Night Diver: A Novel (36 page)

I’ll be making an appointment with the surgeon just as soon as I get ashore,
he told himself.

Assuming he got ashore. But worrying about that wouldn’t help and could damage his chances, so he stopped thinking about anything but survival.

He peeled down his clumsy dive gloves and checked that his dive knife was still in place. After releasing the tab that kept the knife secure in its sheath, he tried to decide on the best way to get aboard. Not trusting his thigh to support him at the moment—and hoping to conceal the dive knife strapped to his calf—he crawled aboard on his hands and knees. Rain peppered across the deck, followed by a spray of salt water from an unusually large swell. The motion of the boat was sluggish, despite the fact that wind, current, and tide were working together instead of smacking the hull around like dice in a cup.

“Stand up and get to the main cabin,” Farnsworth said. The direction of his voice told Holden that the other man had climbed the stairs to the main deck. “If you can’t, I’ll—”

“Shoot me,” Holden said wearily.

“Actually, I’ll shoot the bint. You aren’t worth wasting a bullet on.”

You just keep believing that, you sneering sod,
Holden thought.

Making unnecessary work of it, he pulled himself onto his feet and slowly followed Kate and her grandfather up the stairs.

The wind threw rain like grapeshot across the open deck. Despite that, Kate was sweating. She blamed it on the neoprene covering her, but knew Farnsworth’s gun was the real cause. She peeled off her heavy gloves, noting that Grandpa already had dropped his.

Farnsworth waited just inside the main cabin, watching them as they balanced against the sway of the boat and entered the cabin. He kept most of his attention on Holden, despite the obvious pain in his expression.

“Larry!” Kate said.

Without waiting for permission, she rushed to where her brother lay on the long couch that was bolted to one side of the main cabin. He was pale, obviously exhausted, and having trouble focusing. He was also soaked from shoes to dripping hair.

And tied hand and foot to the legs of the sofa.

“Don’t worry,” her brother said, slurring words. “Breathing okay. Just tired. Bastard made me . . . pull lift nets . . .”

“I’ll get a blanket.”

“You will back away from your brother now.” Farnsworth’s voice was almost eerie in its lack of emotion.

“Do it, Kate,” Holden said. “He’s looking for an excuse to shoot. Holding a pistol does that to some people.”

“Temptation is a wicked bitch,” Farnsworth said, glaring at Larry. “So shut it and keep it shut. I’ve heard more than enough of your whining.”

Larry slumped against his ties and went back to his semiconscious state.

Rain and spray spit through open portholes each time the wind shifted. People in regular clothing would have been cool, but everyone except Larry was wearing neoprene. The chilly blasts from the portholes were refreshing.

Frowning, worried, Kate backed away from her brother through the sporadic spray coming in from various openings. Without warning the ship pitched and she went backward against the main cabin’s long table. When she put her hands behind her to brace herself, she felt the unmistakable weight and smoothness of gold against her fingers. She turned, saw what was heaped carelessly on the wood, and stood frozen in astonishment.

“Pretty, isn’t it?” Farnsworth said.

“Pretty?” she said. “It’s . . . impossible.”

The gold looked alive, sliding and shifting with the motion of the boat, barely held in check by the half-inch rail that rimmed the table. Chains, coins, bracelets, earrings, breastplates, arm cuffs, rings, necklaces, figurines—every shape of gold imaginable, supple, gleaming, mesmerizing, heavy with the weight of time and the nature of the metal itself. Gems shimmered in bolts of pure color from some of the pieces. Other pieces were valuable for the pure workmanship of the gold itself.

As though from a distance, she heard Farnsworth order Grandpa and Holden to stand near Larry. She tried to shake off the spell of the past and beauty and focus on the dangerous present, yet the lure of history was too compelling. She could do nothing about Farnsworth and his modern pistol, but she could absorb the presence of the kind of treasure that had driven men for millennia, the shining reason for so many deaths and dreams revolving around the wealth of the New World.

