute."
This from Joannie, who, having grown bored by the never-ending mangroves, has taken to leaning over the side, rump in the air, looking at the bottom scudding by.
"There's a bunch of shells or something down there."
"Bring her about, Daniel," I order, so he puts the tiller over and we circle around the spot. Sure enough, there seems to be a pile of discarded shells leading from the shore into the deeper water.
"Hmmm," says the Doctor, peering down. "It could be what's called a midden, a native shell mound."
I immediately look to the shore. Could that be a slight opening there? Would that be where the Indians came through to launch their boats and dump their shells?
"Tink. Strike the sail." The sail comes down. "Everyone grab an oar and let's try to shove her through right there." There are four oars onboard and Davy and Tink sling their rifles over their shoulders and each grabs one. I take one, too, as does Dr. Sebastian, and we point the Star's nose to the opening and strain to pole her through. Joannie jumps up forward to push the branches aside as we slide in.
Yes. We are in. There is a low body of dark water on the other side of the mangroves, and then the land comes up to a low plain. We pull the boat up and look about. It is a desert area, with a large lagoon in the middle of it.
"Daniel. Joannie. Take your buckets and fill them up, like Jemimah told you, while we explore."
The kids groan and wade in the water and begin pulling the plentiful oysters off the exposed mangrove roots and dropping them into the pails. They're called coon oysters because, I suppose, the local raccoons like them as much as we do. Davy and Tink and I go looking around, while the Doctor noses about in the brush. I go to the lagoon and dip my hand down into the water and bring it up to taste it. Then I quickly spit it out again. Salt. No fresh water here, that's for sure.
Davy and Tink unshoulder their rifles, looking, no doubt, for some poor innocent creature to shoot—boys, I swear—while I look about the land close to the shore.
Hmmmm ... Close to the path we came in on is a curiously flattened-out spot. It is rectangular and seems to have some vestiges of postholes. I could be wrong—trees could have fallen in that particular pattern naturally, but somehow I don't think so. I walk to the center of the place and fall to my knees and begin to dig in the soft sand. I don't have to dig long before my hand hits a hard thing, and I pull it up and look at it. It is a bone and has teeth on it and it seems to be a jawbone of some sort.
"Doctor," I call. "Could you come here a second?"
He ceases his relentless pursuit of the local insect population and comes over near me. Taking the jawbone from my hand, he weighs it and remarks, "Probably the jaw of one of those tiny deer we spotted on these keys." He looks about him. "This could be a homestead. That might have been a fire pit right there." I look over and see a depression in the ground that I had not noticed before.
"I believe you are right, Doctor. This could have been a large thatched hut on a cleared shore back in 1733. Just what Carlos Juarez could have seen as the Santa Magdalena was going down."
"Could very well be, Miss," he says, plainly anxious to get back to his scientific explorations.
"Well, I am going to mark this spot," I say, and wade back through the opening we had come through. Taking the red scarf from my neck, I tie it to a branch where it should be plainly visible from the Nancy B. and then I head back to the interior.
"Doctor! Doctor! Come look at this!" I hear both Joan-nie and Daniel call out. They are close to the edge of the quiet lagoon, pointing down. Dr. Sebastian goes over to see what they are on about, and so do I.
There, covering the shore, are hundreds of tiny crabs, each holding up an outsized claw to fend off intruders. I reach down and scoop one up and look at the brightly colored little beast in my palm. While it is only about a half inch across and I could easily crush it by simply closing my fist, it holds its claw up in my face, challenging me to do it.
"Ah," says Dr. Sebastian, "they are called fiddler crabs, because they look like they are fiddling when they brandish their claws. Uca pugnax." He scoops up a few unlucky ones, which I will draw and which will ultimately take a dip in pure alcohol. I put my own feisty warrior back on the ground, allowing him to scurry back to his hole. Courage is not always a function of size.
Daniel and Joannie have made a game of herding the swarm of fiddler crabs as they course back and forth across the mucky sand next to the lagoon.
"Head 'em off, Danny!" shouts Joannie. "They're gonna ... they're gonna...Oh my God?"
I jerk my head around and see that a monstrous form has surged out of the quiet lagoon and is running straight for the kids.
"Run!" I shriek. "It's a gator! Run!"
They try to run, but the footing is bad, and the gator rushes on, bellowing. Joannie slips in the loose sand and falls down. The gator keeps coming on, so Danny grabs Joannie by her arm and tries to haul her forward, but the gator is too fast. It keeps rushing toward them, and its jaws open and then clamp down on Joannie's middle. The gator gives her a violent shake, and her eyes, which had been wild with fear, now roll back in her head, and she falls limp in the monster's jaws.
The alligator then turns to drag his prey into the water.
Daniel takes his knife from his side and leaps on the gator's back and begins stabbing at it, but I know it ain't doin' no good. The hide is just too thick. Oh God, Joannie, no!
I pound over, pulling out my pistols as I go. "Davy! Tink! To me! To me!" I point the barrel of the gun in my right hand point-blank at the creature's forehead and fire.
It doesn't even flinch.
"Boys! Fire just behind its front leg!" Maybe we can find its heart! Oh God, please!
Tink and Davy fire and two holes appear in the gator's side, but still it moves inexorably onward. In a few feet it'll be in the water and Joannie will be lost forever.