“Go ahead, touch it,” Farnsworth said, amusement and vindication in his voice. “More gold than most people ever see in a lifetime.”

“The history,” she said. “It’s staggering. My mother collected centuries-old drawings of jewelry like this.”

She touched a crown that sat atop a pile of gold chain instead of resting on a regal skull. The crown was made with long, almost delicate tendrils of gold that curled up at the coronet points like flame frozen in metal. Standing at each point was a richly colored cabochon emerald . . . dark tears of long-dead ambitions still glowing with rich promises. As metal and gems, the crown had considerable monetary value. As history it was priceless.

Holden breathed more easily with each passing second as pain began to loosen its paralyzing grip on his leg. The occasional spray of water from the portholes felt good against his sweaty face.

Keep everyone distracted for a bit longer,
he silently urged Kate.
I’m getting stronger by the second.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” Farnsworth said, eyes wide as gold coins while he stared, resting the gun against his thigh. “That filigreed piece will have buyers salivating.”

She followed the direction of his eyes. The jewelry he was looking at was large enough to be a breastplate, meant to ride low over a lady’s breasts. Emeralds, sapphires, and rubies bloomed like a miniature garden kissed by dewdrops of diamond.

“The goldwork is incredibly fine,” Kate said. “It looks very like the drawing my mother used to dream about. It was commissioned by an old Spanish lord for his spoiled young wife. She wanted to outshine even the queen at the Mid-May ball held in Seville in 1685. No goldsmith in all of Spain could make the young bride’s design, so it was sent to Venice. The rumor was that making the piece nearly beggared her husband.”

The jewelry ran like a liquid dream over Kate’s fingers, untouched by the black corruption of human vanity and lust and envy.

“More likely,” she said, “the lord was punished by the queen when a pretty young upstart wore jewels that put royalty in the shade. Court courtesy demanded that the bride make a gift of the necklace to the queen. That didn’t happen. Legend has it that the lord and his young bride were allowed to keep the necklace, but they were banished to the New World. There is no record that their ship ever arrived. Yet here the necklace is, side by side with a solid gold mask of an Inca god or king.”

Rain came in a whispering roar over the deck as the ship rose up and up to meet a swell, then slid slowly down the back of the invisible force. The
Golden Bough
seemed a bit slow in responding. Grandpa frowned and looked at the wood beneath his feet as though he could see through down to the bilge.

“Pity I have to leave,” Malcolm said. “My understanding is that there is much more down there, but I don’t have the time to dive for it. I should have left days ago, but the nights . . . the nights were so bloody lucrative. They more than repaid my patience. Just as I’ll repay your cooperation. Most of this is yours.”

“What?” Kate said, shocked.

“I’ll take some, but not all,” he said, gesturing to the table. “I’m a runner, not a weight lifter.”

Wind gusted from an unexpected quarter, shoving the ship like a toy against the pull of the anchor until everyone had to brace themselves as the deck tipped hard to port. Farnsworth lurched into the galley counter and went to his knees in a thin puddle of salt spray and rain. His knuckles turned white around the pistol.

Holden lunged for the gun even though stars flared at the edges of his vision as he demanded strength that his thigh didn’t have. Farnsworth brought the weapon up just in time to give Holden a good look at the black mouth of the barrel. The weapon wasn’t wet enough to affect anything that mattered.

“Get back,” Farnsworth snarled above the whine of wind across the open portholes.

Silently raging at missing his chance, Holden stepped backward until his leg gave way and he went to the deck.

“Sucks to be weak, doesn’t it?” Farnsworth said, relishing the American slang. “All those brute muscles useless against a skinny nerd holding a gun.”

Pain bit into Holden, but it wasn’t as great as his anger at not taking the other man down.

There will be another chance,
Holden promised himself grimly.
He’s too busy swaggering not to screw up. A professional would have shot us in the water and taken off with whatever treasure he could carry.

Fortunately, Farnsworth was an amateur at the killing game.

“Crawl over and sit in one of the swivel chairs,” Farnsworth said, gesturing to the table heaped with gold. “You too, Grandpa. Sit so that you two are back to back. Kate, stand by Larry.”

Holden could have walked but saw no reason to waste the effort. He crawled to one of the swivel chairs and pulled himself into it. Grandpa moved carefully, his legs wide to help him balance on the shifting deck.

“Swivel the chairs so that you’re facing away from each other,” Farnsworth said. “Kate, take the line I hung on the hook by the door and bring it here. Be very careful. I would hate to shoot you or your brother because you tripped and fell in my direction.”

She glanced at Holden from the corner of her eye. He was watching Farnsworth with predatory intensity.

Barely audible beneath the sound of the generator and the storm, the automatic bilge pumps started. In the wheelhouse, an alarm kicked in. The bilge pumps choked and died.

“Let me up or this ship will sink under our feet!” Grandpa said fiercely.

S
HUT IT, OLD
man. You’ll have plenty of time if Cameron’s half as clever as he thinks he is,” Malcolm said carelessly. “I am certain the brawny hero is planning madly. Put your arms behind your back, hero. You, too, Grandpa.”

Holden turned his wrists and stacked them to make extra room.

“Chop-chop, Kate. Tie them together.”

The sound of the bilge pump cutting in and out and the feel of the ship itself was more frightening than Farnsworth and his tiresome weapon. Kate went to work quickly, ignoring the fact that both men leaned slightly away from the back of his chair. In addition, Holden took a deep, silent breath and held it while she coiled orange safety line around chairs and men.

She glanced down at Holden’s leg, where a knife waited in its sheath. When she looked up, he shook his head very slightly.

“Tighter,” Farnsworth said, then staggered when water broke over the ship’s bow and ran in a green-white torrent over the main deck. “Sod it. Just get the job done.”

Quickly she tied a very impressive-looking knot on her grandfather’s chest.

“I taught you too well, Kitty,” he said. “That’s as neat a viceroy knot as I’ve ever seen.”

“I always loved the pattern,” she said.

Holden thought quickly back to his days of learning knots and almost smiled despite the pain. One sharp pull and the fancy knot would unravel—as soon as they found a way to get enough slack to work someone’s hand free to reach the knot. Not as easy as it sounded, but at least a fighting chance.

“Isn’t that sweet,” Farnsworth said. “Now back off, bint.” He gave her a shove.

“Real brave with a girl, aren’t you?” Grandpa said. “Gutter slime.”

“I can buy this ship a thousand times over. What makes you think I care what a pissant mick like you thinks?”

“All mouth and no trousers,” Grandpa said. “Untie me and say that.”

With a mean smile Farnsworth slapped the old man hard.

Kate made a shocked sound. She grabbed the first piece of treasure that caught her eye.

Without pausing, Farnsworth backhanded Holden, raking a line of red across his cheekbone with the pistol.

“I’ve been wanting to do that since you came aboard,” Farnsworth said, “you with your family connections and medals and London accent. I came up the hard way, getting my arse kicked by my old man and learning to imitate my ‘betters.’ Guess who is better now?” Taking his time, relishing the moment, he drew back his gun hand to deliver another brutal blow.

Holden had let himself go with the first hit, lessening its force. But a few more like it and he would have the wits of a scrambled egg.

“Stop it!” she yelled, holding her hand high.

Her fingers were clenched around a priceless, palm-size golden frog that was set with cabochon emeralds. The jewels had an uncanny resemblance to the real animal’s skin. Its two round ruby eyes glinted, washed by spray from the nearby porthole.

Farnsworth looked up just before the second blow descended. “Are you mental?”

She measured the heft of the jeweled creature in her hand. It felt like pure wealth, like the heady ability to create a bit of jeweled whimsy from the wealth of kings. It felt like power.